The Anathema

by Rawlins, Zachary

  “Bitch,” Robert Fisher spat, “fuck your –”

  Alice made a disappointed sound and then activated the cattle prod, pushing it firmly to his chest. There was sparking, a loud noise, and then a great deal of screaming and twitching, and some steam coming off his wet shirt where the prod touched. She kept it on for ten seconds.

  “Don’t be impatient,” Alice scolded. “I am trying to make a point. My point is that I will die without ever being able to remember what I have forgotten. There is nothing I can do about it. You, however, can have all of your precious memories back, just by wanting them. All you have to do is trigger that psychic safety word they implanted in your mind, where my friend Mark can’t get at it, and it will all come flooding back to you. I am envious.”

  He didn’t seem to be up to talking yet, but the look in Robert Fisher’s eyes made it abundantly clear that he doubted her sincerity.

  “I’m serious,” Alice protested, pausing to zap him again, and then waiting until he stopped moaning and flaying before continuing. “Do you know what it’s like to suspect that you could be walking right by your favorite food, your dream house, the perfect lover, even ignoring your own birthday, all because you can’t remember? You should be grateful for what you have. You’re lucky to have the two of us here to assist you, working hard to try and help jog that memory for you.”

  Robert Fisher straightened partway up and looked her hard in the eye. There was a faint crackle of power, a minor fluctuation in the Ether. Alice stared back hard for a moment, and then she laughed, and jammed the cattle prod into his crotch, activating it while the big man behind him recoiled in laughter and sympathetic pain. Again, Alice politely waited until Robert had stopped thrashing about on the floor.

  “You are probably wondering why it is that you cannot use your magic brains to kill us,” Alice said crisply. “I should have pointed this out earlier, but I tend to lose my train of thought when I am having fun. My friend Mark Costas probably isn’t familiar to you, but he should be, if there was any justice in the world. You see, Bobby, you might be something of a telepath, but Mark here is a very special kind of telepath; really, he’s a rare and utterly unique talent.”

  “You are too kind,” Mark rumbled.

  In fact, he was too kind to point out that he heard this speech a number of times over the years, almost verbatim, and that he knew that it came from her diaries rather than any direct memory of him. However, since he actually was her friend, he kept quiet about this, the same way he kept quiet about the fact that he was also her former student, because he wasn’t sure whether she’d read about that yet. She’d actually been the one who had overseen his transformation from a chubby, awkward little Salvadorian kid from New Mexico to the tattooed enforcer that he was today. Still, no matter what she had forgotten, he was heartened to see Alice being Alice, and it showed in the genuineness of his smile.

  “Don’t get me wrong, he can do all the normal shit too. That isn't what makes him unique, though. You see, Mark has a protocol that operates entirely on your autonomic nervous system. I’m sure you know all about that – maybe you’re even good enough to do a little of that sort of thing; making people stop breathing, say, or putting them down for a little nap. Mark, though, he’s fucking surgical when it comes to tampering with the actual workings of your nervous system. When Mark decides that you aren’t going to be able to use your protocols, well, I’m afraid you just can’t access that part of your brain. When Mark decides that you’re going to struggle about as effectively as a prom date after a couple wine coolers, well, then that’s what happens. Are you starting to understand? You, my friend, are going to die, face down in a fucking bucket.”

  Robert Fisher coughed, shook, and glared at Alice Gallow, but he didn’t say anything.

  “What about now?” she asked, cocking an eyebrow at Mark.

  He shook his head slowly.

  “Well, then, let’s try again,” Alice suggested jovially, as Mark wrenched Fisher roughly to his knees, again not at all dismayed by his attempts to fight. “Let me know when you think of something interesting to say. Go ahead and call out.”

  Mark plunged his head back in the bucket.

  “How long till he dies from this?” Alice asked, yawning.

  “We’ll have to get a medic in here to set him back up pretty soon, I think,” Mark said, considering.

  “You wanna take the kid gloves off, then? We could try the thing with his fingers and the table saw. The last one definitely didn’t like that.”

