Roger's Blackout

Michael

It's early evening of Thursday, July 5, in Roger Martin's apartment in the Mission District. Empty bottles of alcohol are strewn about—not 151 rum, but ... vodka and vermouth? Roger squints at the wall clock, a pounding headache his reward. He's just in boxer shorts, his skin sheened with sweat. The sharp pain in his head is echoed with a duller one throughout his body, like he's been pushed to his physical limits for the 20 hours since leaving the Ransoms' party. But ... but honestly, this all started there in the Ransoms' garden, didn't it? It started when Roger took that "break" from dispensing medicine in the form of his delicious potions ...

Michael

In late afternoon, Roger hits the head in the Ransoms' home. He looks at himself in the bathroom mirror after flushing and splashes some cool water on his face. He's looking at a man who's been a servant the past few hours, dispensing spiritual and physical medicine in the manner of his forebears. Everyone in URIEL, it seems, came to him with their problems: Mitch and Sophie for sure. And it sure seemed like Archie wanted to talk to him about something... did he just talk to Archie about something? About someone, a guest who hadn't arrived at the party yet ... the very busy, very competent ...

Ah, a brilliant disguise, of course. Being undercover has allowed him to collect so much intelligence, but there's only so much that can come from the guise of a barman. No, it's far past time for him to slip into the party as the jet-set world traveler he truly is. Roger buttons up his shirt and ties a tie, switching out into a lightweight summer evening jacket hanging on the hook in the Ransoms' bathroom. He checks himself out in the mirror and he looks good.

"It's time to go mingle," he thinks to himself, "and just in the nick of time." Roger grins into the mirror; Agent 00 grins back.

Michael

Roger, on the evening of July 5, shakes the cobwebs off and goes to the fridge for a glass of orange juice. For the life of him he can't fucking remember what happened to him after he talked to Archie at the party. But now Roger has a hint of what might have occurred, and it seems like he truly might not have been himself.

Bill

"Shit. Merde. Mierda." Roger looks around his place, and it looks unfamiliar in the summer's twilight. "I should call in. No, wait, I think I did call in. Shit. Merde." He goes over to the phone. There's yesterday's Chronicle folded up on the kitchen table under the wall-mounted phone. It's folded to hold it open to movie show times, and there are circles around several of the times Live and Let Die was playing, at various theaters. Next to that is today's paper, same section, more circles, same movie. Roger reaches for the phone, but thinking of Jo, he remembers ...

Bill

He's sitting in a theater seat, next to a blonde. She's joking she'd like to see him in a top hat. He laughs and asks her if she'd rather see that than the rest of this. They get up and leave. But then, he remembers ... He's sitting in a theater seat, next to Yolanda. She slaps him hard, knocks his head right back and cracks his lip. "Oh shit. ¡Maldito! He must have hit on ... ¡Carajo! No, I can't call. He'd just hit on her too. You pendejo ... it doesn't work this way. There are rules."

Bill

Roger paces around the place a bit, kicking at the figures on the floor. "I could really use Yolanda. But I must have thought that already." He thinks for a second of her, thinks of times he's met her, talking to her in the botanica. He closes his eyes and thinks about her face, and a bit comes back to him. Roger puts his hands to his head, and touches his split lip. Yeah, there'll be no calling Yolanda.

Bill

He's standing next to Yolanda in line for the Grand on Mission St, and "007 LIVE & LET DIE 007" is right there on the art deco marquee in big black plastic letters. She's got her head cocked to one side and her skeptical face on, but only teasingly. The look doesn't stop him as he goes on, animatedly.

"This spirit ... it's old, or it wouldn't be a spirit, but it's also so right now, so new, you dig? I think it's this movie, it breathes out this spirit like when you blow into a fire. It's like this movie turns these theaters into his temple."

"Phht, you know this Hollywood voodoo is cornball crap. It just means I gonna have touristos knocking over my shit in the shop for weeks. It's no great awakening — you're drunk, Rogelio, and at 2 pm in the afternoon on a Thursday. And tarot? Dammit, I hate reading tarot."

"When you see it, in one of these old cinemas ... you'll see. And then you tell me about it, what you feel."

"Yeah, well, two hours of mind-numbing bullshit sounds about right for getting into a trance. You're buying me the big popcorn and Jujubees."

The Grand in the Mission

Bill

"Sophie! Right on! Gotta talk to her. Or ... did I try her already? There was that bit with the drink ... I know she was there for cake ... But after?"

Michael

On the evening of the Fourth, Sophie hustles out of Archie's home office in a rush, her cheeks flushed, her eyes moist. As she hustles to the front door, she bumps right into Roger, who's standing in the Ransoms' foyer with a cocky smirk on his face. Roger kept pretty quiet during the recruitment of Genevieve and Andrew, Sophie had noticed, but gave a sincere thank you to Viv once the Dom Perignon had been popped. His voice was different then, like he was reliving the elements of the game they'd all played in the St. Francis on Friday night ... Sophie doesn't know everything about what happened during that very long day in the St. Francis Hotel, but she does feel like something is up right now. She has other, much bigger things on her mind, but Roger was so accommodating, so thoughtful earlier this afternoon. Maybe ... maybe she can confide in him one last time.

"Oh, Roger, I'm glad I caught you. I ... I need to get back home now, it's getting late and it's a long drive to, er, Castro Valley. But I wanted to thank you again. For the drinks and chat this afternoon and ... well, like I said, I regret not having taken the time to do this earlier."

Bill

Roger flashes a very dazzling smile. "It was, of course, my pleasure. As would be a drive with you. I'm a bit too much under the influence to drive; would you mind taking me crosstown on your way to the bridge?"

Michael

"Oh ... oh of course! Let's pile into my Volvo."

