Curds and Whey Box Set

by G M Eppers

  “I can’t tell, but I think they took my belt, too,” I said. “I’ve still got my shoes, though,” I wiggled my toes and could feel the outline of my New Balance 574s, but it also felt like my feet were bound together somehow. I couldn’t really kick, not even with both feet together. Something pulled them back into place, something other than inertia. And when I moved, I heard chains rattling and clanking again.

  “They took my shirt,” said Billings. There was something else in his voice, but I wasn’t sure what it meant. He sounded like he was in pain, maybe, but not the way Roxy was in pain. His shirt hadn’t been a collector’s item or anything, and the last shirt he’d been emotionally attached to had had a screen printing of a T-Rex on the front. But his tone made me totally forget the ache in my shoulders for a while. What had they done to him? Or was it the same pain I was feeling? He’d been here longer than the rest of us. If I felt like this now, what kind of shape could his shoulders be in?

  “If they are trying to accessorize, they are doing it all wrong,” said Roxy. “You’d think Italians would know better. They have all the best designers.” I wasn’t sure that was true. The stolen shoes, after all, were French. That may have been Roxy sucking up to our captors. She was also familiar with the Capture Protocols, though flattery was low in the list, something like 75.

  “Well, it looks like we’re going to be here for a while,” I said. “And calling everyone ‘hey you’ is going to get confusing. You can call me Rose.”

  Billings said, “You can call me Al. I’ve always wanted to say that.” That song was popular before he was born, but he’d heard it frequently when I’d cued up my Paul Simon collection while he was little, before he got into groups like Rot and Decay, and Worms Ate My Eyeballs in his dark period around the age of thirteen, after my Dad died but just before Butte and I had gotten our divorce. It was five more years before he drifted back to classic rock.

  Nitro went with a version of his middle name which he has never used. “I’m Nate.”

  There was a pause and I had to prompt Roxy to come up with an alias. “Ma’am? What should we call you?”

  “Oh, Hell. All right. Minerva, then. But don’t get used to it.” That was close to breaking protocol, but I didn’t think it crossed a line. If our captors were listening, they had to assume we were not using our real names, or at least not the names we were publicly known by. We were just simplifying conversation. It was better than hanging here silently in the dark. Throwing in a little-used legal name couldn’t hurt and might even cause some nice confusion.

  I was still worried about Billings, though. Hearing his voice had been unbelievably wonderful, but I needed to see him. I needed to hold him, if my arms would ever be capable of holding something again. I wanted him to tell me everything that had happened since he was taken, but that would be admitting to whoever was listening that I knew him, and that I cared about him. And then they would hurt him more to coerce me and I couldn’t have that. “Hey, um, Al,” I said. “Did they hurt you?”

  “They hurt everyone,” he replied a bit too quickly. “Chains’ll do that.”

  I tried my best to shift my position again, but my movements were severely limited. My hands seemed to be secured shoulder width apart, so it could have been worse. In the Spanish Inquisition, they would tie someone’s hands behind their back and then lift them up, twisting the shoulder sockets backwards until often the joints dislocated. Or they would repeatedly jerk the person up and down, tearing the shoulder ligaments apart. I considered myself pretty lucky. I gripped the bar and tried to pull myself up, but my arms were already pretty weak. Okay, I thought to myself. When—and I made sure to use that word—we got home, I was going to request a chin-up bar for the yard. People have tried chinning on the horizontal ladder, but it was hard to do without hitting your head. I never really thought chinning would be that important. But practice at chinning would have been a big help right now. I could only lift myself about an inch or so, but it was enough to relieve my shoulders for a while until my biceps gave out. Then I’d ease up and let my shoulders bear the weight again until I couldn’t stand it anymore. If I’d kept to one position, my arms would have gone numb after a time and I wouldn’t even have felt it, but that could lead to severe nerve damage. Pain was better in a situation like this. Pain meant blood was circulating and feeding those nerve endings. Healthy nerve endings are very important. That didn’t really make it easier, however.

  Al / Billings added, “Yeah, they hurt me a bit. But it’s nothing.”

