by Leahy, R. J.
“I think maybe we did.”
It’s clear she’s having second thoughts and maybe beginning to blame her sister for their present situation, but it’s a pointless exercise. What’s done is done. There’s no going back for any of us and nothing to be gained by dwelling on it. Once you’re a shade, you either learn how to live as a shade or you die, it’s as simple as that. “Pen…”
“Have you ever…you know, been picked up by Counselors?”
I answer as truthfully as I dare. “I’ve been in a few precinct houses in my time.”
“Is it bad?”
“It depends on what they want you for. It’s never pleasant, but not everyone who gets picked up undergoes interrogation.”
“Abby says interrogation is just another word for torture.”
True, but torture is illegal, so they found another word. Interrogations can last for days, weeks even. I’ve seen Counselors bring a prisoner to the very edge of death, only to revive them and begin the process all over again. I’ve done it myself, and worse.
“Sometimes people are just held for questioning,” I say. That at least is true. Often just being picked up is enough to scare people into giving them everything they want to know.
“Oh,” she says, and I see hope rise in her. It’s a thin enough hope, but right now it’s all she has and she’ll grasp it until the end.
I grab a small coil of wire and we stare at each other in awkward silence.
“You promised,” she says.
I hesitate, then reach into the drawer and pull out a pistol, handing it to her. “Remember, two days.”
She stares at the gun, turning it over in her hand.
“Pen, two days.”
She looks up. “Yeah, I know. Two days.”
As I walk toward the Two One Nine station house, my collar drawn up against the cold, I can’t get her image out of my head: small and alone, holding my gun in her hand. A gun with only one bullet.
SIX
The shadows have lengthened by the time I reach the precinct. I find a dark corner in the alley next to the station house and squat down in the trash. On the wall across from me is another Angel graffiti, the white paint dripping down in irregular lines.
Freedom breeds uncertainty; uncertainty invites chaos.
Within the hour, the streets are packed solid with humanity, everyone moving together in sweaty, shuffling, imperfect rhythm. Heads down, eyes forward; all anyone wants is to get home before the scanners come alive. Few look in my direction and those that do, glance quickly away. You can’t be too careful.
Maybe you’ve insulted someone from a another quarter or a different clan, or maybe someone has finally tired of watching your family eat while theirs starve. Not all vendettas are blood feuds and revenge is cheap. There are always men with empty bellies and sharp knives willing to work for a few coins.
To live in the city is to live in fear, so you trust to your instincts and look away; don’t make eye contact; keep on walking. Only Counselors walk the streets without fear, and only because everyone else fears them.
The crowd soon thins, then vanishes altogether as the sun sets behind the tall buildings. There’s a crackling sound and I can just see the blue haze of a scanner flicker to life across the street. I’m in no hurry. Nothing to do for hours yet, so I sift through the trash and find a brick, carefully tying one end of the wire around it. It’s cold. I pull the trash around myself to keep warm and close my eyes.
A few hours later I stand and stretch my legs, getting the blood flowing again. The alley leads to the back of the station and a fenced parking area. An electric gate opens to the street on the opposite side.
I could have chosen any station house, but not all will be delivering bodies tonight. The Two One Nine is in the Huenta quarter, close to the riot. They’ll be busy. I creep down into the weeds and circle the fence to the gate and wait. My timing is good. After only a few minutes, the metal doors of the station house open and a large black van leaves, driving through the gate. As soon as it passes, I grab on and leap lightly up onto the back fender.
I let him get to within one block of the One Twenty Seven before swinging the brick on the wire and flinging it under the van. It bangs around three or four times before shooting back out and I haul it in quickly in case I need to do it again. But it works the first time. The driver stops the van and gets out, looking for the problem.
Even before we come to a complete stop, I step off the bumper and head around the passenger side, coming up from the front of the vehicle as he’s bent over, looking under it. One blow from the brick to an area behind the left ear and he hits the pavement like a slab of beef.
