ABC - Penance

Alvarez Apartment, South Bank District

“Where am I?” Minke asked me. I had sat her on my toilet in the cramped bathroom while I dragged out my first aid box from under the sink. I glanced over at her as she blinked uncertainly under the white LED light that illuminated the multi-purpose room. Besides my toilet, there was a wash basin, shower cubicle and compact auto-washer and dryer all fitting snugly into a space not much bigger than a closet.

“My place” I answered succinctly and soaked a face cloth in the basin with warm water. I squatted in front of her and started wiping her arms and neck down first, trying to get as much blood and dirt off without scrubbing too hard.

She winced so I stood up and opened the tiny medicine cabinet over my basin. I still had some of my pills from last time I had been beaten up, back when I was chasing down Samuel Thane and his cronies. There were two of the blue ones still rattling around in the plastic container so I popped the lid and took one out.

“This will help with the pain” I said evenly, “But you are going to get drowsy real fast”

Minke eyed me from her perch on the toilet seat and I could see the recognition in her eyes.

“I thought it was you, watching from outside the Arena” she said. “I recognised those red gloves of yours” Minke took the tablet and swallowed it dry, then coughed until I grabbed a glass and filled it with tap water. She gulped it down, coughed some more, then was back to breathing normally. I watched her without comment, because before I started my own career in the Arenas I couldn’t take a pill without water.

Nowadays I am an old pro and can take tablets even when I am as dry as the desert.

“I was chasing a lead” I explained. “I had hoped my mark would be there, but the Intel was too old” I met her eyes with mine. “Why were you there, fighting in a Death Match?”

“Wasn’t a Death Match” she insisted tiredly. “Pricks just wanted someone to fight their boy for a few rounds, shed a little blood, then give him a great finish”

“Uh-huh” I replied. “They were going to kill you, Minke. It was an Execution show, like they did with criminals in the old Gladiator arenas. Little bit of cheap blood to whet the audience’s appetite”

“Maybe” she said, dropping her eyes away from mine. “It doesn’t matter anyway, cos I won”

For all her bravado, I realised the girl had not fought many serious bouts in the Arena. She had won because her opponent had expected her to let him win, not to pull some crazy stunt with a half-assed Ability.

“Yeah, you won” I agreed. “Then they beat you up some more and took you outside to feed you into the grinder. Sounds like a win to me”

Minke was trembling, the shakes rising up from her body and setting her arms and legs jiggling. Her voice caught, her head still hung low so I couldn’t see her tears yet I could hear them well enough.

“Thanks for saving me, Judy”

“Don’t call me that” I sighed. “Call me Luisa, or Alvarez if that is too hard. You don’t want to be talking to Judy as she is a right c*nt”

That got a surprised snort and the shakes subsided. Probably more the blue tablet than any side-effect of my charming personality. I reached forward with the damp cloth once more, washing away the filth.

“Thanks, Luisa” she finally breathed out. I took that as a positive sign so I stood up and laid the wash cloth in the sink.

“I need you to take off your clothes” I told her flatly. “You have cuts and scrapes all over so I need to check them out”

She nodded her head in agreement, so I lifted her tank top off first, exposing a plain black sports bra holding down a pair of tits only marginally bigger than mine. Then I knelt at her feet, unlacing her boots and pulling those off. Minke had no socks and her feet were soft and pale, smelling only a little bad.

I got back to my feet and she did too, using the nearby wall as a support. I let her push down her sweat pants to her knees, exposing a pair of rather daring lace knickers in crimson. Those I left in place and helped her pull the sweats off before seating her once more.

The tank top and pants got slung into my auto-washer and I set them for a good soak cycle. Her boots I set to the side of the toilet for hand cleaning later. Then I returned my gaze to Minke’s pale body, barely covered by the bra and panties.

She was a sorry sight. In another time and place, Minke would be a beautiful young woman. She was undernourished, like most people in the Hole, but that wasn’t the problem.

Minke had old bruises and scars over her legs and arms, others visible along the sides of her ribcage and across her back. My own hands trembled as I gently washed her down, trying to keep my expression as neutral as I could.

I had seen this before, on the woman I loved. Jan Andrews, widow of my old partner Detective Peter Andrews. He used to like hurting her, abusing her body in ways you couldn’t see when she was dressed.

Underneath the thin layers of cloth, her body had been like this girl’s. Some of Minke’s scars were from the Arena, same as I had. Yet most of these were from the hands of someone close to her, deliberately marking her flesh with pain and suffering.

“Why are you here in the Wash, Minke?” I asked her softly. “Sam’s crew are based in the Wasteland still, isn’t that right?”

“Yeah, still in the Hole” she agreed, her eyes on me as I tried to clean her up without any kind of sexual implications. Once I felt she was ready I then started applying a sterilising salve over her fresh cuts and finishing with a spray of liquid skin to seal them over.