  He was trying to reassure me, but until there was enough light to see him clearly, I was still worried. I knew my son. If he was missing an ear he’d say it was nothing. I really hated the dark. To be honest, I hated the dark more than the chains and the hanging, and I was hopeful that we’d be out of here before morning. I couldn’t imagine how, but I was hopeful anyway.

  I hung silently for a while, listening to Minerva, Nate and Al discuss the physics of isometric exercise. Although I still had my shirt on, it was only a short sleeve T and my arms were bare. Suddenly I felt something contact my right arm and move downward on the inside of my elbow. I convulsed out of reflex, convinced it was an army of spiders creeping down from the rafters. I tried to shake them off and my chains rattled like Jacob Marley visiting Ebenezer Scrooge, my heart picking up speed in panic.

  “M—“ Billings began, then corrected himself. “Rose, you all right?”

  “Something touched my arm,” I said.

  “You’re probably sweating,” he said reassuringly. “It’s kind of warm in here and hanging like this is more strenuous than it looks.”

  But I didn’t feel warm. And it didn’t feel like moisture. I gritted my teeth together to avoid screaming, still sure it was spiders, and continued to try to shake it off. It slipped under my sleeve and slid down my armpit. “Anyone else feel something?” I twisted as the sensation continued moving south and over my abdomen. Water doesn’t change direction like that. It was some kind of creepy crawly and I was going to go quietly, no, loudly insane. I didn’t care if I pulled a muscle, I jerked back and forth and twisted as the willies took full control.

  “Yeah,” said Nitro. “I think it’s rain water. I heard thunder a while ago. This building is so old, there’s no way the ceiling doesn’t leak. And they probably didn’t do a very professional job mounting the pipes we’re attached to.”

  It still didn’t feel like moisture, but I appreciated their attempt to calm me down. The creeping sensation subsided and I was able to calm my beating heart. “It’s gone. I think I shook it off, whatever it was.”

  “Water,” said all three of them at once.

  “I hope so.” I wasn’t convinced, but it did appear to be gone and I hoped it wouldn’t come back.

  Could someone please run their fingernails down a chalkboard? I’d like that much better, I thought. I toyed with the idea that it was a mouse just to calm myself. I could handle it if it was a mouse. But there’d been no squeaking and it hadn’t felt large enough to be a mouse. Still, it was more likely than their water theory. After a while, my heartbeat settled back to normal as the adrenaline dissipated.

  It turns out that drug-induced sleep isn’t nearly as refreshing as natural sleep. Maybe it was from straining to see in the dark, but my eyes felt like they were the size of navel oranges. I didn’t really want to sleep. It would mean relaxing my hold on the pipe. I was sure to wake up in even more agony than I was in now. Of course, part of that was due to my personal Olympics trying to shake off whatever had crawled down my arm, but it wasn’t like I’d had a choice in the matter. You let something you can’t see crawl all over your body and try sitting still. It can’t be done. Okay, maybe by a Zen master, but how many of those are there? “Nice to meet you all. And I hate to be a party pooper, but I think we should all try to get some sleep. There’s not really much we can do until light, anyway.”

  “That’s a good idea,” said Billings, and in my head I heard him add “Mom,” t
hough he didn’t say it out loud.

  “I have to pee,” I heard Nitro say. I had a flash memory of the physical he’d given me a hundred years ago and what had happened toward the end, rushing into the toilet cubicle to void everything, and the memory swallowed all the pity I could muster.

  Billings responded, “Been there done that. I, for one, won’t think less of you.” And he meant that. Not in the sense of he already thought too little of Nitro, but that he understood his physician friend was human.

  “But…” Nitro was still reluctant.

  The third rule of the CCP was that your bodily functions are no longer your responsibility. Your bladder and your colon now belong to your captors and you should feel no shame in doing what you have to do. It is one of the more difficult rules to put into practice. And now that he had mentioned it, my own bladder perked up like a dog seeing a squirrel. I closed my eyes and let it go. It wasn’t the first time I’d had to do it and it certainly wasn’t my favorite part of the job. It was the first time I’d had to void with Billings present and I appreciated the darkness for that. “If it’s any consolation, I just beat you to it, Nate.” I deliberately used the name he had chosen just to imprint it in my head. “Minerva, how are you doing? We’re all in the same boat here.” The vague scent of urine was drifting up to my nose, but at least I knew it was my own.

