Nevermind

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Scene Title Nevermind
Synopsis Avi Epstein reviews his list.
Date November 7, 2011

Cambridge is silent.

In the cab of the battered pickup truck that serves as Ferry for the soldiers at the end of the world, Avi Epstein is — for the first time in many days — alone with his thoughts. The cab doors are locked, engine off, windows rolled up to keep out as much of the cold as they can, which isn't much. Jaundiced light from a street lamp overhead casts the entire alley outside of the safe house an amber shade. Clouds have littered the sky, obscuring the moon.

On the bench seat next to Avi is an unused Smith and Wesson 9mm in a cherry leather shoulder holster. Stolen from somewhere, found its way through a chain of custody to the Ferrymen. John Logan's prints are likely on it somewhere. That's just the way of the world, for however much longer the world has a way to be. There's no traffic here, hidden behind a block of buildings, parked ahead of an overfull dumpster that hasn't been emptied for weeks. The deterioration of society has some creature comforts.

Avi's been staring at the handwritten list in his hand for a while now. Eleven names, each written in pencil if that somehow made it less final, each with an ability name and a serial number afterward. It's a kill list, from Eileen Ruskin's mouth to his ears. Avi's handwriting makes it more personal. What isn't included in the list are the ages of some of the people, a detail that Eileen was clear to outline so as to not surprise Avi when he got to the Ark. The intelligence that came up from Veronica Sawyer was troubling, most of all the captives who were still alive and yet contained a measure of threat about them. The first name on the list, Leonardo Maxwell, carries plenty of weight. A metallokinetic, former millionaire, sadistic psychopath somewhere in that mental description too.

Others are less obvious or recognizable, people Epstein's never heard of or met before. He doesn't know who Jacob Stack is or why he needs to die, but he trusts Eileen's judgment on this unquestioningly. David Yaeger is an unfamiliar name on the list, Eileen warned Avi he'd be ten or eleven years old. Viral Replication is after his name, and that makes enough sense. It's bleak, but so is this entire situation. There's a good part of Avi that doesn't expect to make it out of this alive, anyway, and if there is an afterlife and he'll be judged for his crimes, all of this will just be sprinkles on his damnation cupcake.

Reaching into his jacket pocket, Avi retrieves the nub of a pencil he'd been keeping on to. No eraser. Flattening the list to the steering wheel, he scribbles a name down on the bottom of the list, a twelfth name.

Nathalie Le Roux — Life Sense — 0008

Looking up into the rear view mirror, Avi folds the list up and puts it into his pocket and adjusts his dark sunglasses. His brows furrow, and he momentarily looks around. His eye focuses on something at the end of the alley, a figment of his imagination, then nothing. Just steam from a vent.

Nevermind.


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