Chapter 286: The Interrogation Gets Personal

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

My original prison guard arrived back just before 6am, the twelve-hour shifts confirming my opinion that I didn't want to work for the DHS. The handover was even quicker.

"No change."

"Thanks."

Apparently they take their job seriously in the DHS, because quite a few of them started arriving soon after 7am. The average leaving time the previous night had been about 7pm, so America may be in the hands of moronic assholes, but at least they're dedicated moronic assholes. That made me feel so much better.

My watching the arrivals was interrupted by my guard yelling out, "You awake?"

I took a wild guess that he was talking to me, so I called back, "Yeah."

"You want breakfast?"

"DO I EVER! I usually eat twice as much as I've been getting here." I usually eat even more than that, but I hoped that he'd be more likely to give me more if I didn't seem greedy.

"Water or coffee?"

"Water please."

I watched him make my breakfast: four slices of frozen bread thawed in the microwave and four slices of cheese to make two sandwiches, and a cup of water. The same as yesterday's lunch, and not nearly as much as I wanted. The last three meals had been about a quarter of what I would've eaten at home. I hadn't been doing anything physical, but I was pretty sure most of my energy went to power my brain's activities which hadn't reduced at all - maybe even increased if constant sight blobbing used additional energy - so I was damned hungry.

When I'd finished my breakfast, I said, "Excuse me, but I'm still SERIOUSLY hungry. Could I have some more please?"

"No. Everyone gets the same."

#3: <So a 300-pound gorilla would be fed the same as Julia. Isn't bureaucracy wonderful?>

I spent the morning watching what I could see on the ground floor. I could reach one more floor above that but my vision was so degraded that it took a major effort to read anything, and I had so little horizontal movement available that there wasn't much available to even attempt to read. Other than reconfirming the address from a delivery guy bringing a birthday cake, I learned nothing remotely useful, nor had a chance to steal any food. It was a pity I couldn't create a "Mouth Blob", because the birthday cake looked very tempting. Or slightly more sensibly, I could've eaten the food in the kitchen. Hopefully the guard would blame the previous shift's guard.

Mid-morning, I heard a buzzer outside my cell and quickly moved the sight blob to watch. Three goons had arrived. I watched the procedure, but it was exactly as I'd expected. I did learn for certain which was the button that unlocked my cell, but otherwise learned nothing, and neither could I think of a safe way of stealing food during their arrival.

I was handcuffed and taken back to the same interview room. I had to wait for the boss asshole to arrive, so I had some time to close my eyes and snoop around the place. I couldn't find anything featuring "Anderson" or "Williams", but I did find the boss asshole sitting in a large, corner office. I quickly scanned the room, looking for anything useful. There were some folders on his desk, but they were labeled with names I didn't recognize. His computer screen didn't show anything useful either, but it was running software that looked like it might display useful information if I typed my name in. I couldn't do it now, but I could as soon as the boss asshole was walking for the door. The question was whether I should do it?

Speaking of "boss asshole", he was wearing an ID tag around his neck, so I could see that his name was Robert Moran. I tried hard, but I couldn't make an appropriate joke out of "Robert".

[[I was surprised to learn from a small number of Marks that in their dimensions the DHS doesn't have agents of its own. Instead it's purely an umbrella organization, directly employing only bureaucrats. All the agents work for the sub-agencies: Customs (previously under the Treasury), Coast Guard (previously under Transportation), Citizenship and Immigration Service (previously under Justice), etc. My lives were considerably different in those dimensions because their DHSs had never had a job opening that had appealed to Moran. I was curious about why a few dimensions had such toothless Homeland Securities, and the best correlation is that in most of those dimensions, their United Airlines Flights 93 - the fourth of the 9/11 hijacked planes - didn't crash into their Capitols (the formal "seat of government"; where the congress meets). The passengers had counterattacked the hijackers and the planes had crashed short of their targets. In the dimensions where all four planes hit their targets, the DHS was formed with greater manpower and powers.]]

He wasn't in any hurry to leave his office, so I had a good snoop around it. There was a three-drawer filing cabinet that looked worthy of investigation, so I sent the blob into it, instructing it to radiate some light so I could see. I started with the top drawer (my surname being Anderson), but judging from the tags I could read on the top of every hanger, it contained very miscellaneous crap ("Leave Requests", "Firearm Proficiency Reports", etc.)

