by Grady Ward
Just being within a thousand miles of the Crux was teasing the animal that was trying to destroy him, but the waves of fear swelled and receded echoing Joex’s own ambivalent sense of danger. Ten years ago, he could not have endangered himself through brilliant aggression. It was as if his gliding arc of self-destruction had also released him from the pinion of self-preservation.
Joex began reading the text describing his contract. The contract was between him and his successors and assigns, and if need be, his estate. The contract was to be in force for 150 years corporeally and unlimited length of time incorporeally. In exchange for suspending imposition of the cost for room, board, spiritual succor and training on the Games Machine, “Jim” had to agree that any Angel of higher rank could direct him in any task whatsoever. All of “Jim’s” current and future possessions were hereby irrevocably given and bequeathed to the Church. All work service and subsequent product belonged to the Church. That if in the sole opinion of the Church “Jim” required correction or penitential service, the Church could impose any that it saw fit for any length of time, including excommunication and permanent designation as a banished Fallen., or worse, Apostate. “Jim” might be assigned and moved to any of the Church properties that the Church required. That “Jim” gave up all right to visit, speak to, write, or otherwise communicate with anyone not approved by the Church, specifically including family members, members of the press or law enforcement, that the Church had irrevocable power of attorney for both financial and medical purposes and for any other purpose the Church in its sole opinion deemed beneficial to “Jim’s” spiritual advancement. “Jim” understood that he may be monitored personally, by remote video and audio with no expectation of privacy at any time, that all interaction with the Games Machine may be permanently logged, and that all monitoring, counseling, investigation, or communication of any kind between him and the Church was the exclusive property of the Church to be used for any purpose whatsoever, including advertising, penance, counseling, or in any case of legal process. All communications with the Church, whether orally, written, by Games Machine or any other means was deemed a trade secret and exempt from use in any legal proceeding, whether sealed or not. Revealing any portion of these communications incurred liquidated damages of Five Hundred Thousand Dollars in US currency per event plus acquiescence to a permanent injunction under perpetual threat of contempt of court.
Finally, “Jim” expressly acknowledged that the Church could end its relationship at any time without further obligation or compensation, that all work Jim might do for the Church was strictly volunteer and unpaid, that no social security, workman’s compensation, unemployment compensation, retirement deduction or tax was provided for by the Church under the Religious Exception Act and that any disputes may not be litigated in a secular court but exclusively by an ecclesiastical court whose members were selected by the Church, and whose decision was final.
Some attorney pleasured himself with this, Joex thought. It is legal pornography. Joex considered it for a moment, the arc of his life, the threat of overwhelming violence against him, his lack of property and fixed relationships, and his probable short, insignificant future whether or not he unraveled the craft against him. He felt the surveillance cameras swivel toward him in their onyx shells as he selected and clicked “AGREE.”
Chapter 25
Joex pushed himself back in his chair, Serena appeared next to him. “OK. Serena, what next?”
“I am Angel Millen, you are Angel Rogers, this way, please.”
Serena took Joex though the hallway to the group cells to his niche containing a thin mattress, which hid a sewn tear along one edge in order to augment the stuffing with socks and surplus clothing; it had a dirty pink duvet with the right-dominated cross in a repeating pattern. There was no pillow.
“Before we start your training, your first assignment is to clean up—indicating a bathroom—replace your clothing, with an Angel kit at this commissary—she pointed vaguely back the way they came—and get a meal and a haircut.” She looked around the empty dormitory. At noon, I will introduce you to your immediate superior.
He turn to follow her instruction. “Just a second,” she said. Without waiting for a response, Serena straddled Joex’s knee as he sat on the edge of his bunk, leaned toward his ear until he could feel the warmth of her face. His unshaven face rubbed into hers. She slid toward his hip until his body stopped hers. He probably smelled. He, surprised, involuntarily cupped his hand around her buttocks and squeezed her closer. He heard a hitch in her breath. She said nothing, breathed out through her mouth, then slid back out against his hands to his knee. She leaned back, got up, tugged on her blazer, turned and walked out. Joex was almost too surprised and tired to be aroused.
Joex was going to be late to his noon appointment with his superior. He had fallen asleep after his haircut as he was stowing his new gear under his bunk. He was awakened by the clatter of other Angels returning to quarters before lunching off steel compartmentalized trays. He had been able to toss the jar of rubber cement and the rest of the contents of his pockets into a trash bin undetected before he showered. It was hard to shower while keeping your fingertips as dry as possible; despite his precaution the rubber film on his little finger was lost. With a good lunch of a vegetable primavera in his stomach, he looked forward to sleeping well tonight.
