Tobacco-Stained Mountain Goat, page 15
Dorothy poured herself a small amount, then sipped. She mulled it over before swallowing. “Mmm. A little tart, but otherwise, it’s excellent.”
“You’re kidding me?”
“I’m surprised you even mind. What is it you usually guzzle? Brandy from the well?”
“Or bargain basement vodka and gin. I like a bit of variety.”
“Stop it. Next thing you’ll do is whip out a packet of cigarettes and cause a ruckus. Well, don’t. I’m not going to let you destroy a perfectly good evening.”
“I wouldn’t do that.”
“Floyd, this is me you’re talking to.”
“True.” I smiled at her, trying to win her over the way I used to be able to, but she wasn’t having a bar of it. “I’m just kidding around, Dot.”
“Exactly. You can be exasperating. You’ve cut yourself off from me. I can understand why you’d do that to our mum, but not me. We used to be friends. When was the last time you were honest with me? Ever since Veronica went to that Hospital, you’ve been a stranger to me. We barely even see one another.”
“Hey, not true. I see you every night on TV.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about. Floyd, how are things for you right now? I can tell something’s up with you. Spill it.”
“Everything’s okay. I swear.”
“Is it really?”
“Would I lie to you?”
“Actually, I do believe you would. Come on, this is me. Is there anything I can do for you?”
“You could enjoy your birthday—and maybe order us some of that well brandy.”
“There you go again. Avoiding the issue.”
“No, just being a cad.”
“And erecting the wall.”
“What wall?”
“Between us. You avoid being serious. You make silly remarks.”
“Force of habit.”
“I see. This suspension of yours—have you thought about leaving Seeker Branch and starting fresh somewhere else?”
“No. It takes time—forms to fill out, applications, approval. All that shit.” It seemed everyone wanted me to give Seeker Branch the old heave-ho and not one of them actually understood the ramifications it would have. It wasn’t her fault. She didn’t have a clue that I had no choice in the matter.
“You can’t just live for the now. You have to think about the future.”
“What future?”
“That’s a cynical way to look at things. What happened to the brother I knew? Why have you changed so much?”
“Maybe it has something to do with losing the person I love most in this goddamned world? Listen, it doesn’t matter. Not now. That’s the past. I’ll be fine. I just need a bit more time to sort things out and settle what’s left of V’s medical bills.”
I didn’t believe any of this shit, but I hoped this would stifle the conversation. Dorothy knew full well about Veronica, but had no idea that I’d just been through the emotional wringer yet again. It made me sad that I couldn’t bring up Laurel with her, but, well, I couldn’t.
“Have you spoken to mum recently?” I was thankful she seemed to have retreated and changed the topic.
“Not for a week or so.”
“Understandable. Well, the latest furor she’s championing is a shake-up of the local Election Board. Apparently they got caught squandering funds and resources in relation to the Neighbourhood Watch so she’s hell bent on rooting out the corruption.”
“Corruption, eh?”
“Yeah, I’m sure mum will sort it out in her own special way.”
“Have they Relocated the entire board yet?”
“Well, it’s not going to come to that, thankfully.”
“Isn’t it?”
“Of course not. It’s just Election Board drama.”
“Where d’they draw the lines in Deviancy, precious? Do you know? Corruption is corruption, even if it’s just over-zealous committee members on the Neighbourhood Watch.”
“My god, Floyd. Are you that paranoid?”
“Maybe I am. Maybe I’m so damned paranoid I’ve slipped over the line into Deviancy.” This was the second time someone had called me paranoid in the past week. I tossed the accusation down with the remains of my champagne—both tasted flat and insufficient.
“Don’t—god—don’t even say that,” she said, glancing nervously around. The more upset and agitated she got, the more annoyed at myself I became, but I couldn’t stop myself.
“Don’t you ever question the bullshit, precious?”
“No.” Her response was surprisingly firm, though she nervously straightened the sleeves of her dress while she talked. “What you’re saying scares me. You sound so bitter.”
“Well. Bitter is an acquired taste. Fine. I’m bitter. But you don’t know what I’ve seen these years. You don’t know what I’ve done. To you, Deviancy is a word that holds actual meaning. I know the truth. The government changes the meaning of it every other week to suit their needs.”
“I’ve seen what Deviants can do. I’ve seen the maimed police officers and the bodies of murdered guards. It’s sickening. They can be animals. They behave worse than animals.”
“Is that what you’ve seen? Really? I’ll note that you’re also talking about my wife, Dorothy.”
“I’m so sorry. That was awful of me. I didn’t mean it that way, darling.”
“Don’t worry yourself. At least she’s dead and buried—well, cremated, anyway. Look, I’m sorry. I’m exhausted, a little drunk, and I’m rambling about things that don’t matter a hoot. Maybe I should just go home.”
“Don’t.”
