Shield

by Rachael Craw

  I rise abruptly, muscles aching, bruises throbbing up my arms. Queasy from dreaming, I’m unsure if I should be relieved I finally broke the cycle of my recurring nightmare – I hope this one won’t replace it. I dig my knuckles into my lower back and stretch. My stomach growls. The small cell is little more than twelve feet squared. Two beds, side table and wardrobe all built into the walls. Short pile carpet on the floor that seems like an uncharacteristic luxury in the underground concrete labyrinth. I dig my phone from my jacket at the foot of the bed. It’s nearly five-thirty. I debate trying to get back to sleep but I’m too jittery and I really do stink.

  Going to the wardrobe, I search through the stacks of standard-issue Affinity clothing folded neatly on three shelves: black pants, black shirts, black sweaters, socks and a stack of cotton underwear in flamboyant grey marl. A fourth shelf with towels and an open case of toiletry items. A glimpse of real-world objects jars me. Brightly coloured middling brands. A lot of sanitary pads and tampons. I shudder, grateful for the ovary zap that keeps me from the harrowing weekly power period but I can’t help picturing Davis and Benjamin patrolling some super-mart for pallets of tampons.

  I’m careful not to wreck the regimental line-up. I hug the bundle, standing in the middle of the floor, newly panicked at the thought of leaving the safety of the room. The hallway is empty except for a pair of new black boots, running shoes and sure enough, several plastic baggies with black sports bras sitting at the threshold. I shove everything inside the door, add a bra and running shoes to my stack and make my way to the right, stepping softly like a sneak.

  Voices ahead stall me. I fight the instinct to run back to the room. I’m not breaking rules. I’m not “escaping”. I’m a Shield. I’m allowed to be here. I straighten up and lengthen my stride. At the end of the hall there’s a dogleg leading to the entrance of the dormitory bathroom. Two women holding towels, heads together laughing, easy. They glance up, that disinterested turn of the head expecting to see something they expect. Instead they see me.

  They take in my civilian clothes and my rumpled appearance. “Bit early for training.” The woman with the full halo of tight black curls, built like an Amazonian goddess.

  Her friend with the ink-black razor-bobbed hair narrows her almond eyes and tilts her head.

  “I’m not … I just need a shower.”

  This explains nothing but then she wasn’t really asking me an outright question. They both produce strong active signals – no aggression – but I don’t enjoy the attention.

  The door opens on a locker room much like the men’s one I stumbled into during my last visit. A rectangular-tiled room with three banks of lockers. The right-hand wall opens to the shared shower stalls. I groan inwardly. I hate the idea of showering in the open.

  They follow me in. I try to look busy and confident. I stop at an empty locker that’s partially open and use the door to block my view of their curious faces, depositing my change of clothes, the shoes and bra and slowly begin to undress.

  The women walk out of sight and I hear the sound of faucets opening and the gush of shower water and I cringe again. They’ll be my audience. I peel my stale clothes off and dither in my underwear, fingering my scars. Two bullet holes. One in the right socket of my shoulder, the other on my left bicep. I feel for the still-sensitive flesh of my lower back and the three concentric scars. No way to hide. I finally surrender my underwear to the locker and wrap the towel tight around me and give myself a stern speech about prudishness and being a grown-up. I will be eighteen in two days. Suck it up.

  When I reach the shower stall, I keep my eyes on the bench where the women have left their towels. In my periphery, I see they’ve taken the central shower nozzles, leaving two to the left and the right. Soap, shampoo and conditioner dispensers sit beneath each shower nozzle. Steeling myself, I lay my towel down and take the shower closest to the locker area for a quick escape. I open the faucet and the water is instantly hot and the stream powerful. It would be bliss except for the discomfort of being naked in front of strangers who may or may not prove hostile if they figure out who I am.

  I sense the women glancing at me and will them to let me wash in silence. I soap my neck and shoulders and keep my face under the hot flow of water.

  “Are you new?” The woman with the curls.

  “Sort of.”

  Stupid answer. It only invites more questions.

  “You’re not part of the returning intake?”

  “I – I don’t know what that is.”

