74
Jacob and the Stock is Down
Jacob had contacted Cesar without Rebecca’s knowledge, and they’d made an agreement. Jacob wouldn’t finance the rescue mission without guaranteed results. With the guarantee in place, Jacob agreed to go to the Virgin Islands to support Project Freedom and the search for Derek. By “support,” Jacob understood that meant giving them money and paying Eric’s mercenaries.
Rebecca had been optimistic about the trip, even though Cesar had admitted that they’d never rescued a single island prisoner. She’d reasoned that, with their financial backing and Eric’s mercenaries, Derek could be the first.
Eric had arranged for the flight to Jamaica, the ship to Saint Thomas, along with the best mercenaries money could buy. Tentatively, they were set to leave next Tuesday. In the meantime, Jacob had business to attend to. He sat at his desk, across from his CFO, Ramesh Patel.
“The stock’s down 18 percent today,” Ramesh said. “It’s down 53 percent since the Chinese started selling.”
Jacob thought about his rapidly appreciating short position. I could walk away from everything. Quit. Move to Panama with Rebecca and the kids.
“Jacob?”
Jacob blinked, focusing on Ramesh again. “Sorry.”
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. How long until we need a government bailout?”
“It depends. If the stock stabilizes, and interest rates remain low, we can borrow more to cover our expenses and pay the interest on our debts, but that’s not sustainable.”
“How long?”
“Could be a year. Could be two or three months.”
Jacob nodded. “I’m taking a trip next week. I may be unreachable for a few weeks.”
With the company in crisis, Ramesh winced at the timing.
75
Summer and Soda
Summer was groggy as she and Javier launched their canoe from the point. The dawn sun provided the first rays of light. Gavin and Eliza launched their canoe as well. The four of them formed a scavenging crew for 1776. They paddled away from the ocean, into the bay. Summer and Javier were in a rhythm, the whoosh of the water behind their oars the only sound. Summer thought about Connor and their brief reunion on the beach. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes.
One hundred feet away, a caiman slipped under the water. They scanned the shore for the aggressive alligatorlike reptile, not wanting to accidentally encroach on their territory. Only a few green iguanas. They beached at an airport, about a mile from their fort. They hid their canoes and paddles in the swath of jungle between the water’s edge and the airport. Each year, that swath of jungle got a little wider since the hurricanes had effectively banished mowing, pruning, and herbicides.
They put on empty backpacks and crouched at the edge of the jungle, overlooking the expansive asphalt runway. A few wrecked airplanes littered the area, but most airplanes had probably been flown or shipped off the island before the hurricanes. A few concrete buildings still stood, but the hangars were reduced to rubble.
“We’re looking for food, lithium ion batteries, medical supplies, clothes, or anything else we can use,” Gavin said. “Watch your step and wear your gloves. A rusty nail could kill you.”
“This place has been picked clean,” Eliza said, frowning.
Eliza was in her late-twenties, with scraggly brown hair, a thin build, and a face like a chipmunk.
“We don’t know that yet.” Gavin removed his backpack and retrieved a Ziploc bag. He removed a weathered map of San Juan. The map had been marked in pen, areas circled and blocked with Xs. These were the places they’d searched. Gavin showed them that the airport had mostly been searched, except for a few broken planes and the hangars that had been reduced to rubble. It was dangerous to search without much cover, but, since it was so early, Gavin thought they had a few hours of safety.
Gavin and Eliza searched the rubble of the hangar. Javier and Summer searched the grounded planes. Most were small single-engine propeller planes. Wings and windows were missing or broken. Rust worked from the outside in. Seats were gone or ripped open, the stuffing spilling out. Javier and Summer searched, wearing gloves, careful around the twisted and rusting metal. The last thing they needed was an infection.
“What’s up with Eliza?” Summer asked, inside the cabin of a plane.
“What about her?” Javier said from the cockpit.
“She’s not very friendly.” Summer had introduced herself yesterday, but Eliza wouldn’t talk to her, probably pissed that Summer had lied about her expertise in submersibles to gain entry into the group. Technically, Javier had lied, but Summer wasn’t going to throw Javier under the bus. His lie had likely saved her life.
“She’s like that. She’s been through a lot. That two-year-old is hers, by the way.” Javier searched under the front seats for something of value.
There wasn’t much to the cabin, just two rear seats. Rat droppings were clustered in the corners. Summer looked around as she talked. “Really? Is the father here?”
“She was gang-raped.”
Summer stopped scavenging, Javier’s revelation hitting her like a ton of bricks. “That’s awful.”
“She doesn’t want anything to do with the child, so we all look after her.”
Summer thought about her son. His perfect little fingernails and perfect little lips. His peach fuzz hair and chubby cheeks. Watching him sleep on her chest.
Javier entered the cabin from the cockpit. “Eliza was taken by the Aryans when she first got here.”
Summer woke from her daydream and turned to Javier. “Huh?”
“Eliza. She was taken by the Aryans when she got here. Ran away somehow. She was pregnant when someone from our group found her and brought her to the fort. That was three years ago. Anyway, that’s what I was told.”
“Why is she here? Why was she arrested in the first place?”
