Protect All Monsters (3 page)

This was an interrogation room.

“Why am I being interrogated?”

The man’s expression was clinical. “You’re in the process of being informed.” He pulled out the chair for her. “Sit down. Please.”

She did as she was instructed. “Can I change out of these clothes? You realize I just saw my brother killed, don’t you? What’s wrong with you people? Why am I being treated like this?”

“Yes, I do realize what you’ve been through.” He sat down, acting more concerned about lighting his cigarette. “Let me tell you a bit about myself first. This is important, so listen up. I work for the government. So does the officer who brought you here. I’m the head of the agency called the PSA, or the Private Security Agency.”

“What the hell does that have to do with me? I’m a legal citizen. My parents are legal citizens. I’m a native-born American. I haven’t committed any crimes. I’m hardly a threat to national security.”

“Ah, you’re getting warm.” He blew out a fine blue smoke ring. “My name’s Toby Quinn. I’ve been doing my job for the better part of fifteen years. My organization has existed for about fifty years. Our system is perfected. We need good people to be of service to our country.”

“Y-y-you want me to go overseas and fight in a war? You’re picking a heck of a time to recruit me. ‘Oh, your brother is dead…hey, join the Marines’.”

Toby broke out in hysterical laughter. He leaned against the wall slapping his leg, really broken up. He was unable to collect himself for minutes. When he did, it was like a switch, and he was serious again.

He offered her a cigarette. She accepted it. Needed it.

“I appreciate your candor. I go through this process at least forty times a week. I’m going to be brutally honest with you, Addey. I’m like a United States Army recruiter. I pick the shitty, low-class parts of the cities to find my participants. Now, I can’t just ask them to join us. We can’t go public either. Nope. Human rights activists would shit a political brick. It’s best the general population remains dumb to our problem. I have to swoop down and capture people during some heavy shit to convince our recruits to join in the effort. I have to call my people—like the ones you witnessed at the crime scene—and have them do their thing before the media gloms on to what we’re doing.” His eyes narrowed in on her. “National security—global security—is at stake.”

She was disappointed the cigarette was already three-quarters spent. “You’re hardly cutting to the chase.”

He visibly took pleasure in what he shared next. “You’re low class, which means you’re poor. You’re exploitable, okay? Your brother was a drug dealer. Hardly the sultan of the earth. Your parents are Mexican. You’re minority. You’re single. You’re a workaholic. You’re a loner. You don’t have many friends. I’m not a racist, and I’m not trying to pick on you, but these are the qualities I look for when recruiting. You’ve been on a list for years. You graduated high school with a 3.6 GPA despite working forty hours a week. You’ve paid your bills and survived without giving in to drugs or crime. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders. That’s also why you’re here.”

What could she say to this except, “I’m still very confused.”

Mr. Quinn checked his watch. “Ah, it’s about time.” He turned on the television that was propped on the cart across from her to Channel 5 Action News. “Give it a few seconds, and you’ll see.”

The reporter, Linda Evans, stood in front of the Sunshine Motel amid a local police crew and an ambulance. Linda began: “
Tonight, tragedy struck a local motel. Employee Addey Ruanova was shot dead tonight by a drug dealer trying to break into the manager’s office. The culprit was also gunned down. His name was Deke Ruanova. Junior, the motel's manager, was the only one to survive the vicious attack
.”

The camera panned to “Junior Alverez”. He was wearing the Lakers jacket and those thick-rimmed glasses. He was identical to the murder victim, a spitting image. Even his voice sounded right. “
It’s terrible what happened. Addey saved my life when Deke tried to shoot me. I gave him what he wanted, the money, access to my safe, and he was still disgruntled. He shot Addey, and he was going to shoot me, but Addey managed to take the gun and shoot him first. Deke shot back in the scuffle, and she was murdered.”
Crying now,
“God bless her, she saved my life
.”

