The Book of Eadie, Volume One of the Seventeen Trilogy

by Mark D. Diehl

  “We know that the girl’s father is endowed to the Public Brain Trust,” Daiss said. “We’ve located him and are scanning his brain for information right now. It wouldn’t be any more difficult to hook you up, should it become necessary.”

  She backed away from the door, allowing him inside. It was a start, but of course she still might attempt to lie.

  He stepped inside, momentarily blinded by the gloom. There was only a small window next to the door, barred, of course, in the typical Zone style. Zone landlords always put the bars on the inside of the glass because the metal in them was too valuable to risk having the bars themselves easily accessible to thieves. The curtains were a hodgepodge of fabric scraps sewn into two long sheets and then nailed into the top of the window frame, such that even when they were pulled back, they completely darkened the uppermost portion of the window. Other than a sink, two piles of rags that must have served as beds and a shelf holding a few glass jars, there was nothing else in the place. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he noticed that the walls had once been a light shade of blue. Now they were mostly coated with the same greasy filth that seemed to settle onto everything in the Zone, its people most of all.

  The key to complete cooperation was to find something they still had and then threaten to take it away.

  “To where are you commuting? For what job?”

  The woman’s eyes narrowed. She took a drink from a dirty mug. “Ardmore. I’m a housekeeper in Ardmore.”

  “Mmm. That’s a very long commute.” Hawkins would have seated himself in a chair, establishing psychological dominance by claiming it rather than waiting for it to be offered, but there were no chairs. “And what hours do you work?”

  “Supposed to be there at eight. Of course, you’re shooting that all to hell. Work till ten, sometimes a little earlier, depending on when the dinner dishes get done.”

  “And you’re paid for this job, certainly. In credits?”

  She looked suspiciously at him, shaking her head and flipping a wrist. “Sure.”

  “Are you paid in any other ways?”

  She set the mug in the sink. “You know how housekeepers get paid.”

  “Enlighten me.”

  “Yeah, like every other housekeeper, I’m also paid in household carbon waste, okay? I take it for recycling. Supplements my income.”

  “And what carbon waste do you collect?”

  “You never talked to a housekeeper before?”

  “I’m asking the questions. How much carbon do you collect, and in what forms?”

  “A few kilos a week. Garbage. Roach traps, when they’re full. Human waste from the old people with the tubes and wires upstairs, all right? I’m paid in garbage and shit. What does this have to do with Eadie?”

  “And is this income reported for taxation? Do your employers report that you’ve been paid in this way? Will their records reflect these kinds of additional compensation if we subject them to audits?”

  Her stare brought flashbacks to his mind of punks aiming guns at him. She would have killed Hawkins then, if she could have. But of course, she could not.

  “Let’s hope I get all the information I need, shall we?” he asked. “That way nobody else will have to be involved in this investigation.”

  “You’re a prissy little fuck, aren’t you?” she said. “You think your job protects you from ending up like me? I used to live like you. My husband made one stupid mistake, and that’s all it took. The company called it insubordination, it cost both of us our jobs, and it eventually cost him his life. That could be you—cops Depart all the time. You might end up living right there.” She pointed through the wall at the next unit over. “You want to take me to the Complex? Lock me in a room a hundred floors below ground, hook me to a machine and ask me questions until we both suffocate? Go ahead. But I’ll tell you then the same thing I’m telling you now: I barely ever see her, I don’t know what she does, and I don’t give a shit. I learned about this incident from the messages you left me, and I can see that she hasn’t changed into her clean uniform yet. That’s as much as I know. So what’re you gonna do about that, mister Angel?”

  Fiend school

  “Knives out and ready … and … fade!”

  Instructor Morea’s eyes stayed fixed on Brian as the students complied with her order. She looked to be some type of islander; a Hawaiian or Filipino, with narrowed eyes and an olive complexion. During her lecture earlier in the day, Brian had noticed a dark, slashing scar across her jaw and another bisecting her eyebrow on the same side, but now he could barely make out a single feature of her face. Even in the bright midday sun she seemed no more than a sketchy image penciled onto the surrounding debris, the brown and gray layers of dirt on her body and clothes camouflaging her almost as well as darkness would.

