The Troll (17 page)

They
talked every step of the way, getting to know everything about each
others lives before Psi. Iris avoided the topic of her father, but
The Guide could see it on the tip of her tongue throughout the
journey. She wanted to tell him everything. He sensed she felt guilty
for having been so close to him once without the ability to stop The
Moderator before that fateful day. He wanted to tell her not to blame
herself, but he could only wait for the topic to come up.

They
walked across the plains of Illinois, once in a while hearing an
engine in the distance. They’d duck down somewhere and hide
until it was gone. The more time that passed, the easier it was to
believe that The Moderator would pull all stops to find them. Or
maybe they’d find The Troll and it would be over. Except, The
Troll wouldn’t have Rainbow on him. The Acrobat would tell The
Moderator about them and the hunt would shift in their direction. As
far as he knew now, Iris and him were still unknown.

Iris
noticed The Guide staring at Rainbow with fascination. “The
Surfer would be proud of you,” she said.

“
I
hope so,” The Guide said. “I don’t think this is
how he saw things happening. I was his soldier. I was just a backup
plan in the case of combat, but most of us believed in The Surfer to
one day get the job done by stratifying.”

“
You’re
not so bad for a backup plan,” Iris said.

“
Well,
I kinda wish it had been him though. He’s believed in this from
the start. He saw what Psi was long before it took everyone over. Me,
I just didn’t get Psi because I didn’t care about
technology. I wrote everything in notebooks and saw a phone as a way
to contact my parents to say hi. Not as an organizer or browser. I
joined The Surfer because I had the distinction of being able to. I
was off the grid, so I figured ‘why not’?”

“
But
you believe in what you fight for…” Iris said.

“
Damn
right I do. Maybe not as much at first, but The Surfer is a great
man. Wigeon is too, but The Surfer and I grew close. We only talked
strategy half the time. The other half, we got to know each other,
played cards and chess. He saw potential in me and tracked down
everything he could find to teach me how to fight. I watched training
videos, read books like The Art of War. I woke up every morning and
did push-ups until my arms wouldn’t move. I did the same before
bed. He wanted me to have value. He was the face of the revolution
and he was building his army, small as it was, and he wanted a
soldier to lead them if the day ever came that we stormed Chicago.”

“
But
that day never came…”

“
No,
because we didn’t grow like he’d hoped. For every act of
defiance against Prime, they’d execute people to remind them
who really had the power. We couldn’t recruit from those who
had Psi because all The Moderator had to do was shut that person down
from the comfort of his office. We hoped for a new generation of non
Psi users, but then they began monitoring pregnancies and inserting
Psi in all kids when they were six years of age. Psi can read the
body—detect pregnancy or illnesses, so we couldn't secretly
have babies either. Those of us without Psi are too small in number
to repopulate. We realized we’d never have the ability to win
with numbers.”

“
My
father didn’t need numbers to take over.”

“
That’s
right,” The Guide said. “So it became about building a
better mousetrap, but that’s what we’ve been unable to
figure out. How do we beat Psi? That became the question, but it made
me
somewhat useless. His
plan to make me into a leader of an army was pointless when the
realization that an army as strategy was out the window. So then, The
Surfer treated me as a confidant. He didn’t want to lose me,
but he didn’t need the muscle. Just a better mousetrap. When it
came to that, I wasn’t helpful. I never beat him in chess…not
once. If The Surfer couldn’t think up a plan, he knew he didn’t
need to pick my brain either.”

“
I
would say the journey to Vegas is right up your alley then,”
Iris said. “This wouldn't be the right task for Surfer. In the
end, it really did come down to muscle. You’re the guy.”

“
We’ll
see,” The Guide said. “The odds are still seriously
stacked against us.” He thought for a moment and finally asked
a question that had been weighing on his mind. “Do you regret
picking The Troll for this?”

Iris
gave it serious consideration. “Any other way and we might not
have gotten this far. It’s like when you shoot pool and you’re
aiming for one ball but knock another in.”

“
So
I’m your slop…” The Guide said with a smile.

“
I
didn’t even know you existed a week ago,” Iris said.
“With Wigeon and Surfer out of action, I didn’t know a
whole lot of anyone who I thought could do this, so I picked the only
person I’ve ever crossed paths with who impacted my thoughts in
any way.”

“
The
Troll isn’t going to change any minds.”

“
No,
but it’s that stubborn way about people that I miss. My father
took the stubborn out of everyone. We’re all so scared all the
time and so no one is willing to fight. The Troll was a fighter.
Maybe only in his own environment, but he still had that quality the
world needs.”

The
Guide didn’t like how Iris felt about The Troll, but he
understood, and on some level, he agreed. What The Guide really
wanted was people who could stand up and face their fears. The Troll
only fought under cover of a user-name No one could be touched when
they sat behind a keyboard and shouted insults. But then again, The
Guide had spent most of his time in hiding the last few years too,
waiting for his moment. It made him feel as if they weren’t so
different. He made a mental note to stand up and say what he believed
if he ever came face to face with The Moderator. He wanted to do it
to prove he was better than The Troll, to hurt the father who hurt
his daughter—a girl The Guide admired.

Suddenly,
The Guide wanted to steer the conversation to something else. He
wanted to talk about them—the undeniable chemistry between
them. He felt his hand brush against hers. It had been happening a
lot on their journey. Their arms would swing as they walked and once
in a while, they’d touch and both would fall silent for a
moment as if registering how it felt.

“
So
Iris…” he started.

