“Then you look in from here.”
“How do you start recording?”
“Press here.”
“Like keep pressing?”
“No. Press and then let go.”
Milly was cradling the camera in her lap, sitting shotgun, and she lifted it up to look out the windshield as she stared into the viewfinder. Evening light was drowned out by glaring streetlights, and there were only a few other cars on the road as they made their way to the racetrack on the edge of town. A car passed them on the right, honking repeatedly. She whipped the camera around to point at Clarissa, in the driver’s seat, who was gripping the steering wheel tightly, staring straight ahead in a rigid posture.
“Why would they do that?” Clarissa asked.
“Because they’re assholes,” Lucy said, from the backseat. She leaned forward and looked over Milly’s shoulder. “So, do you like it?”
“Yeah,” Milly said, looking up at her from the viewfinder fondly. “But are you sure? This is...so much.”
“Naw, keep it,” Lucy said. “I have two more at home. You can build them from a kit.”
“You built this?” Milly asked.
“It’s easy,” Lucy said dismissively. “You just follow the directions.”
Clarissa precisely executed a left hand turn and they could see the stands rising up in the distance, further down this road. Milly panned the camera across them.
“Don’t point that thing at me,” Clarissa said.
Milly looked up at her, lowering the camera. “Why not?”
“Because I’m freaking the fuck out. We’re not even supposed to be out here tonight. If my grandmother knew I was using her car for this, she would take a shit.”
Lucy burst out laughing.
“That’s not funny,” Clarissa said, unsmiling. “Let’s just take a quick look and then head back.” She signalled and turned into a parking lot up ahead.
“Five minutes,” Milly said. “I swear. Just long enough to see the end of the race.”
Clarissa pulled into a parking spot up ahead and killed the engine. She breathed a giant sigh of relief, and seemed to deflate in her seat.
“You left the lights on,” Lucy said, opening the back door and getting out.
Clarissa narrowed her eyes and switched off the lights. Milly had the camera off and was holding it in one hand. She reached over and touched Clarissa’s shoulder.
“Hey, it’s gonna be fine.”
Clarissa looked over at her. “It’s just...it’s always one thing after another. Everything always spirals out of control.”
“Well, this time it won’t,” Milly said. “I bet you.”
“You bet me?”
“Yeah, I bet you we’ll have a fun time tonight and nothing crazy will happen, no grandmothers taking shits, nothing. If I win, you gotta lighten up a little.”
Clarissa glared at her. “And I win if something ‘crazy’ happens?”
Milly nodded. “Yeah. It’s a win/win scenario.”
A moment passed before a smile broke out on Clarissa’s face. “Fine,” she said. They both got out of the car.
“Were you guys talking about me?” Lucy asked.
“Yeah,” Milly said. “We were talking about how you’re really cool.”
They started walking over towards where the stands and concession area were. There was the sound of roaring engines and shouting voices growing louder as they approached. They were walking in a row and Milly was peering ahead excitedly as the racetrack became visible, holding the camera down at her side.
“Do you want a hot dog?” Lucy asked.
“That’s disgusting,” Clarissa said.
“No thanks,” said Milly. “But you can meet us back at the front row.”
Lucy nodded and headed off toward the concession booths.
They kept walking around towards the stands. The crowd was spread out, but there was a fair number of people, some enthusiastically cheering, others watching intently. They walked close together and picked out seats in the front row.
“Which one is the guy you’re always rooting for?” Clarissa asked. She was peering at the track through the chain link fence ahead of them.
“Yellow car. 124.” Milly pointed up at the scoreboard. “They’re almost halfway through. He’s in 4th place, which is good, if he can pull ahead for the finish.”
Clarissa was staring at the scoreboard with a furrowed brow.
The pace car pulled out and everyone slowed down. Some of the cars pulled out for pit stops, including 124. The crew moved in and rapidly began changing the wheels.
“Well, clearly they drive around in a circle,” Clarissa said.
“True,” Milly said.
They got the fresh wheels on and dropped the car back down. A gloved hand came out the window giving a thumbs up, then the car peeled out to join the eager flock gathered behind the pace car. The flag waved and they were off again, roaring ahead. Milly’s hands were gripping the camera in her lap as she watched.
Lucy walked up with a hot dog. “You wouldn’t believe what I paid for this thing,” she said, taking a bite.
“Please don’t tell me,” Clarissa said.
But she just kept chewing.
124 pulled ahead to 3rd place, then to 2nd.
The crowd got to their feet, shouting encouragement and condemnation alike. Milly stood up and peered across to the finish line as 124 zoomed out into 1st and passed by in a blaring yellow blur. She jumped and cheered. Clarissa was looking over at a group of leering men in the next row over. Lucy was obliviously eating her hot dog.
