Page 3 of The Vigilante's Lover
It will do no good for the prison’s mood measurement system to pick up any deviation from the norm. Even if the guards aren’t monitoring it, the Vigilantes are. I recognize their tech over the pathetic measures the civilians put in place.
I step forward and glance up at the conduct screen on the wall outside my cell. Still green.
A disembodied voice barks a command from the speakers. “Inmates out and proceed to morning assignments.”
My fellow prisoners shuffle out in a jumbled wave. Most stare straight ahead, their morning stimulants not yet kicking through theirblood. These I ignore. They are of no consequence to my plan, aside from obstacles to sidestep, like one might avoid a pothole in the road.
A few cast glances at the others, though. Schemers, plotters, and the paranoid. They are the unknown element, something that could destroy all my hard work with an unexpected move.
I fall in with the flow of disenchanted humanity. Head forward, but aware of everyone around me. At the end of the cell block, the stream splits in two, then again at each intersection. Now we are only a few, but inmates from other cell blocks reinforce our numbers as we walk through the central hub.
I feel the unfriendly gaze of a guard fix on me. Johnson.
“De Luca! Step over here.”
Johnson’s voice holds a touch of malice. I move to stand in front of him, my expression neutral. He sneers as he looks me over, then waves a mood wand over my body. It hums a bluish green.
He frowns, seeming to expect something more interesting. He glances at my prison badge, which lists my morning assignment on a digital display.
“Book duty again? Figures an egg like yourself would land there as much as you can.”
I say nothing. He loves to play these games, and I can little afford the time.
“No voice today, egg?” His mean eyes lock on mine. His face is unshaven in a way he probably assumes attracts women, but merely looks unkempt on his fat-cheeked jowls.
I cycle through words of calm in my head. “I have no say in my assignment,” I answer with as little emotion as possible. His mood wand flickers.
Johnson laughs, a rough and unpleasant sound. In another place and a different time, I’d have floored him. I might yet. But for now I just wait.
“Like hell you don’t,” he says. “You’re a schemer. And schemers work the system.”
A vein throbs in his neck. His pulse is quickening, and I need to diffuse this now. He is acting out of the norm. The mood detection sensor will pick up on it, and my plan will unravel if we go into lockdown. The system doesn’t care who is upset — inmate or guard. It just reacts.
“As you say, sir,” I respond, my tone flat.
“Oh, I do,” he says. “And I also say you ain’t going to the library today. I got better plans for you.”
My eyes drop to the wand in his hand. It flickers briefly into yellow. This isn’t part of Johnson’s game, though, so he flips it off and shoves it in his belt. The overhead monitors are much less sensitive.
“All right,” I say, as if it doesn’t matter to me either way. “But I believe McGruder provided the work assignments for today. He may feel differently.”
Fat McGruder is the captain for my cell block. Evoking his name has the intended effect. Johnson exhales in anger through his nose. For a moment I think he’s going to grow a spine for once and go against his commander, but then he looks away.
“Get out of here, egg. Before I find an excuse to give you some physical reprimand.”
“As you say, sir.” The confrontation over, I don’t make much effort to hide my amusement, but Johnson doesn’t seem to notice. Yes, I’ll definitely come back to exact a bit of vengeance on this one.
I’m sixty seconds behind schedule. I quicken my pace to make up half that by the time I walk into the library, the least-patrolled room of the prison. I had to pull a lot of internal strings to get this duty. Traded a small fortune in cigarettes and low-tech weaponry. I took care to never arm anyone with something I couldn’t defend against in my sleep. Didn’t matter. They were grateful.
I scan my badge at the library entrance and head back into the stacks.
Rows of musty books line the gray metal shelves. They only reach up to my chest, a way to keep inmates in view. The guard glances mydirection, a simple acknowledgment of my position, then turns back to his work.
“You’re late,” a deep voice whispers in my ear.
“I know,” I say without turning. Sam is actually five rows away, but angled such that his voice projector can reach only me.
“Little Women,” he says. “Third shelf.”
