Unequal

by B. E. Sanderson

  She darted warning glances at her companion, but Crispin either didn’t notice or he didn’t care. He was the same relaxed person who’d eaten her sandwich minutes before.

  “I didn’t think you’d be the one to come.” Crispin smiled up at the man who had her trapped. “Don’t you have better things to do?”

  “Ms. Logan was important enough to warrant a personal visit.”

  Rue’s brain raced for a way to escape. She held no illusions about who had her by the shoulder. And exactly whose hand was centimeters from her neck. Citizen Executioner Matthew Jenner wouldn’t hesitate to snap those fragile bones. Too bad for them both, Crispin didn’t seem to have a clue.

  “Introduce me to your friend.” She tried to keep the quiver from her voice, but she didn’t quite succeed.

  “Rue, I want you to meet—”

  “Introductions,” Jenner said, “are best kept for a more intimate audience.” His hand clenched tighter.

  Crispin laughed and the happy sound drew several glances. “You can really take the cautious thing too far sometimes, Justin. No one here is going to call the agency on you.” He pushed a chair out with one foot. “Relax. Have some coffee and a sandwich.”

  “This… this is…” She couldn’t seem to force the words around the lump in her throat.

  Jenner took the offered seat, but his hand didn’t leave her. “You’re right as usual, Cris. But you have to admit, I have good reason to be jumpy.” He nodded toward his prey and she cringed. “We’ve already lost one good asset trying to achieve our most recent objective. I don’t want to see any more collateral damage in this.”

  He had to be referencing Hubert. Rue longed to scream. This Justin person was the reason the older woman was dead. Collateral damage? She was a human being. She was my friend. And you killed her. The thoughts ricocheted around her head, tearing her soul to bits.

  “Did you eat, Ms. Logan?” asked Jenner… Or is it Justin?

  She shook her head. If she opened her mouth now, she was afraid she’d start screaming and not be able to stop. Years of seeing the worst humanity could shove at her and she’d never broken down. This horror was more than her mind could bear.

  “Rue?” Crispin snapped his fingers in front of her face. “Are you in there?”

  “I believe she’s having a little trouble digesting everything she’s experienced over the past few weeks. Am I right?”

  This time, she nodded. She had to speak soon, or she might never get another chance. Whatever Jenner’s part was in this drama, she was going to have to play it out. Running at this point would land her back with the DOE. Any attempt to alert Crispin to his associate’s true identity could land her in a worse position.

  “I… I guess,” she sputtered. “It’s… it’s a lot to… It’s a lot to take in… all at once.” The biggest understatement of Rue’s life. The one thing worse would’ve been learning her own mother working for the DOE. Or maybe finding Hubert standing behind her like the walking dead.

  “Then we shall have to make sure we ease you into everything more gradually from here on out.” The man’s grip lessened. Before he released her, he gave her arm a brotherly squeeze. “You’re a smart lady. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have scouted you for so long.”

  The idea he had been watching her long before he ever appeared in her home gave her the willies. With his hand removed from her shoulder, she relaxed a little. Crispin seemed to trust this man, and she couldn’t do anything about it. Not then anyway. As soon as she could get Crispin alone, he’d get an earful.

  “Well, if we’re finished here, maybe this lovely creature will grace me with her company while you gather our friends.”

  Oh, please, don’t leave me alone with him, please. She hoped Crispin would read her pleas on her face. To her disappointment, the closest thing she had to a friend nodded at his apparent leader. Before she could grab his hand and hold him in place, he rose and walked away.

  “Relax. People will assume you’d been sentenced to death,” Jenner said.

  “Didn’t you? Like you did for Hubert?”

  “Margaret understood what could happen going into this.” He shook his head. “I regret what occurred, but I had no control over the outcome of those events.”

  “Right.” She’d believe him right after she believed the sun was cold.

