Episode 17, “A Bad Man”

 

Peyton closed the door of the kiosk, shoulders hunched inside the religion vendor’s plastic cylinder. Rainwater from his overcoat drummed on the tiled floor and left a puddle under his boots. He did not know what to do with his hands. He folded them in his lap.

A small dome light switched on. It was set in the divider that bordered his half of the cylinder. Beneath the light, a plastic door slid sideways. The mesh screen beneath that bore the symbol of the Univariance Church: a star on a cross within a sphere beneath a crescent.

“Child of all gods,” said the man behind the mesh, “know that you are in a safe place, among friends who are here to help you.”

He had no answer. The man behind the mesh wore the LED collar of a priest.  The priest cleared his throat.

“I don’t know how this works,” said Peyton.

“You paid for the confessional,” said the priest. “You may unburden yourself to me.” The priest was middle aged. His head was shaved. His features were very soft. One of his eyes drooped. His face was dark with beard stubble.

“I need to talk to someone,” said Peyton.

“I am listening,” said the priest.  “You may input more funds if time expires before you’re finished.”

Peyton rubbed his hands together.  “I worked for the Triads,” he said.  “It was twenty years ago, here in Hongkongtown.”

“Many have fallen into the trap of easy earnings from organized criminal enterprise,” said the priest.  “I want you to say the Mantra of Forgiveness twenty times and make a donation to the Church of–”

“I’m not finished,” said Peyton.

“My apologies, my son,” said the priest. “Please continue.”  The LED of his collar turned from white to blue.

“There was something wrong with me,” said Peyton. “An imbalance in my brain. I was born with it.”

“There is no wrong in being what the gods made you,” said the priest.

“I killed for the first time when I was nine years old,” said Peyton. “A boy at school. He wouldn’t stop hitting me. I stabbed him in the eye with a stylus.”

The priest’s LED changed from blue to green.

“I killed again when I was fourteen,” said Peyton.  “A Hongkongtown prostitute who tried to rob me. By the time I was nineteen I was performing executions for the Triads. And at twenty-six I killed a man named Wo Jao.”

“These are great evils,” said the priest, “but a donation of suitable size may–”

“Jao was running Sleep for the Triads,” said Peyton, “He was a distributor, whose job it was to supply street dealers. A mid-level member of a very powerful organized crime family. But Jao was greedy. He was skimming profits, shorting the Triads their share of the money. So they told me to kill him.”

The priest’s collar turned red.  “I’m afraid that means time is expired,” he said. “But if you insert more chits–”

“I was small back then,” said Peyton. “Normal. Not like now. I took a gun to Jao’s house. Shot his dog. Shot his guards.”

“Uh,” said the priest.

“Jao was hiding in his bedroom. It was hardened. Safe from attack. I stuffed the ventilators with strips of fabric from his upholstered furniture. I set them on fire.”

“I really think–”

“When he came out, I put my gun under his chin. I told him the Triads had ordered his death. I told him it wasn’t personal. It wasn’t. I didn’t care about him. I didn’t care if he lived or died.”

The priest’s red collar started blinking.  “My son, you’ll need to insert more chits to continue,” he said.

“He begged me. He told me he had a daughter. ‘I’ll never see her again if you kill me,’ he said to me. ‘She’ll grow up alone. You’ll take me from her forever.’”  He stopped and pressed his fingers together. His knuckles turned white.  “I remember it exactly. ‘You’ll take me away from her forever.’ That’s what I did. I put my gun under his chin and I put his brains on the wall.”

“My son,” the priest began.

“And I didn’t care,” said Peyton. “I felt nothing. Killing never made me feel. But then came the Project.”

“My son, the gods love you, but I must call security,” said the priest.

“Something about my endocrine system,” said Peyton. “It had to be rebalanced. Before they could implant the hormone sacs. ‘Building on a level foundation,’ they called it.”

The priest was furiously pressing a button on his side of the wall.  Peyton reached out and poked one huge finger through the mesh screen. He pulled the screen free and dropped it on the floor.

“My son, you can’t do that,” said the priest.  “The Church will have to charge your account for any damages.”

Peyton rubbed the back of one huge hand across his eyes. His hand came away wet. He looked at the priest. “Your panic button won’t work,” he said. “I pulled the cable before I got in.”

“Young man, if you refuse to work with the Church, the Church cannot help you.” The priest frowned at him through the opening in the barrier.

“I just had to tell someone,” said Peyton. “There’s no one I can talk to. I can’t tell Annika. She can’t know that I murdered a father. That I took him from his daughter forever. She told me I should be proud. That I’m doing a good job. But I’m not. I’m not doing enough. I don’t know what enough would be.”

“It is time for you to go,” said the priest.

“My little girl,” said Peyton. “For twelve years I thought she was dead. What is her life now? What will it be? She lives on the streets of Hongkongtown. In flophouses. In the homes of sex offenders. She sleeps in the beds of people who are so horrible they deserve what I do to them. But I’m no better.”

The priest had turned pale. “Please go,” he said quietly.

“They call you ‘father,’ said Peyton. “But a father is a protector. A father does absolutely anything he has to do. To protect his child. To give her what she wants and needs. To make her safe.”

“Please,” said the priest.

“You’re on the offender registry,” said Peyton. “You like little boys. That’s why I came here. I needed to talk. But I can’t talk to anyone.”

“It isn’t my fault,” said the priest. He was crying now. “I’m sick. The doctors said so.”

“Maybe I’m no better,” Peyton said quietly. “Maybe I deserve to die. But I can’t. Not while I have a job to do.”

Peyton reached through the opening. The priest tried to run, tried to open the door on his side of the vendor, but he was not fast enough. Peyton’s grip crushed his throat and snapped his spine.

“I’m a bad man,” said Peyton to the dead priest. “But I’m also Annika’s father.”