I rubbed at my arms, which had started to itch.
My heart beat faster. It was the walls, the cold, sterile monochromes, the smell of disinfectant.
This place reminded me of the IMA's base. In that underground bunker, I had known hell. Its many winding halls, labyrinthine in scale, and so complex that the operatives themselves had to memorize the floor plans and count their steps just to keep from becoming lost themselves. The tiles smelling of disinfectant from being scrubbed of the blood of the innocent and not-so-innocent.
They absorbed pain, as well as sound, those tiles.
I shivered, and remembered the phantom sensations of skin being torn as if it were tissue paper. As cold and unwelcoming as this place was, the IMA was way worse. So far.
The day was young.
“What are you doing here?” the voice scarcely reached my ears through the sound of ringing bells. “This area is off-limits to recruits at this hour.”
The voice was harsh but not necessarily hostile. It did make me jump, though, and I could imagine Michael cursing at me for showing such weakness so readily.
“Oh,” I said, “sorry — I was just wondering, um, where is the food?”
“Are you new?”
The intruder, who was a woman, was wearing business casual. Skirt. Blouse. Pearls. Flats instead of heels. She looked as if she had been pulled from a typing school at random. Her age was indiscernible.
“Yes,” I said hesitantly, wondering if this was some kind of test. How had she found me so quickly? Or was that just coincidence? “I just got here. I'm looking for the cafeteria.”
“You mean the mess hall.”
“Sure.”
She peered at me over her cats'-eye glasses and then pointed down the hall with a fingernail that had been filed to a lethal point.
“Straight, then left at the first junction. You can't miss it.”
“Thanks.”
She nodded tightly, folding her arms and watching me depart. When I glanced over my shoulder she was still standing there. Creepy.
At least I hadn't been apprehended for wandering the halls alone. Creepy or no, Typist Lady had seemed reasonable enough.
But is it reasonable to lock you in at night? To treat you like a prisoner despite the fact that you're on their side? No, when it came down to it, that seemed darn unreasonable, and a pretty major breach of trust.
I wondered if there were still drugs in my system, and if they were the cause behind this onslaught of paranoia. They hadn't fed me anything, so maybe it hadn't been completely flushed out of my system.
Yes, Christina, my brain mocked. Make excuses for the people who drugged you. Blame it on the drugs.
One of these days, I expected I might go to the doctor's and get a report saying that all this drugging and being knocked unconscious had given me permanent brain damage.
I made a mental note to figure out whether it was possible to sneak some food back into my quarters. What if they forgot to let me out of my room one day? I didn't want to go hungry.
They'll probably have you strip-searched at the door to make sure you aren't smuggling out contraband.
Typist Lady's directions had been dead-on. I found the mess hall easily. The little white room looked an awful lot like a school cafeteria minus the chatter and the peals of laughter.
There weren't many people here considering the apparent size of the building. It was possible they were staggering mealtime schedules to reduce contact between the new recruits, but that was a little too Orwellian for my liking.
Like the hotel buffet where Michael and I had eaten together just two days before, the food was self serve. Unlike the hotel, this food was of a visibly lower quality. The grayish eggs, which I bet had come from dehydrated powder, were definitely not morale-boosters.
Nor were they appetite-boosters, either.
I helped myself to a lot of bacon because it's hard to go wrong with bacon, period, even if it started its life as a powder rather than inside a pig.
I also got hash browns and some fruit salad that looked and smelled fresh, but when I took the first bite out of one of the sliced strawberries it had the texture of wet Styrofoam.
People were scattered at various tables as if someone had reached into a giant jar and tossed them wherever, and they had just decided to sit down where they'd been scattered. There were no empty tables, but nobody was sitting in groups, either.
There was one not-too-unfriendly-looking guy sitting by himself with a thick tome of a book that looked technical. Since he was the only one who didn't look like he was trying to poker-face his way through his grudge against humanity I figured he was my best bet.
He didn't look up until I was almost at the table, at which point it was too late to double-back without looking like an idiot. “Can I sit here?”
“Free country.”
Not exactly a declaration of friendship, but I'd take it. I sat down with relief; it had felt like everyone was staring at me while I waited for the outcome.
I ate quickly and methodically, intending to get out of here tan pronto como posible. But then where would I go? I had no idea what awaited me after lunch, no idea where I was supposed to go next.
Ay, I thought, what a mess.
The man across from me had finished eating. He was lingering over his coffee, reading his book, though he looked up at the same moment I was looking over. Our eyes met, and I felt a potent jolt of awkwardness and fear. Nothing like knowing your seatmate could kill you to add a little bit of pizazz to your post-adolescent social anxieties.
“I don't think I've seen you in this bloc before,” he said, using his finger to save his place. “Are you new?”
“What's a bloc?” I blurted.
“So you are new.” He smiled and closed the book. “Schedules are arranged in blocs. To keep the facilities from getting too crowded, different groups are slated to eat at different times. This is A bloc. Best time to eat, because it means the food is still fresh.”
Fresh from the packet it came in, maybe.
