“Well, here we are again.” Her mouth twisted slightly, he knew she was trying to imply only one of them was ever really here when they spoke.
“Here we are.” Phoenix heard himself say, his mind racing. What was it he was supposed to be doing? He knew he was in the middle of an important thought before she had spoken, a thought which now lay broken and disjointed in his mind like a body dropped from a roof. He knew there was something far more important than inane conversation with his wife that he must tend to.
He felt something in his hand, and looking down saw it to be a glass of water. He brought it to his lips, wondering if it had been drawn from his sins or hers. They hadn’t merged accounts when they married, they had both had enough bad experiences with divorces in the past, but that only lead to this problem. His eyes scanned their little sitting room and its plastic furniture, the short hallway that lead to the only other room, the sleeping room.
A thought, intrusive and almost alien: I can do so much better than this.
“You don’t ever feel trapped by all of this, do you?”
She had noticed his eyes scanning the room, his expression tightening. Wait, no, she had noticed that he had the water to his lips without drinking. Damn.
“Of course not, I just worry that I’m supposed to be doing something. Something important.”
A wry smile, a flash of the woman he had fallen in love with. “Just relax. You’ve got this problem, you get given this life and you want to solve it instead of live it. Relax, enjoy the ride, that’s what all of this is about. Thinking about it doesn’t change how it ends.”
He did manage to grin back at her, although shakily. That’s why he had married her. She grounded him, kept him from thinking himself to death. Yet, despite her words there still something in the corner of his mind’s eye that he needed to focus on. Something was about to happen, he knew, that would shake him free of this sense of monotony and repetition. He was approaching it now, growing infinitely closer without ever actually coming into contact with it. She waited for an answer that he wasn’t going to give.
“You never really listen to me, no matter how many times we go through this.” Her petulant voice seemed so far away now, echoing across to him through something that was more akin to memory than reality. He realized then that whatever was preoccupying him could not be as important as bridging the gap between them. Something had made them this way, something had broken their relationship, and though he did not know what it was he could still fix it before it-
His work phone rang, and her eyes darted to it. He sat the glass aside. She looked as though she would speak, and then a resigned expression overtook her. He stood, as he had numberless times before, from the dinner table without a word.
The phone came off the receiver, in his hand, his other holding up a single finger in her direction; silencing her while promising he would have time for her in just a moment, after this thought, after this call, after this job.
The voice from the receiver, his own voice, said gently “Time to chip out.”
Recruitment
“I said, this is your stop.” A man was staring at him in a rearview mirror. Tattoos, cheap synthetic cloth shirt, dry lips. His clothes are brown so he’s a spade, works shifts for his water, and he seems annoyed. Where am I?
Phoenix’s eyes darted around the back seat of the car before focusing on the meter, a projected holograph on the top right of the windshield. The man noticed the object of his attention.
“No use bitching about the price. I have to keep this thing charged up don’t I?”
Phoenix just nodded, and pulled out his wallet. He started to push the chip into it, but not before the driver asked “Got something good on that? If you don’t have the cash I’m sure we can work something out.” The driver turned around in his seat, and looked almost as though he’d be salivating if he had drank today. “Who’s on it? Trish Candy, or someone a little kinkier?”
Great¸ Phoenix thought, a pervert caddy, who would have guessed. He responded as he removed a few tensin chits from his wallet, “Nothing you’d like. I hope you don’t mind chits, I’m not trailing swipes tonight.”
The cabby leaned away from him, barely brushing his fingers across Phoenix’s gloves as he snatched the chits. “You’re one of those then, aren’t you? I was wondering why you alted before glow, why you wanted to be driven here.”
Did I mask in the car? Careless, unacceptable, if he knows who I am, who my alt is… “One of what?” Phoenix asked as replaced his wallet in his back pocket and rested his hand on the small knife he kept in his back sheathe. Sudden, unexpected violence, he reminded himself, I’ll worry about the mess later.
The cabby narrowed thick lidded eyes. “A pervert.”
Phoenix laughed, the tension draining out of him. This guy wants to barter a ride for a Candy dating chip, and I’m the pervert? “Yea, sure.”
He slid the side door open before he could hear a response, and saw the graffiti tagged cement edifice of the Bastard’s House in the light from the glitter sky. That’s right. He remembered now. I’m recruiting because Slane got liquidated while we tried to escape that botched job.
