Streetlethal

by Steven Barnes

  Legs already trembling gave out, and he collapsed to the ground. His mouth was working, trying to find a way to force something out. Aubry stood, unable to move. One of Carl's hands was outstretched, a blood-smeared claw that trembled as his body heaved in a final spasm. The breath leaked out of him in a great sigh.

  Aubry looked up and caught a brief glimpse of sick-white faces staring from their cells. The faces disappeared as a sudden pattering of feet filled the hallway. Aubry was pushed aside as the guards went to Carl.

  Two of them examined the body, while a third, faceplate dropped, waved Aubry away with the tip of his shock prod. "All right. Back to your block."

  Aubry didn't move. "Don't you want to question me?"

  "No." The faceplate curved and distorted Aubry's reflection into a funhouse mirage. The guard's voice was flat. "We saw everything."

  "Then you've got them?"

  Now a touch of irritation came into the voice. "This is our business. We'll handle it. Now get back to your cell, Knight."

  "Did you catch them?" Aubry stayed where he was, even when the guard thumbed his prod to humming life.

  "I said to get back to your cell."

  "You won't catch them, will you?"

  "Knight—"

  "You don't give a damn about this, do you?" The prod whined, Aubry twisted to the side as the guard moved. He slapped the guard's insulated glove away with his right hand, and his left blurred out instantly, stopping a bare centimeter from the mirrored faceplate.

  The guard twisted his hand free, gasping.

  Aubry stepped back, muscles locked painfully tight. "Don't ever touch me," he hissed.

  The voice behind his own reflection was shaking. "G-get back to your cell, Knight. We'll deal with you later."

  Aubry took one last look at Carl's body, now an inert shape covered by a sheet. Red splotches seeped through at face and chest. The shock prod nudged forward again, and Aubry moved away, back toward the staircase, back up to his cell, one last glimpse of the still shape accompanying him into the night.

  Aubry was quiet as he joined the line to the cafeteria. The guards gave him no more than cursory glances, but he felt keenly observed. The other prisoners around him, limping and wheeling in their various states of dismemberment, were quick to turn away if their eyes met his.

  He received his tray and trundled it into the line, waiting for his turn to receive a generous dollop of soya grits, flavored, today, to taste like roast beef hash. The coffee was black and bitter, but he filled his mug to the brim and sipped as his eyes roamed the cafeteria.

  He spotted the man he sought and moved toward him. He set his tray down in the space between Jo Jo and Sugar, across the table from Denim. Denim ate his food without acknowledging that Aubry was present.

  Aubry ate a spoonful or two of the grits, then looked up. "I want a talk."

  Denim took his time meeting Aubry's eyes. When he did it was with a lazily triumphant smile. "So, talk."

  "You know what I have to say. I'm ready to work." There was no encouragement from across the table. "So where do we go from here?"

  Denim chewed slowly. "You wait. When dinner is over, we talk."

  There was no more conversation at the table as they finished. When the chimes sounded the end of the meal Aubry rose. With Denim and his men, he filed back up to the cells.

  The lines thinned as they went. Denim purposely lagged behind. Finally they walked along the corridor as a group of four, only the unblinking SCAN cameras watching.

  "So you want in now, do you, Knight?"

  "Is that so unusual?"

  Denim strutted ahead of him, Jo Jo and Sugar flanking left and right respectively. The boss looked back over his shoulder. "No, not really. I guess I'm just a little surprised that you'd come in after all this time. I hoped you would."

  Aubry grunted. Denim's shoes thumped hollowly as they entered the stairwell. "You're known in here, but you hadn't taken sides. That made you dangerous."

  "I'm still dangerous."

  Jo Jo looked at him speculatively. "We'll have a chance to find out how dangerous you are. I'm not so sure I believe in you."

  "You might as well believe in me," Aubry said softly. "You're a little old to believe in fairies anymore."

  As they took the turn of the stairwell, Aubry rammed the side of his foot into Jo Jo's knee. When the Italian buckled, Aubry hit him in the neck with a whiplash left hand, and Jo Jo dropped as if decapitated, tumbling down the stairs.

