The Impressionist

Jen cautiously removed the patch from the woman's arm, folding the plasti-skin edges over the drug-soaked pad in the center. The patch was a week old now, but still potent enough to blur her reactions with the slightest contact and she needed to have all of her wits about her. Quickly pulling the limp body toward her own, Jen used the forward momentum to get the woman into position over her shoulder. She carried her from the small secreted room into the connecting bed chamber. Behind them, the door shut with a hiss, blending in perfectly with the design pressed into the walls. Jen froze as she heard a noise that seemed out of place. She turned her head slowly, shifting the inert form away from her ear, as she strained to catch a second sound that might help to identify the first. There was no movement. A long, silent sigh escaped from her lungs. This was the most dangerous part, either coming or going. The switch. It was difficult enough to find the mark alone and make the initial switch. It was just as risky to return them back to their life when she was finished with them. The exchange must be made swiftly and smoothly without arousing suspicion in this, already, paranoid society. She eased the woman onto the ornately carved chair in which she had been sitting when Jen and Lissa had nabbed her. Experience had taught Jen that it was better this way. When the woman came around, she would be less disoriented. She would still have to deal with a few weeks of her life just… disappearing. But, after the very public assassination attempt, perhaps that memory loss would be attributed to trauma.  It was standard procedure to feed the mark the week’s events on a dream disk. That way they would vaguely remember the events that Jen had experienced in their place, or think that they remembered them anyway. Jen did not have time to create such a disk today, even if she had access to the equipment, which she didn’t. That had been Lissa’s responsibility. Jen looked down at the sleeping woman in front of her. Perhaps she wouldn’t notice, or even care, about a lapse in her memory. What a waste of space she was. But, for some reason, Control thought that she was important enough to save, and obviously, someone else had thought that she was important enough to kill. Jen stepped casually, but purposefully, in front of the window. If someone were to glace her way from the busy thoroughfare below, they would see the exact image of the unconscious woman in the chair, Alara Tamir, the Governess of this little back world colony. In fact, Jen was counting on the fact that someone would do just that. Jen’s last moments as Alara were spent creating the public history of the day for the woman that she had been, or pretended to be, for the last two weeks. She took her time as she stood in full view of the crowd below. Jen slowly brushed back her hair with a lazy hand, a common “tic” of Alara’s, as she ran through the next few minutes in her mind. Her contact had not returned her many messages and she had no chip for a fresh mask for her face, Jen had no choice. She had to go barefaced. A shiver ran through her just at the thought of it. She hated going without a mask. It was a professional idiosyncrasy, she supposed. She knew that most of the others felt the same way. When one was taught from birth to take on the physical, likeness and emotional profile of another, it didn’t leave any room for learning to be comfortable with yourself. The nano-mask made all of the difference in the world to Jen. Once she was plugged into the system and the plasti-skin adjusted itself to her body, building out the facial characteristics as well as every bump, bulge and mole on the body of her mark, Jen could understand more about the way a person moved and why. She never fully grasped the magic of putting on the face and body of another. The change in the center of gravity, then pull of muscle here or there, the face in the mirror… and then all of the sudden, the accent that didn’t ring quite true, or the gesture that have felt unnatural and silly, it all just fell into place. Truly magic. Jen was a quick study. Mac had told her once that even he had been astonished at her speed and accuracy in canalizing a mark, even when she had been very young. But the no matter work, the study, the practice, it still didn’t fall together until she was “in the skin” of the character. She had started on low level missions when she was just seven, the youngest impressionist on record. By the time she was nine, she was in the thick of it, “fully expendable” was the term used with ease. Mac had been her tutor, trainer, father-figure, and torturer for as long as she could remember. From the day she went on her first mission and until she was eleven, he went on every mission with her as an auxiliary character, someone on the sidelines. He had been close enough to assist, but far enough away to not seem suspicious. When Jen went on her first solo assignment at the age of twelve, she’s had all of the confidence of an adult. When she had her first mission where she had been expected to be sexually active with the husband or boyfriend of a mark, Mac had taken her virginity. He had been all business about it, but kind. He introduced her to the world of s*x in the same way that he taught everything, impersonal, professional, and studious. From that time on, she was also taught to mimic the sounds and movements of her mark in a s****l manner. She was, as always, a good student. And now, even four years after he had gone missing, she would still work out her problems with Mac out loud as if he were in the room. She didn’t have a romantic attachment, but she worshipped him. He was the ultimate impressionist.  She had asked him a few times over the years, "Who are you. Who are you really?"  And he had always answered the same, jokingly, "Who do you want me to be?"   She didn’t know what had happened to him. She probably would never know. Control was not very informative about other impressionists assignments, successful or not. The less you knew, the less you could share if you were somehow caught. You either came back from a mission or you didn’t, that was it. Jen was sad that she didn’t really know what Mac looked like. She had never seen him in anything less than a full body mask. He hadn’t ever removed his plasti-skin, from the day it was applied, as far as she knew. Jen finally stepped away from the window. She was dawdling. She chastised herself for her weakness, her need to have the face of another covering her own to bolster her courage. However, she didn’t have the luxury of time to worry about unmasking herself. Alara had many attendants, any of whom could appear at a moments notice. She had to get out, and quickly too! It wouldn’t do to have two Alara’s in the room if someone came in. Jen trotted to the bathroom and began filling the basin with water, adding a dash of the solvent that all impressionists carried with them in case of emergency. Dipping