by Ramsey Isler
There was no furniture in the room besides a clear plastic table with matching transparent chairs, and an inflatable transparent bed in a corner. Every part of this room’s planning had started with ideas in an email I sent out yesterday, and Newton had made sure that no detail was overlooked.
I had originally lobbied for Madison to be moved to a location completely outside the Rift zone, somewhere where there was no magic. But Dominique vetoed the idea. She said we needed to learn more about the true capabilities of nightcrafters and how to detain them regardless of where they were. She was willing to risk the possibility that Madison might attempt to escape as long as we got valuable information on her abilities in the process. It was very much like keeping a live rattlesnake in a cage. The scientists who keep snakes do it to get venom to make precious anti-venom that will save lives. I knew our goals were just as noble, but the danger was just as great too.
Dominique and I were currently behind the two-way mirror that served as one of the walls of Madison’s cell. She stared at the mirror like she knew we were there, and I felt like her bloodshot eyes were fixated on me.
“How does she go to the bathroom?” I asked.
“There’s a specialized room on the other side of the cell door,” Dominique said. “It has similar security measures as this room, but allows her a modicum of privacy for a brief time.”
“That’s surprisingly decent of you,” I said.
“This isn’t Abu Ghraib,” Dominique said with a sneer.
“Good to know,” I said. “I still have questions about the legality of it all.”
“Unwarranted,” Dominique said. “Madison was caught in the midst of an act that endangered innocent people. Her detention is quite legal. We had the local police in Long Branch file formal charges . . . without mentioning our involvement, of course.”
“Those records are public,” I said. “That will certainly get the attention of the nightcrafters.”
“Yes,” Dominique said. “I am counting on it. Hopefully her caretakers will reveal their presence.”
“Careful what you wish for,” I said. “So what do you want me to do?”
“Talk to her.”
I laughed. “What good will that do?”
“You’ve been through the NATO course on interrogation,” Dominique said.
“You mean that two week basic training thing?” I laughed again. “I don’t think that really prepared me for this. I couldn’t get a confession out of a girl scout.”
Dominique shrugged. The gesture momentarily made her seem less like a government robot. “Give it a shot,” she said. “Every minute we keep her talking is a minute she’s not figuring out another way to escape. Maybe you’ll even manage to get some useful information out of her.”
“Fine,” I said. “How do I get in there?”
“Go outside and make two right turns,” Dominique said. “We’ll open the door for you.”
I did as she said and found myself staring at two armed guards in front of a massive steel door. It looked like it had been acquired from an old bank vault. One of the guards fiddled with it and it swung open, revealing the brightly lit chamber beyond. Madison was waiting. I could tell she recognized me from our little encounter. She threw me a vile look that reminded me of the glare my mother had once given me when I had called her a bitch during a hormone-induced teenage rage.
I hoped this encounter would end up better than that one did.
I went into the room, took a couple steps forward, and immediately bumped my nose on something I didn’t even know was there. I put a hand up and felt a completely transparent Plexiglas wall in front of me. When the massive vault door closed behind me, the wall automatically slid into the floor.
“Hello, Madison,” I said.
“Eat a dick,” she said.
I allowed myself a tiny smirk. “Well . . . that’s not a very nice way to talk to someone who’s trying to help you.”
“Help me?” Madison said. “You’re the asshole who put me in here in the first place. Who the hell are you anyway?”
“Me?” I said. “I’m nobody special.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Just to talk.”
“Is that why you kidnapped me?” she asked. “To talk? Is your social life that messed up?”
“We didn’t kidnap you,” I said. “You’re just here temporarily.”
“Why?”
“You’re a nightcrafter,” I said.
“So are you, apparently. So what?”
“You were out doing some dangerous things. You put lives at risk.”
“You mean yours? That was self-defense. ”
I shook my head and sat down in one of the clear plastic chairs. “Did your teacher ever tell you about the long term effects of the Rift?”
“The hangover?”
“I’m not talking about the effects on yourself,” I said. “The effects on everything else. The power we use has a cost, and we ask others to pay it.”
Madison just stared at me.
“The Rift-kind,” I said. “They’re getting loose, and causing trouble. People like you have changed their environment.”
Madison smiled and leaned back in her chair. “So you’re some kind of weird conservationist protecting the Rift?”
“You might say that,” I said.
“Who the hell are you? I mean, really. I’ve heard about some rogues in our ranks, but this?” She moved her arms in a sweeping gesture towards the intense lights. “This is insanity. This is criminal.”
“You and I both know that nightcrafters don’t subscribe to the laws of ordinary people. That’s why you’re here in the first place. You’ve been outside the rules of the system and playing dangerous games.”
“The rules don’t apply to us because the rules are shit,” Madison said. “People like us do a lot of good in this world, and a lot of that is because we don’t have to bother with a system created by the idiots in power.”
“That’s what we tell ourselves to dodge the guilt and responsibility,” I said. “It’s easy to think we’re the good guys, the mavericks bucking the system and helping each other to be truly free. But the truth is that we’ve been putting millions of lives at risk for our own personal gain. I’ve realized that. You, on the other hand, seem ignorant of it. I’m just wondering if that ignorance is willful or not.”
