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He, however, is clearly not used to it because he suddenly turns to face me entirely as I keep my expression blank, and he says, “I won’t tell you anything.”
“You will,” I reply, my words confident. Now that I’ve got him talking and he spoke first, I’m going to ask questions and watch him closely to see if any of them provoke a reaction in him and, therefore, a weak point that I can use to get him to talk to me and tell us what we need to know. The best way I have found to do this is to rapid-fire questions at someone so they don’t really have that long to think about their answers or how to reply.
Gauld scoffs, “No one else has been able to.”
“Now, that’s not strictly true, is it?” I reply, reminding him of the women and what they’re capable of as I watch shadows cross his eyes. Now that he’s feeling vulnerable again, I start my rapid-fire questions, “How did you first get in contact with Erebus? Did he contact you, or did you contact him? Were you all brought in individually or as a team? Did it make you feel good to betray the people who have done so much for you?”
That last question has him twitching ever so slightly, so I press a bit harder, “Everyone knows that the organisation does so much for its agents, and you’ve been with them for longer than most, and yet it was so easy for you to betray everyone. Put everyone’s lives at risk, friends as well. I know you have friends here, all of whom are feeling incredibly betrayed by you right now, and for what? What could you have possibly gained that was worth risking it all? It’s not like any of us are left wanting where money is concerned, so what was it?”
“Some things are worth more than money,” he replies quietly, although the hand that he can move is balled into a fist, showing his anger and frustration.
His reply surprises me. I honestly didn’t think I’d get him to reply already, but it’s good progress, and I’m pleased.
“I’ve got to say I agree with you there, which is why I don’t understand why you’d risk it all. I mean, your teammates are dead, and you’re never going to see your family again,” he starts shaking, and I continue, “It’s your family who I feel for; they’ll never truly know what happened to you, but I think I can ensure that they know you were disgraced. Your teammates deserved to die for the lives that they have put in danger, innocent lives. Yeah, they definitely deserved everything that happened to them and their names forever being muttered with disgust.”
“My family are dead.” He replies, his voice flat as he stares me dead in the eye, “So my actions have no effect on them whatsoever.”
I tilt my head as my eyes narrow. He really believes that, and if that’s true, then this just got tragic, “I wouldn’t call being on an all-expenses paid holiday for the last two months dead. As far as I know, they got back just before Christmas. We had agents check in on them to make sure that they knew nothing of your betrayal.”
“You're lying,” he replies, his eyes wide with fear and his voice trembling.
“I’m not. What benefit would it have for me to lie to you?” I ask him.
“They’re alive?” he mutters.
“Yes.”
“No, no. He had them. He told all of us that those closest to us were now being held by him and that if we didn’t do what he wanted us to do, then they would die. When we failed to get the information to him, we knew that they were dead. He doesn’t do second chances.”
“He lied to you. They’re safe; they all are. They were all sent on various different kinds of out-of-town holidays, and somehow all communications back and forth were blocked.” I reply, having read it in his file. It had been tacked on the end as something to bring up at a later date, and from his reaction, I can assume that no one had. I knew that about his family. However, I made up that all of their families were okay. I don’t know, but I am assuming that if he was lied to, they were as well, in order to guarantee their cooperation.
I would also be willing to bet that fake text messages and possibly even calls had been sent to his wife so that she didn’t think anything was amiss. She could possibly even have been under the impression that he was out of town on a job and couldn’t communicate. It’s something that someone else needs to look into, and I’m hoping Jynx and Ever have that handled.
“We had no choice, we thought he had our families, and he has so much power and reach, he proved that so often that our hands were tied. He knew things about our pasts that he shouldn’t have.” He speaks seemingly to himself as the implications of what he’s done begin to settle in.
I watch him, listening intently but staying silent, not wanting to spook him.
“Emma had a choice, she was just bitter though, wanted to do anything she could to hurt the organisation, and now she had been given the perfect opportunity.” He pauses and then looks at me, looking truly haunted, “I went to a warehouse once. I had to drop off the flash drive, and for some reason, he didn’t want it dropped at the usual inconspicuous locations that we usually dropped them at. Walking through the dimly lit corridor behind him, I could hear screams of pain, and when I couldn’t keep the shock off my face, he told me that he trained the best of the best to work for him and get him the information that he wanted. He trained spies and soldiers, all broken enough by him to remain loyal. It was disturbing.”
That sort of sounds like what Blake was trying to do with Ever, but on a larger scale, he wanted Ever as his weapon, Erberus seems to want an entire army at his disposal from what I understand.
“They’re there willingly?” I ask.
Surprising me further, he answers, “They may have been at one point, but I caught a glimpse at some of the security cameras, and there is no way that someone would be willing to put themselves through that torture.”
This is slightly more complicated than I thought. If he’s right, then there’s a real chance that there are more people there that need to be rescued and safely detained while their trauma is worked out. Fuck knows what they’ve been threatened with or told.
“Why didn’t you tell anyone? Get them some help. That’s what we do. That is exactly the sort of situation that we help with.”
“Fear,” he replies bluntly, “he can get to you wherever you are. He’d know, and I thought he had my family.”
“Where did you see them?” I ask, not bothering to focus on the other line of questioning.
“I can't.”
“But you do know,” I reply, leaning forward slightly in my chair. “Where?”
“He’ll know I told you,” Gauld replies, the panic heavy in his tone.
