‘Annette…’
‘Goodbye, Poppa,’ Annette said, and then she pulled the trigger.
~~~
A heavy bassline throbbed through Annette’s body, driving out thought, emotion, and the images which kept flashing through her mind. She had thought she wanted to be alone, but her mind had been a whirlwind and she had decided on another plan. The team was out for a night on the town.
They had been worried about her, out of communication for a whole day. She had lied to them about her reasons for vanishing, her movements, and her reasons for wanting to get drunk and dance to wild music. It had been Baltry who had suggested a club called Pier Review, even though the place was quite near Cranfield’s apartment. It was, as Annette had requested, loud and excessively vibrant.
Right now, Baltry thought he was dancing with Annette. Annette was alone with the music, though she opened her eyes at times and flashed him a grin. It was during one of those flashes of reality that she spotted a small group of UDF officers moving through the crowd. One of them was wearing the distinctive, high-collared suit of an Inquisitor and that meant they were investigating something. Next time she looked, they had stopped at the table Cranfield and Kenya were sitting at. Cranfield was indicating the dance floor.
Annette signalled to Baltry – speaking was a pointless activity – and he looked across at the table, frowned, and then indicated that they should probably head that way. Annette gave him a nod, and prepared herself to lie to someone who had the same verification and analysis software that she did.
‘Is there a problem?’ Baltry asked as he approached the table. Carefully placed directional speakers reduced the music to bearable levels off the dance floor, though whispering was out.
‘Well, uh…’ Cranfield said, rising to his feet. He looked at Annette. His mouth worked, but nothing came out.
‘Cran?’ Annette said, putting on a confused smile.
‘Private Barrington?’ the Inquisitor said. This one was a woman: short, blonde hair, severe features, and a slim figure hidden under the straight lines of her suit.
‘Yes.’
‘It is my painful duty to inform you that your father, Charles Barrington, was killed this evening.’
Annette looked at her and… What she needed was right there when she needed it. All that she had done in the past few days, all that she had learned, all of it flooded in on her as though the music had been holding it back and now there was nothing to stop it. Her knees buckled. When she did not hit the floor, it took her several seconds to realise that Baltry had caught her. Kenya was there, hands on Annette’s cheeks and saying something. Cranfield was hovering behind Kenya, not really knowing what to do.
Then Annette was sitting down and there was a glass at her lips. The alcohol stung at her throat and she coughed before grabbing the glass and sinking more of whatever was in it.
‘How?’ she managed.
‘He was shot,’ the Inquisitor replied. ‘In the apartment you shared with him.’
‘C-can I see him?’
‘That would be… unwise.’ The woman’s tone was shifting, becoming softer. For now, Annette had got away with it. ‘The killer used a substantial amount of industrial nanocleanser on the scene.’
‘Shit!’ That was Cranfield. He had probably seen the stuff at work at some point.
‘Do you have somewhere to stay? The apartment is a crime scene.’
Annette looked up. ‘I don’t really–’
‘I have a spare room,’ Cranfield said. ‘My place is close too.’
Smiling weakly, Annette nodded. ‘Thanks, Cran. I… don’t think I want to be alone tonight.’
~~~
Hot water washed over Annette in a torrent. Cranfield did not have a bath, but his shower was very good. His apartment was not large. It had been arranged for him by the UDF when he had moved up from the family farm, which meant they had gone for something suitable for a single man but had thought of possible visits by his family. There was a spare room and Annette had dumped her bag there when they had got back. Cranfield was, of course, being a gentleman.
It had taken Annette insisting on it to have him standing outside the bathroom, with the door open. She had actually wanted him in the room with her, but that had been a step too far it seemed. She had been a little afraid that his cheeks would actually combust. But she found herself really wanting the company of someone who had no idea of what she had become.
