WET WORK
I suppose I'd always known it. But it was on my release that it was suggested to me that when I'd been four, I'd been kidnapped from a Commander's home. As we got older, us kidnapped would get together and compare notes. The story in Gilead was very different from the one we'd been told up north. Here, it was the deviant martha, Rita, who'd been reviled as the chief instigator. I remember her. She was unremarkable. In Canada, she'd once made me a Gilead breakfast to cheer me up. It didn't work.
There'd been trials in Canada way back when, of a Commander and his (deviant) wife. I should say Wife, with a capital 'W'. That status remains to this day, which makes it all the more scandalous that that Wife would turn against her husband. As such, she'd turned against God's law.
My father had been the Commander John Jeffreys. My mother had been his Wife, Irene. It is unknown if I'd had brothers or sisters. But it would have been strange if I'd been trafficked to Canada and they hadn't.
Back in the Gilead prison, there actually was not a lot presented about that early period of Gilead. I most certainly had not been told of my own 'status'. Just the essentials. Again and again. And again. As prisoners came and went, we would go through the essentials yet again.
When I'd been released, I went to a transition and screening centre. It's where I discovered my passion for Guardian's work. I'd seen the way the Guardians around me controlled their spaces. How they had been respected. How they handled weapons. And yes, it was true, the rumoured salvagings and particicutions were rare. I think I saw just one. Unimpressive. Yes, maybe early on Gilead had thought it necessary to be more severe, but the propaganda we'd been taught up in Canada was these days, predictably, simply not true.
Gilead was a Republic willing to do the hard work of confronting the world-wide fertility crisis. Canada was not. Europe was not. Africa was not. China's population went under 1 billion for the first time ever. In the face of their world-wide persecution as a country, it was no wonder Gilead was guarded about those kind of statistics. Here it was, almost 25 years since its righteous inception, and it still lacked international recognition.
That's how the hypocrites roll.
WET-WORK
The last exercise before graduation as a Guardian was the live-fire exercise. Or as Instructor Hiwakawa had called it, 'wet-work'.
It was the only exercise on which we'd be graded. All depended on how we functioned that one afternoon. I mean, we wouldn't be allowed to take the exercise to begin with if we weren't already proficient with weapons. We lost more than one promising cadet to the Eyes of God service, because the cadet could shoot neither quickly nor accurately. Nor with proper target identification.
At some point in the obstacles, each trainee would be presented with a quick decision. Prior to that, the cadet would have to amass clues as to what the danger up ahead would be. None of it was obvious. One had to control one's heart-rate, and pick up on cues. Quickly and accurately amid chaos. Maintain situational awareness.
Eventually, the trainee would be faced with three options - three people each tied to separate stakes ahead of them. It would be sprung on us. Suddenly. These were live people, mostly recruited from the prison I had been at. And other prisons. Of the three options, the trainee had 1.5 seconds to decide which to eliminate. With live fire. Hence Hiwakawa's 'wet-work'.
Trainee Cruz had gone first. He'd eliminated the wrong target. Albeit in 1.51 seconds, barely above the standard. Hiwakawa went to him, right there on the course as we watched, and asked Cruz to surrender his weapon, which he did. Then Hiwakawa dispatched Cruz with one shot. From his own rifle. Hiwakawa then killed one more of the people staked, leaving one last one alive.
Those were the first killings I'd ever seen, must less in the line of work. I'd been somewhat close to Cruz. Yet, he didn't make the cut. Not even a transfer to the Eyes of God Academy. The only good thing about that run was that Cruz had timed at 1.51 seconds. Just barely over.
Others screwed up, but were spared Cruz's fate. Some got the wrong target, some were well over 1.5 seconds. Two from my class managed huge misses for both. They were demoted a year, and had to repeat the last year's training.
Me, I passed. Top of the class. I mean, I know this was all in the service of Gilead and I know that all those prisoners had probably been sentenced to death anyway, but…..
When it sprung for me, the man I (correctly) deduced had been the danger was now the Commander in front of me, neither the Wife nor the martha beside him. I simply dispatched him with no prejudice or favour. When I walked over to inspect my work, I saw his name. He'd been Rebecca's father, Rebecca had been one of the kidnapped kids years ago that day with me. We called her Kiki back then, but in Canada she'd insisted on being referred to as Rebecca. She'd grown up being one of the most vocal kids about 'women's rights', kept getting rewarded by the schools. Her foster parents kept showing her off at anti-Gilead marches in Toronto. That's how bad it was.
