Slow Boil

Everyone thought that after the terrorist/environmentalist group Golden Gaia was eviscerated at the hotel, well, that was it. The damage was so severe to all the participants that nobody dared even talk about the event. It was like a bad dream, a curse, and Edward in particular had no interest in discussing those 15 minutes of his life where, he was convinced, he would die. And yet, even after five years, all the imagery of the hotel felt fresher than this morning’s coffee. The darkness, the paranoia, the shadowy little figures scurrying around lopping off hands and feet. None of it made sense. It was supposed to be a straightforward operation. So straightforward, in fact, that the guns weren’t even loaded. They were just props for intimidation. Golden Gaia may have had a reputation for operating in the gray areas of the law, but they never stepped too far outside the boundaries. Their plan, that day, was simply to capture some hostage footage and send the message that they could reach out and touch anyone. But someone, or something, didn’t know that. It bought the façade, the show, based on what could be seen. Surveillance cameras couldn’t read minds.

Edward looked down at his cheaply made replacement right hand, picturing the prop gun he held that day in his real hand. Who made the mistakes? Why didn’t the police show up, why did everyone’s comms devices suddenly stop working? Why didn’t anyone have a shred of photos or video on their comms devices in the surrounding area? The hotel wasn’t an island. It was in a centralized location with plenty of street traffic and nearby residents in the area. But yet, not a single pixel of that event had been captured or shared on any kind of media. Based on his memory of all the events and all the strange facts surrounding it, if Edward hadn’t had his own hand removed, he wouldn’t have believed it. It sounded like an urban legend, something to keep people away from the hotel afterwards. Which it did, unintentionally, as word got out about what went down. But it was all word-of-mouth; the media pretended it never happened. Rather than gloat about a victory over the terrorists, it vanished. Not a single major news feed had a headline on it. None of it added up.

Golden Gaia suffered a big loss that day, and whoever wasn’t spooked after their hospital visit, left of their own accord, fearing for their very lives. Only a core group of hardened zealots remained, including Edward himself. “What else are we gonna do?”, he said to the others, on more than one occasion. It was half admission, half defeat, almost accepting the fact that they had been beaten at their own game. Not just beaten, but punished. He still remembers the SWAT team who arrived that day came charging in single file but seeing the pathetic, neutered state of the participants, turned into EMT in seconds. Tourniquets were maxed out to staunch the bleeding of those more injured than others. Edward remembers hoping they could save his hand at the hospital, but they lost it in the chaos of delivering everyone to the hospital; bypassing emergency services who probably would have kept it on ice, with his name on the box.

Edward stared at the discount, low budget replacement, and an itch started in his palm. An itch that didn’t belong there. It wasn’t painful, it was maddening. An itch some days, sharp pain others, tickling sometimes, hot and cold flashes. It was not there, and yet, these feelings were just as real as the rusting “stainless steel” of his fake hand. Doctors called it “phantom pain”, and rather than prescribing drugs to calm the nerves, they would prescribe happy pills, which were less addictive and acted on the brain directly. It did help him cope. In fact, Edward took his happy pills right on schedule. Every day for 5 years. Once or twice he had forgotten and just doubled the dose after he remembered the next day.

But he felt enslaved, by the drugs and his fake hand and the itch he couldn’t scratch. He felt the grudge growing bigger in his stomach. Golden Gaia needed to take this to the next level. They needed revenge.  Edward needed revenge.

A rage had been building in his heart for five years, an unquenchable thirst not unlike that unscratchable itch in his palm. He closed his fist and smashed it on the desk, the shock causing a pen to roll just over the edge and fall to the floor. It was time to start planning. There were a lot of loose ends, unanswered questions, and he couldn’t formulate a plan without answering some of those questions first. Major problem. Luckily, he was resourceful. He didn’t exactly have a huge network of like-minded people, not anymore, but he knew where to start looking. The others that remained in the organization had a war chest he could borrow funding from, if that stood in the way. All he needed were a few people that knew more than he did, with problems that money could solve. That was his angle and it never failed. Junkies that needed a fix would talk. Big shots that were over-leveraged could be convinced. Even off-duty cops hustled for credits after hours, as hired security. And then…there were the vets. They were usually half drunk, chewed up and spit out, and two days short of their pension. He found them intolerably verbose and tried to avoid them, when possible, although he would make exceptions if he felt it would really lead to something. This would take time, and Edward whispered to himself, “fuck it”, it had already been five years. What’s a few more? Nothing would improve in the meantime. He turned and looked at his bottle of happy pills. There was one left. He unceremoniously opened the bottle and poured the last pill in the sink. He was done being a slave, no matter the cost. The hand itched again and he absentmindedly scratched it.