He tilted his head. “What's your department?”
Thank God, a question I knew the answer to.
“I'm a coder. A programmer, I guess. I don't really know what they'll have me doing. I haven't started my training yet. But I'm fluent in Java and C-plus-plus — well, mostly fluent, I'm a little rusty — so that's got to count for something, right?”
You're babbling. Shut up.
“You're a programmer?”
“Yes.” I bristled a little. “Why is that funny?”
“It isn't.” He quickly regained his sober tone from before. “There just aren't a lot of women in that department.”
“Well, there's at least one.”
“I'm sure they'll be thrilled to have you.”
Yeah, the science departments were always thrilled to have their token minorities. The problem was, nobody took you seriously; they assumed you'd gotten the position because of how you looked, and not because of what was inside your head.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“They don't exactly see a lot of women, if you know what I mean. Especially not pretty ones.”
Ugh. Skeaze, much? I didn't like this current subject we were on. I also didn't like that we were talking about me so much. It felt like he was forming a dossier on me.
I had been spending too much time around Michael. I was starting to think like him. But he had survived this long, he must be doing something right.
Considering where we were, maybe the guy was forming a dossier on me. Suspiciously, I said, “What's your department?”
“I'm a weapons specialist.”
He probably could kill me then.
“That must be fascinating.”
Sarcasm specialist, though, he was not, because he then proceeded to tell me all manner of incredibly dull things about the minutiae his job.
I had known firearms were deadly. Now I knew that they could be boring as well.
“My name's Marcus,” he said at last, seizing my hand without waiting for me to offer it. He had a firm handshake, one that bordered on the verge of pain.
“Nice to meet you.”
“I'm named for Marcus Aurelius.”
I plastered a fake smile on as I worked to extricate myself in a way that wouldn't seem too rude but would also show him what a creep I thought he was being.
“What's your name?”
“Christina. I'm named—for Christ, I guess.”
Marcus released my crushed hand. “Nice to meet you.” He glanced at his watch, did a little start. “Excuse me.” He tucked his book under his arm as he went to bus his tray. I watched him leave in a hurry.
I now had the table entirely to myself.
Mental note: next time, bring a book.
Chapter Seven
Conflict
Michael
I couldn't even begin to count how many hotel rooms I'd been in just like this one. Empty shells, like spent bullets. They had no heart, no soul.
Just the way I liked them.
Sometimes I would come to these places alone, in between missions or when I wanted some time to myself. Off the radar. Other times, I'd arrive with a woman I'd picked up from a bar. Usually the two of us drunk as fuck. Then, the next morning, hungover as fuck. I was, anyway. I imagine the women were, too, but I guess I can't be sure because I never let them stay the night. Why give them false hope?
That was one point of fact I'd always prided myself on. I was a mean son of a bitch, but I didn't try to sugarcoat it.
It'd been a while, though, since I'd stayed in a place quite this shitty. Either roadside motels had taken a nosedive over the last couple years or a lot of the sleaze went unnoticed when you were sauced out of your mind. My money was on the brain-pickling.
At least these motels were cheap. Thirty bucks a night. The kind of place you stayed when your wife kicked you out, or when you wanted to see a woman on the sly. The kind of place where ID was optional, and cash was paid up front.
Most of that money went towards paying off the federal health inspectors. I'd seen a roach or two scuttle around when I flicked on the light. It was only for the night, but then, I didn't want them crawling on me. Might end up shooting the wall full of holes.
At the next sign of movement I crumpled up the greasy fast food bag that had held my dinner and lobbed it towards the area in question. That'd give the curious little shit-eaters something to contend with.
I leaned back against sheets that probably would have lit up like a tree in Christmastime if I'd had a UV light. I tried not to think about whose bodily fluids I might be lying on.
My ability not to think about certain things had gotten worse over the years. It was a downhill slope. I had so much crap, I was starting to leak like a cheaply made septic tank. Shit was seeping out through the cracks and man, did it fucking stink.
I was getting older, too. That was the problem. I was in my mid-twenties. Another five years, I'd be thirty. An old man in this line of business.
All those years of pushing myself too hard on too little sleep and too little food were starting to take their toll. My body wouldn't be able to do what I was demanding of it much longer. I was winding down.
Jesus. I needed to retire. I needed to get out of this work in a way that didn't involve a body bag and a funeral home.
My eyes focused as they adjusted to the half-light. Outside my room was a big light-up billboard. In its glare, I thought the watermark on the ceiling looked a lot like a disembodied hand flipping me the bird.
I gave the ceiling the finger and rolled over. That was a mistake. The smell of cheap detergent rose up from the sheets like an olfactory fuck-you. What did they do? I lay on my back. Soak the sheets in lye?
It was appropriate, me being in this cheap roach motel, too cheap to even have a name. The motel was a middle finger to the American way of life in general. The greasy underbelly of a tawdrily upholstered culture of consumption that was eating us from the inside out like a cancer.
A cancer we willfully embraced.
