by T. C. Edge
“I’m meant to be meeting Adryan at 7PM,” I inform her. “How will you contact him to tell him I’m here?”
“I already have,” she says.
I stare at her blankly. She offers no further explanation.
“How?” I’m forced to ask.
She turns her left sleeve to reveal an interface on its underside. No other information is provided. I can only assume she used it to either contact Adryan directly – although, I doubt she knows him – or passed the information on to some other entity, such as the Council of Matrimony or the Institute of Human Relations where he works, for them to then give him the message.
Either way, she seems confident that he’s been informed. And now, more than ever, I’m desperate to see him, if only to be away from this woman.
Beneath the High Tower we pull to a stop, and Agent Woolf’s eyes guide mine outside the car to the right. There, a fairly intimidating building awaits, its façade like a fortress and with the city badge seared into its metal and stone exterior.
She steps out of the vehicle and I do the same, before it automatically moves off down the street, working its way to some predetermined spot. Trying to keep the bubbling nerves inside me from showing, I look at Agent Woolf in a manner that suggests I have nothing to hide.
“So, this is where you work, Agent Woolf?” I ask.
“When I’m not out around the city, yes,” she answers in her plain fashion. “This is the headquarters of the City Guard, and therefore is also home to the SCU. Come along, Miss Melrose. If we can keep Mr Shaw from waiting, that would be favourable.”
And on that count, I completely agree.
We move towards the main entranceway into the building, its wide metal doors fixed in an open position, revealing a spacious lobby beyond. Inside, I find all manner of Enhanced going about their business, most of them the regular Hawks, Brutes, Dashers and so on who comprise the physical fighting force of the City Guard.
As is the way of Inner Haven, the interior of the building contains no ornamentation or embellishment. It is entirely functional, perhaps more so than any other structure I’ve visited. The vestibule is simple and uncluttered, merely intended, it would seem, as a central core to provide passage to other parts of the building.
Our journey takes us left, my form being inspected as I go by the various men populating the lobby. Seeing a woman dressed in light blue, I suspect, is a rather unusual sighting here. And, on top of that, it’s quite possible that they recognise me too, given my current level of popularity and fame around the city.
Along the left side of the atrium, a bank of lifts await. Agent Woolf swiftly guides me towards one of them. It opens automatically as she approaches, and we step in.
“Floor 12,” she says.
The door shuts and the lift rises, shooting straight up through the building. When we step out, I find us in another hall, smaller this time, with the walls peppered with corridors and doors marked by their specific purpose.
Some carry the names of high-ranking officers of the City Guard. Others appear to be used for other purposes like surveillance or intelligence. One sticks out in my mind for the writing inscribed on its front: Archives.
My mind shifts for a moment away from my current predicament, zeroing in on thoughts of my parents. Could there be records in there about them? My father was a member of the City Guard after all. Perhaps there are service records detailing his time here?
Distracted by the sudden thought, I find my focus waning. I quickly temper the desire to think in more detail about my parents, and the many tangents such thoughts bring. It’s a dangerous road to travel in current company. The last thing I want is for Agent Woolf to slip inside my mind and see such things play out.
So I refocus once more as we move down a separate corridor, working deeper towards the rear of the building. At the end, I find an office marked with the name of my taciturn companion. She steps through the steel door and enters into a room as clean and uncluttered as the lobby down below.
Inside, I find little more than a metal desk and chairs. The place is as inhospitable a room as I could conceive, appearing as nothing more than a space used for interrogation.
Agent Woolf guides her path straight towards the far side of the desk and takes a seat, before inviting me to do the same. The chair opposite is positioned directly in front of her and fixed to the floor.
I slide in, the chrome surface of the desk trapping me in place. I have little option but to stare straight at her, which is probably the idea.
The room appears to be intended to make life as uncomfortable as possible for anyone Agent Woolf intends to deal with. To make sure they’re off-guard and therefore easier to manipulate. I suspect she reserves this place for her trickier customers, setting them on edge and putting their backs to the wall.
Clearly, she’s deemed me sufficiently crafty to be brought here, perhaps sensing that I was hiding something. And now, here in her private chambers, she’ll have plenty of time to dig away at my mind if she sees fit.
And in time, she’ll unearth the truth.
It just depends on how long I can repel her…
21
Sitting in the straight-backed metal chair, I feel an ache quickly begin to creep through me. It’s an ache in my back, in my legs, in my head. There’s something about this horrible place that seems to seep into you, bring about a bad feeling that radiates from your very core.
Even before she asks a question, I’m starting to feel the heat.
“So, Miss Melrose, shall we begin?”
I ready myself for the inevitable psychological battle, and nod.
To my surprise, however, I don’t feel her slipping inside my mind. She glances to my appearance instead, as if noticing for the first time how I’m dressed.
“It’s an unusual outfit,” she says. “Are you not too warm, wearing two layers?”
What is this? Is she trying to disarm me?
“I’m fine,” I say. “Thank you for your concern.”
Her thin lips try to curl but fail. Her eyes try to lighten a little, a hint of glow catching on the black, but quickly fade. She stares at me through her shark-eyes, even her blinking robotic and seeming to operate by mental design and not instinct.
