SE #9

 

Black subtly tested the shackles around his wrists and the chain connecting to the shackles around his ankles. He was a big man, but he was not big enough to break the fetters. Not that he needed to; he simply liked to test things like that, to see if they could be broken. That’s why I’m here, he thought, amusing himself.

One of the guards escorting Black down the bleach-white hall paid extra attention to Black’s face as it smirked in a way that seemed like a warning to everyone and no one at the same time. Black’s smirk widened when he saw the look on the guard’s face just before he turned straight ahead, the whole group continuing its march.

Red, in a different brightly illuminated hall, had not been shackled, her orange jumpsuit being the only thing setting her apart from the guards escorting her. Rather than smirking, she was looking around the hall, looking up and down the guards, listening to radio chatter, doing all of this openly and unconsciously, her observation of technical weaknesses a habit for her like breathing for others. She had already noticed several compromised elements of this whole march, least of which being her free extremities, but she didn’t think about it. She thought of Black, of when she could see him, of whether it would be before or after their transfer to federal prison.

Almost simultaneously, the two crowds of guards, each with their orange-suited prisoners, one shackled, one not, emerged from two separate doors. Red looked to her right and saw Black; Black felt Red’s presence to his left but looked at the large, black van. Why is there only one? Black thought. But two Marshals were out of the van just as he asked that question, and its back doors were opened, revealing two deputies waiting for him. 

Except they weren’t just for him. They were putting Red in first, then Black. No one noticed anything, not even the oddity of the youngest deputy removing Black’s shackles, not even Red noticed it, her eyes serene as always, with that added smile that only Black could see. And just like that, Red and Black were together again, sitting across from each other in a cool van, with two young U.S. Marshals sitting to besides each of them. 

Red and Black could tell when the van pulled from garage, when it exited the sally port, and when it finally left the main exit of the prison. They waited until the van was at highway speed to say anything.

“Not real Marshals, are they?” Black asked Red.

“Nope,” she said, smiling pleasantly at the young men.

“It’s real mystery we have on our hands, isn’t it?”

“At least yours aren’t bound anymore, darling,” said Red.

“Good point,” Black said as he raised his right fist to bang on the wall between him and the front cab. “Is that you, Draper?” he shouted.

A panel to the driver’s cab of the van slid open and a bearded man in sunglasses peaked his head into the opening.

“Congratulations, Crimson,” the man said, his dry tone not masking his sarcasm. “You two finally solved a mystery. Now, did you come up with any new ideas while you were in there? Did you turn your folly into a benefit? Necessity and invention and all that?”

“I’ve got nothing,” said Black.

“At least we know we were wrong,” said Red.

“Brilliant. Talk it over. I have something to show you back at HQ.”

The man in the passenger side seat slid the panel shut, leaving Red and Black, known together as Crimson, to ponder their folly. To figure out how they’d ended up in jail, when their whole goal had been to put someone else there. They looked at each other and knew they had no answers. No way to explain how things had gotten to this point. No clue as to how to stop whoever was augmenting the country’s robotics infrastructure.  No clue as to how whoever it was had gotten them thrown in jail.

Detective Bines hadn’t heard the alert from his vehicle for several miles, because he was trying to keep it all out of his mind, all the alerts, all the noise, all the thoughts his subconscious wanted him to sort out. The beeping, a subtle, friendly sound, kept going, and he kept ignoring it—until the car sputtered. Like a man awakened by an emergency, he straightened his spine and looked around pointlessly.

Damn gas, he thought. I feel like I’m out of gas already. Should have known.

Bines switched on the economy, giving up on his rush back to the precinct. Slowed down. Asked the car system to locate the closest route to a gas station. Found it. He had enough energy to get there. But do I have enough to get through what happens back at the precinct? He asked him, not consciously, not fully, but as a sense, a feeling pervading his entire body. It was a feeling that had been with him since he left the prison, and it was one of many issues he simply couldn’t decide how to handle. 

But he could handle filling up the hybrid to get him back to the city. He pulled into the station, the white paint of its pumps and its store glistening in the hot sun despite the dirt all over everything. There were a few other cars in the area. A few other people. He didn’t want to deal with people right now. He was tired of people. Of having to walk on eggshells. Of having to pretend he didn’t have his theories, his hunches, about the girl. And now, after talking to her mother, after what appeared to be a failure, after leaving quietly, broodingly, and seeing all the alerts on his phone, from the chief, from his partner, now more than ever, he wanted to be away from people.

He focused on the fuel. Remembered that his card was maxed out. Went in to pay with cash. More people, he thought. An elderly couple and little children, he couldn’t help but notice. Gray hair and blonde hair, the children so fair that they almost looked gray too. So similar, he noticed. Must be related. Not a part of the system. The corrupt system he’d been clandestinely navigating, trying to find any proof of his hunch about the girl. Were these children like her? Were the innocent and sweet, smiling and laughing, were they really, or were they putting on a performance? How could anyone ever really trust—

“HI!” the little boy shouted. “I like your badge!”

He nodded, he thought he smiled, but he wasn’t sure, was trying to ignore his instinct to ensure they didn’t steal anything. A whole trio of them, he thought. Forget it.

He went to get himself a drink, something to give him energy for the ride. He came back and the children were gone. The unsuspecting grandparents were gone. He paid, despite the clerk offering a discount. At least some people believe in me, he thought, his phone buzzing, burning his thigh, but he refused to look at it. He knew what it was about. He knew he was going to catch hell for talking to the girl’s mother. But he’d face it when he got back. He could reason with the chief, plead his case the best he could. His partner, one of the other sources of the buzzing, that would be a different matter. He loved that girl. Little Natty, he called her.

He got on the road and tried to focus on the lines passing by, the cars he passed by, and the tiny skyscrapers on the horizon. But the thoughts kept coming. Little Natty. Natasha. Tasha, as the mother called her with a strange reverence unbecoming of a mother. A reverence extending past the tone in her voice, the look in her eye, but into the words that ended their conversation: “She’s not a mischievous little girl, detective,” the mother had said. “Tasha is more than you can imagine.”

Simple words. A mother’s love for her child whom she hadn’t seen for years. She’d have to wait a few more, until Natasha became an adult, to see her again. But he had heard something else in that voice and in those words. Something he couldn’t just dismiss, no matter how hard he tried, no matter how hard he slammed closed his file folder and shoved his chair under the table. No matter how rapidly he looked through all the alerts on his phone after he’d gotten it back from property. No matter how much he reprimanded himself. He knew what she really meant: you’ll never catch her.