I
kind of expected Ray to raise a fuss at this, but he'd done the
research. As we sat around ramping down, stretching out, Ray gave us
a catalog of the damaged; of people hurt. Overdosed parents.
Shootings. People hooked and strung out for years. Half an hour
like that, with two or three minutes to a case. I'd like to say
that it gave me great insight on how humanity, on how heroism,
salvation, justice, and revenge all tie together, but it didn't,
really. It just changed what I was worried about, a little.
The
days when I would have raised a fuss myself were behind us, mostly.
Laurent could burn.
As
he talked, I noticed something, and stopped him part way through to
ask "Wait, these are all people who were damaged by drug
trafficking, or by Laurent's gang, when they were young. Or they're
still young. What's up with that?"
Ray
paused a moment, and then "We don't want to empower him. If we
feed him hate and rage that he can direct outwards, he might do a lot
of damage before he gets locked up. What we want is to pile on
self-blame, inward-turning anger, that kind of thing."
I
felt my face twitch, just a little "And we're all cool with
doing that to him?"
Ray,
sitting in his recliner, leaned out a little and looked at me. His
eyes weren't angry; they were sad. "Ben. Who does all that pain
really belong with? Who deserves it, almost by definition?"
Not
quite convinced, I came back with "So it's justice."
"Yes."
Certain, sure.
I
looked over at Gina.
"I
already had this chat with him. But tonight we're just laying out
the map; tomorrow we give Clara some training and do exercises, and
maybe a few others, too, if we catch any in the net. After that,
we'll see. Maybe we'll get a better idea in the next couple of
days."
I
wasn't counting on it. But nice, light scouting. That'd do for
tonight; it wasn't like Ray was fully up to speed; my own bruises
hadn't even faded all that far, and they weren't even a patch on his.
Ray
spent a few minutes breathing smoke, and we all settled in.
...
Ulla
called me into lucidity before Ray could find me, and we spent some
time – just an hour or two, subjectively – in training. Then, a
knock on the doors, and out I went.
Ray
was standing in a tux and tails, looking pretty dapper, against a
background of spotlights, shining down. Stepping out, and shading my
eyes, I got a eyeful of Gina's ride – a gun-laden zeppelin. Ray's
phantom crew stood at stations, and nodded to us as we went past.
I
felt a little under-dressed in my black cargo pants and armored vest.
Getting the feel and solidity of body armor down to the point where
I felt like I could trust it had been important, though; I wasn't
going to discard that just to match the tone.
We
climbed up the dangling ladder, and were off.