A hit like that usually isn’t fatal. If it is, it’s due to a ruptured blood vessel slowly bleeding into the brain, squeezing it against the skull like a molcajete. But that takes hours and I only need him for a few minutes. I remove his coat then lift him up and toss him into the passenger side. I slip on the coat before getting in and driving away.
Vans come all night to deliver bodies to the One Twenty Seven. No one tends the gates; they’re automatic, triggered by the tags of the drivers. As we pull up, I grab the Counselor’s arm and pull it toward my window. A second later, the gate slides open. The door to the covered garage is open and I drive inside. Two vans are already here, their cargo of shiny black body bags being unloaded onto gurneys while the drivers go inside to complete the paper work.
As soon as I back the van into a slot, I’m out, keeping my head down and moving quickly toward the station door. Prisoner cells are usually located in the basement, but here that area is reserved for the ovens. This station isn’t typically used for prisoner interrogation and there are only two available holding rooms, both on the first floor. Abby will be in one of them.
I step up onto the landing and enter the station. Two drivers are in the receiving area behind the glass, heads bent over clipboards. No one even looks up. I just need to get through one door then down the hall and I should be to the holding cells.
I open the inner door and take one step inside as something dense and heavy strikes me on the back of the head, dropping me to my knees. I’m able to look up just briefly at a smiling face in a black trench coat before blackness pours over me. So far, so good.
The experience of waking up from being cold-cocked is a little like a near drowning. Muffled voices; vague odors; sensations you can’t quite place, all surge around you like open water. When it finally comes together into something recognizable, it usually does so rapidly, like now.
I throw my head back and gasp. The four blurry images in front of me focus and converge into two men, both wearing leather trench coats with insignia of Counselors. The one on the right has three gold bars across the left sleeve: Liedercounselor. I’m sitting on a metal chair with my wrists bound behind me in handcuffs. My head is pounding. It takes me a moment to realize I’m completely naked. I look around the room. No furniture except for a metal bed attached to one wall with a thin, vinyl covered mattress. No clock.
The Liedercounselor speaks. “Ah, you’re still with us. For a moment I thought Counselor Ellison here might have struck you a little too hard. That would have been… unfortunate.”
The junior or Mindercounselor reddens, but remains ramrod still, his arms at his side. In his right hand he holds an electric prod.
I shake my head, an effort that almost makes me pass out again. “No, I’m good. Never felt better.”
“Excellent. It may interest you to know that the Counselor you assaulted will recover as well, though if he had not, it wouldn’t have changed much for you. The punishment for assaulting a Counselor and murder are of course, the same.”
“Glad to hear it. Listen, I hate to be a bother, but would you know the time?”
He grins as he raises his left arm, pulling back the sleeve. “Ten twenty five. Are you late for an appointment?”
“Dinner reservations.”
“Ah, yes? After curfew? Tsk-tsk, I’m afraid I�
�ll have to have the cook shot.”
“Don’t apologize. I’ve ate there before. You’d be doing the place a favor.”
“I’m glad to see you have a sense of humor. I hope you can manage to keep it. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Liedercounselor Remy.”
“A pleasure. You’ll forgive me if I don’t get up?”
“Of course. Now then, you may be surprised to learn of it, but there appears to be something wrong with your tags. The scanners can’t pick you up at all.”
“That’s odd.”
“Isn’t it? So then you’ll understand that I have to ask you your name.”
“Ellison.”
The young Counselor’s face turns a darker shade of crimson and his mouth sets in a firm line, but he doesn’t move.
Remy raises his eyebrows and smiles. “Like my young protégé here? Isn’t that a coincidence. Related?”
“Could be. Dad got around.”
“I see. I’ll tell you what, why don’t we just call you Mr. Smith for the present? We’ll discover your true identity soon enough.” He rubs his hands together, the black leather of the gloves creaking. “Now then, Mr. Smith, tell me, are you one of those delusional revolutionaries that pop up now and again, or are you just a gun for hire?”
