Feed (17 page)

“I don’t think so. Not yet, anyway,” the girl, Bethany, said. “You’ll have your chance. I have my own questions, and to protect my people, I need them answered as soon as possible.”

Ramone grunted and shook his head. He looked terrible, which gave Elliot a sort of satisfaction. Dark circles underscored his eyes, the rest of his face appeared haggard, and his hair looked sodden with the grease of two or three shower-less days. “The bastard won’t tell you what you want to know. He’s a monster.”

“Hello? I’m sitting right here, you know?” Elliot nodded, tossing his chin arrogantly. The bravado was an act. Insubordination was never one of Elliot’s problems. At least not with people whose power he respected. All he felt for these people was disdain, despite being their prisoner.

Ramone snorted. His fists were clenched at his sides, something that pleased Elliot. He went on, “How would you like it if I called
you
a monster? Not too much, I’d imagine.”

“Monster is the perfect term for you. You have no soul. All living creatures have souls. But monsters? No. None. Nada. Beings of pure evil. Devil-spawn, like you. I never believed in the devil until I met you,” Ramone said, clenching and unclenching his fists, as though he itched to use them on Elliot. He paced too, back and forth in front of Elliot like a caged lion. What held him back?

“I object,” Elliot said, feeling a sarcastic smile creep across his face. “Currently my soul is in limbo until I torture enough people to win my reward—a place at the side of the Prince of Darkness. I have one. It’s just not present here, you see.”

Ramone took a step toward him before Bethany moved to stop him. “Enough,” she said, heading Ramone off. “He’s just trying to get to you, and it’s working.” She pushed Ramone back and turned to Elliot. “Your personal assessment is right. If there is a devil, a hell, that’s where you belong. Torture being the least of your sins. I’m sure you’ve killed here and there, when it’s suited you. Let’s not even start on the animals you probably tormented. Yes, defenseless, helpless animals. For that I should flay you alive.” She pushed her face in close to Elliot’s as she spoke, mocking him. She must have forgotten that he wasn’t tied to the chair. Elliot lunged forward, knocking his head into her nose. She fell backward and Elliot began to run for the exit. It was a terrible plan, not a plan at all, but something told him he’d be better to get far away from them as soon as possible.

His escape was short-lived. Ramone tackled him. They fell to the ground in a heap; Elliot banged his chin on the ground and bit into his tongue in the process. His mouth filled with the metallic taste of blood.

Before he knew what was happening, Ramone was on top of him, pummeling him in the face. Elliot was half aware of a commotion outside the abuse. Soon, Ramone was pulled away, but the damage was done. Elliot’s cheeks felt swollen, broken, and his lips burned in pain. He hadn’t cried out, however, a fact he was proud of. In a way, there was something satisfying about being beaten. It felt right. It felt like love.
Stop that,
he told himself.

“Chance, help me get him back to the chair,” Bethany said, directing the male hippy who’d escorted Elliot to the tent. Reinforcements, Elliot noted—these people didn’t take chances. Chance must have been near the tent entrance. Or behind some crates, Elliot thought with a laugh, running his tongue over the cuts inside his cheeks. Together the two hippies lifted Elliot to his feet and helped him back into the chair at the center of the room. Ramone stood near a wall of the tent, hands at his side, glaring at Elliot. The old man’s glasses sat crookedly on his nose, blood sprouted from cuts on his knuckles, and his hair looked like that of a mad-scientist. Elliot smiled sarcastically, hoping to disturb the man.

“Tie him to the chair,” the girl muttered at her cohort. “We should have done that before.”

“No doubt,” Chance said, pulling a spool of thick twine from a crate and beginning immediately.

“I’m done here,” Ramone said, heading to the closed tent-flap.

“What? I thought you had questions for him,” the girl said.

“You’ve had your fun, now you’re leaving, is that it, Ramone?” Elliot offered, clenching his teeth against the blood in his mouth and the throb in his cheeks.

Ramone ignored him. “No, no questions. You won’t get anything out of him without torture. I can’t do that. I’ve had too much of this already.”

