Stev regained consciousness in a small white tiled cell lit solely by
a glaring fluorescent fixture bolted to the ceiling. Stev kept his
breathing slow and steady, a simple enough trick keeping a cool head could
keep one's heart rate somewhat normal and would not immediately notify
anyone watching heart and respiration monitors. They would notice he was
conscious soon enough, for now he just needed to get his bearings, some
idea of where he was. He was unable to move, strapped down to a rigid
chair. Without moving he noticed there was a needle in his arm, he
couldn't see the bag but he conjectured from the way his vision was blurred
and his thinking process was slowed that it was some sort of truth serum
that was dripping into his veins. He attributed some of the blurring to
the fact that his glasses were gone, but his eyes were not this bad, he
wondered briefly where they had fallen off, if they truly meant to erase
him someone would have picked them up and incinerated them. Judging from
the quality and pressure of the air he was probably some levels
underground. He did not move his head but looked around the room, aside
from the tiles, his chair and the light there was a large mirror (two-way
obviously), and the ever-present telescreen, of course.
The door handle moved, Stev snapped his head up; they were monitoring him very closely to be able to know of his waking up so soon. A streak of pain shot through him at this sudden movement, he refused to wince at it though. Instead he tried to focus on the figure coming towards him. It was Jenkins, even with his faulty vision he could identify the warm beguiling smile, the friendly mustache, the dimples and the crinkles at the corners of his eyes he could see that. Jenkins gave off the air of being the your favorite uncle, gentle, understanding; the feeling of intimacy radiated off of him. Stev did not let such appearances fool him. Jenkins pulled up a chair and sat in front of him and smiled. Stev squinted to see him.
"Oh, that's right," said Jenkins noticing Stev's squinting, he brought forth his, glasses one lens was cracked "You're glasses fell off when those little hooligans brought you in." He reached over and placed Stev's glasses on the bridge of his nose, Stev held rigidly still. Jenkins ignored it and continued "They're essentially good boys, graduated from the ranks of the scouts with full honors, one of them even denounced his parents as being thought criminals. I'm very proud of them, but they do tend to be a bit rough. They're well on their way to being great law enforcers. Some day they might even raise to the ranks of thought police, I wouldn't be surprised in the least."
Stev starred at him, 'What is he rambling on about?' he thought, his mind raced 'What is going on, this isn't what they did to thought criminals', idle chit chat was never in the rumors of the goings on in the Ministry of Love. This of course was preferable to what he was expecting, but he no idea what was going to happen. Plus whatever drug he was under the influence of was blurring not only his vision but bending his mind as well.
Jenkins settled down in his chair and looked at him squarely, "Now I hear we've had some sort of situation in your department. We've traced the problem to you console." Stev feigned ignorance, and looked at him surprised, it was surprisingly hard, the drug made it hard to concentrate. "Yes, it was very hard to detect, you're lucky we caught it before the speech was broadcasted. It ate away at the tape in places, we think it might have been on a disk or something, or ingrained in data you downloaded off the internet."
'Could it be they don't know I did it on purpose?' He thanked his lucky stars he had had the foresight to plant the virus inside data used in his program. At least it really looked like an accident. Here was a prime example of the advantages of being underestimated. They didn't think he could do it. He had to fight hard to keep a look of divine relief from spreading off his face; instead he forced horror to dawn on his face. Faking expressions was getting harder and harder 'What the hell did they put in me?' he wondered briefly. He would be punished of course, but at least he'd be released, he wouldn't be killed, maybe sent to a forced labour camp, but he'd be let go.
" Who could have done such a thing?" Stev forced the shock into his voice. "What disk was this on? Could I have been able to tell?" Stev swallowed heavily, this was hard, he wanted to start screaming with frustration. If not a type of truth serum then this was defiantly some kind of narcotic to make one lose one's sense of judgment. At any rate he decided not to tempt it, technically none of this was a lie. Though equivocating in this condition was proving exceptionally difficult.
"We took the liberty of searching you desk and briefcase. The virus was on a disk with all your image manipulating software and some data from the Internet. It looks like an accident, but we'd like to ask you few questions." Jenkins gave him a genuinely warmhearted smile, "You up to it sport?" He couldn't breathe; everything was hard to focus on. Answers to Jenkins' questions were getting harder and harder to filter into warped versions of the truth. And the questions, pressings began to spill forth. Hours were passed doing this.
"Did you plant this?" Stev blinked, none of the previous questions were this direct.
"I...uh...yes, you tell me it was in that disk that I put in my computer." That was truth, somewhat. He was so pressed he was near tears. 'KILL ME OR LET ME GO!' he wanted to scream. This was tearing at his nerves. He wanted to scream, and throw himself on the floor in a tantrum. But he just sat there trying blindly to answer these questions that were repeatedly thrown at him.
"No. What I mean is did you knowingly download the virus into this disk and then plant it?"
Stev starred at Jenkins. He was fighting hard to keep his heartbeat regulated; as yet he had not unclenched his fists. He took a deep breath and answered, "I-I-it was ingrained really deep in the data, you say. How could I have known what to do? .... That kind of thing requires years of experience." This was part was true; Stev had been at this for years. Working during the day for the party and working all night on his own he had become quite adept at this sort of thing "You might be overestimating my capabilities." Not a lie, but by far was not the truth.
