Chapter #9A Real Face to a Real Face by: Seuzz   Banks wraps one arm across your chest and seizes your shoulder opposite; he wraps his other arm across your neck and grasps the side of your head. You tense and hunch, feeling for a way to throw him off you.
"Careful, precious," he murmurs in your ear. "I'd love to catch up with you, but I'll snap your neck if I have to."
So you wilt. Obviously, it's better if you play for time.
"Good," your old mentor says. "You haven't forgotten everything I taught you." His voice drops to an inarticulate murmur whose words you can't catch. Not until you feel his palm going to your forehead do you realize what he's doing.
* * * * *
You rise through the thick, clinging darkness into gasping consciousness. You roll onto your side, and find your hands manacled behind your back. Too-large boots slide around uncomfortably on your feet, and Sullivan's uniform bunches up around your slim torso. A dark mane of hair falls over your face.
"Moustache has been busy," Banks says from somewhere on the other side of your tangled hair. "Busy and ingenious. Used to, you'd have to change from one mask to another if you wanted to show the world Paige Knotts's face."
You toss your hair back—well, most of it; some still trails across your cheek—and glare at Banks. You're lying on the bed; he is sitting in a chair at your bedside, studying a mask in his hand. "Did you ever tell the others that there's no such person as Paige Knotts, that she was just another mask?" he continues. "Or does this new trick just make it easier to keep pretending?"
You don't reply.
"Oh, don't be that way, Prescott," he says softly, and raises a keen and appraising eye toward you. "You won't compromise anything by telling me. And it would be nice to catch up."
There's no such thing as small talk, you remind yourself, and hold your tongue.
"Mm." He lays the mask on the bed, and retrieves something from the floor. It's another mask. "I suppose this one was for me," he says. He picks up something else: a syringe. "As was this."
You're bursting with frustration and furious self-recriminations, but you manage to keep your tone cool. "Tit for tat," you say. "You wanna catch up on old times, Zack, you gotta pay for it."
"Why should I pay?" he retorts, and fondles the blank mask. "I just have to get this onto you and I'll know everything."
"You'd just rip it out of me? What happened to 'catching up'? And you don't put masks on, Zack. In all the years we worked together—"
"You never saw me get into one," he finishes for you. "Doesn't mean it didn't happen, sweetheart. But sure, I'll play tit for tat. I don't like these cold silences any more than you do."
Good. The longer you delay him, the more suspicious Kips should be when you don't show up, and the more careful he'll be when he comes looking for Banks.
You stare at each other as Banks settles back in his chair. Maybe it's courtesy and maybe it's strategy, but it appears he's willing to let you go first. "When did you spot me?" you ask.
"When I got the mask off you. Ray Sullivan turned out to be a sulky little girl."
"Bullshit! You wouldn't assault someone on the chance that—"
Banks raises a finger. "My turn. Did you ever tell the guys at Diana that your real name is William Prescott? Or are you still pretending to be Paige Knotts with them?"
You roll your eyes. "No, I never told them."
"How come?"
"My turn," you retort. "Why did you take a chance assaulting Ray Sullivan? He could've been real. I could have been somewhere else."
"I chanced it because I was pretty sure Danny Barone wasn't real. It was so convenient, him already set up to liaise with me. Sullivan, obviously, is where his partner would be."
"Still, I could've—"
"Why didn't you ever tell those guys your real story?"
You roll onto your back and sigh deeply. You don't really mind these impertinent, irrelevant questions. They waste time, which is what you want. But it's like Banks is enjoying the torture by picking these topics. Probably that's exactly what he's doing, you reflect. Probing, cracking, prying indirectly; anything to get you talking, into accidentally revealing anything important, so that he doesn't have to use that mask to learn what he wants from you. But you're happy to filibuster. You just can't let him realize you want to filibuster.
"It's none of their business, is it," you say. Banks says nothing. "And it's not like I'm any use to anyone when I'm using my own face. Being blind and everything. I explained all this to you once upon a time, didn't I? It's easiest just having one face for everyone."
Banks chuckles. "Then why are you walking around with some many?" He holds up Sullivan's mask.