Sophie's car is preternaturally neat, and in excellent running order; if Roger is peeking out from behind Agent 00's eyes right now, he might be intrigued that she kept this very sleek sporty little machine hidden from him all these years. But that curiosity is probably not more than just a vague irritant in the back of the Agent's mind.

"My one indulgence. I got used to driving these back in England and I just had to have one when I came over here." Sophie smiles and pulls out of Archie's tony Pacific Heights neighborhood.

Bill

Roger runs a hand along the hood, just above, not touching the surface of the headlight crest. “She is a beauty.” He looks up into Sophie’s eyes. “A beauty. Which side is the wheel on?”

Michael

"The right side, which of course is the left." Sophie smiles; Agent 00, whose knowledge of and memories of Sophie herself are frankly a little hazy, is realizing she is too clever by half to be someone who meets her end in the second reel. She is not a Femme Fatale or a Tragic Innocent; and unlike Jocasta she is not an Action Sidekick who might be bedded at the end of the picture: instead she is a doughty Moneypenny. By the archetypes that throb within Agent Double Zero's (over)soul, such as it is, Sophie is not a Girl; she is a Woman.

"How are you holding up after last weekend? I never got a chance to really get a sense of what you were dealing with at the hotel."

The Librarian's 1962 Volvo P1800

Bill

”Oh, just a full force intrusion of the Enemy with hundreds of innocents in their path and too few Agents on the ground. Whole of reality on the line, I believe. Lucky we got Control himself on the scene, or I might have gotten dashedly tired with all those stairs. What am I saying— I did get tired.” His consonants have gotten too crisp for Roger, but he can’t help himself being bully for the Queen’s English while driving around in this particularly fine vehicle. It doesn’t sound like he’s doing it to be deliberately mocking to Sophie, just like it’s a necessarily to match the environment.

“Not a place anyone would have wanted to be. And you? How are you holding up? Upper lip still properly stiff?”

Michael

Sophie gives a serious look to Roger in the passenger seat; she knows it won't be a long drive to Roger's pad at 11:30 pm on the Fourth of July, and she knows she may not get another opportunity to talk to Roger for... a long time. So she just out-and-asks the man in the passenger seat, remaining outwardly fairly unflappable but keeping a careful eye on this strange passenger as she winds through the streets of San Francisco, taking a deep breath before she works up the nerve to finally ask: "Please excuse the tenor of this question, but it's fairly important that I know this before I go any further, because we don't have much time. Am ... am I actually speaking to Roger right now?"

Bill

The passenger looks a bit uncomfortable. “Well, it seems you’ve bowled my wicket. Yes, Roger took a little break; it’s been a bit too much time on His Excellency’s Secret Service. Ah well, cover blown. Perhaps some other time, then. Goodnight, Miss Moneypenny.” Roger gives a deep sigh, and sinks back deeply into the chair, the shadows temporarily hiding his face. When the next streetlight hits it, he seems more worn out, and he runs a hand over his chin. “Sophie? Sophie? Whose sweet ride is this?”

Michael

"Oh, oh Roger. They've gotten to you too. Don't you understand? They've been hoping something like this would happen, all of them. Granite Peak. Your old friend from Vietnam, Ambrose O'Connor. The doctors, the head-crackers, the implant-makers ... Dr. Gunn." Sophie shudders.

"They've been praying for a break like this. Proof you could push beyond voodoo. And now ... oh God, now they're going to want to squeeze it all out of you, turn you into a weapon ... like they did poor Charley. And you likely won't even remember this tomorrow morning after I've gone to the Peak." Sophie reaches over Roger's lap, into the glove box, and pulls out a pewter flask. She takes a deep pull.

"I'll do what I can. I'll do what I can for all of you. But you've got to remember, somewhere deep down, they'll keep hoping exposure to the Enemy will fracture you further. Maybe even fracture all of us. Every temblor zone is a laboratory, you understand. A live-fire exercise. They want us to adapt, to improve, to go beyond what's human. I ... I can't let them hurt any of you any more." Sophie knows where Roger lives from his file, of course, and she pulls up to the Mission abode.

"I'll miss you, Roger. I'll do my best. I'll try my hardest or ... well, I've been living on borrowed time since the day I was born. I'm not afraid anymore. I know what I have to do." She leans over and gives Roger a ... not passionate, but also not-quite-fraternal kiss on the lips, lasting quite a fair bit little longer than the way those Europeans greet each other.

Bill

Roger, a little flustered by the surprise of a kiss from the Librarian, scrambles for something to say. And the Agent is right there, and maybe knows just the right phrases … so it’s easier to just let him come out his mouth.

“Sophie. You’re too good to us. But that sounds like you’re heading off to war. For us? Why not stay and fight with us?”

Michael

"Don't you know, Agent? This is the bit in the spy film where the plucky girl researcher who's found out the rot at the centre of her entire adult life's work, the organisation that got her only one true love killed, goes off to try and get the evidence of wrongdoing and slay the hydra herself. I hope you'll know well enough to leave me to it." Agent 00 doesn't feel like that role is really a valid part of his operational programming, of his archetypal knowledge. Seems like a good way to get killed in fact.

Well, for Roger’s sake, do try not to end up the dear friend killed at the beginning that draws him into the plot. You play the craft well, and maybe we’ll meet again: you the deep plant that rescues him out of the shadows, what?” The Agent presents his hand to Sophie, and when she takes it, he kisses the back of it. “Here’s looking at you, kid.”

Bill

Roger sits down in a chair, takes a long drink of his OJ, and shakes his head. “No way, esse. Man, mixing Sophie into Casablanca? That can’t be real. That’s another rule you’re breaking, mi amigo: no lying in my head.”

Roger stands, picks the phone off the wall, and calls in to Livermore. “Office Librarian extension, please. What? What do you mean, line discontinued?”

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