Chapter Fifteen: The Prisoner

Cyran Prefecture, Kendrick Estate

Bill was ready, the day they came to arrest him.

He was reading (or trying to) in the study at the Kendrick house.

He heard the Circle Militia's vehicles pull up into the driveway but he didn't move. He'd told Risa and Varien to stay in their rooms and let whatever was going to happen, happen with no interference.

Tveir's men were ranged throughout the grounds of the house and the Circle himself was standing by on his monitor from his own home, since Bill insisted that he stay where he was safe. He didn't want the Chief's men to see anything that they might report back as unusual in the behavior of the Cyran Prefecture's people or their Prefect. It was a must, he'd insisted, to keep everyone safe and away from suspicion.

So when they came for him, Cyran was quiet, normal.

The banging on the door was a little excessive.

"SIFRAS!"

With a sigh, Bill set the book down, drank the remainder of the coffee in his cup and got up to answer the door.

"I'm William Sifras," he said quietly, to the group of gigantic Shapes who stood on the doorstep. "You're here for me."

"Under the order of His Majesty, Chief Circle Vyraius Cerchio, you are required to accompany us to Pantocyclus City, under his protection-"

"Arrest, you mean," Bill said in a low, even tone.

"Not unless you resist the summons, Mister Sifras."

"I will not leave this house willingly. Make sure you note that in your report. I'm being coerced with threats to my family."

"Are you going to make us take you?"

"You look like a reasonable man, sir. As such, you must realize, I cannot go quietly." He paused. "What would you do if you were in the same situation as I am? The Chief has kidnapped my parents and threatened them with violence if I do not acquiesce to his wishes."

The Pentagon who was the commander of the Militia paused. His eye frowned.

"I suppose I would do the same as you, young man," he said in a much less forceful tone. "While I sympathize with your situation, I have orders I must carry out."

"I understand that," Bill said simply. "But you will have to arrest me. I will not go with you, otherwise."

The commander inclined his top angle in a nod. "This will go better if you don't try to fight with us."

"I don't intend to," Bill said. "I just want to make sure it's clear that I don't want to go with you and your taking me is under duress."

"It's noted and witnessed by these men here," the Pentagon said. His Militia men, all Isosceles, nodded as well. "None of us want to fight with a small Triangle, especially one who has been nothing but polite and straightforward."

Bill sighed and nodded. "May I take a small bag?"

The Pentagon looked at his lieutenant. "Is there anything about his bringing personal possessions?"

The Isosceles looked over the file he was carrying and shook his apex. "No sir, nothing saying he can't. I think one small bag is alright."

"Then, yes. As long as there are no weapons in it. We will have to search the bag."

"That's fine," Bill said. He stepped aside and allowed the Militia into the entrance hall. "It's here in the study."

The Pentagon accompanied him into the study, where the rucksack he'd already packed sat waiting. He picked it up and handed it to the commander.

"This is the small bag?"

"Yes."

"I'd expected a suitcase but very well, if this is all you wish to bring."

Setting the bag on a side table, the Pentagon opened it and searched through it.

The Isosceles lieutenant made a note of the the items inside.

"Books, a notebook, pens. A winter coat. A velvet... top hat? Some personal sundries and a few small articles of clothing. Two photographs... oh. This is your parents? And your family." The Pentagon sighed, closing the bag. "I-I apologize, young man."

Bill shrugged slightly.

"It's your job. I can't hold it against you."

"Well, then. I hate to do it but I'll have to handcuff you, if you insist on being arrested."

"It's the only way I will leave this place."

"Very well. William Sifras, under the authority of Chief Circle, Vyraius Cerchio, I place you under arrest for refusing to comply with his order requiring you to accompany us to Pantocyclus City."

He turned to the Isosceles Militia.

"Handcuff him please."

Bill was cuffed and his bag returned to him.

"Bill!"

Bill's angles wilted a little at the sound of that voice.

"Risa, don't-"

"Bill!" Risa ran down the stairs and over to him. Varien followed her, slowly.

"We can't let you go!" Risa said, trying to get close enough to hug him. "Please don't take him away!"

The Pentagon commander looked at Bill, who gave a weak shrug.

"I'm sorry Miss but we have our orders. We won't hurt him. He's been very polite about the whole thing and Circles knows, he sure didn't have to be."

He stepped aside though, and let Risa hug Bill.

"Bill?" Varien said quietly. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

"I don't have a choice, sir," Bill said. "Please, just let me go."

"Please, Bill..." Risa began but Varien took her aside and wrapped an arm around her figure.

"Risa, shh... It's alright. Bill will be fine. These men have said they won't hurt him and I-I'd like to believe them."

The Pentagon frowned slightly but he nodded. "He will not come to harm while we have him in our custody, sir. You have my word as an officer of the Circle Militia."

Varien regarded the man coolly. "I'll hold you to that, officer. I'm Varien Kendrick and this young man is under my care. I regard him as part of my family and I will know if he's mistreated any more than he already has been by the Chief."

"We are aware of that, Mister Kendrick," the Pentagon said. "I am sorry that this situation has occurred and I'd like to say that if I had my choice, I'd let this young Triangle stay here. But unfortunately, I don't have that power. Please, say your goodbyes and then we really must go."