  Brian clutched the knife with the two smallest fingers of his right hand; the index and middle fingers on each hand were still splinted and useless. He tilted his head backward, contacting the wall and sliding down into a half crouching position behind a small pile of rubble. It was a trick he had taught himself years before, keeping some muscles tense while letting certain others go limp, which allowed him to pour himself into unlikely hiding places like this. Large, angular bits of debris pressed against flesh already deeply bruised and sore as his leg settled into a fissure in a shattered piece of concrete. He clenched his teeth.

  All around him, Fiends—Elements of the New Union—were doing the same. Brian watched from his position as they blended into their surroundings, disappearing. Like Brian, they had already mastered this skill before attending the New Union school. No Fiend could survive in this area without it. But many of them had developed other talents that they now had to unlearn, giving Brian an advantage. Having never developed a habit of slitting a throat in the “wrong” way made it easier to adopt the New Union’s method.

  Instructor Morea glided to where he was, whipping her thin wooden rod over his head twice and making a popping noise with the clicker—they called it an imparter—that hung from a string around her neck. Brian had one just like it, as did every other Element in the school. She moved over to where another Element, Lizzie G, was playing Rounder and issued a different command.

  Two swishes of the rod: Move the Round forward fast. Imparter pop from tab 3: Take positions toward the right. Brian tensed the muscles that had relaxed to fit him into the space, straightening and moving stealthily to where the first half of his Round was hidden. He had to give one click from tab 1 and a pop from tab 3, which for Brian’s splinted hands meant pushing the contraption against his chest with a pinky finger. It took a few tries, with the instructor observing as he struggled, but he managed to make the sounds.

  The Elements moved, flowing from position to position like water, advancing one standard length forward and taking positions on the right. He switched directions, his slow-motion dance carrying him swiftly back towards the second group. He gave two clicks, faster this time, now that he had the hang of it, and another pop, setting the rest of the Round in motion. These Elements passed the first half, covering twice the ground. Brian settled in behind the first group, waiting for his next command.

  Brian shifted his body, turning to watch as the other Round moved, half of it toward him and to its own left, half taking positions the others had vacated. The Element at the front of the first half made a weird jog to the right and ended up displacing one Element from Brian’s Round.

  “Stand!” Instructor Morea said, straining her raspy voice with annoyance. The one who had made the mistake, a tall, wiry Fiend with hunched shoulders called Rooter, slowly rose as Instructor Morea approached. Her rod struck Rooter’s head and shoulders again and again, making a sound curiously like a long zipper being jerked up and down. The blows continued even after he had fallen to the ground. A few of his welts were already oozing blood.

  Morea turned to the group, ignoring Rooter. “Gather now,” she said. “Right here.” She pointed to the ground near her feet, wh
ere Rooter still writhed. He slowly sat up as the other Elements filled the space around him, sitting and squatting in a rough semicircle on the gravel.

  Morea’s head pivoted, her eyes staring from face to face. She reached down her shirt, fumbling with what was apparently an interior pocket and removing a small vial. “While you’re resting, I’ll give you the talk,” she said.

  The Fiends surrounding Brian sat with stone faces but there was a strange aura of anticipation about them—maybe in the way they sat, leaning slightly forward, or in the way their eyes all focused on the vial like lasers.

  “This is it, Elements,” she said. “Juice.” She turned, displaying the vial in her fingertips. “I’m sure you’ve all heard of Juice. Many of you joined us because of it.” Brian squinted at the bottle, which held about a teaspoon of amber liquid.

