by Mark Leigh
As dungeons go it was a very clean one; not a piece of hewn rock, dried blood or rusty chain in sight. This one had green-tiled walls and CCTV cameras and what looked like a steel table in the middle of a smooth white floor. It looked, Dick thought, more like an operating theatre than a dungeon.
‘Are you sure we’ve come to the right place?’, asked Dick, half playing for time and half just wanting reassurance that he wasn’t about to have anything pointy and/or hot in close proximity to his genitals.
Unfortunately Carter couldn’t give him the reassurance he sought. ‘It was now or never’, Dick thought to himself. Without warning he swung round and aimed the strongest punch he could at the side of Carter’s head, just above the ear. Almost simultaneously Dick realised that it was the ‘never’ part of his assumption rather than the ‘now’ part that would be true. With an agility that belied his age Carter blocked the blow with his elbow, the same elbow in fact that delivered a sharp jab to Dick’s chin. Whether it was this blow or the knock to the head Dick received when he hit the hard floor is a mute point. What’s important is that Dick was out cold for a short time and when he woke up, found himself firmly strapped to the metal table completely naked apart from something fixed around his waist, covering his groin. Although securely fastened, Dick was able to lift his head a few degrees, which is how he noticed the thing around his waist was actually some sort of box. It was quite a nice one, about six inches square and made of dark tan leather. The sort of box that would be just perfect for keeping letters, keepsakes, photographs or…
‘Wasps’, said Carter.
‘Pardon?’ asked Dick.
‘Wasps. Are you allergic to their stings?’
Dick was confused by this seemingly random question. ‘Er, I don’t think so’.
‘So you won’t go into anaphylactic shock then?’
‘No. Well not as far as I know’.
‘Good, good’, commented Carter with an air of concern. Then, with an air of menace added, ‘Because it’s important that you don’t expire before the torture is fully through!’.
There it was. That damn word again. Like a waiter who can’t stop sneezing, a puncture on a rainy night or the Ghost Rider movie, torture is something you never want to experience. Straining to keep his head raised Dick saw Carter go to a tall cupboard and remove a small jar and a length of clear plastic tubing. Dick said nothing. He wanted to maintain his nonchalant manner and a ‘don’t give a shit’ attitude although this became increasingly difficult as Carter went about his business. The manservant connected one end of the hose to some sort of valve and the other end to the lid of the jar, before filling the jar with something in the corner of the room. It was the sound of buzzing that broke Dick’s resilience and his silence.
Carter saw his puzzled expression. ‘Wasps’, he explained.
‘That’s the third time you’ve said that’, said Dick.
‘Aren’t you remotely interested in what I’m going to do with them?’, asked Carter, an evil smile crossing his lips.
Dick hadn’t seen Carter this excited before. Out of the leader’s shadow he seemed to be relishing his temporary position of power. If Dick could have moved his shoulders he would have shrugged them, but the straps across his chest were too tight to allow that sort of movement.
‘All right, I’ll tell you’, said Carter. ‘You’ve probably heard of the old Native American punishment where they staked their enemies out in the scorching midday sun and rubbed a sweet tasting and smelling substance on to their chests…’
Dick had heard of this and he didn’t like where this history lesson was going.
Carter continued. ‘This attracted the attention of fire ants in their thousands who would swarm over their victim and literally sting and devour them to death’.
Dick farted. A dull metallic ring bounced off the table.
‘The lucky victims died fairly quickly due to shock. The unlucky ones died slowly in unimaginable agony as first their skin and then their organs were literally eaten away in front of them’.
Another metallic reverberation.
‘Well that’s what used to happen. We’ve updated the technique somewhat’.
‘You’re using wasps instead of ants?’, Dick asked, knowing the answer.
Carter shook the jar. A muffled, angry buzzing sound confirmed this. He brought over a small container and with a brush, began to smear a sweet-smelling paste over Dick’s chest.
‘Aren’t you worried that the wasps will fly away?’, enquired Dick, smelling the paste and finding it quite appealing.