  “I’m speaking the truth, but I understand you have no reason to trust me. Yet.” He reached for her hand, but she snatched it away before he could touch her again. “My actions usually speak for me, and so far they haven’t said much in my defense. If you won’t trust me, trust Cris.”

  “He has no idea what you really are.”

  A smile spread across Jenner’s face. “He knows exactly what I really am. Who do you think got him a placement inside the agency?” he asked. A second later he held up his hand. “Don’t answer. I expect you won’t believe anything I say to you. Instead, spend some time evaluating what you’ve experienced. As I said, you’re a smart lady. You’ll come to the right conclusion.”

  He nodded toward the waiter who scurried over. Handing the man his ID card, he said, “I’m crediting their lunch,” then to her, “and we’re leaving.”

  Jenner held his hand out. Rue ignored him, pushing away from the table and standing without his help. If he was going to drag her back to the DOE, she wasn’t going to assist him. She turned. The one thing stopping her from walking out the front door was his hand on her arm.

  “This way,” he said, urging her toward the back of the building.

  “Crispin went that way.”

  “He had other things to do. He’ll meet up with us later.”

  She longed to break free and run into the sunshine. Which was probably what he wanted. She would run and someone would attack her, giving her what Hubert got. Instead, she allowed Jenner, or Justin, or whoever the hell he was to guide her away from the questionable safety of public view. Into unquestionable danger.

  “Will you please relax?” he said. “For a woman who spent so long in anonymity, you’re doing an excellent job of drawing attention to yourself. Were we inside any other establishment, someone would’ve called the agency soon after you sat down.”

  One mention of the DOE was all it took. Rue forced herself to relax. She couldn’t quite manage the amiability she had with Crispin, but she hoped she created the illusion her skin wasn’t crawling. Guiding her toward the back, he nodded at the waiter and the few curious diners. Without saying a word, Jenner managed to put everyone at ease.

  If they only learned what lay behind his good looks and charm, ease would be the furthest thing from their minds.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “Someplace infinitely safer than here.” He didn’t bother with any other explanation. Through the café and then between shelves stocked with supplies, he pushed her along. Within seconds, they approached a door and went through into the alley beyond. Their steps weren’t hurried, but Jenner made sure every move was purposeful.

  Soon, they were headed deeper down the alley, away from the sidewalk and the afternoon pedestrians. In Rue’s head, each meter they covered took them farther away from Crispin—took her farther away from any chance she had at freedom. Without Crispin around, this Justin person could do whatever he wanted. He could disappear her entirely, and all he had to do was say she ran away on her own.

  She’d be as gone as Uncle Howard.

  “You’ve been watching me for years,” she said, more as a statement than a question.

  “I’ve had to.”

  “Since I was assigned to the hospital?”

  He turned her into a narrower space between two other buildings. “Not quite so long. Not personally. My predecessor had your name long before I took his place.”

  The man said his predecessor as though he’d been given a new assignment instead of what she imagined was a bloody takeover. “And you know this how?” she asked.

  “It’s all in your file.” He looked sideways at her as they
walked. “Part of the job is staying on top of who’s out there and what I might have to do in the future. Your file’s been at the top of my list for a long time.”

  “If you’ve got this big file on my life…?” Rue dragged her feet, leaving her unfinished question hanging in the air.

  “Yes?” He pulled at her hand. “We really don’t have time for this. If you have something to say, out with it.”

  “My Uncle Howard.” The words popped out of her mouth before she could really consider them. He wouldn’t tell her. And if he did, he’d probably lie. Part of her wasn’t sure she really wanted the answer. But she had to ask despite every possibility he wouldn’t tell her the truth. “What happened to him?”

  He glanced from one end of the alley to the other. “Not here.”

  “I’m not moving another step until—”

  “Do you really want to talk about this in public?”

  He had her there. She really didn’t want to talk about this at all, but hearing the worst in private was probably going to be better than in the open air. Shaking her head, she let him lead her a little further down the alley and then followed him through a doorway. The spot he’d chosen was no more than a derelict storeroom stinking of moldy bread and stale grain.

