Jacked (26 page)

“Not quite what you expected to see, I’d wager,” said Father Eli as he approached, the same sickening-sweet smile on his face. He nodded at some Black Shirts to help them to their feet as he continued, “When Ferguson set the fire in the lab it spread through the conduits to the server room. Since the Mind was down, the halogen system could not shut off the gas so it was only a matter of minutes before everything was destroyed.” He laughed again. “The funny thing is that if Ferguson had set the fire even a half an hour sooner, before Babylon took out the fail-safe, the abominations would have been spared their judgment. There wouldn’t have been any zoms.”

He peered at the damaged building for a self-satisfied moment, then at Tar and the doctor. “But that is history and we need to talk about the future. Your future. Your reaction showed me something today, that some people out there still think the Mind will return and the old ways along with it. We need to put an end to that kind of thinking before it spreads.”

Father Eli looked at Ludler. “In two days we will hold a public gathering on campus and introduce our little fixer to the people.”

He smiled at Tar. “They are going to hear about what you are, see what you can do and they are going to understand that you are completely under our control. Then you are going to tell them about the Mind, tell them that it will never, ever return. That it is gone. Forever. You will be our example to everyone when they think about the way it used to be. You will be what they think of when they realize there is no hope of ever going back.”

Tar’s head started spinning again. Instead of feeling like he might hurl again the grass swayed beneath him. He took a deep breath, determined not to pass out.

“Dr. Pierinski, however, you will serve a different purpose. I believe the avid Captain Ludler is right. The people also need a reminder of what happens to those who don’t respect the law. Before our fixer speaks to the masses, you, my sinful doctor, will receive purification.”

Chapter 36

Tar raised his head and stared into the shadows by the door.

“Who is it? What do you want?”

Lieutenant Martinez stepped forward. For several long seconds he stared at Tar, then smiled a toothy grin that might have passed for a snarling predator.

“A clean uniform would be nice.”

Tar looked down at his feet. “You’ve been watching me a lot the last couple of days.”

“You’re a prisoner. What do you expect? Maybe I just wanted to see what the little fixer does next,” Martinez said with a laugh, then he sobered. “You don’t act like the other one.”

Tar jerked his head up.

“Ha! Yeah, there was another freak like you,” Martinez continued. “Jordie Thomas. What a fragged mess. Pale, skinny, no books. He never talked to nobody. He was in my class at school, just a few years back.”

Tar looked away, then wiped at his pants. “How’d you know he was a fixer?”

Martinez leaned back against the wall and crossed his arms. “Like I said, he never talked to nobody. Stayed off by himself. Then one day there was a fight, a nasty one with six or seven guys all goin’ total aggro on each other. Somehow Jordie got caught up on the edge of it. Next thing you know he’s on the ground and his bag pops open.” Martinez snorted. “He always had this old canvas piece of crap looped up over his shoulder. Anyways, all his junk spills out—bits of wire, pieces of metal, old tech—a big pile of it. Right there on the ground. Everybody stops, guys stop going at each other, and then music starts comin’ out of one of the apps. People freak out, he picks it all up and takes off like the fires of the Faithful are already burning his ass. They go to his house, where he lived with his grandma, and find tons of apps, all of them working.”

“So,” Tar said, trying to keep the tremble from his voice, “what happened to him?”

“Captain Ludler tested him, then purified him
and
the old woman.” Martinez started to leave the room. “I’ll see you soon, fixer.”

“It was you,” Tar blurted out.

Martinez turned, the door still open, and looked back. “Me what?”

Tar wanted to keep quiet, to melt back into the shadows and hope everyone just forgot about him. But there was one small voice inside that was furious. The Black Shirts killed fixers. They killed innocent people. They were fragging monsters.

“You were the one who called the Black Shirts on Jordie.”

Martinez grinned, turned, and walked through the door. Just before it shut his voice drifted back into the room.

“See you soon.”

#

Tar flinched beneath the sun’s glare. Martinez grabbed his arm and pushed him forward into a stumbling walk up a stairway. He emerged onto a stage and a rumble of voices made Tar raise his head, forcing him to look out over more people than he had ever seen in his life. He stood on a platform at one end of a rectangular strip of grass, surrounded by banks of seats in an oval above him. Jammed in tight—elbow to elbow and knee to knee—thousands of men and women stared back at him, their murmurs echoing over the platform and washing down on Tar.