Jenkins looked at him thoughtfully. He chose his words carefully. "Maybe you're right, you are but a boy. How old are you anyway" he glanced down at a clipboard he had been carrying, eighteen? Well your age and inexperience" (Stev fought back a smirk) "excuse your ineptness somewhat, but slip-ups like these cannot be tolerated. I think time in a forced labour camp is a little harsh, so we'll let this one slide." He got up "Despite your young age and naiveté you are quite good with computers. But pull something like this again and you'll be looking at least five years in a camp. We need you here, but from now on your going to be watched a little more closely. Do you think that fair?"
Stev nodded in shocked, which caused yet another bolt of pain to shoot up his spine. Jenkins then loosed the straps holding him to the chair, pulled the wires off of him, and yanked the needle out of his arm; blood welled briefly, and let him up.
He swayed a bit on his feet, his eyes blacked out briefly. Stev noticed his hands were shaking; he clenched them and shoved them in his pocket. Jenkins gazed at him, though he might not be able to make it all the way home on his own, Stev would be damned if he would let Jenkins see him fall.
"You know what" Jenkins said "I'm going to call my boys in here to help you to your desk, I doubt you could find your way out on your own" As he was saying the aforementioned Jenkins had pressed a red call button situated next to the door. The three boys came in.
"What do you want us to do?" Asked the tallest, the apparent ringleader.
"I want you to assist Mr. Phourlorne to his cubicle back on the third flour. And I don't want to see you guys beating up on him, ok?" An unspoken order went through with this command. The tallest nodded, the other two took Stev by his arms and led him out the door.
They were halfway to the lifts when Jenkins called out again "Oh boys, do show Mr. Phourlorne the penalty for ignorance on the job." The door closed one guard let go of Stev's arm, the other swung him around and smashed him into the wall, held him there by his shoulder.
"Stupid boy" The taller said, and with those few words spoken kneed him in the stomache. 'I won't cry out' Stev thought to himself 'I don't care what they do, I won't scream'. One of them hit him square across the face ripping the scar on his nose a bit and knocking off his glasses. Stev couldn't see who, but one of the boys knocked his knees out from under him, and he crashed to the floor. The blows from the fists stopped, replaced by swift, powerful, hard kicks to his ribs, stomache, spine, face, legs, anywhere they could find a spot to kick. He felt a few cracks, and shuddered involuntarily, several fractured ribs, not fully broken, but painful nonetheless.
Fighting back would have been useless, though Stev was far from weak. His naturally wiry frame did not betray his strength in the least. He might even have been able to take all three of them, but he was in their territory and had he fought back he would have had it much worse. So he just lay there and took it. After they had gotten tired of their sport Stev pushed himself to his hands and knees and climbed to his feet. He managed to walk to the lifts and back to his desk without collapsing.
By the time Stev reached his cubicle it was well past 2300 hours, and several punctuality, and laziness messages had come in from the mail chute at the side of his desk.
The door handle moved, Stev snapped his head up; they were monitoring him very closely to be able to know of his waking up so soon. A streak of pain shot through him at this sudden movement, he refused to wince at it though. Instead he tried to focus on the figure coming towards him. It was Jenkins, even with his faulty vision he could identify the warm beguiling smile, the friendly mustache, the dimples and the crinkles at the corners of his eyes he could see that. Jenkins gave off the air of being the your favorite uncle, gentle, understanding; the feeling of intimacy radiated off of him. Stev did not let such appearances fool him. Jenkins pulled up a chair and sat in front of him and smiled. Stev squinted to see him.
"Oh, that's right," said Jenkins noticing Stev's squinting, he brought forth his, glasses one lens was cracked "You're glasses fell off when those little hooligans brought you in." He reached over and placed Stev's glasses on the bridge of his nose, Stev held rigidly still. Jenkins ignored it and continued "They're essentially good boys, graduated from the ranks of the scouts with full honors, one of them even denounced his parents as being thought criminals. I'm very proud of them, but they do tend to be a bit rough. They're well on their way to being great law enforcers. Some day they might even raise to the ranks of thought police, I wouldn't be surprised in the least."
Stev starred at him, 'What is he rambling on about?' he thought, his mind raced 'What is going on, this isn't what they did to thought criminals', idle chit chat was never in the rumors of the goings on in the Ministry of Love. This of course was preferable to what he was expecting, but he no idea what was going to happen. Plus whatever drug he was under the influence of was blurring not only his vision but bending his mind as well.
Jenkins settled down in his chair and looked at him squarely, "Now I hear we've had some sort of situation in your department. We've traced the problem to you console." Stev feigned ignorance, and looked at him surprised, it was surprisingly hard, the drug made it hard to concentrate. "Yes, it was very hard to detect, you're lucky we caught it before the speech was broadcasted. It ate away at the tape in places, we think it might have been on a disk or something, or ingrained in data you downloaded off the internet."