  Before either of the others had a chance to move, Aubry had taken the step forward that he needed to grab Denim's chin from behind, place a foot in the small of his back, and drop into a tomoenage stomach throw, performed from the rear. Screaming, Denim wheeled through the air and smashed Sugar into the wall.

  Sugar scrambled up and dropped a knife out of his sleeve. He limped back in, teeth bared. Aubry faked a punch and faded back as Sugar lunged. The injured leg slowed Sugar for a fraction of a second, all that Aubry needed to deflect the knife with his right hand, and ram the ball of his foot into the exposed armpit.

  Denim shrank back against the wall, watching in horror as Aubry and Sugar joined in the dim light. There was a sudden shift of mass, and then a sharp crack that preceded Sugar's boneless slide to the ground.

  Then Aubry was coming for him, and there was nowhere to go except back down the stairs. But even that option was no longer open, as a hand reached out, iron fingers lacing into the long black hair. Denim's head was pitilessly, inexorably, twisted back. The last things he saw in this world were Aubry Knight's flaming black eyes and the hissing downward chop that broke his neck.

  Aubry lay in his cell, waiting for the guards to come for him. He was at peace, the pain and anger cleansed from his system in a single purifying act of violence.

  The light in his cell snapped on, and the door slid back. Three guards, with shock prods whining at "kill," stood outside, motioning him away from the cot and over to the wall. Slowly, he complied, and as the door opened two of them advanced to shackle his hands and feet. He offered no resistance. At prod-point they hustled him along the hall and down the stairs.

  He was led from the main block down through corridors he had never seen. The air grew colder, the oppressive sensation of muggy air scraping at his calm.

  In a cell lined with yellow plastic he was magnetically shackled to a chair. He sat there in the middle of the room for hours— how many he wasn't sure, because there were no clocks in the room. He fell asleep and woke up twice before the door opened. Charteris walked in.

  The assistant warden looked as if he hadn't slept for days, and in his eyes there was a curious mixture of hatred and respect. "Knight. I knew I'd be seeing you again."

  "Just what is it I'm supposed to have done?"

  "Let's cut the crap. You killed Denim and one of his boys, 'Sugar' Markum."

  One of Aubry's heavy eyebrows inched up. "And the other one?"

  Charteris looked disgusted. "In a coma. The doctor said it looked like he'd been hit by a car. Broken knee, broken neck, concussion, and skull fracture."

  "Too bad. He seemed to be a nice guy."

  "So, you tried to kill him?"

  "Not me. Denim said that lots of accidents happen around here."

  The pudgy man came closer, and for an instant Aubry thought he was going to be backhanded. "There is only one reason why you are still alive. One reason we don't send your black ass to the meat shop right now."

  "And what's that?"

  "The same reason that Denim wanted you. You can be useful. You could replace Denim."

  "As what?"

  "My go-between. Officially there is no meat shop here. We just have an unusual number of prisoners who volunteer to donate or sell body parts. Nothing illegal about that. And they do earn reductions in their sentences if they prove that they can support themselves on the outside."

  "And what do you get from this?"

  The assistant warden smiled toothily. "The satisfaction of a job well do
ne."

  "Charteris, you make me want to vomit."

  "Don't get holy with me. Why else did you kill Denim? You wanted his position. Well, I'm offering it to you."

  Charteris lit a cigarette, leaned back against the wall and studied Aubry carefully. "It's not up to you, Knight. We have evaluated you carefully. Do you know something?" He leaned forward, smoke trickling in streams from his nostrils. "You're a very sick man. Hate is the only emotion you're comfortable with. That's just not healthy, and we've decided to help you."

  He straightened and walked back to the door. He stopped without turning and said, "Just a little something you've needed for a long time."

  Then the door slid open, and he left.

  4. Therapy

  He was distant from the action, Aubry strained against his bonds, leaning forward, breath hissing from between clenched teeth.