The other cars crossed the finish line in staggered batches, making their placements. They made a couple more laps and started pulling over to the sides and climbing out. 124 stopped nearby, on the other side of the fence, and people swarmed over. Kenny Strongshanks climbed out the window and took off his helmet, tossing it back into the car. They could hear people shouting congratulations. Milly walked up to the fence and Clarissa followed her after a moment, but Lucy stayed in the stands.
Milly’s heart was beating a million miles an hour. She put her hand on the chain link of the fence, then it lowered to the camera she was holding. She turned it back on and framed Kenny in the viewfinder and everything seemed to still.
“Kind of a goofy looking guy, isn’t he?” Clarissa said, squinting her eyes as she peered over to where they were gathered in excited congratulations.
“He’s...,” Milly said. “You know...”
“Greasy?”
“Yeah, but...”
“Walking over here?”
Kenny waved as he walked past them. “You ladies reporters?” he asked, pointing at Milly’s camera.
“Actually we are,” Clarissa called out as he turned to walk away. “Do you mind if we interview you for the...paper?”
He turned around and looked at them for a moment. Milly was watching through the camera. Then he smiled and took a couple steps closer. “The paper?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Clarissa said, “we want to do a piece on your...amazing accomplishment.” She looked over at Milly but she wouldn’t make eye contact.
“Never seen you out here before,” Kenny said. “But you I have seen.” He pointed at Milly.
“Congratulations,” Milly said, briefly looking up at him before her eyes shifted back down to the viewfinder. “First big win of the season.”
“Yeah,” he said, “but we’ve been putting a lot of work in.”
Clarissa was looking back and forth between them. “I hear they go faster the more you step on the pedal,” she said.
“That depends on if you also have your foot on the brake,” he said, laughing.
“Will I see you again?” Milly asked, not looking up from the camera.
He paused. “That for the paper?”
“No,” she said. “It’s just for me.”
“Tell you what,” he said, “come back out here next Saturday night. Sit in those same seats and I’ll have them fix you up right. What’s your name?”
“Clarissa.”
He was still looking at Milly, but his eyes shifted down to the camera lens. “What’s your name?” he asked.
“Milly,” she said.
“Clarissa and Milly. Talk to you Saturday.” He waved and started to walk away. “It’s good to have fans for a change.”
When he was probably out of earshot, Clarissa turned to look at her angrily. “What the hell are you doing with that camera? He must think we’re complete freaks.”
Milly turned off the camera and looked at her. “I thought we were journalists,” she said.
“We’re going home,” Clarissa said, walking back over to where Lucy was sitting.
Milly followed after her and they all started heading back out into the parking lot. The stands were emptying out and there was a small crowd gathered at the main gate. They walked back to the car in silence. The stars were coming out as the clouds blew over.
Clarissa was already in the driver’s seat when they both got back in. “Why do I get the feeling you have to be drunk to properly enjoy this activity?” she asked.
“The food was nice,” Lucy said.
“I mean, I could probably fill a bottle with gin,” Milly said. “Like a water bottle.”
Clarissa looked over at her. “You’d do that?”
“Sure. This could be like, our thing.”
Clarissa looked back at Lucy, who immediately nodded, then she sighed. “Next Saturday it is, I guess.” She started the car.
They were joking around on the way home and Lucy leaned forwards and turned up the volume when Iceberg Hotel came on. When it got to the chorus they all joined in.
Milly was dropped off first and she looked back as the car stopped. “Thanks for this, Lucy,” she said, holding the camera tenderly. “It means a lot.”
“No problem,” Lucy said. “You mean a lot too.”
“You’re going to make me cry,” she said, getting out of the car. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Thanks for the ride.”
“Later, bitch,” Clarissa was saying as the door closed.
Milly was walking up the driveway and her eyes drifted across the windows. No lights on. Behind her, the car drove off. She unlocked the front door and stepped inside. Silent as a tomb. She looked into the darkness for a moment and her ears rang in the silence.
She took off her shoes and stood there looking down at the camera, her hands running over it. Then she walked up the stairs, and into her bedroom at the end of the hall, closing the door behind her. She walked over to her desk and put the camera down as she took a seat. There was a little door on one side that could be opened to pull out the magnetic tape reels. She rewound the reel and took it out of the camera, transferring it over to a small projector on her desk. Plugging a set of headphones into the side, she put them on and turned the projector to face the wall.
The playback started with a whoosh of photons into the dark room. They were in the car, and the view was panning across the road. She sped up the playback until the next segment of video. It started with a shot of Kenny standing beside his car on the side of the racetrack.
“Kind of a goofy looking guy, isn’t he?”
“He’s...You know...”
“Greasy?”
“Yeah, but...”
“Walking over here?”
He grew larger in the frame projected on her wall, seeming to be smiling right at her.
“You ladies reporters?”
“Actually we are. Do you mind if we interview you for the...paper?”
“The paper?”
“Yeah, we want to do a piece on your...amazing accomplishment.”
“Never seen you out here before. But you I have seen.”
His hand pointed at her from the wall. She was watching the playback with no expression on her face but a sort of relaxed concentration.
