BZZZZERT!

I woke up, expecting to deal with an asshole or two arguing assholes at once, put on my white suit (yay, I get a new, very slightly larger one tomorrow), and went down to the viewscreen irritably, Billy and Sarah coming out to watch. I got an Enforcer instead.

"A normal is approaching the island from the southeast, sending out uncoded messages on normal-band radio requesting permission to land. Approaching normal has been identified as The Anarch." What?! He's surrendering, or what?! And how the hell does he know where my island is?!

"Do not terminate him.", I commanded the Enforcer, to Billy and Sarah's surprise. "Let him land." I was going to watch him come, of course commanding my strongest weapons to prepare themselves and come with me. We walked out, around the island, to the beach where his boat approached.

Of all the insane things he could do, he's coming here in a speedboat, nearly unarmed (in comparison to the locals), and very, very vulnerable. He isn't shooting at anything here. He isn't moving to attack, he's just coming... it's like he's putting himself at my fucking mercy! What the fuck?! Some dude starts directly attacking Illuminati for more than two years and then he comes in here, at my mercy.. and he still looks like an Enforcer, too. Sitting in the bushes with power binoculars, I could see his facial features from here- grim, and mission-like. Maybe he is planning to destroy us after all... not like I can't just nuke his ass first. The Enforcers, of course, would have already nuked his ass if I hadn't ordered them not to. My servants were at my side, similarly wondering what the hell he's thinking.

"I guess sheeple are dumb till the end.", muttered Sarah. "Or maybe he thinks he can do something."

"I don't get how he can be this stupid, especially now.", said Billy in a puzzled voice. "He's been uncaught by the world controllers- and now he just decides to come over here?! That boat might be loaded with explosives, maybe even a nuke, Howie. Maybe he just plans to take himself out and us too."

"Well.. that's a risk I'm going to take. I have to ask him why, and I have to ask him how he knows...", I uttered determinedly. I had to know. I just had to. The figure came closer and steadily closer. I wasn't going to bother with Enforcers here. I was determined to handle this fucker myself. We went down to the beach and stood at the point he would land, heavy weapons at the ready. "Stop the boat or you die!", I called out in one of my most authoritarian voices, in case the boat was a bomb. The boat stopped as fast as it possibly could. "Now swim to shore." As soon as I said it, the Anarch immediately jumped out of the boat and swam at a steady pace until he was climbing out of the water, standing in the waves.

Then even I could not have predicted what would happen next.

"Master Howard!", he shouted, in a voice that reminded me of a lost child finding its mother. "Master Howard.. I thought you were.."

"Okay, first off, how the fuck did you know who I am?!", I said in a semi-panicked voice, holding my Micro with a steady hand, the power setting at full blast. In a hundredth of a second, this guy's head could be severed from his body- and the classification of solid things, for that matter. He could have gotten the information from the Illuminatus being attacked.. but we severed those connections before he got in there.

"I don't know how I know... I just had to find you, Master Howard. I know who you are... I thought you were dead as you were not where I was placed.." Placed? That's the term used by Enforcers, signifying the circumstances under which they are given to their masters... oh holy shit.

"Who the hell are you?", I asked him. A general question, but maybe he'll just spill it.

He did, immediately and obediently. "I am a prototype sentient Enforcer, placement date May 25, 1997. My master is Inheritor Howard."

"Dominator, now.", I told him. "But you are an Enforcer. No one outside would know that.." The gravity of what he was telling me reached my brain. He's the prototype sentient Enforcer Daddy told me about, I thought I was going to get him back when I was 9. He never came, the project was scrapped, Daddy never mentioned him again... but here he is, as the everfucking Anarch. How could I not have known? Why didn't anyone tell me about this? Someone's head is going to roll..

"Why did you attack governmental and Illuminated institutions?", I asked in one of my more demanding voices.