  “I’ll tell you right now,” Morea said, tucking the vial back into the secret pocket. “It’s everything you’ve heard. And more.” Her eyes glazed as she froze for a moment, her hand still halfway down her shirt. “The rush of God-like power … It’s real. The calm, like you could sew your own heart back together.” She removed her hand from her shirt, heaving with a couple of deep breaths and staring into each Element’s eyes. “Bloodlust! With Juice, killing is more than an act. More than a desire, more than anything you can think of or decide. Killing is an absolute need. And when you kill on Juice—” she swallowed and blinked. “Killing when you’re on Juice is the most luscious feeling in all Unity. You will never, ever forget your first kill on Juice. And you’ll want to feel it again and again and again.”

  She zipped the rod through the air above their heads. “When you are entering a combat situation you will consume your vial immediately.” She swung the rod at Rooter’s face, stopping it about a centimeter in front of his nose and giving a small, satisfied smile when he didn’t flinch. “And if you should ever consume Juice when you are not in a combat situation or ordered to do so by your superiors, you will be kept in sight of Unity for as long as the Divinators can manage.” She inspected the rod’s tip, scrubbing at a spot with her thumbnail. “And that, I’m told, is a very long time.”

  In sight of Unity—the Fiend way of saying “Tortured so you wish for death.” Divinators. Brian’s body tensed, suppressing a shudder as his own memory blended with the samurai’s: black clothes, chanting, suffocation. Pain.

  I don’t need any drug to lust for your blood, bitch. I’m sorry I can only kill you once. Remembering the samurai inside his head, he briefly considered whether that was in fact true. Maybe you could come back again and again, and I could kill you over and over! He forced his attention back to the lesson.

  “You’ll all be issued your first vials of Juice upon completion of your training,” Instructor Morea said, glancing around at various Elements. Her stick stabbed into Brian’s chest, tilting him backward so he looked up at her. “But you, Rounder Samurai, will get yours right away.”

  INVALID USER TRANSACTION | VOID

  INVALID USER TRANSACTION | VOID

  INVALID USER TRANSACTION | VOID

  INVALID USER TRANSACTION | VOID

  Old Fart stared at the blinking words. “I don’t understand it. This is the account my wife and I have—Oh.”

  Dok looked over Old Fart’s shoulder at the screen. “What’s wrong?”

  “I think my wife locked me out of the account.”

  “She can do that?”

  “All our financial accounts are managed through the company. She’s high enough in the organization to do just about anything—who’d question her? And of course, the fact she’s divorcing me wouldn’t come up in the conversation. I bet she told them she was afraid I’d been kidnapped or something. Who knows? Maybe she actually thinks I was.”

  “You tried, anyway,” Dok said. “We’ve still got three of the gold coins you found in that pipe and they’ll get us everything we need. I guess you’ve got to go back and straighten it all out now, huh?”

  Old Fart sighed. “I suppose I should.” He winced, shaking his head. “That’s going to be awful. She’s a very cold, very insulting woman … But it’s probably best to do it sooner rather than later.” He kicked a piece of gravel gently with his toe.

  “Well,” Dok said, thinking. “I could still use some help carrying the supplies back from the market.”

  Old Fart smiled. “Yeah, you can’t carry all that back by yourself. You’ll need me! And besides, I can’t leave without saying goodbye to everyone.” He took a deep breath, squaring his shoulders. “But after that, I really will have to go back and fix this. I can’t hide from it, or from her. Thanks for guiding me to this machine, Dok. I’m sorry I can’t contribute funds to make it easier on everyone like I said I would.”

  “They’ll understand.”

  “Do you know how to get to the market from here?”

  “Of course. This is my old neighborhood. My office was a couple blocks over that way,” he answered, nodding in the general direction. “I set up shop here because I wanted to be close to the market with the best medical supplies. The guys I deal with have connections in Korean Town and Little India.” He pointed as he spoke, first one way and then another. “Which are both actually quite close to here. In this market I can get good stuff without risking my neck trying to cross a race border.”

  They turned a corner and walked a block down a different street, then turned again. Dok squinted at a man shuffling toward them. The man looked up as he got closer. His eyes were red and his face was flushed. “Dok?” he said.

