Death Wish

by Lindsey Menges

  The mystery woman picks the third door on the right and crouches down. I slide back into the shadows so I can continue watching her. I watch her pull a small leather pouch from her pocket, taking out some slender tools. She proceeds to fiddle with the room’s lock. Once she successfully picks it she stands up, turns the handle, and slips inside.

  I lean back and slide down to the ground, wondering what on Earth I’m doing following her. I don’t have any weapons or backup, and the building is completely empty except for the two of us. I have a new suspect for the Smith case, and when I report the details of this event tomorrow morning the higher-ups can move forward in the investigation. I sigh and get back up, prepared to head out, when I see the sign hanging above the hallway.

  LIFE CHIP RESEARCH WING

  Well. That changes things. Someone sneaking around the abandoned Life Chip Research area in the dead of night can’t have good intentions. I could wait until tomorrow to report this, but what if this person is preparing to kill more citizens? Even though I’m alone, she is too. With a new rush of resolve running through my veins, I stand up and run back to my office.

  A few minutes later I’m standing outside of the room again, breathing heavily from the run but now armed. My gun with anesthesia bullets I use on assignments is now holstered against my hip. I feel more prepared with some form of protection other than my fists. I draw the gun and slowly move forward, stopping just outside of the room. I press my ear to the door to listen. I hear soft clacking sounds; my quarry is typing on one of the computer’s keyboards. The clacking stops, and a robotic male voice says Now accessing Life Chip schematic records.

  That’s all I need to hear. The Life Chip records are strictly off-limits to everyone except for the Engineers who created them. And since I doubt an Engineer would need to pick the lock of an office they should have a key for, it’s obvious that the person who broke in shouldn’t be in there. And I’m now certain that this person is involved with the deaths of Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

  I slowly draw my gun from its holster while moving my other hand to the room’s doorknob. I turn it, but to my dismay I find that the woman re-locked it when she went inside. Knowing that I can’t risk letting her get any more information, I take a deep breath, lean back, and kick down the door.

  “Freeze!”

  I burst into the room while aiming my gun at the person by the computer. Her back is to me, facing the screen when I enter. She jumps at my entrance and immediately freezes, her hands still hovering over the keyboard.

  “Unauthorized access to Life Chip records is strictly forbidden. Raise your hands above your head and turn around,” I order, moving closer in case she tries anything. The woman remains frozen a moment longer, but then her shoulders slump. She sighs.

  “Dammit, ‘Liza,” She mutters while she raises her hands. “Why did it have to be you?”

  She turns around slowly. The light from the computer catches her green eyes. My stomach drops.

  It’s Robin.

  *

  “Robin?” I’m confused and in shock. Why is she in the lab? “W-what are you doing?”

  She smirks, and with her hands still raised leans back against the desk she had been typing at. The light from the dozens of monitors in the room casts her in an eerie blue glow.

  “Oh you know, just taking a midnight stroll through the office. Something wrong with that?”

  She smirks, lazily crossing one leg in front of the other while she stares at me.

  I lower my gun slightly while still keeping my finger on the trigger.

  “No, there’s nothing wrong with that,” I reply. “But there is something wrong with stealing classified Life Chip information. And I’m pretty sure that’s what you’re really doing.”

  “Wow, nothing gets past you, huh?” She’s mocking me now, widening her eyes in an exaggerated display of surprise. “How about we say I got lost, and came in here looking for a map?”

  “Actually, I was thinking we’ll say—”

  I freeze, my retort cut off as understanding washes over me.

  “Oh… Oh no… Robin, tell me you aren’t the one who killed the Smiths.”

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  She still keeps that indifferent smirk plastered on her face. But there is a slight tremor in her upraised hands, and her cheeks flushed in the blue light when I spoke. I narrow my eyes at her, the reality of her betrayal finally setting in. I stride forward, raising my gun again.

  “You can pretend to be innocent later, but right now you’re coming with me.”

  Robin spins. In the blink of an eye, her suddenly outstretched leg kicks the gun out of my hands. Shock overrides my senses, and with that moment’s hesitation she ducks past me to run out the door.

  “Damn it!”

  I dive down to grab my gun, and a second later I’m sprinting after her.

  Robin runs down the hallway. As I give chase I remember the first time I ran with her when we exercised in the Training Room. At the time, I had thought she was just a natural runner. But now I see that her speed is not a gift, but rather the result of extensive training. She turns left into another hallway, and I can’t help but smirk. The corridor she’s just turned in to cuts off in a dead end.

  I turn into the passage in time to see Robin reach the end of it, look around in fear, and whip back to face me with an expression of loathing. She charges forward and pulls back her fist to punch me in the face.

  I transfer my gun to one hand and catch her fist with the other, stopping its trajectory a few inches away from my face. I quickly slip the gun back into its holster, draw back my now-empty hand, and sink my fist into her stomach. She lets out a grimaced oomph and doubles over.

  “Don’t even try to tussle with me, Sun,” I snarl, slamming my right knee into her chin. She lets out another pained cry and falls to the ground. I move over, standing with my legs on either side of her collapsed form. I pull out my gun and point it down at her. “You know what I’m capable of.”

