12. Tea for Two

The sneaker guys woke Mateo up again. It was almost routine, except they wouldn’t stick to a dang schedule. He was tired and feeling like the stage of drunk where every emotion is turned up to about an eight.

“Hi guys,” he said, getting up. If he didn’t get up on his own, as he’d attempted once when really groggy and feeling recklessly experimental, they had hauled him out of his cot like a sack of potatoes and not given him time to put his shoes on, which had sucked.

He was sure by now that there had to be other prisoners in here, even if he never heard or (thanks, stupid sack) saw any of them. The place just didn’t make sense otherwise.

He held out his hands for the sneaker guys. He’d found out that if he did that they would usually cuff him in front, which was pretty convenient if you had to keep wiping your nose thanks to a perma-cold.

You could argue that he was being too much of a pushover, sure, but why not? He didn’t have a dog in this fight. He didn’t even know what this fight was about. They were really careful about basically keeping him in a box, and it was working. Monocle Man was probably — no, scratch that — definitely learning from him, but it was a pretty one-way street. And it seemed dumb to hack off the soldiers. So far they’d been ... well, not nice, but not mean either, and he didn’t want to change that. He had to face facts. He was probably stuck in the future for good, and he’d need all the breaks he could get. So he didn’t argue about that dumb sack, and went where they walked him.

It wasn’t Monocle Man this time in the room. He blinked. The guy at the desk was one of Monocle Man’s regular buddies, and was wearing a slightly fancier version of the sneaker soldiers’ uniform rather than the custom(?) deal Monocle wore.

To Mateo, still groggy, he looked like a fluffy cartoon owl and just about that scary. He blinked again. Who was this guy, Monocle Man on opposite day?

When he looked up from his paperwork and noticed Mateo, his expression immediately went to involuntary concern. “My dear fellow, you’re not ill, are you?”

“No, sir,” said Mateo, trying to focus, then immediately started coughing. “I mean it’s just a cold, sir.”

Owl guy looked amused by this immediate self-contradiction, but more concerned.

“Miss Simpson, could I possibly trouble you to bring us some tea?” he said into a telephone, getting up to pull out another empty chair. “I don’t think Mr. Smith-Ramirez’s throat is in very fine fettle today. Thank you.”

He hung up. Pushing the chair over to Mateo, he said “Sit down, lad, you look peaked.”

Mateo sat, like he was expecting a whoopie cushion, or maybe a land mine.

“Whuh?” he managed to say.

“Clear off a bit, don’t hover,” Owl Guy said to the soldiers, shooing them away. He moved his own chair around the desk and sat. Mateo’s brain just made static noises at him.

Miss Simpson (probably) entered with two mugs, big things like coffee cups. It hit Mateo that all the chicks in this weird place were all note-takers. Come to think of it, only the dudes of Murder Amish had jumped him, while the chicks just hung around looking approving, which was kinda weird. And he hadn’t seen any female soldiers, not one, even though this wasn’t a combat role. Huh. Different strokes. Not what he expected from the future, but absolutely nothing had gone like he expected since he crashed into that field. Maybe just because it was a jail. He looked away from her quickly so his interest wouldn’t be mistaken for, well, interest.

“Here, captain Short.” She handed over the mugs and left.

“Thanks ever so. Now take your time, lad, it’s no good to anyone, you coughing like that.”

Mateo took the mug with both hands, partly because he was so weirded out and didn’t want to drop it, and partly because that was basically his only option with cuffs on. It was really hot, almost too hot to touch the sides of. It felt great. He risked a sip and burned his tongue just a little.

Mateo didn’t drink tea except when he was visiting Avi, and this was a lot like it, strong and hot and full of milk. Not as sweet and definitely not spicy, but the first actually tasty thing he’d had since the science doughnut screwed him over. It felt like it was thawing him out. Captain Short took a drink from his own, watching him sympathetically.

“Uh, thanks,” said Mateo, and started coughing again. Aw snap, how was he going to be able to talk for a couple hours?

“This won’t do, my boy, it simply won’t do. Have one.” He fished a wrapped piece of probably hard candy out of his pocket and handed it over. “Here, put your tea on the desk so you don’t spill it. These taste simply foul but they certainly work as advertised.”

It tasted like menthol and eucalyptus and fumed through his sinuses like pepper spray, bringing tears to his eyes. It tasted just like the cough drops his grandmother used to inflict on him when he was little. He instantly stopped coughing, throat as happy as his sinuses were pissed.

Short patted him on the shoulder, and it was, weirdly, great. He couldn’t remember the last time somebody had done that. He kind of remembered some cop show on tv where it was one of the cop’s job to be really nice to trick suspects, and maybe that’s what this guy was doing, but WOW, he just didn’t care. He wanted to tell him everything, just so he wouldn’t be alone with it anymore. Dude, you would not BELIEVE the month I’ve been having. Particle accelerators are the WORST. If I ever make it home I’m eating SO MANY doughnuts as payback.

Dang, right, he probably wouldn’t believe it, though. But maybe...

“That’s all right, take your time.” He shook his head. “You shouldn’t have ever been put in this position, lad, being sent to this county like you were. It’s not fair to you, and it’s not useful to anyone else. The colonel can be rather stern, I think. Fair play on some, but you don’t strike me as really meaning any harm. Just the wrong place and the wrong time, am I right?”

“Yeah,” Mateo said, still rolling the fuming cough drop around his mouth. It was easy to blame his eyes watering again on it. “I don’t want to cause you guys any problems, I just want to go home.” Why’d he say that? It wasn’t possible unless they had a time machine stashed somewhere, and they wouldn’t believe him and they might get cheesed—

But Short just nodded. “And so you shall. You just have to let me help you.”

***

"How did blowing hot go, Short?"

"Amazingly well, Commandant! Give me another day and he'll be eating out of our hands."

Stephens smiled. "Well done."

"I took the liberty of issuing him another blanket and ten hours' time off. He's not been sleeping well, and I'm worried that if he doesn't relax enough to get his head down properly we won't get any sense out of him at all. He didn't go so far as weeping on my shoulder in gratitude, but..."

Stephens nodded. "He doesn't seem the type to fight to the death if he can expect good treatment if he surrenders."

"I agree, commandant. I think he never wanted to be a spy -- maybe another one who was blackmailed. Would you like to talk to him tomorrow or shall I?"

"You. This is the crucial point, and the soft touch will serve us well. I don't want to frighten him into clamming up."

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