Family (17 page)

Zollers started to say something but I caught a flinch from him as though he’d been struck, a cringe that hinted at something bad. The door to the medical unit slid open a moment later and Michael Mormont appeared, a calm smile on his face, Eve Kappler a few steps behind him. He looked around the unit, past where Dr. Perugini was working on Kurt, and over to Zollers and me. Within a second of locking eyes with me he came my way and I felt the dread in my stomach rise unexplainably. Well, I might be able to explain it.

“Well, well,” Mormont said as Zollers rose from the stool after sliding his finger along the edge of a bandage, pressing it to my flesh. “Feeling any better?”

“Not much,” I said, holding up my unbandaged arm. “Why? Do you care?”

“Not really,” he said with a little shrug. “I need you to come with me, back to headquarters.”

“We’re in the middle of this right now,” Zollers said, pointing to my still-bloody right arm. “Can it wait just a few minutes?”

“Hardly.” He nodded at Eve, who looked at me in her usual inscrutable solemnity and walked behind the bed I was sitting on. I turned to track her, but Mormont spoke and drew my attention back to him. “Ariadne wants you at HQ.”

I exchanged a look with Zollers, whose eyes held something I couldn’t understand. “Fine,” I said, and stood up, letting my feet fall the half foot to the floor from the bed. “But I—” I stopped as I felt hands behind mine, and felt something hard and metal close onto my wrist, like when Clary had clamped his hands down on them. The pain seared on my open cuts and I swore. “What the f—”

“Handcuffs,” Mormont said with a smile. “They’re something new, designed to hold even a top-of-the-scale meta like you.”

“Is this really necessary?” Zollers asked with a tired look, as though he already knew the answer.

“Yeah, it’s necessary,” Mormont said, and his hand went into his pocket. “You know what this is?” His hand came out with something small between his thumb and forefinger, something small enough I couldn’t really see it from a few feet away.

“Yeah,” I said snottily, “it’s your d—” A hard blow to the back of the head dropped me to the ground as Eve drove an elbow into me that caused a flash in front of my eyes.

“I shouldn’t be surprised you’d go to the lowest common denominator when it comes to defiant answers,” Mormont said as I stared at his shoe, my cheek on the floor, blood in my mouth. I felt Eve’s hands seize me around my sleeve as she dragged me back to my feet.

“Manners,” Eve said in that stiff German accent of hers. I restrained myself from spitting blood in her face in response, instead let it drip, felt it go down my chin.

“This is ridiculous,” Zollers said, anger rising. “I’ll be reporting your conduct – both of you – to the Director.”

“He won’t do anything,” Mormont said, and his hand came up again. “As I was saying – this is a listening device. Found it in Ariadne’s office. Small scale, short range, so whoever was listening to it was right here on campus.”

“Congratulations,” Zollers said dryly. “There are hundreds of people on campus. Why are you harassing this one?”

“Very simple, Doc,” Mormont said with a smirk. “Because when I searched her room a few minutes ago – and yes, she was the first person I suspected, but for other reasons – what do you think I found?” The smirk grew wider but Zollers failed to react. “If you guessed the matching set for listening into this, you’d be right. Just turned it on—” he pulled a little black box from his suit’s other pocket, something that looked a little bigger than an MP3 player, complete with a headset – “and suddenly I hear the world’s worst case of screeching feedback.” He held them both up in front of him, the microphone and the bug. “Still want to defend her?”

“Absolutely,” Zollers said, clenching his teeth. “You’ve got not one speck of evidence that these belong to her.”

Mormont shrugged. “I found ‘em in her room, Doc.”

“I really oughta start locking my door,” I said through a rapidly swelling lip.

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” Mormont said, grinning at me. “You’re coming back to headquarters to answer some questions. And regardless of how that goes, Ariadne has declared you a person of suspicion.” He took a breath through his nose as though he were savoring the moment. “Couldn’t have said it better myself, because I’ve got some suspicions about you.” His smile broadened. “So you don’t have to worry about locking your door for a while, because where you’re going, it’ll be locked…pretty much all the time.”