‘Not really’, added Carter. ‘Because I’m going to introduce them to the box fixed over your groin’. He attached the free end of the hose to an inlet on the underside of the box that Dick couldn’t see. He banged the jar a few times. ‘By now the wasps are very annoyed. When I turn the valve they’ll enter the box and start swarming around’.
‘But the paste is on my chest’, observed Dick with more than a hint of panic in his voice.
‘Precisely’, added Carter, banging the jar some more. ‘The wasps can smell it but they can’t get to it. Think how much more frustrated this will make them’. He smiled his evil smile again. ‘Have you ever received multiple stings to your penis?’ Carter enquired.
Dick thought for a moment. He was about to say ‘yes’ but then had to admit that he hadn’t.
‘Well, the Wasp Box usually gets our suspect talking. In between his bellowing screams, of course’.
Carter slowly turned the valve. Dick raised his head to see a few wasps already in the clear tubing beginning their short journey into the box. The valve was opened a little bit more. Dick wasn’t sure why it taking so long to wake up from this terrible dream. Then he realised why; it wasn’t a dream. Dick had never pleaded for anything in his life. Not for justice, for forgiveness or like now, for mercy — but then again, he’d never ever been this helpless with wasps about to crawl all over his manhood. His bowels went momentarily before his resolve.
‘Stop it! Please! I’ll talk! I’ll talk!’, he shouted.
‘I can’t hear you’, said Carter. The wasps were now halfway down the tube.
‘Please! I’ll tell you everything!’. Dick was now screaming.
‘What?’, Carter asked. The wasps were now mere inches from entering the box. The buzzing became louder and louder, in fact far louder than it should have been.
Dick heard Carter swear under his breath then close the valve. The loud buzzing wasn’t from the wasps but from a wall-mounted speaker near the door. Carter walked over to it and pushed a button. Maxx entered. He winced, wafting his hand in front of his face theatrically as if he’d been offended by a particularly nasty smell like, for example, the aftermath of someone voiding their bowels.
‘I’m so glad you agreed to co-operate Dick’, he said smugly. ‘After you’ve cleaned yourself up tell me all you know and I’ll let you live’.
CHAPTER 30
Back in the comfort of his office Maxx studied a lengthy confession. The author of this confession sat facing him, slumped back in his chair, wearing a defeatist expression.
‘Didn’t know that… Knew that… Knew that… Didn’t know that! I had no idea about that!’ Max put the neatly typed sheets of paper down and looked up.
‘Good. Very good Dick. Some interesting things here’. Maxx nodded to no one in particular and made a few hand-written annotations. ‘What you’ve said collaborates our own picture of the Resistance and the reports from Mr. Parnell, or should I say the late Mr. Parnell. Although they seem to have achieved some good technological breakthroughs, on the whole it appears the Resistance are a ramshackle bunch of amateurs chasing after this so-called secret weapon. Most importantly though, it seems there’s not a lot more they can do without you. You’re their basket’.
‘Pardon?’, Dick enquired.
‘Their basket’, Maxx reiterated. ‘You know, where they’ve put all their eggs’.
Dick nodded his understanding of this
analogy.
‘In any case’, Maxx continued confidently, ‘Even if you were still at liberty, and still in contact with your colleagues, it wouldn’t make one iota of a difference. In a very short time the whole Resistance will be a redundant force’.
Dick stared at Maxx who was clearly enjoying the moment.
‘That’s right Dick. Your intelligence was correct after all. The best technicians in the Party were working on a weapon’.
‘I know that’, answered Dick. ‘Operation Trojan Horse’.
Maxx smiled his creepy smile again. ‘That?’, he asked. ‘That was just a small diversion. A margin note or a side-bar, if you like, in my book of Total Domination’.
‘You mean there’s another…’
‘Secret weapon?’ The Leader finished Dick’s sentence for him. ‘Of course. What sort of fanatical evil leader would I be if I just had one secret weapon? This one will make all future resistance futile!’.
