S.W. Tanpepper's GAMELAND: Season Two Omnibus (Episodes 9-11) (111 page)

What are you doing, Jessie? Jessie, you need to keep away from me!

Still keeping her eyes on him, she shrugged the pack off her back and hugged it to her chest. Micah stepped forward.

“This thing better be fully charged,” she muttered, pulling out the EM pistol.

She didn't have time to check, just squeezed the trigger as he leapt.

 

“
Noooo!
”

Siennah Davenport hurled her goggles to the floor, then gave them a kick. They flew across the room and crashed into the far wall. Despite being a large room, the equipment didn't break. Arc's VR gaming gear was built to take abuse.

“This is so unfair, Daddy!” she wailed.

“Honey, please,” her mother said, reaching for her. “Your father's busy right now.”

“No! I don't care. It's not fair!” Siennah bent down until her face was as close to her mother's Link as she could manage without the tiny image of her father blurring. “I want you to ping Arc right now and tell them to stop this nonsense! I bet they did that on purpose, cutting the signal in side Gameland like that. They didn't want me to catch her so fast.” She growled in frustration. “I was so close to getting her.”

“Calm down, baby,” her father said.

“I'm not going to calm down! First they cut the feed right after I find her. She could've killed my Player while I was off-line! And now this? I wanna know where the fuck she got an EM gun! She's not supposed to have those in there! I bet it was that freak of a brother of hers, the cop. They should arrest him and put him in jail for aiding a known fugitive.”

If Henry Davenport, the mayor of Greenwich, Connecticut, knew that Eric Daniels was, at that very moment, sitting shackled to an interrogation table at the police department, he didn't say anything about it to his daughter.

“I told you I wanted one of those new immersive suits Arc developed, the one you can wear anywhere.”

“It hasn't even been released, babe,” her father replied. He was only half paying attention. There were other things on his plate to be worried about, most of which had to do with Arc. And, yes, he was already on the line with his contacts there, demanding — politely, of course — an explanation for why the network had suddenly dropped out for nearly twenty minutes, putting his publics work people at risk so soon after giving them the all-clear.

His daughter's obsession with that silly little game of hers just didn't seem as important as keeping the citizens of Greenwich safe.

A dead citizen is a non-voting citizen
, he thought wryly.

“Daddy? Are you even paying attention?”

“Of course I am, honey.”

To be perfectly honest, he didn't really know how he felt about
The Game
anymore. It was such a violent thing, all that beheading and neck-breaking. Maybe he'd feel differently if it wasn't real people, like that game the poor kids played, the one that was purely digital. What the hell was it called?
Zombiepocalypse
or something like that. He wasn't sure.

His “friend” at Arc kept trying to tell him that it was all good. “Your daughter's not killing real people. How can she? They're already dead.”

“Well, I know that. But this new Player of hers is—”

“Dead.” He'd laughed and given the back of Henry's neck a reassuring squeeze, and he could've sworn the man was checking to see if he'd gotten his implant. “They're all convicts anyway, scum of the earth. When we throw them into Gameland, it's like we're doing society a favor by publicly shaming them for the serious crimes they committed. Letting people watch them being hunted down and ended serves multiple purposes.”

“I'm just not sure it's healthy for my daughter to be—”

“Henry, Henry, Henry. It's fine. Trust me. You just worry about you, okay, my friend?”

Henry Davenport was a smart man. He didn't become Mayor of Greenwich because he was stupid. He knew what his “friend” was doing. Trust had nothing to do with anything.

But, of course, in the end it always came down to his little baby's happiness. Even if he hadn't become a politician, he would've acquiesced to Siennah's demands eventually. She was his little girl and anything she wanted, well, she got.

He overextended himself getting her the best equipment that money — and credit — could buy. And when she told him she wanted a new Player, and not just any Player but one she'd actually known in real life and had gone to school with, he said okay. Even though he knew it was wrong.

She was his little girl, after all.

Besides, she was good at it. And the money she brought in was nothing to sneeze at, either.

