The Hidden Story of Triple-T.

Author's Commentary:

The Hidden Story of Triple-T.

The second battle of the book is in full swing.  If it feels quick, uncomfortable and unsatisfying.... good.


Because I wanted the reader to have this uneasy feeling at the end of this chapter.  I wanted it to feel like there are still so many loose ends just flopping around all over the place.  I wanted it to feel like something terrible is about to shatter everything.

*Thunder Crash!*
*Maniacle Laughter!*
*Dramatic Music*

Ahem....

Anyway, I was skimming through the first draft looking for something to say about this chapter and I came across this scene.  I cut it because it was part of the whole early two-thirds of the book that got hacked off because... well, it sucked.  But, more specifically, I cut this scene because, although I liked it, it wasn't time yet.

There will come a moment where we explore Viekko's backstory a little more.   In future books I definately want to spend time talking about where he came from and where he is going but, for now, it just doesn't fit.  It was an interesting look into Viekko's past but it has nothing to do with the events in hand.

So I guess what I am saying is, think of this as a preview.  Or a bit of microficiton from Viekko's past.  I don't know what it is yet.  But I hope you like it.

The Triple-T Clinic:

A nurse took Viekko outside where the patients were enjoying their exercise hour.  He found Theo sitting alone at a table with a checkerboard and sat down across from him.

“How’s it going?” he asked, “They takin care of you here?”

Theo didn’t respond and he didn’t look up.  He just reached over and picked a checker off the board.  A second later he set it down again with a tap.

“I went by the club last week.  Angela’s taking good care of the joint.  It’s becoming the place in Rio to get noticed in the music Stratum, you should see the acts she has rolling through there.” said Viekko.

Theo picked up the same checker and set it back down.  It wasn’t like he set it down deliberately, it was more like his hand simply ran out of upward momentum and crashed back down on the board where it started. 

Tap.

“She redid the design, though, you should see it.  Place looks like an art gallery.  She had those new walls put it that project different textures... you've seen them.  Had the whole place looking like it was built under the ocean last week.  It's a hell of a sight, but it gave me a headache.  The kids seem to like it, but it's not like the old place.”

Tap.


Something else caught Viekko's eye nearby.   There was a man that kept walking into the wall.  He wasn’t hitting hard and not at different spots, but slowly at the same spot over and over again like a toy robot hitting an obstruction.

Other people were sitting on the lawn staring with blank, slack-jawed expressions.  Not staring at anything in particular, just staring.  Orderlies patrolled the grounds and made sure nobody was looking directly at the sun.  It was a problem around here, Viekko learned later, they would just lay down on the grass and burn their eyes out.  They wouldn't say anything and they wouldn't do anything even as their eyes were boiling in their sockets.
 
The people actually exercising were just wandering around the yard with the fixed expression and rocking gate out of a bad zombie movie.  Viekko had heard the term ‘Triple-T Zombie’ before, at the time he thought it had been an exaggeration.

Viekko witnessed all of this while his friend, the former king of Rio de Janeiro nightlife kept taping the checkerboard with the same checker, over and over again. 

Theo once said, “Life without the 'T' is a life with the volume down.  Jack in and feel life pulsing though your brain.”

Tap, tap, tap.

The day he gave Viekko his first hit, he winked and said, “Nothing feels better then fucking on the 'T’.  It's a explosion in your mind.  It pushes past pleasure, past pain into a realm mere mortals cannot comprehend.  You might cry, even a big guy you.  It's that intense.”  

It would eventually kill you, it’s only a matter of time before the Rage hits.  The news strata were full of people being shot dead in the streets by local law enforcement ordered to get control of the triple-T problem.  Sometimes they would jump off a bridge or run their car though a building in a fit of insanity.

Tap, tap, tap.

The lucky ones, the ones that didn’t snap and kill themselves or somebody else... eventually they had a heart attack or a stroke trying to control it.  The only other option was giving up your humanity, your very soul and sense of identity .  You had to spend the rest of your life watching your own life like a spectator in your head.

Tap, tap tap.

Viekko sat and watched Theo play with that same stupid fucking checker for almost forty five minutes.  He wasn't concerned with Theo.  That poor dumb bastard could rot in a gutter for all he really cared.  He came to see the other side of triple-T, the side people had told him about.  It wasn't as bad as they said.

It was much, much worse.

Viekko got up.  He wanted to break every bone in Theo's face, but... why bother.  He wouldn't even feel it.  He probably wouldn't even notice that it happened.  They only thing he might have accomplished was accidentally killing Theo.  And he didn't want that.

If this was the future Theo had forced on him, then he wanted him to live a long life.

Tap, tap, tap.