  She turns around to rinse shampoo from her frothing hair. She’s tall and muscled and sleek. I can’t help but notice she also has scars. They’re not obvious at first. Faded lighter marks against her dark skin. A long ragged line runs down her left thigh. A slash across her ribs. Several smaller cuts mark her arms and she has a round scar in her shoulder socket just like mine. “What are you? Eighteen? Nineteen?”

  “I turn eighteen on the weekend.” She doesn’t care about your birthday, moron. “I think I’ll be joining the newbies. Probably. Depends what Ethan says.”

  “Ethan?” Her eyebrows shoot up and the other woman gives me a stern who-do-you-think-you-are look. “Could you possibly mean Counsellor Tesla?”

  My body flushes with heat – and not from the shower. “Sorry.”

  “There are no newbies,” says the shorter woman with the razor bob. “No Proxy, no Warden sweeps for months. The returning intake is here for refresher training from the last Orientation.”

  “Oh.” To give myself an excuse to turn away I pump the shampoo nozzle, squirt too much into my hand and slop it onto my head. Soon my head is foaming. I can feel the women next to me are not only curious but suspicious.

  “You know Counsellor Tesla?” Razor-bob.

  “Um,” I mumble, eyes closed against the suds. “He’s my Watcher.”

  Neither respond. Their silence doesn’t feel satisfied. It feels like I’ve said something else they didn’t expect and now they’re more suspicious.

  I get way past the point where I should’ve started rinsing. Foam spills down my shoulders and chest. I’m obviously stalling. I tip my head beneath the flow, willing them to leave me to it.

  “Members of the Executive don’t Watch.” Amazon Curls. “And newbies aren’t appointed Watchers until they complete Orientation.”

  Oh no. I shrug.

  “Maybe Watching is Tesla’s punishment?” Razor-bob.

  “Knox shouldn’t have cut him off.”

  “He won’t last.”

  I can’t tell if she means Ethan or Knox. I keep my mouth shut and decide to leave the conditioner.

  “The Thurstons will stand by him.” Amazon Curls, her voice tinged with warning.

  “Alexis maybe. Not Juno.”

  I prickle all over.

  “Everybody has a thing for Tesla.” Amazon Curls’s tone implies she does too. It gives me an uncomfortable feeling and my ache for Miriam deepens. Get dressed, get out, get food, find Ethan, see my mother. I shut the faucet and go for my towel. I nearly get to it before they notice my scars.

  Amazon Curls clears her voice. “Core samples?”

  I wrap myself up, give a reluctant nod and make a quick escape to my locker. I drag the towel over my skin, scrubbing it red in my haste. The waistband of the grey panties rolls on my damp thighs and I nearly tear the cotton trying to straighten them out. The pants are a hard wrestle, designed to be close-fitting. I tear the plastic baggie for my new bra. The showers stop. Shit. I yank the black elastic, jam my arms through the straps and fumble the clasp. I’m barely in when they come around the corner straight for me. I pretend not to notice and reach for the tank top.

  Neither woman moves or speaks as I fight the shirt on, emerging red-faced.

  “It’s against the Reform to sample newbies, isn’t it, Stephanie?” Razor-bob.

  Stephanie. It’s not a very Amazonian name. I lift my chin. “Ethan stopped it.”

  Both sets of dark eyes narrow.


  “Counsellor Tesla,” I say, my voice small.

  Stephanie tilts her head. “He would.”

  “Only Knox would order a core sample.” Razor-bob drops her towel and turns to her locker. “He can be vicious.”

  Stephanie stays to eye me, her towel tucked in place. “Bet you had looong hair.”

  I don’t answer. I sit on the bench and start on my socks and shoes.

  “But why would the Chair of the Executive Council order a core sample procedure on a new Asset?”

  Pins and needles give warning stabs in my spine. She knows. Or she’s drawing near the answer. I’m the Stray sympathiser they’ve heard about. Defensive strategies fire. I calculate the distance to escape routes, identify objects that can be used as weapons. I could rip a locker door from its hinges to use in self-defence. Stop it. You’re being ridiculous. No one is going to attack you. No one is going to kill you. I can’t help it, mentally sizing her up. How old is she? Mid- to late-twenties? She’s ripped. Clearly trained. I’m taller – only by a fraction. That could be an advantage. What about her friend? She’s smaller but muscled like a gymnast. Would I even stand a chance?

