I'm dreaming.

That's the polite way of putting it.

It's a nightmare.

It's always the same nightmare.

Every night.

Nearly two years now.

“What happens?”

The same thing. I'm in a mall.

“By a Venn machine.”

Yes, the doors cycle open and I place the painting inside.

“Of your wife.”

Yes, and set it down so she's facing out the door. I step out and I'm facing her. I can see in her face that she hopes it will work this time. The door closes automatically as the machine cycles. Then the door opens.

“And the machine is empty.”

And I hear her voice. “Why didn't you save me, Martin?”

“And I wake up in a cold sweat,” Martina said. She was sitting on a sofa in small office.

“Is this why you've been Martina the last twelve times you've been here?” said Dr. LaFondra. She sat in a chair opposite Martina with a legal-sized notepad in her lap.

“I don't know.”

“When was the last time you spent any time as Martin?”

“I had to go to the FBI office in Phoenix. That was six months ago.”

“The baby case?”

“Yes, the fallout from that case is still on going.”

She interrupted him, “Let's not slip into a tangent about that. How long is your current venn?”

“I had Agent Burkes set the machine for a year the last time I asked him to venn me.”

“Do you always have one of your subordinates venn you?”

“Only since Carrie's been gone. Who else could I trust? And since I've been doing it, Assistant Director Jimenez has recommended this practice to any agents using the machines.”

“That's sensible. Now, when you wake up, are you relieved that you aren't Martin?”

“What do you mean?”

“In your dream, Carrie accuses Martin of failing her. And then you wake up as Martina. Is this intentional?”

She paused. “I don't know.”

“Think about it,” the doctor looked at her watch. “Think about it between now and our next session because our time is a couple minutes over. That's some progress. You haven't mentioned the nightmare before.”

They stood up and shook hands.

“I'm slow to open up to people.”

“Everyone is.”

* * *

“Anything else, Martina?”

“Actually, yes. I'm putting together a proposal to expand the task force's operating procedure. Currently we are only supposed to look into 3 year venns. But I've got some credible dark web evidence that certain venn abusers are aware of the task force and have adopted a policy of using 2 year venns instead,” Martina Sapretti, Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI, said.

“That shouldn't be difficult to change,” her boss, Paul, said.

“Actually, it might make our work easier. I've had Cho monitoring the local logs for 2 year venns. They're even more rare than 3 year venns. It seems once someone decides to venn for more than a year they just figure 3 years makes more sense than just 2 years.”

“In for an penny, in for a pound.”

“So it seems.”

After the meeting, Martina returned to her office in the Transformation Task Force wing of the office. There were seven agents working for Martina here in New York and around forty nationwide. All because of the painting on the wall behind her desk that she generally did not look at. She stopped and gave it a good look. Could Carrie see her? Was this the last copy and the nightmare could have been ended months ago? She sat down and tried to concentrate on the paperwork on her desk.

She was reading a report of a local politician hiring someone to liquidate his rivals. Literally, they would be lured into the machine, turned into water and dropped down a toilet and flushed. No way to be recovered for three years after that. Hard to maintain a political base when one disappears for three years. There were no good laws covering that. The machines do not work if you are forced inside. Kidnapping is the wrong term. Unlawful imprisonment? So far the only recourse is civil court. But the case is very uphill, needing to prove lack of consideration in the verbal contract to use the venn machine together.

When Special Agent Burkes knocked on his boss' office door, he found her looking up at the painting behind her desk muttering, “Now we're looking into two year venns. Two years is still too long to be away from loved ones, Burkes.”

“Yes, Sir, we have an odd case.” Burkes stepped in and sat down. “We got a call from the Richmond office about a dead venn user who managed to get away from agents by disappearing in venn machine.”

“Disappearing?”

“They suspected the perp was venned when he was so willing to be gunned down so they put the body into the machine alone expecting it to end their venn. When the door opened, the machine was empty.”

“That's usually not possible.”

“No, it isn't. No one was in the other side, so the perp could not have been modified right there. And invisibility just can't be done in a Venn machine. Agent Drecker in Richmond was hoping our unit could explain what happened.”

“Yeah, it's kind of obvious what happened,” Martina said. “The perp wasn't more than 50% of the mass from their venn. If you venn into multiple items or forms, putting less than half of the resulting mass into a venn machine and recycling it causes whatever was put inside to vanish.”

