Chapter Seventeen
[This chapter is a page and a half]
The uniformed policewoman, Peggy, has come to collect the now sleepy
Jason, as the General walks him to the door of this section. The General
reminds Jason that he can't do anything if somebody voids his police
pass, and he is going to have to re-apply for all his IDs, which
apparently requires "invasive interrogation." He gives Jason a friendly
punch on the shoulder, assuring him "a Six can take it."
Back in his office, Felix orders Jason bugged, some sort of killswitch
installed on him, and a microphone installed in his throat, if they can
do it without Jason noticing. He also orders 24 hour surveillance on
Heather Hart, 24 hour surveillance on all known Sixes in whatever his
jurisdiction is, and asks Herb to pull all the files on all Sixes. This
is just in case the Sixes are politically organizing again.
Chapter 18
Jason, free in the morning sun, takes a breath of smoggy air. To his side, a woman asks him "how now, little man?"
This is of course Alys, still in her pre-punk punk getup. The phrase is a
play on Jason's recorded voice recognition phrase "how now brown cow",
which Alys heard earlier. She's over six foot, like Jason, and has gold
zodiac symbols in her teeth. She immediately begin talking about her
brother's ways: nice, then slip all that tracker shit on you. She tells
Jason he has a fusion explosive device on him somewhere.
Jason puts it together "Oh, General Buckman is your brother?" He sees the
resemblance between the two. Jason then remembers Alys is quite likely
also a seven. Alys offers to remove all that junk off of Jason, and
Jason accepts...despite accepting a few hours earlier that such things
were part of the price he pays for freedom.
In Alys's quibble Alys takes some stuff she filched from the police HQ: a
detector to find the bomb, and a multitool surgical device (with
automatic topical antiseptic action) to cut it out. Jason thanks her for
removing the thorn from his paw. Alys comments that Felix always keeps
his hands clean, and makes his staff do the dirty work. "I really hate
him" Alys says. She then takes a hand size strobe light, finds his micro
tracker, and puts a pin through it. The vocal recorder fell off, so
Jason is now deloused, so to speak.
Alys asks who Jason is, and he replies "an unperson." Soon she figures
he's McNulty's mystery man. Alys actually interrogates Jason slightly,
and gets him to admit he knew *slightly* more than the police had.
(Jason, absurdly, feels a little guilty he didn't tell the whole story
to General Felix; he wonders if maybe Felix couldn't have actually
gotten to the bottom of what happened to Jason.) Alys asks if he wants
to go over to Felix's house. Jason senses acute danger as Alys explains
that it is her house too. Alys wants to show Jason all the cool stuff
they have in Felix's "billion dollar castle." She also spots that Jason
is a Six. Jason decides that the extreme police surveillance that will
follow him actually makes him a little safer in this scenario, and
agrees to go.
They take off in the quibble, and it sports a double-power police
engine. While Alys is flying, she tells Jason to get one thing very
clear: if he makes any sexual advances to Alys at all, she will kill
him. Jason notices that Alys is strapped with whatever kinda ray gun the
police usually carry. He gives a Ten-Four to that, but then starts
thinking about what Alys' orientation actually is. Alys seems to guess
where Jason's mind is going, and tells him that all her sexuality is
tied up with her brother, Felix. Oh yeah, they've been in an incestuous
relationship for like five years now, they have a three year old boy,
lives in Flordia.
Jason's composure is blown away by this. His first coherent question is why the fuck is Alys even telling Jason this.
She responds she's been a fan of Jason Taverner for a very long time,
she has all his albums and everything. She gestures to the Quibble's
back seat, and yep, there's nine of Jason's ten albums. Having fragged
Jason's mind entirely, they arrive at the house.
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