Caldera

Chapter 17: Tate/Carlie

Tate squinted at the glimmer of light teasing through the bars of her cell.

Even in the darkness, there was enough to tell her where she was being held. The walls reeked of blood and bleach. Water dripped from a nearby pipe, echoing as it landed with faint, hollow splashes. As Tate counted seconds with unerring calm, she focused on the cold bite of the iron bunk at her spine, sharpening her resolve.

Until then, she had been in a temporary state of unnatural repose, hyper-relaxed but ever vigilant as she waited amid the grit of dust in her cell. Body perfectly still, breathing and heartbeat reduced to a quarter of their normal cycles. Senses dampened, so that she was sensitive to neither heat nor the smells in the dim jail. All the while, Tate retained just enough mental activity to keep track of time. As she waited, her mind kept a steady track of the seconds, minutes and hours as they elapsed. She had learned this technique from a Buddhist master in Xinjiang, the Uyghur region of China. Shane called it her "human hibernation trick."

Whatever, it did the job. Tate could conserve her energy on extended missions, or decrease the time needed to acclimatize to extremes in the environment. She did, however, maintain enough brainpower to take in her surroundings. Unlike Carlie, who had been tranqed after the fracas earlier, she was simply dragged off to the facility's dungeon with little fuss. The Diablo soldiers had neglected to sedate or even hood Tate, possibly because of the distraction from Monkey-Girl's shenanigans.

Watching Carlie unleash herself on the Diablos dogs earlier provided some perverse entertainment for her. It was like watching a storm set loose — brutish, yet beautiful in its own terrible way. Tate, by contrast, eschewed such barbarity and preferred her own brand of quiet finesse. Let them underestimate her calm for weakness. Unlike Carlie, she could delay gratification. She'd make them pay in spades at the right moment.

Stevens – or rather, his body double – still rattled by the ruckus, barked orders like an amped-up Raul Julia to the men who hadn't been thrashed by Carlie's strong legs, to secure them both. Betancort, on the other hand, did nothing but purse his lips with disapproval. He could have instructed his men to take extra precaution while securing the two of them. If they were his men, that is.

She filed that instant away for future reference. In the meantime, Tate eyeballed the floors and the path, her mind already busy creating a mental map of the facility as they moved. On the outside, Hotel Diablo looked more like a fortress than a mansion, with its slightly-curved building wings, high-pillared facade, and thick jutting walls. Inside, however, it was a disappointment. Instead of the wide, elegant staircase and balconies that would rival any Gilded Age palace, the interior resembled that of any small government building she'd seen in Los Angeles, with its drab white walls and generic images of rural Monterrey on canvas.

The reception area where they had their audience with Stevens and Betancort was a conference room with plain but functional furniture. From there, they took her and Carlie to an elevator, which brought them two stories down. They went through a narrow, carpeted hallway, and to another elevator that took them even lower. The dungeon was four floors below decks.

Of course, every major underworld organization needed one of these, just to flex whatever inflated sense of criminal might they imagined to have. She'd seen her share of it during her tenure as Wraith, Hades' top assassin: Dungeons, medieval torture chambers, execution rooms, and crematoriums... the whole nine yards. The more imaginative of these crime syndicates had breaking wheels, electric chairs, quartering rooms and other gruesome methods of torture that would make Vlad the Imapler blush. Next to them, Diablos had a Mickey Mouse operation.

She wondered how Carlie would fare under such duress. Knowing her, Tate figured that while she was being tortured, she'd laugh maniacally like a demon ready to be unleashed. Any lesser individual might put up a valiant effort, but cave in after a matter of time – it didn't matter whether it was in seconds, hours or days. Not Carlie: She relished the pain. It was a twisted, sadomasochistic kind of fetish that she fed on, fueled by a lifetime of trauma that began on the streets of South Central. [That harsh childhood nourished Carlie's hatred and cynicism. She had been that way until Shane found her and nurtured her. But when he left, she went off the deep end.]