Chapter 15

One Year Earlier

The air was thick in the box. The cool damp of the basement faded as the air had become warm and stuffy inside. I could see the light coming in from the seam around the door of the box, streaming in from outside the basement’s painted windows. Of course, I couldn’t see them, but since Mom had turned off the basement light, I knew it was daytime now. I had been in the box for over eighteen hours by my reckoning.

My back and legs were stiff. I was sitting, my knees bent in front of me, crammed sideways into the box and taking up every inch of space. The pressure of the metal against my back and my legs was tight because of how little room I had. I felt numb. I was sitting in my own filth and had been since yesterday. The smell would have been unbearable but I had been exposed to it for so long that now it was just another constant, like the tapping of the pipes overhead in the basement as water ran through them, or the thrumming of the air conditioner unit outside as it started to run every hour or so.

I leaned my head against the metal side, and smacked my lips together. I hadn’t had a drink of water since I was locked in, which meant I was due to get out soon, I hoped. Mom never left me without water for more than a day. I felt weak and my stomach roared with desire for food. I didn’t even care if I showered, I was so hungry and thirsty. I had sobbed myself to sleep in the darkness and I woke up frequently throughout the night, the discomfort to my neck and back causing me to awaken at unusual times. Once, I had a fit, the claustrophobia pressing in on me when it was totally dark, and I slammed my hand against the metal until it bled, but afterward I had broken down and started crying, and fell back asleep for a little while. When I woke up, I was calm again.

I heard something outside, faint tapping. I listened and realized it was footsteps on the stairs. I heard them leave the wood steps and pad onto the foam mats that covered the basement floor where we practiced martial arts. They halted outside the box and I held my breath, daring to hope it was over. I heard a screech of metal as the little slot above me opened, and I struggled to my feet, willing my legs to work after being crammed in a desperately uncomfortable position overnight.

The light streamed in from the aperture. I looked out and squinted my eyes shut. The light was so bright, it hurt my eyes like someone was sticking their fingers into them. I opened them slowly, little by little, over ten seconds and looked out. A shadowed face stood a few feet away, and I could see the disappointment even through my squint. I smacked my dry lips together, hoping for some moisture. “Hi, Mom,” I said.

She didn’t answer me at first, and I saw her hand reach toward me, the light catching something she was holding, glinting and shining through it. She brought it up to the window – a water bottle, filled. I reached up, desperate, banged my elbow on the side of the box, sending a shock of pain to my fingers, but I didn’t care. I grasped at it, pulled it from her and heard the satisfying crack as I broke the seal and twisted, my hands shaking as I did so. I brought it up to my lips and felt the cool water pour over them, cracked, and felt it caress my tongue, coating my mouth. It reminded me of a plant we’d had in the kitchen years ago, in a red clay pot – the dirt had dried out after a few days and when I poured water into it after remembering that I had to water it, it stayed on top of the dry soil for a few minutes before soaking in. My mouth felt that way, like the water was sitting in it, waiting to absorb through the tissue and re-hydrate everything, like that dry soil.

I swallowed and felt the cool water running down my throat, and chugged it, drinking hungrily. My stomach roared as the liquid fell into it, a pitiful sacrifice and not at all what the rulers of my belly wanted, but it would have to do for now. My skin was sticky everywhere, and my clothes clung to me. As the water cleansed that awful taste of bitterness off my tongue, it was replaced by the seeping smell of the box, of me.

“Have you had enough?” Mom leaned forward and rested her hand on the opening of the slit through which she passed me the water. I saw her eyes, intense, staring in at me.

I remained silent as I took the last drink. I felt sick in my stomach, pain and cramping from drinking it too fast after not having anything for so long. “Yes,” I whispered with a slight spray of spittle as I pulled the plastic ring of the bottle away from my mouth. “Yes.”

“I don’t expect we’re going to have any more problems with you doing your chores, then?” There was a tone of patient expectation, but it was harsh, and cold.

I felt resentment stir, tempting me to say something I would regret. “No,” I answered after a beat, and only a beat.

