Ren began to shake. Sweat coated his forehead as a wave of heat surged through his muscles, like a fire unleashed in his veins.
She was going to boil him from the inside out.
“I don’t know!” Ren said.
The heat rose. He vomited bile.
“Don’t lie to us.” Major Endo slid her gaze to the mirror, and somehow Ren knew that Crown Prince Katsura was watching them. Waiting for Ren to crack. “Where did you take the princess?”
Every inch of Ren burned, and he knew he was dying. Memories flashed through his mind, snapshots from his last sixteen years: the shop, the cliffs, his dad, and his mom. He held on to the picture of her inside his head. He would never know if she was in Alcatraz or not, but he had given the Resistance the key to find out.
That would have to be enough.
When the pain exploded a hundredfold, Ren felt himself go, floating above the room, above the Fortress, above White Crescent Bay, and higher still.
He hoped that this was the end.
Ren’s eyes fluttered open.
He wasn’t dead. The pain told him that he was still alive.
But he had no idea where he was, either.
Lying on his back, he found himself in a world of mist and wind. Sheets of dark gray clouds covered the sky, and a cold drizzle fell onto his cheeks, sliding down his face and rolling onto his neck. Water lapped close by, and his body rocked slowly back and forth.
He was on a boat.
Ren tried to sit up but couldn’t. It hurt too much. So he lay there while his head pounded and his throat begged for water and his shriveled stomach hungered for some soup or rice. He felt wrung dry and exhausted, but Major Endo wasn’t hitting him or kicking him and, for that, he never wanted to leave this place.
Fingers of darkness crept into the corners of Ren’s vision, and he teetered again on the edges of consciousness. But before his eyelids fell, he saw something in the distance — a massive bridge, so long that it took up his whole line of vision and so high that the top of it was obscured by the clouds. He had seen it before on his visits to San Francisco. The Golden Gate Bridge.
Sea spray misted Ren’s cheeks, and the cry of gulls echoed in his ears. The water rolled beneath him in a steady rhythm, and Ren thought that he was dreaming. When the blackness beckoned him again, he fell into it without putting up a fight.
The next time Ren woke up, he wasn’t sure how long he had been out. He only recognized the coldness that made his teeth chatter and his body shiver all over. He was lying on yet another cot, stripped down to a thin T-shirt and boxers, the same pair he had been wearing the night that he was shot. The clothes stank of blood and filth, and if that wasn’t bad enough, his limbs and stomach had been bound to his bed with thick leather straps. Ren had no choice but to lie flat on his back, staring up at the fluorescent lights on the dripping ceiling.
Shuddering from the damp, Ren grimaced as a new wave of pain crashed over his body. It had dulled around the edges, but not by much. His gunshot wounds had been haphazardly re-stitched after Major Endo had split them open. He closed his eyes at that awful memory, but Endo wouldn’t be banished so easily. He could still feel her fingertips on his head, and he could still see the small smile resting at the corners of her lips whenever he screamed. She had wanted to kill him, but someone must have ordered her to stop. The Empire must have had more plans for Ren.
More questions?
More torture?
Panic seized him. He couldn’t face Endo again and whatever else the Empire had planned for him: needles in his veins, surgery without anesthesia, or chemicals pumped through his body until he couldn’t take any more. The Empire had probably patched him up just to break him again.
But there was no way for Ren to wriggle out of his straps. He didn’t even know where he was. He found himself in a large concrete cube of a room. Dozens of cots were lined up next to his own, some of them occupied, others empty. A strange stench hung in the air — a mixture of bleach and ammonia that covered up a third scent, which hovered underneath Ren’s nose, smelling sour and foul and wrong. It smelled of death.
Ren’s head jerked to one side when a silver-haired Japanese woman approached his cot. She was wearing a crisp white nurse’s uniform and matching white shoes. Ren’s breath felt trapped in his throat. Should he pretend that he was asleep? But the nurse had noticed that he was awake and had already grabbed the clipboard at the foot of his bed.
She approached him with a frown and stuck a thermometer into Ren’s mouth, nearly gagging him. Then she gave his wounds a passing glance before jotting something on the clipboard and mumbling, “Patient may be dispatched tomorrow or the next day.”
