PIXIE (VIII)

I’m not even sure how to begin describing the scene that lay before us as the Cartographer opened the door to the room where Adella, Rothery, and several others were being kept. I can say that the smell is what hit me first. The worst thing I’d ever smelled up to that point had been bodies burning in a derailed train car during the war. This was far worse, a lingering smell of decay and filth.

I spotted Adella sitting on the far wall. While she was obviously malnourished, she wasn’t horrifically so. It was more the look in her eyes that frightened me. Gone was the enlightened, inquisitive spark I’d seen in the young journalism student I’d traveled with all those years ago. In its place was a vacant stare, bordering on feral. I scanned the room and saw the same look in the eyes of the others. And judging from the fact that several bodies lay on the floor, I’d say that they were one provocation away from ripping each other apart.

“There she is, Miss Sinclaire,” the Cartrographer said, pointing to Adella. “The woman you came looking for. Or is it? Take a look around. See those bodies laying on the ground? That one there, he was a captive, just like them. And he was killed by them, based on the suspicion that he’d taken a single bite out of someone else’s food ration. This is what happens when people are pushed enough. In the end, we are just base animals.

“Well, almost. Your friend Adella…she never broke. Never lifted a finger. I know because I watched. She won’t admit that, though. She’s taken on the responsibility along with the others, but her hands are rather clean. Metaphorically speaking. Physically, they’re quite filthy.”

I whirled around on him and grabbed him by the neck, forcing him back against the wall. His men hefted their weapons but he stopped them.

“Now, Miss Sinclaire, let us try to remain civil. I’ve brought you here for a reason. I’m planning to let you, and Doctor Trenum, leave along with your companion.”

“And what’s the catch?”

“A choice. You can take a look around, take in what you see, and decide whether anyone in this room is worth saving. If not, just walk away, along with Miss Villanova here. Or, you can let us have Miss Villanova, and take Miss Chatelaine.”

I looked over at Villanova. She was staring at me fit to kill. It was any easy choice. This woman had been dogging me since Docryville, trying to put a bullet through my skull. It was an opportunity to both get rid of her, and save Adella.

“No,” I said.

“No? No what?”

“I don’t accept either set of terms. They’re stacked, you see. Meant to re-enforce whatever twisted world view you’re trying to illustrate here. You don’t think I know what you’re doing, with this little experiment? It’s all very misanthropic, but I’m not biting. I leave them to rot, it shows how quickly our faith in people can crumble. If I trade one person who’s a problem for me for another I’m trying to save, then I’m just an opportunist.”

“And if you resist, then you’re a fool. What will it be?”

I looked at Veronica, then at Arufina. Anything I chose, I was choosing for everyone. There was no debate about that. But then, the three of us had chosen to come here on our own.

Time to face the consequences.

“Foolishness suits me just fine.”

I brought my knee up, driving it into his stomach and knocking the breath out of him. He folded over and I threw his limp body toward his men, who had all idiotically bunched together in the entry way. They fell back, giving me enough time to pop one of the sleeping pills and toss it into the entryway.

“Veronica, back up from there,” I said as the smoke filled the entryway. I pulled my dagger and turned to Arufina. “Easy big girl. I’m just going to cut you free.”

“You are a fool, if you think this changes anything. I still plan to kill you.”

“Then do it after we get out of here. For now, grab a couple of those guns and get ready to fight. Or are you willing to just leave these people behind?”

She looked at the room. “Poor wretches. Why should I give a damn what happens to them?”

“Because you’re the kind of person who would track a world famous spy half way across the world to make her answer for the death of your friend. You want justice for Osyn? Help me get these people out of here.”

My saying the name of the girl I killed struck a chord with her. I could see it in her face, a temporary moment of surprise. I think that letting her know that I hadn’t forgotten Osyn’s name helped temper whatever rage was inside of her.

“Alright then. I’ll help.”

“Pixie, are you sure about this?” Veronica asked. She’d picked up a gun and was holding it on the entrance. From up the stairs I could hear voices.

“I’m trained for subterfuge, and no offense, Ronnie, but I’ve seen you shoot. Arufina is a trained gun-fighter, and we’re about to fight an army of the same. Yeah. We need her.”

“Do you have any more of those annoying things?” Arufina asked as she found the keys to her shackles and unlocked herself. I supposed she meant my sleep bombs.

“Just one.”

“Use it wisely, then,” she said, then proceeded to undo the gun belts of the five unconscious Cartographers. She handed one to Veronica and another to me, then slid the others over her shoulders like bandoliers, and checked each of the four guns. I reloaded my gun, holstered it, and turned to the captives.

They had long since stood up and gathered in the center of the room. In front of them stood Adella.

“Alright, people, listen up,” I said. “We’re going to get you all out of here…”

“But where are we going to go?” one of them asked.

“I don’t know. Back to your homes.”

The man who asked the question started sobbing. I thought about going on with trying to rally them, took one look at the others, and knew it wouldn’t do any good. The only thing to do know was to focus on fighting our way out of there and worry about these people then. I turned my attention to Adella.

“Adella,” I said, and she flinched at the name, then looked up at me. “Adella, do you remember me?”