‘You seem pretty confident of that’, Dick said trying to conceal his anxiety.
‘Oh I am Dick, I am’, replied Maxx with the smug, self-assured grin of someone not just brimming with confidence, but absolutely teeming with it. ‘It’s a secret weapon that won’t remain a secret for much longer. And after I use it, the Party will be all-powerful and invincible — now and in the future!’
With all this talk about secret weapons and power Dick expected Maxx to cackle maniacally while stroking a fluffy pedigree cat on his lap — but he didn’t. In fact he was remarkably reserved about the whole thing (and of course he didn’t have a pet cat with him, pedigree or not).
‘The deployment of this weapon will usher in a whole new phase of government!’ Maxx leant forward towards Dick, ‘A government you could still be part of’.
Dick was shocked. Since giving up the information about the Resistance and his own role in their plans he’d been very anxious about his intended fate. Maxx had said his life would be spared but Dick still didn’t believe him; anyone who lied about their penis size would be capable of lying about absolutely anything. But here he was, still alive and being offered another chance to join the Party.
‘I’m glad you agreed to give in’, continued Maxx. ‘It would have been such a great shame to have you tortured and killed. Such a waste of a good resource. The Party could do with someone like you Dick, someone with your intelligence but more than that, your deviousness. The same deviousness you’ve employed to get this far’. Maxx grinned. ‘I might be a ruthless leader but I’m also a very pragmatic one. To be blunt, I’d rather work with you than against you’. Maxx rose. ‘Let me show you my weapon’.
Dick smiled back. ‘Please. I’m not that sort of guy’.
‘I think you’ll be impressed’, Maxx continued.
‘Really?’, asked Dick, now smiling. ‘Remember who you’re talking to!’
Dick and Maxx then both fell about in convulsions of laughter, proof if anyone needed it that men of all ages and positions in life could find amusement in jokes about penis size. Trying to compose themselves the two men marched off to look at the Party’s secret weapon.
– – o O o – –
It was late and very dark when the Party car pulled up outside a familiar building, the Scientific Research Centre. Carter exited first and opened the rear door. Dick and Maxx exited and all three walked to the main entrance in silence. The lobby was empty apart from a bored cleaner polishing the floor and two even more bored security staff polishing their buttons. Startled by the sight of the Leader they jumped to attention and saluted him. Returning the salute the Leader presented his ID chip to the scanner which blinked green. Dick and Carter followed suit.
‘But you’re the Leader. You don’t need to scan, do you?’, asked Dick walking alongside Maxx.
‘There are no exceptions. Not even for me’, Maxx explained. ‘Although it’s highly unlikely, someone could gain access by assuming my appearance and my identity’. He gave a wry smile as he continued at a brisk pace. ‘It has been known for people to use fake biometric chips, you know’.
Exiting the elevator on level five they walked along never-ending corridors, passing through three other security posts, the only sounds coming from the echo of their footsteps. Eventually they turned a corner to face two armed guards standing to attention outside a plain door. More salutes were exchanged. Dick noticed that this door resembled all the other plain doors they had walked past apart from one thing; there was no lock. Instead, adjacent to it at head height was a small glass screen. Maxx approached and placed his eye in front of it. Moments later there was a bleep of acceptance followed by a buzz and a whirr; the sound of an intricate lock being activated.
‘Retina scan’, explained Maxx. ‘And it’s only programmed to recognise two people in this facility; myself and my chief scientist, Dr. Hargreaves. Identity chips might be copied but no one can do the same with our retinas. Ispo facto, no one but myself and the good doctor can access this room’.
Dick remembered Dr. Hargreaves from the first time he was at the Scientific Research Centre, a snob of man in a swanky starched white lab coat, he recalled. He was still thinking about him as Carter pulled open the heavy metal door and flicked a switch. Light flooded a large room that was full of identical battered leather suitcases and, in the middle, a trestle table.
‘Here it is’, announced Maxx proudly. ‘The culmination of three years of research and development’.
