Page 31 of Gamma
Alexei runs his fingers through his hair, scraping the salt-and-pepper locks back over his scalp. “Explain.”
Thomas flips his phone over and searches for something—when he finds it, he twists the phone around to face us, landscape-oriented. On the screen is a video, which he taps to play. It’s grainy, shaky, and taken from far away, so even zoomed it’s hard to make out much. It’s the fortress in question, a looming, squat structure of giant stone blocks, crumbling with age—it must be at least a thousand years old. There’s an opening where a giant gate must have been in ages past, now simply a wide notch in the stone walls. On the other side, a small courtyard, which is the focus of the video. There’s a truck backed into the courtyard, a giant ex-military truck, the kind of thing used to move troops around. Several armed guards stand around the truck, carrying M-16s, AK-47s, HKs, and Uzis—their focus is on the rear of the truck, which from this angle is hidden.
For a moment, it’s just the guards standing there, waiting. And then a woman appears, clearly having just hopped or been hauled down from the bed of the truck. One of the guards gestures with his barrel, and the woman walks, head down, shoulders hunched, into the bulk of the fortress. The video is being recorded from too far away to make out much of anything except rough features, but it’s apparent the girl is a prisoner, perhaps even bound wrists in front of her. Another woman makes the short trip, and another. I count twenty-six in all. When they’re done unloading, two of the guards take a side of the gate, lift it up, latch it, and then one of them whacks the side of the truck twice with a fist, and the mammoth vehicle trundles out of the courtyard and out of the frame—leaving at least a dozen guards milling around and chatting. Slowly, they enter the building where the women had gone, and then, just like that, it’s an old ruin once more.
“No fucking way,” Duke growls, rage in his tone. “Not a fucking chance in hell.”
“Duke,” I say, swallowing hard. “I want to hear his idea.”
Thomas eyes me curiously. “You would consider it.”
Duke looks at me, stabs a finger at me. “Donotfuckin’considerit for a single goddamn second, Corinna Abigail Roth.”
I arch an eyebrow at him. “You don’t get to use my full name, Duke…middle name…Silver.” Duke can’t help but chuckle at that. “I also don’t remember asking your permission.”
“I wouldn’t send someone I hated into the lion’s den like this fool is suggesting—much less you.”
“When I said there’s nothing I wouldn’t do, I meant it.” I turn to Thomas. “But the only way me going undercover or whatever makes any sense is if there’s a plan to get us out.”
Thomas bobs his head side to side. “I did not say there was a plan—only an idea. You go in, pretending to be ‘merchandise’.” He uses finger quotes, here. “Someone else would have to be one of the guards, or…the truck driver, or something. If the girls go there, I think also there are people going there to buy them. So if you can find someone to pose as a buyer…” he gestures at me. “She finds the people you wish to free. The buyer is there to make sure nothing happens to her. On the outside, there will be a distraction. A shooting of the truck, after the girls are unloaded. Chaos, explosions, the killing of guards.” He indicates Duke. “This is where you come in. Make off with your imprisoned friends, and we have some kind of getaway ready not too very far away. It is the best I can come up with.”
Alexei’s eyes go to me. “Is a stupid plan, Miss Roth.” He sighs. “But I think is only one will work.”
Duke shakes his head. “Fuck no.”
I rub my temples. “So I get myself kidnapped by…” I drop my voice and lean forward, whispering. “By Spaulding’s traffickers.” I resume a more normal tone. “I’m at their mercy all the way into the fortress. Once in, I have to hope and pray I find a way to escape wherever we’re being held, without being raped or killed. Then I have to find Apollo and Yelena, somehow get them free from whereverthey’rebeing held. My only protection is…someone? Someone acting like a buyer, or something. Meanwhile, you guys attack a fortified position, outnumbered by at least a dozen to one. Then, once all that is done, me, Apollo, Yelena, and my so-called buyer will have to escape the fortress, reach you guys outside the fortress—andthenwe finally get away. Do I have that right?”
Thomas nods, shrugs. “Yes, that is it, more or less.”
I look at Alexei, and then Duke. “You guys have a better idea?”
Neither says a word.
Duke leans his elbows on the table, clutching his head. “Fuck, fuck,fuck! Your dad would kill me. And then your mom would resurrect me soshecan kill me.”
Alexei rubs his jaw. “Many ways it can go wrong.”
“With a very small margin of success,” Duke adds.
A new voice enters the conversation. “But it really is the only thing we have.”
I start, looking to my right, over my shoulder, where the voice came from—a man at a nearby table, just within earshot; he’s wearing an olive drab bucket hat, dirty jeans, and a ratty gray T-shirt. He’s alone, his back to the room. I’d barely noticed him—I don’t know that even Duke had really seen him. Has he been here this whole time, or did he just arrive? I honestly can’t say.
Duke, for his part, frowns, peers at the newcomer, and then laughs. “Goddammit, Anselm. I fuckin’ hate it when you do that.”
I look again—he’s got a fake beard on, but the only reason I know it’s fake is because I’m now aware of who he really is, and that Anselm doesn’t have a beard—otherwise, there’s no way to tell it’s fake, so well done is it. He’s wearing sunglasses, as well, mirrored aviators—and he’s wearing them indoors. Not like Anselm at all, who is the least pretentious person I know.
It’s just enough of a disguise that I may not have recognized him even if I’d seen his face. But facing away, hunched over, silently puffing on a hookah? Even Duke didn’t recognize him, and they’ve known each other for thirty years.
Anselm shoves his chair toward our table, the back of it facing us, and straddles it, removing the sunglasses. He produces a cell phone from a pocket, sets it on the table, and presses play on a video he’s got cued up.
It’s Apollo. His face is carved from stone, expressionless. He’s holding a note card, from which he reads in a monotone voice, not looking at the camera—his eyes flick, once, briefly, away from the note card, to the right. At some off-screen. Yelena? Spaulding?
“…If you care about our lives at all, you will wait for further instructions. That is all.” His voice trails off.
Yelena stumbles on-screen, as if pushed. Apollo catches her, his hands resting possessively on her shoulders. She’s unharmed, but visibly terrified. Her eyes are fixed off-screen—on Spaulding, I imagine.
She flinches, shrinks against Apollo—at some silent command from the off-screen presence, I assume.