I added that last line to goad her. I knew she was a smart woman — she went to Columbia after all — and one of the quickest ways to make a well-educated person mad is to imply that they’re stupid. She took the bait.
“Who the hell are you calling ignorant?” she yelled. “You aren’t even a decent nightcrafter! You just got lucky with your little trick, but I could tell you’re just an amateur. You couldn’t even dispel a few inkwells. You’re a hack, and you’re calling me ignorant. I’m surprised Mater let idiots like you graduate. You must have sneaked by while Kellar was in charge. I hear he’s always had a soft spot for charity cases.”
Kellar.
Now that was revealing. My eyebrows involuntarily shot up in surprise when she said his name but, judging by Madison’s nasty grin, she mistook the gesture as a sign that her insults had hit a sore spot. I’m glad she assumed I knew more than I actually did while simultaneously calling me an idiot. I wanted to know more, but I couldn’t risk revealing that I had no idea what the hell she was talking about. So I calmed myself and stuck with my original plan.
“Look,” I said, “I understand that you’re pissed off because you were tracked down, knocked out, and locked up by a bunch of strange people. But you need to understand what we’re after here. The Rift is dangerous. It’s a threat to everyone’s security, and the nightcrafters have their heads stuck too far up their asses to realize it.”
Madison relaxed and she settled back in her chair. “The Rift isn’t that much of a threat. We control it, not the other way around.”
“If you have so much control, why do you let attacks by the Rift-k
ind happen?”
“We don’t let them happen. They’re accidents. Like people getting bitten by sharks. Crap just happens sometimes.”
“A surfer getting randomly bitten by a shark is an accident,” I said. “An innocent kid getting eaten because sports fisherman were putting bloody bait in the water to get a trophy fish? That’s something different.”
“We didn’t open the Rift,” Madison said, without missing a beat.
“But you are using it, and spreading it. Things are getting worse because of you. Besides, did you ever think it might be a better idea to close the damn thing?”
“Nobody can close it.”
“How do you know? Have you tried?”
She glared at me, silently.
“Exactly,” I said. I sensed an opening and went in for the kill. “You don’t know because you never tried and probably never even thought about it because you were too caught up in your new powers and everything they could do for you. Your powers and your teachers have you on a self-serving path that ignores the rest of the world, and that’s why I call you ignorant.”
“And you think you can convince all the nightcrafters to quit the craft just to be upstanding citizens?” Madison said.
“That would be ideal,” I said.
She scowled at me. “You’re a hopeless idealist.”
“And you’re in denial,” I said.
“Kiss my ass,” Madison said. “When the others find out about this, you’re dead.”
“Maybe,” I said as I stood and carefully backed away, towards the door, “but you’re here in the meantime. You might want to cooperate if you want to make your stay less uncomfortable.”
I left the room with Madison’s fierce eyes trying to stare a hole into me. Without her magic, she wasn’t really a threat. More bark than bite. But I was sure that if she ever did escape she would do everything in her power to make me feel pain.
I returned to the chamber behind the two-way mirror. After the extreme brightness of the cell, I’d forgotten how dark it was in here. My eyes struggled to adjust to the darkness as Dominique strode up to me and asked, “Who is Mater?”
“I have no clue,” I said. “Maybe Madison’s teacher?”
Dominique put her hand on her chin and nodded thoughtfully. “Mater means ’mother’ in Latin. It would make sense.”
“Usually nightcrafters and their students are matched up by gender,” I said. “Women teach the girls and men teach the boys. It just works out better that way.”
“Madison also mentioned Kellar,” Dominique said. “Your teacher.”
“Yeah, I did catch that. Apparently Kellar’s not the head honcho anymore. Maybe he retired.”
“Maybe,” Dominique said. “And maybe this Mater person took his place. Regardless, it seems like we have our first lead on the identity of another nightcrafter. See how good you are at interrogations?”
“I don’t know about all that,” I said. “She might not ever want to talk me again after this.”
“We’ll see about that,” Dominique said.
“You really think Madison is going to tell us anything else?”
“No,” Dominique said, directing her eyes back at Madison through the two-way glass. “Not willingly, at least. But there are other ways.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“There are other ways,” she repeated. “You should go now. But don’t stray too far. Madison may want to talk again soon.”
“It’s Friday,” I said. “Maybe I made some weekend plans.”
“Maybe I just canceled them,” Dominique said.
* * *
On my way back home, I realized something. Dominique was my boss.
I know it sounds idiotic, but the gravity of my situation never really sunk in until that moment. Dominique knew where I lived, she knew my name, she knew my social security number, and she had my DNA profile and fingerprints. Most importantly, thanks to my exuberant willingness to help, she knew exactly how to circumvent my abilities. She owned me. If things turned sour, I could end up just as much of a prisoner as Madison.
