Training Chapter 5: Little Litanies

The door to the walk-in freezer opened, and Dina flinched. As she dreaded, the man in the biohazard suit and gas mask entered. Her fear slowed the moment – she looked at his right hand; it was empty. His body stepped through the door, lurching unsteadily in the oversized suit. Left foot, right foot. She inhaled, gasped really. His left hand entered the room, and it carried the pail.

The man stood in front of her. She tried to look at his mask, see who was behind the tinted circles, but her body, her instincts instead bent her into a small ball in the corner.

His body started to turn, just like it did too many times before. She clenched her eyes shut as the ice-cold water shocked her, caused her muscles, both meat and myomer, to contract to the point of agony. The black robe that gave her scant modesty was light and soaked. It gave no warmth.

The initial scorching sensation quickly gave way to the sledgehammer ache as the frost seeped into her bones.

As he left, plunging the freezer into darkness, she could only shiver.

Ξ§§§Ξ

Paolo looked away from the monitor, his stomach turning. How could they?

As if reading his mind, Doctor Belissaro cleared his throat. "While we have not ever had a cyborg been taken prisoner for any extended period, they do suffer extensive injuries in the course of their duties. You may think this cruel, but it is the best way we can think of to simulate the pain of multiple moderate injuries without actually inflicting them on the cyborgs."

His mouth too dry to speak, his throat too sour to even form words, Paolo glared at the bald man.

"We enhance the endocrine system as part of the conversion process. These cyborgs…"

Dina is a girl, damn you! They're all just girls! Paolo's eyes grew harder each time he heard that word.

"… are capable of secreting endorphins at an inhuman rate, but they need to be exposed to extreme discomfort so they can develop the autonomous response to trigger the release."

His voice honed to an edge, Paolo asked, "So how long will this take?"

"It's up to her."

The door to the observation room opened, and the man in the biohazard suit entered. He took off his gas mask.

And you, Captain. I can't imagine doing this, but you didn't even pause.

As he shed the outer layer, Raballo said, "It's tough to watch. I know. We all have to. It's our job to send them into dangerous situations, and they will get injured. In the field, we can't let that distract us from the mission."

"You did this? To Claes?" The thought of that quiet and owlish pre-teen being reduced to a shivering mass enraged Paolo even more.

"Yes. And they said I had to watch, so I watched. I won't lie to you; it ate at my soul, too. Listen, Paolo. We all have the instinct to protect the young, even if it's not our own children. I've read it is common in all mammals. A child is a member of the next generation, and to protect them is to protect our future."

Unsteadily, he stepped out of the oversized rubber boots, his hand grasping the doorjamb for support.

"But," he said with a heavy sigh, "you have to stop thinking of them as children. They are weapons, and they have to honed and tempered."

Paolo looked into his eyes. Years of working together gave him the experience to tell when the captain was speaking his own feelings, or saying what was required of him to say.

For the first time, Paolo couldn't tell.

From his laptop Belissaro cleared his throat. "It's time to change modes. The infrared thermometer shows her core temperature approaching the lower limit."

A long and heavy breath escaped Paolo, one he didn't know he was holding.

Ξ§§§Ξ

After the short, but too long a walk to the freezer, Paolo's heart pounded. The opened door splashed a deformed rectangle of light, one corner pointing at the huddled ball in a corner.

"Dina?"

"Oh, Signore Paolo!" She leapt up and raced into Paolo's half-open arms. If she hadn't hugged him so securely, he would have been upended by her impact, but she kept him upright. Fifty kilos of girl was a strange, yet comforting anchor, thought Paolo.

"Are you all right, Dina?" She was pale, so pale. Her lips were an inhuman shade of violet.

"Yes, Sig… Signore." She sniffled. He wasn't sure if it was from the cold or tears.

Belissaro surprised Paolo by producing a towel and another robe, this one thick and full. "Dry yourself and change your robe."

The speed in which she doffed the soaked robe shocked Paolo. He looked away as she toweled herself off, then donned the newer robe.

Belissaro looked at him, a slightly surprised light in his eye. "As her handler, you'll need to get used to that."

I hope not! Mentally, Paolo made the sign of the cross. Twice.

They walked to another room in the basement of the Medical Wing. This one was tiled, with a drain in the center. An inclined table came out from one wall, pointing at the drain.

Paolo recognized the purpose of the room, and his heart seized.

"Dina, I want you lay on the table, head over here." Belissaro patted the lowered end. "Raballo? Hold her left arm. Yes, the elbow and shoulder, just like that. All right, Di Tomaso? Same thing, right arm."