  “I hope you’re not her.”

  I keep my face impassive as I collect things from my locker, my pulse throbbing in my ears. I don’t hurry but I make no effort to fold anything. I crouch to collect my old shoes. Stephanie pins one sneaker beneath the ball of her foot. I don’t try to take it just rise with what I have and turn away.

  Razor-bob blocks me, half-dressed in her pants and bra. “This is no place for a girl who doesn’t understand what she was made for.”

  My heart kicks but I can’t help myself. “Weird. I thought Affinity was exactly the right place. Isn’t Orientation designed to brainwash me so I can embrace my glorious destiny as a mindless killer?”

  “Stray-lover,” Stephanie says behind me.

  “You don’t know anything about me.” I step over the bench for a clear path to the door, ignoring the ringing in my ears. Stephanie draws close and the fine hairs rise on the back of my neck. Elbow, forearm, side kick. No! Ethan would be furious if I got in a fight on my first day and this is exactly what Kitty warned me against. Besides, these women are older than me – probably senior in rank, if that’s even how it works.

  Stephanie’s hand clamps my upper arm, cold and hard. Electricity stabs through my spine. An excruciating note pierces my inner ear. Lockers burst open all around us – a sound like crashing symbols. The women cry out and duck their heads then Stephanie drives me back against a swinging locker door, her eyes springing wide. I smack the back of my head on the metal frame and tumble into her signal like my foot has slipped at the edge of a chasm and I’m plunging.

  The locker room disappears. A nightmare, rabbit-hole plummet into this woman’s memories with the familiar markers of Kinetic Memory Harvest: pressure in my chest and head, bruising bursts of colour.

  Her shock reverberates through me.

  A blurry scene unfolds, a dark room, somewhere run-down. I draw all my mental energy to the scene and it comes clear. I feel the air of the room, breathe the dank fug of neglect. An abandoned office?

  Sick with fear, I pant hard, trying not to make a sound. The Stray is in here. I know it. And there’s only one way out and that’s behind me. An invisible tether tugs behind my navel; it’s weak but it’s there. I left my Spark on the busy street when I sensed the threat.

  The memory skips ahead and at first I can’t tell if she’s making it happen or I am, but then I feel her weakness and I know it’s me. The realisation gives me a spiteful thrill then a flash of shame. I’d hate it if this were happening to me. I remember the sense of violation when Felicity performed a Harvest on me in Miriam’s kitchen. I try to pull back – I don’t want this. I don’t want to make her feel weak.

  A dark blur lunges through the office door. He drives me into the wall, smacking my head, a dizzying blow. I’m too slow, too winded. I scrabble at his face but his hands are on my throat. Oxygen cuts off, terror surges through me–

  I haul myself back from the memory, flinging her signal away.

  The bathroom swirls back into focus, my eyes clear. Razor-bob leaps forwards to help her friend and I get the impression that only split seconds have passed.

  “I’m sorry,” I choke, backing away to the door. My parting glimpse of Stephanie’s face is more disconcerting than an expression of rage or hate.

  It’s fear.

  BREAKFAST

  “Could I maybe just eat here?” I peer from the door of the dorm room, past the Director of Residence, but the corridor is clear.

  “Are you asking me to bring breakfast to your room?”

  “No, no. I just wondered if there’s any way I could bring some food back here …”

  Her marble stare could rival Ethan’s. “Meals are eaten in the mess hall. The kitchen closes at seven-thirty. If you’re training today you’re obligated to ensure you are well fuelled. Malnourished Assets are trouble for themselves, their trainers and their peers. Are you going to be trouble, Ms Everton?”

  “I – no …”

  We make our way to the north corridor in silence, me scanning the bandwidth for approaching signals, praying Amazon Curls – Stephanie – and Razor-bob are done with breakfast and long gone from the mess hall. I’m not familiar with this part of level six – my four weeks on the psych ward were on level five. Food was delivered. They had an in-house gym. A reading room. A lounge with a big screen and a stack of old DVDs. I had been the only talking inmate. There were three others who kept to their rooms. It was boring as hell but it was safe. Walking through open corridors doesn’t feel safe.