  “Mr. Jamus! What are you doing all the way over here?”

  Mr. Jamus coughed. “Came to see you, a’course. Got the flu.”

  Dok nodded, reaching to feel the man’s forehead and neck. “Yes, it looks like a bad one. I can’t give you anything now, but we’re heading for the market—”

  “It’s okay. I saw the other doctor already. The one in your office. He gave me some shit.” The man produced two bags of powder, one yellowish and one white. Dok snatched them out of his hand.

  “In my office? I don’t know this other doctor. I want to check this with the spectrometer—” The man watched Dok put some of the powder into his machine.

  “You don’t know him? He looks like you—dark skin, anyway. I thought he must be your brother.”

  Dark skin? Dok shivered. “That is very creepy.” He handed back the yellow powder, shaking his head. “I can’t imagine why anyone would give you this for a flu. It’s a sedative. A pretty strong one, too. How much of this did he tell you to take?”

  “Don’t know. Just said to take it first and take ‘a lot,’ is all. Then I’m supposed to take the white one.”

  Dok wiped the inside of the spectrometer clean and used its scoop to take up a little bit of the white powder. He pushed a button and the spectrometer flashed.

  Dok stared at the little box, reaching up with his other hand to steady the shaking one that held it, rereading the data for the powder’s main component:

  As2O3

  White Solid

  197.841 g/mol

  mp: 274°C

  bp: 460°C

  Arsenic Trioxide

  Common Use: Rodent Poison

  Coiner’s room

  “It’s only a group of six,” Coiner said. “That’s half what you’d lead normally. Don’t worry so much, Rounder Samurai. The school tells me you’re a fast learner, and anyway, you’ve got to practice giving commands.”

  “But, Patrol Leader, I don’t know enough yet—not enough to command a Round by myself if we actually engage,” Brian said. “I haven’t even learned as much as the Elements I’ll be commanding.”

  Coiner’s hands stayed at his sides and his voice was calm but he still gave the impression of grabbing Brian by the ears and shouting into his face. “You are a Rounder in the New Union, Rounder Samurai. You are ready to lead the Round or you would not have been given that rank.”

  “Is this standard procedure, Patrol Leader?”

 
; “Never had a Rounder go through the school before, Samurai. You’re the first, and you’re a Rounder in my Patrol. That means I decide when you’re ready to lead, and I’ve decided you’re leading now. Only a few maneuvers, you understand. It doesn’t have to be anything elaborate. We have to get you used to being in charge of your Round.” He snatched his old assault rifle from its place against the wall and broke it down for cleaning. He did not look up again.

  Brian hesitated a moment, then nodded. “Yes, Patrol Leader. Thank you for your advice, Patrol Leader.” Brian backed out of the room, turning down the hallway after his feet had crossed the threshold.

  I’ll kill them all if I get the chance, even if they take me out with them. And if I don’t get the chance to kill them, I’ll break away and run back to Dok—or they’ll just kill me. No matter which way it goes down, I’ll soon be rid of you, Samurai.

  New Union residences

  Coiner listened to Rounder Samurai’s footsteps moving away down the hall. He set the rifle down and quietly rose to his feet, leaning out the door to check that the passage was clear. Sunlight shone in through the concrete structure’s gaping window and door holes.

  Coiner strode quickly along the empty corridor, making a few popping noises that served for knocks as he arrived at the doorless entrance to a room. The man inside pulled himself to a standing position from the floor, where he had been doing pushups. He nodded, waving Coiner in and toward the huge leather seat along his wall that had once filled the back of a luxury car.

  “I just said goodbye to the samurai, Lux,” Coiner said, settling himself onto the leather. Coiner himself was on the large side for a Wild One, but Lux, easing into a cross-legged position across from him on the bare concrete floor, was massive enough to tower over Coiner as he sat on the makeshift couch. Only someone as big as this Frontman could have carried the car seat here and earned himself the nickname.