A Method Truly Sublime (The Commander)

by Farmer, Randall

  5’8”, blonde hair, blue eyes. Hancock sounded like she might be some kind of Nordic goddess, but the pictures didn’t match Tonya’s mental image. Hancock’s hair was a mousy color, almost brown, and cut short, man-style. Her pale blue eyes were as mean as a snake’s. Like Keaton, and so unlike what she expected from Focuses, better appearance wasn’t a part of her Transform enhancements.

  Hancock’s body was the worst. Her body barely looked human, much less female. 255 pounds and not an ounce of it fat. Thick muscles lay like cables on her frame, a weight-lifter’s muscles on a woman’s body. Tonya found herself both repulsed and engrossed. Even Keaton, despite her muscles, managed to present herself as more human than Hancock.

  The pictures were hard to study and hard to ignore. Tonya’s careful eyes picked out problems all over Hancock. Her body showed signs of healing wounds, from her capture. Her left shoulder showed recent surgical scars, implying the CDC doctors had helped the Arm part way through her incarceration. Worse, despite all the healing, Hancock appeared to be up on juice – which meant someone had arranged a juice draw for her. Also, how in the hell did Hancock manage to finagle such a picture-perfect-for-Arms cell? Yes, something rotten was happening here.

  Tonya knew Keaton backwards and forwards. As the prototypical Arm, Keaton was a serial killer, brilliant, intractable, with every ounce of her brilliance turned to destruction and power gain. She was a sadistic Transform predator who suffered occasional psychotic breaks. She also dealt amicably with other Major Transforms when she wanted, though her diplomatic skills mirrored those of a bottom-end Focus. Nevertheless, Keaton had charmed more than a few Focuses over the years, and while using Tonya as her main contact she had gotten herself hired for quite a bit of dirty work by Network members and Council Focuses. Tonya also understood how seductive Arms were, or at least Keaton was, to her.

  Every bit of information she knew about Hancock, through Keaton and Rizzari, implied Hancock was about as intractable, uncontrolled, and dangerous as Keaton.

  Tonya had worked with Keaton for almost four years, up until last September, constant but tenuous contact mixed in with a few terrifying and seductive face to face meetings. The Council trusted Tonya to deal directly with Keaton. Every time she dealt with Keaton, though, Tonya came back convinced that she needed a better handle on the sadistic lunatic. Certain other Focuses, like Lori Rizzari and her crew of mystical crazies, thought they should be able to deal with Arms by appealing to their rationality.

  What rationality, though? The Arms needed to be brought into Transform society. Tamed, not just dealt with at the end of a pole. Left wild, as Hancock’s tagged Transform killing spree showed, they were nothing but a danger to humanity. Especially Focus households.

  Now the FBI had captured Hancock and stopped her killing spree cold. True, the only reason the FBI had captured Hancock was because of her youth and inexperience. Younger also meant she should be more controllable, which would make completing Wini’s tasks that much easier, except for getting the Arm out of here afterwards.

  Freeing Hancock still appeared to be impossible.

  From Tonya’s reading of the case file, the only reason Hancock remained alive was Keaton; the Feds wanted to extract enough information from Hancock to bring down the older Arm. Tonya barely repressed a laugh at the Feds. Hancock had been out of Keaton’s clutches for six months. By now, Keaton would have churned through several sets of identities and operations.

  Tonya leaned forward and tapped her pencil against her cheek. If anyone could tame a Transform, Arm or not, it was her. She had tamed Keaton, if one was charitable about the results. She felt the excitement building at the thought of the challenge and attempted to push it away. Her first priority was to survive the political morass, not her professional desire to tangle with a challenge worthy of the name.

  However, if things worked out…she wouldn’t object.

  “Is this the viewing room?” a familiar voice asked out in the hallway, startling her out of her concentration.

  Tonya turned to see a man walking into the room that she hadn’t seen in person for several years. She repressed a gasp.

  The intervening years hadn’t been kind. What little hair remained had turned gray. The lines that marked his face, which once made him distinguished, now just made him look old. He wore a well-worn suit of expensive cut, nowhere near his old standards. Despite the years and the wear, he still carried himself with an air of competent if not arrogant experience.