Joex was exhausted. Not just the usual homeless red-rimmed fuzz of random rousts and hard plastic benches, the cold and lack of circulation biting into your legs, but he was sick unto trembling. He knew if he really thought about it logically, as in the older days, his fear would master him and he would curl into some kind of catatonia, cry, or perhaps begin shouting and uselessly threatening those around him. Shall he curse God and die? But he had a stronger need to taste of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. At least he deserved to know why he was a marked creature—marked for extinction. In all his formal training and career as an engineer, the one skill he lacked was being comfortable with uncertainty. Things leaking out at the edges. Enigmatically, he had learned and practiced that one skill as a homeless person even as he possessed nothing else. Figure and ground. The delineation of negative space. He realized that his previous night’s Games Machine introduction had catalyzed him to understand that relationship for the first time. Joex trembled, visibly. The Games Machine had power. Maybe it also had answers. Joex could sense why people might give up their own life to taste the life of an Angel.
Until that time, his fear was to be a silent companion. It was large and it was exceedingly dangerous, he had to tip-toe around it, but he couldn’t gaze upon it or speak to it. Or even think too clearly about it. Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must pass over in silence.
Chapter 26
It was a rare warming day in Portland as Assistant United States Attorney Rauchmann answered his phone on the first ring.
“US Attorney’s office, Jim Rauchmann speaking.”
“Jim, this is Mark. We are going ahead tomorrow with the Riu Bao custody.”
“I thought I had more time.”
“Things are changed. I think Bao is in danger.”
“What are you talking about?” the US Attorney said, clicking the phone into speakerphone mode and opening up a browser on his terminal.
We asked Portland Metro to id a car that was surveilling Bao’s street. “It came back two private investigators who directed them to their boss; an attorney in town.”
“So?”
“An attorney with the Church of the Crux.”
Jim paused. The investigative prowess of the Church was well known. “What were they doing?
“Metro said they just asked for their lawyer. We have called the lawyer three times since last night. Perhaps needless to say, he is not available. We are going to bring Bao in.”
While Special Agent Langley was updating the prosecutor, the US Attorney was in turn searching a social website for a handful of key words, memorized along with many more months b
efore. No hits.
“Why would the Crux have anything to do with Bao?” Rauchmann said casually, as he frantically searched for another set of key words. Only partial hits.
“No idea. I don’t even want to think about it,” said the Special Agent.
“Okay, Mark. We’ll have the grand jury prepped and ready with the current complaint. Just send me your affidavit in the morning, Mark.”
“No problem, Jim. I am glad that we took this bastard down on my watch.” Special Agent Langley pressed the secure button on his phone and hung up, completely unaware of the turmoil in the assistant attorney’s mind.
The US Attorney considered the exchange. He knew that this was sooner than his associates wanted. Was it too soon? He didn’t know. His associates had shown him before exactly how deep he was involved and the overwhelming evidence that they had ferreted God knows how out of his computers. He selected the check box for “new submission” and carefully typed the innocuous key words that he was taught. They would be globally searchable in seconds.
Chapter 27
Joex “Jim” Baroco showed up at the transept desk at 12:10 p.m., Serena was waiting for him, stood and spoke to him, “Angel Rogers, you are very fortunate that Archangel Jack isn’t here yet.” Joex said nothing, chilly in his new work garb and decorated buzz cut.
A thin, tall woman approached them from an assembly room from the direction of the narthex entrance. She walked with a deliberate, measured cadence, as if she were self-conscious of her appearance upon them. She was as tall as Joex, wore the same work overalls and matching severe buzz cut; she was distinguished with a plain red scarf she wore around her neck as a single flash of color.
Serena said “Good afternoon Archangel Jack. This is the newly ascended Angel Rogers. Agent Rogers, this is Archangel Marla Jack.” Marla made no motion to shake hands or otherwise acknowledge the introduction to Jim. She just said, “Time for our first Games interview. Come with me, Angel.”
She turned and walked toward the Scriptorium, then into one among a handful of conference room that lined its far edge. Joex followed several paces behind. When both of them were in the room which had nothing; not a light switch, or a whiteboard or a power outlet, or window or carpet, except a tiny cheap battered red table that looked like child’s pretend furniture, two plastic chairs and a luminous ceiling. She pushed the table aside and moved the chairs so that they were facing one another. She motioned for Joex to sit. Marla then closed the conference room door, which was a several times thicker than a normal door and dogged it shut with two handles at its top and bottom. “No disturbances” she said, noticing Angel Rogers curiosity.
“I can hardly hear the people outside anyway,” Joex said, politely.
Archangel Jack had a instant succession of expressions that squalled over her face. “It is not to prevent them from disturbing us.”
She then sat and began: “This is a Games interview. You cannot advance in the Choirs without success with both the Games Machine and these interviews. I think you learned how to succeed with the Games Machine. You play and simply do as you as instructed according to its running analysis. As you have deduced, it varies its presentation depending upon the current context of you, what you have learned, how fast your progress and your current success with the presentation.
There are hundreds of thousands of hours of Games Machine play available and our Games Machine engineers are both adding hundreds of hours of raw content every week and changing the strategic pruning to streamline the process of delivering the service to you. Since it varies with the circumstance and player, in a sense the Games Machine content is endless. But despite the engineers’ acumen in test generation and integrating the electronic sensorium of the Games Machine with its content and its players, we need these interviews to ensure the training is managed properly. Someday we will not need engineers to cradle the Games Machine. It will be able to acquire, produce, and tune its owns results and interactions. Nor will we need these interviews. For now, we do. To do well here you simply need to be honest.” Marla paused and then continued. “Let’s begin.”
