The orderly’s name was Michael Roan Horse and even though he looked like a muscle-bound stereotypical jock, he wasn’t. Owning a degree in Physics and the medical field, he had taken the job in the government for personal reasons, the least of which had been to spy on the white lawmakers of the BLM. Under his ‘roid exterior (which was entirely genetic and not enhanced) rested the keen brain of a political activist and Native American radical. Yet his brain was one of those closed to my influence making me think that he had been one of those unfortunate developmentally delayed brain.
He had done something to the cameras in my room so that they were rerouted showing an image of me sleeping in the bed but it wasn’t me or my room. It showed the room next door to mine so whatever Mike did in my room wasn’t recorded or fed to those that were observing me.
First, he untied me, propped me up and then dressed me in women’s clothes. Pantyhose over lace panties which chafed uncomfortably. A linen skirt in navy blue with a matching jacket blouse that he filled out with a sports bra. He put the soft stretchy material around me and stuffed the cups with water-filled latex gloves. Arranged a short blonde spiky wig on my head and proceeded to carefully paint my lips, eyes and cheeks with feathery touches. Held me at arm’s length and admired his work.
“Damn but you make a pretty girl,” he said as he scooped me up and stuck me in the chair.
Slowly, he opened the door and peeked outside. “No one wandering the halls yet.”
He put me on my feet, my arm around his shoulder and half-carried me down the long sterile corridor.
“Where’s Rachel?” I asked. He hushed me. “She’s waiting for us. Keep your mind on walking.” We reached the end and there was an elevator; his keycard opened it and we stepped inside. He nuzzled the side of my neck and I wrinkled my nose.
“Ewww,” I said. “Man, I don’t swing that way. Gross.”
“No but the cameras are watching us so act like my girlfriend who’s drunk,” he returned. “Guards smuggle chicks down here all the time. It turns them on to be romanced in the government nuclear disaster bunkers.”
“Romanced?” I raised an eyebrow, one muscle that didn’t require much effort to move.
“Sounds better than laid,” he grinned and stuck his tongue in my ear. I tried to punch him but he grabbed my hand and tucked it around his waist.
Once the door opened, we were surrounded by men and women in uniforms, congressional pages, dudes in three-piece suits who stayed close to Senators and Congressmen. I saw men wearing those ear wires that denoted Secret Service and guessed which ones were CIA types. They all followed the same pattern---a certain look. Six feet give or take an inch, average looks, and good looking in a bland way with normal haircuts not too long or short and no three-day scruff. I did see some that must have been DEA or Narcs because they looked scruffy and dirty.
“Don’t talk and don’t stop,” Mike whispered as he swiveled me towards a set of gates standing between us and the lobby doors. Metal detectors. The guards were more focused on those people coming in.
“Wait,” I squeaked. “I’m tagged. I might set off the metal detectors.”
“Can’t be helped. We’ll just have to risk it,” he decided and we stumbled through it together, knocking the frame with a ping almost as loud as the alarm as I passed beyond it to sprawl on the floor. My linen skirt hiked up to reveal the tops of the pantyhose he had made me wear.
I pulled it down before anyone could see the bulge that no girl every had behind the lace panties. Mike helped me up, apologizing to me, the approaching guards and the curious lookie-loos.
“She’s a wee bit loaded,” he confessed as he flipped out his ID. I was amazed, he no longer looked like a mindless ape but a sharp dressed aide.
“She has to go through the scanners,” one of the guards said eyeballing my chest. Luckily, the water balloons hadn’t burst when I’d mashed them on the floor.
“Why? We came through with no problems,” Mike protested. “Look, she promised me a special surprise if I showed her the Vaults.”
“You brought another secretary to the Vaults, Roan Horse? You dog. That’s four this week,” said the guard. His tag read Brian Volker.
I slapped Mike, rose to my wobbly feet and marched out in indignant silence. Behind me, I heard hoots and wolf calls.
I exited onto a subway platform white tiled with black and white floors and brilliant lights everywhere. No gloomy, depressing underground here, clearly millions had been spent on this special rail system.
There were no exits, no stairwells out to the streets and I dallied on the platform waiting. Mike came at a run, grabbed my elbow and dragged me towards the approaching lights which turned out to be a train. Electric, small cars with enough room to seat twenty people and connected to each other by a sort of airlock. We went all the way forward to sit in the carriage behind the conductor. There was a man sitting behind the conductor in jeans and a jacket. He gave us a brief glance and I tried not to stare. He was Native American, one of the Southwestern tribes. Navajo or Hopi.
The train slid smoothly forward into a dark tunnel interspersed with lights every hundred feet or so to reveal brick and cement walls free of graffiti; doorways or access points. There weren’t even walkways for the maintenance workers.
We traveled in silence until we reached a station and pulled into a huge terminal that was broadly lit by an open skylight and wide arches. People dressed in everyday clothes with heavy coats were rushing back and forth. From their clothing and their packages, I was able to ascertain that it was near Christmas time for many of them carried brightly wrapped presents while others wore seasonal garb. I saw two women that would have won hands down ‘the world’s ugliest sweater contest’. In the far corner out of the wind but in an exit way, a salvation army clerk was ringing her bell by her kettle.