  A shrill whine started in the earphones, built to an agonizing intensity, then oscillated. Light burst behind tightly squeezed eyelids, and his stomach spasmed. He fought against the pressure, pressed his lips together, and attempted to swallow as sour fluid splashed into his throat.

  Then the signal stopped and his world righted again, his stomach calming. He took a deep breath and tried to concentrate on the screen.

  Welles struggled desperately to free himself from a leg scissors.

  And the signal tore into Aubry's brain, acid boiling in his guts, foaming up, stopping just before the point of release. He screamed in humiliation as his sphincters relaxed.

  And in the darkened room the doctor and his assistant nodded quietly to each other and prepared to trigger the button again. And again.

  On and on into the night.

  An eternity later he was carried back to his cell, dragged past the shocked, disbelieving eyes of his blockmates. He was dumped unceremoniously on his bunk, half-conscious and filthy, with the cell door open for all to see.

  He had no idea how long he lay there, only that eventually the work boss came and he was taken to the laundry.

  Still dazed, he pulled loads of wet, steaming fatigues out of the enormous washing machines and ferried them to the driers. The other men watched, but didn't speak.

  Although he managed to stay on his feet, by the end of the shift he was aching with the need to turn off his mind and sleep.

  But just before the end of the shift they came for him, taking him back once again to that small, plastic-lined cell. There, movies played ceaselessly on the walls and Aubry seethed with chemicals and wrenching sound.

  Again and again the urge to vomit rose, only to be squelched. He tried to look away, and was shocked again. Back in his cell he tried to rest, to clean himself, only to be awakened and dragged back for more. He tried to work in the laundry and to ignore the nasty, whispered jokes and disparaging grins. He fought to hold on. To anything. To the image of tombstones, the names now lost in fog.

  Mealtime provided a contrast to the reception he received on the job. Places were made for him at the tables. When he stumbled groggily, sympathetic hands propped him up. There were no nasty asides or jokes, only a growing sense of acceptance. Finally, the eyes said eloquently, finally, you are one of us, and you understand.

  Two days later they came for him again. This time he thought he would die. He could not turn away from the screen, from the scenes of violence in a thousand forms, without receiving a smashing shock in the chest. He could not watch the screen without becoming ill. He went beyond consciousness into a trance induced by pain and nausea. There was a kind of synesthesia, when sound became a rainbow of hue, and color an army of lice driving him mad with itch. And emotion was scent, a sickly wisp of scent that brought him a welcome moment of relief, allowing him to empty his stomach. Even the humiliation and the wet were a cheap price to pay. Aubry cried, delirious with relief.

  At the end of the session, Charteris came to call, wrinkling his nose at the smell.

  "You really are taking the hard road, Knight. We'll break you if you don't work for us. You won't even know where your brain went. We can just scramble you. What do you think about that?"

  Aubry raised his head, panting. His eyes seemed sunken far back in their sockets; a week's growth of beard was caked with drool. He growled at Charteris, puckered, and spat.

  It hit the assistant warden in his open mouth. He gagged, backing away, and wiped his lips with the back of his hand. "All right, asshole. We've made it easy for you so far. Fight on or give in, you're going to be our boy. Think about it."

  Then he was gone from the room. Aubry twisted in his seat, trying to get his head out of the phones that were strapped down so tightly. He shook and foamed with rage and frustration, the frustration transmuted into fear as the earphones hummed anew. The lights went down, and Aubry Knight howled his misery in a roomful of shadow plays, dancing at death in color and stereo sound.

  Aubry lay in his cell. He hurt everywhere: his wrists where they rubbed against the restraints; his stomach from the spasming; his ears. He seemed to have banged his head at some point, and it ached abominably. A patch of skin over his left ribs was swollen—he had no idea when that might have happened, but it itched as if an insect had laid eggs there.

  He had trouble remembering who he was or what day it was. His muscles felt slack and unresponsive.

