Skin on My Skin (15 page)

“I wouldn’t be trying to trade for her if she didn’t.”

“No, I suppose not. Fine. Bring her here and I will give a set of suit seals. I will also give you as much time in the bar as you can stand. You’re obviously aware of what she is and how valuable she is to Fortress. Take care of us in this and you will be taken care of. Bring her to us.”

It was a good deal, but it wouldn’t help me sleep at night.
 

“No, it’s not going to work like that,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm and level.
 

“Oh? Then just how is it going to work?”

“I need certain assurances. And I need them from someone higher than you.”

“That’s quite an unusual request, my friend.”

“And this is an unusual trade. How many Touchers do you actually have back there? I want to talk to the man in charge, that’s it. Then I’ll bring her to you and take my seals. You can keep your bar credits.”

The banker grinned at me and I did not like that. I did not like that in the least.
 

“As you wish, scavenger. I will get you your interview with the boss. Afterwards, just remember that it is you, my friend, that requested that meeting.”

“Let’s just get it over with,” I told him. I’d be happy never coming back to Fortress after this.
 

“If you’ll leave your suit with me…”

I interrupted him again. “I’m not taking off my suit.”

The banker laughed and again I didn’t care for it much. It had the quality of steel on rusty steel. “You may not enter any further than here with it on. You were here the other night. You saw what happened. We’ve obviously had to rethink our security protocols in the meantime. You remove your suit or we have no deal. I can do nothing about the new rules.”

I hesitated.

“You will be perfectly safe. Your escorts will be suited and, once you cross into the park, you will be in containment the entire time. Trust me, if this is real and you have our property,” I cringed when he called Jenna that, “then we wish you no harm.”

I nodded. I didn’t want to take off the suit, but it was useless without the seals anyway, and the banker knew that. I began to take off the bio-armor. I stood there in shorts and a t-shirt, ready to get on with it. The man stared at me quizzically for a moment and then smiled that dark smile again.
 

“You’re a bit older now.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Older. Oh, I know the picture is old. But you are much older than I would have thought. Living in the ruins does that to you, doesn’t it? It ages you.”

“I don’t have a clue what you are talking about.”

“It is you, isn’t it?” he asked as he pulled a picture from the bulletin board and turned it around, pressing it to the glass so that I could see. “If it’s not you, then the resemblance is uncanny.”

The picture was of me in containment, back in the house with my father. My father would have been the only one that could have taken it. My heart thudded and sweat began to pour down my forehead, running into my eyes. I didn’t know what to say, knew even less what to think. I felt like I’d just been slapped in the face.
 

“Where did you get that?”

“It doesn’t matter, Jacky,” the banker said, nodding to the guards. “Take him.”

I didn’t bother struggling. Struggling might mean tearing up the guard’s suits and exposing us all to the Preacher’s Plague. No point in that.
 

“You know, Jacky. All you had to do was show us your face. We’d have let you in to see the boss any time you wanted. He’s been looking for you a long, long time.”

I really didn’t know what to expect when the guards led me out of the back of Club Flesh. I’d been to Central Park many times as a child and always remembered it being a cross of lush greenery and blowing garbage. It was an odd oasis in the middle of the city, a stark green contrast with the miles of concrete. I didn’t know what was behind the huge walls and, when I finally got a good look, I didn’t know how to react.
 

The people of Fortress had built a town of sorts behind the walls, but it wasn’t the town I’d envisioned. Instead of pristine suburban style houses, complete with white picket fences and kids playing, there were shanties. The awkwardly constructed houses were made of the same trash and debris that the wall was. People lived in old cars and busses, tents made of dingy white canvas with FEMA logos on them, and whatever other materials they could get their hands on. The small homes were situated about twenty feet apart, mostly enough to prevent the parts of the Preacher’s Plague that caused death. Throughout the park, between the homes, were containment tunnels build of plastic sheeting, glass sheets, and reclaimed lumber. It looked like a spider web of poorly built arteries. People walked in those tunnels, carefully spaced, under the watchful eyes of guards in bio-suits with weapons.
 

