Ian Fleming's James Bond
in
THE CORNERS OF HER MIND

By Frostbitten

Part 4

A Haven For Souls

Bond was now back in the control room down in the basement. While on his way back, he had worked out a rough plan to achieve what he considered his next task: getting Nikki out of her Anita persona and back to her innocent self again. The plan was in no way foolproof. There were many things that could go wrong, but Bond couldn't think of any other solution.

He walked back into the maze, his senses on alert in case Nikki had already woken up. However, he found her where he had left her, still lying on the ground, unconscious. He lit up one of his special cigarettes, and stood leaning against the wall, enjoying a much needed smoke to relax his nerves. Looking at her in her present defenseless state, he couldn't believe she was the same ferocious creature who had attacked him so savagely just fifteen minutes ago.

Gradually, Nikki started to regain consciousness. Her eyelids fluttered, and she moaned. Bond walked back into the control room, and picked up the microphone that he had seen Geffen use to communicate with Nikki. He spoke into it: "Anita, this is Wolfgang. Can you hear me?"

There was no answer. Bond waited a few seconds, then repeated his question. After several tries, he finally got a reply: "Wolfgang, what happened? Did Bond get away?"

Her voice sounded weak, probably because she was still dazed from the blow, but it was definitely Anita's voice, lower and rougher than Nikki's normal voice.

"Don't worry about Bond," he reassured her. "I already took care of him. However, a situation has come up, and I have a new target for you. Listen very carefully ..."

Bond spoke to her for the next five minutes, giving her detailed instructions about her next hit.

            *************************************************

There was a full moon over Bangkok that night, and it bathed the whole city with a pale, surreal light. However, the Mayor's ball was in full swing, and its participants hardly paid any attention to the celestial beauty above them. Geffen, resplendent in his Il Dottore disguise, was chatting up one of the local beauties while standing on the second floor terrace of the sprawling mansion.

"So, as I mentioned in my latest book, hypnotherapy can be very beneficial to people suffering from chronic pain. For example, I once helped a patient who was suffering from cancer by using hypnotherapy on him, and through my powers of suggestion, I was able to make him believe that the pain was lessening. Because of that, his final days were much more bearable."

"That was so wonderful and kind of you," the young woman spoke earnestly, her eyes shining with admiration for the great doctor. "I know about pain, believe me. Even though I'm not that old, my knees sometimes suffer so terribly from arthritis, I can hardly walk."

"Many young people do suffer from arthritis. Tell you what, why don't you let Il Dottore take care of you? I can try to hypnotize you, if you like, and maybe I can make you feel less pain," Geffen said magnanimously.

"You would do that? Oh Dr. Geffen, I don't know how to thank you...", the beauty said, while blushing appropriately.

"Well, I'm sure we'll think of something. Now..." Suddenly, Geffen's cell phone rang, rudely interrupting him. He pulled it out, and snapped: "Yes?"

His eyes widened in shock as he heard Bond's voice coming through.

"Sorry to interrupt your persistent siege of the young lady's virtues, Geffen, but I have some bad news for you. Your bodyguard is dead, and so is your butler. Your "champion" has failed, which you already know, since I'm still here talking to you. Actually, she is quite good, and wouldn't have any problem if given an easier target, one that is more suitable to her level of experience. A target like, for example, yourself."

"What are you talking about, Mr. Bond?"

"Oh, I gave Anita a new assignment. You know, you really did a good job training her. Once she has a target, she pursues it with a single-mindedness that is frighteningly effective. But you must already know that, and if you don't, you will find out soon, I promise. I told her that a competitor has murdered you, and is now taking your place at the ball, wearing the Il Dottore costume. Her task is to eliminate the impostor. You are really making her job quite easy, standing outside in plain view like that. But it doesn't matter. There is nowhere you can hide that Anita won't be able to find you, just like there was no hiding place for all her previous victims."

Geffen gave a short, hearty laugh. "You are quite mad, Mr. Bond. All I have to do is remove this mask, and once Nikki sees me, she will not harm me. After all, I am Anita's lover, as well as her partner in crime."

"It won't do you any good. I told her that the impostor is wearing the latest in synthetic "faces", a disguise that is an exact duplicate of your face. That way, the impostor can really get close to her, and eliminate her too, thereby getting rid of his toughest competition. She will make the task of killing him, or should I say you, a matter not only of revenge, but also of self-preservation. What do you think? A rather far-fetched story, to be sure, but I found her to be surprisingly gullible when she believes that the intelligence she is getting comes from Wolfgang."