"Because they were attempting to perform the forbidden act of governing me. Only you can do that." Oh for fuck's sake. This whole 'anarch' deal was nothing more than an Enforcer command gone wrong. None but the master may govern an Enforcer, and in the case of a sentient Enforcer, anything he would perceive as a danger to his commands... all this is the result of some blunder, the details I'll have to find out. Figures that it would be something stupid like that. No glorious shootout, no defiant, suicidal explosion. This is where the resistance's mightiest warrior comes to his knees, willingly. I powertripped for a split second at the thought.

"How old are you?"

"Three years, six months."

"They managed to do the training in less than eight months on a sentient?!" It's possible, I've just never heard of it. I thought a sentient would go crazy being trained as an Enforcer. I haven't heard of the topic even being considered since this guy...

"That is true, Master Howard."

"All right.. if you really are an Enforcer... pick up the first pebble you see." He (it? With what pronoun do you refer to a sentient Enforcer?) did.

"Now eat it.", I said, thinking that if this was bullshit he would at least hesitate. Paul gasped. The misdirected agent gulped it down as he would a pill.

"Now puke it back up." Large quantities of vomit joined the pebble in its return to earth- Enforcers have biofeedback circuitry not matched by the most adept yogi. Yup. None other than an Enforcer could have done it that quickly.

"That settles it..", Billy said.

"So how did this happen?", I asked. "Where were you placed?"

"Your recording told me that when I woke up, I would be at you, and you would be the only person I would obey from then on. I was then drugged with sleep gas and sent to you." The hell? I never received any kind of delivery information.. maybe they had intended it to be a surprise, and then fucked up.. I've got to get to the bottom of this. "I woke up in the back of a crashed delivery truck at the bottom of a cliff. I was.. confused. Both people in the front of the truck were dead. I was unhurt due to the restraints. I sought you out but the communication equipment was broken. I heard people coming and secrecy demanded that I leave." Oh, fuck. I know what's going on now. The person who didn't tell me about this is going to die.

"Our operatives or normals?", Billy asked.

"Almost certainly normals."

"We just have to assume that was cleaned up..", Sarah said, shaking her head. I hate assuming secrecy. But assumption is necessary in an organization this large, and secrecy threats created by the crash would have been noticed by now anyway.

"Speaking of normals.. who knew about you?"

"No one, Howard. They all assumed I was superhuman in some ways. Some believed I was a government project. No one had knowledge." His sentience allows him to manipulate.. and his Enforcer training allows him to find things out. Best of both worlds, if he's on your side.

"Good. All right. Come on in. We've got business to discuss with someone." Walking back to the house, I turned my back to him without worry. Sarah will keep an eye on him if no one else.

"There is a thing I must bring to your attention, Howard."

"What?"

"You are implanted."

I am..

I am..

"WHAT?!", I turned around and shouted directly in the Anarch's face, my fist-blades centimeters from his cheek. I heard Billy stuttering and Sarah saying "No way... no way." The Anarch was not fazed... he has to be an Enforcer, but whose? He can't be lying.. can he? "YOU'RE LYING!!"

"I cannot lie to you. I suppose you must do something in response. What is your course of action?"

"Better question. How did you find that out?", I asked. I noticed Paul almost paralyzed with shock, then shaking his head in disbelief.

"I read it from fifth level Brutus Mando's computer, shortly before circumstances forced me to leave. That is also how I found out your location."

"What else did you find out about Brutus Mando?"

"I found out what he does to be an Illuminatus. I found out where he was from. I found out the full extent of his place in this organization."

"Did you find anything about the group responsible for this?", I said, pointing to my head.

"No." The gravity of what he was telling me finally reached the inside of my brain. Oh.. no. No... that can't be right.. this has got to be crap.. but something tells me he's not bullshitting me here.

"Oh, we can find the truth of this real fast.", Billy said. "They're not magnetic but we can get something.. wait, don't.."

"'Wait, don't' is right, Billy.", Sarah said. "You know that if they are capable of that, they are capable of finding out about call-downs. Howard, do you have anything?" Do I.. I found my thoughts being clouded with an enormous fear and the shock of it all. Me? No way.. no fucking way. The day before my twelfth birthday, too...