People worried about the degeneration of society. Too little, too late. Society was broken, and we were all fucked. Whenever some businessman wanted to eliminate some young entrepreneur's rising star, or a politician wanted to take out one of their political enemies without starting a war, they called me. Or someone like me.
They say you can't put a price on human life. Well, we found a way and it isn't as much as you might think.
I was a weapon. It was my job to kill, and kill as cleanly and quickly as possible. Not out of mercy, no, but because I might get blood on the fucking carpet.
No, even if I did manage to get out from Callaghan's thumb, I couldn't see myself living la vie en rose. Not when I was a part of everything that went against it.
Christina wouldn't be able to deal with that kind of guilt. There wasn't much distance between the shooter and the trigger. The computer, however, might allow her to dissociate.
But then again, it might not.
Christina
With the table to myself I no longer had any reason to hurry. Marcus had gone, but now other people were making me feel on the spot. Every so often, someone over at another table would give me a strange look. Not a mean look. Just strange.
Like they knew who I was.
Who are these people?
The door to the mess hall opened. A uniformed man shouldered the door aside, eyes scanning the tables. He zeroed in on me.
“Parker, Christina?”
It sounded like he was calling roll, and I raised my hand the way I would if I really were in school before I stopped to think about what I was doing.
At the sight of the sneer that crossed the guard's face I quickly lowered my arm. Something about people yelling at you causes you to revert back to the mannerisms of a child. Maybe because most people have worked out other ways to deal with people by the time they have matured into rational adults.
“Yes?” I tried to make my voice sound deep and reassuring. It sounded like I had a cold.
“You were supposed to be in the computer lab at oh-seven-thirty hours.”
Computer lab? Had I seen anything that looked even remotely like the entrance to a computer lab in my brief wanderings? I didn't think so.
The guard was still watching me, waiting for a response, and several other people at nearby tables, who had been attracted by the commotion, were, too.
“That's news to me,” I said.
The guard fixed me with an impatient look. “Damn rookies.” His eyes flicked to my empty plate, then back to my face. The scorn was back. “Are you done here?”
“Yes,” I said, in the same tone.
“Then get up and come with me.”
I was being evicted. I took a last desperate sip of juice. Not out of any real sense of thirst, just for spite. “I don't know where the computer lab is.”
“You're looking in a fucking orange juice glass.”
“You're right,” I said. “I haven't even tried the coffee. Or the milk.”
Someone laughed. I was grateful for that.
The guard was not. He grabbed me by the wrist, forcing me to set down the glass.
“You're hurting me!”
He muttered something sarcastic in response, just below my hearing threshold. It didn't sound kind.
We went down various hallways and corridors. There were many twists and turns, and while they weren't quite as identical or tortuous as those in the IMA's Oregon base, what distinguishing touches there were—potted palms, the odd Plexiglas window looking out at a thick blanket of pines—were hardly solid landmarks.
Once again, I wondered if I'd made a mistake.
“Who designed the floor plan?” I said. “Escher?”
“No excuses next time,” the guard said. It was like he'd read my mind and found the words least likely to reassure me.
“It wasn't an excuse. I got lost.”
I bet he was a recruit to
o, and that his lesson plan consisted of scoffing and saying nasty things to other people in order to frighten them and keep them in line.
“Where are we going?”
He didn't bother dignifying that with a response.
I did my best to look for landmarks. I was going to have to find my own way down this path, and the guard was clearly going to be of no help. I didn't even realize we had gotten to my destination until he came to an abrupt halt that had me stumbling.
“What—”
“Here.”
He turned on his boot heel and walked away, uniformed back growing smaller as he retreated back towards whatever hole he'd crawled out of in the first place for the purpose of making my life miserable.
I looked at the door. Had he even brought me to the right place? Without a map, I couldn't be sure. What if this door was locked, too?
I tested the handle. It wasn't locked. So far so good. I pulled, and it swung open to reveal a room filled with computers. I sighed.
Thank you, God.
Now that I was certain I was in the right place I was able to relax enough that I could look more closely at everything and get a feel for my new work environment.
The flickering monitors cast strange shadows in the gloom. The lights had been turned down to reduce the glare. Off to the side of the room was the door to a glass cubicle. A room within a room. Through the windows I could make out a man with Asiatic features sitting inside, frowning.
“Close the door,” someone hissed.
The door to the hall had caused a long square of yellow light to spill into the room. Several of the people inside were rubbing conspicuously at their eyes and wincing.
Flushing, I closed the door. “Sorry,” I mumbled.
Their glares did not look very forgiving.
“Noob,” someone whispered loudly.
I know there's a stereotype that nerdy guys are supposed to be adorable and awkward and clueless, and for some that is definitely true. However, there is a dark side to nerd and geek culture. A side built on a foundation of arrogance and entitlement.
A side that is rife with misogyny.
A side that is quick to take up the chant, “Tits or GTFO.”
When I asked, “Um, who's in charge?” one of them jabbed a finger at the man in the glass room without moving his eyes away from the screen. Without even acknowledging my presence at all.
Locked and Loaded Page 7