“Congratulations. First big win of the season.”
“Yeah, but we’ve been putting a lot of work in.”
“I hear they go faster the more you step on the pedal.”
“That depends on if you also have your foot on the brake.”
“Will I see you again?”
She blinked in her bedroom as she heard herself ask this question, hardly believing it could be real.
“That for the paper?”
“No. It’s just for me.”
“Tell you what, come back out here next Saturday night. Sit in those same seats and I’ll have them fix you up right. What’s your name?”
“Clarissa.”
“What’s your name?”
“Milly.”
“Clarissa and Milly. Talk to you Saturday. It’s good to have fans for a change.”
The playback ended and for a while an empty square of light was projecting on the wall. She was breathing slowly and deeply, looking at it with her eyes slightly unfocused, her hand on the projector controls, one thumb slowly moving over the ridges on the edge of the knob, back and forth. Then she rewound the tape and watched it again.
#
There was a prison within the prison.
An old aircraft hangar had been converted for this purpose. A smaller area within the main hangar had been enclosed by a transparent plastic cube, and this cube was further subdivided into four sections or blocks. Within each block there were 12 cells, all laid out in a 3×4 grid on one wall. All the walls were made of transparent impenetrable plastic. Inside each cell there was a clear plastic bunk, sink and toilet. One prisoner each.
Down an adjacent wall ran stairs connecting the cells to a recreation area, which was where they also ate their meals. They were let out two at a time, twice a day, but otherwise were confined to the cells.
The guards wore black clothing and patrolled the blocks with batons. The outer cube was a one-way mirror, so no-one inside could see out, but around the cube, in the outer hangar, there were subdivided office spaces and storage areas, technical control areas, as well as a gym and a cafeteria. There were slightly more than 1000 cameras in the outer hangar area, all aimed at different parts of the prison area, some with zoom and tracking ability by remote control.
Milly was inside her cell in Block A, laying on her bunk, when it started.
The new girl down on the lower level, Patty Wovenworn, started whistling. At first she just whistled a few off key notes sporadically, but then she started whistling something that sounded like an old child’s nursery rhyme. Other prisoners in the block began shouting for her to shut up.
“Keep doing that and I’ll rip your lips off, you dumb whore!” Suzie shouted from the top level.
But she just kept going for hours. Then into the night, and the beginning of the next day.
Eventually some of the outrage turned to pleading. “I’ll give you anything, Patty! Just five minutes of silence!”
In the morning they all saw the guard walking down the inner corridor between the blocks towards the soundproofed door. Patty’s whistling continued as he approached and a tension began to grow, but as his hand approached the handle of the door, the whistling abruptly stopped. He entered the block to the sound of complete silence. They all pondered the ramifications of this development as the guard, who they knew only as 27, walked into the middle of the recreation area to begin the roll call.
“Goldholly and Scoldknee,” 27 said. “Then proceeding through the roster.”
There were groans and discontented muttering.
The doors to Milly’s and Suzie’s cells opened and they walked out and started making their way down the stairs.
“And I don’t want any bullshit today,” 27 said.
“How about I fuck your mother in the ass with a knife?” Suzie said, walking down the stairs.
“My mother’s dead,” 27 said, looking up at her.
“That’s good because her asshole was probably so blown out she wouldn’t feel it anyway.”
Milly was down the stairs first and she stopped, facing the tables in the recreation area. Suzie walked up and stood beside her.
“What’s got your panties in a twist today?” 27 asked.
Suzie looked over at where Patty was laying on her bunk with her hands behind her head. They made eye contact, but Suzie refused to call out the whistling even though it was a rules infraction. “Just tired of taking a shit every day in front of you and your retarded cronies,” she said, looking back over at 27.
He walked up to them, holding his baton, but he just looked them over. They were both wearing red jumpsuits and slip-on shoes. “Fine,” he said. “Just keep it down. I have a hangover.” He walked past them and on up the stairs to inspect their cells, and they sat down at one of the tables.
“You know, I had this song in my head all night,” Suzie said.
“I don’t even remember music,” Milly said, looking down at the table.
Suzie looked over at her. “Sure you do. It was this annoying, repetitive sound. Lotta people singing about love, dumb shit like that.”
Milly scratched her thumbnail on the tabletop. “Wovenworn.”
“What?” Suzie said.
“At the end,” Milly said. “In the roster.”
Suzie stared at her for a few seconds. Then she got up and started walking towards the stairs. Everyone in the cells who had been paying attention sat up in their bunks and some walked up to the bars for a better look.
27 was in Milly’s cell on the middle row with his back to the door. Suzie walked up the stairs and over to the open cell door. She kicked him in the ass as he was bent over inspecting the bunk and he lost his balance and fell to the ground. He instantly starting scrambling to his feet.
Suzie stood back on the catwalk in front of the cell door with her hands above her head.