"I don't.. I don't know.", I said. "Check.. check the closet.. lots of shit in there. Check the basement too, if you don't find something.. By the way.. for the next 72 hours, all of you are forbidden to say anything about turnabout being fair play."

"Didn't cross my mind.", Billy replied.

I tried to compose myself.. and failed. By the time we got back to the house, I was shaking all over, almost catatonic, sitting down on the couch as my servants went to examine the closet for detection tools. Me? ME?! This has got to be bullshit... got to be.. I did research on Brutus Mando, found nothing pertaining to anything like this.. but of course I wouldn't.. Son of a bitch.. I have no idea how long I just sat there cradling my head. Tears were coming out of my eyes and I wiped them off angrily. Son.. of a.. BITCH!! "FUCKING DAMN SHITTY HELL!!", I swore, screaming at the ceiling. Just where have I heard that before?

"Your command has prohibited me from making an observation plus wisecrack, Howard.", Billy said nonchalantly. Oh, yes. That's where.. they searched the closet some more, the Anarch going to the elevator. He knows this place.. maybe they did that when they made him, though.

"I believe this will do the job.", Sarah said evenly, using both hands to hold up a heavy, but precise tool that looked like an electronic mini-mortar gun. The Anarch stopped and went to inspect that device.

"What's that?", I asked.

"Sonar mapper. Goes from a few hundred meters to a few millimeters. This thing'll do it. First, let's try it on him.", she said, gesturing to Billy, using the device's telescopic lens to focus in on his head, her strength and dexterity allowing her precision with the bulky device. "This might be annoying.", she warned, as she ran it across his skull. He grimaced a bit but did not move.

"Definite. No question. The metal shows right up."

"Now.. try it on me.", I commanded her, also grimacing from the almost-unheard noise in my ears as a result of the ultrasonic scan. The way she looked at me told me everything. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I'm not dreaming; I can't be. This is.. demented, sick.. who the HELL would do this?!

"Howard.. you realize that no one's ever survived removal.", she said, and my hands were trembling very, very fast.

"I.. don't.. care.", I said, looking into her eyes as she put the thing down on the carpet. "Take them out of m-"

"Waiiit, Howard.", Billy loudly said, interrupting me. "Dumb decision, remember? I gotta warn ya.." He was.. right. It would be stupid just to try it.. but I can't give my knowledge away with some test.. shit, they might already know.. oh DAMN!!

"Although you know why we can't stage organized testing procedures, we can at least find something.", Sarah said, sighing a bit, only slightly spooked in comparison to me. "Murphy's everfucking law."

"No.. Sarah. Murphy's law is.. 'what can go wrong, will go wrong'. This is 'What shouldn't ever possibly go wrong is going wrong along with a whole lot of other things that must be going very, very wrong.'"

"I suppose, then, you should prepare to die.. because I know you're not going to sit on your hands now. It's all or nothing with you. Always has been." The way she said 'has been' suggested my non-survival, and I sneered at her at that but said nothing. She was, indeed, right that I wasn't going to live as a servant, especially since I have no idea who my master (fuck, those words feel like liquid shit in my head) is.

"All right.. now to see just how the implants kill..", I said, reaching for the keyboard. "They're not going to monitor this.. at least not right now, because anyone could be looking that up.." If my body is not secure, my server most assuredly isn't either.

"Don't bother, Howard.", Billy said.

"Why not?"

"I already memorized it." It should come as no surprise that he did. He probably did so early in his implantation.

"So, then.."

"Overload of the nervous system. All of it. Massive electrical flux, with the activity centered in the implants' area. Your brain goes into convulsions. Either the brain kills itself directly, or it tells your heart and lungs to move very, very quickly, burning them out. That might be mitigated by your engineered status.. but the Enforcers.."

"Didn't survive even with their improved bodies. I know."

"So then.. what's the solution?"

"A power drain.", suggested Paul, the first time I've heard him say anything in a while. "Take some of the electricity out of your head. Use drugs or something to slow the convulsions down, or maybe if you let the electricity out of your head somehow.."

