“Then how’d your credentials get used twelve times?”
The hack, Karl thought. When they broke into my cerebral computer to leave me that threat about I.I.s.
There was a silence in his head, but he could sense Maynard’s contemplation.
“That would explain how authentic the logs looked. I found it hard to believe they could counterfeit your identity.”
It doesn’t matter, Karl thought. There’s no evidence of the threat. They won’t even listen to me without something to support my claim, which also makes any future appeals that much harder.
“There’s gotta be something that would exonerate you,” Maynard said. His tone didn’t seem so certain, however.
If there is, it better be pretty damn good, Karl started. On top of my badge being used, I have no evidence to support my alibi. All footage of me fleeing or moving around during the attack has been erased. In fact, the mere existence of edited security footage seems to have solidified the case against me further.
“Damn!” Maynard said. If he had hands, he’d have slammed them against a nearby surface. “That’s my fault.”
How do you mean?
“When we were escaping, I was breaching the security feed,” Maynard explained. “Perhaps my handiwork left the footage ruined. I hadn’t thought about that—I hadn’t thought of much more than getting the hell out of there.”
The psychologist took a moment to absorb the information. He wanted to lash out and yell at the I.I. for his part in the sentence, but he knew it was irrational. He had been damned long before the security footage issue arose.
This wasn’t just a bunch of bad luck, Karl said. This is deliberate. Someone wanted us to take the blame, and they wanted us to do so without relying on chance. Whoever is behind this also planted emails between me and the terrorists.
“Emails?”
Yep. And they must be someone I know because they captured my tone flawlessly. Every odd misspelling, every capitalization habit, they had nailed down. They must have gone through thousands of old messages to perfect my voice. Maybe they even had an A.I. scan them.
“So what does this all mean?” Maynard asked. “What do we do?”
It was clear he was becoming overwhelmed with the hopelessness enveloping his host. The wave of dismay that washed over them both was intense.
We’re going to prison, Karl said. There’s nothing to do.
“But we’re innocent!”
You keep saying that like it means something, Karl said.
Caged
Yellow teeth grinned back at Karl. The inmate they belonged to locked his face into a mask of subtle malice, smiling as the psychologist squirmed before him.
“How ‘bout it?” he said. “Willin’ to spare some?”
Karl looked down at his tray. There was a bit of mashed potatoes on one portion, but the knucklehead had put his filthy fist into it when he’d first arrived at the table. Beside that was a cup of fruit, which the brute insisted on having.
Karl reacted with no expression at all. It was like he was an android before it had received emotional training. The thug didn’t seem to like that.
“Whatcha say?” A bit of saliva flew from his lips.
“Fine,” Karl said. “Take it.”
The aggressor cocked his head.
“That’s it?” he asked. “You’re just giving it over to me? Did they take your cock, boy? Are you even a man?”
Karl was at a loss.
“I don’t know what you mean,” he said.
“Don’t you know what respect is, boy?” the inmate asked.
“Yes.”
“Then why aren’t you showin’ it?”
“What?”
“Why aren’t you shown’ it, boy?”
“To who? What do you mean?”
“To me, you shit!”
“Am I not showing respect?”
The inmate slammed his fists onto the table.
“Damned right, you’re not!”
Karl could stay a zombie no longer. His face screwed up in confusion.
“I don’t know what you want!” he said.
Then he felt a sharp pain in his thigh. He hadn’t notice it at first, but the inmate had dropped his fork down below the table and jammed the pronged ends into Karl’s leg at the appropriate moment.
Karl’s face wrenched in pain and he cried out.
The inmate grinned.
“That’s what I want,” he said. Then his smile fell a little. “But you still aren’t looking me in the eye.”
The words reached Karl, but he was in too much agony to respond. The inmate waited a moment before anger stole his expression. He twisted the fork.
Karl writhed in pain, a shriek breaking before it could escape his lips.
“Look me in the eye!” the inmate demanded.
At any moment, Karl could call out for a guard to help him. But he didn’t dare. He would be forever remembered as a snitch, and then it would only be a matter of time before someone killed him in his sleep.
Just before he was about to break and scream for help, an orange jumpsuit blurred past him.
“Stop that!” the jumpsuit shouted.
The voice, another inmate, had a firm grip on the brute’s wrist.
Karl’s aggressor shot a sharp glance at his attacker, then his eyes went wide. His arm loosened, and the fork clanged to the floor.
“What do you think you’re doing there?” the new inmate asked.
“It’s not what it looked like, S.S.,” the aggressor said. “This new meat wasn’t showing me the usual respect.”
“So you expect it’ll come from tortured lips?” the new inmate said.
“I take it how I get it,” was the reply.
Karl’s rescuer twisted the aggressor’s wrist a little, which seemed to bring immense pain.
“If you don’t leave this ‘new meat’ alone, you can consider yourself cut off,” the new inmate said. “Permanently.”
The thug’s expression instantly fell into one of complacency. With a snort, he pounded on the table, stood up, and lumbered away. He stopped to stare at Karl for a moment, which made the psychologist uncomfortable, before he peeled off with the rest of the crowd.
Karl turned to his rescuer.
“Thank you!” he said.
The stranger was rather thin, at least compared with most of the other inmates, but he was tall. He had a sort of spider-like appearance, but that was likely only due to his lankiness. He brushed at his curly red hair before waving a hand of dismissal at Karl.
“Think nothing of it,”
