Working Stiff

home clientele available to me as customers, as Mr. Fairview did. I have to look to the future.”

“I’m not your assassin,” McCallister said. “And she’s not peddling your drugs.”

“Wait. Let’s review. You are an assassin, as we both very well know; Ms. Davis is in a particularly nasty situation, because her supply from Pharmadene is gone, and even if she managed to secure some on the way out, it won’t be much. It doesn’t store well; did you know that? Ineffective in the vials after about a week. Fresh batches are important. So really, there’s no bargaining going on here; you’re going to do what I want, and she’s going to do what I want. Because the alternatives are unthinkable.”

“Where are they?” Bryn asked. She raised her gun and pointed it at Mercer’s face.

He cocked his head, baffled. “Who?”

“The people who live in this house. The kids.”

“Oh, they’re in the back,” he said. “You’re free to go check on them if you’d like, but I promise you, their hearts are still beating. They’re just in a very deep sleep.”

“And where’s Annie?”

“Your sister. Ah, yes.” Mercer glanced behind him, toward a rounded doorway that led into a kitchen; Bryn could see a silvery refrigerator and a sink from the angle where she stood. “In there. Go on. I’ll wait here. By the way, the kitchen door has been jammed shut.”

McCallister started to follow her as she moved, and this time she was the one to give the hand signal. He didn’t like it, but he obeyed … mainly, she thought, because he knew Mercer was far too dangerous to leave unobserved.

She crossed to the kitchen and stepped inside.

For a second she didn’t see anything, and then she heard a scrape, and looked to her left. There was a recessed breakfast nook with a table and chairs. One of the chairs had been turned to face outward.

Annie sat on it, hands tied behind her, legs secured to the wood. She was breathing fast, and her hair was in her eyes, lifting and falling with each rapid gasp.

“Bryn, help,” she whispered, but that was all she had time for, because there was someone sitting behind her who slipped a plastic bag over Annalie’s head and twisted it tight at the neck. Annie immediately panicked, twisting against her bonds, the bag sucked tight into her open, gasping mouth.

“No!” Bryn screamed, and raised her gun.

“Careful,” said the man killing her sister. “I’m just making a point. Look.” He loosened the bag, and slipped it up just enough that Annie sucked in a deep, agonized breath. “Play nice, Double Trouble. I’m not going to tell you twice.”

Double Trouble. Oh, God.

The man torturing her sister was Fast Freddy Watson. His smile was like razors, and there was bitter triumph in it. “You fucking lunatic,” she spat. “Take that off of her. Now! ”

“Nah, I don’t think so; I love watching you squirm,” he said, and snapped the bag back into place. Bryn watched helplessly as her sister arched against her bonds, sucking plastic as she tried to breathe. “How’s life after death?”

She fired a round right by his head, adjusted her aim. He ducked behind Annie, spoiling the shot. “Let her go,” she said. “She’s your leverage, you asshole!”

“Trust me. It’s not going to kill her. Just fuck her up a little bit.”

“I swear to God I’ll shoot you.”

“Gotta shoot her first!”

Behind her, she heard McCallister enter the kitchen. When she glanced back, she saw he’d brought Mercer, and he had his gun at Mercer’s temple. “Let’s call this a draw,” McCallister said. “I pull the trigger and you get no more antide-cay medicine, Freddy. We don’t want that, do we? Let her go.”

Annie was gagging on the bag. It was misted over from her breath, and Bryn had that double-vision nightmare again. She didn’t blink as she met Freddy’s gaze, just visible over her sister’s head. “I’ll put you down, Freddy,” she said. “Don’t think I won’t.”

“I know you would,” he said, “but we both know I’ll get up again.” He shrugged then, and yanked the bag off Annalie’s head. “Whatever.”

Annie coughed and sobbed and gasped, tears streaming down her face, and Bryn came forward, grabbed Freddy, and shoved him facedown onto the floor. “You got him?” she asked McCallister.

“Got him.” He put a foot on the back of Freddy’s neck, and kept the gun trained on the real threat. Mercer.

Bryn rummaged in the kitchen drawers, found scissors, and cut Annalie’s ties at the wrists and ankles. Annie pitched forward into her arms, sobbing wildly. “Shh,” Bryn said, and stroked her matted hair. “Shh, baby, you’re okay. It’s all okay.”

“No, it’s not,” Annie sobbed. “It’s never going to be okay. Never.”

“She’s right,” Freddy said. His voice was muffled against the floor, but he still sounded creepily sure of himself. “Poor little Annie. Not the first time she’s been through that. Right, Annie?”

“What …” Bryn looked at her sister, scraped the hair back from her face, and looked into her eyes. “Annie?”

Annie whispered, “It happened before. The bag. Coming back. The bag.” She was shaking all over, and her face was ice white. If Bryn’s eyes were haunted, Annalie’s were blind mirrors, reflecting only panic and horror. “He likes it.”

Mercer sighed. “I told you not to play with her, Freddy.”

“I was bored,” Freddy said. “She’s fine.”

“She’s no good to us insane.”

“Annie! Annie, look at me. You’re safe now. It’s all right. Understand?” Bryn hugged her again, and got her to stand up with her. Annie’s skin felt damp and cold. Where she’d been tied, it was …

... Discolored.

“Annie?”

Her eyes weren’t just blind; they were ever so slightly cloudy. The whites were discolored.

There were livid red bruises on her skin where it had rested on the chair’s arms.

“Annie. Oh, God …” Bryn felt suddenly, violently sick, and had to fight the impulse to throw up. She turned, screamed out her fury, and pointed her gun at Freddy’s head. “You killed her,” she said. “You son of a bitch! You killed my sister! You killed her and you brought her back too many times!” Burning tears blinded her, and she came close, so close to pulling the trigger. That was why there were bruises. Why Annie’s eyes were cloudy, even though she hadn’t been long out of revival.

Because he’d been using up the nanites too quickly by torturing her.

Mercer said, “I needed leverage, Bryn. Something you cared about other than your own survival; I couldn’t count on you not being ridiculously self-sacrificing, what with your military service background. Now you’ve got good reason to work with me. Oh, and please don’t shoot Freddy; it’ll be hours before he’s any good to me again.”

McCallister shoved him face-first into a wall and held him there, gun at the back of his head. He was tight with fury, and the look he gave Bryn was black with it. “You want me to do it?” he asked. “Tell me and it’s done.”

Mercer held up a single finger. “As Harte expected, I’ve taken precautions,” he said. “You see, I don’t want to be one of the zombies. I have a counteragent in my system that will destroy any nanites injected in my bloodstream. If you put a bullet in my brain, it’s the end. No revival. No more drugs for your girlfriend or her sister.”

She wanted Mercer dead; God, she wanted it with every aching cell in her body, but it wouldn’t solve anything. Not now. “You can‘t,” she said. “We need him. God help me, we need him. I need him.”

Down on the floor, Fast Freddy rolled over on his back, looked up at Bryn, and laughed.

“But I don’t need you,” she said, and shot him in the face.

Twice.

Annie screamed and covered her face with her hands. Then she staggered away and threw up in the sink. Her shorts revealed telltale lividity bruising all along the backs of her thighs.