ADELLA (IX)
6th of 11 Month, 281st Year of the Triumvirate

In recent days, I have found myself going around in circles about where to begin in recalling the events surrounding my capture in the swamps around Lelina. My memory is all too muddled by the stress of our situation and the horrors my compatriots and I were forced to endure. They tell me I was gone only for one year, but that one year seemed like an eternity.

Time is hard to measure when you’re in captivity. When every moment could potentially be your last, time becomes simultaneously priceless and worthless. I’m not sure how to describe it, exactly. Your mind fades between hopefulness and despair. Your worst enemy is your own mind. Eventually you learn to shut it down, and everything becomes a blur.

I had no idea where I was when I came to in what, I’ve been told, was an abandoned hospital in the wilds outside of Point Hammond. All I remember is that Rothery and Meriam were there. In the beginning, that was some sort of, I suppose selfish, comfort. There were others as well, in the beginning. About twenty five or thirty. They’d all been there longer than us, and the realities of their situation had long since set in. From time to time one would be taken away, seemingly at random. Others would be brought. From the whispers of our fellow captives, no one was ever brought back after they’d left. Everyone who entered the room did so for the first time. Everyone who left did so for the last.

For the longest time we were left alone together. Our captors, whoever they were, bothered us not. They did not taunt nor torture us, nor did they provide anything other than food or water. We were kept alive, but in squalor. The stench was unbearable. I never got used to it and even now I can taste the air of that place in the back of my throat.

From time to time I could see shadows behind the frosted glass panes overlooking the room. The shadows would stand there, still as statues until turning away and disappearing. It was almost always just an individual. Every now and again it would be a group. At first I thought I might discern a pattern, and be able to count the passage of time based on when it was a single shadow, or multiple. I soon learned that it was completely random.

I slept 40 times before the ‘scenarios’ began. The ‘scenarios’ were what turned our imprisonment from an atrocious situation to a living hell.

They began secretly giving messages to us. At first the messages would be some innocuous thing, like what day of the week it was. These we shared when they started coming. And it was through this sharing that the various groups within the room started to finally intermingle. I suppose that was the point.

I slept fifteen more times when I began to notice a change, however. People seemed to be keeping secrets, and the number of messages we shared began to dwindle. The messages had changed, but to what, I wondered?

One day I bit into a piece of bread to find a piece of paper stashed inside, along with a nail file.

It read: ‘Someone plans to kill you. They believe you plan to kill someone close to them.’
I stood up and went to the center of the room and I told everyone what I found, placing the nail file on the floor. I said that I had no intentions of hurting anyone, and if anyone had received a similar message, it was likely a manipulation.

I left the file and turned to head back to Rothery and Meriam. I only made it a few steps when I heard rushed footsteps behind me. I turned to see one of the other captives, a woman whose name I cannot remember, rushing toward the file. She picked it up and dashed to the other side of the room, straight toward a man standing against the wall.

There was no hesitation, no warning. She just drove the nail file into the man’s neck and killed him. When the others stood up in outrage, she tried to explain.

‘I have a sick son!’ she said. ‘They said they’d get him medicine if I did it! I’m sorry!’

No one listened. They all turned their back on her. I turned my back on her.

A few sleeps later and one of the men, whose name I do remember, Shelby, began to suggest we organize. If we were going to keep our sanity, he said, we should instill order. Our own order. None of us were a threat to each other, he said. It was us versus the bastards who put us in here.

We listened to him. That was a mistake.

Shelby did instill order, but it was an unfair one. He elected himself as the leader. No, that’s a lie. We all looked to him. He seemed the most capable. But he wasn’t what he seemed.

As we eventually learned, he was one of Them. And two of the four others he appointed as his lieutenants were Them, as well. Eventually they just became a new form of messengers. Only now the messages were coming from people we thought were trustworthy.

It didn’t take long before we were at each others throats, accusing each other of stealing food or plotting against each other. We all began to fight. Shelby would swoop in and break it up sometimes. Other times he seemed resigned to watch. To observe. That was my first clue.

Then they started offering people respite. For those who did what They wanted, they were promised extra meals, or a bath. They promised tiny things, things most of us would take for granted. But they seemed like such huge prizes in the dark.

Then, the Worst Day happened. I’m not sure on the details. It started with an errant accusation, or an insult. It doesn’t matter. Five of us died that day. Meriam was one of them. She’d just gotten caught in the middle.

New people were brought in. This was after Shelby and his two cohorts were revealed to be Them. So these new people, they never stood a chance. Their every move was watched. The slightest misstep either got them beaten or killed. Not by Them. But by Us. They weren’t even sending us messages any more at that point. They didn’t need to. When we started treating the new captives as our own captives, I realized, there was no Them anymore.

I started to think none of this would end. But then it did. Agent Pixie Sinclaire and Professor Veronica Trenum. One day they just entered the room on their own volition, unbound, with several men in blue at their backs and a third, giant woman in shackles with them. They took one look around, and the horror on their faces really drove home what we had done.

How dare they, I thought, looking at the judgement in their eyes. How dare they judge?

And then one of the men in Blue pointed at me, and made Pixie Sinclaire an offer.