  Something was gone—he could feel it. A whole range of emotional responses went foggy when he tried to summon them. He was glad to be in his cell, especially when the door closed and locked, and he was no longer under the scrutiny of the other inmates. He could curl up on his cot and stare into the darkness.

  Dreams were strange and fearsome places, where for the first time in his memory the creatures that haunted them rose up and tore, and his limbs were weighted with chains.

  He woke up in the middle of the night, staring, panting, and knew he was losing the battle for his mind.

  Stitch, the new librarian, came to sit with him in the mess hall the next day. His eyes darted furtively from his own tray to Aubry, to the observation windows to his tray again.

  He spoke quietly. "We know what'cha going through. And why." He didn't say anything else until the end of the meal, when he added, "Help's coming."

  Aubry watched him as he gulped down the rest of his coffee and opened his mouth to speak. Before he could, a gloved hand dropped on his shoulder. "Time, Knight."

  Aubry felt for the place in his head where anger used to flare, and felt the spark die under a flood of nausea. He rose docilely and followed the two guards from the room, back to the hated conditioning chamber. The other prisoners watched wordlessly.

  Months. It had to be months later when Aubry kicked to the surface of the filthy pond he was drowning in. The one with the Kraken whose arms sucked at him and pulled him down into darkness, where time lost its meaning and the only reality was pain.

  It had to have been months. It had to take that long to twist a man's head off at the shoulders and turn it inside out. Even with the sound and the lights and the drugs that turned his senses against him. It just had to.

  Aubry opened his eyes, seeing the ceiling of his cell, not knowing where he was. He tried to make a sound, but a thin mewling noise was all that emerged.

  There was a creak at the doorway, and Aubry moved his head too quickly, the pain shooting up his neck. "Mother?"

  It was Stitch. He examined Aubry soberly and tossed a book to him from the brimming cart. "Return this one personally," he said, "say, an hour from now." His eyes said more, but he wheeled the cart on. Aubry watched, numb. He leafed through the book nervously, wondering what in the world they could want. A distant relative of the automatic disdain and haughtiness surfaced, but at the first flash of annoyance or anger, a wave of nausea immobilized him. He stabilized his breathing and waited.

  There were two men in the library with Stitch. Both of them were missing body parts: one of them an eye, one a leg. Stitch leaned on a cane.

  Stitch was nervous, and rings of perspiration stood out under his bony
arms. "We know that you killed Denim."

  Aubry started to protest, then gave it up as useless. "So what?"

  "Now they're going to kill you,'unless you start up where he left off. We can help you."

  "How?"

  The thin man looked around the room carefully. "Escape."

  Aubry's laugh was ghastly to hear. "You're crazy. No one has ever escaped from Death."

  "True, but it's still possible. For one or two men, if they're strong, and they time it right."

  "What are you talking about?"

  "A distraction. What you need is to buy yourself enough time to make it to the mountains before they know you are missing."

  "I don't... how do I do that? How can I get that time?"

  "Riot," Stitch said softly. "A food riot would do it, but there are a lot of men who know the assistant warden's been getting rich from selling us. It's been building up for years. But with Denim on the inside, and the Ortegas on the outside—"

  Aubry's eyes cleared as he locked on the name. "Who?"

  "The Ortegas. They broker the organs, and grease the chute. Didn't you know?"

  He thought, trying to pull together a cohesive picture from the swirling chaos in his mind; failing.

  "Anyway, that's how the lid has stayed on. With Denim dead, things can be pushed a little. If you're in the right place when things begin to heat up, you can make your move."

  Aubry looked at the three of them, hope dulling to suspicion in his eyes. "Why would you do this for me?"

  "Denim," they said with a single voice. "You did what we should have done a long time ago. Things may be bad again; they may get worse. But for right now, Charteris's ramrod is dead, and we're going to kick some ass."

  Aubry raised his eyebrows at that. "Just what are you talking about?"

  "You'll see. I'm surprised you haven't smelled it yet."

  The empty, silent faces, the eyes burning deep in their sockets, the low murmuring at dinner, had he really been so lost in his own world that he hadn't realized?