her finger in the mixture, she drew a line along the top of her forehead. The chemical signal to the plasti-skin cause the nano-bites to unform and release. The chemical reaction zipped throughout the entire nano-suit and the skin began literally falling off of her body. She peeled off the chucks, ripping it into pieces to speed the decay and dropping it into the spiked water in the sink. The synthetic skin was a heat sensitive material and the moment it was removed from Jen’s body, it turned pale, waxy, dead looking. It dissolved almost instantly once in the sink. She dipped her hands in the diluted mixture, using the solvent to scrub off the thinner yet tougher layer of plasti-skin from her fingers that had mimicked, exactly, Alara’s fingerprints. As she watched them dissolve, she wish that ditching the wig was just as easy, although the edges of the wig were made of the same material as the rest, the hair was real human hair, strung a strand at a time through a skin like substance that would cling to the nano-tech plasti-skin, but release when hit with the solvent or an appropriate computer program. She took the wig and wrapped it in a scarf, stuffing it in her carry sack. She decided to leave in the brown contact lenses with Alara’s imprinted retinal pattern. Her own natural eye color was a startling and noticeable violet-blue, and Jen was hoping to blend into the crowd. Jen now looked in the mirror, and wrinkled her nose at the image in front of her. She was barefaced to the world and she felt absolutely naked. She c****d her head a little to one side as she gave herself a moment to study the face in the mirror. What kind of personality would go with the girl looking back at her? What quirks and tics should she have? What register should her voice be? How would she move and what sort of inflections did she use in her speech? Jen had naturally curly, darkish blond hair that was usually shaved to be comfortable under the layer of fake skin that she wore. It had been a while since she had been groomed however and it was short, but not too short to be look conspicuous on the street, thank goodness. Her nose was smallish, of course, having been surgically altered in her youth to be able to mimic, through the use of Control’s technology, to mimic any facial shape demanded of her height range of her chosen mark’s. Her complexion was as pale as could be, as she rarely went out into the sunlight without the benefit of a full body mask. She borrowed a little bit of foundation and face powder from Alana’s make-up bag and looked again. Yes, she thought, that was better. She studied herself objectively. She didn’t want to stand out or be memorable in any way. She nodded, finally satisfied. She made her way back toward the door of Alana’s suite. Jen had come to know this room well in the past two weeks. The walls were painted pasty pink and there were several overstuffed and indulgent furniture pieces scattered about in gaudy, garish colors. No doubt, the décor had been hand picked by the not-so-pleasant woman in the chair across the room. Jen wouldn’t miss this place, that was for sure! Sometimes, Jen would become quite attached to her temporary life playing at a particular character. She had a great longing to live a “normal” lifestyle. When she slipped into the role of a happy person living a good life, it wasn’t always easy for her to give that life back to its rightful owner and, once again, return to her uncertain and unpredictable profession. “Not that I have a choice,” she muttered. Control was not known to be very forgiving. They kept close tabs on all of their impressionists, which was another reason that Jen was so concerned about having not heard from her local contact, Lissa, in over a week. It wasn’t the first time that she’d lost contact during an assignment, but it was a very rare occurrence and it had never been for this long. She could not take it lightly. There was a lot of pressure in an assassination assignment. Not only was her life at risk, by posing as the target, but the life of the mark was at stake as well. If the assassination was successful. Not only was her own life at risk, by posing as the target, but the life of the mark was at stake as well. If the assignation was successful, it was not just the impressionist who lost their life. To allow the mark to come back after an agent had been killed in their stead, would expose Control and the entire organization. Control would then be compromised, along with any future good that they might have done. If the different political leaders knew that they could be so easily replaced, or that their trusted spouse or even their child, was not who they thought them to be, paranoia would reign supreme. If an impressionist died, so did their double. The company contact made sure of that.      That’s not to say that the job didn’t have its’ perks. If Jen wanted something, anything, all she had to do was ask. She could vacation in the top hot spots in the galaxy. She could have jewels, any form of entertainment (legal or illegal), the most expensive food and drink… the works. She could do whatever she wanted, except leave, of course. People across the galaxy wasted their time away wishing that they could be something or someone else, like an ambassador, a holographic movie star, a pilot, or even a planetary Governor or Governess, like that Alara woman that Jen had just portrayed. Jen had been them all and more. She could go anywhere and be almost anyone or anything that she wanted to be, for a brief time anyway. Her favorite assignments were the fact gathering missions. There was less pressure on those missions as no one was plotting your demise. She could take her pick of an industry or technology that Control was looking for more information on or about. From there, she had to identify someone in her height range who had access to the equipment and she was “in.” Jen had a natural talent for working with machinery of any kind. She loved figuring out how something worked and making it run better and faster. She often left those assignment feeling good about herself, having left a gift of an improved system for the disturbed mark… implanting the memory of them figuring it out themselves. It felt a little like a good deed instead of feeling like a thief that stole a piece of someone’s life. She slipped into the hallway and began to trace the escape route that she had planned for herself earlier in the week. Jen reached the public area of the building and eased herself into the crowded kitchen, grabbing a plate to look like she was delivering it to someone, and then leaving it on the counter just inside the dining hall that she entered. She kept her eyes down and detected no unusual interest being cast in her direction. As she slipped out the door to the street, she silently congratulated herself on an almost seamless switch. Now, all she had to do was find Lissa, get a new plasti-skin suit and an assigned face, and she could be on her way.