27 walked up to her brandishing his baton. “So that’s how you wanna play it, huh, Scoldknee?” She just stared back at him. “Turn around,” he said. “Hands behind your back.”
She turned around and put her hands behind her back and he handcuffed her. “Goldholly, back in your cell,” he said.
Milly walked up the stairs and into her cell and 27 sealed the door. He walked Suzie out of the block and over in the direction of the solitary confinement area.
But she was back by the next morning in time for breakfast.
The first names 27 called out were Mildred Goldholly and Ellen Sourbody. Ellen, a permanently dour-faced middle-aged woman who rarely spoke to anyone, walked down the stairs and they ate their breakfast mostly in silence.
They returned to their cells, and they were called in pairs, until eventually he called Suzie Scoldknee and Patty Wovenworn. When he said the names together, Patty looked up in surprise as the cell doors opened. Suzie was walking down the stairs from the top row. Patty sheepishly emerged and went over to the bottom of the stairs to stand beside Suzie, who she did not make eye contact with.
27 walked over and looked at them. He stared at Suzie. “Now I want zero bullshit, otherwise you’re outta here for a week, got it?”
“Absolutely,” Suzie said.
He looked at her suspiciously but waved them over to the table, and he went up the stairs to check Suzie’s cell.
They sat down at the table and were quiet for a moment as they waited for the food trays to be brought in.
But Patty eventually broke under the pressure. “What are you gonna do to me? Please don’t beat me up, OK? I’m just going crazy in here.” She was speaking softly, almost a whisper. Suzie and everyone on the first level could hear her, as well as Milly sitting on her bunk on the second, but it went unnoticed by 27 and many others throughout the block.
Suzie smiled at her and spread her hands. “I’m not gonna do anything.” She looked her in the eye. “So long as it stops. Now.”
Patty nodded enthusiastically.
Later that evening, after the lights had been dimmed for the night shift, there was a feeling of victory and relief that the whistling had finally ceased, but some people were still talking back and forth between the cells in low tones.
“Hey, Goldholly?” Suzie said, from the top level.
“Yeah?” Milly said. She was sitting on her clear plastic bunk staring at the clear plastic floor, but she looked up and could see Suzie looking down at her through the floor above.
“That was pretty slick.”
“What?”
“You knew I’d be bumped to the end of the roster if I got pulled out. Then I’d be paired with Patty. My new best friend.”
There was silence from Patty’s cell.
Several people who were listening expressed surprise and interest.
“Maybe,” Milly said.
“Maybe I was wrong about you,” Suzie said. “You are a stuck up bitch, but you’re not completely selfish.”
Some people laughed.
Milly smiled slightly and picked at her mattress. “And you might not be a complete foul mouthed, domineering ogre, and actually care about this block and trying to make it less of a nightmare.”
Several people laughed in surprise, including Suzie. “You know, you’re pretty cute when you start speaking up,” she said.
“Ooooooooh,” said several voices, almost in unison, to general laughter.
Milly stayed silent, but there was a smile on her face.
“If I was next to you right now,” Suzie said, “I would hold your hand.”
Some people started hooting encouragement.
“I’d do a lot more than hold her hand!” Tina Twistbow shouted from the top level.
Almost everyone was laughing at this point.
“You’re not gonna leave her hanging, are you?” a voice called out.
Milly shook her head. “Well,” she said, “let’s imagine that I am sitting next to you right now.” She closed her eyes and her breathing stilled. “And I reach out, and I hold your hand.”
#
Kenny Strongshanks didn’t know what to do, so he called Lucy.
She answered after a couple rings. “Kenny?”
“I know. But I need to talk to Milly. Or not talk to her, but know what she said about...the argument we had.” He was in his apartment sitting tensely on the edge of his bed.
“I’m at the office right now,” she said in a hushed tone.
“Can we meet?” he asked. “Not there. At the diner around the corner.”
She sighed. “Yeah, but...she’s still gonna know.”
“That’s fine,” he said enthusiastically. “I want her to hear what I have to say. All of it.”
“Great. And I’m like, the ombudsman? The surrogate interlocutor?”
He frowned. “A friendly intermediary?”
“Well, it’s almost lunchtime anyway. I’ll meet you there in half an hour.”
“Thank you, Lucy,” he said, but she had already disconnected the call.
He got up and began getting dressed, still quite stressed, but finally with some purpose in mind, some plan of action. He decisively grabbed his wallet and keys and drove across town in his custom hot rod pickup truck.
At the Golden Halo diner he pushed open the doors and walked inside. Lucy was already sitting at a booth by the window.
“Imagine this,” he said, walking up. “Nobody ever has to leave the cradle. Nobody even ever has to learn how to walk.” He sat down across from her. “They just roll around on the floor lost in fantasy land coming out of a god damn projector, with a phone strapped to the side of their head!”
Some of the other people in the diner were looking over, murmuring discontentedly.
Lucy sunk in her seat and put on a pair of sunglasses. “Try to take it down a notch, Kenny.”
