Metropolis - Lower 56th Prison Conference Room

Tuesday, May 5th, 2089 | 3:17pm

“W-what!?” Christ spluttered. “That’s not a proposal! That’s a death sentence! Why would I plead guilty when I wasn’t even there! I thought you were on my side, and not protecting whatever bastard it was that really did this!”

Suerte nodded and nodded while she spoke, waiting until she was out of breath to respond.

“You won’t be getting a death sentence.”

“How would you know?!”

“Despite what you might think,” he said, running a hand over his already straight tie, “I am quite good at my job.”

“If you’re so good, then make it so I don’t have to go to prison at all!”

“Now,” he said, flattening his wide lips, “that I can’t do.”

“Why not!?” Chris asked, throwing her hands in the air.

“Because it would go against my interests.”

“You are interested in me going to jail!?”

“Well, yes,” he said matter-of-factly. “Isn’t that the reason I am here in the first place?”

“I don’t know! How would I know? You haven’t told me anything! Why are you here!?”

“To recruit you.”

“Recruit me?” Chris asked, confused. “What for?”

“That,” he said, grabbing the top folder from his remaining pile, “I can only tell you after you sign this,” he said, placing the folder and opening it right in front of her.

Chris looked at the pages inside, then back at Suerte to try and read his expression. Unfortunately he was as undecipherable as ever and she reverted her attention back to the document. It outlined, in great detail, a non-disclosure agreement. Anything Castiel Suerte ever said to her was to remain between the two of them unless Suerte gave the explicit authorization to do otherwise. Chris continued reading the document, trying to see if it would give any hints as to what Suerte wanted from her. However, by the time she got to the end of the five-page long document, all she’d managed to do was ascertain that there were no loopholes that she could find and seeing as Suerte was probably the one that drafted it, there weren’t going to be any.

The iron-clad contract scared her more than she wanted to let on. Keeping her eyes down, she read and re-read the document once more. When she was certain she understood it as well as she could under the circumstances she looked back at Suerte.

“This document doesn’t let me repeat anything that is said between us, but it doesn’t say I have to do what you tell me to.”

Suerte smirked.

“You aren’t a child,” he said almost mockingly.

Chris blushed in embarrassment, but refused to look away.

“I know, but why should I do anything you want me to?”

“You’ll be adequately compensated.”

“Compensated!?!” Chris asked in bewilderment. “How?! What could you possibly offer me that would make me want to go to jail for a decade!”

Suerte tapped the folder in front of her in response.

Aggravated by the man’s antics, Chris took the pen from him and signed it. All the document did was prevent her from repeating their conversation to anyone, and seeing as she didn’t intend on taking the man up on his offer, she didn’t see the harm in signing it. Before she could even lay the pen down, Suerte had already straightened the pages inside the folder, closed it and set it on top of the ‘used’ folder pile. He was reaching for the next one when he suddenly stopped short and brought his arm back. Chris was confused for a moment as she watched the man before her fiddle with his forearm, then she remembered the implant. She watched Suerte fiddle with his forearm for a moment, trying to read his expression as he did so, but his face was as indecipherable as always.

“Ah,” he said a second later, “saved by the bell.”

Before she could even process his words, Suerte was already standing up and bundling all of his folders together again. Reflexively, she also got on her feet when Suerte took out his briefcase and put all of his folders inside, along with the little black recording device.

“By the bell?” she asked, confused. “Have we been in here for that long?”

“For that…” Suerte started, “Oh! No, no, no. We don’t have the one hour limit thing.”

“We don’t?” Chris asked, taken aback. “I thought all—”

“They do, but we don’t,” he said simply, as if his words explained everything.

“…Okay?” Chris said, not knowing what else to say. She’d known all along she was dealing with big players, but to be able to disregard police rules completely in this way, they had to be a lot further up the ladder than she’d originally thought. It scared her, but she also couldn’t deny the rush of curiosity. A minute ago she hadn’t been too excited about agreeing to the man’s terms, but seeing him leave now without giving her any answers also left a sour taste in her mouth. She had never planned on agreeing to his schemes so she didn’t know why she was reacting this way. Balling her fists, Chris stepped around her chair and got ready to follow Suerte out of the room, but the moment she did so, he looked up at her in confusion.

