Robert Crane - Omega

“Oh, I see,” he said, but I could tell by his voice he didn’t. “Well, that’s good. Now, if you can just open your mouth,” he brandished a swab, “I need to get a sample of cheek cells…”

I sighed, and opened my mouth. The swab was long, white and had cotton on the end. It was not pleasant, not fun, but it didn’t matter because my head was already elsewhere. This suit was something that could change my life, could make me able to touch my boyfriend, to feel him against me without two layers of clothing to separate us. We could sleep in the same bed, could stop fooling around in our dreams…and start doing it in the real world.

And I wouldn’t have to worry about his eyes turning colors anymore.

The exam lasted longer than I wanted, and was far more invasive than I really cared for. I sighed with relief when I was done. That I’d learned about the new material was worth the inconvenience of dealing with Sessions and his complete lack of humanity . When finished, I dressed and worked my way back to headquarters, where I found Parks in the watch room next to the basement interrogation chamber where Fries was being held. I watched Fries, who sat with a black hood over his head, handcuffed to the metal table in the center of the room. There was no cot in the cell, and I wondered if he’d slept sitting up in the chair. Actually, I wondered if he’d slept at all.

“Would you have, in his place?” Parks asked when I voiced that thought to him, “We’ll be able to get an idea of his state of mind when we pull that hood off.” His gray hair flowed over his shoulders, somewhat more controlled today than it normally was. Its usual state was to be bushy, but it looked like he had washed and perhaps combed it. “Let’s take a look, shall we?” His expression was almost wolfish, his teeth bared as though he were a feral creature ready to strike. He strode out of the observation room and into the hallway, unlocking the door using a key card. The door opened with a gentle whoosh , and I walked in first when Parks gestured for me to.

Fries wore the same clothes he had when I had encountered him yesterday in his apartment—suit coat, black pinstriped pants, leather shoes, no tie. I could see the top of his chest in the space between the hood and his unbuttoned shirt; I had seen him with it off, and he was muscular, in very good shape. I suspected he spent some time on that, probably more as a vanity thing than any sincere desire for the added strength his definition would bring him. I circled him and came to a stop just to his left. His head moved under the hood, swiveling to follow the sound of my footsteps.

Parks took up position at the shoulder opposite me, and looked at me over Fries’ covered head. Parks reached down and took hold of the hood and gave me a questioning look. I nodded. He gave me a wink and then yanked the hood off, causing Fries to blink at the brightness of the light. He shut them harder when I yanked off the duct tape.

Fries blanched, then slowly opened his eyes, keeping them squinted as he stole a look first at Parks, then at me. “Oh, good, it’s you,” he said upon seeing me. “I was hoping it’d be you.”

I stared at him, forcing my face to carry an expression that I hoped conveyed bleak humor. “Because I didn’t hit you hard enough yesterday to satiate your masochistic desires?”

“No,” he said, and formed a smile that caused me to feel another desire to pound his face into tenderloin. “I just like seeing you, that’s all.”

“I assure you, the feeling is not mutual.”

“Enough of this crap,” Parks said. “Fries, we’ve got questions for you.”

“I’m sure you do,” Fries said, turning to face Parks. His expression went from a grin to something more concealed, calm. “I doubt I have any answers for you, though. At least none that would satisfy.”

“You, unable to satisfy?” I arched an eyebrow. “Common occurrence.”

“I don’t hear any complaints,” he said with a light shrug and a smile.

Something primal and brutal welled up inside me, and I couldn’t contain myself. I hit him before I even realized I was going to, leveling him with a punch that sent his chair over backwards and snapped his head against the floor with a crack that I felt reverberate off the walls. “That’s because the women you seduce are dead before you finish,” I said, leaning over him. I reached down and forced my gloved hand against his throat and lifted him back up, setting his chair upright against the wall. “If you didn’t kill them, they might tell a different story.”

I heard him take a deep breath around my hand, his wrists still attached to the chair courtesy of the handcuffs. “I do know how to make the girls scream.” He coughed. “I didn’t hear you complain.”

I restrained myself from hitting him. “Oh, I didn’t? Sorry. I was very unsatisfied with the look I got at your equipment. It seemed pitifully inadequate to the task before you.”

I caught a flash of rage in his eyes that disappeared behind another smile, this one faker than any of the others he’d used on me. “Heh. Very good. But you wouldn’t know what satisfaction is, would you, Sienna?”

“Enough,” Parks said, and I felt his hand on my shoulder, gently. I looked back and saw that there was no mistaking the look in his eyes— Back off, it said. I walked back to the table, seating myself on its edge. “We’re here to talk to you about your employers.”

“I’ve got nothing to say about my employers,” Fries said, leaving the smile plastered on. I heard the click of his handcuffs against the chair as he rattled them.

“You sure about that?” Parks gave him a dead stare, cold and unmoving, without a trace of warmth.

Fries smiled tightly. “Yep. If you’re planning to torture me, though, I suggest you get started. It might take a while to get to the good stuff.”

A sound came from the door, unlocking and opening, cutting short Parks’ reply. We turned to see a flash of red hair as Ariadne stuck her head in. She flushed at the sight of Fries, who smiled back at her. “I need to speak with the two of you for a moment.”

“Nice to see you again, Ariadne,” Fries said with a little shrug . His hands clinked the cuffs as the chain reached maximum extension. “I’d wave at you, but I think you can see I’m a bit tied down here.”

“Just the way I prefer you,” Ariadne said. “Parks, Nealon…a word, please.”

I cast a look at Parks, who shook his head in a warning that took me a moment to decipher. I realized he meant I shouldn’t show hesitation in front of Fries, but when I looked at Fries he was already grinning at me. Too late. I followed Parks into the hall where the door slid shut behind us and Ariadne activated the lock.

“This one’s gonna be tough without getting physical or using chemicals,” Parks said the moment the door clicked shut. “He’s got a serious reserve of self-confidence that ain’t bluster. Probably been trained to resist interrogation.”

“Doubtless,” Ariadne said, “but that’s not why I called you out here—”

“He said it was nice to see you again,” I looked at her pointedly. “You know this scum on a personal basis?”

She shook her head. “In passing. I didn’t realize it at the time, but he tried to flip me a few months ago.”

“Flip?” I looked from her to Parks. “Like…physically?” I lowered my voice. “Like…”

Ariadne let out a hiss. “No. As in flip me from the Directorate to Omega. I didn’t know who he was at the time, and it was a clumsy attempt, but it had…” I saw some of the life drain out of her, “…repercussions. I’m not going to go into detail, but suffice it to say the Director is fully aware of what happened, and you needn’t concern yourself with it. We have something else brewing.”