  “Yeah, I guess we probably should – wait a minute. I think maybe I got something here,” Mark said, closing his eyes and cocking his head, as if he were listening intently to music only he could hear.

  “Would it help if I shocked him in the balls again?” Alice asked.

  “Not really.”

  Alice pouted, but she let him do his business. She had to remind Mark to let Robert Fisher up for air, and by the time he did, the man was in sorry shape, vomiting all over the floor.

  “Gross,” Alice said contemptuously. “What’d you get, son?”

  “He’s worried,” Mark said, a grin breaking across his tattooed face like sun through the clouds. “He’s worried about his kids. He’s worried that they didn’t get underground in time, that we’ve found them. He’s worried because he doesn’t think he could handle that.”

  “Holy shit! That’s where the conditioning broke? They got sloppy! You have their names?” Alice said, reaching for her cell phone. “Let me make a phone call.”

  She stepped out of the room to make the call, leaving Robert and Mark alone.

  “Wh-where am I?” Robert Fisher croaked. “Is this Central?”

  “Oh, you didn’t recognize it?” Mark asked patiently. “I thought you would. This is the worst place in the world. This is the room you are going to die in.”

  Robert Fisher had nothing to say to that. Mark smiled, folded his arms, a man at peace with his place and station in the world, and waited for Alice, who didn’t take very long. She waltzed back into the room, sliding her phone back into her pocket, and kissed Mark on the cheek as she walked past, the only woman he’d ever known tall enough to do that without reaching.

  “Mark, how is it that I never snagged you for Audits?” Alice said with her eyes full of laughter. “A man of your talents is wasted on Analysis.”

  “I’m a hemophiliac,” Mark said gently, explaining what he had already told her, years before. “My nanites malfunctioned, don’t know why. I bleed, Alice. I wouldn’t last a minute in the field. Besides,” he said, smiling at her affectionately, “I like what I do. So, what’s up with his family?”

  “Not sure about the wife or either of his sons, but the assumption is that they were still inside the main Taos compound when Xia torched it…”

  “No,” Robert Fisher moaned, until he was cut off by Alice, who pivoted smoothly, without looking away from Mark, and kicked him savagely in the midsection.

  “…but we did snag his daughter in the raid. She graduated two years ago, name is Shelly Fisher. You know her?”

  Mark shook his head ponderously.

  “Me either,” Alice said, shrugging. “But we will soon. Now all we need is another bucket.”

  Mark nodded and left the room. He returned toting a second rusted bucket, filled to the point that the water inside slopped and spilled on the concrete as he set it down, not too far from Robert Fisher’s head. Fisher stared at it for a long time, while Alice smiled and watched, nudging Mark with her elbow.

  “Don’t do this,” Robert said, pleading with his eyes. “Please. Don’t hurt her.”

  “Bobby, Bobby. I thought you would know by now. That’s my thing, baby,” Alice chided, leaning forward, so that her face was only inches from his. “All I do is hurt people.”

  “Please…”

  “Don’t talk as if I am the one creating this situation,” Alice said, seizing him by the cheeks and squeezing. “You know how to fix it. I am warning you, Bob, t
hat if little Shelly walks through that door, then she is going to die in this room, too. It’s going to be an ugly death. One you will be allowed to watch every second of, before you get the chance to die here yourself. So, I want you to think very carefully about what you want to do, because you don’t have a whole lot of time left.”

  The look on Robert Fisher’s face was one of abject pain, the realization of defeat. Exactly, in other words, what she had been waiting for all day. Alice smiled, genuinely pleased.

  “Mark,” she asked softly, “is he done?”

  Mark nodded absently.

  “Quiet, Alice,” he said gruffly, bending down to put his hands on Robert Fisher’s wet head. “I’m trying to work here.”

  “So sorry,” Alice whispered, smirking and pacing. It only took a minute. Mark was clearly pleased when he looked up at Alice.

