Chapter 28: Reeducation

Farook is captured and desperate to find his daughter, Omni, as dangerous alliances and unsettling truths unfold in a tense confrontation.

The door clicked open, and heavy boots kicked them alert.

“Storytime is over.”

Rough hands lifted him up and dragged him out of the room, his feet and legs stumbling to keep up. The others shouted behind him, but he only had ears for one voice.

“Where is she?” he demanded and struggled with his captors’ grip on him, a stupid gesture while still blind with the hood over his head. All they did was walk him into something hard. A long clang and white spots, and an aching head told all he needed to hear.

“Shut up,” the man on his right unnecessarily drove home, not the smart one then, thought Farook.

He couldn’t feel the Override, so he felt no disconnection effects. But with no devices at hand, he wasn’t about to hack anything either. How could he help Omni?

They maneuvered him through a corridor and roughly into a seat.

“Sit here and wait for the boss.”

Moments later, they forced another body into a seat nearby. “Farook, you ok?”

“Yes — “

A punch to the gut cut him off, and he changed his mind about speaking.

“Quiet,” said the raspy voice of the Dumb One. The smarter guard kept quiet and was far harder to place in the room.

He repeated the brief prayer he’d been saying to himself since they took Omni. A soothing action to keep his mind busy while he waited for whomever this boss was to show himself.

A metallic scraping sound announced someone else had entered the room. Farook sat stock still, the hood still over his head, and listened as hard as he could until his ears ached.

“It’s been a while, Murph.”

Next to him, Farook felt more than heard Murph go rigid. He knew this man. Murph sounded surprised to hear that voice. Farook filed that away for later.

“You’re the boss?” Murph said at last, the question clear in his tone.

“You’re alive, you mean,” the voice said, condescension dripping from his words.

Oh no, this is personal then, thought Farook as the bottom fell out of his stomach. He adjusted the mental math in his head, and their chances of escaping with their lives dropped.

A slight scrape on the chair legs, and a moment later, a hand removed his hood, and he saw the speaker’s pale good-looking face. He wore paramilitary garb and a gun at his waist.

He smiled a sad smile at Farook, which he didn’t understand but made him fear for Omni. Before he could stop himself, he blurted out, “Where is my daughter? What have you done with her?”

“She’s fine. I’ll take you both to her in a moment,” the man said and cut the bonds at Farook’s wrists. He’d forgotten the pain until the moment relief flooded in. Hope bloomed, but he didn’t know if he could trust a word from this man.

He rubbed his wrists and looked over at Murph, his head still covered, no motion made to uncover his head or release his bonds.

“He’s far too dangerous to untie,” watching his gaze the man said, again with that sad smile. Which made Farook frown and wonder at the story between them, and Murph’s hand on it. The man placed a firm hand on his shoulder and guided him out of the room. “Bring him too,” he said to the two guards.

Perhaps this would work out okay for them. Hope grew in Farook’s heart and, although he was wary, he scanned the office building for any sign of his daughter.

They walked through a glass-lined corridor. Panes of glass were missing, a sign of disrepair and neglect. The building, obviously hijacked years ago, was no longer kept to its original purpose. Building hijackers. Kidnappers.

Could he really trust anything these people said? Fear laced his veins, and he remembered the missing person in their group. “Where’s Ash?”

“He’s being,” the man paused as he thought about his words, “reeducated,” and then he smiled at his joke, “repaired, too.”

A chill went through Farook’s body, and he glanced around through the windows to see any sign of his daughter.

And he found her.

“Dad!” the sound of her voice almost made his knees buckle, and he stumbled, catching himself on a door frame.

“Omni?” he turned to his right and saw her getting up and running to him, then her arms were around him, and he held her before pushing her back, “Are you hurt?”

“Hurt? No, not at all,” the surprise in her tone confused him for a moment, “Ok good,” he said.

“I told you she was fine,” the man gave Farook a gentle nudge into the room before walking past and sitting at the head of a boardroom table covered with papers and what looked like maps of the city.

“Let’s all take a seat. It’s long overdue that a certain person in your retinue told the full, unvarnished truth.”

Farook and his daughter sat next to each other, and he looked over her. He could see she was physically unharmed. She didn’t even look scared. What was going on?

He glanced back as the guards shoved Murph into the seat opposite the blonde-haired man. He sat in the middle between the two, and the silence grew uncomfortable until eventually, Murph spoke, his voice hoarse.

“Zeke,” he said.

“Tell them, your new crew, tell them what happened to your last one. Tell them what you did to Vinn.”

“I did nothing to her!” Murph yelled suddenly. A guard cuffed him hard, and Farook watched Murph turn to face the man. Even blinded by the hood, he could sense him staring daggers at that guard.

The Dumb One was dead if Murph ever got free. But that didn’t seem likely now, he turned back to the blonde man, Zeke he was called. Ezekiel, perhaps, thought Farook.

Zeke nodded at the smart, quiet guard, and the man took out his gun and placed it at Murph’s head, and the man straightened.

“What good will it do, Zeke?” Murph whispered.

“It will make me feel better,” Zeke said, voice full of spite. “I’m growing impatient.”

“How did you become boss here, hmm Zeke? That’s a story I want to hear? Why don’t you tell us that? Hey, after everything they did to us, you’re suddenly their boss?”

“A common enemy is all it took,” said Zeke.

Murph chuckled, and at a glance from Zeke, the dumb guard struck him again.

He spat blood on the floor.

“Fine,” said Murph, “I’ll tell you.”

“Good,” said Zeke, “I want them to know. I want to see it in their faces when they realize who you are.”