  She coughs. The small spray of blood that accompanies it shows that the impact of my knee did some damage.

  “Freaking bitch,” she rasps, still curled around her stomach from my earlier hit.

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m the jerk here.” I click off the safety of my gun, and motion at her with it. “Get up,” I say, stepping back but still keeping the aim on her. “You’ve got some explaining to do on our walk.”

  “Our… walk?”

  She pushes herself into a sitting position. Hatred is still plastered across her face, but now it’s accompanied by apprehension.

  “Yeah, didn’t you hear? When you kill citizens without authorization, you get a special prize: a one-on-one meeting with the Primary!”

  I throw her a wide grin of mock-excitement. She spits on the ground, a glob of saliva and blood, and looks at me with pure rage.

  A small pang shoots through my chest. I hope that she can’t see the pain I’m feeling underneath my sarcastic demeanor.

  “Get up,” I repeat, but this time I bend down and grasp her arm, pulling her to her feet.

  I keep my hand firmly gripped on her forearm and turn her around; now she walks in front of me, her enclosed arm twisted behind her and the barrel of my gun pressed into her back.

  “You know,” I say, my words echoing down the empty hallway as we walk, “I feel really stupid for not figuring it out sooner. Those poor people died just after you got here. So tell me, Godmother Sun, why were you looking up Life Chip schematics? Trying to figure out how to kill more people?”

  I jerk her arm up and she winces. The dim lights glint off the metal of my weapon.

  Robin doesn’t respond. Instead, she twists around suddenly, and her free fist collides with my shoulder. I let out a pained noise but don’t relinquish my grip on her arm like she was hoping. Instead I holster my gun to free my other hand and deliver a swift punch to her kidney. She cries out and I pull her close, wrapping my free arm around her neck.

 
“I wouldn’t recommend that,” I whisper, my mouth inches from her ear. “Do you know how many Wish assignments I’ve completed that involve apprehending someone? People really have a weird obsession with the whole ‘cops and robbers’ relationship.”

  Robin snarls under her breath, but she finally responds to my comments.

  “Don’t compare what I’m doing with the sick fantasies of your clients,” she spits out, shaking her shoulders in an attempt to free herself. But the way I’m holding her arm behind her only causes her pain, so she stops quickly. “There’s a difference between catering to selfish desires and being a part of what’s right.”

  “People are dying, Robin! How is that right?” I tighten my grip on her arm as I force her to the door.

  “How is murder right, Miss Fairy Godmother?”

  She is still angry, but she isn’t trying to escape me anymore. Her attitude is pissing me off, and my frustration makes me snap at her.

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  She lets out a sharp huff, infuriated that she has to explain herself.

  “I’m talking about killing people. I’m talking about the blood of innocent, living humans being shed by people who think that they’re doing them a favor. But it’s sick, and it’s wrong. People can’t live forever. We need real, natural death in our world again.”

  Another pang shoots through my chest, but I keep my expression neutral. I can’t let her know that I’ve been having the same thoughts. Because even if I think our system needs to change, murdering innocent civilians is not the way to go about it.

  “Would you rather we return to the time before the unlimited organ supply? Before the Life Chip was even conceived?” I keep my doubts to myself. “It wasn’t just the elderly who died, it was everyone. Children contracted horribly painful diseases that couldn’t be cured in time. They died before they could even live. Do you really think you could argue against the system we have now if you were looking into the face of a three-year-old with inoperable cancer? Could you spew your propaganda to their parents?”

  I let go of her arm and spin her around, pressing the barrel of my gun into her stomach to remind her she can’t run.

  “Make no mistake,” I whisper, leaning close so that my eyes are only a few inches from hers. “The world was sick and rotting. What we have now is better than mankind could have ever hoped for.”

  Robin’s green, almond-shaped eyes narrow at my words, but then she looks away with a sigh, her face taking on an expression of sadness.

  “It’s not better,” she says, her voice small and filled with pain. “We just put a pretty coat of paint onto a hell no one could have imagined.”

  I ignore her words and take her arm again, marching her away from the deserted Research Wing of the building and towards the Godparent offices.

  “I’m taking you to the Primary, Godmother Sun,” I state, looking away as I try to mask the pain I feel at her betrayal.

  *

  While she occasionally tries to jerk her arm away, Robin makes no real effort to escape me. Instead, she keeps talking through my silence.

  “Did you know that we’re the only country in the world with the Life Chips?”

  When I don’t respond, she continues.

  “It’s a good thing, too. There aren’t enough natural resources to support this many people. Before all of this limitless longevity, there was a relatively equal balance between people being born and people dying. Sure, sometimes the balance was slightly skewed in one direction or the other, but overall the ratio of newly-living to newly-dead was pretty even. But now, with these new methods of immortality, the number of people who are willing to actually choose to die is way less than the numbers that want to keep living.”

  I glance at her, and she tilts her head.

  “Do you know why that’s a problem?”

  I look forward again, still not responding, and I feel her shrug her shoulders before answering her own question.