“She used to be an online teacher or something. From what I heard, she was teaching antigovernment stuff and one of her students told on her.”
“She has been through a lot.”
“Yeah.”
“What about the younger child? The baby.”
Javier beamed. “Freddie Jr. He’s Fred and Willow’s child. Probably the only child on this island with married parents.”
“They’re married?”
“Yeah. Apparently, when Fred and Willow were at home, she couldn’t get pregnant. Then they come to this shithole, and she gets pregnant. Maybe it’s ’cause we don’t have all the chemicals here. I don’t know.”
“That’s crazy. Did they get arrested together, like me and Connor?”
“I guess. Not sure though. Gavin told me that they were members of 1776 before they were arrested. All they did was post antigovernment information on the internet.” Javier sighed. “I learned the hard way about that too.”
Summer offered a sympathetic smile, then turned, and looked behind the rear seat. She moved some debris and saw a small plastic box. Summer grabbed the box labeled Botiquin De Primeros Auxilos. “I think I found a first aid kit.”
Javier moved closer to take a look.
Summer opened the airtight box. Inside were bandages, tape rolls, antiseptic, tweezers, burn cream, finger splints, and rubber gloves.
“Nice find,” Javier said.
They checked a few more planes, finding nothing. It was getting late, and the gangs would be active soon, so they went to the hangar. Gavin and Eliza moved broken cinder blocks from a pile where a wall once stood.
“Summer found a first aid kit,” Javier announced as they approached.
Summer held up the kit.
“I think a vending machine’s under here,” Gavin said, already sweating bullets. Gavin stepped off the pile and showed Javier and Summer the small exposed corner.
Summer and Javier helped to remove the debris. It was, indeed, a vending machine, with snack food wrappers strewn about, the glass case shattered.
Javi
er picked up an empty bag of chips. “Fuckin’ rats.”
Everything was eaten. Chocolate chip cookies. Potato chips. Oatmeal raisin cookies. Candy bars. All gone.
“What about the soda machine?” Summer asked. “If there’s a vending machine for snacks, there’s usually one for drinks.”
They cleared more debris, finally finding a crushed soda machine, the glass display shattered like the snack machine. Many of the soda cans had been smashed, the surgery liquid long since lapped up by the rats. But quite a few cans were still intact.
“Look at all these Coke cans!” Javier said, his eyes like saucers.
They collected about a case of soda and hauled their booty two hundred yards back to the water’s edge. They sat in their canoes, shaded and protected by the jungle, each of them drinking a soda.
Eliza took a swig and said, “I haven’t had a nondiet Coke since I was a kid. I was too afraid of getting fat like my mother.” She raised her can to Summer. “You did good.”
Gavin and Javier also raised their cans to Summer.
She grinned in response.
76
Naomi Opposes Psycho Island
“Since the island prisons opened in 2044, they’ve sent over two million people to these inhumane godforsaken places. Two million people.” Naomi paused, letting that number sink in with the crowd. “Some of you may be thinking these island prisoners are psychopaths and have no place in polite society.” Naomi nodded to herself, the Baltimore harbor with two docked prison ships in the background. “But what if they’re not all psychopaths? What if the due process loophole they’ve created to rid our society of predators is also being used to eradicate political opponents?”
A few thousand people stood by the harbor, slack-jawed, hanging on Naomi’s every word.
“The island prisons have been used exclusively by Republican presidents. According to survey data, over half of the people sent to these prisons are people of color, precisely those people who don’t vote Republican. But it’s not just people of color who are targeted in these incarceration schemes. It’s antifascist activists, socialists, and people who are upset with our crony capitalist government.” Naomi took a deep breath. “I spoke with many families of many island prisoners, and, more often than not, their son or daughter or brother or sister is a person of color and a person who opposed the tyranny of a government that’s been bought and paid for.
“I’m not here to tell you that voting Democrat is the answer. It’s not. My democratic opponents, Corrinne Powers and Randal Montgomery, both supported the Island Prison Crime Bill in 2043. If they’re elected president, I expect business as usual.” Naomi surveyed the audience again. People held signs that read Send the Republicans to Psycho Island, Bring the Prisoners Home, Close Psycho Island, and Naomi Sutton 2052. “If I’m elected, I’ll end this barbaric system of incarceration. I’ll review the cases of each and every inmate sent to the island prisons, and we’ll rescue those sent there unlawfully. We’ll reunite them with their families, regardless of the color of their skin or their political persuasion.”
The crowd cheered.
77
Derek and the Games
The locker room was full of men, some bragging and pumping themselves up; others dead quiet, fear in their eyes. Derek sat on a bench next to Jordan, his knee bouncing with nervous energy.
Jordan glanced at Derek’s knee and said, “Relax. Don’t waste your energy.”
Derek stopped fidgeting. He hadn’t even noticed his knee until Jordan pointed it out.
It was Sunday. Game day. They were waiting to be called to the stadium to fight to the death. They had no idea who would be their opponent, only that it would be a white man from another locker room. They’d watched other men called, some of these grown men crying and begging the Aryans to have mercy, to let them go. The ones who were inconsolable were sent to another room. Derek knew they wouldn’t be spared. The Reaper had said that, if they refused to fight, they’d be sacrificed at halftime.