“Dispatched? Where am I?” The words tumbled out around the thermometer. Ren’s pulse had doubled speed. Would he turn into a laboratory mouse that soon?
The nurse didn’t reply. Instead, she glanced over her shoulder and called out, “Bring him some water and rations but not too much. We have orders to get him as strong as possible, but we’re not a charity.”
The nurse removed the thermometer, made another notation, and stomped away to attend to another patient who had started thrashing and screaming. A handful of seconds passed before a different nurse swung by Ren’s cot, pushing a rickety metal cart. She looked younger, perhaps in her early twenties, but her face seemed drained of color, as if she hadn’t stepped into sunlight for months.
Pulling a stool to Ren’s bedside, the nurse poured water into a paper cup and some of the liquid spilled out because her hands were shaking, which was strange. She held the cup to Ren’s lips while he took a few timid sips of the gritty-tasting liquid. Then the nurse removed the lid of a metal pot and ladled a single scoop of rice gruel into a bowl as her fingers kept trembling. She brought the bowl to Ren’s lips, and he sniffed at it. A few spots of mold floated on the gruel’s surface, but his starving stomach won out and he slurped it hungrily.
“Slowly,” the nurse said, her voice pitched high.
Ren was halfway finished when he almost choked on something sharp. He coughed it out to find a folded-up piece of paper.
The nurse seemed to have been expecting this. She angled her body to obscure the paper from the other medical attendants scattered around the room, and she pressed the note into Ren’s open hand. “Read it.”
“What —”
She shook her head to silence him. “Hurry. Please.”
Bewildered, Ren tried to open the paper with one hand, but he could barely move his arm and the note kept slipping out of reach. Finally, the nurse did it for him and placed the paper flat into his palm. Ren scanned the faint writing and his eyes bulged at what he saw.
Callipepla californica. I am a friend of your cousin’s. She knows me as Bluefin.
Ren fought to steady his breathing. Marty had mentioned a source within Alcatraz code-named Bluefin, and this nurse had also known Marty’s code phrase. He read on.
You’re in a medical facility on Alcatraz Island. You were brought here not long after the Joint Prosperity Ball. The Revolutionary Alliance attacked the Fortress during the ball to free Zara St. James, but they failed. The Fortress is on lockdown, and Zara was transferred to Alcatraz along with you. I believe she’s being held at the main prison.
A chill snuck down Ren’s back. The Empire must have moved Zara to Alcatraz after her Alliance failed to rescue her. Now both he and Zara were locked up on this island, with thick walls surrounding them and only frigid seas beyond.
I’ve been in touch with your cousin via radio. She and your father are safe, but the Resistance canceled their operation on the prison. Tessa and Aiko didn’t show up at the safe house. We don’t know their whereabouts. Until they arrive, we have to wait.
Ren’s chest hurt reading that — in relief and in pain. Marty and his dad were alive and breathing free air, and he was grateful for that, but now he worried about Tessa. Had she gotten caught? He didn’t want to think about that, and he didn’t want to think about what this m
eant for the mission. If Tessa and Aiko had been captured or killed, then there was no way for the Resistance to land their forces on Alcatraz. They wouldn’t be able to free the prisoners being held here. Including Zara. Including himself.
Hopelessness descended over Ren like a cloak. The mission had collapsed — he had gambled and lost, and now he was trapped in Alcatraz. Amid the darkness, though, Ren found one jagged shred of light.
If his mom was alive, then she was somewhere nearby. Somewhere close.
Suddenly, Bluefin grasped the paper, plunked it back into the rice bowl, and urged Ren to down the contents. Wincing, Ren managed to swallow the gruel and destroy the evidence of the note’s existence. As soon as he was finished, Bluefin’s radio chirped in her pocket and she scuttled to her feet, nearly knocking the stool over in the process.
“I have to go,” she whispered. “I’ve stayed too long.”
“Wait!” Ren’s fingers grabbed the back of her uniform. There was so much more that they needed to discuss, about Zara’s whereabouts, about what Crown Prince Katsura had planned for him — and about one thing in particular. “Is my mom alive? Her name is Jenny Tsai.”
