Little Brother: Chapter 18–Epilogue

The mission was complicated, retrieving a sacred relic that had been stolen by an ogre who was bent on subjugating the people of the land to his will.

Somewhere, of course, there was another player with a similar grudge against me, so that even as I was enjoying the camaraderie of the team, I’d always have to keep an eye open for a knife in the back, poison in the food.

He cornered me as I skulked in the lobby, hoping to spot the clan-master of my rivals and swoop in on him and draw his blood.

We became known as the nation’s foremost hoaxers, as weird, pathological liars.

Maybe the reason your subconscious dredges up all these miserable ghosts is that they need to get closure before they can rest peacefully in humiliation afterlife.

It had been a candy bar shaped phone, silver, plastered in the logos of a dozen companies that had subsidized the cost of the handset through the phone company.

“Here’s the thing. Now that you’ve helped me, it’s really dangerous. If you get caught, I’ll get caught. They’ll get anything you know out of you—” I held up my hand to forestall their protests.

Zeb had passed them to her the same way he’d given me the note outside school — bumping into her as she waited for the bus, apologizing profusely.

She said the name without any inflection at all, like it was a block of cement.

I’d had the worst that they could throw at me, and I’d survived it, and I’d beaten them, beaten them for months, showed them up as chumps and despots.

Then it was cacophony, a thousand different shouting voices.

No, I think we’re going to be able to get you arraigned and released on bail pretty fast.

The courtroom was full of tears and hugs, and even the bailiffs couldn’t stop it.

“Mr. Governor, with all due respect: we have incontrovertible video evidence that Marcus Yallow, a citizen of this state, native-born, was subjected to a simulated execution by DHS officers, apparently acting on orders from the White House. Is the State really willing to abandon any pretense of justice for its citizens in the face of illegal, barbaric torture?”

The records were meticulous, but Carrie Johnstone has the encryption keys.