'Could it be they don't know I did it on purpose?' He thanked his lucky stars he had had the foresight to plant the virus inside data used in his program. At least it really looked like an accident. Here was a prime example of the advantages of being underestimated. They didn't think he could do it. He had to fight hard to keep a look of divine relief from spreading off his face; instead he forced horror to dawn on his face. Faking expressions was getting harder and harder 'What the hell did they put in me?' he wondered briefly. He would be punished of course, but at least he'd be released, he wouldn't be killed, maybe sent to a forced labour camp, but he'd be let go.
" Who could have done such a thing?" Stev forced the shock into his voice. "What disk was this on? Could I have been able to tell?" Stev swallowed heavily, this was hard, he wanted to start screaming with frustration. If not a type of truth serum then this was defiantly some kind of narcotic to make one lose one's sense of judgment. At any rate he decided not to tempt it, technically none of this was a lie. Though equivocating in this condition was proving exceptionally difficult.
"We took the liberty of searching you desk and briefcase. The virus was on a disk with all your image manipulating software and some data from the Internet. It looks like an accident, but we'd like to ask you few questions." Jenkins gave him a genuinely warmhearted smile, "You up to it sport?" He couldn't breathe; everything was hard to focus on. Answers to Jenkins' questions were getting harder and harder to filter into warped versions of the truth. And the questions, pressings began to spill forth. Hours were passed doing this.
"Did you plant this?" Stev blinked, none of the previous questions were this direct.
"I...uh...yes, you tell me it was in that disk that I put in my computer." That was truth, somewhat. He was so pressed he was near tears. 'KILL ME OR LET ME GO!' he wanted to scream. This was tearing at his nerves. He wanted to scream, and throw himself on the floor in a tantrum. But he just sat there trying blindly to answer these questions that were repeatedly thrown at him.
"No. What I mean is did you knowingly download the virus into this disk and then plant it?"
Stev starred at Jenkins. He was fighting hard to keep his heartbeat regulated; as yet he had not unclenched his fists. He took a deep breath and answered, "I-I-it was ingrained really deep in the data, you say. How could I have known what to do? .... That kind of thing requires years of experience." This was part was true; Stev had been at this for years. Working during the day for the party and working all night on his own he had become quite adept at this sort of thing "You might be overestimating my capabilities." Not a lie, but by far was not the truth.
Jenkins looked at him thoughtfully. He chose his words carefully. "Maybe you're right, you are but a boy. How old are you anyway" he glanced down at a clipboard he had been carrying, eighteen? Well your age and inexperience" (Stev fought back a smirk) "excuse your ineptness somewhat, but slip-ups like these cannot be tolerated. I think time in a forced labour camp is a little harsh, so we'll let this one slide." He got up "Despite your young age and naiveté you are quite good with computers. But pull something like this again and you'll be looking at least five years in a camp. We need you here, but from now on your going to be watched a little more closely. Do you think that fair?"
Stev nodded in shocked, which caused yet another bolt of pain to shoot up his spine. Jenkins then loosed the straps holding him to the chair, pulled the wires off of him, and yanked the needle out of his arm; blood welled briefly, and let him up.
He swayed a bit on his feet, his eyes blacked out briefly. Stev noticed his hands were shaking; he clenched them and shoved them in his pocket. Jenkins gazed at him, though he might not be able to make it all the way home on his own, Stev would be damned if he would let Jenkins see him fall.
"You know what" Jenkins said "I'm going to call my boys in here to help you to your desk, I doubt you could find your way out on your own" As he was saying the aforementioned Jenkins had pressed a red call button situated next to the door. The three boys came in.
"What do you want us to do?" Asked the tallest, the apparent ringleader.
"I want you to assist Mr. Phourlorne to his cubicle back on the third flour. And I don't want to see you guys beating up on him, ok?" An unspoken order went through with this command. The tallest nodded, the other two took Stev by his arms and led him out the door.
They were halfway to the lifts when Jenkins called out again "Oh boys, do show Mr. Phourlorne the penalty for ignorance on the job." The door closed one guard let go of Stev's arm, the other swung him around and smashed him into the wall, held him there by his shoulder.
"Stupid boy" The taller said, and with those few words spoken kneed him in the stomache. 'I won't cry out' Stev thought to himself 'I don't care what they do, I won't scream'. One of them hit him square across the face ripping the scar on his nose a bit and knocking off his glasses. Stev couldn't see who, but one of the boys knocked his knees out from under him, and he crashed to the floor. The blows from the fists stopped, replaced by swift, powerful, hard kicks to his ribs, stomache, spine, face, legs, anywhere they could find a spot to kick. He felt a few cracks, and shuddered involuntarily, several fractured ribs, not fully broken, but painful nonetheless.
Fighting back would have been useless, though Stev was far from weak. His naturally wiry frame did not betray his strength in the least. He might even have been able to take all three of them, but he was in their territory and had he fought back he would have had it much worse. So he just lay there and took it. After they had gotten tired of their sport Stev pushed himself to his hands and knees and climbed to his feet. He managed to walk to the lifts and back to his desk without collapsing.
By the time Stev reached his cubicle it was well past 2300 hours, and several punctuality, and laziness messages had come in from the mail chute at the side of his desk.
