Looking over at the reception desk, James notices an attractive woman waving at him. She sits behind the desk, ever vigilant, just as James knew her to be once upon a real world. Sizing up the baffled pair, the woman at the desk offers a sad smile.
“Hey there, James. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
Taciturn approaches and rests both hands on the desk counter.
“It has, Rachel. You look… good.”
The woman rolls her eyes and lets out sigh.
“Sorry. It just stops being a compliment, these days. Or at least, it’d be more of a compliment if I actually had a choice in the matter.” She stops her own rant before it begins. “But thank you, James. I appreciate it.”
Rachel opens a drawer at the side of her desk and produces two yellow guest passes with their names and photos on them.
“Here, keep these with you at all times. They’ll give you access to everywhere you’re allowed to be. They’ll be active for 4 hours, but my understanding is you’ll be out of here much sooner.”
James takes the badge handed to him, but Matilda is conspicuously hesitant to take her own from Rachel’s extended hand.
“Wait. What? But… how could you have…?”
Rachel smile fades as she closes Matilda’s hands around the pass.
“Oh, honey. If he didn’t know you were coming, you wouldn’t be here.”
Rachel shifts her focus to Taciturn.
“Donovan is waiting for you on his floor, James. He also said that he’s very much looking forward to discussing everything with you.”
James tries to find the right words.
“Rachel, I…”
But they elude him.
“I guess, thanks,” is all James gets out before turning to move toward the elevators.
Matilda fidgets with the badge around her neck. Once they are out of earshot, she speaks up.
“So, you want to explain that to me? She seems too nice to be here.”
Taciturn clenches and unclenches his fist, finds himself doing it, wills himself to stop.
“I’m sure if she had the chance, she’d slit Donovan’s throat just as soon as you would.” Matilda nods toward Rachel’s desk.
“She works for the monster.”
The elevator hums as it descends to their level.
“She’s trapped here just like everyone else. I doubt she’s even allowed to leave that desk.” Matilda looks again, this time with quiet, dawning horror, in the direction of the lobby.
“But… why would Donovan do something like that? It’s so… messed up.”
The elevator doors open with a cheery ding!
“I don’t think Donovan sees it the same way she does.”
Chapter 10: “The Deal”
As they ascend in the glass elevator past seemingly endless floors, Matilda mentally prepares for the inevitable. At the top floor of this Tower, she’ll be face to face with the man that’s been sending hunters after her for as long as she can remember.
Answers first, she reminds herself, grinding her teeth – after that, and only after that, she can put an end to all this. For the third time in as many minutes, she instinctively reaches to where her knives ought to be, and for the third galling time, she finds nothing. The strange light at the building’s entrance has taken her precious blades, sheathed in the comfortable, familiar weight of her vest, and left her nothing in exchange but this ridiculous, thin dress. Matilda closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. It carries her back to her first slaver kill. She didn’t even have her knives then, and she made do well enough. She lets the air out of her lungs and focuses on the instincts that have kept her alive. In her peripheral vision, she can see Taciturn’s gun-hand opening and closing, clenching and unclenching.
As the elevator rises, the city lights begin to disappear into the smog below. Matilda watches as the buildings gradually fade to primitive shapes. Wrapped in simple low-resolution textures, they continue to decrease in detail as the elevator rises. The farther they get from the surface, the fewer resources are drawn by the System to maintain these details. Generated clouds obscure visibility, and the buildings on the horizon are unloaded and replaced with pure, impossibly blue sky. With each second of their ascent, several distant, washed out features and template groups of buildings create the impression of a skyscrapered gridwork now far below them.
The elevator slows and Matilda readies herself as best she can. When the elevator eventually stops, the doors open to reveal a richly decorated office. At the far end is an ornate desk, with massive dynamically-tinting windows comprising the entire wall behind it. The vista beyond the wall is an acrophobe’s nightmare in polarized, muted hues of sun, sky and cloud-layer. Pictures from the golden age of the twentieth century hang on the other walls. Matilda can see her reflection in the polished marble floors. Imposing alabaster columns hold up a high, painted ceiling. But the most conspicuous aspects of this office are the glass cases, at least twenty of them, arranged in the fashion of exhibits in a museum. Varying in size, some of these cases house what appear to be rusty tools, archaic machinery, and at least one living creature – a purple lizard that presses its peeling body against the glass.
Behind an imposing semicircular desk at the focal point of this ostentatious, sterile menagerie, Donovan Craze sits comfortably in a chair that, in another setting, might be taken for a throne.
As they exit the elevator, Donovan stands up. Matilda assesses the Babylonian ruler. Aside from his expensive suit, nothing about Donovan matches how Matilda had imagined him. The handsome, well-groomed man smokes a cigar in one hand and holds a snifter of brandy in the other.
“James!” he smiles, smoke still rising from his cigar. His hearty voice booms in welcome through the large space that is more gallery than office. “Welcome to the Tower, my friend.” The elevator doors close behind them with a barely-audible hiss.
James responds with a nod both cool and decorous, but Donovan is undeterred. Grinning, he gestures to a pair of exquisitely-upholstered armchairs in front of his desk.
“Please, sit.”
As they stand gazing at his imposing desk, his venture sanctum, Matilda catches sight of something prominently displayed within one of the glass cases nearest the elevator. The katana looks incredibly old… but it would get the job done. Answers first, she reminds herself.
“And this must be the infamous Matilda. I see you’ve noticed the first Taciturn weapon. Tell me, honestly. What’s it been like, traveling with one of them, so far?” He makes a sweeping gesture with the hand holding the cigar to include James and lets out a hearty laugh. Matilda opens her mouth to challenge him, but Donovan continues without pause.
“Well! It’s great, to finally have us all together.”
Turning away from them, Donovan gazes out the glass window to the infinite skybox beyond.
“What happened, James? You used to be so smart. Perhaps all that time spent in the badlands has dulled your edge.”
He turns back to James and Matilda to find them still standing by the elevator, and a disappointed frown materializes on his chiseled face.
“Seriously, friends, you insult me. Given all the resources I’ve spent making sure we all met, I’m offended that you think I’d do you any harm. Please, take a seat.”
Taciturn approaches the chairs without a word. Hesitantly, Matilda follows, muscles and instincts wound tight, ready to pounce at the first wrong move. Amid the stronger, free-floating smells of cigar smoke, brandy, and aggressively-expensive cologne, her heightened senses pick up two subtler, keenly-pleasurable scents: Coffee and tea. She spots a silver tray with two cups, resting on a short table between the two chairs. The cups sit next to an unopened pack of cigarettes and an ashtray.