  “What are you doing here, Zielinski?”

  Hank smiled. “Nice to see you too, Tonya. I wondered if you were the Focus they would send in to clean up Focus Teas’ mess.”

  Tonya frowned at him.

  “What I’m here for is to get you to authorize me,” Zielinski said. “Teas kept out every last Network doctor, researcher and law enforcement agent, save a few of her personally controlled people. Sign the papers, and I’m gone.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Tonya said. “I guess I need to dig deeper into the paperwork.”

  “Well, when you get to Tommy’s request and mine, we’d appreciate it if you acted on them.” ‘Tommy’ was Special Agent Thomas Bates, one of the Network’s chief FBI contacts, someone she had worked with many times in the past.

  “I haven’t decided anything yet, even what I’m going to do,” Tonya said. “As you said, this appears to be a mess, and I suspect the Arm compromised quite a few more members of the staff than our old friend Dr. Jeffers realizes.”

  Zielinski shot her a ‘whose side are you on’ look before he covered the room with a relaxed and comfortable smile. He turned to Tonya’s people. “You must be Marty Fenner and Delia Vinote. Congratulations on your recent promotions in the Biggioni household.” They both smiled and relaxed.

  Tonya leaned back, resigned to the inevitable. “Glad you’ve managed to join us.” Zielinski could turn on the charm when he wanted. Secret Agent Zielinski. Nearly impossible to read, almost as difficult to affect with her charisma, he always had some devious plot in the works. She wondered how he had learned about Marty and Delia’s promotions.

  What was Zielinski doing here? Zielinski had reestablished contact with Hancock while Keaton trained her, but Tonya never managed to figure out from Zielinski’s Network reports how much contact. She knew he had sewed up Hancock in Rizzari’s Boston College lab at least once. Just before the mess in Philadelphia and Hancock’s still suspicious near-simultaneous graduation, he flew off to West Germany to learn more about the West German Arm, a perfectly reasonable thing for a researcher to do. However, his trip had won him a contract on his life. He had vanished, only to return, alive, the instant Hancock got in trouble.

  His earlier problems worried Tonya more. He had been involved in Hancock’s transformation, trouble for him, as the FBI made sure he lost his medical license in the aftermath of her escape. They may have also tried to kill him by injecting him with Monster juice. He still had juice in him. Not much juice, but Tonya’s senses were well honed. His juice load explained the fact he appeared to be about ten years older than his real age.

  Only after the nearly successful assassination attempt had he clammed up, both over the phone and in his now nearly useless Network reports. By then he had been working closely with Lori Rizzari, an arrangement set up by Flo Ackermann in spite of Tonya’s wishes (or to spite Tonya). Ackermann was a friendly warm puppy in person, but behind the scenes she schemed like a demon to get the Northeast Region Council seat out of Tonya’s hands, either into her hands, or Rizzari’s, or any one of about a half dozen more malleable Focuses. Flo didn’t trust Schrum or the other first Focuses, which said a lot for her intellect and spine, but not a lot for her wisdom and sense.

  Underneath the stench of Special Agent Bates’ cigarettes, Zielinski even smelled like Rizzari’s household. Hmm. Tonya had recently received a report from Lori about a recent important advancement in Transform training techniques, a report Tonya felt forced to squelch, a report with far more rigor
than normal for Rizzari. It fit. Hank had been hiding out in Rizzari’s household and helping Rizzari’s crazy Cause.

  Despite the fact that he wasn’t hers any more, Tonya felt she owed Zielinski. Only with Zielinski’s reluctant and life-threatening help had Tonya been able to establish a business relationship with Keaton.

  “Sit. Sit down.” Tonya pushed a stack of files out of the way and indicated the seat across the table from her. Zielinski dropped his briefcase on the table and sat. Tonya leaned forward in her seat and rested her elbows on the table.

  “How familiar are you with the situation?” she asked.

  “Just what I’ve overheard. Hancock is cooperating and spilling all sorts of information. She’s not fully healthy. A few days ago Focus Teas managed to come up with a volunteer unclaimed male Transform for Hancock, and one of Teas’ people, Dr. Wilson, operated on Hancock’s shoulder while she was out following the juice draw.” Delia and Marty drew back imperceptibly. Transforms always had this reaction. If they weren’t tagged, they might be the ones being asked to ‘volunteer’.