“I’m not much for causes. I like to think of myself as an independent contractor.”
“I thought so. You have the look. Some of my colleagues were hoping they would send in one of their own, but I find fanatics tiresome. I mean all that rambling about freedom and liberty and…oh, what’s the other one?”
He looks to Ellison, who gives a slight shrug of the shoulders.
“Democracy, that’s it! Where do they come up with these ideas? I swear I think they just make this stuff up as they go. No, it is much easier dealing with a practical man such as yourself. Now then, if you would be so kind as to tell me who sent you for the woman?”
“Woman? You have women here? This night just keeps getting better.”
The nod is so slight I almost miss it, but I’m able to grit my teeth and contract my stomach just before the prod strikes me, right above the groin. Even prepared, the force of the shock is excruciating. I double over onto the floor, pulling the chair on top of me. For several seconds that seem more like several minutes, I can’t breathe. Ellison roughly pulls me back up. I’m still bent over in the chair, straining to take a breath as spasms rack my body.
“Shall we try again?” Remy asks.
I can only grunt in response.
“Oh,” he says, his smile fading. “I do hope you haven’t lost your sense of humor. I was beginning to enjoy our repertoire.”
I work the muscles in my jaw, fighting to speak. “Two Cosags walk into a bar…”
The next shock hits in my left nipple. I’m not ready for it and my mouth slams shut with such force I bite through my tongue. Once again I fall down onto the floor, this time writhing as the contractions rip through me. I’m allowed to lie there a little longer before being hauled back up.
“My apologies, but I’ve heard that joke before. Let us understand one another, shall we? You are a shade. A man with no identity has no rights of any kind—that is the law. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you aren’t an imbecile and that you know this already. That being so, then you also know that your life will shortly end.”
He steps closer and looks down at me with a practiced expression of feigned sympathy. “There is nothing I can do about that. I’m simply a servant of the law and the law is very clear concerning shades. Please try to understand, the city can’t have undocumented actors wandering throughout the precincts stirring up trouble with no regard for the consequences. I can tell you from personal experience, that many of these people are deviants of the worse kind. They have to be eliminated; I’m sure you can see that. Order must be maintained.”
He sighs. “Unfortunately, the law now requires that prior to your execution, you undergo interrogation for…” He snaps his fingers at Ellison.
“Forty-eight hours, sir!”
“Very good.” He smiles. “But as Liedercounselor, I do have some leeway in these matters. Tell me who hired you and I can have that reduced in half.”
He squats down near me. “Give me more and I can do even better.” He raises four gloved fingers and breaks into a wide grin. “That’s right, just four hours. Why, for a man like you, four hours of interrogation would be nothing. I might even be able to arrange for certain considerations to be given, say to your eyes or genitals. Then it’s just a quick, painless execution.”
The muscle fasciculations have slowed enough for me to sit up in the chair with effort. My throat is raw, but I force myself to be heard, spitting blood with my words. “Throw in a hand job from Ellison and you’ve got yourself a deal.”
I see Ellison move, but I can do nothing to prepare for it, if that’s even possible. He drives the prod between my legs.
The pain is impossible to describe. My entire world explodes into something white and hot. I don’t remember falling or even moving, but I’m on the floor again, lying on my side, my arms still bound behind me. I’m making a sound like a gurgling drain and flopping around like a freshly hooked fish. The floor under me is wet; probably my doing. The chair is in front of me, also on its side and against the wall.
A blurry set of trousers appear in my view. Remy squats down. He’s smiling, then laughing. The pain is so intense it drives all else from my mind, even rage. I can only gaze at him through teary eyes as the spasms continue.