  The smell of bacon wafts on the air. The Director nods at the double sliding doors coming up on our left with the bright-red horizontal racing stripe. “Return to your room when you’ve finished eating. Davis will pick you up from the dorm.”

  “You’re not coming in?”

  She raises her eyebrows before swivelling on her heel.

  I’m ready for the signal blast when the mess hall doors open and step into a torrent of static that makes my head swim. I hold myself back, a tightening of my telepathic muscle, and slowly the signals recede – enough so I can think and see straight. I realise that standing here wincing says look at me and head for the servery. There are three long rows of tables. Half-a-dozen women in their twenties and thirties sit in the middle, a handful of older teens sit nearest the food and on the far-right my fears are realised. Stephanie and Razor-bob sit with four other serious, official-looking women. Official by the single red stripe on the shoulders of their shirts and jackets. Razor-bob glares, Stephanie looks away.

  While the other curious tables return to their food and conversation, the official-looking women track my progress to the counter. I resist running from the room. I resist checking over my shoulder. I resist the rush of defensive tactics my instinct churns out at the lick of adrenaline. Scrambled eggs, edge of tray to throat. Bacon, shatter plate – drive shard through bicep. Toast, leverage weight off counter, right foot to chest. Cereal, spoon to cheekbone, knee to gut.

  The doors to the mess hall open again, more signals join the crush. I take my tray and edge through the gap in tables in the same row as the teens. Defying my instinct further, I sit with my back to the glaring women.

  Cold toast, lukewarm scrambled eggs, a tough salty bacon strip. I chew with mechanical focus, not savouring anything – shovelling coal for the furnace. I don’t want to tempt my metabolism into a shaming low blood sugar blackout but I’m so wired it’s hard to swallow. The hairs on the back of my neck bristle, sensitive to the troubled current and the predatory vibe pulsing from two rows behind me.

  The volume of chatter is a middling jumble of voices. The teens a couple of tables down from me are quieter than the rows of older women behind us – they must be the returning intake. They huddle. Seven of them. Listening and watchful, alternating glances at me. One of them offers an uncertain smile. I keep my eyes on
my food, shovelling, chewing. Do Not Disturb.

  “We should’ve come earlier,” a girl with a southern twang says to her companion as they approach from the counter. I glance up. She has big brown hair and a heart-shaped face full of freckles, her nose wrinkled at the stack of food on her tray. The other is older, wearing bulky scrubs over a small, thin body, blondish hair pulled back in a tight bun. She frowns at something across the room.

  “They bake their own croissants but you have to get in quick,” the girl says.

  The blonde hesitates. “Here’s fine.”

  “The kids’ table?” The girl gives a snort but she shuffles through the gap and takes a seat on my bench. The blonde woman sits diagonally from me, still frowning at whatever she doesn’t like the look of and I wonder if it’s someone in the third row where the official women are sitting.

  “Tuesdays and Thursdays they do porridge,” the girl says.

  “I remember.” The blonde has an accent too but I can’t pick it.

  I fork cooling hash brown into my mouth, chewing faster.

  “How’s the new spook?”

  The blonde pauses, her knife and fork hovering over her own stack of food. One of her hands is paler than the other. She glances at me as though warning the girl to mind what she talks about in public and says with a lowered voice, “Don’t call her that. If you wish to train in the department you must treat her with respect.”

  My brain stops like a stalled engine. I blink once. Twice. The restart comes with a roar of static and high-pitched ringing in my ears. The clues rush at me from thirty seconds of overheard conversation forming a conclusion as hard as concrete. Her hair is no longer blonde but sandy; her accent is no longer unidentifiable but German; her hand is no longer pale but bleached. Helena. This is Helena.

  Half-chewed hash brown forms a greasy plug in my throat. I have to force it down. My head gets swimmy. My fork slides in my clammy palm. My ears flame with heat. I grieve for the dark curtain of hair that would have hidden the side of my face. This is not how it’s supposed to happen. I decided last night that it wouldn’t happen – at all. I planned to explain it to Ethan this morning, even though I would have burned with embarrassment to bring it up: I don’t want to meet Helena. Can we please organise for me to not meet her? Figure out schedules or something? Figure out how long she’s going to be here – how long I’m going to be here – arrange for me to recover/train/Orientate in a vicinity that won’t coincide with whatever she’s doing here?