‘I mean,’ Cranfield said, ‘I get it, I really do. First time I killed someone… I mean, I didn’t even know he was dead until after. I hit the guy, but I didn’t know how hard… I had to keep telling myself he was a bad man. He was a Zero. They can’t be cured and they’re dangerous. It still… I didn’t sleep too well for a while.’
Annette rubbed shampoo into her hair. ‘I’m an academic. I mean, I joined the SAU, but I’m really an engineer. I thought I was ready for it. I guess I was wrong. Then the guy attacked me in my bedroom.’
‘And now it looks like some of his friends came back.’
‘Yeah. I guess.’ She used the excuse of washing the soap from her hair to stay silent for a few seconds.
Cranfield, apparently, could not handle the lull. ‘Do you think they’d let us look into it? Maybe we could find them and–’
‘I kind of doubt it, Cran.’
‘Why not?’
‘We’re soldiers, not investigators, and I’m a suspect.’
‘What?! No way do they–’
‘Criminology one-oh-one. The family is always suspect. Mom will be on the suspect list too, probably higher up it, but no one knows where she is. They won’t let me investigate the case until they can definitely rule me out and I don’t have an alibi. I picked exactly the wrong moment to decide I needed time to myself.’ She shut the water off and opened the door of the cubicle.
Cranfield took a step away from the door. ‘There are towels on the rail.’
Annette grinned in his direction, even if she could not see him. ‘I see them.’
‘Good. Annette, you don’t blame yourself for this, do you?’
‘Why shouldn’t I?’ That was true. Annette picked a towel up and began drying her hair, which would take a while.
‘You don’t know how many of them there were or what kind of weapons they had. You don’t know it would’ve been different if you’d been there.’
‘You’ve seen me take down twenty Zeroes in no more than a second, Cran. I made a choice and Poppa’s dead because of it.’ Truer words had never been said.
‘Well… Will you be okay in there for a minute? I’ll go pour a couple of drinks.’
‘Yeah, I could use one. I’ll be out when I’m dry.’
‘Great.’
Five minutes later, Annette walked out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel. Cranfield was sitting in his lounge, not a big room, but there was enough space for a couple of sofas and a smoked-glass coffee table. The big man stood up as Annette entered and she watched in technicolour as his body reacted to the sight of her in just a towel. Increased blood flow to the face and groin, an obvious reddening to the cheeks, and equally obvious reaction lower down. She wondered whether his embarrassment stemmed from her state of dress, his reaction to her state of dress, or both.
Cranfield did not look like a wine man, but there were two glasses of white on the coffee table. Annette picked the nearest one up and sipped. ‘That’s nice stuff. Crisp. Not too heavy.’
‘They, uh, sell it at a local shop,’ he replied. ‘Look, we’ll talk to that Inquisitor, get all this straightened out. Then we’ll go find the bastard who did this and–’
‘Or bitch,’ Annette said. ‘Never forget the fairer sex.’ She almost laughed at the little strangled noise he made at the mention of sex. ‘You’re sweet, Cran, but I’m not sure I want to find them.’
He moved closer, looking as though he wanted to hold her, comfort her, but not really sure how. ‘Afraid of what you’d do?’
‘Terrified.’ Again, t
he truth: Annette was terrified of what would happen if she was found out. She looked at Cranfield, hovering protectively, and came to a decision. She put her glass down. ‘Cran?’
‘Yes, Annette?’
Annette let the towel slip from around her body. ‘I really don’t want to be alone tonight.’
5/12/83.
‘How was he?’ Kenya fell into step beside Annette as the team walked through the lobby of White Tower.
‘What makes you think I’d know?’ Annette replied. The slight smirk was probably a giveaway, however.
‘I may not have your software, but I can see the way he looks at you. And that smug look you’ve got.’
‘Yes, well… He’s inexperienced, but he takes direction well. He kept me awake long enough that when I did go to sleep, I didn’t dream.’
‘That’s… a cure for insomnia I hadn’t considered.’
‘You should try it. Worked for me. I–’
Annette stopped as two uniformed UDF officers stepped in front of Cranfield and Baltry. The Inquisitor handling the case moved in behind them. ‘Private Barrington, we need to talk.’