Archangel Jack first asked about information “Jim” had already given to the Church. His lies were not yet too much of a burden to handle, but Joex had no idea how long he could parrot the same information without making an error. He could feel the heavy sensation of his fingertips from their rubber cement coating.
After the preliminaries, Marla began to format her questions as the Games Machine had, first a statement or an explanation, then a question to elicit information from Joex. “Every part of your brain is exercised in context with each other part. “The advantage is quadratic. As you double the distinguishable cognitive functions, you square the possible interactions between them. What does this imply about the growth in the size of the Games Machine corpus compared to its efficacy?” He answered the best he could, sometimes with a question, which she ignored. She was completely in control of the interview.
The questions then took an odd and disturbing turn. Marla asked Joex to imagine strangling an infant. She recited as if from a script, going into elaborate and gruesome detail of the baby’s choking and twitching, the ligature marks from his blanching fingers, and the baby’s dilating pupils in its dying eyes. “What do you feel?”
“What do you mean how do I feel? Joex said. “I feel horror and remorse, I am calling for emergency response, I am giving the infant artificial resuscitation.”
Archangel Jack said, “That is a Fallen answer. You now must imagine three things. First, the Church has unequivocally directed you to strangle the infant. Two, you believe the directive from the Church is absolutely just, even if you do not know why. Nor in fact will you ever know why. Third, you feel absolutely no emotion as you carry out the Church’s direction. Can you do that? This is an exercise. You are simply imagining.”
Joex thought about this, “I’ll try.” He wanted to understand this sick business completely.
She then recited the script again, varying it slightly in detail and gore, so the image would not grow stale in the retelling. Each time she waited for him to digest the disturbing images. Sometimes she cocked her head slightly as if she were listening to a far-off forest animal.
“Again. Watch your breathing. Think about something pleasant to you. Again. Let your heartbeat fall. Again. Do you know you are making fists? Unclench your shoulders. Open your knees slightly. Vary your position in the chair. Look above my eyes. Think of emptiness. Think of the Games Machine. Think of Serena.” This was the only time she referred to Serena by given name. Then she was done.
“Fine. Just a few more questions. Remember, honesty is what I am looking for. Complete honesty. Without it you will go nowhere within the Church, or in life.”
Once again, things began to veer off in direction Joex did not expect.
“Have you ever masturbated?” Archangel Jacks asked.
“What?” It was a question that wasn’t linked to anything Joex expected. It was like seeing Picasso’s “Femme” illustrating the Proper Liturgies for the Eucharist.
“Have you ever masturbated?” Archangel Jacks asked.
“Yes?” Joex answered unnerved.
“When was the last time?”
“When I was a kid, I think,” Joex said.
Archangel Jack slapped him hard. “When was the last time?”
Shocked, Joex, felt his warming cheek sting. His eye began watering from the corner of his eye on that side.
“A few weeks ago?” Joex said.
He flinched before the slap landed this time.
“When was the last time?”
“A few minutes ago, with Angel Millen, she rubbed herself against me and I enjoyed it,” said Joex, desperately trying to avoid further abuse. “Why are you hurting me?”
“Instant penance for your lies. This is by far the kindest thing I can do for you if you want a life in the Church. Good. Good.”
“I don’t know if I can take the physical abuse, Archang
el,” Joex complained, “do we need it?”
In response, with her muscular right arm, Archangel Jack pulled Joex toward herself until his scalp nestled in the hollow between her chin and her collarbone. With her left hand, she deliberately inserted it into the back of his trousers, bent over, stiffened her fingers, and pushed them as far up his anus as she could. She paused for a moment then her voice unnaturally dropped two registers and said, “I am your superior. This is not abuse and you will take it no matter how hard it is. Do you understand?” The shock of rape and the deep Satanic growl from Marla Jack made Joex instantly and clearly understand the function of the thick door.
“Yes, Archangel. Yes, Archangel.”
She withdrew her fingers from him and, without looking at them, wiped them on the top of his thigh.
“You have completed your first Games interview,” said Marla Jack, “you are on your way to perfection.”
They both stood, he arranged his clothing. She undogged the door and he blinked to scatter the tears that were catching in his lashes. God, he was pathetic, Joex thought; ten year ago he could never have taken that.
She led him back to the transept desk where Serena was working, clipping forms and referring to a monitor on her desk.
Archangel Jack walked back to the assembly room. Despite her thinness, which almost shaded into frailness, her stride was as long and as deliberate as it was when she had arrived.
“Do you want me to make you something? A cup of tea?” Serena asked, glancing back at the hidden kitchen.
“That would be nice.”
She prepared a cup of hot water and put in a tea bag. He walked over to wait for the tea to steep. She regarded Joex with her blue and gold eyes. She took his hand between hers and put it hard between her legs, curling its fingers up into her. “Take it, Angel Rogers.”