But Bluefin was already wheeling the cart away from him and out of the room entirely.
Ren stared after her, awaiting a response that wouldn’t come. It killed him that his mother could be so close but there was no way for him to search for her. He was stuck on this cot, deep in the Empire’s lair, with little hope and no way out.
The Viper was trapped.
Ren dreamed of dark and twisted things. He was back at the Fortress, and the base was in flames. Screams shattered Ren’s eardrums while he tried to escape the inferno. He stumbled over moaning bodies that clawed at his shoes with burnt fingertips. One of the bodies clutched Ren’s pant leg, and he looked down to find Jay staring up at him. Then the face shifted into Marty’s. Then Mr. Cabot’s.
Help me, Ren, his father whispered. Help me get home.
But the smoke thickened, and Ren could no longer see his father. He shouted his dad’s name until his throat was scratched raw. Don’t leave me, Dad. Come back, come back, come back.
Somebody shook Ren out of his dream, and he jerked awake into a different nightmare entirely. He was still in the medical clinic at Alcatraz and was still strapped to his cot. Bluefin hovered over him, and she looked worried.
“Wake up,” she said, slapping his cheek as a show to the other nurses. “You need to eat and drink. You have a long day ahead.” Just like their last encounter, she held up a cup of water to his lips and then a bowl of rice gruel.
With sleep clinging to his eyelids, Ren managed to gulp some water, but even such a small act pulled at his swollen stitches. Then he took in the gruel sip by sip until he discovered a new note from Bluefin. He slid it out of his mouth, and she helped him unfold it before placing it into his hand.
Good news: Tessa and Aiko have been found, but the attack is stalled. There’s no way inside. Alcatraz has ordered that all incoming ships must have the correct passcode. No exceptions for fingerprint and retina scans.
Ren felt something being crushed inside him. His heart, maybe. Or his last wisps of hope. He wasn’t surprised that the Empire had taken these precautions, but having his suspicions confirmed felt like another kick to his gut. The Resistance may have put together a huge army of fighters, but what good was that if there was no way of accessing the prison?
Your cousin has been talking to Zara’s Alliance. Her uncle has sent troops across the border to help the Resistance and to retrieve his niece. Both the Alliance and the Resistance may attempt a prisoner exchange — Aiko for you, Zara, and the other detainees.
Ren blinked at this development. A part of him was skeptical that the Empire would accept a prisoner exchange of this magnitude. Trading Aiko for over a hundred American prisoners, including Zara, himself, and all of the Anomalies? That was too much to ask, but such a deal could work if the crown prince was desperate enough to get his daughter back, especially now that his wife and unborn son had been killed. The Empire needed Aiko to cement the upcoming deal with the Nazis. If she wasn’t in the picture, there would be no engagement — and possibly no more V2.
The note continued, but Ren had to ask something first. He had been turning the thought over and over since he last saw Bluefin, and he couldn’t hold it back any longer.
“Is my mother alive?” he whispered. “Is she here?”
Bluefin gave a small nod. “Yes, she’s here.”
Ren forgot how to breathe. Joy surged through him, dulling the pain that clung to his wounds. “Is she … is she all right?”
Bluefin looked away, which dampened Ren’s relief.
Before she could say anything, though, the head nurse called to Bluefin from the front of the room. “Get the prisoner ready! The guards are coming for him.”
“Hai,” Bluefin replied to her superior.
“The guards?” Ren whispered, the questions about his mother silenced for now.
Bluefin nodded and motioned at the note, and Ren hurriedly finished the rest of it.
Unfortunately, the bad news. Now that you’ve recovered enough, they’re sending you back to interrogation. I’m very sorry, but there’s nothing I can do.
Sweat broke along Ren’s hairline. He couldn’t go through another round of torture. He couldn’t go back to that place. As his pulse went erratic, Ren pulled hard against his restraints. He would rather die trying to escape than with Endo’s hands on his skull again, his blood raging hotter and hotter.
“Let me out!” Ren rasped at Bluefin.
She looked stricken, but she pursed her lips and held down Ren’s shoulders with a surprisingly strong grip. With one hand, she dropped her note into the gruel and forced him to drink it. Ren wouldn’t open his mouth.
