The Long Dark by B.J. Farmer (important books to read .TXT) 📗

with the pistol I had taken from the dead person back at the gun store. She tucked the gun in her waistband, glared at me. I was next, I thought. It was only a matter of time.

***

The small building was dark, dank, and cold. There were two mattresses on the floor, which obviously wasn’t enough for all of us. As cold as the room was, and considering they had taken our coats and boots, it really didn’t matter. We wouldn’t be sleeping much unless we wanted permanent sleep. I was surprised we were still alive. For the life of me, I couldn’t understand why they just didn’t kill us. We offered nothing of value, that I knew of, anyway.

I paced the floor. Quill sobbed, as did Duane. Sam and Avery sat in absolute quiet. No one knew what to say, I was sure, but it was, I think, a matter of everyone coming to terms with our newest situation. Duane might’ve felt guilt or something akin to it. For me, I felt nothing. When your life is no longer yours to control, why does it matter? That’s how I felt at that moment, anyway. Luckily, I didn’t have time to come to a different conclusion, as guards stormed in and grabbed both me and Quill.

“Avery! Please, stop,” I cried out, as he struggled with a guard who was dragging Quill by the arm, as she screamed, across the floor to the exit.

“YOU FUCKING BASTARDS!” Avery screamed at the top of his lungs.

Sam grabbed hold of him, saving him a severe beating at the least.

The look on Quill’s face, while they half-dragged her in a different direction, was one of resignation and sadness. I looked away. What was I supposed to do? I was being dragged in another direction, towards something just as sinister.

I waited in what I thought was an interrogation room. I mean, I was sure it had a different purpose before the Order, but its repurpose was perfect: claustrophobically small, downright austere, and only one way in or out. Fuck, I thought. It’s really come to this.

I was in there for what seemed like an eternity before the door finally opened. Janna walked in alone, and gracefully sat across from me. She seemed confident that I posed no threat because no one bothered to restrain me. After watching what she did to the guy earlier, I can’t say I really wanted to tangle much with her. That and I knew there were guards outside. I heard them outside as Janna entered the room.

Her stare was as potent has her blazing red hair. She wasn’t an exceptionally attractive woman. She was thick like a bulldog but somehow feathery and swift as a dancer. Not fat, just thick like she had worked for a living. She had intelligent and piercing eyes, and I felt, as she looked over me, like she was reading my every thought.

“How does it feel?” She asked.

“What, being on the other side of things?”

She nodded.

I had no intention of letting her know just how scared I was. “What did you do with Quill?”

She lingered on a smirk. “Do you remember the scientist I was telling you about? She has a keen interest in her.”

“So, she’s real?”

“You seem surprised.”

“I assumed you were trying to save your ass.”

“Almost everything I told you was true to some extent or another.”

“Yeah, well, except the part about not wanting to fight for the Order and tracking the phone.”

“I did lie about tracking the phone, but I didn’t lie about not wanting to fight for the Order. It’s nothing… just a mirage to get us pissants to fight and die so people in power can have more power. We were used.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “Yet here you are still fighting for them.”

“No,” She said, laughing. “I’m fighting for me… fighting to stay alive. We’re a lot alike like that.”

“I’m nothing like you.”

“The Order has taken everything from me, my parents included. Why in the hell would I fight for them?”

I shook my head. “You’re still fighting against me. I don’t see a difference, whether you don’t see yourself fighting for them or not.”

“I only know this way. I would never be accepted into your culture. We’re too different. I’m here dealing with the lot I was given, and I’m going to make the best of it.”

“You aren’t North Korean. You’re a fucking white woman, Janna. A fucking soccer-mom looking white woman at that. I’m pretty damn sure you could find a pretty easy path into our culture if you wanted it. You don’t, though.”

“It isn’t that easy.” She seemed, for whatever reason, to want me to understand how they could be the way they were. She thought for several moments, her eyes cast to the table in thought, before speaking again. “If I told you red is blue once you would laugh at me. If I were to tell you that ten-thousand times, you might start second-guessing yourself. Add a metal rod into those repetitions and see what you think about blue. You would fight someone if they argued red wasn’t blue.”

I honestly didn’t give a care about their brainwashing. “So, where does that leave my friends and me?”

“I’ll be blunt,” she said, looking me directly in my eyes, “You are going to admit to sabotaging the agent in Barrow and Prudhoe Bay.” Then, without a bit of hesitation, she finished, “You will then be executed.”

“And my friends?”

“The scientist needs Quill--”

“No --”

“I’m exposing myself by not having already executed you. You have absolutely no say in what happens from here on out.”

I sighed. “My other friends?”

“After the scientist figures out a way to further control the Grays, then we will need to begin rebuilding. We will need labor for that. I’ll make sure your friends are treated humanely under the circumstances.”

“But if I’m supposedly CIA, won’t that make my friends guilty, as well?”

“CIA?”

We translated the messages on the phone. “The secret.”

She looked genuinely surprised. “Bravo. I set that up nicely,