"It's my job! And it was your job to— My turn to ask a question!"
"Then ask one."
If he wants to rehash history: "Why did you quit Fane?"
"I didn't. They quit me."
"They fired you?" You raise your head.
"What did you hear about it, Prescott?"
"I heard you went native after Nzhingha kicked Ishtar out. What's your side of it?"
"How nice that you want to hear my side of it. How unprofessional of you, too." He smiles sourly. "They fucked up with me. They put me on Nzhingha's payroll." He snorts. "They expected me to be loyal to them, even though he was the one paying my bills." He pauses. "Even though he was putting his life in my hands."
A cold shiver skitters up your spine. "So you did go native."
"I suppose, if that's the way you want to look at it. The way I look at it, Hyde-White has your soul pickling in a jar someplace, though you'll call it loyalty and gratitude to Fane."
That cuts, hard and deep. Now you're ready to change the subject. "Did you get a phone call before you called me?"
"No. Why don't you make a new life for yourself, Prescott?" Banks cocks his head. "You can make yourself into anyone. Why play Hyde-White's junk-yard poodle?"
"He controls the masks. I can't disappear."
"We got a mask here." He holds up the blank. "You could fall in the line of duty, you and— Who are you partnered with on this job? Kips? My gut tells me it'd be Kips. You wind up dead, or so it seems. And then you walk away, under this thing."
You sigh and look away. Why don't you leave? It's a question you've considered but shied away from. Probably you keep working for Diana for the same reason Kips and White and Cox and the others do. But why do they keep at it? You've never talked to them about it. Probably they like the thrill. Do you like the thrill?
All you know is that the more deeply you feign thoughtfulness, the longer Banks will stay silent, and the more time you'll be able to waste. What time is it? It was nearly five-thirty when you met Banks; it's got to be nearly six by now. If Kips hasn't heard from you by six-thirty, when all of you were supposed to meet at that bar—
Your plans are shattered by the buzz from a phone. Banks plucks it up from an end table; you recognize it as Sullivan's. After glancing at its screen, he puts it to his ear. "Yeah?" he says. "You downstairs?" He chuckles in a gravelly way at the reply. "So let 'em wonder why it's just you and me. If you're that worried, though, come up to my room. 1608. Probably better anyway, we've got shenanigans to pull. You have any trouble getting little Mavin out?"
A hard icicle shoots down your spine. You try to veil your reaction, but Banks's eyes crinkle as he stares down at you. "You think I mind sharing Zack's face with you? It's best if we split duties, that way we can keep Barone and Sullivan both in seeming circulation." He winks at you. "No, I got him docile." He lays the phone aside.
You fight down your labored breath. Banks smiles thinly, and swings the blank mask around. But it isn't blank: it shows a white surface, over which your own name glitters. He tosses it aside and stands up. He'd been blocking the clock, which reads "7:48."
"You son of a bitch," you snarl as Banks walks around the side of the bed.
"You expected me to play fair?"
"So what are you planning for me and—?"
"Now you want to talk. I was just filibustering until Kips called back. I was tired of staring at your skanky ass." He seizes you by the wrist and undoes your shackles. You twist to fight him, but he's too strong, and slams your open palm against a spot on your shoulder.
The world goes dark. You scream, but Banks flips you onto your face, muffling your cries, and claps the cuffs back around your wrists.
Your bony, man-sized wrists.
You writhe onto your back and gasp at the enfolding darkness, blinking furiously and helplessly at it. Something soft and heavy goes into your mouth, and then a gag is wrapped over it and behind your head.
Banks's voice seems to echo in the vacuum. "It's been a long time since we had a real face to face, Prescott. A real face to a real face. Well," he sighs. "Meditate on what you've done and how you got here. But don't take too long. I'm curious to see what you come up with."
But you don't reply, and you don't meditate, either. Instead, you silently count the seconds.
At ninety-seven you hear the softest knock, as though on the other side of the hall. Eleven seconds later, a door latch clicks.
Even then, you count to forty-five, your ears straining into a room you cannot see, before making any move. You have the following choice: 1. Continue |
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