He climbed the steps to the Bastard House, opened the door, and was greeted by the sight of a middle aged woman with the face of a former prostitute seated behind the reception desk. I know what you’ve done. He wanted to see the way her jowls would flap as she stammered a response to that. Everyone’s done something that deserves hearing that at least once. Whether it’s a condolence or condemnation is up to them.
“I have an appointment,” he said before she could sputter out a question, “I’m here to look over your stock for a worker.” She struggled to her feet. Sways a bit as she stands, out ate her heels. She’s too used to scrounging every sin to buy new ones and fresh enough to the Patriarch’s payroll to waste it on food.
Her eyes grew sly entirely too quickly for Phoenix’s taste. “You look like you are in a hurry, that’s too bad. It’s getting close to glow and we aren’t s’posed to do interviews after they get out of their lessons.”
She wants a bribe. Pay her off or call the bluff? “That’s unfortunate. I suppose I’ll wait until tomorrow and tell whoever works then that I got sent away from my appointment.” He idly adjusted his mask, waiting the long moment he knew it would take for her to realize what that would mean for her job.
She glared at him, but turned to the computer to call up his appointment and criteria for interviews. She rolled her eyes at the name he had given. “Down the left hallway, second door on the right. I’ll send whoever is available to meet with you, ‘Mr. Smith’.”
She’ll send me the trouble makers, the ones they want to get rid of, for not playing ball. Good. If I wanted someone who behaved I’d recruit from a Charter or put out an ad on the net. He walked down the hall, opened the door she specified, and took a seat on the too-small chair, propping his feet on the plastic table, and waited.
#
The kid had the right look: a face and build that made placing his age difficult, brown eyes that were mistrustful without being sullen, and sunken cheeks which gave him the look of being driven by a hunger without succumbing to it. The fat ones were dulled by their comfort; they had grown fast and early and so learned to cultivate a brutish nature. It served them well in the confines of the House, but resting on their laurels led to a decisively underdeveloped worker. The small, starving ones lacked the physical power to defend their meagre rations from the brutes, and never developed a strategy to cope. I want the hungry ones. The ones who kept what they had not by physique or power but by being ruthless.
Neither of them had spoken since the kid had taken a seat, it was the same strategy Phoenix had used on the others he interviewed today, stay silent long enough, and they’ll talk. What they say will tell you all that you need to know.
The kid ran a hand through his short shorn hair as he spoke. “Someone got offed, and now there’s an open spot for me.” His eyes had already scanned over Phoenix’s figure, and now moved to rest on the goggles of his gasmask.
Phoenix nodded, responding “That’s not much of an observation. It’s true of anyone that comes to this house.” The kid fidgeted. “No bastard gets to leave unless a worker gets liquidated.”
The kid’s lips traced upwards, a faint smile. “You say worker, but that’s not who died. You aren’t a spade.”
Phoenix leaned in. “How are you so sure?”
“You’re masked out. No one alts before they come to recruit unless the work they do isn’t approved of.”
Phoenix nodded, flexing his hands in their gloves. “Anything else?”
The kid took a breath, as though he was gathering himself, but he seemed like he was starting to enjoy the game. “You wear clothes that are heavy enough to conceal things under them and protect you, but loose enough to let you move freely. You registered your visit here not too long before you came, or the interviews wouldn’t be done this late and done this hurriedly… So you need me badly because you have something important you need done soon, and that requires manpower.” The kid’s eyes broke contact with Phoenix’s goggles and he finished in a softer voice, barely audible. “You’re a corporate goon.”
Phoenix stood, and the kid almost cringed. He raised a hand before the kid could speak again, “You’re right about some things, wrong about others.” He waited half a beat, watching the boy’s face fluctuate between expressions as he struggled to determine if he had impressed or insulted with his evaluation. Then Phoenix asked, “How old are you?”
The kid looked wary of the question. “Too old to be here.”
“If a bastard turns 18 without being taken from here, they liquidate him don’t they?” Phoenix waited for the answer, though he knew it already. I need to make him say it, need him to recognize how much he’ll owe me if I choose him… and maybe get back at him a little for making me think about Slane dying.
He licked dry lips, wetting them. “Yes.”
“The vids they use to prepare you for leaving are old aren’t they?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll have to take a great deal of time to explain not only your new occupation, but also our city, won’t I?”
The kid noticed the implication, and stood with a wide smile barely contained by his hollow cheeks. “You won’t regr…”
Phoenix raised a hand, silencing him. He asked again, “Won’t I?”
A swallow, a nod, the answer Phoenix needed. “Yes sir.”