My eyes saw everything; down to the smallest detail as if the entire scene was at the end of a microscope. The doors of our carriage opened, the tall man exited. Mike touched my elbow and we followed him out of the train merging into the crowds. He was tall enough to follow and Mike tall enough to see over the crowds.
The stairs up brought us to streets that I knew from my programming memories that Hamilton had given me. We were in downtown Washington, D.C. near the Nations Bank building, minutes away from the Capital and White House.
Police were everywhere. The man we followed walked past them without giving any a second glance and we trailed behind unnoticeable as the holiday shoppers were thicker than thieves.
Ahead loomed a mall, one of those giant ones with Sears, Macys and the like. Both the train passenger and Mike headed for the entrance, up the escalator to the food courts. We found a table at a Steak’nShake where he ordered a meal for both of us.
I ate slowly, the drugs easing off in my system so that I could hear the chatter of busy minds if I concentrated hard enough. If I wasn’t careful, the incredible din of it would overwhelm me.
So many people, so much information coming in. I had sudden access to the computers in the stores, the banks, ATMs and a veritable unlimited data stream lay at my fingertips. Accessible to my thoughts. I could have anything I wanted merely by tweaking numbers in my head and through the net. A whole new world was opening up before my eyes. That is until Mike thumped me on the forehead.
“Pay attention, Lacey. You can’t space out like that in public,” he said gruffly. “We still have to get you out of the city.”
“Bus, train, car or plane?”
“They’re watching everything as soon as your absence was discovered which would have been---” He looked at his watch. “Approximately 12 minutes ago. I guarantee you wouldn’t make it by bus, airplane or train.”
“Car? Is someone driving me out of the city? And when do I meet up with Rachel?” I asked. I scratched at my thigh where the pantyhose pinched and he snatched my hand away.
“Ladies don’t do that,” he hissed. “Keep your elbows off the table and your hands off your crotch.”
“Okay, dad,” I sniped. “Cuz, technically, I’m jailbait to you. I want to see Rachel.”
“She’ll meet us at the safe house, later,” he promised. Leaning over, he kissed me on the lips and I fought the urge to wipe off my lips on my sleeve.
“Wait here. Leon will pick you up and take you home,” he ordered and left me.
“Who’s Leon?” I asked nobody in particular. I could watch his progress through the crowds until he dropped from sight on the escalator. Leon must have been nearby because as soon as Mike left, the man from the train approached my table carrying a box of pizza and an orange Crush.
“Hi, Lacey,” he said and his black eyes twinkled. “I’m Leon DeCarlos.” His pupils were dark and unfathomable in his tanned face with its outdoor squint lines. He had that long lean look of the Navajos and not the squatter barrel shape of the Hopi. His hair was short, bristle stiff and black, his age could have been anywhere from 25 to 50.
He had the serenity and confidence of an older man but the athletic movement of the younger. He sat down and ate his pizza without talking to me; I knew that waiting for me to begin was Navajo courtesy but I was part Indian too. I could play the silent game as well as he.
Finally, he spoke but it was not what I expected. “I love the pizza here. They cook it in a brick oven.”
“Really? That’s all you have to say?” I sputtered.
He lifted his eyebrow. Did it better than me, both of mine went up together no matter how I practiced it. “What is it you want me to say? Hello, is the US Government spy culture after you? Seen any spooks lately? How do you feel about genetic manipulation or water boarding? By the way, you’re a pretty half-breed.”
I told him a nasty word in Anglo-Saxon and he laughed. Wiped his hands on his napkin and stood up. “Ready or are you going to finish massacring your burger?”
“I’m done.” I rose too and nearly fell over on my short heels. I could feel a general weakness in my limbs and worried that Cameron would re-activate the chip that took away my ability to walk. He had obviously turned it off trusting in the Thorazine to keep me sedated and compliant. I had no idea how soon he would use his tracers to pinpoint me. The sooner I made it to a location with a computer and electronic parts, the sooner I could make something that would neutralize anything still in me.
I looked around. “There a Radio-Shack store in here?”
“Probably. Why?”
“You have a credit card?” I asked instead of answering.
He nodded. I dragged him off to the small store sandwiched between a Payless and Gertrude’s Chocolates. When I was finished shopping, I placed everything on the counter waiting impatiently as the sales associate totaled the bill. Surprisingly, it came to less than $400 and that was including the miniature soldering gun.
Loaded with packages bearing the store’s logo, we hit the CVS next where I had him purchase a pre-pay cell phone. I told him I had to use the restroom and he steered me towards the WOMENS when I inadvertently headed for the MENS. Luckily, it was a one seat toilet and I dragged him in with me. Locking the door, I stripped the back of the phone, exposed the motherboard and reconfigured the whole thing with the parts that I had picked up at Radio Shack. A little bit of soldering, a quick charge in the bathroom plug and I had an electronic jammer that was capable of masking any signal that I could put out. I called it a quipp. Unfortunately, the power it used drained the quipp in an hour if I left it on that long.
“Now, no one can track me,” I said. “Once we get to the safe house, I can make something that will blow most of the tracers’ electronics.”
“Most of the tracers?” he questioned.
“Yeah. I can’t do anything about my tagged blood except for a total transfusion. You have access to a dialysis machine?”
He gaped at me before I opened the door and gestured him out. There was a line waiting to use the bathroom. I smiled sweetly at the old lady in the front of the line. “Always wanted to do it in the ladies’ room,” I said and sashayed off.