“So how would we find the rest of them?”

“I wish I knew the answer.” After an awkward pause, “I suppose I could ask about expanding our surveillance directive. Give me Drecker's number and I'll explain it to him.”

After Burke left, Martina sat staring at the painting behind her chair for several minutes before calling Agent Decker.

* * *

“Watch this,” Agent Burke said. The big screen in the war room showed a Venn machine at a mall. After a few second a pair of mannequins walked up to the machine.

“They are already venned,” Martina said. “Once again the suspects use multiple venns to make it harder to trace them.”

“They have the machine set to two months so it isn't on our radar.”

A few moments later, four people stepped out of the machine, two on each side.

“There it is,” Martina said. Notice both pairs who stepped out were two men, one significantly taller or heavyset than the other. Also notice how well they are controlling two bodies. They've done this many times before. The smaller one does the job. If they get killed or need to escape, they go into the machine and disappear. The larger one probably spends time in a low stimulus or zero stimulus place so that controlling the smaller one is easier.”

“How do we catch them?”

“Legwork. We need to get a court order to start watching more Venn machines for people doubling themselves.”

Burke said,“I was going to say that can't be too common. But who knows what's common in venn culture.”

* * *

Several months later, Martin entered Dr. LaFondra's office. She only allowed a small amount of surprise to reach her face as they shook hands. “Good to see you, Martin. Please have a seat.”

“Hello, Elizabeth.”

“So you know what I'm going to ask.”

“You were right. I didn't want to be Martin Sapretti, whose wife went missing on his watch. I need to go back to being myself. Last night, I did not have the nightmare.”

“Why do you think that is?”

“The end is only a few weeks away. It'll be three years in 18 days.”

“That's wonderful. Isn't it?”

“I'm nervous. What did spending three years as multiple paintings do to her? Was the painting I had the last painting and she's endured this torture because I was afraid to lose the last bit of her I had?”

“We've discussed all that before. You still haven't made peace with your decision?”

Martin paused to think before saying, “No.”

The doctor waited for him to go on.

“No, I... That's what the dream is.”

“The dream you didn't have last night.”

“I've been thinking about putting the painting in a machine a lot lately,” Martin said. “I could handle not seeing the painting for couple weeks. I've been on assignments where I was away from the painting even longer since it happened. But I still haven't done it.”

“Why not?”

“When I see her again, I'm going to be an emotional wreck. Maybe she will too. I don't know if I want to do that in a mall. Maybe that's selfish. But somehow I want this to be private.”

“But the painting is in your office at work. How will that be private?”

“I plan to take that day off from work. I'll bring the painting home the night before.”

* * *

Martin was home from work that day. He had an exact timestamp based on the mall footage of that fateful day. His team informed him it would be about 15 minutes short of the exact time because of how the venn machines measure a year compared to how the calendar does.

The painting was leaned against a wall in the living room. As the time approached he sat down, facing away from the painting. He tried not to look at the time ticking down. He sat there with his eyes closed trying to use meditation to calm his racing heart.

Time passed. Too much time passed. He looked at his phone and the time had passed. After berating himself for cowardice, he turned around and the painting was not there.

Tears ran down his cheek. He was happy. It had been so long he almost did not recognize the feeling. She was not here. But she was somewhere. Somewhere drawing breath, able to do as she pleased, no longer trapped in a nightmare.

He was glad he was sitting as he was overwhelmed by his joy. But then he wondered where she was. What if she was in a small place unable to escape? A forgotten place? A place she could not find a phone and call him?

Minutes stretched into one hour then two. Paul, Burke, Cho, even Taggart called him to see if they had been reunited. He had been lifting weights for the ninety minutes since the painting vanished when his phone rang with an unknown number. He wiped his palms on his hands and answered, “Hello?”

“Is this Martin Sapretti?” A woman with a very French accented said.

“Yes.”

“I'm Inspector Batteau of Interpol. I believe you are with the FBI, yes?”

“I am Deputy Assistant Director of the Transformation Task Force.”

“Good, good. We had a hit on Carrie Sapretti, I believe she is your wife.”

“Yes. What kind of hit?”

“She was arrested in Marseilles for breaking into a museum. We are working with the French government now to get the charges dropped, as we are aware of her special circumstances. She also does not have a passport.”