While talking to Geffen, Bond was also watching him through a pair of powerful binoculars from his position behind one of the large palm trees surrounding the Mayor's estate. The magnification of the binoculars was so good that he could see droplets of sweat starting to form on Geffen's forehead and above his upper lip. The big man turned and walked away from the other guests, while dabbing at his face with a white handkerchief.

"Are you starting to feel the heat, Geffen? Or maybe you can sense the telescopic sight of a sniper's rifle trained on you, and anticipate the moment when bullets from the high-powered weapon will drill into your body? How does it feel to be the prey rather than the predator?" Bond's voice was cold and cruel, and he didn't bother to conceal the fact that he was enjoying making Geffen sweat.

"Why are you doing this, Bond? What do you want?", Geffen whispered fiercely into his cell phone.

"I want the reverse trigger, Geffen, the code word or phrase that you use to deactivate the Anita persona, to return Nikki to her true self. You can't reach her, but I can. Your only chance for survival is to give me the code so that I can prevent her from turning you into another entry in Anita's bloody ledger of kills."

"You are crazy. Do you think that you can save her, take her away from me? I will hunt you both down, kill you, and take control of Nikki again."

"You are just wasting time, Geffen, something that you don't have much of. Now, tell me the code!", Bond ordered.

There was a short pause. Then, as his instincts for survival took over, Geffen whispered through gritted teeth: "It's a saying by Goethe, "On every mountain height is Rest". You may have won this battle, Bond, but I promise you that I won't rest until I've won the war."

"Without Nikki, your war is already lost. I will be coming for you later, Geffen, and there won't be anyone for you to hide behind." Bond hung up without waiting for Geffen's reply. He immediately dialed Nikki's cellular number.

"Yes?", she answered after several rings.

"On every mountain height is Rest," Bond spoke slowly and clearly into the phone.

A couple of seconds passed. Then, Nikki spoke, and Bond's heart sank as he recognized the low, arrogant voice of Anita.

"Who is this?"

Is it possible that Geffen has given him the wrong code, Bond wondered. No, the man had clearly been frightened to death of being a target for Anita. He wouldn't dare to do anything but give the phrase that would disable the killing machine that had been let loose upon him.

Bond repeated the reverse trigger. Again, there was a brief moment of silence. Then, he heard the buzzing sound that told him Nikki had ended the call. He pressed the Redial button, but a connection could no longer be made, as Nikki must have turned her phone off.

Bond stared at his cell phone, unsure of what to do next. Sweat started to appear on his forehead, and he angrily wiped it off as it ran into his eyes. He looked across the street at the deserted mansion facing the Mayor's. There, on the second-floor balcony of the French Country-style house, was Nikki, probably lying on the ground, taking careful aim with her sniper's rifle. He couldn't see her, but he knew that was where she would be, because he himself would pick that spot if he were planning to assassinate someone at the Mayor's party.

There was only one thing to do. He must go to Nikki, and somehow prevent her from carrying out the deadly task that he himself had given her. He had no great love for Geffen. In fact, he despised the man, whom he viewed as a cowardly, manipulative psychopath. However, he had given that psychopath his word that he would stop Nikki, and that was what he must now do.

Cursing under his breath, Bond ran quickly across the street, through the open gates of the deserted house, up the driveway, and stopped at the main entrance. He pulled out the ASP, and gingerly turned the door handle. The door was not locked, and it swung inward on well-oiled hinges. Bond quietly slipped inside and, hugging the wall, carefully crossed the empty foyer and living room, to the wide, curving staircase that led to the upper floor. He walked up the stairs, taking great care not to cause any creaking sound. When he reached the landing above, his eyes quickly scanned his surroundings, and located the room that would give the best, most direct view of the Mayor's house. As he walked up to the door, he found it to be slightly ajar, and he peeked into the room. It was a small bedroom, measuring maybe twelve feet by twelve feet and, like the rest of the house, was completely unfurnished. Directly across from the door was a set of French doors that opened onto a wide bal cony with iron railings. There, lying on her stomach, was Nikki. She didn't hear Bond step into the room, as her concentration was totally focused on the mansion across the street, her right eye peering through the scope of a sleek, lethal-looking rifle.

