The Conduit: Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Shelly typed frantically on Susan’s computer, trying to crack into all of the protected files Susan had saved. The ones she worked on the most were the medical files marked Jane Doe and the financial files. As much as Max had been able to learn about Susan, there was more on the computer than he had the skills to uncover. While Susan worked, Max flipped through the hard copies she had in her drawers, looking for anything that would give them a clue to what Susan was up to.

“I think I’ve got something,” said Shelly.

Max put a file down and walked around behind his assistant. He was looking at a set of test results. They weren’t typical blood tests, however, and Max wasn’t sure he was reading them correctly. He looked at Shelly, who shrugged her shoulders in response. She saw it too.

“That can’t be right,” he suggested.

“I wouldn’t think so,” sighed Shelly, not sure what to make of the results.

Max looked at the test results, amazed that there was a chance a blood test could tell the age of a subject. It was a newer test, the B.A.T. test, but it appeared legitimate. If it was, then Jane Doe wasn’t human. Jane’s biological age test indicated she was more than three hundred years old.

How, he wondered. He took a seat next to Shelly and continued to read the rest of the results. The more he read, the more confused he became. As he went down the page, he questioned whether Jane wasn’t the one who killed Carter. After reading this, anything became possible in his mind, even an eighteen-year-old girl being a savage monster capable of killing a man.

“Look, Shelly. Nobody but you and I can know about this. This can’t get around the station,” explained Max.

“What get around the station? That you’re holding a centuries-old immortal down here,” answered Shelly.

The two looked at each other, both realizing that nobody was going to believe such a tale. Nobody could be that old. Max needed to get the doctor into an interrogation room, and he needed to get answers. Only Susan could explain the results in front of them.

“Fine, until we find Susan, then keep it to yourself, okay?”

Shelly nodded, still not sure anybody would think anything more than she was drunk and telling crazy stories. Would what they discovered be easily believed by most of the crew, and would the science team be all over her? She definitely wasn’t telling the science team. Shelly agreed to keep working on things so Max could get back to the command center.

“Call me if you find anything new,” he ordered, heading out of the medical lab.

It was when he hit the corridor that they both heard his radio. Han and Jensen had found the doctor, returning from her final sojourn to The Starry Night. As soon as she was back aboard the Oceanic, Han was going to slap cuffs on her and drag her to an interrogation room.

Susan steered the launch up to the Oceanic. She was expecting a welcoming committee, but expected it to be Han and one or two of his men. She didn’t expect it to be Han and Jensen, two of the mercenary team that brought Jane aboard. The doctor faked a smile as the boat got close enough to the launch deck, steering carefully against the steel girders but slowly enough her stowaway could evade being detected.

“What do I owe the pleasure?”

“Susan,” Han addressed her, “You’re under arrest.”

As the craft made contact with the Oceanic platform, Susan watched two of the mercenaries jump aboard, and they rapidly took over. It was clear they didn’t want her making a run for it aboard the five-hundred-horsepower launch. She stood back, her hands in the air, as the steely-eyed Jensen Shaw kept his hand on his sidearm.

“Anybody want to tell me what this is about?” asked Susan.

“Oh, we think you are well aware. Aren’t you a doctor?”

Once she was out of the launch and aboard the Oceanic, Susan was put into cuffs and taken away. Han and Jensen escorted her to the turbo lift as Jensen ordered his two men to search the launch. They didn’t want to risk missing anything, so Jensen ordered them to be extra thorough.

“Gut the damn thing if you have to,” he told them.

An uncomfortable silence in the turbo lift was because Susan didn’t want to go down to the detention level. Susan wasn’t being detained for questioning in the security office; she wasn’t sure why, but this had come as a surprise. As she was taken out of the lift and escorted to the containment area, Susan was surprised to see so many of the security staff on duty at the same time.

“Shepherd had his errand girl crack my computer,” she announced.

“He’ll be in to talk to you,” Jensen told her.

They knew enough. But the doctor quickly questioned how much they knew. If they knew that she was working against them, then Susan was going to be extracted and sent to some deep, dark hole in the middle of nowhere. It was a risk for the kind of money she was making. Part of her felt bad about the betrayal. She liked Max and the Oceanic. But Susan was deep and needed a way out.

She sat behind the electronic barrier, hearing the slight hum of the generators as the shimmering blue light kept her from leaving, dimly shining in her eyes. The steel bunk with a mattress was new. She was one of them, after all, so maybe the guys wanted her to be comfortable, thought Susan. But it could be to lull her into a false sense of trust or a feeling of appreciation.