I had no idea why Kiki's dad had, in effect, been salvaged. After all these years. At my hand. At first it bugged me, my first killing. But I was sure that he'd deserved his fate, so I chalked it up to me serving Gilead. Also, my time of 0.85 seconds was an Academy record that year, the only time under 1 second. It helped me win top cadet. Even as I was to have nightmares from that point on.
BLAINE'S BODY MAN
I still struggled with that sweet spot, one of showing the requisite respect when offering a carefully crafted criticism to a superior. Mostly that involved keeping my opinions to myself.
Nowhere more so than at Commander Blaine's residence. I mean, the first glaring issue was that he was the first Commander I'd ever heard of who'd been unmarried. Some had become widowed after losing their Wife, but Blaine had never married. (There was a rumour that he had married many years ago, and the martha in Blaine's house, Beth, told me not to talk about it. The only mention people had ever made was that he'd, 'never married'. So I left it at that.)
I was Blaine's body man. Obviously, as a Commander he had free rein in his house. On odd occasions I'd be called inside, often not even knowing the reason. But not often. At his residence, I patrolled outside.
Suffice it to say, it was a bit of a shock, though, to accompany Commander Blaine to a hotel I came to know as 'Jezebels', a hotel (and a perk) which had been available to Commanders since Gilead's inception. That should not have been allowed. I knew exactly what transpired within those walls, and had only raised it quietly with someone up the chain-of-command within the Guardians' ranks. He told me in no uncertain terms to 'leave it alone'.
I distrusted my Guardian superiors after that. I couldn't believe that some in our service played politics with black and white morality.
Commander Blaine must have been better at reading people than me. Maybe 'reading people' was a life-skill Commanders must develop, so it was great to see Blaine go through that in the SUV on his return home.
"Jefferys," he said, "Can I discuss some stuff with you?"
I said, spying him in the rear-view mirror, "Of course, sir. Anything."
"I was once a Guardian, too, you know."
I had not known that, and I told him so. But it explained many things about the man. Aside from the million questions I'd have for him if we'd been of equal rank, it explained why we got on so well. I truly believe I pleased him by him never having hum need to anticipate what I'd do in various situations.
He looked out the window beside him, "I've done both sets of work. I've done home security, like you. I've also done field work, where things are not so clear cut."
I said, "That's one thing I've not done, sir: true field work. At the Academy, they said that in the early years - maybe 20 years ago - that Guardians played a huge role in the field. Even household Guardians."
Blaine said, "Decision making in the field is often the difference between winning and losing." He stopped for a second, said, "Do they still cover the Lexington-martha scenario in the Academy?"
"Yes sir," I said. "It's the class-based introduction to the last live-fire exercise, just before graduation." He remained silent, so I continued, "Instructor Hiwakawa stressed the importance of quick and accurate decision making."
"Did he tell you which campaign that the Lexington-martha scenario was from?" I told him, no.
"You're a returnee, aren't you, Jefferys?" I told Blaine that I was.
Blaine then said, "Well, it has a lot to do with you. It was the day you were trafficked to Canada, back in the day. If a Guardian in the field had made a different decision that day, rather than shooting that martha, you'd probably still be living in your dad's, The Commander's home here today."
All I could say was, "I should look into that, sir," knowing that confessing that one would 'look into anything' was a risky thing to say in Gilead.
I drove into the Blaine compound, the gate closed behind the SUV. I got out for the security sweep, including checking some of the tripwire indicators, all of which revealed that the house (outside of the kitchen and the martha quarters) was unoccupied.
So I walked back to the SUV and opened Blaine's door saying, "We're good, sir."
We were standing on the cobblestones of the driveway, he turned and said to me, "Say, Jefferys. After your rounds tonight, why not drop by my office. I didn't get to what I'd wanted to say. It's about the hotel. I don't want you to get the wrong idea. Let's do it later." I'd never been to his office. I told him I'd be there about 11:15 pm, which seemed late but he approved.
