The Voting Machine

Master Keys

After Polk left the room, Decatur removed mystraps and lowered me from the pipe. When I was settled on the floor, leaning against one of the walls, he loosened the rope around my wrist and offered me an energy drink. I guzzled the sugary soda until my stomach started rumbling.

"That taste good?" he said in a comforting tone. "You must be thirsty."

"Where's Stevens?" I asked. Their boss, the Special Agent in Charge, had been my main interrogator in the station house. He had promised me early on that I wasn't a suspect in the murders of Zeke and David.

Decatur grinned. "He couldn't be here. But he is concerned about you. We all are. This is a very tragic case. We don't believe you meant to kill them. You were probably scared right? I am sure you were shaken up after a full day of questioning. Then Teresa drove you home, she must've told you things that made you even more worried. Then Chang and Weisbein pull up in front of your room at the crack of dawn. Did you even realize who you shot? I might've done the same thing in your shoes."

I sipped the energy drink again.

"We want to help, Temo. We think the thing with Chang and Weisbein wasn't pre-meditated, so that works in your favor. But we need to understand your state of mind when you pulled the trigger."

"I didn't kill them."

"OK. You still don't want to be honest. We'll come back to that. What about Zeke and David? How were you involved in the attack on the voting machines?"

"I wasn't!"

"Sure you were."

"I have an alibi. I was at the hotel that morning. You're the one who picked me up."

"You don't have an alibi the night before. You were out weren't you?"

"I was out for a walk. That's all."

"Can you prove it?"

"So you think I set the trap in the voting machines?"

"Someone did. Who had more access than you?"

"How would I get in the polling stations? They locked them up at eight ever evening."

"Yes, but you had access, didn't you? You think we didn't check the County Clerk's office? You were signed up as a poll worker. David had you guys down their many times during the training sessions. We know he made the case that his team should have complete access to the polling centers. He worried that Zeke's Founding Fathers would get in there after hours and tamper with the voting equipment.

"We checked with the County Clerk's office. They had two sets of master keys that gave access to all the polling centers in Las Vegas. Now one set of keys is missing. Someone got into those locations and rigged the traps in those machines."

Decatur paused and studied my reaction.

"How would someone know that the machines would kill Zeke and David? How would they know those two would be the first to show up for voting?"

"C'mon Temo. You were David's friend. You must've known that he and Zeke have a sort of tradition for years, don't they? They were famous for their politics in this city and they took pride in being the first ones to show up a cast their ballots on Election Day. Then when Nevada moved to early voting they moved this tradition to the Tuesday exactly one week before Election Day. I've heard this story from many of their friends in the past day. Don't pretend you didn't know about it. So it was an open secret that they would be there first thing in the morning yesterday. And so maybe all this other stuff about a terrorist threat is just a cover for a pair of murders. But the question is why."

"David was like a father to me. He helped me get my life back on track. You really think I would kill him?"

"We know you did. We have the evidence, just like with Chang and Weisbein. You are guilty, Temo. That's not a question. That's not in doubt. But we can help make the case that you weren't acting alone. That will help show that you are really a victim in all of this. You were recruited weren't you? You were radicalized. They took advantage of your vulnerability. You've had so much misfortune in the past year. That's the pattern they look for, Temo, so they can manipulate you. You don't need to be ashamed to tell the truth."

"You're never gonna get me to confess."

"We'll see about that."

Decatur snatched the can of soda from me and emptied it over my head. When Polk returned they tied my wrists together and strapped me back on the ceiling pipe.

***

Sounds drifted in the ceiling overhead; the trickle of pipes and the distant roar of a power generator. I knew we were somewhere deep underground, a place unmarked on maps. The second time they bound my wrists it tore the skin. I could the feel my flesh raw and bloody, pressed against the cold metal of the ceiling pipe. Once again it felt like my chest was gripped in a vice. I'd wait as long as possible before drawing my next breath, savoring that last bit of oxygen until I was dizzy. Then I'd inhale as the pain flooded back through my ribs and every muscle in my chest.

A memory haunted me, a scene from a summer evening in the desert, when I stood at the screen-door outside of David's house and listened to his conversation with his former student, Brenda Savage.

"You the only one I can talk to, Mr. Stone. I can't keep it locked up in my mind any longer."

"It's important that you tell your story, Brenda. You're going to heal yourself by telling it. A lot of other people too."

"But you can't let anyone know it came from me."

"You have my word on that. Now tell me about the elections. That's when you started taking orders from someone outside the chain of command correct?"

"That's right. Started out as a fragmentary order. Then it kept changing until finally it was something totally different. Shiro's soldiers. That's what we called them. They was in battle rattle like the rest of us. I thought they was OGA but even then they was different, like no group I'd ever seen."

"They made camp with the other soldiers?"

"No, they kept apart. They didn't want us to see what they was doin'. They had a CHU where they took their ghost prisoners, locals they brought in during the elections."

"What did they do to the ghost prisoners?"

"Whatever needed doin'. They used pipes and ropes. And they liked energy drinks. Convoy brought in caseloads of energy drinks. They liked the fizz. The ones I saw were in charge of the handling the ghost prisoners. A white guy and a black woman. Clean-cut. Good-lookin'. After the election they burned down the CHU and I never saw them again."