The pit of her stomach dropped a hundred flights. It slowly sank in: the news report, her death, and Junior standing in for the interview—the man who’d had half his head missing! She shot up from her chair, outraged. Mr. Quinn shoved her back into her seat. “Look, you’ve got a long few days ahead of you and some major adjusting, so calm yourself down. Please.”

Addey pounded her cuffed hands against the table, feeling herself trapped in Toby Quinn’s exploitative grasp. “What the hell is this you’re trying to pull? I’m not dead. How could Junior be standing there? He’s the one who was killed tonight. Why do all this shit for me if I’m a low-class Mexican not worth a damn, according to you? I’m a nobody. I’m afraid to find out what exactly you’re planning to do with me for all this effort.”

Mr. Quinn went to work to assuage her outburst. He set a laptop computer on the table. He turned it on and began typing. “Computer technology has worked wonders for us in the past decade or so. It’s easier to recruit people in your circumstances. You see, there are two kinds of police. The normal police, and then there’s us. Only certain people are in the know about what we really do. You have to be dead to help us—in the ‘on the books’ sense of dead, I mean.

“Junior is computer-animated art. Tonight, he’ll commit suicide in his apartment. His head’s already blown off, so the story will stick. The reporters work for us. The police—our men—work both sides of the deal. It’s for the good of mankind, Addey. You’ll see very soon. I’m sorry your brother died, and I’m sorry we’ve taken liberties with your life. You can’t ask people to do this job. You can only create these exploitable situations when real shit actually happens—real deaths, real crimes. You’re the perfect candidate. We pool the names of people like you and wait for tragedy to strike. When the shit hits the fan, we’re there to clean it up. That’s being honest.”

Mr. Quinn turned the computer to her angle. The Web site was labeled
Private Security Agency
. A file was uploaded: Addey Christine Ruanova. He deleted her name, social security number, driver’s license, home address, school records, birth certificate and bank accounts—the savings at a hard-earned five grand. He was a pianist, playing to his heart’s desire.

“Stop that! What the hell are you doing?”

The man was taking a demented pleasure in erasing her existence. Her life was unraveling. She was helpless to those orchestrating the downfall. “So I’m dead now in flesh and on paper? Is this getting you off? You’re really enjoying this. Well, I don’t think it’s so funny. Show some humility.
Asshole
.”

“Humility? I might be ruthless, but it’s necessary. This is a tough job, dismantling people’s lives and sending them off to that damnable island.”

“Island? Am I going on vacation?”

“You wish.” Now he was somber. “Okay, I apologize for getting carried away. I’m scaring you, and you’ve been through the worst night of your life.”

“This is the worst night of my life.” She stubbed her cigarette into the ashtray. “Can I have another one?”

He handed her another cigarette and a book of matches. “Knock yourself out. You deserve it.”

She smoked with a vigor unknown to her, though she normally smoked half a pack a day. She was taking in too much information and was already backed up with other questions. Understanding wasn’t an option, she concluded. She had to listen to the man talk, and that was it.

Her mind churned out deplorable ideas. “So what’s my funeral going to be like?”

He smirked. “Closed casket.”

Chapter Three

Mr. Quinn removed her handcuffs and directed her to a different wing of the facility. The building as a whole seemed uninhabited at this time of night. She could read it was one o’clock in the morning on the oversize clock in the foyer. The water fountain nearby eased the tension in her body, the sound of water pattering against water. She clung to anything to distract her from the night’s events. It wasn’t long before a security officer at the desk ahead of them monitored them with too much interest.

“Good evening, Mr. Quinn,” the security officer said. “How goes you?”

“Evening, Ted.”

They shared a look that agreed she was in for something crazy.

They cleared a short hall, where at each side of them was a wooden door, one marked “Men’s” and the other “Women’s”. It reminded her of the segregation of a public swimming pool. She heard the sound of a running shower in the far background. Mr. Quinn stopped at a hole in the wall marked “Receiving”.

