SiSU: - Homeland - Cory Doctorow

Homeland
No. You know what I felt like? I felt like I was drowning. Like I'd been strapped to a board,
tilted backwards with saran-wrap over my mouth, and had water ladled down my nose, so
that it filled my windpipe. My choke reflex had come to life, sucking hard to try to bring
air into my lungs. Each time I coughed, the saran-wrap belled out, pushing out some of
the precious sips of air left in my lungs. Each time I breathed in, the saran-wrap formed
a tight seal around my mouth, and the suction drew more water down my windpipe. My
lungs began to empty and collapse. My brain began a kind of awful fireworks display, the
last lights and noises of a panicked organ about to wither and die and rot.
That.
I was sweating now, all over my body, and had the feeling of a terrible weight on my chest.
It was the weight of the knowledge that I was in the power of someone who believed that
he could do anything he wanted to me and never face a single consequence.
“Marcus, buddy, calm down, all right? We're not here to hurt you.”
I hated myself for the weakness I was showing. I'd once slept badly, pinching a nerve or a
vein or something in my leg, and when I'd stood up in the morning, my leg had given way
like it was made of wood, and I'd pitched forward on my face. Now I felt like something
else -- my inner strength, the place I'd gone to that moment on the playa at the temple -had
let me down when I least expected it.
“I would like,” I said, voice a gasp, “to consult --”
He slapped me. Not hard. In fact, he was almost gentle. But he was fast, so fast I didn't
even see his hand move, and had to reconstruct what had just happened from the way
that his body shifted, leaning forward a little, then relaxing back, his arm a blur in between.
My face stung, but didn't hurt.
“Marcus,” he said, and now his voice was stern and paternal. “Enough of that. We're not
here to hurt you.” But you slapped me, didn't you? Of course, he hadn't slapped me hard.
And I had no doubt that he could have, had he chosen to. He was a good six inches taller
than me, broad-shouldered, and the muscles on his forearms and wrists stood out in cords
and masses like a superhero drawing. “We just want to talk to you. If you want to get this
over with, you should listen to what we have to say.”
I stared fixedly ahead of me.
“There's something you have, Marcus. Something important. Something that you've been
gossiping about to certain urinalists in the big old world.
“The thing you have, it's not yours. It's our job to get it back. Once we're confident that
we have secured it, there will be no further need for us to communicate with you and no
further need for you to communicate with us.”
I thought about asking for a lawyer again, but couldn't see the point. I kept up my fixed
staring.
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