Not killing anyone. It's just a game. They're already dead. Criminals.

She hadn't even noticed when he stopped transferring her monthly allowance into her bank account, which was a good thing, because he didn't have it. Nor did she notice that he'd begun skimming from it to pay off his own debts.

His hobbies were even more expensive than hers.

“I want my money back, Daddy. I thought this Player was going to be a lot better than the last one, but he's just a big stupid idiot.”

Henry Davenport felt the muscles in his hands cramp as he gripped the arms of his leather and mahogany chair. Behind him, one on either side, were the two flags of his administration: the State of Connecticut and the City of Greenwich. In the far corner by the door was the New Merican flag, and it was to this that his eyes now traveled, or, more accurately, to the woman sitting in the chair beneath it.

His mind automatically calculated the hundreds of dollars it was costing him for every minute he was paying attention to his daughter instead of her. Thousands of dollars, in fact.

“I should never have listened to you, Daddy. Getting him was a bad idea.”

He sighed and wondered what it was with the women in his life, how he could never seem to satisfy them when he, himself, was so easily satisfied. How they seemed to forget that it was they, not him, who always wanted more
more MORE!

Procuring the new Player had cost an arm and a leg. But he'd done it, because it was for his little baby. And the way she'd gushed and hugged him when he told her had almost made it all worthwhile.

It sure didn't last long, did it?

Ungrateful little bitch.

He looked over at the woman and tried to smile. He could tell she was getting antsy.
One minute
, he mouthed, holding up a finger.

One minute and another hundred dollars, just for sitting there with her shirt undone and her sloppy breasts hanging out all over the place like that.

His hands began kneading the armrests again.

“Can we talk about this when I get home, honeybunch?”

“No, Daddy, I— Wait a sec.”

He watched her look away from the screen. Then she disappeared completely. “Almost done,” he whispered over to the corner where the New Merican flag was hanging.

“Never mind,” Siennah said, returning. She had her goggles on again. “He woke up. But, I swear, if she's done anything to him, I swear I'm going to kill that fucking bitch and eat her whole fucking corpse until there's nothing left but her head.”

“That's my girl,” he said, smiling weakly. But she had already disconnected.

“Now,” he said, carefully standing up and reaching for his own set of goggles. He was feeling a little shaky after that conversation.

He enjoyed the way the woman's eyes traveled over his body, which was naked from the waist down. (All except for his socks, which he kept on for luck, as he was a suspicious man.) At least the medically-assisted erection he'd been carefully nursing hadn't abandoned him.

“Where were we?” he asked.

She smiled charitably at him, then donned her own goggles.

“I believe your Player was just about to fuck mine,” she purred.

 

“Get up,” Officer Castle grunted. “You're being moved.”

Eric's head was pounding from an EM hangover, and his neck felt like it had been used for a punching bag. But it was the new bruises on the side of his body that concerned him now. They'd clearly been inflicted after he lost consciousness. Undoubtedly, the squad that had cornered him in the hospital took out their frustrations by delivering a few kicks each.

Fortunately, they were all on the side opposite his healing ribs.

Castle stepped into the room and jerked him to his feet. “I said get your sorry ass up!”

“Cuffs,” Eric coughed. He'd spent the night manacled to the cold steel table in the interrogation room and his back and neck were stiff.

The officer bent down to unlock his ankles. “Don't try anything.”

“I need to use the bathroom.”

Castle released one of Eric's wrists and threaded the chain through the ring on the table before recuffing him behind his back. “You can piss yourself for all I care.”

“Where are you taking me?”

“Downstairs.”

“You're taking me to lockup? I want to see Harrick.”

“Captain's got a lot on her plate, now that she's had to pick up your slack.”

“What do you mean?”

Castle led Eric out of the room and through the middle of the department. The officers called it “running the gauntlet.” Both sides of the aisle were lined with workstations. One by one the officers looked up as he passed. Most sneered at him, no longer masking the disdain they had privately held for the man who led the Necrotics Crimes Division. “Zombie-lover,” some of them spat. He did catch a sympathetic eye or two, but most now viewed him as no different than the common street thugs they dealt with on a daily basis. Maybe even worse.

