But even that skill failed him.
“Hey …”he managed. “Not so rough, okay?”
But she wasn’t listening to him. She had his shoes now and was sitting on the cement floor. She kicked her sandals off and replaced them with the almost-new Reeboks Chad had worn less than a week. She got to her feet again and resumed pacing the cell, testing the shoes out.
She showed Chad a feral grin. “Fuck, yeah.”
A while later-Chad wasn’t sure how long, since he no longer had his watch-they heard footsteps padding down the corridor outside the holding cell. Chad was sitting on the cot again, the pendulum of his emotions ticking wildly, alternating between boredom and apprehension bordering on terror.
He’d figured he wouldn’t speak to Sheena, as he thought of her, again unless prompted, but a question sprung to mind that he just had to ask. “Is this hell?”
She turned a cold gaze on him. “Shut up. We have company!”
The footsteps grew louder and in a moment two burly guards appeared at the cell door, a cuffed prisoner between them. Sheena didn’t acknowledge their arrival. She lit a handrolled cigarette from her pouch. Chad, however, got off the cot and walked over to the door. “Is this a real jail?” he asked no one in particular.
A collapsible nightstick appeared out of nowhere and whickered through two of the bars. Chad gasped at the sudden sensation of pressure against his abdomen. It was like being jabbed in the stomach-hard-with the end of a broom handle. Then the door clanked open, the prisoner was uncuffed and pushed inside, and the door was reclosed with an emphatic clang.
One of the guards said, “Now, y’all be good.”
Guard number two laughed. “Try not to have too much fun in here.”
General snickering ensued from the non-incarcerated side of the door. Then the two behemoths were lumbering away, their idiot laughter reverberating in the hallway. Chad rolled onto his back and saw Sheena lunge forward to clamp a hand around the newcomer’s throat.
Great, Chad thought.
I’m in jail with a homicidal maniac.
The new arrival was also slightly built, maybe just a touch pudgier around the middle than Chad, but he was older-Chad had him pegged at around fifty. He had salt-and-pepper hair and a small bald spot at the crown of his skull. Sheena dragged him like a rag doll to the opposite end of the cell, where she commenced banging his head off the wall. Chad gaped in astonished horror at the smear of red that suddenly brightened the drab beige wall. Then there was a sound so grisly in tone his stomach revolted. A splintering sound, the stranger’s skull collapsing. Chad rolled over again and deposited the contents of his belly on the floor.
The body tumbled to the floor. Chad cleared his throat, hocked a mouthful of spit onto the floor, and tried to breathe. He looked at the body, a darting glance, and his stomach knotted up again. He braced his palms on the floor, got slowly to his feet, and turned his gaze to Sheena, whose expression of nonchalance was chilling. A thin sheen of sweat was visible at her forehead, but it was the only evidence of the violent episode she exhibited. She looked-satisfied. Content. As if she’d just returned from a jog around the park, flushed with good health and vigor.
Chad couldn’t believe it.
A human being had been murdered right in front of him.
His eyes widened behind his glasses. “Why? Why did you do that?”
Sheena strolled over to him. She put her face right up against his-their noses touched. “Did that scare you?”
Chad started in disbelief. A peal of humorless laughter wrenched free of his throat. “I’ve never been so goddamn scared. What’s wrong with you? You killed that guy for no reason.”
“That was my stepfather.” Her face was expressionless, but Chad detected a deep well of anger and resentment, unknowable angst. “Last time I saw him, he was slitting my little girl’s throat. Three years ago, man.”
Chad thought about that a moment.
The emotional pendulum now seemed permanently anchored in the red zone of terror. “What the hell kind of place is this?”
“He deserved to die.”
She ignored his question. Or maybe she hadn’t heard it. She seemed intensely focused on making him believe what she said.
Fine.
“I believe you.” He swallowed a lump in his throat. “He deserved to die.”
It wasn’t a lie.
What else could you say about a child killer?
The woman’s expression softened some, and she backed away from him, resumed her perpetual pacing of the cell.
Chad could make no sense of this place. That thing, that shapeshifter, had brought him here, but why? There had to be some reason he was here instead of dead. The mystery of his circumstances bothered him, made him crave more information, something-anything-that might point to a way out of this insane dilemma.
“Look-” he started.
She slapped him. “Stop.”
He stopped.
Despite the burst of violence, there was something new in her expression, a hint of feeling he wouldn’t have expected. It took him a moment to recognize what it was, and when the realization came, he was surprised.
It was compassion.
“A few minutes ago, you asked if this was hell.” She gripped one of his hands, but not in an unfriendly way this time. “Well, Below’s not the hell of the Bible, but it is a hellish place. A suburb of hell, I guess you could say.” Her grip on his hand tightened, but, again, not in an aggressive way. “Forget all the rules of civilized society, they don’t apply here. Don’t trust anyone. Be prepared to kill. Sleep with one eye open, because someone is always out to get you.” Her eyes riveted on him. “Most of all, and I hope like hell you believe me, I’m the best friend you’ve got.”
Chad sputtered, “But… but that’s absurd. You just kicked my ass and took my shit. If you’re my best friend, my worst enemy’s gotta be one charming son of a bitch.”
Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “I can’t tell you everything yet, but this much you can know-what I did to you was a case of keeping up appearances.”
Chad showed her a baffled frown. “Say what?”
Her voice dropped yet another notch, to the point where she was nearly inaudible. “An act. That’s all it was. I treated you the way banished people are expected to treat newcomers-mercilessly.”
Chad’s voice was choked with incredulity. “Banished people? Banished from where?”
“From Above.”
Chad grunted. “Oh, thanks. That clears it up.”
She ignored the sarcasm. “We’re getting out of here. You and I. See that dead fucker on the floor?”
Said “dead fucker” twitched intermittently and oozed brain matter on the floor.
“How could I miss him, Sheena?”
She smiled, and there was a wicked gleam in her green eyes. “You don’t think his presence here, after all these years, was coincidence, do you?”
Chad gave his head a weary shake. “I suppose not.”
“Damn straight it wasn’t.” She glanced at the steaming corpse, and her smile faded. “That was a favor to me.” Her gaze returned to him, and there was something so haunted in the look she showed him that Chad had to fight an urge to avert his eyes. “A show of gratitude for agreeing to be here. Arranged by our benefactor Above.”