"Get up, Nikki! Slowly! Hands behind your head!", Bond commanded, while covering her with the ASP.

Nikki was surprised, but she recovered well. She did as Bond had asked, then slowly turned around to face him. Her smile was taunting him, and although he couldn't see her eyes, as the upper half of her face was covered in shadows, he could imagine them staring at him with a malevolent gleam.

"Mr. Bond, I see that Wolfgang didn't take care of you after all. That's OK. It means that I will have the pleasure of doing it myself."

"No, you won't. On every mountain height is Rest," Bond said, while carefully monitoring her. There was no apparent effect, and he started to feel foolish for believing Geffen. Perhaps the man was out there laughing at him right now.

Suddenly, something changed in Nikki's posture. Her body, which had been standing rigidly, defiantly straight, seemed to relax. When she spoke, her voice was soft, and hesitant, as if she had just awakened from a deep sleep, and wasn't completely sure of where she was.

"John? Is that you?"

Bond breathed a sigh of relief. The code finally worked!

"Yes, it's me. However, my name is not John Keys. It's Bond, James Bond."

"James Bond? Why did you lie to me about your name before? And why are you pointing a gun at me?"

Bond quickly put the ASP away. He walked toward her, and when Nikki backed away fearfully from him, he held up his hands, palms forward, in a reassuring gesture.

"It's alright, Nikki. You are safe now. I am an agent working for the British Secret Service, and I mean you no harm. Come, let me take you out of here. I will tell you everything when we get back to your hotel."

Bond took another step toward her. Then, he heard a gunshot, which sounded like a thunderclap inside the small room. He felt a searing pain in his stomach, as if someone had run a white-hot rapier through his gut. Looking down, he dully noted a dark red stain that had appeared on his white shirt, and was rapidly widening, where the bullet that had penetrated his back had made its exit. Slowly, Bond pirouetted on the ball of his right foot, and found himself looking at Geffen, still dressed in his sinister Il Dottore costume, his big body filling the door frame. Bond didn't remember falling down, but in the next instant, he found himself lying on the floor, looking up at the towering figure in the black cape. In his right hand, Geffen was holding a nasty-looking revolver. He took a couple of steps forward, so that he was standing directly above Bond.

"It's a terrible thing to be gut-shot, isn't it? It's one of the most painful, and bloody, injuries a person can suffer. You will lose a lot of blood, and you will die soon without proper emergency medical attention. And believe me, you will receive no such care, since there is no one here but the three of us, and no one in the party across the street, with the loud music going, would have heard the shot."

Then, Geffen turned toward Nikki, who stared at him in shock.

"You shot him, Mikael. Why did you do that?"

He crossed over to where she stood in a few quick strides, and roughly grabbed her long hair and tilted her head back so that she could look into his eyes, which were boiling with fury.

"You! What a terrible disappointment you are to me! I gave you all the advantages, and you still couldn't handle Bond. The real Anita would never have failed. You don't deserve to carry her name!"

He spun her around, and sent her flying face-first into a wall with a violent shove. Nikki cried out in agony, and crumpled to the floor. Geffen walked up to her, grabbed her by her hair again and dragged her, kicking and screaming, across the room. Her foot made contact with something, knocking it over with a loud crash. Bond's eyes were getting blurry with the pain that surged throughout his body, but he squinted in an effort to see what she had kicked. It was a small house, made of little sticks of wood, that had now been knocked on its side. It had been sitting in a dark corner, so he hadn't noticed it when he first entered the room.

Geffen noticed Bond looking at the house, and commented wryly: "We are in serious trouble now. You shouldn't have done that, my dear Nikki, knocking over the Spirit House."

He turned to Bond, and spoke like a professor giving a lecture: "You see, Thai people believe that in any old house, there are spirits of people who have lived and died there. These spirits must be contained somewhere; otherwise, they would roam around and cause all sorts of mischief. So, they build these little dollhouses for the spirits to live in, creating a haven for souls, if you will. The house that we are in must contain some very unhappy spirits, so a Spirit House is particularly necessary. This mansion used to belong to the Chief of Police of Bangkok. He was very active in waging war against some nasty organized-crime families, and must have really aggravated some powerful mobsters, because one night, someone got into the house and executed him and his entire family. Thai people believe that the souls of those who were murdered usually hang around the place of their deaths, so this house must definitely be haunted. Even with the Spirit House here to contain the ghost s, the residence has been sitting on the market for months, with no prospective buyers. That's also why I knew that you and Nikki would be here. As soon as you mentioned that she would be trying to get me with a rifle, I knew that this deserted place would be where she would station herself."