“Are you comfortable?” someone said.

Susan turned to the front of the cell. Max stood there with Han and Jensen flanking him. The three all wore a menacing look on their faces. Susan didn’t know what to say as they stood there. She just nodded her head.

“Good, because you’re going to be in here a while,” Max told her.

Max pulled a chair up to the barrier as the others went to the control center. He bent forward; his hands clasped together. The look on his face was so hateful that all she could do was sit and wait for him to begin questioning her. She still had no idea what she was going to say. It was all going to depend on him.

“Would you like to explain the money?”

Susan was being paid handsomely for spying on the Oceanic crew and leaking information to her employers. It all went to a bank account, once a month, and she could transfer funds to any account in her name. She knew there were several million dollars in the main account. There was no explaining that kind of money, not based on her salary.

“Not really,” she admitted.

“Why?” he asked, “Why are you really here?”

That was the crux of the equation. Why was she really there? Max and his cohorts hadn’t figured out the reason behind Susan being aboard the Oceanic, or why she agreed to spy on them. All they knew was she was on the take, working for someone other than the group. And that was why he was so pissed off.

She shrugged her shoulders at Max, brushing off the question he asked. To Susan, it didn’t matter why she was there. The job was nearly finished, and when they were able to facilitate the release of the girl, both she and the preacher man were going to be exceedingly rich. All she’d done was falsify some documents and hide some lab results from him. She might lose her license, but other than that, Susan wouldn’t be formally charged with any crimes.

“I was paid to keep an eye on you and your boys,” she admitted.

“Why, though?” he wondered.

“The girl, Max. It’s all about your Jane Doe,” Susan told him.

Max stood up. He looked at the camera and called for some help. Moments passed, and Jensen and two of his men appeared. Jensen looked at Max and asked him how he wanted to proceed.

“As we discussed?”

Max answered, “Exactly as we discussed.”

Max keyed the entrance, allowing Jensen and his two men to enter the cell. Susan wore a new look of concern on her face. As she stood, moving to the back of the cell, the two men grabbed her by the arms and zip-tied her hands. Jensen stepped forward, an ominous look in his eye as he reached into his vest. He removed a black cloth that was a hood before putting it over Susan’s head.

Susan struggled, trying to shake the hood away from her eyes. She frantically wanted to know where they were taking her, but Jensen and the two men kept silent as she was dragged out of the detention center and into one of the outer corridors. She yelled repeatedly, “Where are you taking me?” But it was to no avail.

Hanson Morrow and four men from the station entered the detention center. Han looked at Max, the two of them sharing a nod. They hadn’t finished Susan yet, and Jane Doe was now the story. Max and Han entered the main detention area and found Jane lying on her bunk. When they walked in, it was obvious she was expecting them.

“How did she know we were coming?”

“She smelled us coming. She seems to have heightened senses,” suggested Max.

Jane rose from her bunk, walking with sway in her movements as she found her way to the seat closest to the barrier. Like a young child, her quizzical look was confusing. Max suspected Jane was far more in control than she was letting on. She’d been holding back this entire time, but he didn’t know why.

Today wasn’t going to be a friendly question-and-answer session. Max felt it coming, and he knew they didn’t have the time for another round of Jane’s storytelling. Whoever the girl was, he needed to know, and he needed to know now. As he stood there, watching her sit down, nice and relaxed, Han and his men entered.

“We’re not alone.”

“No, Jane. We’re not,”

“Too bad,” she laughed at him. “I was hoping to get to know you better, before…”

Max yelled at Jane to tell him, “Before what?” She was playing him again. This time, he knew it. As the men surrounded the barrier, each of them aimed a rifle at Jane. Then Max dropped the barrier. Four unarmed men rushed Jane, grabbing her as she began kicking and screaming. Jane was taken into a side room, with only Max and Han remaining in the main detention area.

“Are you ready for this?”

Han looked at Max. He wasn’t as certain of what came next, not as certain as Max was. But if they were going to get to the bottom of what Jane Doe was, her connection to Carter’s death, and why the doctor was being paid to hide the truth, the girl needed to be broken.

“We’ve come too far to stop now,” answered Han.

Max nodded. “You don’t have to be in the room for this. I’ve done this a thousand times.”

The security chief appreciated the offer but decided to push forward. He hoped that they were doing the right thing, but there was no way to know without finishing what they had set in motion. He promised Max he was good with what was about to go down, even though if it were to get out to the world, they’d be branded as criminals and guilty of human rights violations.

