Read Online First Person Peculiar by Mike Resnick - Free Book Online

kill.
    Suddenly I began to feel constricted, like the walls were closing in on me and the air was getting too thick to breathe, so I put my jacket back on and went out for a walk, keeping well clear of Second Avenue.
    I stayed away from the busier streets and stuck to the residential areas—as residential as you can get in Manhattan, anyway—and spent a couple of hours just wandering aimlessly while trying to analyze what was happening to me.
    Two trucks backfired, but I didn’t duck either time. A huge black man with a knife handle clearly visible above his belt walked by and gave me a long hard look, but I didn’t disarm him. A police car cruised by, but I felt no urge to run.
    In fact, I had just about convinced myself that Dr. Brozgold wasn’t humoring me after all but was absolutely right about my having an overactive imagination, when a cheaply dressed blonde hooker stepped out of a doorway and gave me the eye.
    This one, whispered the voice.
    I stopped dead in my tracks, terribly confused.
    Trust me, it crooned.
    The hooker smiled at me and, as if in a trance, I returned the smile and let her lead me upstairs to her sparsely furnished room.
    Patience, cautioned the voice. Not too fast. Enjoy.
    She locked the door behind us.
    What if she screams, I asked myself. We’re on the fourth floor. How will I get away?
    Relax, said the voice, all smooth and mellow. First things first. You’ll get away, never fear. I’ll take care of you.
    The hooker was naked now. She smiled at me again, murmured something unintelligible, then came over and started unbuttoning my shirt.
    I smashed a thumb into her left eye, heard bones cracking as I drove a fist into her rib cage, listened to her scream as I brought the edge of my hand down on the back of her neck.
    Then there was silence.
    It was fabulous! moaned the voice. Just fabulous! Suddenly it became solicitous. Was it good for you, too?
    I waited a moment for my breathing to return to normal, for the flush of excitement to pass, or at least fade a little.
    “Yes,” I said aloud. “Yes, I enjoyed it.”
    I told you, said the voice. They may have changed your memories, but they can’t change your soul. You and I have always enjoyed it.
    “Do we just kill women?” I asked, curious.
    I don’t remember, admitted the voice.
    “Then how did you know we had to kill this one?”
    I know them when I see them, the voice assured me.
    I mulled that over while I went around tidying up the room, rubbing the doorknob with my handkerchief, trying to remember if I had touched anything else.
    They took away your fingerprints, said the voice. Why bother?
    “So they don’t know they’re looking for an Erasure,” I said, giving the room a final examination and then walking out the door.
    I went home, put the towel back over the vidphone camera, and called Dr. Brozgold.
    “You again?” he said when he saw that he wasn’t receiving a picture.
    “Yes,” I answered. “I’ve thought about what you said, and I’ll come in tomorrow morning.”
    “At the Institute?” he asked, looking tremendously relieved.
    “Right. Nine o’clock sharp,” I replied. “If you’re not there when I arrive, I’m leaving.”
    “I’ll be there,” he promised.
    I hung up the vidphone, checked out his address in the directory, and walked out the door.
    Smart, said the voice admiringly as I walked the twenty-two blocks to Brozgold’s apartment. I would never have thought of this.
    “That’s probably why they caught you,” I whispered into the cold night air.
    It took me just under an hour to reach Brozgold’s place. (They turn the slidewalks off at eight o’clock to save money.) Somehow I had known that he’d be in one of the century-old four-floor apartment buildings; any guy who dressed like he did and forgot to comb his hair wasn’t about to waste money on a high-rise to impress his friends. I found his apartment number, then walked around to the back, clambered up the rickety wooden stairs