Before
he could say more, a shadow crossed their path, belonging to someone
who couldn’t be more than five feet behind them. He turned to
find The Coach barreling toward him, a determined look on his face.
He tried to step out of the way, but The Coach’s meaty hands
were on his shoulders and pulling him backward with his force.

Before
Iris could react, The Mortician was approaching her quickly,
cornering her where she stood. She got into a fighting stance and as
The Mortician reached for her, she easily deflected all his blows. A
couple of times, his skin would touch hers and she'd feel burning.
She didn't have time to think about what The Mortician was, but made
a point not to touch him.

The
Mortician took a step back and regrouped, sizing Iris up. “Come
with me darling,” he said. “I won’t hurt you.”

“
Bullshit,”
The Guide said. He struggled against the grip of The Coach who had
his arm wrapped around his neck. “Let her go. We didn’t
do anything wrong.”

The
Coach spoke close to The Guide’s ear in a harsh tone. “You
think I don’t recognize you? You ran from me at the barn.”

“
We
were in the area when all that went down. We tried to help you guys.
We were trying to catch that Troll you’re hunting.” The
Guide knew they wouldn’t believe him but had to try.

“
You
helped him back there,” The Coach said. “
Where
is he?”

“
I
don’t know,” The Guide said. “I ran off alone.”

The
Mortician tried to move in on Iris and she deflected him every time,
keeping her eye on The Coach and Guide. If only he could slip free,
they could run, but their enemy had the advantage. She found The
Guide’s eyes and he was giving her a panicked look and mouthing
for her to run. She shook her head at him, refusing to leave him
behind. She noticed The Mortician using a hand-held device and
punching in numbers. After a few moments, he looked up at The Coach.
“Neither has Psi,” he said.

“
So
is this where you tell me it’s one big coincidence?” The
Coach asked. The Guide stayed quiet, a look of determination on his
face. Everything in his eyes was telling Iris to leave and it enraged
him that she stayed, well within distance of The Mortician. “Empty
your pockets,” The Coach demanded. The Guide tried to fight and
resist, but next thing he knew, The Mortician was patting him down.
The Mortician looked up with a smile and his hand emerged with
Rainbow in hand. “Coincidence?” The Coach asked again,
with a laugh.

“
Run,”
The Guide said. “Run or they will kill us both.”

“
Not
if you give up The Troll,” The Coach said.

“
Why
do you even need him at this point?” Iris asked. You got your
flash drive. You win.”

“
Because
the world needs to see him fail. They don’t care about this,”
he said, flashing Rainbow around like it was nothing. “Until
they see his corpse, they will believe he’s rebelling against
us and getting away with it.”

Suddenly,
The Guide brought his head back and cracked The Coach in the center
of his face. He slipped out of his grip and made a grab for Rainbow,
but The Coach saw it coming and pulled away. The Guide hurried back
to where Iris stood and grabbed her arm. They turned to run, but The
Coach shouted, bringing them to a halt. “I’ll destroy
this now if you move!”

His
voice echoed in the field and then everything was quiet. The Guide
and Iris turned and faced The Coach, who held Rainbow between his
thumb and forefinger. “If I do it, your chance is gone forever,
and I will see to it that The Moderator punishes many innocent people
for what happened here today.”

“
What
do you want with us?” The Guide asked,
defeated.
Iris found his hand and suddenly their fingers were interlocked.

The
Coach stepped forward, a sadistic smile on his bloodied face. “This
isn’t over until we have The Troll, and you’re going to
be our bait.”

Chapter
2

The
Troll reached for the soda can at his feet but couldn’t find
the energy. The Acrobat and Troll’s boredom had reached a new
low and the activity of the day had been to roll a can from cell to
cell, attempting to avoid hitting the bars as it moved back and
forth. The Troll couldn’t do it anymore and The Acrobat was
seemingly bored.

They’d
tried every way possible to cure boredom and between it all, they
spent most of their time trying to persuade each other to submit. The
Acrobat would tell The Troll that he needed to just let them out
before they starve to death and swear he wouldn’t hurt him. The
Troll refused to believe it. He wanted to, but bought his time by
waiting him out. The time was drawing near that they really would die
if The Troll didn’t open the door between them.

They’d
argued, talked about life, tried to catch bugs and birds, but at the
end of the day, The Troll couldn’t trust that if the door were
opened, The Acrobat wouldn’t kill him or bring him to The
Moderator to be killed.

The
Troll wondered if The Acrobat genuinely liked him. Their first night
together, they'd discovered passing the time with word games was
effective. The Acrobat listened as The Troll told him about all his
online exploits, the people he'd fooled, the games he'd played.

The
Acrobat told him of his time at the circus, how he'd gotten there,
what his family was like, the electricity in the air when you're
swinging from a bar in front of a crowd of a thousand people, the
smell of cotton candy and popcorn in the air, the heat of flames
below and the blaring of music upon a safe landing while the crowd
went wild.

They
laughed, they got to know each other, they argued. And after a few
days together, they finally grew bored. They were close to a breaking
point. The Troll had to make a move fast or they both would die.

After
a long silence and both men staring at the can at The Troll’s
feet, The Acrobat finally spoke, his voice dry. “If you won’t
come out, at the very least, let me go. Have some mercy.”

“
How
would I do that?” The Troll asked.

“
Just
slide me the keys. When I'm free, I'll give them back to you and
leave.”

“
If
you’re free, you’ll just tell them where I am, or kill me
yourself.”