  “Okay, so far. Maybe I went while I was unconscious and they cleaned it up.”

  “Maybe.” Or it could be that life in evening gowns had helped her develop a tolerance. Her bladder was now the equivalent of camel humps for urine. If you make using the bathroom inconvenient, you learn to wait longer in between. On missions where I’d worked with her for long periods, I went three or four times to her one. When I’d tell her I needed to use a restroom, she’d just say “of course, you do,” and wait for me outside.

  Once our evening de-ablutions were finished, we awkwardly settled in for some much needed sleep. It was neither easy nor restful, but I did manage to at least doze intermittently, nearing consciousness only to shift my shoulders once again.

  As I expected, I woke up to screaming shoulders, a stiff neck, and numb hands. Immediately, I grasped the bar, lifting my head carefully and wishing I was able to rub the back of my neck. There was considerably more light now, though it was tinged orange and pink. There were tiny windows high up on the walls that didn’t open at all so they provided no ventilation. The air reeked of sweat and urine, and still I could detect the underlying aroma of Limburger. Out of curiosity, I looked straight up and noticed that all four of us were handcuffed to individual tubular frameworks that looked like they had been salvaged from a bunch of hang gliders. I also recognized my own handcuffs. There was a scratch in the metal of the locking mechanism on one cuff from when an Uber gouda dealer tried to escape using his diamond ring. Fortunately, Nitro had discovered his activity and confiscated the ring, though he’d had to break the guy’s finger to get it off. At least, that was his story. I didn’t see it. That meant the key, unfortunately, was in a hidden pocket on my HEP belt which was, of course, missing. Then I looked down and saw that each of us had our feet shackled together and chained to large round metal rings set firmly into the wooden flooring just inches below us. This wood was newer and thicker than the wooden door I’d broken to get in. And I had even less leverage to work with. There were also several more sets of glider frames hanging above metal rings, set in a large circle. The four of us only made about a quarter arc of the circle.

  That’s when I looked to my right and saw Billings. He was still asleep, with his head bowed low. He was, indeed, shirtless and I gasped. He had several cuts on his arms and torso that looked like a four year old had scribbled on him with red ink. They weren’t bleeding, and they weren’t deep, but the sight still made my heart ache for him. Pappardelle was going to pay for this. I was going to call to Billings to wake him up—I even remembered to call him Al—but my mouth was utterly dry and my lips were chapped and sore, and I was hungry enough to bite them off and eat them.

  “Ow!” Nitro was coming to with a groan and a rattle of chains. He, too, grasped the bars and pulled himself up.

  There was a gasp of pain as Roxy also woke up. “Man, is this getting old fast.” There was now a dark stain on her blue dress, but I wasn’t going to mention it. It wasn’t very big. Most of it had probably run down her legs. My own jeans were uncomfortably moist in that area as well. Nitro had incidentally worn dark gray denim and his stain was barely noticeable.

  “Al?” I called, finally, after licking my dry lips with my dry tongue. “Hey, Al. Wake up.”

  His head raised slowly. Good God, he looked exhausted. I probably should have let him sleep, but I wanted to make sure he hadn’t died during the night. His breathing was so shallow I couldn’t see his chest or abdomen expand. His eyes had sunk into his head and he had about a two day growth of beard that made him look much older, to my eyes, anyway. My baby didn’t have a beard! But he did have a dull, defeated look. “Morning!” He tried to sound cheerful, but it didn’t at all work out that way. Like the rest of us, he grasped his framework and pulled himself up with a grimace.

  “My God, what did they do to you?” I asked, unable to hide my concern.

  “I told you, it’s nothing. Small cuts.” As the light shifted, I could see far more cuts than I had at first. Dozens, even shallower than the others.