  “It’s a problem because this planet can’t sustain that many people. There isn’t enough food or resources to go around, and that leads to shortages that really hurt the population. If it wasn’t for the unlimited supply of new, healthy organs, the people in our country would be dying off pretty quickly due to the lack of healthy living. But because of the organs and Life Chips, no one notices that they’re living an inferior life.”

  Unable to help myself, I respond.

  “But how can you call it an inferior life, if everyone is alive and well?”

  She makes a noise of disbelief, and when I look again Robin has a sad, lost look on her face. “They may be alive, but people aren’t well.”

  For a moment all I want to do is comfort my former protégé. But then I remember what I caught her doing and I steel myself, pushing down the compassion and renewing my grip.

  “I’m sick of your vague comments,” I mutter, pulling her along.

  We’ve finally reached the hallway of the Godparent offices.

  *

  We walk down the thinly carpeted hallway, neither one of us speaking, when suddenly an ear-piercing shriek comes from an office a few feet away. We both jump and look at each other. Without speaking, we run forward to stand outside the office the noise came from. I look at the sign on the door and see that the office, and the scream, belongs to Jenny, a Godmother who joined the Fairy Godparent division two years after I did. She was the one I waved to at the Smith meeting. I knock hesitantly, and when another scream answers I push open the door, my hand still a tight vice on Robin’s wrist.

  Inside, Jenny is curled up on the room’s couch, her head laying in the lap of her partner Albert. He’s bent over her, whispering softly while Jenny shudders in his embrace, her sobs occasionally punctuated by another shriek. Albert looks up in surprise at the sound of us, but when he sees me an agonized expression passes his face.

  “What happened?”

  I ask the question in a soft whisper. I pull Robin into the room before shutting the door behind us.

  Jenny gasps out a sob, and Albert strokes her hair gently while he answers us.

  “She just came back from assignment…” he says, speaking softly in an attempt to calm her.

  While she isn’t screaming anymore, Jenny is still clearly distressed. Her outfit, a yellow blouse and dark blue jeans, is disheveled, and beneath the rips in her shirt I can see streaks of dried blood. Albert looks at me, mouths the file, and pointedly looks at Jenny’s desk. I release Robin’s wrist and look at her, my expression saying that I will track her down again if she tries to run. But from the horrified look on her face, I can see that she won’t be going anywhere.

  I cross over to the desk and pick up the manila folder lying on top of it. I open it, see the name of the target, and then scan down and read the Death Wish. My eyes slowly widen as I read, and at the end I close my eyes, sympathetic pain for what Jenny has just endured coursing through me.

  “What is it?”

  I turn to see Robin standing by my shoulder, trying to get a look at the folder. I hand it to her, mouth Something horrible, and look back at the two on the couch. Seeing Jenny shudder in Albert’s arms makes an unbidden memory burst through. The scars that lace across my back burn and I have to push the memory away before it consumes me. But, because I went through something similar to Jenny, I think I know what to do.

  I move over to the pair and crouch down, gently taking Jenny’s hands into mine. She lets out a gasp at the contact, but when I start to softly whisper to her the shaking begins to subside.

  “Jenny. Jenny, it’s okay,” I say, holding her hands with one of my own and stroking her hair with the other. “You’re safe now, Jenny. You’re with people who love you…”

  While her breathing begins to slow into a gentle lull, I recall the words that were spoken to me years ago when I endured a Wish like this one. I start reusing them, almost like I’m reciting memorized lines from a script.

  “Eliza. Eliza, look at me. My name is Ashley, I
’m in the office across from you.”

  “Jenny, it’s Eliza, from down the hall. Jenny, can you look at me?”

  I’m not sure why, but when I was being comforted the continuous repetition of my name helped me focus. It seems to be working on Jenny too. She looks up at me, her big brown eyes emptying and refilling a constant stream of tears. She’s hiccuping, and a trail of mucus flows from her nose, mingling with the dried blood on her face.

  “Eliza, I know that you’ve been through something horrible that no one can imagine. But I can promise you that you’re safe in this room.”

  A warm hand on my shoulder, because my back is too bloody and broken to withstand any touch.

  “Jenny, I can’t even begin to tell you how sorry I am for what’s happened,” I murmer, making sure my hand avoids anywhere I see blood. “No one here can imagine what you’ve just experienced.”

  An expression of pain streaks across her face. Another agonized sob escapes her lips, but she keeps her eyes locked on mine.

  “I haven’t endured what you have,” the woman named Ashley says, her voice gentle and soothing. “But I have had to endure a Wish that was atrocious like yours.”

  I pull my hands down from my face, and see that a latticework of angry, raised welts covers both of her arms.

  “Eliza, I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now… But I can promise you that you will come back from this.”

  “Jenny, after what you’ve just gone through, I won’t pretend to understand what you’re feeling.”

  I’m still using the kind, warm tone Ashley had used for me, and Jenny is hanging on to my every word. Relief rises in me for a moment when her hands squeeze my own. I remove the hand that was stroking her hair and use it to gently take one of her hands and place it on my shoulder.

  “Jenny, have you seen the scars on my back?”

  She nods. It’s a quick, barely-there motion, but I know that she heard and understood.