I’d always envisioned the people of Fortress to be happy, safe from the ravages of the dying city behind their walls. But these people did not look happy. Not in the least. They kept their heads down and stared straight ahead, never making eye contact with each other or the guards. They came and went through two-way sealed portals spaced every fifty feet. Many tended to gardens outside the containment tunnels, which were also spread a good distance from each other. The entire settlement was designed so that people could work outside, in the sun, far enough away from each other that they wouldn’t die from the contact. I had to admit, it was ingenious, but I also knew there was way more to it than met the eye. The people were just surviving. They weren’t any different than the scavengers out in the city. They were just more centralized. They didn’t have that sense of community I’d always imagined Fortress would.
 

There was no joy in Fortress. These people were just as dead as the rest of us.

I certainly didn’t expect the multitude of Preacher logos. There were flags ruffling in the breeze displaying the same image I’d seen out in the city and the logo was painted everywhere you turned. There were even flyers stapled to the trees displaying the cartoonish image of a man in a wide brimmed hat with a beard. The words ‘The Preacher Lives’ were written everywhere. It was very disconcerting and I had no idea what to think about it. Did these people worship the Preacher? What sort of crazy shit was going on here? Add to that the fact they’d apparently been searching for me for a long time and I was more than a bit numbed by the overload of information.
 

I paused, walking slower, and watched as a man outside in one of the fields stood, a crazy look on his face. The fields were spaced so that the edges were at least twenty feet from the next. The people, in the fields, didn’t wear bio-suits and it was the only way they could work without contaminating each other. The man turned around slowly, looking for something. His eyes were wide, crazed. He locked onto the man working in the next field over and took off at a sprint, running towards him. Even as he neared the boils began on his skin and his legs became puffy. The other man didn’t notice until it was too late and the runner tackled him.
 

“What the hell?” I asked, inadvertently. The guards followed my gaze. One raised his rifle, took aim, and fired through the plastic sheeting of the tunnel, dropping the running man with three shots. The man he was running towards started to run himself, right up to the point the guard shifted his gaze and fired two more shots, dropping him. The whole thing had taken place in less than five seconds. Five seconds and two men were dead. I wondered if they were better off that way.

“Keep moving,” the guard spoke over his suit’s crackly external speakers.
 

I suddenly regretted my decision to trade Jenna for seals. This wasn’t a place for her. This wasn’t a place for anyone. I’d often wondered what it would be like to live in Fortress, with other people, and now I knew. It was a graveyard filled with slaves. There was nothing to do about it now, though, and I’d have to continue through the motions until I could leave. I didn’t know what I was going to do about the seals, but I couldn’t force Jenna to come back to this place. Besides being completely wrong, I knew I’d never sleep another night in my life if I did it.
 

The guards led me into the tunnels and the normal folk cleared the way, exiting at the nearest airlocks as quickly as they could. There wasn’t just a lack of joy in Fortress, there was a fear so thick you could smell it in the air. The tunnels split and we followed one that was in much better condition towards the center of the park. There, in a tall stand of oak trees, were half a dozen mobile homes, all joined by containment tunnels. This was where the power rested, I knew. This is where I’d find the boss.
 

The guards led me into the biggest trailer and sat me on one side of a hermetically sealed wall. The interview area was plain and I sat on a metal folding chair. Just on the other side of the wall, however, was opulent. I faced a large, mahogany desk. Behind the desk, on the walls, were paintings I was sure had come from the many museums of New York. Before the plague they had probably been worth a lot of money. To collect them now only was only meant to show the boss’s power. He had everything. He could worry about the fancy things. To one side was a stack of old looking wine bottles separated by gold bullion bars. The boss wanted the person sitting where I was to know what the deal was. It was stupid, though. The wealth represented the old world and the old ways. The gold bullion was worth little to nothing. Someone my age, who’d grown up with the Preacher’s Plague, would not trade for it. The booze, maybe, but not the gold.
 