Dick was about to say something stupid like, ‘The secret weapon is luggage?’ but before he could make a fool of himself Carter picked up one of the cases, hoisted it on to the table, took out a small key and unlocked it. Snapping open the two latches he opened the case. There, resting on a purple crushed-velvet lining was what could only be described as a ‘contraption’. It consisted of a large brass cylinder, several brass spheres, lots of copper tubing, some dials, a few small metal boxes and a whole load of complicated wiring. Dick thought it looked like the result of an unholy alliance between a tuba and a deep sea diver’s breathing apparatus.
‘The device is kept in the case for ease of transportation and for disguise’, Maxx explained. ‘After all, no one would ever expect that an old suitcase contains something of such importance, something of such overwhelming consequence that it will change the world!’.
‘So you keep saying’, said Dick.
‘And do you remember something else I said to you recently — that very soon, all resistance will be futile?’ Dick nodded. ‘Well this is why’.
Dick walked around the table, looking closely at the device within the case.
‘Go on, examine it. Tell me what you think it is’, said Maxx smiling.
Dick ran his hands over the copper tubes and the dials. He put his ear next to the large cylinder. He rapped one of the brass spheres to hear a dull, hollow ring. For some reason only known to him, he even smelled the wiring. He had absolutely no idea what this thing was. Weapons that were designed to have such a fundamental impact should be large, he thought. Large and matt black, the colour of choice for deadly weapons. This looked too small and too shiny to have anywhere near the sort of effect that Maxx was threatening.
‘I’ve never seen anything like it before’, admitted Dick. ‘Can you give me some sort of clue to what the weapon is?’
‘It rhymes with “prom”’, suggested Maxx.
Frown lines took over Dick’s forehead as he thought for a few seconds. ‘Mom?’, he offered.
Maxx shook his head.
‘Vom?’
‘”Vom?’’ That’s not a word!’ exclaimed Maxx.
‘It’s short for vomit’, offered Dick.
‘Why the fuck would my secret weapon be vomit?’, Maxx said with more than a hint of exasperation in his voice.
Dick’s confused expression indicated that he obviously hasn’t thought this one through. Maxx didn’t have the patience to wait and hear how Dick expected vomit to defeat the resistance movement, so he revealed the answer.
‘Rhymes with “prom”
… try “bomb”’.
Dick flinched, accidentally knocking the table in the process and jolting the suitcase. In a reflex move he ducked down, covering his head with his hands.
‘Don’t worry. It’s not primed!’, Maxx explained, smiling.
Dick pulled himself to his feet and tried to regain at least some of dignity he’d just lost. He looked at the device again, this time with more respect. ‘And you’re going to blow up the resistance headquarters with this bomb?’, he asked.
‘No’, Maxx said. ‘You don’t even know where it is, so how the hell would we?! In any event, even if we did blow it up, it wouldn’t stop any rebel factions from re-grouping and carrying on their work like they’ve done in the past. Up until now the Resistance has just been an annoyance — a boil on the backside of the Party. But there’s no knowing what trickery they might get up to in the future. Take you for example…’
Dick went slightly red.
‘Who knows what damage you might have done if I hadn’t recognised you?’
Dick went redder.
‘Tell me, how is it that some members of the population question the Party and take petty actions against it?’, enquired Maxx. ‘The sort of people that the Resistance try and identify and recruit. Why don’t these dissidents think and act like 99.9% of the population?’
‘The Resistance gives them an antidote to the monthly bromide injections. You must know that’, answered Dick. ‘This gives people a greater degree of free will. It makes them more questioning about this society’.
‘Precisely!’ shouted Maxx. ‘And as much as it pains me to say it, we’ve never managed to track down supplies of the antidote and whoever manufactures and distributes it. And we’re unable to even identify it within people’s bloodstreams. Which is where the bomb comes in.
‘Think back to our time Dick. Do you remember something called the neutron bomb? It was an atomic bomb specifically designed to kill people but leave buildings and the infrastructure intact’.