I had been so happy that someone was willing to help me stop the threat of the Rift, I hadn’t even realized the trap I’d set for myself. I couldn’t back out of this. I couldn’t just quit and say I’d had enough. If I wanted to escape I would have to go underground, change my name, and live on the run. I didn’t have the foggiest clue on how to do any of that. My only route to a normal life without NATO was to complete my mission. The Rift would have to be closed.
I drove back to my building and let the car idle outside. My mind was in a hundred different places at once. I wanted to rest, and relax. But I also wanted to keep moving. It was almost like staying in one spot would just remind me of how trapped I was.
So I put the car back in gear and kept driving.
I roamed the city for hours, driving around every part I knew and a few neighborhoods I’d never been in. When traffic threatened to get too congested, I turned out of the city and got lost in suburbia. For a while I didn’t know where I was, but that was okay. All that mattered was the freedom the road gave me.
By the time I got my bearings it was five in the morning. It would be dawn soon. Once I knew where I was, I decided to visit a familiar spot. It was a place I had not been to in a long while, and it was past time I went back for an update. I drove west, out to Springfield Township in New Jersey.
The small city was quiet at this hour, and I was the only person on the streets. I drove up to a park near the border of the city and got out of the car. There’s a lamppost in the middle of the park — ten feet of iron painted black. I think it’s been there for over a hundred years.
When Kellar first kicked me out and I had to learn how to live on my own, one of the first things I did was explore the boundaries of the Rift. I soon learned that certain parts of New Jersey were “dry” and completely devoid of any sign of the Rift. Without the Rift, I was just another ordinary guy, so I wanted to get an idea of how far I could go before I reached an area beyond the Rift’s invisible well of power. The westernmost point used to be this lamppost at Blackstone Park in Springfield Township.
Not anymore.
I walked twenty feet west from the lamppost and I could still feel the Rift here. It was strong. Pulsing. Growing. Of course, I had always known that the Rift was spreading. The mapping expedition in Europe had proved that. But I never thought it would happen this fast. And the worst part of it was that I felt responsible for some of it. I had spent far too much time tapping into the Rift recently. I always told myself it was for the greater good, but sometimes it was hard to reconcile that with my conscience. That was especially true in times like this, when I could see the direct effects of what people like me were doing.
Just beyond that lamppost, in a quiet part of New Jersey that had never reported any Rift-kind sightings before, was an elementary school. It’s a cute little building with a rainbow-colored playground in the back and childish crayon drawings plastering the windows. When I first came here, I pledged I’d never see the day when the Rift spread to that perfect refuge of innocence. But I’d failed these kids and their families. The darkness was on their doorstep. Maybe nothing would happen this month, or this year, but eventually some kid would be alone in that darkness, and something horrible would happen.
CHAPTER 7
I stayed next to that lamppost in Springfield and watched the sun come up. I hadn’t seen a sunrise in forever, maybe not since I was in grade school. Watching that distant ball of fire gradually banish the darkness was a calming experience.
I didn’t go back home after that. Instead, I just went back to the NATO building. I figured there would be plenty of work to do and tons of information to sift through from Madison’s capture. It was early Saturday and there was certainly a lull in the normal activity, but I wasn’t the only one at work. As I walked through the halls, a few bleary-eyed staffers did their best to give me welcoming morning greetings.
Dom
inique gave me my own office in the building when I first signed up, although I’d only been there once. It was in the middle of a crowded clutch of offices that held junior team members and the assistants of NATO bigwigs. The area was always a hive of activity, with eager young people hurrying off in every direction. I felt strange being in a place that was so busy all of the time, but Dominique felt the best thing to do was hide me in plain sight with all the other young people.
I got into my office, turned on the annoying fluorescent lights, and logged into my computer. Then I typed out a message reporting my findings on the spread of the Rift to Dominique. The message went out on an encrypted system that was separate from the main email servers, so I wasn’t worried about the wrong eyes taking a peek.
Once that was done, I opened up my regular email inbox. To my surprise, it was full of unread messages. A cursory glance showed that most of the items were just standard protocol alerts; the usual minutiae of government work. As mundane as it all was, I ended up totally absorbed by it. A boyish part of my brain was still amazed that I’d ended up with a secret government job, and every little message held promise of revealing some special knowledge. I lost myself in all the messages for well over three hours, but I had only read through half of them when my desk phone rang. I answered it.
“Come to my office,” Dominique said. Then the line clicked off.
I shut down my computer, locked my door, and made the long trip to Dominique’s office in an entirely different area of the campus. Fifteen minutes and two security checks later, I was sitting in a leather chair across from Dominique. She didn’t even take her eyes off her computer screen when I walked in. I had to sit there for a few minutes before she even spoke to me.
“Based on your new observations in Springfield,” she said, “I had the science team do some estimates on the new spread of the Rift.” She pulled up a global map on her computer screen, with the familiar outline of the NATO Rift map overlaid in black. “This is our original map,” she said. Then she hit the Enter key, and another image popped up. In this one, the black blob in the North Atlantic was significantly larger. Its spread was still limited to the east coast of North America and the west coast of Africa, but in Europe the dark spot had moved considerably eastward, nearly blanketing all of Sweden and Germany now.