Her hands required some attention, the skin over the knuckles split from tonight’s encounter with Steel Hammer. More salve, a spray of the liquid skin to speed up healing, then I slid a thin gauze mitten over her hands as added protection.

“You’ve got big hands” I noted to Minke as I worked. “Brawler’s hands my Papa calls them. Means you were destined to be a fighter”

“Man hands, that’s what Victor calls them” Minke replied. “He always said I should have been born a boy”

“Who’s Victor?” I asked nonchalantly, getting her to lift her arms so I could carefully probe at her ribs. Minke paused and I felt the lie coming.

“Just some guy back at the camp” she replied. I sprayed some antiseptic onto a few of the older wounds and got her to face away from me so I could examine her back. Her spine and ribs stood out, not as badly as some I saw from the Hole, so she got fed enough.

Not enough to stop the hunger, just enough to stop her losing strength. Another form of control that somebody had over her and it I guessed it was whomever Victor was.

I had done all I could for now. She really needed a good hot shower once her wounds had sealed up a little, so that could wait. Her biggest need was food, preferably before sleep overcame her. With my arms offering support, I got her off the toilet and into the main living room.

While she sat in uncomfortable silence on my old sofa, I went into my bedroom and located a big T-shirt she could use to sleep in. She managed to dress herself in that while I hunted through my kitchen cupboards for what I wanted.

“Aha!” I exclaimed proudly when I found the box of protein bars. I took one out, unwrapped it and gave it to Minke. “Eat that while I make you some hot soup” I told her. She looked at the bar with a mix of hunger and aversion.

“Isn’t this one of those bars they feed the Guards?” she said, giving me a wide-eyed look.

“Sure is” I replied cheerfully. “Packed with protein, nutrients and no flavouring what-so-ever. It will give you some fuel to help you recover quicker”

I had grabbed an instant chicken noodle soup in a cup from my stash and flipped my tiny kettle on. While it boiled some water I leaned against the kitchen counter and gave her an encouraging look.

“It’s not poisonous to regular people” I assured her easily. I did not mention the emotional suppressants the things were laced with since I figured she would probably benefit from those too.

The small store I had left from when Bingo and Clancy stayed here had been steadily diminished by my new partner Ghost. As bland as they were, Ghost was addicted to the protein bars. I used them as bribes whenever I needed something extra from the clone so giving one to Minke was a big sacrifice.

She took a tentative bite, chewed and swallowed. Her disgusted face at the taste made me laugh so I had to promise her I would give her a candy if she ate it all. I had to fish around and produce the candy before she finished the bar, so she definitely had trust issues. Then again, so did I.

With bar and subsequent candy eaten, I gave her the hot soup. Minke cradled the cup and sipped it while I watched her like an over-attentive mother. It did make me flash back to the times I fed my kids, Bingo and Clancy. Definite mothering issues going on inside my head, but I was busy so I pushed those thoughts back down deep where they belonged.

In short order I had my impromptu house guest cleaned up, treated and fed. The whole exercise had taken less than half an hour, so I reckoned the tablet I had given Minke should be making her sleepy by now. On cue she yawned so I took the empty soup cup and got her to her feet.

“You can sleep in my bed tonight” I told her, which earned me a look of alarm on her face. “It’s Okay, I’ll be sleeping on the couch”.

I finally got her settled and left a bottle of water on the bedside drawers. She laid on her back, arms crossed defensively in front of her chest, until I walked out of the room. I pulled the door closed but not all the way, leaving a narrow gap so she could see it wasn’t locked.

By now I was totally whipped as well, so I stripped and had a long hot shower. The water was soothing, washing away my worries and the grime of the streets at the same time. God bless you little hot water system!

I rummaged in my washing basket, luckily stuff I had washed and folded already, hooking out some boxer shorts and a T-shirt I used to sleep in. Suitably attired, I dragged out one of the sleeping bags I had kept from when the kids stayed with me. This one was Clancy’s, a hint of his male musk still lingering in the lining.

Like some kind of pervert I stood for a solid minute, breathing gently with my head half into the bag, wondering how the pair of ex-Guards were going. Jericho-Three had sent them on some secret mission to the Northern Bloc and I had gotten no word on their well-being in the weeks since they had left.

Most of the time I am a pessimist, or a Realist as I tell my lover Jan, but in this instance I chose to be optimistic. No news meant nothing bad had happened to them and that was how I kept myself sane.

I laid the sleeping bag on the couch and wriggled myself into it, then hit the remote to turn off the lights. Lying on my back, my head snug against the armrest at one end, I looked up at my ceiling in the dark.

Tonight I had found no leads in my investigation but I did save a girl from being ground up into hamburger. I even got to shoot one asshole and beat the fuck out of another, with no damage to myself.

There have been better Friday nights in my life, but there have been lots that were worse. I smiled into the darkness and rolled onto my side, facing the kitchen unit. At some point my eyes closed and I drifted into sleep, wondering if Minke was still holding a grudge about what went down last time.