‘She’s just lost her father,’ Cranfield began, stopping as Annette put her hand on his arm.
‘It’s okay, Cran. She needs to talk to me.’
The Inquisitor nodded, but it took Annette’s software to detect the slight smile. ‘If you’ll follow me, Private,’ the Inquisitor said before to turning to lead Annette away.
~~~
‘Yes, I feel guilty about my father’s death. I’m responsible for it.’
The interrogation room had been designed to disquiet the subject of the interrogation. It was small, blandly grey, and badly illuminated, though the latter made no difference to Annette. There was a single chair, bolted to the floor in the middle of the room. It had brackets for fixing restraints to it, but Annette was not restrained. This was a ‘friendly’ interview with the victim’s daughter.
‘Admitting guilt to an Inquisitor is generally not something someone does,’ the Inquisitor said from behind her. ‘Explain.’
‘I was attacked on Thursday morning. An insurgent gained access to our apartment, seeking revenge for the death of one of his compatriots, at my hand, the previous evening.’
‘I’m aware of both events. You stated in your report that you had encountered both of them before, prior to joining the SAU.’
‘Yes. I’m not a killer, Inquisitor.’ Annette looked down at her hands and frowned. ‘Well, I am a killer, that’s quite obvious to me now. I’ve killed more people than anyone else in my team, but Ghost was… different. Him and another. They were close, personal. Ghost ended up with his brains all over my bed, and the other died as he fell into my arms. I didn’t think I was capable of that kind of… Anyway, I decided I needed to clear my head, think things through, and I forgot that there was a third insurgent with Ghost and Cheetah when I saw them. They called her Angel.’
‘And you think this “Angel” came after you and killed Charles Barrington.’
‘No. I don’t think that. I think Angel was my mother.’
There was a pause. This was information the Inquisitor did not have it seemed. ‘You believe your mother was part of the Insurgency? You have evidence?’
Annette paused this time. ‘I saw her at the Nutopium plant. She detonated the bombs.’
‘That was not in your report.’
‘I didn’t want to believe it. I’ll add an addendum to my report. I’ve got sensory data showing her triggering the explosions. I should have included it, but… I’ll take whatever punishment the UDF deems necessary for the misjudgement.’
‘That isn’t for me to decide, Private. You’re free to go. Make sure that report is updated as soon as possible.’
Annette got to her feet. ‘Within the hour,’ she replied and started for the door.
7/12/83.
It appeared that, for the time being, she had got away with it. The day after the interview, Annette and her team were tasked with another raid on a Cabal safe house. Annette was glad of the choice of targets: she was not sure she had the stomach for fighting Zeroes or insurgents. Zeroes especially. The insurgents had chosen their path, but the Zeroes were victims.
Cranfield had not minded her staying at his place. Her apartment remained a crime scene and she had no desire to go there anyway. The big man’s stamina was up to a little loss of sleep too. Annette saw things behind her eyelids every time she closed them, things she did not want to see, and the only way she could sleep was exhaustion. So far, Cranfield was not minding that either. In fact, he seemed to think his ship had come in, but Annette knew it could not last.
When they were stopped in the lobby of White Tower again, it almost came as a relief, but Annette was a little confused since it was not the Inquisitor who stopped them. This was a man in UDF uniform with some fairly senior insignia on his shoulders. Annette’s software supplied a match: the guy was a major general.
Cranfield was immediately on the defensive. ‘Don’t you think she’s been through enough in the past few–’ Again he stopped as Annette placed a hand on his arm.
The general took the opportunity to get his statement in. ‘Private Barrington, I’m Major General Robert Carson. I’m with military intelligence. I’d like to speak to you.’
‘What about?’ Cranfield asked.
‘Classified. Private?’
