Internment(45)

My heart stops. So far, the only way I’ve been able to see David is with Jake’s assistance. But maybe I’ve been stupid to rely on him.

“If we get caught—”

“When you get caught.” Jake puts his hand on my arm. “Remember that. Not if. When.”

“I don’t get it. Are you threatening us? If you’re going to narc on us, go ahead and tell the Director. It’s not like I can do anything to stop you.”

“I’m not turning you in. Don’t you see that by now? You need protection. Things are escalating in here. It’s not only me; I have—” Jake stops. Looks down and shakes his head.

“You have what?”

“Nothing. There are others trying to help, within certain parameters, but we won’t be able to save you if the Director orders an extrajudicial transfer and directs his private security detail to seize you in the middle of the night. You don’t know what he is capable of. I do. Trust me on this.”

“I think we saw a pretty good demonstration of his capabilities.”

“People getting tased? Butted with a gun? Dragged away? Punched? That’s nothing. That could’ve happened at a police station. Here, in this camp, once they take you into custody—this land is a designated war zone. Rules don’t apply.”

“I get it. Our civil liberties have been shredded.”

“It’s not about violating your constitutional rights. If you’re caught and taken to a black-ops site for interrogation, they will do things to you. Things you can’t imagine. That woman taken at the orientation? She wasn’t sent to black ops. That was getting roughed up a bit. I’m talking torture. You know those guys who go missing? Why do you think they never come back?”

His words slam into my chest. So far, David, Ayesha, Soheil, and I, we’ve mostly talked and planned and played at being the Mobius Resistance. Now I realize how totally amateur we’ve been. The stakes are high. The highest. And I’m not sure if any of us are ready to take on the Director and his real-world consequences.

I take a deep breath. “I have to do something. If what you’re saying is true, we have to tell people. I don’t think people on the outside will tolerate this if they know.”

“That’s why the Director wants this place airtight. Information does not get out. This camp is the first, another is about to open, and the High Command within the Authority won’t stop at two. They want internment to go wide scale.”

“High Command?”

“It’s all under the auspices of the secretary of war, but it’s made up of Homeland Security guys. CIA and FBI, too. You need to understand that the president operates like the Constitution is a blank slate. His party holds the Senate and the House. No one is challenging him. People won’t even call him out on his blatant lies.”

My shoulders fall. I feel like my entire body is going to melt into the floor. I look into his eyes and whisper, “Help us, Jake.”

He takes a tissue out of his pocket and hands it to me. “Let’s keep moving. This looks suspicious. I’ve got to get you back.”

As we turn to continue our walk back to Block 2, the Director’s very large presence steps in front of us, blotting out the sun. One of the drones follows behind him.

“Director—” Jake struggles to gather himself, then clicks his heels into attention. “Sir.”

This is as near as I’ve ever been to the Director. This close, I see that his jaw juts out, making his swollen purple lips even more prominent.

I turn my head to look at Jake, but his eyes are trained on an object in the distance. I wish I could do that—focus but not focus. But when my adrenaline spikes, like it is now, when my body feels fight and flight in the same instant, everything falls into sharp focus. Almost too sharp. And I hear the grind of a truck’s engine starting up, desert floor crunching under heavy wheels. I wonder if that’s the truck David’s on. I pray it is. I imagine the gate opening and closing and him being safe on the outside.

The Director uses silence. Like after that woman was tased and when he waited for Noor’s and Asmaa’s and Bilqis’s screams to fall away, making sure we all heard. Silence might be a tool, but it doesn’t look like one he wields comfortably. He pulls at his collar with his index finger. The sun beats down on us. I watch as sweat beads up on his forehead; he dabs at it with a white handkerchief.

“I see you’ve ventured on a little field trip, Miss Amin. Not hanging out with your friend on the block? What… watching the soccer players?”

He knows my name. He knows all of us. I’ve been trying not to draw attention to myself. Maybe I’ve been careless. The Director might be uncomfortable, but he’s not unaware. Every muscle in his body seems ready to pounce like a dog that has been trained to fight.

My chest tightens. Too tight. I pray that this stupid baggy T-shirt conceals the phone in my pocket. The blood rushes to my head, and the world feels like it’s tilting. I focus my eyes on a single point in the distance to keep my balance.

I straighten my shoulders and remind myself to breathe. “Uh, yes. Director. Sir. It’s just that I—” My mind goes blank. I have no words.

“She lost her necklace in the Mess, sir, and I escorted her there so she could find it.” Jake steps in, using the same lie I gave him; he speaks faster than usual, his consonants not as crisp.