"Wouldn't work.", the Anarch said to Paul. "He may survive with that plan. However, the parts of his brain that were attached to that may.. depending on his brain's chemicals, depending on how fast and how much.. he may lobotomize himself. He'd regenerate it, but.." But I'd forget everything and be an easier target for a very, very long time. "And I would not use chemical inhibitors on him." My biology tends to violently react in the presence of any such drug- at least that's what their tests on my prototype parts told them.

"A little at a time, then.", Paul suggested. "I've seen the videos of guys dying. It takes them a few seconds.." But 'a little at a time' would take a medical facility, and Paul's expression showed that he realized that.

"You guys realize that we're not going to get this done anyway, if Murphy's Law holds out.", Sarah said.

"Why not, Sarah?", I asked immediately and with force.

"Because they've already had this discussion. They're capable of putting two and two together, guys. You did not keep the fact that you let the Anarch on your island a secret, Howard. They probably already know that by now, although I doubt they've been listening to our conversation- if they did, we wouldn't be here talking about it. But they've already gone over this. They know what you'll have to order. They know that the Anarch attacked one of their men and gleaned important information. They're probably considering right now whether to strike or not."

"Fuck.....", I trailed off. "So.."

"I", the Anarch began, "have an idea."

"Spill it.", Billy said.

"They probably have a catalog of devices needed for such an endeavor as your master plans to do. If they are monitoring- which we must assume- then their catalog probably only has such devices as were created when your master was implanted, which would probably be at birth. If they have not updated.."

"Forget it.", Sarah said. "One, they probably do update any automatic system, and two, I ASSURE YOU that they're monitoring your communications LIVE right now. They wouldn't even have to crack your system- just the places where things are ordered from. Because I'd be using the encryption keys for those places, which these people would know."

"Okay.. so we can't order anything.. guess we'll just have to do it bare, then.."

"No, we won't.", Paul said.

"Eh?", I asked.

"You see, Howard, you're forgetting your own manipulation teachings. You forget how cowardly people are. The people on you are probably very afraid to do whatever they have in store. After all, if you've got your ears plugged and your eyes closed in the basement," That would do it, wouldn't it? It was probably the first thing Paul thought of, to avoid being commanded. The three of them have been prohibited from avoiding my commands for so long I forgot it was an option. "they still have to fight Billy and Sarah. If you give them a reason to question your motives.."

Billy got it before I did. "You're going to say you're unimplanting the Anarch, aren't you?"

"Bingo! We have a winner.", Paul said, grinning.

Sarah just sighed. "I can't even think of the comparative risks. There's no way to compare the unknown with the unknown. So if we're going to use something, what?"

"Yes, I admit it, I did my homework here, too.", Billy said. "We don't know how the fluctuations will work with you, but if we have some device balancing them out over a period of time... let's see.. damn, I don't remember it all." He sat next to me, drew the keyboard to himself, and looked things up.

"Any device balancing out the impulses from the brain would have to react to the previously unknown data.", the Anarch said, his neutral tone unwavering in the slightest. "Furthermore, as it says here, the impulses are random inside the afflicted's head, centering on the implants but occurring at all points. Attaching anything to the front of his brain would do little, and we would separate very many neurons if we inserted any probing devices." Which is what the device's description had on it: non-neuron-separating. It was an experimental implant-removal electrical modifier.. which did next to nothing because its connections (possibly many) would only stick to the surface. "It is also unable to predict the fluctuations very well. And this is.. the only such device." I rolled my eyes and shook my head. The only such device in existence.

"It's this or nothing.. by the way, aren't these transmitting?", I said, gesturing to the cursed things in my skull.

"No.", Sarah said. "Almost certainly not.", the Anarch said at the same time. "They would destroy their secrecy.", he continued. Ugh, I must not be thinking straight not to have caught that.

"So how many connections are you going to order?", Billy asked me.

THAT, I caught immediately.

"How many do you expect me to order?", I asked him coolly. "Four? Five?"

One second passed.