  “You really can’t let him go, can you?” he asked.

  Of all the things she expected him to say, that wasn’t one of them.

  “No. I can’t.” He’d been too big a piece of her life. Howard was too much of who she was to simply let him become another one of the disappeared. “Do you have any information about what happened to him?”

  “I do.”

  Goosebumps rose along her arms. The tone in his voice could only mean one thing. She almost let it lie rather than hear the words she was sure he would speak. But her conscience wouldn’t let her escape in ignorance. Uncle Howard never escaped. Why should I?

  “Tell me.”

  The man’s face grew stony, but something akin to hurt flickered in his eyes. For a moment, she dared to hope this person had met her uncle. If Jenner had heard of him, it meant he hadn’t been disappeared. He could be dead and yet somehow he’d escaped his original fate.

  “Tell me what happened,” she said again.

  He shook his head as he spoke the first few words. “Citizen Plumber Howard James Winston—”

  “He’s dead. I’ve suspect as much for a long time. But I need to learn what happened. Please.”

  “Winston’s not dead.” Sadness swept over her captor’s face. “I wish he was. I would rather he be dead and buried since the last time you saw him.”

  “He’s alive?” The words should’ve brought Rue joy, but Jenner’s tone killed any chance of happiness.

  “Very much so.”

  Rue could scream. This whole thing was dragging out too much for her raw nerves to stand. “Take me to him.”

  All at once, Jenner’s expression turned hard and cold. “If you want to see your uncle so badly, Crispin should’ve left you where you were.”

  “The DOE has him?”

  “The DOE doesn’t have him. He has the DOE. Citizen Plumber Howard Winston is better known these days as Citizen Equalizer Hank Winston.”

  ELEVEN

  Before Rue could stop herself, her fist connected with Jenner’s chin. Thankfully, they were out of sight. Physical violence would bring the DOE faster than Shiraz’s birthmark.

  “Liar.” She ground the word between her teeth. The Citizen Equalizer’s name was extremely similar to her uncle’s she was surprised she hadn’t noticed it before. But they couldn’t be the same person. She refused to believe the head of the DOE was the same gentle soul who taught her how to read. “My uncle hated the DOE and everything they stood for.”

  “Past tense being crucial in this case.” Jenner rubbed the red mark blooming on his face, but he didn’t retaliate. In the back of her head, a little voice was screaming at her to run. No way would one of the DOE’s agents stand for being struck—even if it meant discarding his little game of pretend.

  “I see what you’re doing.” Her mind scrambled to fill in the gaps. The one person she trusted most in her whole life would never have betrayed her this way. The answer? Jenner was lying. It wasn’t too big a stretch. He’d lied to Crispin about what he was. He had Bruno and the untrusting Shiraz believing his pretty game of pretend. Saying a few nasty things about her uncle was probably a pastime for this bastard.

  “Do you really?” he asked. His hands clenched and unclenched, as though his fingers ached to return the blow she dealt. “Interesting, because you certainly don’t seem to have the slightest idea what you’re doing. How could you possibly understand what I’m doing?”

  “You’re trying to confuse me.” She gazed at the shelves, searching for something to throw at him. Too bad for her, they were empty. “You’ve got all your followers confused and you’re confusing me, too.”

  He rubbed a knuckle into his eye, as if she was giving him a tremendous headache. Well, good.

  “My followers, as you call them,” he said, “are well aware of who I am and what I’m doing. They are also aware what I say about your uncle is the honest truth. Ask any of them.”

  Crossing her arms over her chests, she rolled her eyes and snorted. “Convenient how they’re all elsewhere when you decide to tell me.”

  “Damned inconvenient, if you ask me.” He took a step toward her but as she moved away, he stopped. “Listen. I didn’t intend to have this conversation so soon. I wanted to wait until we were more comfortable with each other—once you’ve had a chance to know the real me.”