  “But why? What do they want?” Then, believing that they were listening, I directed my voice to the whole room and shouted, “what the Hell do you want?!” I knew they wanted a corridor, a path into Europe to market Uber, perhaps in a large scale, relatively short burst while the region tried to recover from the damage, but I wasn’t about to give it to them. “Al, what did they say? Anything?”

  He took a deep breath, and leaned his head against his left upper arm. “I got the impression they were trying out a new interrogation technique. Just practice, to get the cutting depth right, something like that. Sometimes they used a big knife, sometimes a small knife, and once a pencil sized laser. I think I’m a guinea pig for something. If they come back, I’ll tell them they don’t need any more guinea pigs.”

  “You need medical attention. You’ll get infected.”

  Billings shook his head. “No. I’ll be fine. After they finished, they hosed me down.” He paused. Talking was tiring. He probably hadn’t eaten, either. “With salt water.”

  Christ, I thought. Salt water, on fresh wounds. Sanitary, yes. But painful beyond belief, and only slightly better than cauterizing with a blow torch. “I’m sorry, Al. God, I’m so sorry.”

  “Don’t be. You didn’t cut me.” He raised his head with new strength. “This is not your fault.”

  “Ssshhh,” said Roxy/Minerva. “Someone’s coming.”

  A massive door opened just beyond Nitro, who tried unsuccessfully to turn his head to see. An elongated rectangle of yellow light entered into the room just before a large oddly-shaped shadow. It was two large men, with another man between them. The man in the middle was unconscious and being dragged by his shoulders. His head was down, but I could tell it was Badger. He was too short to be either Butte or Sir Haughty. They pulled him to a spot near Nitro and used a pulley device to lower one of the hang glider frames. They’d already removed his HEP belt, but used what I was pretty sure were his own handcuffs to secure his wrists to the frame. Then they used the pulley to lift him into the air and produced more chains to bind his feet and secure them to another ring in the floor.

  “Hey!” I said. In my head, I was already identifying the men as Thug One and Thug Two. Thug One was the larger man of the two, though both were more massive than anyone on my team. I’d seen bigger, but they’d been on our side. A couple of detectives in Baja California about three years ago. But being five foot two at the time, it was hard not to feel intimidated. “I’d like to know what this is all about. I was just enjoying my tour of Italy when I was very rudely kidnapped and –“

  Thug One, his task of bi
nding Badger completed, approached. He was heavily Italian, with thick, dark hair cut just below his ears, thick eyebrows to match that almost met in the middle, black eyes that held intelligence but no feeling, and a nose that had been broken more times than the Ten Commandments. He was wearing a green head scarf tied in the back and a black tank top that revealed his massive biceps and several tattoos of skulls and snakes in various combinations. His jeans had ragged holes in the thighs and partially detached pockets in the rear. Thanks to my chains, I could look at him eye-to-eye. It took a lot of willpower not to divert my gaze as he came up close and stuck his face an inch from mine. “Capo Piccolo, she talks, eh? She has spice.” His breath smelled of garlic and amaretto, and his teeth were varying shades of yellow and brown, but they appeared to all be there.

  Thug Two, who was younger and had a beard coming in badly, finished an inspection of our foot chains and stood up next to Nitro. He had similar attire but his tank top was royal blue and fit more loosely, one leg of his jeans was undamaged, and he sported only one tattoo: a small circle at the base of his throat. “Papa likes spice.”

  “Interesting tattoo,” commented Nitro. “What’s it mean?”

  Thug Two fingered his tattoo and became introspective for a moment, as if he’d forgotten it was even there. “My mother made me get this when I was twelve and I started smoking with my friends. She said that’s where they put the hole to breathe through when they have to take out your voicebox.” He laughed and pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. He shook one out and put the pack back, then produced a lighter. After a few puffs, he took the cigarette from his mouth and offered it to Nitro, who turned his head in disgust. Thug Two put it back into his own mouth, then walked over to Thug One and offered it to him. Thug One accepted it with a smile, took two deep drags, and gave it back, letting the smoke exit through his nose. I thought they might blow the smoke in our faces, but apparently that didn’t occur to them, and I wasn’t about to suggest it.