“I think you’ve made counselor Ellison angry. I like you Mr. Smith, I do,” he says, wiping his eyes, “you’re a bit profane for my tastes, but funny nonetheless. Don’t let this opportunity pass you by. You’ve proved your courage. Both counselor Ellison and I are dutifully impressed. Take the offer. You must realize by now that eventually you’ll tell us everything anyway. It’s inevitable. Every man has a point at which he can go no further. After two days of interrogation you will be so far beyond that point, that you will look back upon it as the happiest moment in your life. Now tell me, who hired you?”
It’s enough. I’ve taken it as far as I have to, to convince him of my sincerity and as far as I dare without risking his anger and the possibility of permanent injury. The muscle contractions make answering a struggle. “Two men. Paid cash. No one gave me…a name.”
“No, of course not. No one hires a man for a suicide mission then gives him his name and address. But you knew how to get into the station; you knew your way around and where the holding cells are. That’s not a thing to be picked up in some rushed meeting in an alley. That takes planning; days of planning. And it means someone from the inside must have supplied the information.”
He leans close, whispering. “And that’s what I’m really after, Mr. Smith. We’ve known for some time that there are traitors within our ranks. I haven’t gone through all this trouble for the egomaniacal leader of a handful of renegades. We’ll find him soon enough. No, I want the name of the man on the inside.”
“I... only heard one name. It might mean nothing.”
“For your sake, let’s hope that is not the case,” he says.
So here it is. I thought I had the highest probability name when I first decided on this way in, but that was before Pen told me about the purge. Was he part of those purged? Is he still in the Council? Or maybe he led the purge himself. I have no way of knowing and so this is the biggest throw of the dice I’ll ever make. “Keillor,” I whisper. “They said someone named Keillor supplied the plans to this station.”
I can’t see his expression at first because he’s placed his ear right next to my mouth. When he pulls away I wonder if I’ve made a mistake. His face shows no emotion. For a long moment he says nothing, just stares at me. Finally he turns his head toward Ellison, as though gauging if the young Counselor heard, but Ellison is still at attention, his eyes straight ahead and his expression firm.
“Are you certain?” he whispers.
>
“I swear; I swear,” I mutter again and again.
He stands. Through the corner of my eye, I watch him. He runs his hand through his hair and paces the room. Finally he stops and addresses Ellison. “I need to call HQ.”
“Yes, sir. Should I send him out for interrogation?”
Remy stares at me for a moment, considering. “No. I don’t want him talking to anyone. No one but me is to enter this cell or speak to the prisoner, do you understand?”
“Yes sir.”
He pauses, looking at the wall that separates the two holding cells.
That’s right, what does she know?
“Or the girl,” he adds. “In fact, I want you to station yourself in the hallway and clear the floor of all other personal.”
“Sir?”
“Am I being too vague, Counselor Ellison? No one is to have any contact with these prisoners. They are to remain incommunicado until I return.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Ellison, if Mr. Smith here should accidentally ‘fall’, or otherwise succumb to a fatal mishap, then I promise that you will learn the art of interrogation first hand.”
Ellison looks nervously at me, like he’s afraid I might die at any minute. I wish I could laugh.
They leave me on the floor in a puddle of my own urine. The pain is still agonizing and my entire body is cramping but I don’t have much time. I can see the back of Ellison’s head through the window of the door as I force myself to shimmy along the floor until I’m at the bed. Fighting not to cry out, I heave myself up and fall onto the mattress.
Getting out of handcuffs isn’t a difficult skill to master, but it does require something to use as a pick and I’m a little short of materials. I am able to slip my arms down to my buttocks and slide the cuffs past my legs and out in front of me, something that’s actually easier to do naked than clothed.
I’m a little unsure of the time, but there can’t be more than fifteen minutes before they fire up the ovens. I’ll have to hurry.
My fingers are stiff and trembling, but I manage to work them into the stitching of the vinyl mattress cover and tear it loose. I keep an eye on the door as I start ripping the vinyl into strips, but Ellison appears to have taken Remy’s orders to heart and is unmoving in his position.