It was not really an invitation and they all knew it. Annette nodded and followed Carson through the halls of the complex to an elevator which took them up. Annette raised an eyebrow as the car rose above the ground-level facilities and she found herself looking out through the glass side to the park. They were going all the way up.
‘If you don’t mind me making an observation, General,’ Annette said, ‘you aren’t just with military intelligence, are you?’
‘I run a very specific part of it. There’s a lieutenant general above me. Above him, there’s Doctor White.’
‘Oh.’ Asking more was not going to get her anywhere. He had told her he was important, but so had where his office was. A century ago, there had been something called the Space Needle in Old Seattle. It had collapsed following an earthquake, but Doctor White had had White Tower built to mimic and surpass it. At four hundred metres, White Tower was over twice the height of the old Space Needle, though there were three storeys of government buildings at the bottom, and another three in the disc-shaped structure at the top. The topmost floor was Doctor White’s residence and no one got up there without a very good reason, but the floors directly below it were reserved for the most important work the administration conducted.
Carson led the way to an office without a park view, but it still had a window which Annette thought denoted some prestige. Cranfield’s two guards were left outside the door and Carson waved Annette into a chair before taking his own place behind a large but fairly functional desk. He smiled at her, steepling his fingers and just watching her for a second. Was he trying to make her uncomfortable or working out how to start?
‘You are, I assume, aware that there are people living outside the walls of the enclave?’ Carson said. ‘Some are more advanced than others and have visited the city.’
‘I was taught about it in history class,’ Annette replied. ‘They were first encountered in year twenty-eight, but that was not revealed until twenty years later when they began infiltrating the enclave and started the Insurgency. Doctor White preferred to keep the initial overtures secret to avoid a panic. This was all before I was born though.’
‘Quite. Similarly, the actual influence of outside agents on the Insurgency has been somewhat downplayed. As your own recent experiences indicate, there are more of them here than we like to admit. The danger is… not inconsiderable and has been growing.’
‘Surely Doctor White has some plan to… Ah, and you are that plan.’
Carson smiled. Annette found herself not liking that smile. ‘The reports on you are, it seems, accurate. You are uncommonl
y perceptive. However, the plan to counteract these foreign powers is not so much me as you, and others like you. I am in charge of coordinating things, but it’s our operatives who do the real work. We want to send you to one of these foreign powers where you will gather intelligence, assist local resistance forces, and perform direct actions as required. What do you say, Private?’
Annette looked at him for a second. ‘Why me?’
‘There are a number of important criteria in our selection process. We prefer agents with no family ties left here. We’ve learned that that works far better through bitter experience. Sadly, you fall into that category. We look for people with unique skill sets and you certainly meet that one. We need people who have proven their loyalty to Utopia City.’
‘And I have done?’
‘Your work Below and against the Cabal has been exemplary. Your admission that your own mother had become an insurgent seals it.’
‘I… didn’t report my mother immediately.’
‘A factor which was taken into consideration, Private. Doctor White reviewed the case himself. He made a note. Let me…’ Carson located a file on his desk and flipped it open. ‘“Subject’s reticence in implicating her mother should be seen as a positive. Loyalty is loyalty. No one should be reprimanded for making the right choice in such a conflicting situation, even if they delay.”’
Annette blinked, dumbfounded for a second. Carson was not to know that her surprise came from learning that she had fooled Darius White himself… ‘Doctor White wrote that about me?’
‘He doesn’t review every candidate, but he showed a particular interest in your case. Positively, it seems. Will you take up his challenge, Private?’
She would leave the city, leave everything she knew. She would be shipped out to some backwoods community in the wasteland to help undermine it. She would be leaving civilisation behind her and there was every possibility that she would never see Utopia City again. How could she possibly refuse?
Part Two: Rotten Apple
Manhattan Island, 15/12/83.
Annette’s internal computer woke her at what she had been told was nine a.m. on this side of the continent. She was aware of the concept of time zones and her software was able to cope. She had never had to deal with them, however, and her body clock was still trying to work its way through the change.
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