Movement caught his eye from the other end of the stage and he turned to see Dr. Pierinski and Jimmy tossed down in heaps. It looked like Roger had taken another beating, blood trailed down his chin and the front of his shirt and Jimmy shook his hair back to reveal a black eye. Ludler stood over them, the smile on his face leaving no doubt who had delivered the punishment.

Tar stiffened, sensing movement from behind. It was not a blow, however. Father Eli walked past, close enough to make him flinch but not making contact.

The man walked to the front of the stage, his immaculate white shirt and pants almost glowing in the gloom of the cloud-ridden day. He grabbed a piece of tech, nothing more than a small cylinder on a stand, and began speaking into it:

“Thirteen years ago…” His voice echoed out over the crowd, the tech amplifying his voice and silencing the whispers. It was convenient how the Faithful used tech when it suited them. “…judgment was handed down upon mankind because arrogant souls believed they could play God and improve upon His creation. They believed they could make, through their own hands, something greater than what God provides us through nature, given to us through flesh and blood.

“On the day of The Crash, the day of our salvation, we rid ourselves of what they were forcing us to become. On that divine day we began living for ourselves again. On that divine day the Mind fell and mankind was reborn!”

Father Eli paused for a scattering of applause. He did not react to the small response but Tar saw Ludler’s face cloud over in anger, rivaling the gray sky with his own dark look, angry at the less-than-spirited reaction from the crowd.

“Now we have captured one of them, one of the defilers who sought to remove us from our humanity!” continued Father Eli. He pointed at Dr. Pierinski with the cylindrical device in his hand. “Here is one who thought himself greater than God. Someone who sought to degrade mankind with foul technology and profane machinery. I give to you Dr. Roger Pierinski, one of the makers of the Mind!”

Ludler half-threw, half-pushed Roger forward. Too weak to brace himself the doctor staggered forward onto the stage and fell near Father Eli’s feet. Whispers started up again in the crowd.

“But that isn’t all.” Father Eli turned to the people. “We have also captured one of their abominations, one of their creations, a boy who is so much a machine he can repair tech with merely a touch. I show you Taro Hutchins! A fixer!”

Tar barely registered the gasps of awe, the smattering of hate-filled shouts, or the few hundred who dared applaud. He struggled to keep his feet as Martinez pushed him forward, then grabbed the rope tying Tar’s hands behind his back and jerked him into position by Father Eli.

“We can not move forward with our lives until these people are hunted down and made to pay for their sins against the rest of mankind! We can not hope to find our way until these people are removed from the road ahead of us! The Faithful must pave the way by purifying those who would lead us astray! Abominations like this boy,” Father Eli gestured at Tar, his hand almost making contact with his cheek, “can serve as a reminder to the unwary.”

Father Eli took a deep breath, then scowled. “We do not tolerate the heretics who destroyed our world. We do not lend a hand to those who harbor the abominations. Captain, begin the purification!”

Ludler stepped forward and grabbed Dr. Pierinski. He dragged him to the front of the stage, tossed him to the grass below, and then jumped down himself. The crowd stepped back almost in unison, seeking more distance between them and the intimidating Black Shirt captain.

“No,” Tar muttered, not believing what was happening.

Father Eli heard him. “Oh, yes,” he said. Then he nodded to another Black Shirt, who bent and grabbed Jimmy.

“No!” Tar said again, louder, as the man dropped Jimmy over the edge, as well. “He’s just a kid!”

Father Eli snorted and responded by uttering verse: “Show no mercy; have no pity. Kill them all, old and young, girls and women and little children…begin your task at the Temple.”

Tar blinked as the madman spoke. Tears welled in his eyes. He gazed at the two metal tubs filled with water in front of the platform. He watched Ludler fasten soot-coated bands of metal to Dr. Pierinski’s wrists. When it was Jimmy’s turn he couldn’t stomach it anymore. He looked away and stared at the faded letters spelling “Skybox” on the upper reaches of the stadium.