He paused at the tent-flap. The girl protested once more before letting him go.

“He’s dangerous, you know.” Elliot said to her as the canvas doorway fell shut behind Ramone.

Sparks flew as a thunderous slap blinded him. “Shut up. I won’t play your mind-games.”

The hippy who tied him up smiled as he backed away. “Smart, Beth. They’re as trained in psychology as they are in the physical torture.”

“Stay in here with me, Chance. I don’t want to accidentally kill him. Like the last one,” she dusted her hands off and squatted five feet from Elliot.

Chance nodded. “Of course. That was a mess. Don’t want to clean something up like that again.”

Last one?
Elliot thought, feeling a cold sweat break over his bruised and cut forehead.
They have to be bluffing. Definitely a bluff.

*****

“Here comes Ramone,” Marci whispered to Blythe. The two of them were the only ones who remained at the fire with nothing to do or tend to in the camp. The fire had died down a little and truth be told, Marci was getting really bored. If something hadn’t happened, like Ramone appearing from between the skeletal trees, she might have gone a little crazy—gone running through camp screaming or something. Just to be moving. Living. Sitting still for long periods of time was hard work.

Blythe looked in the direction Marci’s whisper indicated. There was something different about the awkward man, Marci noticed. She turned to Blythe to say something about it, but Blythe’s eyes were intent and calculating. Her cheeks became ruddy, her eyes flickered toward Marci for a second, and she turned away from watching Ramone. The lawyer probably got sick of Marci observing every little thing that went on, but that was tough. Marci couldn’t help it. It was how she was.

Blythe sees it too,
Marci thought. What did it mean? What was different about Ramone?

Ramone broke the circle of lawn and camp chairs and settled into one with a sigh. He ran his fingers through his peppered black hair, rubbed his forehead, took his glasses off and polished the lenses with his shirt.

No one said anything for a while. Marci grew restless and felt the energy move into her legs. She tapped her toe and shifted in her chair. “Well, so. What happened?” she asked.

Ramone looked directly at Marci. “They’re not going to get anything out of him. But we can be sure his superiors are on their way here now. Bethany thinks her camp is going to be prepared, but I can tell you they won’t be. The three of us need to be prepared. This is my fault. We led them here.”

Blythe rubbed her jaw and sat forward. With her chin tilted downward, she looked at Ramone. “What are you proposing?” she asked carefully.

“Exactly, what are we going to do?” Marci pitched in, suddenly feeling like she might be left out if she didn’t assert herself. There was no way they were going to leave her out.

Ramone scooted to the edge of his chair, pulled a short branch out of the fire by the cold end. The other end smoldered and glowed red. “Those in certain positions of the Organization are never captured on camera. It’s like they get away with not existing. I don’t think your friend . . . Ghosteye? Ghosteye’s betrayal did much. I’m not surprised, actually. People don’t like sweeping change. They tolerate it by degrees. A slow rise in temperature like cooking something alive. If the people saw what—” he swallowed, turning the brand in his hand, staring at the red hot end. “What happened to me, they let themselves believe it was fake. Like a TV show.” He laughed and shook his head. “That’s much easier, you know? Why let your life be turned upside down? Just choose to be blind. They turned away and went about their business. That’s what I think, anyway.”

“I believed it,” Marci said, quietly, remembering the horrifying scene on her slate. “It changed my life.”

Ramone put the branch back in the low, weakening fire. The red had dwindled to black. Before he spoke again, he looked at Marci, his blue eyes piercing even from across the fire. “Thank you Marci. If only everyone had been like you. If only others had been as courageous,” he clenched his fist and bit the first knuckle as he leaned against it, his elbow resting on the flimsy arm of the camp chair. “We have some choices to make. They won’t be easy. I’m not sure which is right, either. Morals are so . . . nebulous these days.”

“Say it,” Blythe said, stirring. Marci glanced at her, then back at Ramone. Their gazes locked. “Tell us what you’re thinking, Ramone.”

