Is it right to betray the trust of a man, just because you’re smart and ruthless and will do anything to get what you want? Is it right to take everything from someone, just because you can? And how far can you push it before you cross the line between human and inhuman … and somebody notices?

Inspired by Bailey Taylor’s Give A Little, Get A Little, this tale brings back Weber, the troubleshooter and unlikely savior first seen in The Wheel Keeps Turning, a previous story of mine. Those who hate when the bad guys win, consider this a sequel to Bailey’s tale. Those who love watching evil triumph and hate when I mess with othe people's endings … well, this is a totally different story, honest! The names have been carefully left out to protect the innocent AND the guilty. *grin*

She came back from her weekend away, a satisfied smile on her face. It was a celebration of another successful deal, and her company … her company was doing so well, she was sure it wouldn’t be the last. Her chauffeur left her luggage in the foyer by the door, and closed the door behind him when he left. She took a deep breath, enjoying the feeling of being home.

‘Home,’ she thought, looking around at all she had stolen from the man she used to call her boss. ‘My home. All mine, now. And so is he … she … it.’

She never called her ‘it,’ at least not to her face. After all, she had made sure the process had changed him into what looked like a very pretty woman … everywhere but between the legs, of course. She had set out to emasculate him, but she did herself one better. Between her legs was nothing but a smooth naked emptiness, broken only by a small hole to pee through. The way it looked reminded her of the buxom yet strangely sexless fashion doll she used to play with as a child. Eventually the former secretary had decided to rename her ex-employer in honor of her new status as a plaything.

“Barbie!” She listened to the echoes from every corner of her new home as they bounced back at her, remembering how tiny her old apartment used to be. She wondered where her “intellectual property” had gone to, since ‘Barbie’ was contractually obligated to be here cleaning and cooking when she wasn’t being the perfect secretary at what used to be her company.

“Where are you, girl?” She added a nasty edge to the term, rubbing in what she had done to him. She didn’t do it every time she spoke to … her. That would lessen the impact, and she really wanted Barbie to suffer.

She walked back to the kitchen, only to find it spotlessly clean and totally empty.

‘Nothing cooking?’ She ran a finger across the stovetop, and noting it was cold. ‘Barbie knew I was coming back today. There is a meal on the schedule, too. What is she playing at?’

A touch of irritation began to rise inside her. ‘Where is she? She has no friends, no family. She has no LIFE. I made sure of that. The only thing she has left is serving me, and the only reason she’s still here is the contract she signed, and the thin hope she might get away from me next year, and get his old life back. Like I’d ever let that happen. Even if I did let her leave at the end of the contract, she’d still be dead broke and alone. And I never guaranteed I’d turn her back into the man she was. Maybe I’ll tell her that when I find her, stupid bitch.’

“Barbie! Come here this instant!” She could hear the anger making her voice tremble, and she marched towards the dining room. “You come here right now or I swear I’ll —“

She turned the corner into the dining room and stopped, surprised. There was a large man sitting at the head of the table, drinking a glass of white wine.

“You’ll what?” he said, the question in his voice oddly melodic. There was a small smile on his face that didn’t quite reach his eyes, and she felt a shudder inside as if she’d just stepped into a cage with a very hungry lion.

There was another predator in the room, and he was bigger and scarier than she’d ever be.

She could see he was a big man, wide and solidly built. Dressed in a black Hong Kong suit, tailor-made, with a black turtleneck shirt underneath, he looked professional, but oddly comfortable as well. He had blonde hair and bright blue eyes, with a nose that had seen a punch or two in its day. There was something vaguely Irish about his face, and she realized suddenly that he looked someone she knew. Part of her brain spun wildly for a moment as she reached into long term memory.

‘Yes,’ she thought, confused. ‘He looks a little like that actor … who was he?’ It was years ago, someone she’d seen in a movie. Brian somebody. ‘Dennehy, that’s it.’

She shook her head and returned her attention to the room. But it was hard to focus on him, despite the smile. Something about him made her want to run, even as she held onto her outrage as tightly as she could to keep from being frightened to death in her own dining room.