“I'll be in Marseilles in the morning,” Marin said. “If she is released before that can you get her to a US Embassy?”

“I will get in contact with you if she is released before you arrive.” The inspector gave Martin her office number and location before hanging up.

* * *

Martin called Paul as he drove to the airport. Paul told him he would see about getting a military ride home to avoid passport issues.

The next afternoon, Martin was holding Carrie in his arms, in her holding cell. “How are you?”

“A little spacey still,” she said. “It's so quiet.”

“What's so quiet?”

“I spent all this... time in four locations at... once. I think... one was in Hong Kong. But wherever I... was there was always... noise, people talking, all... overlapping with very little silence.”

“I'm so sorry.”

“No, don't... be. It's my fault... I should have known you... you...” Tears welled in her eyes. “For the first few... months I thought... this was a prank. I should have... known you would never... set the machine for... three years. I'm so... sorry I put you... through this.”

“No, no, it's not your fault, Carrie.”

A guard tapped politely on the bars. “I'm afraid you have to leave now, Monsieur.”

Martin held Carrie for another moment before getting up. “You're going to be fine. I won't be far.” He turned to the guard, “Has she been given medical treatment? She may need treatment for how slow her speech is.”

“I will take it up with the guard captain,” the guard said.

Martin was greeted by Inspector Batteau in the precinct lobby. “Let me take you to lunch,” she said.

* * *

True to the Inspector's description of what would happen, a summary judgment was made that afternoon and Carrie's case was placed in the custody of Interpol. The Inspector got the charges dropped within another two hours and Carrie and Martin were on a train to Paris to get to the US Embassy there.

“Your speech is improving,” he said.

“Yes. I think I'm use to being in only one place again.” She looked up from her phone and tussled his hair. “You've gotten a few gray hairs. I hope not over me.”

“I've aged. You haven't,” he said.

“I've heard from my sister that Martie has been spending a lot of time at our house.”

“Martina,” Martin said. “I spent most of the last year as Martina.”

“Really? Why?”

“I told my therapist it was because I wanted to be someone other than the guy whose wife was missing.”

“And the real reason?”

“Your going to cry.”

“Why?”

“I was Martina so I could wear your clothes. I felt closer to you that way. And I really needed to feel you.”

“Aww, Martin,” she pulled him in for a hug and they sat like that for a good stretch of the train ride.

* * *

By the time they reached Paris, Martin had told Carrie about some cases that had been solved while she was gone. He was shocked when she interrupted a few of the stories with details she knew, some that he had forgotten, because she had heard him talking about the cases in his office.

“I have to call Paul as soon as we land.”

“Why?”

“Bringing you into the office as a painting was a huge breach of security. Why didn't I think of that?”

* * *

At the embassy, they got to meet the ambassador and part of his staff. Martin and Carrie were treated as visiting dignitaries. The ambassador had read his briefing papers and peppered Martin with questions about venn machines and the kinds of cases his task force was investigating.

Arrangements to get Carrie temporary diplomatic papers simplified her exit from the country without need for a military flight. “It's better this way,” the ambassador said. “Military flights lack in luxury.”

It was not until they were in the air, flying back home, that Carrie said, “Do you have a picture of... me as a painting?”

“I do.” He unlocked his phone and handed it to her. He did not need to do anything else as the image was his background image.

“It's actually a rather good likeness,” she said. “It's too bad there was no way to save one of them.”

* * *

Paul entered their home. “I'm sorry to have to do this, Carrie.”

“Do what?”

“I need to debrief you about your experience.”

“Debrief?”

“You were given access to secret information accidentally. Everyone but you were at fault for not noticing earlier. But I should not have allowed Martin to bring an unauthorized party, in the form of a painting, into the office.”

The debriefing was short since her memory was a bit fragmented.

After he left, Carrie said, “Let's go to the mall.”

“Why?”

“I want to meet the latest Martina.”

“I thought you might want to stay out of the machines.”

“Are you kidding? I have to get back on that horse or I'll lose my nerve.”

“You sound like you have enough nerve to last you a long time.”

“C'mon, I'm not going to let some murderer ruin my enjoyment of being venned.”

“Okay, that sounds great, Carrie.”

“We'll only set it for three months,” she said. “Just to be safe.”

“Right. Just to be safe.”