The Liberation Paradox

The End of Mercy

Mr. Daniau

17:31

Eddie Daniau was sleeping fitfully when the tentative knock on his bedroom door awoke him. With so much on his mind, he was lucky to get even a few hours of restless sleep. Only sheer exhaustion had allowed him that much.

At first, he awoke momentarily confused. It was a daring thing someone was doing knocking on his door. Instinctively, he reached for his plasma pistol, but stayed his hand as his higher brain came more fully awake. Anyone who meant him harm likely wouldn't be knocking politely. Likely this was one of his lieutenants here to give him some urgent news. Likely it was some news he wasn't going to like.

Eddie sat up on the edge of the bed as the knock came again, this time slightly more loudly. He still didn't answer it, allowing his mind a little more time to wake up. He blinked hard, trying to squeeze the sleep from his eyes and rubbed his face. The knock came again. This time, Eddie felt he was ready to answer.

"Who is it?"

"It's Miles, sir."

"Come on in, Miles."

"Yes sir." The door opened and Miles came in. He looked tired too. Eddie doubted if Miles had gotten much more sleep than himself.

"Take a seat." Eddie indicated one of the armchairs where he often sat to read in the evenings. "What's going on?"

"Thank you, sir," Miles said as he sat in a chair facing his boss. As soon as he sat down, Miles began bringing Eddie up to speed on the events which had unfolded as he'd slept. Miles knew it would only annoy Eddie if he didn't get right to the point; that was one reason Miles was his chief lieutenant. "You remember I told you the nerds called in an electrician from the Local 171 to upgrade our server's power supply? Well, uh, we can't seem to find the electrician."

"That's... unprofessional of you."

Miles suppressed a wince. "Sir, there's more. Awl came to me and said the nerds that were supposed to be keeping an eye on him had lost track of him. I asked Awl to describe this 'electrician' to me and, well, he sounded familiar to me."

Eddie narrowed his eyes but said nothing.

"So I went ahead and checked the security feeds from the ground floor lobby." Miles handed Eddie a piece of paper. It was a printed photograph, a single frame of the video from the main lobby. The man in the picture was dressed as an electrician with the name "Danny" stitched into his lapel and a tool belt slung around his waist. His long, black hair was tied neatly back in a ponytail. Of course, Eddie recognized this bogus electrician right away. It was none other than Sid Stone. The arrogant conman even had the gaul to wink at the camera.

Eddie was now fully awake. He could feel his blood pressure rising as he ground his teeth together. So Sid Stone was the one who'd stolen his accounting files after all. He'd shown this man mercy last night as Stone had unwittingly done him a great service with Congressman Harmon. This time, there would be no such mercy. This time, Eddie was personally going to take that man apart, piece by literal piece. He was going to pull all of those perfect teeth out one by one. He was going to break that perfectly squared jaw and those sharp cheekbones. He would dislocate those broad shoulders and flay that beautiful, dark-honey skin off the man's flesh. He was going to take out that winking eye with a hot poker. He was going to tear that man screaming from limb to limb and he was going to add another "mushroom" to his collection. But he was going to start with that hair. He was going to shave that bastard bald.

"I assume you've ordered a thorough search of the secure zone," Eddie said. His tone, even and quiet, betrayed none of the seething anger he felt.

"Y-Yes, sir." Miles was obviously frightened by his boss's lack of outward reaction to the photograph. Good. He should be. "We've searched everywhere except your apartment and, um, Miss Claire's."

Eddie nodded. "I want a thorough search of my apartment and I want guards posted outside Mika's. No one is to enter her apartment without my say so, got it?" After the earlier scene with Mika, Eddie didn't want to send any of his enforcers into her apartment unless he was very sure Sid Stone was actually in there.

"Yes, sir," Miles said.

As an afterthought, "And make sure you cover the back servant's entrance as well."

"Of course, right away, sir."

Miles got up and made to leave to carry out his boss's orders, but Eddie stopped him. An idea had just occurred to him. "And send somebody down to the server room. Tell them to bring their office phone online and to call me on my cell. And tell them to call me on speaker. I want to talk to all the nerds at once."