The second drawer's first tag was "Acevedo", then "Adams, Isaiah & Joseph", "Allah" (which made me curious), then "Anderson, Mark" (Allah would have to wait). If the drawer had been mostly empty, I thought I could've slid the hanger open several inches and flicked through my file; but the drawer was packed. There was no way to read my file while it was inside the cabinet.

I did notice that my file was one of the thinnest. Not "thin", as the bulge it made indicated probably a hundred or more pages of paper, but even at that size it was thinner than nearly all of the other files. I also noticed that I was the only Anderson to have a file. All things considered, that was a worry. I didn't want the rest of my family involved in whatever this was, but if they were then I'd know that the DHS was truly barking up the wrong tree. Unfortunately, I did have secrets.

Moran had a coat stand holding his jacket and a shoulder holster, but I could only fantasize about shooting him with his own gun and then extracting my file from the cabinet to read it. Just as well for him that his gun didn't have a silencer fitted to it, because then my fantasy would've been harder to resist. (I was just joking with myself as I wasn't going to shoot anyone. Even if doing so would get me out of this mess - which it wouldn't - I wasn't going to become a murderer just to save myself another day or two of crap.) I was tempted to flick his gun's safety off, but couldn't guarantee that any accidental discharge wouldn't hurt someone else or injure him too much. Shooting his own balls and cock off would've been ideal, but that was too hard to arrange an accident for, especially as his belly would be in the way.

The rest of the drawer's alphabetic filings went through to "Justice", which was one of the thinnest folders (honestly! I assumed it was a surname, but I did enjoy the irony). The bottom drawer of the cabinet started with "Keller" and went through to the end of the alphabet. There was no "Williams" file. Its absence meant that following our money seemed even less likely to be the explanation for this, making it seem even more likely to be about me.

After another ten minutes of my fruitless searching, Moran got up and headed out his office door, unfortunately without feeling the need to refresh his memory by re-reading my file. While I'd been waiting for him, I'd decided not to use his computer or pull my file out of his cabinet. There was too much chance of those activities leading to suspicion and trouble. I might take the risk if I was still here in another couple of days, but not yet.

I got some good news and some bad news as Moran walked to the interview room - he pocketed his ID tag. I thought that implied something bad might happen, but also implied I'd get out to talk about it. It was probably good news overall, I hoped.

He sat himself down facing me, asking, "Do you have sex with Ava West?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you count her as your girlfriend?"

"Because I don't think of her that way."

"How do you think of her?"

"She's a nice girl, but she's primarily a lover. Julia is my girlfriend."

"What does Julia think of your having sex with Ava West?"

#4: <Careful how you answer. He wouldn't be asking unless the democratic freedoms of America depended on how Julia reacts to our fucking Ava.>

#7: <The DHS is a fucking joke.>

"She knows Ava is my lover and accepts it."

"Why?"

"Why does she know Ava's my lover, or why does she accept it?"

"The last one."

"She thinks I should get more experience so I'm not tempted by other girls later in our relationship, when things will be more serious."

"Why is she so obliging?"

#3: <Don't say, "Ask her," or anything like that. Let's try to keep everyone else out of this.>

"That's her personality, I guess. You don't seriously expect me to question her attitude, do you?"

"Did she behave in the same way toward her previous boyfriends?"

"I believe I'm her first."

"Why did she choose you?"

"Probably for my tolerance of absurd, time-wasting questions."

Moran looked up at the goon, instructing, "No meals for Mr. Anderson for the rest of the day."

The goon nodded.

#6: <FUCK! Can we revisit our decision about shooting his nuts off with his own gun?>

"Why did she choose you?"

"Because I said something nice about her in front of other kids at school."

"What did you say?"

"That she pushed my buttons."

"Very smooth. How many lovers do you have?"

"It depends on how you define lover."

"Do you want to eat tomorrow?"

#6: <Don't make any jokes about Clinton. We don't want to get political, and especially not derogatory about Presidents. As far as the DHS is concerned, we've never heard of politics.>

"I'm not being facetious. You asked me how many lovers do I HAVE - present tense. Right this instant I have zero. How far back do you want me to go before deciding whether someone is my lover or not? And what activities justify inclusion? If a neighborhood girl pulled on my pee-pee when I was four, does that make her a lover? If I had intercourse with a girl a year ago but I've never seen her since then, does she get counted? Like I said, it depends on how you define lover."