“Let me explain why you’re here,” she begins, her own posture as rigid as mine. Looking upon her chair, it looks like it’s equally uncomfortable. Some sort of personal form of self-torture, perhaps, to keep her continually focused. “When I visited your academy several days ago, I found some threads of memory that didn’t line up as they should have…”
I brace for the reveal. She’s so hard to read that her next words could be just about anything. She could just as well tell me knows everything, or nothing, and her expression would never change at all.
“My focus was on discovering if anyone knew about the whereabouts, or means of escape, of your friend Joshua Brent. What I found odd was that, upon hearing the news of his incarceration, many of your fellow residents at Carmichael’s witnessed you rushing out of the academy in a state of desperation and anxiety.”
Ah, so it is about that…
She stops briefly. I feel I’m expected to speak, or offer some explanation.
“Yes,” I say. “I was distraught. Drum – Josh –is one of my best friends. It was a very hard thing to hear.”
“I comprehend what you’re saying,” she drones. “Such emotional reactions are common among your kind. I see them often in my line of work. However, your reaction was not the odd part of it. What was unusual was that your memory of that event was so faded in your mind. Seeing as it was such a recent, and shocking, memory to you, that is rather strange.”
Again, silence. Again, I offer some excuse.
“As I say, Agent Woolf, I was anxious and afraid for my friend. I know what incarceration at the holding cells means. I guess the memory was affected by my state of mind.”
It’s the best thing I can come up with. To suggest that the shock of h
earing the news created some sort of break in my mind, leading to the memories being cracked and blurred.
Perhaps this is something Zander should have foreseen. After all, it was him who informed me that an agent would be arriving to search for clues about Drum’s escape. He should never have concealed and muddied that memory to such an extent. It was only ever going to lead to suspicion…
Agent Woolf continues to stare at me with her blank, dead eyes. I can feel her creeping about on the edge of my mind, just taking a view from afar. I stare back at her, maintaining as casual a countenance as I can manage, and work to shield my thoughts and turn them to other things.
It’s a fine balancing act, and my heart begins to work up a sweat once more. That too, will be something she can sense. My pulse, and my rate of breathing too, and the other imperceptible signs of nerves and awkwardness that I’m no doubt displaying to someone of her abilities and experience.
I begin thinking about Drum as a younger boy, about our friendship, about specific memories we’ve shared. Then I focus on one – on the day he found out about Fred and Ziggy’s death. About his grief and my attempts to comfort him.
I know that, if I focus on that memory alone, it’s all she’ll be able to see. However, if I allow my thoughts to stray too far off track, I may be unable to prevent her creeping deeper inside me.
Thankfully, it doesn’t last long, and her mental intrusion isn’t particularly invasive. It’s clear that she’s merely attempting to gauge my current train of thought, and to find out if I’m lying. I refuse to let her come to that conclusion.
I can’t let her come to that conclusion.
Then she turns the conversation elsewhere, trying to throw me off balance.
“I spent some time with your friend, Tess Bradbury, as well,” comes her serene voice. “I understand you share a room with her?”
I nod.
“There was confusion in her head over how you’ve been behaving in recent days and weeks,” she continues. “It would appear she has a great deal of temporary animosity towards you, focused around a belief that she isn’t being included in what’s happening in your life. There is clear jealousy there too, regarding your current courtship with Mr Shaw. Would you care to offer your side of the story?”
I feel her dart into my mind again, inspecting my thoughts. I keep them centred on what she’s just said – that, yes, Tess is currently unhappy with me. And that, yes, my current life has had a negative impact on our friendship.
“A lot’s been going on with me recently,” I say. “The Fanatics’ attack on Culture Corner, the ceremony just down on the street below the High Tower, the bachelor ball and courting Adryan. There’s been loads to get my head around, Agent Woolf. And I know that Tess is jealous. We’ve always been so close, but now our lives are starting to diverge. It’s just…the way life goes.”
It’s all the truth really. Minus, of course, a few other bits and pieces that I’ve been going through recently. Those thoughts are hidden, however, concealed by the ones I’m happy for Agent Woolf to see.
“Life does contain its twists and turns,” admits the Savant, still staring at me with a relentless intensity.
The only chance I get to break the cycle is when I turn briefly from her gaze. Doing so, she quickly suggests I don’t let my eyes stray from hers. The weaker the eye contact, the weaker her ability to explore the internal workings of my consciousness.
“However,” she continues. “What I found in Miss Bradbury’s mind went beyond the events you’ve spoken of. She appeared to have some vague knowledge of rather more exciting, and dare I say, illegal, incidents.”
A desire pulses through me to enter her mind now. To see exactly what she’s thinking. Oh how I’d love to know the truth of what’s in her head. She might just be toying with me. She might already have ascertained my guilt, wishing to only prove it by getting me to confess, either verbally or mentally.
I can’t, however. Should I enter her mind, she’ll immediately know what I’m capable of. A woman like her will be all too aware of my presence. All I can do is try my best to deflect her from my own head without her knowing.
It’s a true test of my new powers.