“Let’s get this over with.”

As they walked into the room, Jane was tied to a medical table. Two of the men held her head in place.

“Jane,” sighed Max, “Who are you?”

Jane’s eyes bounced around the room, the bright light from the ceiling shining directly in her eyes. Her breathing was frantic, and she was fighting to set herself free. She heard Max repeating the question as he walked around the table. Who are you? Who are you? Who are you! When she didn’t answer, her face was covered with a soft towel, leaving her in near darkness.

Two of the men continued to hold Jane’s head in place as one stood over her, waiting for further instructions. He held a bucket in his hands, a bucket of icy cold water. Max looked at the officer in the eye and nodded.

The slow, methodical application of water across the face of someone being tortured elicits the fear of drowning. As the tortured soul inevitably ends up with water in their nostrils, down their throat, and filling their lungs, their bodies respond. The question that differentiates each person is how long before they change their minds and start telling the truth. Max, in his years, had supervised thousands of interrogations. Many of them were sessions involving such enhanced interrogations as waterboarding, blunt force interrogations, and venous chemical interrogations.

As the bucket was emptied onto Jane’s face, it made it hard to know when to breathe. She, too, had taken in several amounts of water, as she coughed and hacked, trying to expel the fluid in her trachea. As the first bucket was emptied, Max nodded at the two holding her head. They removed the towel, and he looked down at her.

“Who are you, Jane?”

Jane looked at him, venom built in her gaze. He knew enough to know that Jane was extremely valuable to someone, but why? What was her real story?

“Talk to me, or they hit you with another round,” he demanded.

Jane kept quiet, just looking at the man controlling her fate made her see her father, her betrothed, and all that which she’d worked so long ago to escape. Why were they being so heavy-handed with her? She didn’t understand. But it wasn’t going to work. She’d suffered through far worse torments than the one they were putting on her.

“I’m Jane,” she smiled. “You just said so.”

Max nodded at his guys, who immediately forced her head down and covered her with the towel again. Another bucket of water was held over her face and head. Max urged her to tell them the truth, or he’d give them the go-ahead. She had no fear, Jane. So she urged Max to do what he had to do.

“Again,” he ordered.

As Max walked around the edge of the table, watching the water splash against the towel and Jane’s young body thrashing around beneath the steely grip of his four toughest officers, he saw Han turning his head. This was an advanced level of enhanced interrogation, and something Han had never seen before. It wasn’t for the faint of heart.

“She’ll break, buddy. Just relax.”

Han nodded but wasn’t as convinced as he was when they were planning on how to break down the girl and get to the truth. He was angrier then and wanted Carter’s killer. But how could the girl have been involved while locked away behind the barrier and under constant electronic surveillance?

“Let’s try this again,” Max suggested, getting immediately into a tortured and startled face as they pulled the towel away. “Who are you?”

“You’d never understand,” Jane choked out the words through gasps filled with fluid.

Try me, thought Max. With a point of his finger, he ordered his guys to continue. Jane was the key, he was sure of it. He just had to unlock whatever secrets were lying inside the young lady. As they started pouring again, there was a frantic tapping on the exterior door. Max looked, and it was Shelly.

“What the hell is she doing here?”

“I don’t know,” sighed Max.

Max stormed into the outer corridor, grabbing his assistant by the arm. Shelly wasn’t supposed to come down to the detention level without proper authority and a dammed good reason. Those were his exact words, a dammed good reason.

“What?” snapped Max.

Shelly handed Max a printout. She’d found something interesting, something they hadn’t gotten back until just now. It was a printout from the San Diego Marina, and the last known port of The Starry Night. As Max read the dockmaster’s report, The Starry Night filed an itinerary that included a trip into the South China Seas, and it was owned by…

“Son of a bitch!” he angrily exclaimed. “That’s why she was so blasted excited about exploring that dammed yacht.”

Suddenly, the lights all dimmed throughout the entire detention center. Max grabbed for his radio, calling for a status report. His radio wasn’t getting a signal out of the containment wing. What the hell is going on, Max questioned. He ran back into the room where they were torturing Jane. Max looked at the men and told them to secure the prisoner. He pulled Han to the side and told him how they were dead in the water.

“We are on emergency power and the coms are down,” he explained.

“What happened?”

“I don’t know. But we’re going to have to secure the girl and start trying to figure it out,” he told Han.