Varien stepped in to embrace Bill.

"Be wise," he whispered in his angle. "Be clever. I believe in you, son. Use your power."

Bill blinked. It was an odd thing to say but given Varien's recent illness, it wasn't unexpected. He nodded his apex however. "Be safe, sir," he said.

"I will," Varien said quietly.

"Good bye Varien, Risa. Stay safe. Take care of each other, okay?" He swallowed hard.

"We will," Risa said. "Please do the same, Bill. Write if you can. We will miss you something awful."

One of the Isosceles made a sound suspiciously like a sniffle.

The Pentagon took a deep breath. "Come along, young man." He put a hand on Bill's back and walked him to the front door.

On the threshold he paused.

"I'm very sorry about this, sir," he said to Varien.

The group of them passed through the door and onto the front steps.

Bill glanced back at the house.

Varien and Risa stood in the doorway, watching them, eyes sad.

It was the last time Bill would see either of them, alive.

Spring, Pantocyclus City, Chief Circle's Palace

From the moment he arrived, Bill's life had been a weird kind of purgatory.

When it came down to it, he really didn't know what he was expecting but so far, nothing that had happened made any sense.

At least, not to him.

He'd been hurried to the apartments he was expected to occupy with very little ceremony and left there, to explore the place on his own. Cerchio hadn't even shown up to greet him, which given his previous behavior was odd but definitely not unwelcome. He hadn't been uncuffed until he was in his new rooms and then locked in. Even though the suite was generous, even boasting a separate music room with its own grand piano for his use, it was still, clearly, a prison. The doors to the balcony were locked, the windows only opened partially.

The television in the suite was closed-circuit and only broadcast select programming. It did come on every day at the same time, just as all televisions and radios did now, for Cerchio's speech and daily reminder of his power.

The day Bill arrived, it was another public punishment, this time of the citizens of one of Arca's villages. The Prefecture had fallen to Cerchio's Militia earlier that week and Bill had yet another group to strike off his list of allies. He turned his back on the television, not caring if there were cameras monitoring his rooms.

He didn't want to see any more of Cerchio's demonstrations. He could hear it, however.

Bill had expected, with intense anxiety, being summoned to Cerchio that evening. The summons never came and he finally fell into an exhausted, stressful sleep.

He'd expected to be summoned the next day. Nothing.

This went on for about two weeks, with Bill just drifting anxiously from room to room of his small new home, sometimes plunking away at the piano, sometimes sitting as close to the balcony as he could and gazing drearily out the window into the garden just beyond.

He was well cared for. He was brought elaborate meals regularly and his needs were seen to; bed linens changed on a regular basis, the apartment cleaned occasionally, his laundry washed and sundries replaced as needed; but nothing else happened in his now dull, depressing, silent and lonely life. The Palace servants weren't allowed to speak to him, short of necessary communication and after a while, he lost interest in trying to coax them out.

He'd taken advantage of the small wet bar in his apartment for several nights but that got old quick. It didn't serve his purposes to be either drunk or hung over when Cerchio eventually did call for him, though it would probably have made what he planned to do easier, in one way or another.

His plan, which he'd refined over the time he'd had to wait before he was arrested and even further refined over the time he'd been in what he'd begun to think of as 'solitary confinement', was simple.

At the first reasonable opportunity, when he was able to be alone with Cerchio, he was going to assassinate him.

Rather than waiting for something worse to happen, like Alistair's conviction, or suffering the indignity of Cerchio's unwelcome attentions just to keep his parents alive, Bill decided that the first time he had an opening, he was going to take it. If he could do it before Alistair's conviction and execution, he could stop everything.

By killing Cerchio, successfully, not only could Bill stop Alistair's death and save his parents, if he did everything right, he could stop the atrocities going on in the provinces. He had to make sure he didn't get caught. Being killed for the assassination of the Chief Circle would make the next stage of his plan a lot harder to achieve.

He intended on seizing the Chief's power for himself.

It was the only way he could think of to save his family and stop the war.

The trick would be getting the Circle Council to accept or at least, agree to, his interim leadership. He figured at the very least, he could get Tveir's allies on his side, the rest of it would have to be somewhat militant to begin with, just because nobody in their right mind was going to accept a Triangle as Chief, at least not at first. He'd need the support of the resistance to help him establish and maintain control, though he didn't plan on doing it with force unless absolutely necessary. Most smart people didn't want this fight any more than Bill or the resistance did. When it came down to it, people, particularly professional people, could be logical and intelligent and if approached with that kind of mindset. He hoped it would be easier to negotiate and win supporters rather than end up with another explosion of fighting. As long as they were assured that their jobs were intact, he figured the majority of the Circle Militia and indeed, most of the Palace employees would join his side.

Cerchio wasn't well liked in the Palace, Tveir explained. Most of his own people and the Council hated him and would have been quite pleased to see him gone. He definitely wouldn't be missed and as long as he was replaced with a better, smarter option, they might overlook the fact that Bill was a Triangle. Bill didn't intend to stay Chief for long, anyway. He was really hoping that he could convince Tveir to take over, if he was being completely honest with himself.