“Who … who are you?” She raised her voice to him, trying to drown her own fear with her anger. She was mad at Barbie, and now this bear of a man sitting in her chair as if he had every right to be there. Intolerable! ‘What are you doing in my house?”

“We’ll get to that,” he replied, the smile growing just a little bit. “But at the moment, I’m curious. What exactly could you do to that poor man that you haven’t already done?”

Her heart raced. “What are you talking about?”

“The sexless hopeless thing you call Barbie,” he said, his smile fading slightly. His eyes seemed to shine just a little, as if he found her indignation amusing. “The poor twisted tortured man who used to be your boss. What were you going to do to him if he didn’t come rushing to your call like a bitch in heat? What could you do to him now that you’ve stripped him bare of everything he owned and turned him into a pretty toy?”

She took a step back. “How do you know any of that?”

He gave a slight shake of his head. “That would be telling. I’ll get to that later. Trust me, though. This is one story you don’t want to jump to the end of. Especially you.”

She waited a few seconds, then her anger got the better of her.

“What I did or didn't do, or what I might do in the future … that’s all none of your business, whoever you are. But you are in my house, and I want you to leave.” She moved to the wall and touched a disguised button. “I’ve just alerted the guards at the gatehouse. They’ll call the police unless you leave now.”

“Have you now?” The big man took a sip of the wine and grinned. “Actually, you only think you alerted them. And I suppose if that button still worked, that might be a small problem. But it doesn’t. None of the internal security systems are working at the moment. So the guards at the gatehouse might as well be on the Moon, for all the good it does you.”

Her blood ran cold. She was alone with him. Totally alone. Having a completely absurd conversation about something he should know nothing about. What is going on?

“You still haven’t answered my question. I really am curious.” The smile shrank again, and she could feel the danger grow. “You stripped him of his company, his possessions, his sex, his body. What’s left to do beside kill him? Not that you would, since you seem to enjoy tormenting him so much.”

Not sure what else to do, she managed to smile back at him and delivered a passable shrug.

“I’m sure I would think of something,” she replied, trying to keep her voice light, as if she were flirting. A voice in the back of her head warned her not to play with this man, but what else could she do?

“I bet you could, too,” he said. “If I let you. But that’s not going to happen.”

The way he said it, it sounded so matter-of-fact, as if he already knew how this bizarre encounter was going to end.

‘Maybe he does,’ she thought. ‘I should be running. Why am I not running?’

“As to who I am, well, that’s the thing.” He put down his glass and looked up at her, standing by the archway to the kitchen. “My name is Weber. I work for an organization called First, Do No Harm. My boss is a guy who has way too much money on his hands and a real hate on for Josef Mengele and people like him. People like you.” Weber raised an eyebrow. “Do you know him?”

“Of course I do,” she snapped. “He was a monster! He experimented on Jews during World War II, used them as guinea pigs for all manner of unnatural experiments. Treated them like lab rats. I’m nothing like him.”

“Really? I think … Barbie would have a different view. I know my boss does.” He stood up slowly, and she took a small step back. “That’s why he sent me.”

“What are you talking about?”

“We go after people who experiment on humans … treat them as less than human, like lab animals. Take away their rights and turn ‘em into toys … or pets. You know the type.”

He caught her eyes and held them. “I’m what you might call a ... well, a troubleshooter. Some folks used to call me a mechanic, but now … well, I’m on a different path. My job is to fix things. And today, I get to fix you.”

He walked around the corner of the table towards her, and she took another step back.

‘I should run,’ she thought again. ‘I should fly. I’m a bird and he’s a very big cat, and I really shouldn’t stand here. I should fly away as fast as I can.’

But she didn’t. The whole scene felt unreal, like a bad dream she was having while she was still awake.

“My boss had been watching that medical company … the one you did the deal with,” Weber said softly. “They were the reason you started the chain of events that led to us having this conversation, remember? It’s why you tricked and betrayed your boss into eventually giving you everything. First his company, then his life. You sold them his tech, and they used it to make the body-shaping machine that turned your ex-boss into your pet-toy-slave.”