“How can you be so relaxed?” Derek asked.
“I’m not,” Jordan replied. “I’m conserving my energy. If we’re gonna get out of here alive, I figure we have to win at least four fights, maybe more, depending on how many guys refuse to fight. It’ll be a war of attrition. Not wasting my energy now gives me a small advantage over those other guys who are freaking out. Could be the difference between winning and losing. Living and dying.”
The Aryans used the best fighters for single combat. It was a fight to the death, the winner advancing to the next round. Only one winner would survive the day, the prize being induction into the Aryan Nation—or the tribe of choice if the winner happened to be nonwhite.
Derek was happy that the Aryans had classified him as nonwhite. The Aryans pitted whites against nonwhites in these bouts. The last person he wanted to face was Jordan. Derek wondered what would happen if the winners of each round were predominately from one race or another. If I win my bouts and Jordan wins his bouts, we’d face each other in the finals.
Derek held his breath as an Aryan trainer approached, walking past Derek and Jordan, pointing at a group of approximately ten black men. “Let’s go. Y’all are on deck.” The black men left, some with puffed-up chests, others with bulging eyes and shaky knees. Those men had been picked for group combat.
Derek exhaled and said, “I don’t know if I can do it.”
“When I was a kid, I played varsity football as a freshman,” Jordan said. “My first game, I was scared shitless. Back then, I was only a buck forty. But, after the first hit, I was fine. Some guys have that aggression. Once they’re in a fight, they let go of the fear, and they fight for their life. Other people lay down and die. You’ll fight when the time comes.”
Derek nodded, then said, “You never told me why you’re here.”
“Neither did you.”
“I killed the man who raped and murdered my girlfriend.”
Jordan turned to Derek, his face stone-cold. “Pretend that piece of shit is every man you fight today.”
They didn’t say anything for a few minutes, Derek processing the advice, Jordan wearing his game face.
Then Jordan said, “I was with an Army Special Forces unit. We trained the Venezuelan rebels. Supplied them with the dirty bombs they used in Caracas. Then, with the country in shambles, the US companies came in and bought the place for pennies on the Fed Coin, and we secured another forty years of oil. I was a part of that.” He shook his head, his jaw set tight. “I was a product of the system. American patriotism and exceptionalism. That shit was shoved down my throat since birth. But, after Venezuela, a crack opened in me, and I was never the same. I couldn’t unsee the shit I saw. As much as I tried, I couldn’t erase the truth. I went AWOL. Got involved with an antigovernment group called 1776. I started posting videos anonymously, talking about all the shit we did in Venezuela. I was broadcasting in different places. I lived off the grid for ten years. I was careful, but a facial recognition camera caught my face, and they brought me in for going AWOL, and my last post was still on my computer.” Jordan took a deep cleansing breath. “They classified me as an Unlawful Enemy Combatant, and you know the rest.”
The Aryan trainer approached and pointed at them. “Let’s go. You’re on deck.”
They were led to the dugout. The roar of the crowd rose and fell with the action on the field. A battle royale was in progress, with a group of whites fighting the group of blacks that had been summoned only minutes earlier. Bodies lay motionless and bloody. Men swung their machetes and swords wildly, missing more than hitting.
Derek winced as a black man was stabbed through his stomach, the blade exiting his back. The white man yanked at the sword, but it was stuck. Another black man approached from behind and plunged a knife into the white man’s neck. Derek turned away, his stomach queasy.
Swords and machetes leaned against the dugout wall, like baseball bats. Knives were displayed on the bench. The weapons were rusted, but the edges
were fresh and sharp. A dozen Aryans stood watch over the weapons.
One of them pointed his machete at Jordan and said, “You’re next. Pick a weapon.” Jordan looked over the knives, feeling the weight in his palm, checking the edges, finally settling on two fixed-blade knives, one six-inches long, the other eight-inches long, and both razor sharp.
An Aryan snickered. “Little blades for such a big man.”
Jordan sat on the bench, unresponsive. Derek knew Jordan planned to use a knife if given the chance. They’d practiced with wooden swords for days, and yesterday they’d practiced with steel swords. The steel swords were very heavy and cumbersome. Most of the men were out of shape and huffing and puffing after swinging the swords for a short time. In addition, Jordan was much more comfortable with a knife.
The crowd roared again. Derek looked from Jordan to the field. The fans stood and cheered. Eighteen bodies lay motionless in the dirt. Two dark-skinned men stood with their machetes raised over their heads, their bodies covered from head to toe with the blood of the others. Aryan guards surrounded the men, and they dropped their machetes. They escorted them back to the locker room, the crowd giving the men a standing ovation. If The Reaper was a man of his word, the winner or winners of the battle royale would be given to the gang of their choice.
While the Aryans removed the dead bodies, three skinny women pranced to the middle of the field, wearing nothing but boots, and holding pom poms over their breasts. They performed a weird dance that was part striptease, part cheerleader routine. The crowd cheered each time they bent over, bounced, or twirled.
2050: Psycho Island Page 27