If the old world wealth in the back of the room wasn’t enough to impress and intimidate, the man I knew to be the boss the moment I laid eyes on him, was. The boss came in the room dressed in the most spotless piece of bio-armor I’d ever seen. It wasn’t just that the armor looked new. It did. But it had also been customized. The helmet was painted with the Preacher’s logo over the visor, giving it the appearance of a face. I couldn’t see behind it. The rest of the armor was painted in the same red and black colors the logos and flags were. Whoever the man behind the mask was wanted to give the impression that he was, in fact, the Preacher. I wasn’t prepared to accept that, but the red bio-suit was unnerving.
 

“Nice suit,” I said in echoes of the smart assed conversations I’d had with my father over the years. I had to put on the air of defenses because I was scared shitless. “Love the paint.”

“Thank you, Jack,” the man responded. His voice was distorted over the suit’s speakers and it sounded, for all the world, like those toys that were around when I was a kid that made you sound like Darth Vader. It did little to decrease my fear level. I was ready to bolt.

“How do you know me?” I demanded, trying to push the fear aside. “Where did you get that picture of me?”

The man laughed and it was eerie, considering his suit did not move. “Oh, you know. One of our patrols wandered across the camera, I’m sure.”

“But why were you looking for me? You were the one following me in the ruins, right? Or your people?”

“I don’t have the faintest clue what you’re talking about, Jack. As for as why we were looking for you… that is my fault, really. The picture from the old camera evoked some nostalgia in me. I wondered, over the years, what had happened to you. We are always looking to help the poor survivors of New York.”

I stared silently, unsure of what to say. The boss of Fortress was the ultimate bull shitter. I didn’t believe a word he said, but I was too afraid to pry further. I shouldn’t have come in the first place and now all I wanted to do was run away. I’d have to play along until I could get out of the place.

“I understand you’ve come to trade for the return of some of our property, correct?” My old phone, with the pictures of Jenna, was on his desk. “As well as the location of our attacker?”

“Yes,” I said quietly.
 

“I have to tell you that this is probably the largest trade our facility has ever conducted. And I cannot begin to tell you how much we appreciate you facilitating the return of our property. But I am curious. You’ve already worked out the details with the Banker. Why, then, did you ask to see me?”

I wanted to see the man behind the visor. I wanted to know who was pretending to be the Preacher. I desperately wanted to look the man in the eyes. But I wasn’t going to and some nagging sensation inside told me I’d be better off not knowing whom it was.
 

“I need assurances.”

“I’m listening.”

“If I bring her to you, I’ll get my seals.”

“Seals are a small price to pay for the return of our property. Let’s be honest here, Jack. You know how valuable she is. You know what lengths the cretins out in the ruins would go to in order to possess her. So let’s not kid about this. I want her back. Her presence has been missed. I will gladly give you a set of seals for her safe return. I’ll give you a dozen sets of seals if that is what you desire. That you claim to know the location of our attacker is simply a bonus. As they say, my friend, you are holding all the cards. Tell me what it is you want and I will make sure you have it.”

“Okay.” I said. They were giving me what I’d asked for. The boss had as much as admitted that they would give me anything I wanted. But I was still hesitant. I didn’t want to bring Jenna to them. I still felt like I’d made the most horrible mistake in the world.
 

“So bring her to us. We will make our trade and you can go about your way. I do not understand the problem.”

“I need other assurances.”

The man sat immobile behind the desk, which made it impossible to see what his emotions where. “Such as?”

“That Jenna won’t be hurt. I don’t want her to be hurt.”

The man chuckled. “What, exactly do you think we are here at Fortress?”

I thought about the two men I’d seen shot. “I don’t really know.”

“Then why don’t I show you, Jack? Let me show you how we are working to a new future, a new world built out of the ashes of the old. Perhaps then you may even want to join us.”