“What are y— Oh,” Suerte said and then smiled his usual heartthrob smile. “No, no, no. We are far from over. I just thought you might like a little… break. So I arranged for a little… surprise.”

Suerte was smiling as he clipped his briefcase shut, but Chris found herself fighting the urge to step back defensively. A small brittle smile graced her lips in response to his. She didn’t like the way he said ‘surprise’, it made a shiver of dread crawl down her spine, but she stood stock-still hoping he wouldn’t see through her. Suerte used his usual measured stroll to the door, giving Chris enough time to conjure the worst possible theories. By the time the guards opened the door on the other side Chris had convinced herself that Suerte was leaving to let in some kind of torturer that would ‘soften her up’ for the ‘proposal’. Her mouth was dry, her skin was crawling and she felt like running. Chris tried to reason with herself that nothing would happen, but when she looked up to see the camera without a blinking red light, she almost bolted outright.

Chris took a deep breath to calm herself. Losing it at this point in time would only hurt her situation. She had no idea when the light had gone out, but knowing her lawyer, it hadn’t been on at all during their conversation. She remembered seeing it when she walked into the room, but she’d never looked back at it to make sure it was still recording. Chris let out the pent up breath, hoping the small measure of calm she’d attained would remain. The whole situation was out of her hands anyway, she saw no point in fighting it only to lose out in the end anyway.

“I’ll try to give you as much privacy as possible…” he said, accompanying his footsteps out the door.

Chris felt her breath stuttering out of her lungs as she looked to the door, apprehensive of who would be joining her. What she saw when Suerte’s back no longer blocked the doorway, completely took her breath away, immediately cutting off her air supply. It hadn’t even crossed Chris’ mind that Suerte would have brought her here. If Chris hadn’t been too busy drinking in her sight, she might have felt a little guilty for expecting the worst from her silky smooth lawyer. He’d brought her sister.

Rin.

Chris’ knees went weak at the sight of her. Suerte had guaranteed Rin’s safety, but Chris had still needed to see it for herself. Tears came to Chris’ eyes as she ran towards Rin, arms open, grabbing her sister and hugging her as hard as Chris could remember. Rin, who had refused such displays of affection in recent years, didn’t offer any resistance, Rin’s only reaction to the emotion-driven assault was to lift her skinny arms and clutch at sides of Chris’ shirt. The childish movement only made Chris cry harder as she considered the events it would take her sultry teenage sister from displaying this kind of vulnerability. Chris hugged Rin as hard as she could, willing the world to leave her sister in peace.

“I’m s-s-sorry…” Rin sobbed.

Chris was so caught up with the fact that she was reunited with her sister that she didn’t notice the door close or the fact that her sister had started shaking. When she realized, Rin was sobbing and begging for forgiveness, over and over and over again. Caught off guard for the hundredth time in the last three days, Chris pushed Rin away, holding her at arm’s length to get a better look at her face. The usual dark make-up Rin chose to wear was completely absent with the exception of some smudged left-over edges and streaks running down her cheeks. Rin’s eyes were swollen and red, the usual beautiful dark brown of her irises was tinged with a suffering that Chris didn’t understand.

There was something really wrong going on, and Chris didn’t know what it was.

“I’m s-sorry Chris,” Rin sobbed again. “I’m s-so sorry, I never m-meant—”

Rin choked on her sob, unable to finish her words. The harder she tried to speak, the more tears flowed down her face. Chris frowned at her sister’s reaction. The slight feeling of uncertainty crawling around Chris’ stomach turned into full-blown dread. There was something very wrong going on for her sister to be behaving the way she was. Although some measure of sadness was to be expected, seeing as Chris was in jail, this amount of guilt that Rin was expressing obviously wasn’t.