He breathed out raggedly. “Sorry. It’s just...is this what you had in mind when you got into all of this?”
She rubbed her chin. “I don’t really get hung up on these types of philosophical issues.”
“What about personal issues?” he asked. “Do you think it’s fine for someone you know to live like that?”
“I think it’s an exaggeration,” Lucy said.
“Do you think it’s healthy for her to live...the way she’s been living? Sealed up in that room like it’s a cocoon?”
“Maybe,” she said. “Cocoons serve a purpose.”
He shook his head. “It’s just...we used to go out and, you know...just do stuff. I’d go stir crazy shut up alone like that half the time. She doesn’t even go to the grocery store.”
“There’s no need to. We have a cafeteria at the office. Or we order in.”
“OK. Let me start over.” He put his hands on the table and breathed out. “Is she pissed?”
Lucy nodded. “Yeah.”
“How pissed?”
“I think...I mean, correct me if I’m wrong, but I think she felt you should be willing to meet her halfway. Like...halfway between the cocoon and the grocery store, say.”
“So I should just accept this about her?”
“Yeah.”
“So I kinda fucked up?”
“Yeah.”
He frowned. “Can I fix it?”
She shrugged. “Depends.”
“Can I buy you lunch?”
“It’s a start.”
“I could eat the ass end out of a horse right now,” he said, as the waitress was walking up.
“I don’t think that’s on the menu,” the waitress said.
“How about two specials and a couple bottles of suds?” Lucy said.
She wrote it down and walked off.
Kenny sat back in the booth. “I’ve just always been the sort of person to get out there, you know? Cars. Adventure. Even walking in the woods.”
“She brought the world to her,” Lucy said. “In a way that can be controlled. That’s what we had in mind when we started this. Safety.”
“OK, how about this? A camera that I wear. It has a live connection to her. Anywhere I go, she goes.”
Lucy pointed at the corner of the ceiling where a security camera was watching them.
“I mean, not just like that. More...personal.”
She nodded. “I think I follow. I was working on something that could be worn within the ear canal. It would have to be combined with a separate camera, possibly affixed to clothing. I’m not sure yet.”
Clarissa walked in from the direction of the other entrance looking harried. She was talking on her personal telephone, but ended the call as she approached and sat down next to Lucy. “I can’t stay long,” she said.
“Your presence is a delight, as always,” Kenny said.
Clarissa looked over at Lucy. “I’m surprised to see you over here, with everything that’s been going on. I thought she’d have you working overtime on the new project.”
“She does,” Lucy said tonelessly. “But this is another special project.” She gestured at Kenny, who smiled back at them.
“Oh,” Clarissa said. “Lovers quarrel?”
Kenny sighed. “We just don’t always see eye to...camera on certain things.”
“He thinks she should get out more,” Lucy said, looking over at Clarissa. She was still wearing the sunglasses, which enhanced her deadpan expression.
“Oh yeah?” Clarissa asked. “Why don’t you try taking her for a spin in a race car?”
Lucy snorted with laughter.
“I did try that, actually,” Kenny said, slightly despondent. “She didn’t enjoy it.”
“Ever consider you might just not be a good match?” Clarissa asked.
Kenny opened his mouth, more so to let it hang agape than to respond, but the waitress arrived with their food.
“I can’t stay long,” Clarissa said, looking over at the waitress. “Maybe just a coffee. I mean a diet soda. No, I mean a coffee.”
“How about both?” the waitress said.
“Sure,” Clarissa said. “Thank you.” As she was walking away, Clarissa turned back to them and spoke more softly. “I think she hates me,” she said, subtly gesturing back at the waitress.
“She just up sold you an extra drink,” Lucy said. “She probably loves you.”
Clarissa’s personal telephone rang and she looked down at the number displayed on the handset. “I gotta go.” She walked away, answering the call as she walked over to the exit.
Kenny shook his head. “Quite a lady.”
“You’re just lucky she doesn’t hate you,” Lucy said, taking a bite of her sandwich. “You wouldn’t even be able to get in the building.”
“I need to talk to her,” Kenny said, looking down at his food, but not eating.
“Yeah? What would you say?”
He thought about it. “I think we should get married.”
Lucy burst out laughing. “What?”
“I think it’s the only thing that makes sense. We could get a house, and she could have a place...a cocoon, whatever she needs, and I’ll go in the front door and she’ll go in the back if that’s what it takes.”
“Good lord,” Lucy said. “Look, this is above my pay grade. I think you better go up and talk to her.”
“Right now?”
She nodded, taking another bite. She waved him off. “Go get her, tomcat.”
As he walked away from the table, the waitress was bringing up the coffee and the soda on a tray, but he walked past her with determination, out the side exit onto Oak Street, then he jaywalked over to the other side of the street and walked up to the corner. He walked around the side of the building and through the main entrance.
“Mister Strongshanks,” the receptionist said, standing up as he came in.