Ramone seemed to straighten and grow taller staring at Blythe like that. Marci felt she’d seen all this before, back when she watched them in the Feed, while they were in Blythe’s office. Everything that had transpired since then seemed to melt away. It was the same palpable electricity from the day they’d kissed, before everything had gone to hell. Marci felt a thrill watching, but it was more complex than that, what with their lives on the line now and the world crashing down around them. There was a bubble around them, and things felt like they’d be all right, strangely. If Ramone just spoke and disturbed the quiet, it could only put things back together. It was strange and she didn’t understand it, plus she wished it was she, and not Blythe sharing this insane, earth-shattering gaze with Ramone.

“We go to war. People will die, Blythe. We hit them where it hurts. We tear down the infrastructure. Buildings will burn, companies will fall. We follow the ones on their way here right now back to their nests and flood them out.” He paused, his mouth a grim line, his eyes on fire and the air electric.
That must be what he meant about morals.
Was it wrong? Who knew? These days, who knew?

“Or?” Blythe whispered fiercely.

“We hide. Forever. We keep running. There have to be other geologically dead areas like this one. We could build a compound, like this one, and continue to quietly recruit followers until we have enough people to fight. Another war, but different. Less brutal. More quiet.” He rubbed one hand across the top of his thigh. “The problem with that is that I have no idea how long it would take.”

“What about your invention? The thing that could cloak us from the cameras?” Blythe asked, her gaze never faltering.
A cloak? That’s what it was!
Marci thought, remembering how they danced around the subject in their meetings.

Ramone shook his head. “I can’t build that without equipment. It’s not the kind of machinery you find laying around a junkyard either. It’s specialized and it’s expensive. If we had it, it could help. But procuring it might waste valuable time. Especially if we want to use whoever it is on their way here now to find our targets.”

War? Targets? What the hell? And why was Blythe acting like this was a normal conversation? Marci shook her head. “Sorry to interrupt your summit, my liege, but what are we talking about? War? Killing people?”

“I didn’t say killing,” Ramone interjected quickly.

“Well you said people will die, and that’s pretty much the same, if you ask me,” Marci said, waving her hand like he was arguing semantics with her. And he was.

“That’s different. It’s different. I’m not suggesting we go take people out like we’re assassins. I’m saying we burn down buildings. Destroy the things that continue to profligate what we want to stop: the cameras, the cheap entertainment—cheap monetarily, but expensive when it comes to us and our lives, our privacy. We need that back. The world needs it, Marci, don’t you see? People require a space of their own, where they can reflect on who they are. The need to be able to rejuvenate and collect themselves, their thoughts, their ideas. If you are never spared a moment to pause, you end up going crazy. Wives and husbands need their bedrooms to themselves. And those who don’t want those things, they can continue to sell themselves. But people who wish for the opposite should have the choice.”

“But you’d kill for it?” Marci asked, feeling overwhelmed.

“I’m not sure. Maybe. Yes. But only because I believe what’s been happening is the rape of civilization. The Organization has taken away choice.”

“Blythe?” Marci turned to her side. “Are you with him?”

Blythe nodded.

“My marriage dissolved because of the feeds. I’m not saying it would have been perfect without them. I’m not just looking for an excuse. But I think things would have been different without the feeds. They were different before the feeds.”

“Weren’t you just talking, rather frankly if I remember right, about killing the Enforcer?” Ramone asked.

“But that was because he hurt you. And I saw him. He didn’t care, either. He was monstrous,” she whispered, glancing back and forth between Ramone and Blythe.

“I’m not going to force you to do anything you don’t want to do, Marci. But that kind of monstrosity will continue if the Organization and the feeds continue. You won’t see it. But it’ll be there. In the shadows.”

A shout at the northern end of the camp broke their conversation. It was followed by a raucous commotion as people began running towards it, voices became shrill and urgent as instructions were yelled back towards the center of camp. Ramone rose halfway, one hand on the arm of his camp chair, and watched as men and women left their tents and hurried away. Marci jumped up and followed, only glancing over her shoulder to see if Blythe and Ramone followed. They didn’t. Blythe sat frozen in her chair, staring across the smoldering fire at Ramone.