just don’t get it — we had an understanding, you and me…”
We rumbled over a metal plate, the van’s shocks rocking, and then the rocking changed. We were on water. Heading to Treasure Island. Hey, Ange was there. Darryl, too. Maybe.
The hood didn’t come off until I was in my cell. They didn’t bother with the cuffs at my wrists and ankles, just rolled me off the stretcher and onto the floor. It was dark, but by the moonlight from the single, tiny, high window, I could see that the mattress had been taken off the cot. The room contained me, a toilet, a bed-frame, and a sink, and nothing else.
I closed my eyes and let the ocean lift me. I floated away. Somewhere, far below me, was my body. I could tell what would happen next. I was being left to piss myself. Again. I knew what that was like. I’d pissed myself before. It smelled bad. It itched. It was humiliating, like being a baby.
But I’d survived it.
I laughed. The sound was weird, and it drew me back into my body, back to the present. I laughed and laughed. I’d had the worst that they could throw at me, and I’d survived it, and I’d
I let my bladder cut loose. It was sore and full anyway, and no time like the present.
The ocean swept me away.
When morning came, two efficient, impersonal guards cut the bindings off of my wrists and ankles. I still couldn’t walk — when I stood, my legs gave way like a stringless marionette’s. Too much time in one position. The guards pulled my arms over their shoulders and half-dragged/half-carried me down the familiar corridor. The bar codes on the doors were curling up and dangling now, attacked by the salt air.
I got an idea. “Ange!” I yelled. “Darryl!” I yelled. My guards yanked me along faster, clearly disturbed but not sure what to do about it. “Guys, it’s me, Marcus! Stay free!”
Behind one of the doors, someone sobbed. Someone else cried out in what sounded like Arabic. Then it was cacophony, a thousand different shouting voices.
They brought me to a new room. It was an old shower-room, with the shower-heads still present in the mould tiles.
“Hello, M1k3y,” Severe Haircut said. “You seem to have had an eventful morning.” She wrinkled her nose pointedly.
“I pissed myself,” I said, cheerfully. “You should try it.”
“Maybe we should give you a bath, then,” she said. She nodded, and my guards carried me to another stretcher. This one had restraining straps running its length. They dropped me onto it and it was ice-cold and soaked through. Before I knew it, they had the straps across my shoulders, hips and ankles. A minute later, three more straps were tied down. A man’s hands grabbed the railings by my head and released some catches, and a moment later I was tilted down, my head below my feet.
“Let’s start with something simple,” she said. I craned my head to see her. She had turned to a desk with an Xbox on it, connected to an expensive-looking flat-panel TV. “I’d like you to tell me your login and password for your Pirate Party email, please?”
I closed my eyes and let the ocean carry me off the beach.
“Do you know what waterboarding is, M1k3y?” Her voice reeled me in. “You get strapped down like this, and we pour water over your head, up your nose and down your mouth. You can’t suppress the gag reflex. They call it a simulated execution, and from what I can tell from this side of the room, that’s a fair assessment. You won’t be able to fight the feeling that you’re dying.”
I tried to go away. I’d heard of waterboarding. This was it, real torture. And this was just the beginning.
I couldn’t go away. The ocean didn’t sweep in and lift me. There was a tightness in my chest, my eyelids fluttered. I could feel clammy piss on my legs and clammy sweat in my hair. My skin itched from the dried puke.
She swam into view above me. “Let’s start with the login,” she said.
I closed my eyes, squeezed them shut.
“Give him a drink,” she said.
I heard people moving. I took a deep breath and held it.
The water started as a trickle, a ladleful of water gently poured over my chin, my lips. Up my upturned nostrils. It went back into my throat, starting to choke me, but I wouldn’t cough, wouldn’t gasp and suck it into my lungs. I held onto my breath and squeezed my eyes harder.
There was a commotion from outside the room, a sound of chaotic boots stamping, angry, outraged shouts. The dipper was emptied into my face.
I heard her mutter something to someone in the room, then to me she said, “Just the login, Marcus. It’s a simple request. What could I do with your login, anyway?”
This time, it was a bucket of water, all at once, a flood that didn’t stop, it must have been gigantic. I couldn’t help it. I gasped and aspirated the water into my lungs, coughed and took more water in. I knew they wouldn’t kill me, but I couldn’t convince my body of that. In every fiber of my being, I knew I was going to die. I couldn’t even cry — the water was still pouring over me.
Then it stopped. I coughed and coughed and coughed, but at the angle I was at, the water I coughed up dribbled back into my nose and burned down my sinuses.
The coughs were so deep they hurt, hurt my ribs and my hips as I twisted against them. I hated how my body was betraying me, how my mind couldn’t control my body, but there was nothing for it.
Finally, the coughing subsided enough for me to take in what was going on around me. People were shouting and it sounded like someone was scuffling, wrestling. I opened my eyes and blinked into the bright light, then craned my neck, still coughing a little.