“I’m on a mission,” Kenny said, walking towards the elevators at the back of the lobby. At the top floor he turned and went to the end of the hall and opened a door, walking into the outer office area, and closing the door behind him. He crossed the room to another door that was magnetically sealed. There was a panel mounted beside it with a camera and view screen. “Milly,” he said. “Please open the door.”
But it remained closed.
“I love you,” he said.
Her face appeared on the view screen. “Is that true?” she asked. “What you said in the diner?”
“Yes. Absolutely.”
“You wouldn’t fight me on this? Or on anything I need?”
“You win. Just please open the door.”
The view screen blinked off. And the locks disengaged. The door opened and Milly came out and she ran up to him and embraced him. She had been crying and she started saying things to him, all kinds of things she had never said before, and they promised each other they would never leave.
#
“You’re sitting alone waiting for a phone call from someone you love. Two hours goes by.”
Her biometric readings were dancing across the display panels arrayed on the table before the Borderline Scanner. He observed the results with a careful eye.
Milly was sitting on the other side of the table with electrodes attached to her arms and torso. There were several cameras built into the scanning equipment and they were zoomed in on different parts of her face.
“The thought crosses your mind that there is a straight razor in the bathroom.”
The Scanner was looking at the readouts, but Milly’s gaze was fixed on his face, visible in a gap between the pieces of equipment. He was wearing a mirrored visor across his eyes.
“You come home from school as a young child and you are excited about your accomplishments, but there is no one there to greet you. The house is empty.”
He stared at the readout for a long time.
“You look into a mirror. What is the first thing that crosses your mind?”
“It’s been five years since I’ve seen a mirror,” she said.
“Please don’t answer the questions aloud,” the Scanner said.
The machine in front of him started beeping. He reached forward and pressed a button. “That’s the end of the session,” he said. “I’ll need to meet with you again next week.”
Milly stood up and started stripping the electrodes off.
“You can wait for the nurse to do that,” he said.
She had them ripped off and she tossed them onto the table in a tangle, but it rolled over the edge of the table and fell off. The Scanner bent over to pick them up and she reached forward into the case containing the scanning equipment and pulled out a slender tube that was attached to the lining of the case. She pushed it up her sleeve.
“Lemme give you a hand with this stuff,” Milly said.
“No,” the Scanner said, standing up with the tangle of wires and electrodes. “Just report back to 23. We’re done here.”
She walked out the room and into the hallway. 23 stood up from a bench beside the door.
“I have to use the bathroom,” she said.
23 sat back down and gestured across the hall. “It’s over there.”
She walked across the hall and into the bathroom area beyond. There were no other prisoners in these outer offices unescorted and the bathroom was empty. She walked into a stall and sat down. Pulling the tube out of her sleeve, she unscrewed a cap on one end of it and shook out a small earpiece onto the palm of her hand. She fitted it into one ear.
“Um. Hello?” she whispered.
“Damn, it’s good to hear your voice,” Lucy said.
“Yours too. Everything good so far?”
“Yes. As long as you keep that transmitter on you, I can trick any cameras nearby. There should be a vent in that room that connects over to the other side of the building. You’ll bypass a whole checkpoint that way.”
She climbed up on the back of the toilet and pulled a strip of metal from the inside of her other sleeve and began unfastening the screws. Footsteps passed in the hallway but didn’t enter. She got the vent cover off and laid it on the seat of the toilet. Then she boosted herself up and squirmed in the vent.
“OK, that vent is going to be the main problem if you get out of range of the camera in the bathroom.”
Milly was worming her way along through the duct. “Surprised there’s only one camera in the women’s bathroom.”
“One that we know about,” Lucy said.
“Really hope there’s not others. Or we might be in trouble.” She could see another opening up ahead and kept inching towards it.
“No one in that room ahead. Storeroom.”
The duct she was in opened up at a junction point and she was able to twist around and kick out the vent. She pushed herself out feet first and dropped down into the room. There were two rows of shelves filled with riot equipment and a door on the other side of the room.
“So where’s he at?” Milly asked.
“He’s just leaving the interview room now. Should be passing by that room in about twenty seconds.”
Milly grabbed a baton from a shelf nearby and moved over to the other side of the door.
“He’s passing now. Coast is clear so far.”
She opened the door and stepped out into the hallway, already winding up, and delivered a backhand strike across his head. He crumpled to one side and she threw the baton back into the storage room and pulled the Scanner by his feet through the doorway. He’d dropped his case of equipment and she went back for it and then closed the door of the storage room and began stripping off his clothing and changing into it. He was still unconscious as she rolled him onto his side and took off his mirrored visor. She put it on and walked back out into the hallway.
“OK, straight shot down that hall,” Lucy said.
She walked down the hall at what she hoped was a measured pace, though internally she was trembling like a leaf. She kept thinking about Lucy in a van somewhere watching this on a monitor, then substituting a false video feed where she never existed, and found the thought somewhat calming.