Bill certainly didn't want to be King of anything. Even running the resistance wasn't his idea of a fun time. When it came down to it, all Bill wanted was to go home to Cyran with Alistair and his folks, settle down, finally get married and have a nice, quiet life with his family and friends in their little village in the trees. Maybe then he'd finally be able to actually become a physicist and mathematician, as he'd wanted since he was a child.

He wasn't even twenty-one and he desperately wanted to retire. He couldn't think of anything he wanted more at this moment than the solitude and simple pleasures of village life.

His childhood dream of being a scientist seemed like a thing of stars, something he could barely see and never touch. Sure, he'd been a 'famous' pianist, (which to be frank was what got him into this deplorable current situation in the first place!) which had been fun in the beginning but had definitely gotten extremely stale. He'd been able to use his scientific training quite often as the leader of the resistance and well, he used his considerable mathematics knowledge every day of his life, considering he kept most of his personal journals as well as his field journals and notes in a variety of ciphers, including the maths ciphers he knew nobody was going to be able to figure out-ever. So if the copious amounts of documentation, journals and notes he'd kept as Cipher were ever discovered, he wished whomever was tasked with trying to decipher them good luck, because they'd need it.

This evening, Bill had allowed himself one glass of wine while he sat by the window while the manservant collected his dinner dishes and cleaned up. He was a Triangle, like him and Bill had the distinct feeling that the guy resented him with a passion. Well, sure, of course he did, since he was an Equilateral just like Bill but he was required to serve him as though he were a Polygon.

"You know," Bill sighed, trying once again to stimulate a conversation, "I don't want to be here any more than you want to be serving me. I wish you'd at least try and talk to me for once."

"That's not the way I heard it," the man finally said in a tight voice.

This was new. Bill tilted his apex and looked at the Triangle. "Oh? How did you hear it?"

"They say you're the Chief's new... companion and that you're just being difficult. We were told not to talk to you or give you any more reason to complain. They say he's about had it with you."

"Huh, is that so?" Bill said coolly. "You realize I've been here for almost two weeks, alone, with nobody to talk to, locked in this room and I haven't seen the Chief since I got here?"

The Triangle paused and looked at him, confused. "Locked in this room? The door is always open when I come here."

Bill's eye frowned. "It is? Whenever I try it, it's locked." He considered the other Triangle. "I just assumed you were given a key or a passcard or something."

"No, we aren't given keys, of any kind, sir."

"Just call me Bill. It's my name," Bill said easily. "So you go in and out at your leisure."

The door is automatic. He's got to have something on him, or on his tea-tray that triggers the lock.

"Yes sir. It opens for me and closes. I can show you, if you wish."

And yet, he still calls me 'sir'.

"Yes, if you would."

The Triangle wheeled the cart out of the main room and into the small hallway that joined the music room. Bill asked him to pause before approaching the door and went to try the handle, showing him that it was, indeed, locked. The other man looked shocked and then, distinctly nervous.

"Now, leave the cart there and try it yourself, I want to see something."

He did as Bill asked. The door remained locked.

Now, the poor man looked even more uncomfortable.

So it's the cart.

"Go ahead and take your cart. Thank you for talking with me. I've been alone for a while and I really missed another human voice."

"I'm sorry," the Triangle said. "I will talk to you some more tomorrow if they send me." He offered a contrite expression and pushed his cart up to the door, which then clicked softly and opened out into the hallway beyond. The servant went through and the door began to close behind him.

"I can use this," Bill muttered as he watched the door close rather quickly once the Triangle was through. "Somehow."

He stood there, examining the door for about ten minutes, then went back into his suite, found his rucksack and began to sort through it.

By now, he'd figured out where the cameras were in the suite, which was annoying and creepy. They weren't exactly well hidden. Well maybe they were but not to someone with Bill's knowledge and background. Two were in his bedroom area, one in the music room and one in the bathroom, facing the bathing area. He'd figured out how to cover them, which he did when he was in the bath and sometimes the music room just to be 'difficult' since he knew Vyraius had to be the one behind the distasteful placement of them.

It also meant there were places in the apartment where there weren't cameras.

In the bathroom, a corner was unobservable and it was in this part of the room that Bill had placed his rucksack. When he'd placed it there, he'd made sure the camera could see that it was empty and he was just putting it there to have it stored out of the way. What the camera couldn't see and only Bill knew, was that the rucksack was cleverly built with a false bottom. In the secret compartment on the bottom of the bag were Bill's secret weapons.

A pocketknife, set of lock-picks, his favorite lighter and a sealed bottle of lighter fluid, a couple of small coils of wire and the hunting knife.

He knew enough about electronics to know how to short out that electronic door lock and enough about picking locks to be able to pick a mechanical lock if need be. He had a package of wooden pencils, which were innocuous on their own but combined with a good lighter, could create a small, distracting fire if necessary and the pocketknife was just good sense, as it could be used for a variety of things, from stripping insulated wires to self defense.

The hunting knife, well... that was for Vyraius.

Once he figured out how to break the lock, things would definitely be looking up.