CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The chemical compound in the syringe was not lethal, but the medical technician let me know that having electricity-conducting toxins flowing through my veins was not good for my health. “Taken in large quantities,” he said, “it might cause cancer.” He did not smile as he said this, though he must have known that a long bout with cancer was the least of my worries. He also told me that the toxins would dissolve in my blood. Two or three injections, he said, should not cause permanent damage; and in his experience, no one had required more than two sessions with this particular compound.
After giving me the injection, the technician left the room and I was alone. My fingers tingled and my palms were covered with sweat. Lying alone in the darkness wearing nothing but my briefs, I noticed the air getting colder and wondered if that chill was in the room or in me. I had time to think about how I could twist information. I practiced lies and half-truths in my head and watched the way the monitor reacted as I convoluted facts.
I did not know if anyone had ever tortured or even interrogated a Liberator clone. I did not know what kind of strength the hormone—the adrenaline and endorphins— would offer. It would certainly keep my thoughts clear, but that might make the pain more acute.
At the moment, I saw no reason to suffer for the Unified Authority, the pan-galactic republic that created me. Yes, I had been made and raised by that government, but I had also been banned by it. The Senate passed laws to outlaw my existence. Che Huang sent me out to do his bidding, but he was no friend. The patriotic stirrings that I once felt for the Republic had been nothing but a misconception.
I looked around as best I could. Everything within that cone of blinding light shining over my table was bleached white by its brightness. Everything beyond the edge of the light was nearly invisible to me, shadows at most. Time moved slowly. I thought about the orphanage in which I grew up. I had a mentor at the orphanage—Aleg Oberland. He was the man who convinced me to follow current events. He kept in touch with me after I left the orphanage. He sent me two or three letters per year over the mediaLink.
I thought about Vince Lee, my old friend from my days in the Marines. Vince and I went on leave together. We were in the same platoon and we survived the slaughter on Little Man together. He was still an officer in the Scutum-Crux Fleet.
How long would they leave me alone to think? Was this part of the process—letting the fear of torture weaken my resolve? Maybe they just wanted to wait until their chemicals spread through every cell of my body, running through my veins like a mouse in a maze. I made the mistake of staring straight up, and the light above my head shined into my eyes. When I looked away, orange and black dots filled my vision. And the room around me was filled with absolute silence.
Time continued to pass. I watched the heart, stress, and pulse lines on the monitor. Minutes done were minutes gone. I thought about the people I knew, the clones and officers in my past platoons. I did not care for the Unified Authority, nor did I feel that I owed it anything, but there were individuals who had mattered at one time or another. There was Sergeant Tabor Shannon, a Liberator. He and I got drunk together the night I learned that I was a clone. During the battle at Hubble, he and I went into a cave filled with Mogats. He never came out.
There was Captain Gaylan McKay, a natural-born who showed no prejudice against clones, not even Liberators. He died on Little Man. McKay’s last act was ordering me to leave him behind. How could I ever look these men in the eye …even in my dreams? These men died defending the Republic. They believed in it to the last.
What about Klyber? I imagined him standing over the table and regarding me coldly with his stern face and pale gray eyes.
“How are we doing?” The man who came in was tall, thin, bald, and wore glasses. He looked absolutely ordinary. If I passed him in a crowd, I would not notice him.
My heart, stress, and pulse lines jumped. My stress reading, which had nearly flat-lined, now looked like a mountain range. I tried to roll from side to side and break free from the restraints.
Something had to happen. Someone would save me. Perhaps Yamashiro would come back. Maybe Navy intelligence had discovered the Hinode Fleet’s location. Maybe …Maybe Ray Freeman would come. Any moment, he could pound through that door carrying his massive particle beam gun.
The man stood over me. His skin looked paper white in the bright overhead light. The thick lenses of his glasses magnified the size of his eyes. He reached into the breast pocket of his white lab coat and produced a long glass tube. This he opened, showing me its contents. The tube was a quiver for three-inch needles. The man selected one. “This will not hurt,” he said.
Yamashiro or Freeman , I thought. They were my best bets. Surely Yamashiro knew that the Morgan Atkins Separatists would betray him. He would have to know that the Confederate Arms would not look upon the Japanese as equals.
Smiling kindly, as if to reassure me, the man stabbed the first needle deep into my right bicep. I flinched, but the restraints prevented me from moving my arm.
“Don’t move,” the man said, pressing the needle deeper into the muscle. “You would not want to break the needle. Then we might have to dig it out.” His head ticked up and down as he counted to twenty. When he finished counting, he pulled the needle from my arm, wiped the blood off with a cloth, and examined it under the light. “Good. Good.”
“The needle turns green if the compound has dispersed properly,” the man said. He held the needle over my face so I could see it; but of course, the light engulfed it and I could not see anything.
“You’re in excellent shape, Colonel Harris. Sometimes the compound bunches up, especially when a patient has bad circulation. With you, it’s spread through your upper extremities perfectly.”
He placed the needle on the table beside me. I twisted my neck and managed to get a look at it. The shaft of that needle had turned jade green. I imagined myself sticking that needle into the man’s eye, stabbing it into the eye and pushing it all the way through until it jabbed into his brain.
The man held the tube so that I could see it. He wanted me to know what he was doing. I could tell this by the slow way he selected the next needle and held it up for me. “Now let’s be sure that the compound is spreading through your lower extremities,” he said cheerfully.
“Get specked,” I sneered.
“Don’t take this personally, Colonel Harris. I’m just doing my job. Besides, this is nothing. This is just a small pin-prick. Don’t get worked up. In a minute it will all be over; and I assure you, you will forget all about the pin test.” With that, he stabbed the needle deep into the calf of my right leg. This was not like an injection where the medic presses the point against your skin, then neatly slides the needle into place. This man jabbed his needle in as if it were an ice pick. I winced, but the straps held my leg still. The man repeated everything, counting to twenty, pulling and cleaning the needle, and then showing me the results.
“Excellent. Now, let’s just be sure the compound has dispersed properly throughout.” He selected another needle, then paused. “This one may hurt. I assure you, you will forget about it soon enough.” And he plunged that third needle into my stomach.