“All right,” she said, and I heard the pin slide out, unlocking the box. She stepped back and the door swung open from its own weight, on a slow arc. I took two steps and fell onto the mat, felt my knees give out and send my face against the canvas, where it rested. My legs stretched out and I enjoyed the feeling of open space, unfettered, uncramped, and I let myself rest, face down.

“When you’re done, get upstairs and shower, then fix yourself some breakfast.” I turned my face to look up at her from where I lay. She stared down at me, her arms still crossed. “I’m going to work. When I come home tonight, my bathroom had better be clean.” I still felt a dryness in my mouth, and I looked up at her. “Do you hear me?” she asked, and I shied my eyes away from her and nodded. “I can’t hear you nod your head,” she said, and I stared down at my sweatpants, stained from my hours trapped in the metal case behind me. “Answer me,” she said with rising urgency.

“Yes,” I said, my voice cracking. “I’ll clean it up.”

“Good.” She took a step away. I still didn’t look at her, but stayed on the mat, pressing my face against it, smelling the sweat of all our efforts, our workouts, on it, and loving that smell more than the overpowering one that radiated everywhere in the basement, from the box, from that hell. “Now clean yourself up. Only someone who’s totally pathetic would just lay around on the floor all day. Get up.” I heard her feet recede onto the stairs, heard them click against the wood steps, one by one, and I knew she wasn’t looking at me anymore.

I heard her feet overhead, heard her walk to the front door and open it, heard the tell-tale beep of the alarm, then heard the door shut again. I sighed, and I continued to lay there, my face pressed against the mat, and I didn’t get up for several more hours.

Chapter 16

Now

I awoke on a narrow cot, my eyelids fluttering as I heard something. The room I was in was small, about ten feet by ten feet, an army-style cot in the middle of it and not much else for decor. The walls were bare and set in small segments, carved squares from floor to ceiling, which was a good ways above my head. It was the room I’d woken up in after arriving at the Directorate for the first time, or at least one identical. There was a single glass pane on the wall opposite me, and I waved humorlessly at it with a big, fake, smarmy smile as I sat up and felt my feet touch the floor. The floor was dry, and squeaked as I rubbed my sock against it.

I shook the cobwebs out of my brain and rubbed my eyes. The lights turned on as I moved, either because they were set to motion sensors or because someone watching on the other side of the mirrored glass decided to grace me with illumination. I blinked as the lights flickered on overhead, the sterile fluorescence painting the scene in even starker black and white detail, the gray of the squared walls a depressing spectacle.

“I have to go to the bathroom,” I said aloud, feeling the pressure on my bladder that came after awakening. I waited, and didn’t hear anything for a few minutes. I stared at the walls, trying to remember which set of squares concealed the door; it was hidden into the ornamentation of the wall, which was both annoying and probably very practical for when they kept prisoners. Disorientation makes it harder to escape, after all.

I heard the faint hum of the overhead lights and nothing else save for my steady breathing, which I had been attuned to since I woke up. There was no real smell in the air; it was a room well ventilated and there was not even a scent of the air conditioner at work, or of food (though I was hungry and thought I might be imagining the smell of pancakes), and the feel of my weight on the cot was infinite, enough to make me not bother even standing up. What was the point, anyway?

I heard a series of clicks come from the wall to my left and I turned my head as the door opened, appearing as if by magic from the lined squares on the wall. A familiar face stepped inside, along with a familiar body – Zack’s dirty blond hair at the top of his lean frame, his face grimmer than I remembered it being last week, when we were still dating. “Come on,” he said with a jerk of his head toward the exit.

I stood and walked over to him, my feet feeling the firmness of the tiled floor which seemed metal, it was so cool and steely. He moved back from the door to let me pass and once I was in the colorless hall, he gestured which way to go, and that I should walk in front of him. I didn’t want to break the silence (and I didn’t really have anything to say to him, anyway), so I just went along. He led me to the bathroom and left me alone for a few minutes while I showered. There were fresh clothes laid out for me and I put them on, not bothering to dry my hair since there was no hair dryer. I didn’t have anywhere to be, anyway, and the damp coolness of it brushing against my neck was a pleasant enough sensation.