“S-sorry-y—” Rin continued as Chris dragged her to one of the chairs.

Chris dumped Rin into the one Suerte had vacated and took the one next to it on the same side of the table. Chris tried waiting to see if Rin would settle down, but after a couple minutes of more failed apologies, Chris decided it wasn’t going to happen.

“Rin,” Chris said simply, taking Rin’s face in her hands so that the girl would look at her in the eyes, something she hadn’t done since she’d walked through the door.

“I— I’m sorry, I—”

“Shhhh…” Chris comforted her, “It’s okay. Tell me what’s going on.”

“I— I— I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“Rin,” Chris said when Rin looked away, not able to maintain eye-contact, “Rin, it’s okay. It’s not your fault.”

Those words incited another bout of choked sobbing. Helpless, all Chris could do was lean forwards on her bolted chair, trying to offer her sister as much bodily comfort as she could. Chris stroked Rin’s hair and smelled the unfamiliar shampoo in it. She felt responsible for dumping her sister into some unfamiliar home, unable to care for Rin herself. Tears streaked down Chris’ cheeks as well. Seeing her sister suffer the way she was tore at her heart more than anything else ever could.

“Rin, please, please tell me. I need to know so I can help…”

“I— I can’t,” Rin sobbed. “I—I— wasn’t… You weren’t… And then he…”

Chris’ spine jerked straight.

“He?” Chris tried to probe gently, not sure she wanted the answer to her own question. “Who is he?”

“Ed-Eddie,” Rin said, finally looking up to look Chris straight in the eye, “he-he was at the party—”

Chris continued to stroke her sister’s hair as she spoke, trying to keep Rin talking. The sobs had just barely subsided enough for Rin to get some cohesive words out and Chris didn’t want to interrupt that, even if it meant keeping her silence when all she wanted to do was jump up, scream, shout and ask what the hell was going on. Rin didn’t even know Eddie! And what party! She was supposed to be at a friend’s house studying on Saturday.

“Mmmm…” Chris comforted Rin, keeping her inner turmoil to herself. She was trying to keep her sister calm, when she herself was anything but.

“H-He came h-home—”

Another sob interrupted the story. Chris continued her rhythmic strokes, trying to calm her sister as best she could. Her own heart was beating so hard out of her chest that she was surprised it hadn’t already broken through her ribcage. The sound of its thumping beat was reverberating through Chris’ head, creating a fog of noise that Rin’s words had to travel through, as if trying to protect her from the truth that was about to come.

“I’m so, so sorry Chris, I didn’t mean to—”

“Shhhh—” Chris cooed, “It’s oka—”

“I-I killed him!” she gasped. “I didn’t mean to kill him!”

“Sh—”

Chris’ voice fell away along with everything else. Suddenly, she was experiencing her life as if from the outside. Chris’ eyes were dry and she knew she should probably blink soon, but her body was completely frozen, unwilling to respond to any commands. Chris was still breathing, she could feel her chest move up and down, but she didn’t know how. Meanwhile, Rin had pulled away from Chris and bundled herself up in a little protective shell. Chris tried to open her mouth to say something, but she didn’t know what. She tried to lift her arms to pull Rin towards her, but they wouldn’t respond.

Her mind was incapable of processing her sister’s words, as if unwilling to deal with the consequences they would bring. She was in a state of shock and her rational side told her to get a grip and figure out what she was going to do about it, while the rest of her just wanted to crawl into a hole in succumb to the shock. A single tear rolled down Chris’ cheek, and it was all she needed to knock her back into reality.

Chris wasn’t a crier.

The milk was spilled and it was time to deal with it, the longer she waited, the longer it would have to sour. It was going to stink regardless, but she might as well mitigate the stench as much as she could. Shaking herself back into reality, Chris wiped at the tear, destroying all evidence it had existed in the first place, then she took Rin in her arms and said, “Shhhh— It’s okay Rin, everything is going to be okay.”

The only question now was how she was going to achieve that.