“See, that’s why I’m here, princess. We didn't know what was going on inside your ex-employer’s company, but that wasn’t really part of our charter. We just knew that suddenly his tech was in someone else’s hands. Even the development of the body-shaping technology didn’t mean it was going to be abused. Until you did it. You went and turned a human being … into a sexless thing, a slave with nothing to live for but waiting to see what new Hell you could trick him into accepting. You think you’re nothing like Mengele? Lady, you could give him lessons.”

Her mouth went dry.

“And that’s why I’m here. Because you crossed the line that defines what it is to be human. And if that machine makes it easier for you to do it, others will follow. That’s why I broke into your offices and read everything there was to read. The copies of the different contracts, all of your correspondence, even your ex-boss’s journal.” Her eyes widened, and he grinned. “Didn't know about that, did you? He wrote about the whole thing, from beginning to end. You are, as my old man used to put it, a real piece of work.”

“He asked for it,” she whispered. “He wanted to do unspeakable things to me if I lost that first bet.”

Weber shook his head. “No, princess. Don’t go there. Whatever he wanted to do doesn’t matter. You had the deck stacked against him before the first card was even dealt. And you couldn’t lose. You already had the deal lined up with the company that built the body-shaping machine, so you manipulated him into the bet that started all this, knowing there was no way for him to win.”

She took a deep breath and shuddered all over. He knew too much for her to lie. Nothing left but to brazen it out and hope for a miracle.

“I knew he wanted me,” she said. “He was weak. Easy prey. And he had what I wanted – what I needed to succeed. His company. His technology. So I played him, every step of the way. He was so trusting … so easily manipulated. And I cut him down, a slice at a time, until all that was left was a shadow of a person. A thing. A toy. A nothing.”

Weber looked at her like she was some kind of insect. Not with hatred, exactly, but if she was some kind of alien bug he’d never seen before, and he wanted to classify it before sticking a pin in it and mounting it on the wall.

“He may have been a fool, and easy prey,” he said, as if explaining something to a small child. “He might even have been a bad man on some level. I’ve seen his fantasies, after all. But let’s be honest, he couldn’t hold you to them if you really wanted to leave. And none of it makes any of what you did right. He wasn’t evil. You were. And believe me, princess. I know evil, all too well.”

She opened her mouth, and he raised a finger. She froze, and he continued.

“Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should. Like you said, he trusted you. You were the closest thing he had to a friend in the world, and you systematically betrayed him over and over again until you had everything you wanted, and he had nothing at all. You could have chosen another way to get what you wanted. A better way. You could have stayed … human.”

He took a step closer, but even as he moved, he felt unnaturally still to her.

“As much as I like my job, the worst thing about it is having to deal with people like you. You’re the worst humanity has to offer. And you gave up being human a long time ago. So like I said, I get to … fix things.”

“What can you do? He’s trapped, and everything he had is mine. And it’s all legal, every bit of it. Contracts duly signed and notarized. I’m sure you saw the copies.”

Weber sighed and shook his head. “Look into my eyes, princess, and ask yourself. Do you think any of that matters … to me?”

She locked eyes with him, and saw the truth. Then she heard the front door open.

“Help!” she screamed, turning towards the door. “There’s a man in here! Help me! Somebody!”

She heard the clicking of high heels on the hardwood floors … and saw herself walk in from the foyer. The world spun for a second, and then righted itself slowly. Her other self smiled, but it was thin and cold. Any joy the smile held seemed to come from seeing her suffer, but she couldn’t bring herself to look away.

‘God,' she thought almost absently. 'Was that how I looked to … her? All this time’

Weber spoke from behind her. “When your boss disappeared and his tech wound up in the body-shaping machine, my boss sent me to look into it. After I reported back about everything I found here, in your office and here at home, my boss decided to take action. He bought the company you sold your ex-employer’s technology to, so now the tech you stole and the genetic engineering machine belong to him. He’s going to make damned sure its use is tightly controlled from now on. Of course there’s going to be fallout from restricting its use, but it will still be used to heal people. He’ll just make sure no one can ever pull what you pulled here again.”

She looked over at her doppelganger, standing there in a severely tailored business suit, the skirt a few inches above her knees, hose and heels and a pearl blouse that was one of her favorites.

‘It does look good on her,’ she thought, then stifled a laugh. ‘On me.’