“You’ll get us both killed if you don’t!” she whispered back to him. “And you need to eat to keep up your strength. Open up.”
Ren choked down the slippery rice, but that was all the complacency he would give her.
“I can’t go back!” Ren knew he sounded desperate, but he didn’t care. “Kill me. Give me an overdose of something. Please!”
Just then, the doors to the clinic were flung open. Two prison guards strode inside, searching over each bed-strapped patient until they landed upon Ren. Bluefin grasped the handle of her cart.
“Stay strong,” she said, regarding him with pity before she retreated into the shadows.
Ren wanted to call her back, but he couldn’t. Even now, he knew better than to reveal their connection, but he couldn’t stop the panic that flooded him. He yanked again at the restraints, his feeble muscles straining as far as they would go, but the prison guards overpowered him easily. One of them pressed him down while the other undid Ren’s straps. Working together, they dragged Ren from the cot. Ren’s bare feet hit the floor and his knees buckled immediately from days without use, but the guards simply flanked him and carried him out of the clinic and onto the gravel path outside, not bothering to cover his feet.
Once they were out in the open, Ren flinched in the daylight, even though a layer of thick clouds stretched across the sky, smearing the sun and shielding the city from sight. A biting breeze sent shivers down Ren’s skin. He was wearing a worn prisoner’s jumpsuit, pocked with holes and old blood — it might have been his or it might have been someone else’s — and he trembled in the chilly weather.
Wisps of fog curled around Alcatraz, but Ren finally managed to get his first lucid glimpse of the place. It was an enormous rock plunked into the middle of a bay, with a lone road that circled the island and a half dozen buildings that branched out from that path. Most of those buildings — like the water tower and the medical facility that Ren had left behind — were situated close to shore, but the main prison rose above the rest, built at the very center and the very pinnacle of Alcatraz.
The main prison seemed to watch Ren’s approach with its security cameras twisting and turning their metal nec
ks to follow him. Truth be told, the building looked rather ordinary to Ren, merely three stories tall and with a plain façade. But he knew what he feared most lay within those walls, not without.
The guards yanked Ren to the prison entrance, where they passed through the heavily locked main door and the inside gate. The soles of Ren’s feet slid over cool concrete as they entered the cellblock. Each cell was squished against the next like matches in a matchbox, and they were stacked on top of one another, three levels high. The rooms were tiny, too, with barely enough space to cram in a bed, a toilet, a sink, and the prisoners themselves.
That’s when Ren dug his heels against the floor — he saw his own future etched on those lifeless faces. Some of the prisoners lay on bare mattresses, hooked to an IV bag of bright orange or neon-yellow liquid. If they heard Ren coming, they didn’t seem to care; they simply gazed up at the ceiling. Other prisoners sat on the cell floor, hugging their knees to their chests and knocking their heads against the bars. And still there were more, a few with missing limbs or eyes, a couple with no teeth or hair. An old man was scratching so desperately at his arms that his skin had turned into a bloodied mess. Yet he wouldn’t stop. He just kept whispering, “It’s in my blood. I have to get it out. It’s inside me.”
Despite the gruesomeness surrounding him, Ren kept looking into every cell that they passed. His mother might be close. Ren tried shouting her name, but one of the guards thrust his elbow into Ren’s gut and that was enough to silence him.
The guards strode by the last cell in the block and headed into the cavernous room at the back of the building. Every window had been blacked out, and the fluorescent lights overhead offered a flickering and unreliable light source. A long, thick curtain had been strung along the ceiling, cutting the room down the middle and obscuring the other half from Ren’s view. But the curtain couldn’t block the sounds drifting through the fabric, groans and cries and a growl. Ren shivered. He didn’t want to think about what was beyond.
The guards deposited Ren at the center of the space, pushing him onto a metal folding chair that dug into his spine. The area around Ren was empty, aside from a lone standing spotlight. One of the guards switched on the light, and it flooded Ren’s face with its hot brightness. When he managed to pry open his eyes, the guards had taken a few steps back, their arms at their sides. They hadn’t bothered to restrain Ren to the seat.
Live in Infamy Page 18