  “Zielinski, correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t supplying volunteer Transforms to Arms what got you in trouble in St. Louis?”

  “Yes,” Zielinski said. He smiled sardonically.

  Tonya waited for the anger and offense, but he just smiled, easy and relaxed. Secret Agent Zielinski. No normal should possess such iron control. She wondered what higher game he played. He shouldn’t be here. The risk he took here was insane.

  “How would you like to help me figure out what’s going on?” Tonya said. “I managed to get every last medical report, non-military interview record and surveillance tape here.”

  Zielinski’s eyes lit up. “I think I could be talked into doing that.”

  “Do your colleagues know how much you drink? You tell them it’s just social drinking, don’t you, but you know it’s a hell of a lot more than that. You ever hurt a patient when you’re drunk…”

  Tonya lifted a hand, and Delia stopped the projector. Zielinski sat back, not saying a word. Whatever deep thoughts passed through his head, he didn’t share them with Tonya. Dr. Ascot had retreated to the back of the room, acting as inconspicuous as possible for a doctor to be.

  Tonya leaned forward in her chair and tapped her lip thoughtfully. The first time she had watched this scene, she almost laughed aloud to see Hancock rout all those doctors while naked as a jaybird and chained to a table.

  She didn’t laugh now.

  Hancock’s attack had been far too accurate and far too effective. Tonya couldn’t have managed such an attack herself and she was very good at reading and manipulating people. Arms were blunt instruments, the Transform version of the Marine drill sergeant. To see any Arm capable of something this nasty and this subtle was unnerving.

  Tonya didn’t like this at all. This scene made a lie of her insistence that she was the Arm expert among the Focuses.

  “What does this indicate to you, Hank?” she said. She had made sure they were on a first name basis, building an illusion of trust that made Marty, Delia, Danny and Pete all nervous. They would need to live with her gambit.

  “I believe the tape says it all, Tonya,” Zielinski said, his voice flat and utterly emotionless. More, he wouldn’t say. She hadn’t been able to pry a thing out of him yet. Worse, he wasn’t the least bit surprised about Hancock’s games.

  “Show me the first nightmare scene again,” she said.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Tonya sat back, waiting for the scene she had seen three times before. To her, Hancock’s nightmares sounded much like those of a young Focus struggling with the Dreaming in an overly stressful situation. Even the merest hint Hancock might have access to the Dreaming made her sweat.

  “See,” Agent McIntyre said. “That was easy.”

  “You cocksucker, I’ll have your ass, someday, McIntyre,” Hancock said, beaten, despondent, no more a predator than an infant.

  “Sure. Whatever you say, Hancock. So, you know Stacy Keaton? Tell me about her.”

  “Uh huh. She has a thing about fingernails.”

  “Fingernails?”

  “Yes. She marks all of her people by removing their fingernails. I couldn’t count the number of times she ripped my fingernails off my fingers. Like this.” Hancock ripped a fingernail off one of her fingers and screamed bloody murder. “Whoo, that was a bad one.”

  Tonya signaled to Delia, who turned off the tape. Both Delia and Marty looked green and shaken. Tonya had done worse to herself. Zielinski appeared, if Tonya read him right, damned pleased. Trying to cover up his reaction, but damned pleased.

  Hancock had rolled McIntyre. Not recently, as Dr. Jeffers feared, but as early as her fifth day here. The Arm didn’t have complete control over McIntyre, but she had him enough to influence him.

  “Start it again at the 43 minute 20 seconds mark,” Tonya said. Delia spooled back through the tape and started it up again.

  The tape covered Focus Teas’ first interview with Hancock. “Did you have any other interactions with any Transforms on February 2nd?”

  “No,” Hancock said. Her body language said, to Tonya, that she shaded the truth.

  “Have you ever hunted Detroit?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I never felt like it,” she said. Another lie, this time canny enough to fool Tonya. Only Tonya knew the real reason, because Keaton had told her. For whatever reason, Keaton claimed Detroit as her hunting territory.