Geffen now had pulled Nikki into that rectangular area of moonlight that was streaming in through the open French doors, so that Bond could clearly see what he was going to do next. He twisted her hair until tears of pain flowed from her eyes, and pressed the barrel of the revolver against the top of her head.

"I should have realized before that you are not strong enough to become Anita. I've wasted several years trying to make you worthy of her name, but now I see that with you as a partner, I will never regain the glory that my beloved Anita and I once shared. It's time for me to cut my losses and move on. I will kill you, and find someone else who can better help me fulfill my quest."

He looked into Bond's eyes, and continued: "And you, Mr. Bond, once again you've failed to protect a woman that you care about. You can watch me kill her, just like you've watched your wife be murdered by your enemy."

Rage filled Bond's mind, and he desperately wanted to get up and throw himself at Geffen, hoping that he could use his weight to carry  the mad psychiatrist with him through the French doors, over the railings of the balcony, before they both fell to their deaths. Even without his words, Geffen reminded Bond of his most hated enemy, Blofeld, because of his large frame, his arrogant posture, and the gleam of insanity in his eyes. Bond wanted to kill this madman so much he could almost taste it. However, he had lost a lot of blood, his mind was still in shock from being gut-shot, and his body no longer responded to his silent commands.

Bond looked at Nikki, and their eyes met. He looked down at his right leg, now stretched out until it almost touched her, then up into her eyes again. She opened her eyes wide, and made a small gesture to indicate that she had not understood what he wanted her to see. Desperately, Bond looked down at his leg again, and felt Nikki's eyes following his gaze. This time, she finally saw the handle of the Sykes-Fairbairn fighting knife, held in a leather scabbard fastened to his leg, just above the ankle. When Bond had fallen down, his trouser leg had pulled up slightly, partially exposing the knife. It was a weapon that he had taken from Priest. She looked up with an expression that seemed to say: I can't do it, it's beyond me.

The situation was hopeless, Bond thought. He had deactivated Anita too early, and now, when her life depended on it, Nikki didn't have the courage and skill to reach for the knife and do what must be done.

Seemingly able to read his mind, Geffen gloated: "I bet you're wishing you had let Nikki stay in her Anita persona just a little while longer. You can still put her back in it. You know the trigger; you just have to say it. But you can't do it, can you? Because you have seen how difficult it is to get her back, once she has been put under. It has been getting more and more difficult each time. Who knows? Perhaps the next time she has to assume her alter ego, she would stay in it forever. Go on! Say the words. Be the one to make this sweet young woman a killing machine for the rest of her life."

The game was over, and Bond knew it. He could never take the chance of permanently altering the mind of Nikki Le, and thus recreating a monster that the world had already been rid of. Perhaps the only thing left to do was to face death with some dignity.

Geffen pulled Nikki's head back so that he could look into her eyes, and said: "Time to say good-bye, my sweet." He pointed the revolver at a point right between her eyes. At that moment, Bond saw something that later, in hindsight, he could never convince himself was anything more than a hallucination that his mind, clouded by pain and shock, had simply conjured up. He thought he saw a dark shadow rise out of the toppled Spirit House and fly toward Geffen, wrapping itself around him. Then, as a result of sheer coincidence, or of some dark, mysterious forces at work, a strong gust of wind blew in through the open French doors, lifting up the curtain and flinging it at the back of Geffen's head. Instinctively, the big man turned his head around, and raised the hand holding the gun to brush the curtain away. Nikki then did something that took both Bond and Geffen by surprise. She reached for the knife on Bond's leg, pulled it out of the scabbard and, with one lightning-fast, fl uid motion, slashed a deep cut across the inside of Geffen's right thigh. The big man screamed as dark, thick blood spurted out of his leg, and he fell to his knees, while his revolver dropped uselessly to the floor with a loud clang.