Two people were talking together at the other side of the hallway, but they didn’t look over as she passed, since she was wearing the trench coat and visor which were characteristic of Borderline Scanners. When she got to the checkpoint, she pulled out his ID card and flashed it at the guard, who waved her through.
She passed through into the lobby and walked over to the main entrance and out into the parking lot beyond.
“He’s driving that shitty silver sports car,” Lucy said.
She pulled the keys out of the jacket pocket as she approached and got inside. “Is this really happening?” she asked, looking down at the controls.
“Yes,” Lucy said, “and you’re almost there, just one more checkpoint.”
Milly started the car. She reversed out of the parking spot and headed over to the gate. There was another guard in a booth and a bar in place, but she swiped the ID card through a slot and the bar rose up.
Then she was free.
Lucy directed her to the parking lot of a nearby gas station and they ditched the car.
Milly got into the back of the van and was stripping off the visor and trench coat. She threw them onto the floor of the van in disgust. “What a bunch of dorks. Let’s skip sucking each other’s dicks. Get us out here. One more stop to make.”
#
Clarissa pulled into the driveway at around 4pm. Kenny’s truck wasn’t parked in it, only the small passenger car she hadn’t seen moved in a couple of months. She grabbed her purse and got out of the car, walking up towards the front door. She had a key and was able to unlock it, but she knew she was already being watched.
Heading down the stairs, she found the big vault doors open and was able to walk through. There was another apartment down here, with a small kitchenette and a bathroom. The bedroom and office were in the back.
Milly came walking in from that direction. “Another emergency?”
“You could say that. Things are coming to a head with the deal. They’re talking about city-wide adoption of the surveillance tech. Only problem is, it would be a buy out. The company gets turned into a utility. Security on tap.”
“That isn’t security,” Milly said.
“Why the fuck not?” Clarissa asked.
“Because it isn’t control. It’s giving up control.”
“We would be right at the spigot, doling it out!”
“On whose behalf?” Milly shook her head. “Absolutely not.”
“It just doesn’t make sense to me,” Clarissa said. “They are the ones in control. No matter what. It only makes sense to work to enrich their interests. The stronger they become, the better they are able to protect us.”
“That is a false sense of security, because at any moment it can be snatched away.”
“And yours can’t?” Clarissa stared at her during several seconds of silence.
Milly tried to turn away and head into the back room, but Clarissa reached out and grabbed her wrist. She pulled a chloroform soaked rag out of her purse with her other hand and clamped it over Milly’s face. Milly started struggling, but Clarissa was able to push her up against the door frame and hold her grip across both on her lower face and one wrist. Milly’s other hand came up clawing at Clarissa and left one scratch on her cheek, but she was losing consciousness and her eyes closed.
Clarissa lowered her to the floor and held the rag there for several seconds. Then she pulled it away and checked her pulse. She took a roll of duct tape from her purse and bound Milly’s wrists, ankles and mouth, then she laid her in the closet of the bedroom.
She walked back into the office area and sat at the terminal and deleted all the footage of herself from the moment she arrived, and then she shut down the whole surveillance grid.
Kenny came home after about twenty minutes, later than she was expecting. She was in the kitchen when he walked through the front door.
“Oh,” he said. “Hey, Clarissa. Long time no see.”
“Too long, you might say.”
“Yeah, maybe. Have you talked to Milly yet?” He took off his jacket and shoes and threw his keys on the table. “It’s kinda short notice, but I wanted to take her out to this dinner I got invited to.”
“We have a bit more to discuss, but she’s taking a nap.”
“Can you wake her up and tell her for me? I gotta take a shower.” He started heading upstairs.
She heard him enter the bathroom and the water began running. Then she followed him up the stairs. She had a kitchen knife in one hand, hidden behind her forearm. The door of the bathroom was open slightly and she walked up to it.
“Hey, Kenny?” she asked.
“Yeah?” his voice came back through the sound of the shower.
“Need any company in there?”
There was a pause. “No, I’m fine, Clarissa. Just go wake up Milly, OK?”
She walked into the bathroom. His silhouette was visible through the curtain. She walked to the far side of the bathroom and waited until she could see him putting his head under the water, then she pushed the curtain aside enough to see his naked back.
She stabbed him several times in the torso in rapid succession, once right through the ribs into his right lung as he started to turn towards her. She backed away beside the sink. He was looking at her with a strange expression on his face.
“Clarissa,” he said.
There was blood running down his torso and being washed away by the streaming water from the shower head. He tried to take a step towards her but he slipped and fell into the tub. He was trying to get up on his hands and knees but there was blood pouring out of multiple wounds in his torso.
He started coughing up blood and he lay there struggling more and more weakly as she watched him. When he stopped moving, she threw the knife into the bathtub and left the shower running. She went back downstairs and Milly’s eyes were open so she held the rag across her nose again, then she dragged her up to the bathroom.