  “He gave it up,” Mark said, sounding satisfied. “We’ve got what we need. Locations, safe houses, alarm codes, passwords, dead drops, the whole deal. Fisher is the most senior member we managed to turn out. The Taos Cartel is over with this.”

  Robert Fisher moaned, but Alice’s laughter drowned him out.

  “Well, alright, Bobby, I appreciate that,” she said jovially. “You saved us a whole lot of time. I’ll keep that in mind, when I use that info to hunt down your wife and sons, if they haven’t been killed already.”

  There was a knock at the door, while she shook Robert Fisher like a ragdoll. Mark padded over to glance through the glass panel inset in the security door, nodding to someone outside and then holding up his hand.

  “Hey Alice,” Mark said doubtfully. “They brought the girl. What do you want to do with her?”

  Alice tossed Robert Fisher on the floor, and then made a fist, and bit her knuckle while she thought about it, looking serious. Her smile spread slowly across her face, as lovely and toxic as the sheen on an oil spill.

  “Well, shit,” Alice said, gesturing expansively. “We already went to the trouble of getting another bucket. Be a shame not to use it, right?”

  * * *

  As the sun set behind the hill that sheltered the Academy, Gaul rested his feverish head on the cool expanse of his desk. His mind smoldered with the excess heat of simultaneous processing, buzzing with partial downloads and custom-built Etheric software. Rebecca would have known, he thought, in the corner of his mind that was not burning with possibilities, burdened with a thousand potential futures and borrowed protocols. She would have brought ice water and cold towels, and she wouldn’t have told him to stop, because she would have known that he would ignore her. Instead, she would have sat down on the corner of his desk, lit one of her forbidden cigarettes, and talked to him, making it impossible for him to multi-task, because a conversation with Rebecca was a titanic undertaking. Once she had grounded him, she would have walked him back to his little cottage behind the Administrative building, and she would have run him a cold bath before she left for her own tiny apartment in a disused wing above her own office. And she never would have told anyone about it. Because Rebecca was a master of keeping secrets.

  He could almost see her sitting on the corner of his desk. He could almost smell her despised, habitual cigarette, he could almost hear her nagging at him, and he knew that all of this meant that he must be very sick indeed, that he must have been pushing himself far too hard for too long. He didn’t stop, though. Because no one was there to make him.

  But Rebecca would have.

  19.

  “What do you think, Alex?”

  “I am sort of excited,” Alex admitted, taking in his uncharacteristically opulent surroundings. “This is my first time in a limo, after all. On the other hand, I’m still regretting some things that happened earlier, and wondering if I‘ve ruined my life by going along with this. I guess I’d say my feelings are mixed.”

  “Don’t be like that,” Emily scolded. “We are on vacation. You have to try and have fun.”

  “Right,” Alex said. “Besides, except for Timor, it’s me in a limo full of girls. That is definitely pretty cool.”

  “Actually, Timor won’t be much competition for you,” Emily said, tipsy from three glasses of Champagne, patting his Alex’s affectionately. “He told me so.”

  Timor blushed and muttered to himself. Katya laughed uproariously. Svetlana looked vaguely uncomfortable. Anastasia attempted to murder Emily with her eyes.

  “Right, then,” Alex said lightly, hoping to change the subject. “So, uh, where are Renton and Therese?”

  Anastasia gave Emily one last glower, clearly wishing she would move away from her cousin, then reluctantly turned to face Alex.

  “They are taking the long way. Security procedures,” Anastasia said, sipping from the glass of mineral water she had taken, rather than the excellent sparkling wine that had been handed around when they got in. “Not my idea, Black Sun regulations. Therese had to be psychically blindfolded so she couldn’t find the island again. Renton’s taking care of that. Not that she won’t be able to figure it out the first time one of the fishing boats or the vendors come by. But I don’t make the rules,” Anastasia said ruefully. “At least, not yet.”

  “Does that mean I shouldn’t ask where we are going? Because I definitely won’t figure it out.”

  “Ha Long Bay,” Anastasia said, shrugging. “And before you ask, that is in northern Vietnam.”