With a low, guttural voice that startled Bond, Nikki hissed into Geffen's ear: "I have just cut open your femoral artery. That's a kill. And so is this!" She drew the knife across the underside of the psychiatrist's arm, creating another geyser of blood. "Your brachial artery is now gone. And now, for the piece de resistance..." She pulled the knife back and, as Geffen's bulging eyes showed unendurable pain and terror, rammed it into his neck, severing his jugular artery. His body tottered back and forth for a second, then fell to the ground where it remained, jerking spasmodically, as blood continued to spew forth from his three grievous wounds. As Geffen's body finally stopped twitching, Bond again thought he saw the dark shadow that had been hovering above the big man flew back into the Spirit House as if sucked back into a black hole.

Nikki watched Geffen die, her face showing no emotion. Then, she slowly turned back to face Bond, who was on the verge of losing consciousness due to a severe loss of blood. With a weak, barely audible voice, he asked: "Anita? ... Nikki? ..." He never got an answer, and as she started to move toward him, his mind shut down, and he slipped gratefully into an impenetrable darkness.


Good-byes Are For Tomorrow

The black Ferrari 328 GTS cruised along the winding Highway 1 that hugged the cliffs along California's spectacular Central Coast. Despite being almost 20 years old, the car ran as smoothly and powerfully as any modern sports car, and the famous Ferrari engine note provided a wonderful soundtrack to the breathtaking panorama of the Pacific Ocean that always seemed to get better around the next hairpin curve of the road.

Bond drove with precision, but at a reasonable speed. He was enjoying the drive too much to rush through it. As he turned to look at his companion, Nikki looked back at him, black hair flying freely around her face, and smiled. The sun was up, the car's top was down, and everything was right with the world. Bond and Nikki were on the last leg of their vacation in the U.S., and they were heading toward Newport Beach, a very chic part of Orange County, where they would return the rental Ferrari, then take a taxi to Los Angeles International Airport to catch a flight that would take them back to London.

Spotting a lookout spot by the side of the highway, Bond eased the Ferrari onto the promontory, and parked near the railing that stood just a few feet from the edge of the cliff. As they got out of the car, Nikki exclaimed: "Look at all these wildflowers, James. They are all in full bloom. How beautiful!"

Bond looked at the flowers, and a memory crept into his mind.

"I wonder if flowers cry out when they are picked."

"Beg pardon?"

"Oh, it's just something I remember saying to a lady friend a long time ago."

"Really?", Nikki looked at him with amusement. "And how did she respond to that?"

"She went off to marry another chap."

"Oh poor James! Don't worry, though. You may have better luck this time." She threw her arms around him, and kissed him.

Bond looked deep into her eyes, and smiled. It was hard to believe that they were standing here, with flowers blooming all around them, and the Pacific Ocean lapping at the rocks below. They had gone through so much the last six months. Bond had spent the early part of that time in various hospitals, first in Bangkok, then in London, as he struggled to hang onto life, and then recover from being shot in the gut. Nikki also had some healing to do, and she had gone to several psychotherapists in an effort to rid herself of the alter ego that had been implanted in her. Geffen had done a thorough job on her, and it was quite difficult to undo all the damage. Her treatments continued even after Bond's injuries had healed. She had stayed with him in London, and twice every week, he had driven her to her appointments with Dr. Graham, a well-known psychiatrist. Two weeks ago, after almost four months of treatment, Dr. Graham had proudly announced that he considered Anita banished fro m his patient's mind. "You can search all the corners of your mind, young lady," he had told her, "and you won't find any trace of that monster." Nikki had been overjoyed, and so was Bond. To celebrate, he had booked them on a two-week vacation in the States, which they had spent exploring the beauty of the West Coast.

As he held Nikki in his arms, Bond found himself wondering what would happen to them after they got back to London. Would they create some more beautiful memories together, then go their separate ways, with Nikki resuming her musical career, and Bond returning to the only life he had ever known, the rather lonely life of a secret agent, fraught with danger, alleviated by stolen moments of pleasure such as this? Or would they be able to, against all odds, form something more meaningful, more lasting? Even as he posed these questions to himself, Bond already knew the answer. He lived his life like a blind man tracing a broken necklace with his fingers. Each pearl was enjoyed to its fullest for its smoothness, with its beauty rendered more precious by the fact that it could be the last one on the string. Such a life was not one to be shared. He had no right to subject a person he loved to such an uncertain future.

However, he would not tell Nikki all this. Not now. Not when the birds were singing, the sun was suffusing everything with a warm, golden glow, the ocean was a gently rippling carpet the color of lapis lazuli, and she was gazing at him with smiling eyes. "Good-byes are for tomorrow; today, there is only love," he told himself, and kissed her.