“It will all be over in a few more minutes,” Father Eli said so only Tar could hear. “Then you will tell them about the Mind. Afterward, Captain Ludler wishes a word with you. I believe he wishes to discuss the remaining fixers.”

Tar had never seen a purification ceremony but everyone knew what happened. He thought of One Shoe, probably out there looking for his little brother right now. He thought of his best book, Toby, and wondered if he was okay, if he was out there looking for him…if he was even alive. Then he thought of Nataly and a sob escaped him. Her father was about to die, horribly, and with him would die any hope Tar still held of saving the zoms.

Tears rolled down his cheeks as he turned to watch his friends. Dr. Pierinski was already in a tub of water, hunched on his knees and leaning up against the side for support. Jimmy was kicking and swearing as two Black Shirts lifted him off the ground and flung him into the other tub. Black cords attached to the metal bands snaked off to the side of the arena and back into a concrete walkway.

“With your help,” Father Eli’s voice echoed out over the crowd again, “we will punish all those who see us as machines!”

Tar looked at the crowd, not wanting to watch the death of his friends. The faces were blurry through his tears but he found himself staring at a red-haired man directly in front of him. Unbelievable, shocking, red hair.

“Captain Ludler, purify them!”

Tar shook his head and blinked, clearing his vision enough to make out a scarred cheek beneath the man’s red hair.

Turbo.

Tar turned his head left just as Ludler signaled for the purification to begin.

Tar was about to scream in despair when the captain roared, his face contorting in rage.

Jimmy still thrashed in his tub but Tar realized it was not in pain, but in anger as the boy unleashed a steady flow of cuss words. Dr. Pierinski was still alive as well, lifting his head and staring up at the crowd.

Tar swiveled his gaze back at Turbo and saw him smiling. Then Tar noticed Oso beside him. They moved apart and there was Toby, staring back at him. Toby!

Screams rose up from everywhere as One Shoe and a half dozen Moenes rushed a group of Black Shirts, swinging clubs and pipes. Scattered gunfire broke out and people either dropped to the ground in terror or ran blindly toward the sides of the arena.

Tar’s world was suddenly turned upside down. Something sent him rolling across the stage and he ended on his back with his feet hanging in the air above the ground. For a blink he thought he saw Martinez leaning over him, shouting at him in the din, but the words were washed away. A moment later the lieutenant was gone and a wave of people washed over him, sweeping him away and leaving Tar staring up at the gray sky.

“Tar! Tar, can you hear me?” Toby hove into view, his face a few inches away. “You hurt?”

Still too stunned to speak, Tar just shook his head.

“Roll over,” Toby said.

Tar moved and his friend grabbed one of his wrists, using his trusty knife to cut through the ropes.

“We gotta move,
hermano
,” said the huge Moene, Oso, who was kneeling on one knee beside them. “We got what we came for and it’s startin’ to go ugly.”

Tar sat up and looked out over the grassy area. Most of the crowd was still in a panic, trampling the weak and injured to get out. Pockets of fighting were scattered across the area with Moenes and other gang members still battling Black Shirts. Here and there some of the crowd had joined the fighting and it looked to Tar as if the majority were taking Father Eli’s side.

He saw one of the purification tubs was upended, the water in puddles around it. The other was still upright but there was no sign of Dr. Pierinski or Jimmy.

“Where are they?’ he asked, gesturing toward the purification area.

“On their way out,” Oso said, hauling Tar to his feet. “Just like us. Let’s go.”

They ran toward the tunnel Martinez had pushed Tar through just minutes earlier. It was the way to freedom, their path away from the Black Shirts. Oso leaped down the steps first, but then Tar spotted Father Eli, his white clothes standing out against the faded red bleachers in the lowest seating level above the tunnel. He stood alone, the entire section guarded by Black Shirts.

Not quite alone. About twenty rows below Father Eli, one foot resting on the back of the row in front of him, was Ludler. He glared out over the fighting, hatred written in every tense muscle of his body. Slowly the man turned until he was staring back at Tar.

The captain’s gaze felt like a fist of ice punching into his stomach, freezing his blood and threatening to do the same to the muscles in his legs. Tar was so scared it hurt to breath and he realized Ludler would never stop until he and every other fixer was dead.