  Her arms tightened until they presented a shield wall in front of her. “Which you is real? Justin? Or is the real you Jenner?”

  He shook his head. “Jenner is an act. It always was.”

  “And Justin? Is he the real you, or another act you put on?” This time she stepped forward and he moved back. With her mental shield in place, she was ready to take him on. “For the DOE, you’re Matthew Jenner. For these Unequals, you’re Justin Nobody, leading a crusade to save mankind from the DOE. Who else are you?”

  She needed to stop talking. But if she stopped talking, her shield would crack. She would begin to question whether she had the strength stand up to him. If it collapsed, she would doubt herself and wonder whether he was right about her uncle. Howard had been the rock she used to stabilize her whole life. He was the reason she escaped being labeled Unequal as a child. She owed twenty-eight years of freedom to him. She couldn’t conceive of owing the last few days of running and fear to him, too.

  Justin didn’t answer. Maybe he had no answer now that she finally caught him out. The pulse raging in her ears since his pronouncement subsided. In its absence, she could hear the city moving beyond the buildings. People going about their carefully controlled and oh-so equal lives. Did they understand their lives could be so much more than merely Equal.

  Howard… Hank? She couldn’t accept they were the same person. Howard had taught her to be something more than merely the same as everyone around her. He taught her to believe she could be more, if she worked hard. If she really tried, she could become the doctor she always dreamed of being—the DOE be damned. All those talks in his basement room, when her father wasn’t home. The long discussions when her father had assumed they were both sleeping. The sum total of her drive lay in the wisdom her young uncle imparted.

  And somehow she was supposed to believe all his wisdom had become one big lie.

  As her pulse slowed, her brain began reasoning through Justin’s lies. The more she thought, the more a little voice hinted how his words might be the truth. It was akin to picking up a glass, assuming it was filled with water and discovering oil. The shock was too great for her to accept it all at once.

  “Take me where you want,” she said, backing away from him. “You win.”

  He shook his head at her. “Winning wasn’t my intention.”

  “Whatever your intentions were, you’ve beaten me. For no
w.” She didn’t care where they were going any longer. She only wanted to get there. Maybe he could provide her with proof Uncle Howard had turned into a completely different human being. Maybe she could find a way to prove how wrong his assumptions were. In any case, she was sure she would be able to reason out whether Justin was trying to trick her.

  The man stared at her and then shrugged. Without a word, he stepped back into the daylight and began walking toward the other end of the alley. Rue stood gaping after him for a minute before she followed.

  “We’re about finished with the back ways,” he said once she caught up. “Are you ready to begin your act again?”

  She nodded, but she wouldn’t be able to pull it off as well with Justin.

  “It won’t be long. But this section of the city is not without risk. Many of the DOE live here. On any given Saturday, they could both be living their personal lives and watching for infractions.”

  “Sounds like a happy place to be.” She didn’t bother to hide her sarcasm. “Why exactly are we going through here if it’s so risky?”

  He shook his head. “You’ll have to remain in the dark for the time being. Once we’re through, you’ll understand the reasoning.”

  Rue was getting fed up with being told she’d understand things later. All her life she was interested in learning about things the moment she discovered them. Waiting was a virtue best left to the Equals. However, from everything Justin said, this wasn’t the place for a fight.

  “Lead the way.”

  With a nod, he turned away from the alley’s end and opened a door she hadn’t noticed until right then. It opened into a storefront of some sort. Racks of clothes created a maze between them and the wide glass windows facing the sidewalks. Justin slipped between a rack of coats and a unit filled with sweaters. Rue pulled the door closed and trailed after him.

  “They still sell these things?”

  “As long as it isn’t illegal to make clothing choices, they’ll sell whatever they can.” He held out a hand to encompass the goods. “Of course, people continue to wear their assigned uniforms for the most part.”