Bile filling his mouth, Paolo did so. He noted that Raballo moved quickly, efficiently. This was familiar to him, Paolo realized. Of course. He had to do this to Claes, too. By this time, Paolo was glad he skipped breakfast.

"Now, Dina? I need you to not move. Raballo and Di Tomaso are holding onto you only to remind you. The point here is to not move."

No longer shivering, Dina smiled brightly at the doctor. "Got it! Don't move." She looked at Paolo. "I won't, promise. I'll make you proud of me."

Unable to speak, and steeling his gaze in hopes of not showing the welling tears he felt, Paolo could only nod.

As he dreaded, the doctor laid a plain white cloth over her face, then went to the sink and started filling a bucket. Satisfied she couldn't see, Paolo let one tear escape down along the left side of his nose. Under the cotton weave, he saw her mouth moving, but the water's rush blocked his hearing her words.

The bucket full, Belissaro turned off the spigot. The room seemed to echo with her soft whisper, "I won't move, I'll make him proud. I won't move, I'll make him proud."

In a dark way, her gasp when the doctor drenched the fabric was a mercy, a respite from her show of devotion that crushed Paolo's heart a little each time.

She gasped, and her body arched. Paolo bore down on the terry-cloth wrapped arm, but it didn't move. Slowly, the body lowered. The towel turned translucent, and he could see her mouth struggling for the air that the water-laden cloth denied her. It opened and closed rapidly, and Paolo noticed it wasn't the gaping attempts to inhale like what he himself endured during Resistance training.

No, she was still mouthing her mantra. However silent the room, in his mind, her soft, cooing voice reached out to him. "…won't move, I'll make him proud."

The wall above the sink presented a clock, a large, old analog clock with a red needle sweeping away the seconds. A minute, then two. An agonizing ten seconds. Another. All this time, she did not move, save the fluttering of the sodden rag as she mouthed her mantra.

At three minutes, Belissaro lifted the rag. Dina's gasped, panted, then looked at Paolo. "I didn't move! You're proud of me, right?"

Paolo nodded. He had no words.

Ξ§§§Ξ

The three men sat in their chairs in the monitoring room. Paolo looked at display from the infrared camera. Again, in the corner of the freezer was curled a small figure.

"I never saw that reaction before." Belissaro repeated.

"Waterboarding? Really? Waterboarding a ten-year old girl?" Paolo was livid. His ears burned, the vein in his neck felt like it was about to burst.

"It's an instinctive fear response. We all have a fear of drowning. It's genetic." The doctor couldn't meet Paolo's eyes and instead stared at another display.

"And the point of this? What is your godforsaken reason this time?"

At this, Belissaro finally turned to him and held up three fingers, then folded each as he recited, "Epinephrine, norepinephrine and cortisol. The exercise was meant to cause her to secrete those three hormones. The parts of the endocrine system in her body has been augmented, but we didn't touch the pituitary gland, nor did we modify the amygdala." He tapped his temple.

After taking in Paolo's blank look, the doctor continued. "Fear. Fight or flight. Her body is capable of incredible feats of strength, but she needs to learn to control it. We need to flood her body, her mind with epinephrine." He sighed. "Adrenaline. Same thing. We need to teach her to think clearly in the middle of a storm of hormones. If she doesn't, she'll be as dangerous to us as she is to them."

Raballo's cell phone chimed. He sighed and started putting on the thick rubber suit again.

"No, let me go." Paolo headed for the door.

"That breaks the protocol."

"She's my girl. If anyone is going to do that to her, it should be me." His teeth were so clenched they felt fused into one.

Raballo sighed again and started undoing the zipper to the lower half of the suit. "Let him go, Doctor. Trust me, when he's like that, there's little you can do to stop him."

"All right. Di Tomaso, you know where the bucket is, right?"

"The waterboarding room. I can find my way."

As he closed the door, Paolo heard Belissaro talking to himself. "Never saw that before. This always works to trigger a fear response."

He thought back to the shoothouse and smiled. His illicit joy at keeping Dina's secret fear from the doctor was short-lived. It sputtered away as he started filling the bucket. With heavy heart, he walked back to the walk-in freezer.

"Oh! Signore Paolo! Can I come out now?" Her eyes suddenly blazed with hope, but then grew wide with terror as he walked in, carrying the bucket.

"No, Dina. It's time to get splashed again. I'm sorry."

"It's… it's okay, Signore Paolo. I'm just g-g-glad it's you."

He closed the door, and in the darkness said, "Come here, Dina. Give me a hug. Follow my voice."

He was rewarded with shivering arms wrapping around his torso.

"Ready, Dina?"

Her face, buried into his chest, nodded once.

With both arms, he raised the bucket over his head and upended it onto the both of them.