In a flash he mentally reviewed the various phases of the procedure he had simulated so many times before, both during training and in his mind.
The red Spy lit up and a loud buzz, short, hoarse, but peremptory, informed him that the elevator was moving up. Giovanni cleared his throat, hating himself for the palpitations that were slowing down his reaction times; he then opened the reinforced door and stepped in the Ring.
With wide steps he reached the elevator and stopped in front of it right in the moment when the sliding doors opened.
The five people inside the cabin – two EGs (Escort Guards, shaved heads and mirrored sunglasses, one of them on the front of the group and one in the back) and three civilians – stood staring at him for a few seconds, as if his presence there surprised them. He stared back at them in silence, feeling his throat suddenly go dry. Had he forgotten something? No, he was sure there were no particular formulae or greetings for that circumstance.
Then, with a brisk nod from the soldier standing right in front of him, barely perceivable yet very eloquent, he realized he had made an enormous mistake: he got confused because of his excitement, like a rookie at his first day of work.
When the convicts were being delivered, the Keeper had to stand in front of the Shutter, not the elevator. How could he start off with such a blunder? He felt a sudden warmth starting from behind his ears and expanding to his cheeks.
Trying to maintain a neutral expression he quickly turned around and, with a martial bearing, he approached the Shutter’s glass door. He could hear the steps of the five people following behind him and almost felt a wave of mockery and blame coming from the two expressionless soldiers. He cursed himself for his clumsiness. He new that form and substance were equally important in the eyes of the NMO and he hoped that his mistake would have no consequences.
When he was in position, Giovanni turn back to the newly arrived. In that moment the first of the EGs, who had a small, reddish cut on his left cheek coming from a hastily shave, took a form out of its pocked and read it out loud: “As per disposition 4816/35 we deliver today the following convicts to the Keeper of Tank 9: Calogero Calatafimi, fifty-six, child abduction…”
Giovanni raised the clipboard and drew a tick beside the first name.
“…Pietro Calatifimi, forty-nine, child abduction; Goran Pashkov, thirty-one, multiple murder while driving drunk.”
Giovanni finished ticking each name, then grabbed the form the guard was handing him and signed it, trying not to meet his gaze: he wouldn’t be able to see them anyway, hidden as they were behind lenses that would only reflect two small reflections of his own face; he also felt that, had he been able to see it, it would be condescending and paternalistic, annoying him so much he would end up making some other unforgivable mistake.
He gave the form back with an automatic motion, then focused on the polished push-button panel beside the Shutter’s door and began to input the Unlocking Code, trying to appear confident. The UC was changed every day and, for security reason, had to be known only by the Keeper and the Centre’s staff. Because of this he kept his clipboard up to serve as barrier with a hint of childish satisfaction. Moreover, the number that was given to him wasn’t the right one: he had to add the day’s number to each digit. It was January 2nd, so the UC 473 would become 695. Giovanni held his breath while pressing the golden buttons, spacing each digit using asterisks.
The unlocking program allowed only one mistake. In the event he would input the code incorrectly once, a red spy would start beeping. In case of a second mistake the EGs had to temporarily suspend the procedure and investigate. Only after proving the Keeper’s good faith could the procedure be resumed. Of course that would cost him a warning. Three warnings and you were out. Giovanni thought back at the pock-marked face of Alex couldn’t-remember-the-surname, the guy who graded right behind him, who would be more that happy take his place.
No way, friend. Find something else to do.
The UC worked. Giovanni breathed out quietly in order to hide the apprehension that almost paralysed him while an invisible hydraulic mechanism made the glass and metal door slide in the circular wall. It was like a whisper, a silky rustle. The small room known as the Shutter appeared in front of him.
It was a tiny room with crystal walls, extending over the Tank’s circumference for about a meter. A sort of balcony, about as large as the elevator’s cabin, small and closed on all sides, suspended over the dark, circular abyss ful of dying bodies. From where they stood, Giovanni and the others couldn’t hear nor smell anything. The Shutter’s far wall was a second two-shutter door named Disposal Door (the staff had re-named it the Suffering, quoting the inscription on the gates of Hell in Dante Alighieri’s “Inferno”).
“Come on, marche!”
Giovanni came to. It was the second Guard who had talked, the one behind the small ground. Using the barrel of his standard-issue Beretta 13-S as a prod he made the three convicts, rigorously in a line, approach the Shutter, while Scar – the one with a wound on his cheek – had moved on one side to let them pass and make sure that everything would go according to plan. It was like Giovanni hadn’t really noticed them before that moment. He was so concentrated on his task and his pondering that he had forgotten about a whole chapter of the manuaclass="underline" interrelations with the convicts.
Convicts are not human beings anymore.
Convicts have no right to speak.
The Keeper has no obligation to talk to the convict, unless he has to enforce order, together with the EGs.
Convicts are cattle. No, that wasn’t written on the manual. But it was implied. To the NMO, certain deeds and choices equalled regressing. Cattle Nothing more.
Giovanni gave them a hard look. Two children kidnappers. A drunk-driving murderer. Yet another one. He felt the urge to push them himself to make them get in the Shutter faster, but he knew he had to behave. Feelings had to be suffocated, annihilated: the instructors repeated it over and over again.
While walking past him, The three convict’s eyes shortly crossed his. They didn’t show any particular emotion, probably because they weren’t feeling any. They had been sedated. The treatment was administered half an hour before the delivery and wore off half an hour after the Unloading. The procedure was used to limit, if not completely eliminate, any sudden panic-induced reaction. On the other hand it also relived the convicts of the terrifying experience of being in the Shutter. Giovanni thought they didn’t deserve such magnanimity and should be forced to live every single horrifying moment. What comforted him was that once the effect of the pill they had to ingest wore off they would have all the time in the world to reach new peaks of unparalleled horror, pain and despair.
The three walked shuffling their feet with vacuous gazes, getting in the Shutter like calves to the slaughter. As usual, their hands were tied behind their backs by narrow, yet resistant milled plastic cuffs: once tightened they were worse that the regular metal ones.
Once they were position once behind the other – the with his chest pressed against the Suffering and the last one with his back barely beyond the first door – the Shutter had reached its maximum capacity. A joke recurred in the training course, probably recycled year after year. The instructor would suddenly ask: “How many people fit in the Shutter?” to which the candidates would promptly answer: “Three.” The answer was right, of course. But they could be unexpectedly be corrected: “Wrong. None. Only cattle fit in the Shutter.” To which they would start laughing, only to be immediately stopped by a quick hand gesture. It was better if the higher ups, for example Stevanich, didn’t hear certain jokes. His sense of humor was next to zero. Had word of such amenities reach his ear, nobody could predict his reaction. And Giovanni, even if he thought of him as a modern Vlad Tepes, felt more in sintony with him than with the goliardic spirit that almost always found its home in the lower ranks of strict and intransigent hierarchies.