"How many females have you ever had intercourse with?"

#8: <What do we answer? I've a feeling he's going to want to discuss ALL about every single girl.>

#1: <We shouldn't mention Lily because she's a foreigner. That might get him even more insanely paranoid. I'd hate to mention Pat because her parents would be upset. How about we restrict ourselves to Julia, Ava, Alexis, and half a dozen of the Target Girls, so nine in total. Surely he'd lose patience by the time he's finished asking questions about all of them.>

#All: <Agreed.>

#2: <About food. Should we tell him we have an unusual metabolism and need to eat 50% more than most people, and that we'll starve even if we got the normal ration, and we'll starve even faster now he's cut us off?>

#5: <I'd rather keep our having anything unusual quiet for the moment. Especially because I can't imagine him changing his order. He's obviously an asshole for keeping an innocent boy under conditions like this.>

#All: <Agreed.>

"I don't objectify girls by thinking them as notches on my bedpost, but I guess the answer is nine."

"Who was the first?"

"Julia Williams."

"When was that?"

"April Fools' Day last year."

#5: <Not even the slightest smile. The asshole has no sense of humor.>

"Who was next?"

"I think that was Ava West."

"When?"

"Mid to late April. I can't be sure of the exact date."

#3: <April 22. It was... >

#1: <I know. I'm trying to act like a normal person, not someone with an almost perfect memory.>

#3: <You're right. Carry on.>

"Who was next?"

"Alexis I think. A week or so later."

"Alexis who?"

"Joseph."

"Who was next and when?"

I gave him the Target Girls' names and approximate dates, a couple of which I swapped around, and some of others were wrong by a few days.

"Why the large gap after Alexis Joseph?"

I shrugged, "Busy, I guess. That's just the way it worked out. It's not like my life revolves around sex."

We spent until lunchtime discussing my sex-life. Why on Earth ANYONE would want to waste two hours learning about my sex-life was beyond me, especially the guy with the biggest office on this floor. Surely he had more important things to do?

Lunchtime consisted of Moran stepping out of the room for a minute, talking to someone, and then he returned and resumed the discussion. Several minutes later the person he'd talked to delivered Moran's lunch. Moran ate it in front of me, while continuing his questions.

After lunchtime, the topic changed to my athleticism. For examples:

• What sports I played ("Soccer only"), how long I'd played it ("A couple of years"), how well I played ("Pretty good"). That resulted in tomorrow's breakfast being canceled, and I was forced to admit, "I'm probably the team's best player".

• We spent fifteen minutes discussing the training I'd done for my winning the 10k running race. I tried to be as vague as possible, but I had to admit that I hadn't done much. By now I was VERY worried about tomorrow's lunch.

• He then asked about the fights of mine that'd made the papers, and we spent AGES dissecting those. That led to Aikido, and we spent ages discussing that too. I made no mention of ki, talking only about the physical and spiritual aspects of it. I did recite the "Wild Stallion" parable to emphasize that Aikido was a passive, defensive un-martial art, to make myself seem non-threatening. [[Telling Moran the parable turned out to be a bad idea, although it probably just made him more determined to do what he would've done anyway.]]

Moran left to go have his dinner, leaving me guarded by yet another goon (they'd rotated a few times during the day).

It was just me and the goon in the room, so I asked him, "Do you have any idea how long this is going to last for?"

"SHUT the fuck up!"

I was surprised at how vehement he was, but it wasn't something I could argue about. [[By now, Moran had given his staff and the jail guards EXTREMELY strongly worded instructions not to get into conversation with me, and not to let me talk unnecessarily.]]

Not having too many other things to do, I thought some snooping was definitely called for. I sent a sight blob down to Moran's room, arriving just ahead of him. With any luck he was going to access my file and start making notes in it. Phoning in a pizza order for me would fall within the category of "with any luck" too. Instead he logged off his computer, locked his filing cabinet with a key he was carrying on his key-ring, grabbed his gun and jacket and left, presumably to get some dinner. Damn!

#5: <Maybe someone else was listening to the interview and is still typing notes into our file?>

We searched around for anyone doing that, finding nothing. There were plenty of people still at work, but they were all working on other things.