  “Oh, shit. Don’t they, like, hate Americans?” Alex asked curiously. “I saw Full Metal Jacket. I would hate us.”

  “Actually, that doesn’t come up much,” Anastasia said, clearly taken aback by the reasonableness of the question. “Probably because my family isn’t American, but also because Vietnam is a pretty young place – not many people are old enough to remember the war, and most people are too busy trying to make money from tourists to worry about their country of origin. The government can be a bit passive-aggressive, and they have any number of rules about what foreigners can and cannot do, including owning land. Technically the island is held by a Vietnamese development group, and on paper, they run a small resort there. In reality, the resort is my vacation home, and the only guests are my family, but we pay taxes as if it were full year round, so no one objects. You will like it, I’m certain. It is beautiful, the weather should be nice if very warm, and there are beaches.”

  “Wow,” Emily said, shifting over in her seat to be nearer to Alex. “This is so cool, Anastasia!”

  “How come we didn’t just go straight there?” Alex asked, finishing off his own glass and setting it aside. “Couldn’t we have skipped the flight from Tokyo and the drive out and stuff? Couldn’t Svetlana port us directly?”

  “Yes, but there are people in Central who can track apports,” Anastasia said, frowning at the thought. “We never go there directly. I had Svetlana take us to Narita Airport in Tokyo because it’s the regional transportation hub; all that tells anyone watching is that we went somewhere in Asia. The Black Sun has holdings throughout the region. They might know about the island, but they don’t know we are going there.”

  “Doesn’t that seem a little bit paranoid? It’s only a vacation, right?”

  Anastasia sneered at Alex.

  “You are naïve, boy. I was still in my mother’s womb the first time someone tried to kill me, an abortifacient slipped into her poached egg. The precognitives knew I was coming, so the cartels didn’t even wait for me to be born. That is the world we live in. You will learn this, eventually.”

  “It seems like you are going a little far…”

  “You think this was the extent of my subterfuge? You underestimate me,” Anastasia said haughtily. “At the marina on Ha Long Bay, we will be met by an old friend and employee of the family, Mr. Bao, who will handle both the payment and the telepathic memory wipe of the driver who took us here, and then after, the ferryman as well. Meanwhile, Renton, Therese, and a few others are on an overnight flight from London to Beijing, then to Hong Kong the next day. They won’t meet us in Ha Long Bay until Tue
sday, at the earliest.”

  “Anastasia! That’s mean,” Emily said. Her tone was chiding, but she seemed delighted.

  “They never used to have limousines here,” Katya said, sounding a bit sad about it. She was still wearing an unnecessary windbreaker, despite the heat and humidity, and eating bright red battered shrimp she had bought from a vendor outside the airport. “Remember those Chinese jeeps that we used to have to take, Ana? I hated those things.”

  Anastasia nodded, and then, to Alex’s absolute astonishment, she laughed.

  “Timor got sick every year, do you remember?” Anastasia asked, laughing from behind her hand. “Poor child. Never could stomach the roads or the suspension.”

  “Thank you for reminding me,” Timor said glumly. “You are both just showing off for Alex and Emily.”

  “I wasn’t doing anything!” Katya protested. “I was harmlessly reminiscing.”

  “They are trying to con you,” Timor said, leaning over Emily to confide to Alex. “Normally, they fight the whole way here about what movie they plan on watching on the big television downstairs.”

  “Now who’s showing off,” Katya muttered, closing her eyes and leaning her head against the window.

  It wasn’t a long trip, perhaps four hours with traffic, which was generally heavy and varied from bicycles to massive Chinese cargo trucks, all crowded together on the same narrow roadway. Most of the vehicles they passed were vans and trucks, all sitting low on their suspensions, loaded with cargo or covered in passengers clinging to every available surface. Anastasia and Katya quarreled briefly, then both appeared to go to sleep, while Emily stared out the window at the lush countryside, Svetlana read, and Timor and Alex played Gin on the foldout table in between the seats. They crested a particularly large group of hills, and then started to descend back down into an urban area.