“This is your stop,” he said, tapping the bell on the counter twice. A person was awakened from the back. The woman was in her late sixties, her beehive hair an obvious wig. Her eyes were slanted and red from sleep. “How was your nap, Stella?”

“Wonderful until you came along.” Stella studied Addey with sympathy. The woman dug into a shelf behind her, gathered ten different pieces of paperwork, stapled them and placed them on a clipboard. “Sign your life away.”

Mr. Quinn sneered at her. “Thank you, Stella.”

He flipped through the pages, showing her the document. “There is a positive side to this. You sign on for two years, you get a full ride to the college of your liking. Also, your folks will receive a two-hundred-grand handout from the government. Call it a giant food stamp.” He thought it was a clever joke Addey would enjoy. She didn’t laugh. “It’s for your trouble, okay? We’ll label it as a life insurance policy, and your parents are the beneficiaries.”

He seized her arm, his grip cold as it was circulation cutting. He whispered in her ear, “You can survive. Watch your back and don’t trust anybody. You make it two years, you’re home free. Never be afraid to defend yourself. That could mean murder. Nobody will hold it against you.”

He turned to the final page, returning to whom he had been moments before his strange warning. “Sign on the bottom.”

“Do I have a choice?”

He offered a crooked smile.

“Yeah, I thought so.”

She signed the document, and she’d regret it indefinitely.

Mr. Quinn said good-bye, and they parted ways. Stella reappeared and pointed to the women’s room. “You can clean yourself up, dear. There will be a hot shower and clothes your size waiting inside. Take your time. This is all overwhelming, I’m sure. If it’s any consolation, you’re being strong. You can’t go wrong when you’re strong.”

The words sounded like dialogue from a cheesy after-school special. She let it go and walked to the wooden door at the end of the hall. She opened it, and it was a shower stall with a bathroom, mirror and set of clothes in a plastic bag folded neatly on a shelf.

The door was locked behind her, the audible click making her jump. “Relax. It’s just me, Stella.”

Just when she thought her situation was awful enough, she caught her reflection in the mirror. Blood caked her neck and chest, and it completely stained her legs. The red was a breaking crust. The majority of it was Deke’s.

Her brother was dead.

The PSA hadn’t bothered to computer fake his image.

She stood frozen. Her black hair—“Black as a jelly bean,” her mother used to say—was coming undone from the hair clip, the curly length extending down to her shoulders. She owned a soft, doughy face. Her skin was tanned from the summer sun. She didn’t burn. A flat, emotionless expression had taken over her otherwise friendly demeanor.

Addey checked the room for windows. There were none. She kept thinking out an escape plan, and nothing came together. What would happen if she did escape the facility and somehow reach civilization? Would someone be waiting in hiding to capture her or gun her down?

“I can’t beat them,” she said to herself. “Whatever, I need a shower.”

She undressed and cleaned her brother’s blood from her body.

Her skin was the color of blush. The shower had been hot enough to scald clean. She changed into a black skirt and a white button-up shirt: what was provided. A name was embroidered into the right breast pocket:
Addey
.

“This is impossible.”

She eyed the name again and again.

She tried on the black pumps, the heels three inches long. Before she could attempt to open the door, it was opened for her. Stella waited at the threshold.

“Good girl, you’re cleaned up and dressed. You won’t be needing your old clothes anymore. Okay, dear. You can leave the room.”

She considered overtaking the old woman and running for her life, but where would that get her? They’d find her, the PSA, and she’d be in no better position than before.

Stella gave her uniform the once-over. “Oh, you’ve got a tear in your back. Can’t they make these clothes to last? Here, let me fix that.”

The woman moved behind her. That was the moment Addey was pricked at the neck. Instantly she was on her knees, her head spinning like a top, the scene turning into burning pixels of blurry color. She peered up at Stella, who was welding a spent syringe.

She said, “I’m so sorry, dear. There’s no time to explain things. You have a plane to catch.”