Having failed to find any information about me, I decided I might as well pass the time snooping in general. I noticed one person who had a screen that was displaying software that looked the same as I'd seen in Moran's office. Maybe I could type my name in to read what the DHS thought they were doing, so I could say whatever needed to be said to counter their worries. There were a few problems: The computer's current user would freak out, anyone walking past his workstation might see the computer working itself, I worried about setting off an alarm in case this computer didn't have security access to my file, and I worried about leaving a security trail of some sort.

I had the idea of trying the other offices rather than the open-plan area. The owners of those offices presumably had the highest clearances, and no passersby could see the offices' computer screens. Moran's canceling my meals strongly implied I'd be here at least another day, and he hadn't actually asked ANY question that were remotely related to terrorism yet, so God knows how much longer this was going to take. At the current rate, it'd be a week or more!

Half the offices were occupied (denigrate the DHS if you wish - I certainly will - but they do work long hours). The empty offices all had their computers turned off. Damn.

#4: <Or maybe it's just that their screens are in screensaver mode?>

#5: <Good point!>

We revisited the empty offices again, pressing the shift key on each keyboard. On the third attempt, the screen came to life. It was still logged in! Chances were that the owner had stepped out for dinner, but I couldn't rely on that, and I didn't know how long ago he'd left. I'd be able to read the screen and see anyone coming in the door if I positioned the sight blob correctly, which would give me only a couple of seconds to get out of my file. That was cutting it scarily close, not to mention that the screensaver wouldn't be reactivated, so this was definitely a risky proposition.

On the other hand, my multiple-day interrogation was starting to look like a scary situation too, so I decided to go for it. The screen was currently displaying the wrong sort of software, but I'd seen lots of people working on screens around the office now, and I'd deliberately watched to learn how they navigated their software. I could even leave the current display as it was by opening a new window for my work, so I wouldn't have the problem of getting back to this one when I'd finished.

I opened a new window, then navigated to the point where I could call up someone's file. A couple of seconds later I had a choice of typing in "Allah", "Anderson, Mark" or "Justice". I went with the middle choice. I hit the "Enter" key then sent the sight blob out of the room momentarily, to check if there was any visible reaction.

#5: <No screaming alarms, flashing red lights and metal barriers dropping over every window and door. That's good.>

The information was very well structured, with a contents page, hotlinks, search and filtering facilities, and all the other modern tricks. I already knew what I wanted to do. I filtered the file to show only notes entered by "Moran". That brought up a couple dozen notes, which I quickly started reading through.

The fuckwit thought I was intending to finance terrorism!

#4: <How the fuck are we going to convince him we have no intention of doing that?>

#8: <Saying "We've got no intention of giving $2 million to ragheads" doesn't exactly slide casually into a conversation about how many lovers we've got.>

#1: <NONE of our conversation with him has ANYTHING to do with what he should be asking about.>

#2: <Can we find out why he's doing what he's doing, or why he thinks we'd give away our hard-earned money?>

I searched through the file some more, finding some clues. For example, they had the details of our four overseas accounts, including the list of signatories for each. Some other agent had made a note that I was the only person with access to all four, and that it didn't seem to make sense for me to have access to the Williams' accounts. He'd suggested that splitting the accounts across two families might be "for obfuscation purposes." I was impressed by his vocabulary, but not his grip on sanity if he thought I was a terrorist financier. Especially as the money was still sitting in the accounts, so it hadn't financed anybody.

Another agent had commented that we were installing excessive security measures in our new home, implying we had some nefarious reason. Apparently he'd forgotten that we were kidnapped out of an earlier home. The tunnel came in for several special comments, because of the "tactical flexibility it provided in a firefight", "unwillingness to have their movements observed", and other such stupid comments. The tone was very much that good people don't need to use tunnels. Tunnels are sneaky things that only bad people would lower themselves to use; apparently forgetting that the White House is linked to tunnels (or given the way my respect for authority is going south, perhaps not forgetting).

The file was full of putting the worst possible interpretation on any given fact, and ignoring the perfectly valid counter-arguments. For example, one of the file's authors found it very suspicious that I was taking private martial arts lessons and asked why was I in such a hurry to learn how to fight? He ignored the fact that Aikido was a purely defensive art, that I'd only ever fought in self-defense, and had never been charged with assault. It was a big file, and there were plenty of facts, so more than enough opportunities to make scarily suspicious statements.