Caged
Ryle knew it was in reality a cage, surrounding him front and back and hemming him in on all sides, but it made him feel better to think of it as a grate – something he might one day be able to slip through and find his way to freedom.
“You're never getting out.” That was Silas, his jailer. The larger man liked to walk past the open-air cage two or three times a day and remind him of his plight, let him know just how far from grace he'd fallen. Silas' taunts had no effect; Ryle's real punishment for misdeeds came from within.
“You'd better hope not,” he said, flashing a smile. At least three of his teeth were missing after repeated beatings, and he knew he wasn't the same handsome man that had been taken into custody on Renal III. “If I do, running will be your only option – and it won't get you far.”
Silas barked a laugh but there was a nervous undertone to it, a fear that his prisoner's boast might just be true. It was no surprise; fifteen men had died bringing Ryle in and twice that many were injured, including Silas. Capturing the best agent in the quadrant didn't happen easily, even when he was caught off-guard. Being betrayed by the government Ryle had sworn to serve had made his reactions slightly slower than they should have been, and given his captors the time they needed to act. It wasn't as though he hadn't been expecting some kind of grand betrayal – he just had a different timeline in mind. So far as he knew there had been no other agents that could even come close to his level of skill and assumed that bought him at least a few more years.
As it turned out, the government wasn't quite so lax when it came to finding his replacement.
“Wouldn't matter,” Silas said, kneeling down next to the cage. “You could kill me and this whole place but you'd still have to deal with Wrath. She's been waiting for the chance to get her hands on you since we took you in – if she'd had her way you'd already be dead.”
Ryle smiled again. Wrath was controlled by the government in the same way he had been and that made her vulnerable. Killing him went again their explicit orders and while it appeared she certainly had the ability to pull off the job, doing so would blacklist her and put her head on the chopping block. No one was that stupid.
Silas spit in his face by way of goodbye and then kicked the cage for good measure as he stood. With no time to jump back Ryle was forced to take two electrified cross-beams in the face but didn't so much as flinch when their arcing heat seared his skin. Three months of tinkering with his prison had earned burns all over his body and sense of desperation until he realized where his true opening would come from – human error. Technology could be made to cage, made to hold, but those who manipulated that technology were ultimately stupid and weak.
He glanced down at the small sprayer he'd lifted from Silas and then slipped it into his back pocket. Stupid. And Weak.
***
Nightfall meant only one guard on duty, switching every four hours. The compound was secure and completely hidden from scanner traces to anyone on the outside, and Ryle was its only prisoner. Though the guard booth above his prison's muddy pad was lit, Silas and the others preferred to leave him in darkness, presumably in an effort to both dehumanize and frighten him. All it really did was give him time to work unsupervised.
Silas' sprayer was meant to quickly cauterize an injury or stop a burn from spreading and had little in the way of value as a weapon, at least on its own. Once dismantled and a few key components altered, however, it became a useful tool in escaping the cage.
The trick lay in getting his nighttime guard to come down into the mud, something Ryle accomplished by yelling slurs about the fat man's mother until he could no longer endure. When heavy footsteps came tromping down the concrete stairs Ryle was ready, modified sprayer in hand and a grin on his face.
He charged forward as the guard's electro-probe came through the cage, pressing himself against the electrified metal bars and jamming the altered sprayer into a meaty and quivering leg. The guard howled in pain as the device's entire medical payload dumped in one application, and Ryle shot an arm out, pulling the guard hard toward him even as he set the sprayer's metal handle against the cage framework.
Another howl rose and quickly cut off as Ryle's improvised conduit filled the guard with massive amounts of electricity, shocking his heart to stillness. Once the man was down, keys were easily found and the cage door unlocked; it hurt, but most of the prison's power had been expended in taking a life.
Ryle threw himself into the mud as the cage door swung open, glorying in freedom, but wasted only a moment enjoying the sensation before he stripped the guard of weapons and armor. His escape wasn't over yet.
“I was wondering when you'd get around to it,” a soft voice said from atop the stairs. “You've missed chance after chance.”
“Wrath,” Ryle said quietly, not bothering to move. His replacement had clearly been planning the moment of her triumph for quite some time – she couldn't kill him outright, but could easily make the case he had died in the chaos of an escape attempt.
“Must we be so formal, Ryle? There was something familiar in the voice, something he was sure he should recognize. A pale wrist-light flared as Wrath descended the stairs, and his breath caught at the bone-white revelation. “ 'Daughter' is a far more appropriate term, don't you think?”
- D
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