And right now, I’m beginning to feel the strain.
I break eye contact again, turning to look down at my hands. Once more, she orders me to look back up.
I’m starting to lose it. My thoughts are beginning to wander, my focus waning. I battle again to keep her at bay, but she’s strong, and unrelenting, inexorably working her way deeper into my thoughts and memories. Trying to uncover the truth that Zander has hidden away deep inside.
“I don’t know anything about that,” I say. “I can’t tell you what’s in Tess’s head. She’s always had a busy imagination.”
“Hmmmm,” she rumbles. “That isn’t the impression I got of her cerebral machineries. Her creativity is actually quite uninspired. You, however, are far more creatively inclined. Perhaps that’s why I find you rather difficult to read.”
“Um, is that a compliment?” I ask with an awkward smile. It’s some hopeless attempt to break the tension, and fails spectacularly.
“It’s merely a statement of fact,” she replies dryly. “It’s possible that Tess’s recollections of the more exciting incidents I speak of are merely dreams that you’ve had. Mostly, her recalls were based around things you said in your sleep. Active and creative minds such as yours are more disposed to that sort of thing. Sometimes, it can be difficult to differentiate between dreams and proper memories.”
“I do dream a lot,” I say, seeing an opening. “I didn’t know I talked in my sleep, though…”
“Well, you do.”
“And, um, what was it that I spoke about? What did Tess hear?”
I regret asking the question immediately. Hearing the specifics is only likely to turn my thoughts to such things. I make sure to focus hard once more and keep my true recollections hidden, just as Zander taught me.
“Well, nothing particularly concrete,” says Agent Woolf. “I discovered fragments only. A firefight. Raging water. Poison. According to Miss Bradbury’s memories, such things have been prominent in your unconscious mind.”
“Dreams,” I say. “Just dreams I guess.”
Her stare seems to stiffen. She leans in just a little further. Then she shakes her head ever so subtly.
“It’s curious, really,” oozes her voice. “All these sleep talking incidents have taken place after the escape of Joshua Brent, during which a firefight occurred between the men transporting the trucks, and those who sought to free their occupants, your friend included. It’s curious, too, that you have dreamt of raging water, given the account of our men. Of course, this wasn’t reported on the news, but one fugitive managed to escape their clutches via an underground river. A river that, after careful exploration, has been found to lead beyond the city walls, right into the toxic and poisonous swamps of the south.”
I steady my mind as she speaks. I steady my head, and my breathing too. Her words grow increasingly cold and empty, and her eyes stare with a burgeoning concentration, intense and penetrating.
“So, after the escape of your friend, during which a firefight took place, and someone escaped down an underground river and out into the toxic marshes. After all of that, you began to dream of the same events, it would appear, mumbling about such things in your sleep. Curious, don’t you think, Miss Melrose?”
I don’t answer. I can’t answer. I flash my eyes away from her, breaking the seal. My steady pulse begins to hurtle, and my breathing grows more shallow, audible now in the silence of the room.
“What’s strange, however, is that you have no such recollections of any of these events in your head,” she adds. “Perhaps, therefore, it is all just a coincidence.”
I turn my eyes back to hers. They’re blacker than ever, more lifeless than ever. A brief hope burgeons in me once more before being expunged.
“However,” she continues. “My experie
nce has taught me not to believe in coincidence. There is something about you, Miss Melrose, that I do not trust. You are an enigma to me, and that alone makes me doubt everything you tell me. There are strange things going on inside your head that require further exploration. Now sit completely still, look right into my eyes, and just try to relax. It’s time I searched a little deeper…”
My body continues to react, my focus waning. I’m not prepared for this. I’m not prepared for her.
I can’t fight her off forever, not here in this room. This horrible, uncomfortable room. Eventually, she’ll break through, unearth the truth of who I am, what I am, what I’m here to do.
And when that happens, I’ll be executed, and so will Mrs Carmichael, and the kids from the academy will be tossed out onto the street. And the secret entrance I know to the underlands in the north will be discovered. And a force of Stalkers and Con-Cops and City Guards will be sent down there to cut right into the heart of the Nameless.
It will all come crashing down around me. Right here, right now, my mind is being pulled apart, Agent Woolf’s fingers getting a grip inside. And soon enough, she’ll prise me open and uncover the treasure within.
And so it begins. I sit ahead of her, looking into the darkness of her eyes, everything else seeming to fade to nothing around me. I try again to re-gather my focus, to prepare for the onslaught, to let my defensive instincts take over and my mind show its full power.
And as I do, a noise echoes inside my head, and I find myself coming right back into the room. The blackness grows lighter again, and the hateful face of Agent Woolf appears before me, her eyes now rising to look beyond me and at the door behind.
The sound comes again, more forceful this time.
It’s knocking. Someone’s knocking on the door.
As Agent Woolf calls out: “I’m busy,” I turn to see the door opening up anyway.
And before my eyes, the shape of another Mind-Manipulator appears, dressed in the lightest of greys, his eyes ice-blue and hair brown and neatly arranged. A well-rehearsed smile lights on his face, so welcoming against the endless frost of the agent, and yet still not completely human in nature.
