Black drew a long, deep breath, and put his fingertips to the bridge of his nose, looking down at the tabletop for long seconds. Without looking up, he said, “Dr. Withers, step it up, if you please.”
“Wait, what?” Gerber said, surprised, as Withers pulled out an orange-labeled ampoule, and loaded it; this time, the injector touched the side of his neck. “I’m telling the truth!” The injector hissed as it deposited its contents in his circulatory system.
“And I’ve already told you, we know you aren’t,” Black retorted, even as Gerber felt the stronger drug hit his system. He shivered and briefly felt nauseated.
This one is going to take some effort to fight, he thought. Just got to stay calm. This ‘chair is the lie detector’ business is bullshit. They need finger sensors, cranial sensors, a blood pressure monitor, eye monitors, all that shit. No way this chair is doing all that. It’s just a plain ol’ metal lockup chair, bolted to the floor. Sure, it’s a little more ergonomic than most, but it’s probably to intimidate with the ‘lie detector’ shit. The straps and cuffs they have me strapped in here with – they’re not even attached to the chair. If I can stay calm, I can bluff ‘em.
“Now,” Black continued. “I’m going to try this again. Be sure to give me correct answers this time, because there isn’t any return otherwise.”
Bullshit, Gerber thought.
It took a lot of effort – almost more than Gerber could manage to exert – but he pushed through the new drug and gave them his cover story. Black paused in essentially the same place. He and the doctor stared at each other for long moments, then Black nodded.
“Are you sure, Captain?” Dr. Withers answered that nod. “There’s no coming back from this one.”
“You can see the telemetry as well as I can, Doctor,” Black said. “Until we can get him to tell us the truth, it’s pointless.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Gerber asked. “What does ‘there’s no coming back from this one’ even mean?”
“It means that, unlike the previous drugs I’ve just given you, there is no antagonist, no antidote, to the drug I am about to give you,” Withers said then. “It is, effectively, a mind-force. It gives your brain, your nervous system, no choice but to obey what Captain Black says. If he tells you to do something, you will do it. If he asks you a question, you will answer it. If he told you to leap off the tallest building in Imperial City, you would do so. You will know what you are doing, but be unable to stop. In this respect, it creates a schism in your mind itself. One part of your brain is obeying the Captain. The other part of your brain is trying to regain control. The end result is inevitable – you will go mad by the time we are done.”
“MAD??”
“Mad, insane, lunatic, psychotic, crazy, out of your mind, whatever term you prefer to use,” Withers confirmed. “The last time I saw someone taken this far was just a few years ago. When he lost his mind, he began to scream, and didn’t stop until he was executed the next day. The first time I saw it was quite a while back – before the last Empress was assassinated. I was a trainee, observing in VR. That subject went insane, and subsequently shit herself, pissed herself, and threw up all over herself. Then she sat there and drooled, with empty eyes, until the physician administered the lethal injection. It isn’t a pretty thing to watch. I can’t imagine living it is any easier.”
“WHAT?!” Gerber shouted, appalled.
“I told you,” Black said. “We will have the information the Emperor desires. We have no compunctions about continuing to use stronger and stronger medications on you until we get the information we want. Your life is already forfeit for your failure to cooperate. If your mind is forfeit in the process, that is your choice, not ours.”
“I’ve been telling you the truth! I’VE BEEN TELLING YOU THE TRUTH!” Gerber shouted, even as Black nodded at Withers, and Withers reached into his bag and removed a red ampoule, fitting it into the injector. “NO! STOP! I’M TELLING YOU THE TRUTH!”
“Would you like to see the telemetry?” Black asked, calm. “I’m opening a VR channel for you. Have a look. I’m sure you’ve seen the like before.”
Gerber dropped into the channel and watched a dual feed: video of his interrogation on the top, and the annotated telemetry scroll on the bottom. Each time he answered a question, the telemetry ‘bumped,’ depicting his lie for everyone to see.
And all I told them was my name, address, and place of birth, he thought. And they knew, instantly, I was lying. All my training is worthless against this. They have a system here that the DP never even thought of.
He dropped out of VR and stared at them in speechless horror.
“Well?” Black asked, still calm.
Gerber could say nothing. Truthfully, he didn’t know what to say.
“Very well. You may proceed, Dr. Withers.”
Gerber tried to pull away, but Withers followed, and the red-labeled drug hissed into his neck, even as he tensed to fight it.
What happened next felt like his brain was put into a vise.
And the vise tightened more with every second that passed.
“What is your real name?”
“Fran- Franz A-Adelbert Ga- Gerber.”
“Have you ever used the alias, ‘Frank Garb’?”
“Y-yes.”
“On Sintar?”
“Yes.”
“Is Frank Garb the identity you use on Sintar?”
“Yes.”
“Where were you born?”
“Durmstadt, Essen.”
“And that is where?”
“Essen District.”
“In what polity?”
“The Democracy of Planets.”
“Are you loyal to Emperor Trajan?”
“Ye- uhn. Y-y-” Gerber broke off and took a deep