“Harrick's had your NCD idiots out all morning mopping up a few hotspots. Fucking network glitched out for about a half hour.”

“How?”

“The fuck do I care? Probably because of the storm.”

“Any outbreaks?”

“That would just make you happy, wouldn't it, asshole?” He shoved Eric toward the stairs. “Down. And no funny business. This time it won't be an EM pistol but a bullet I put in the back of your head. And don't think I'd hesitate for a minute to do it either.”

“What am I being charged with?”

Castle snorted. “Really?” He shook his head. “You're fucking clueless, Daniels, you know that?”

They reached the sentry for lockup. The guard and Castle exchanged the usual pleasantries, which is to say they each told a couple dirty jokes while the transfer was cleared.

“Three's empty,” he told Castle. He actually looked a little sympathetic to Eric.

Castle brushed the recommendation off. “Ain't gonna waste a clean cell on this scumbag. What else you got?”

“Purse snatcher in one. Coupla street pushers in two.”

“Pushing what? Zoners?”

The guard chuckled. “High society? No way. The hard stuff. Tough guys.”

“Put him in two.”

“But—”

“Captain's orders.”

“They'll kill me if you put me in there,” Eric said. “They'll find out I'm a cop.”

“Cop?” Castle's sneer deepened. “Don't flatter yourself. You're a dog catcher at best, and I say that meaning no disrespect to dog catchers. Or dogs.”

He turned to the guard, who could only offer Eric a shrug. “Sorry. If he says the captain is okay with this . . . .”

“She is,” Castle grunted, and handed him over. “Cell two.”

* * *

Eric knew it wouldn't take long for the two prisoners to figure out he worked for the department. Criminals had a sixth sense about such things, and of their ilk drug pushers seemed to be most exquisitely attuned to individuals who didn't particularly subscribe to the chemical lifestyle. Plus, it didn't help that he kept his hair clipped regulation short.

He stepped into the cell, then turned to allow the guard to remove the cuffs on his wrists. “You know what's going to happen, don't you?” he said, keeping his voice low.

“Might not,” was his only response.

“Do me a favor then?”

The guard frowned at him. “No favors,” he announced loudly. He planted a hand on Eric's chest and pushed him further into the cell, then swung the cage door shut and locked it. He really did look apologetic. “And keep it down in here. All of you! I don't want to hear a peep.”

Eric rubbed his wrists and watched the guard leave. The heavy steel-plated door giving access to the holding cells clanged shut. He turned, eyed the two men on their bunks, then walked over to the toilet. With each passing minute, his chances of being jumped increased. When it happened, he'd rather not piss on himself.

He could feel their eyes on his back, watching him, judging whether he was a threat or not, deciding whether he was worth their trouble. All of that figuring would be discarded when they realized he was a cop.

He zipped up and flushed, then washed his hands in the stainless steel sink. The water pressure sucked, and there was no soap. There were no towels either. He dried his hands on his pants, then went and climbed onto one of the empty upper bunks.

He'd just settled in when a head popped up over the side. “What's your story?” the man asked.

Eric hesitated. If he was a regular police officer dealing with the living on a day to day basis, interrogating criminals instead of containing the dead, he might've had a better idea of how to deal with the situation. As it was, he could only guess what might be the best way to keep himself alive long enough to be transferred out. “Not really sure.”

The pusher turned and smiled at his partner. “Yeah, us too. We was jus' minding our own business and the cops came and dragged us here. I hate cops. Fuckers.”

Eric didn't respond.

“You must hate cops, too.”

“Yeah, I guess.”
A few in particular.

“You sure? ‘Cause you don't sound too sure. Me, I hate cops so much I just want to— Um, you ain't a cop are you? You know you have to say if'n you are one. If you lie, that's like perjury or something. You a cop or snitch?”