Suddenly the pieces came together.

“Barbie,” she said, and even as the name left her lips she cursed herself inside for using it.

“Yes, it’s me,” her other self said. “When you did what you did to me … when you tricked me for the last time, you went and had yourself scanned and modified. I heard them talking about it when I woke up. You went through the process yourself and tried to make yourself prettier. I thought you were beautiful, just the way you were. But you already knew that, and used it against me.”

Weber’s voice came from behind her again, a little closer. “Since we own the company now, we found the password needed to reverse his modifications. And since you won’t be needing your body anymore, we loaned it to him for a while. We didn't know you’d erased his old body’s pattern. He still thought you were going to let him go when the year was out. But it’s okay. They’re already working on rebuilding his original genetic pattern from some DNA samples, hair and skin. By the time it’s ready, she will have sold her old company to my boss, transferred the proceeds of the sale to an account in the Caymans with her old name on it, and be ready to retire … and be a man again.”

Her ex-employer and ex-toy looked at her briefly, and she could see so much staring back at her in her own eyes — the betrayal, the hurt, the disgust … and just for an instant, a sadness. Then the other her turned and walked away, toward her new old bedroom and out of her life forever.

She turned back to Weber just as it hit her.

They didn’t need her anymore.

“So …” Her words caught in her throat, and she cleared it before starting again. “So what happens now?”

He raised an eyebrow.

“What are you going to do to me?”

He tilted his head and raised an eyebrow. “Do to you? What do you think I’m going to do?”

“I don’t know! You could do anything! You could … could …”

She started shaking all over, thinking about the things they could do to her now that they had control of the technology she helped create. Nightmares made real poured through her mind, and tears began to fall. He let her imagination run riot for a moment, then reached out and touched her shoulder, gently.

She froze, and stared at his hand as if it was going to bite her. Weber let his arm fall to his side, and sighed.

“Poor princess,” he said, looking at her with something resembling kindness. “You still don’t understand. I’m working through some issues of my own, but I’m sure as hell not going to hurt you. A few years ago, it would have been different. I would have hurt you. A lot. And I would have enjoyed it. Back then I was a talented thug for hire, with a knack for problem solving. But even as a thug, what you did to your boss would have disgusted me, and I would have taken my time making you realize how wrong you were to do it. Days, maybe even weeks. Knives. Acid. Pain is a good teacher.”

She watched him move his shoulders, trying to release some built-up tension.

“Now I’m working on being one of the good guys, and I have to admit it’s hard. Because I really do want to hurt you for what you did, and God knows you deserve it. I’d enjoy it, too, I really would. But if I take pleasure in hurting you, then I’d be just like you were with ‘Barbie,’ yes? I’d still be less than I could be, and less than I want to be. Less than … human. That’s why I stopped being who I was and went to work for my boss. Because doing what I do now, I have the chance to be more.”

“So I’m not going to torture you. I’m not in the cruelty business anymore. I’m in the ‘ending cruelty’ business. When you turned a person into an object, just because you could, you lost the right to be human. No matter what he was like before, he will always be more human than you could ever be. Because he never would have done what you did.”

“Now he’s you, at least for a while. Not the best solution, but it solves some problems while creating new ones. Problems like you.”

“Think about it. You aren’t you anymore. You’re not even a person now. You’re just an obstacle, don’t you see? An extra body where one shouldn't be. You’re keeping everyone else from having a happy ending, and we can’t have that, now can we?”

Almost without thinking, she shook her head. He nodded.

“Good girl. I’m glad you understand. Like I said, I’m not going to hurt you, princess. I’m just going to kill you.”

She didn’t move. His eyes … she couldn’t stop looking at his eyes.

“I’m trying so hard not to make this personal. Just one predator to another, right? I’m going to make you go away, and then everyone gets to move on." He smiled. “That's one thing I’ve always been very good at. Making problems disappear."

Weber took a step forward and raised her chin, then looked into her eyes. His other hand came up and cradled her head. She felt his fingers moving, looking for the right spot, where the spine meets the skull.

“Don’t worry,” he whispered, and her blood ran cold. “You won’t feel a thing, I promise. I’ll be … gentle.”

And he was.