She stripped off her clothes using a pair of scissors and put them into a trash bag. Then she lifted her under the arms and into the tub where Kenny’s exsanguinated corpse lay. She held her up in the bathtub and dropped her so her head struck the edge of the tub, then stripped the tape off and left her laying on top of the corpse with the water still running on both of them.
She grabbed the garbage bag and walked back downstairs and out the front door, getting in her car and driving away.
#
Clarissa was back in the control room, where she had been pacing back and forth since she had gotten the word of Milly’s escape.
“Ms. Silverheather,” one of the techs called out. “I got something on the prison lines.”
“Let’s hear it,” Clarissa said, walking up.
He started playing the audio through the speakers. “-ow it’s short notice. But the bird has landed, OK? I just wanted to let you know that I’m holding your hand right now.”
“I’m holding your hand too. Good luck.”
The call cut out. “Trace that call,” Clarissa said.
“I can’t find the receiver, but the sender is right in the prison.” He brought up a video feed of Suzie Scoldknee sitting in front of the telephones. She hung up a handset and walked away.
“Put a hit out on her immediately,” Clarissa said.
“W-what? Shouldn’t we call CLAM or something? This is getting out of control!”
“Wrong! I have things under control.” Clarissa leaned over him and pointed in his face. “And you’ll do exactly as I say.”
He hurriedly turned back to his terminal and began placing a call.
Clarissa walked back over to her security chief. “Maybe we can provoke her into doing something stupid.”
He nodded.
Another tech looked over and called out. “There’s been a possible attack at your residence! Someone drove a large vehicle through the front doors.”
“Something stupid like that,” Clarissa said. She looked over at the security chief. “Head out there with a squad immediately.”
He left the room hurriedly.
After a while she got sick of pacing and went down the hall to her office. She walked over to her desk and popped several pills, washing them down with a cup of cold coffee. She looked across the office and saw a cleaning lady there with a cart beside the door to the bathroom.
“Get the hell out of here,” Clarissa barked at her.
Milly turned around to face her. She was wearing janitor’s coveralls and gloves. “Now on account of our history, you have about thirty seconds to say something that doesn’t make me want to kill you.”
“What the fuck?” Clarissa said. She stumbled back towards her desk and started fumbling in the drawer.
“It’s gone,” Milly said. “And the cameras are dead while we have our little chat. Start talking.”
“Obviously you’re not going to film yourself killing me!” Clarissa looked outraged. “Do you actually mean to suggest you wouldn’t have done exactly the same thing if I got in the way of your dream for what we built? Miss Control Freak?”
Milly was looking at her with no expression. “Ten seconds,” she said.
Clarissa’s face contorted with rage. “I killed your little prison girlfriend. Just like I killed your moron husband.”
Milly’s eyes narrowed. “What?”
“Couldn’t help but send her a little message in case things went south, huh? ‘I’m holding your hand.’” She pantomimed crying. “Boo hoo.”
Milly grabbed a spray bottle off the cart which she had previously filled with hydrochloric acid, and she sprayed it several times in Clarissa’s face. Clarissa was looking right at her, with more a look of confusion than alarm as the blasts caught her directly in the eyes. She doubled over screaming, clutching at her face.
“I just wanted to make sure I was the last thing you ever saw,” Milly said. “And by the way, the cameras were broadcasting all of this, including your confession.”
Clarissa’s face was reddened in several places, her eyes clenched shut over scarred corneas. She was screaming continuously, thrashing about on the ground.
Milly threw the spray bottle back on the cart and pulled out a broken off piece of broom handle. She stepped up to Clarissa and started bludgeoning her in the head repeatedly. Her eyes were wide and unblinking and she stared downward at Clarissa’s mutilated face as she struck at it over and over again with the broom handle. Then she started crying. Her sobbing face broke into a sorrowful grimace as her tears streamed down it and she uttered a nearly incoherent stream of obscenities in a screaming, choked off tone. She threw the broom handle aside and just started stomping on the broken mess of Clarissa’s head as it disintegrated into pieces.
#
They had her down in a different spot now.
It had a wide open courtyard where they could sit outside in the sunshine and smoke cigarettes. The rules were still pretty rigid, but they were allowed out here 20 at a time for an hour.
Milly was sitting on a bench surrounded by a group of other women in prison uniforms. “And then they sent me here,” she said.
“Wait, you’re Mildred Goldholly?” a younger woman who had just arrived asked her. “That’s crazy!” She had a look on her face for a second that reminded Milly of Suzie. “That video was all over the newsfeeds.”
“You cleared your own name, but why? You were already free,” another woman said.
“No way,” someone else replied, “you can’t live like that. With someone holding that over you.”
Milly scoffed. “It’s common sense. What else could I have done? Besides, things are predictable in here. You could do a whole lot worse.” There wasn’t a camera in sight, but glancing over at the external door that led back into the cell block, she could see two guards there, periodically looking over at them. She gestured across the table. “Now pass me another one of those cigarettes.”
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