  “Stop,” Tonya said. “Switch to March 15, tape 4, at the 11 minute mark.” Delia did so, a long process.

  Focus Teas’ second interview with Hancock. The staff had Hancock restrained, while Teas did up-close charismatic interrogation. Tonya watched while Teas worked through her preliminary questions, and paid close attention when she got to the matching questions.

  “Did you have any other interactions with any Transforms on February 2nd?”

  “No,” Hancock said. This time Tonya couldn’t tell Hancock lied.

  “Have you ever hunted Detroit?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I was ordered by the Arm, Stacy Keaton, not to hunt Detroit. I don’t know why, exactly.” Hancock had changed her answer to one where she didn’t need to overtly lie! Tricky, very tricky.

  “Stop,” Tonya said. This was bad. Hancock had rolled Teas, and it hadn’t happened during these interviews. Which meant the lunatic fool, Teas, had visited Hancock in the off hours and disabled the surveillance cameras or suborned the people in charge of them. The Arm was an expert at telling partial truths, a method which might be able to fool even a top-end Focus like herself.

  Worst, this meant Hancock’s vetting by Rizzari hadn’t been worth shit. If Hancock wanted, she could have pulled the wool over Lori’s eyes in exactly the same way. Teas didn’t have the strongest charisma among the Focuses, but she was no slouch, and likely possessed the strongest charisma among the first Focuses. Up close and with the body contact Teas needed for her brand of charisma she should have been strong enough to prevent the Arm from rolling her.

  Tonya turned to Zielinski. “Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” Yet another question that would disturb her people, but Zielinski was nearly as good at reading people as she was in a situation where she didn’t have her usual Transform sensory advantages.

  “I believe you Focuses term this mutual rolling,” Zielinski said. As predicted, Marty and Danny gasped when they heard Zielinski’s words. That term wasn’t one to be bandied about. “I’d say Hancock wasn’t able to gain control over Teas, but was able to conceal much of her true feelings and reactions. Teas had full control over Hancock’s more violent side in the second interview, but not in the first. For someone of my minor skills I can’t tell anything else.”

  Minor skills my aching back, Tonya thought.

  The smile on Zielinski’s face showed far too much pride for Tonya’s taste. How much had he taught Hancock in the ch
arisma department, anyway?

  “This is evidence that Hancock might be behind the Transform killings and abductions,” Tonya said.

  Zielinski frowned at her but didn’t say anything.

  “Dr. Jeffers, I’ve examined the information you’ve provided,” Tonya said. “I believe absolutely everyone in contact with Hancock is compromised, not just Special Agent McIntyre.” If Hancock had the skills to roll Teas, rolling anyone else on the staff wouldn’t be a problem.

  “That’s absurd,” Dr. Jeffers said.

  “It’s the truth. Here’s my interim report,” Tonya said, and passed it to Dr. Jeffers.

  He scanned the report and sighed. “I’m not sure I can do anything with this, Focus Biggioni. What would you recommend?”

  “You want to interrogate her? Put me in charge. Give me the Arm. Other than that, forget it. She’ll find some way of breaking out of here within a week. Lives will be lost and you won’t learn anything.” Tonya cranked up the wattage on her charisma. “My help is your only way out of this mess.”

  Dr. Jeffers shivered but fought off her charismatic poke. “Of course, Focus Biggioni. I’ll pass that advice along to my superiors.”

  Superiors? Gaah. Political appointees and politicians, all as impossible for Tonya to affect with her charisma as Zielinski. They had seen it all before. Her ideas wouldn’t likely go anywhere, which wouldn’t satisfy Wini. She needed to come up with another angle to put pressure on the situation.

  “I’ll be hoping to hear from you, soon.”

  Carol Hancock: March 18, 1968

  I waited in my cell throughout the morning for the shit to start flying. I sensed the tension, not in those who came to visit me, but in the situation. No interrogations, no doctors.

  Mr. Michaels, my usual, took my vitals and drew my blood. “Sorry,” he said, when I asked where everyone else was today. “They don’t tell me anything. They drop the requests in my in-box and I do them. My boss, Dr. Reynolds, isn’t even cleared to visit you.”