“I’m sorry. I mean it. Dot, things are not always what they seem. Neither am I. My life feels like it’s on a perpetual loop in purgatory. Sweetheart, my job is—well, being a Seeker is hell. Do you know what a Seeker does? What we really do out there? It’s not just a matter of rounding up stray Devs and loading them up into cages. Sometimes we have to kill them, and it’s all done with state approval. These are not animals we’re talking about—I swear it. They’re people. Often innocent people. People like Veronica. Regardless of what the telly says. And you know why we do it? Because we have no choice. Because people like me have wives or husbands or children or parents that were disabled, or got sick, or disagreed with the government, or committed some petty crime. And then the ones left behind—like me—have no choice. The government threatens our loved ones, forces huge Hospitalization bills on us, and it’s our responsibility to pay them in order to even retain a sliver of hope for our family and their well being in the Hospital. Meanwhile we watch as our loved ones are labeled as animals by the media. You knew Veronica. You knew the vibrant person she was. Was she an animal? Was she a Deviant?”
“No. She wasn’t. I’m so sorry.”
“Did she deserve imprisonment and death? Does anybody?”
“No.” Dorothy looked down, her eyes tearing.
“Well welcome to my world. Now ask yourself, what do you think would happen to me if I quit being a Seeker? I’ll tell you—I’d be labeled a Deviant. Period.”
“I’m so—I don’t—”
“Stop. It’s okay. And I am sorry. I didn’t want you to know all this crap, but I guess it was good to get it all off my chest.”
good night, sweetheart
Whatever response my sister was or wasn’t about to give got lost as the entrance doors to the dining area were abruptly flung open and cracked hard against the walls. Two men dressed in filthy rags bounded in—and they fit the media’s caricature of Devs so damned well that you could practically cut them out and pin them up. One was sporting an unruly beard, tangled hair, and had a discoloured bandage over one eye. The other had a shaved head and what seemed like burn marks all over his face. On top of this, and fractionally more alarming, was the fact that the duo were flaunting what looked to be police assault rifles.
The dining chatter stopped on a dime, and an eerie silence overtook the room—leaving only the music wafting through the speaker system. It’s completely inappropriate, I know, but I couldn’t help noticing it sounded something like a muzak bastardization of “Goodnight, Sweetheart, Goodnight” by the McGuire Sisters.
O’Herlihy, the maître d’, speedily intercepted them but was unceremoniously dismissed with a volley of shots that tossed the man and his menus back against the white (now red) reception counter. Then they started taking pot shots into the crowd of diners.
I immediately lunged across the table, grabbed my sister, and shoved her under me as we hit the floor. She screamed and thrashed about as bullets smashed white chinaware, porcelain vases, and Waterford Crystal glasses above our heads. There was a huge crash as one of the large windows shattered near us. Once the initial mayhem subsided they began to slow their shots, taking their time to aim. I watched the pandemonium from beneath our table—the patrons that tried to run were systematically mown down. I could see Kev standing still, hysterically screaming, but miraculously none of the bullets seemed to hit him.
I pinned Dorothy with one arm as I reached beneath my jacket for my gun that wasn’t there—I’d had to hand it in upon suspension—and swore a swag of sailor’s oaths to myself while forcing our frames as low as we could go into the shag-pile carpet, then marginally lower again. I squeezed my hand over Dorothy’s mouth to shut her up, though her eyes betrayed her absolute terror. From my vantage point under our table I could see the legs of the assailants creeping forward as people cried and screamed. There was a steak knife and corkscrew on the floor beside me, and after a bit of indecision I grabbed the blade.
Ol’ one eye was closing in on our table and I shoved the knife deep into his right calf muscle. The handle was jerked away from my grasp as the man staggered back, howling, his rifle firing wildly into the ceiling as he struggled to remain standing. Pieces of chandelier and white plaster rained down.
The man regained his composure, took a look at me with his good peeper, and instead of firing started to quickly hobble away as if he were more scared of me than I of him. Both men retreated back to the entrance and vanished. I motioned to my sister to remain where she was, then crawled out from under the table. I took a brief survey of the room and noticed Kev was no longer where he’d been standing—I hoped he was okay but feared the worst.
I grabbed the corkscrew—my steak knife was nowhere to be found—and held it so that the spiral point of the corkscrew stuck out between the fingers of my fist. Taking a deep breath, I sprinted through the carnage to the entrance and followed the trail of blood out through the foyer, down the white marble stairs, and onto the street. The blood trail ended abruptly—the Devs had vanished into thin air.
I grabbed my Mitt-Mate and reported in to Branch, then took out my packet of cigarettes and lit up as I waited for the cops to arrive. A pair of extremely well-armed Devs had just laid waste to a posh restaurant inside the Dome. It was unthinkable. People began spilling out from the restaurant, limping down the steps and past me.
Dorothy found me and buried her face in my chest. Her hair was disheveled and the sleeve on her dress was torn, but she seemed uninjured. I could hear her crying the words “Deviant monsters” over and over and suspected she was well and truly lost to me. I held her tight, the cigarette dangling from my lips.
corkscrew
The area had become increasingly chaotic, and there was a growing crowd of ravenous onlookers. I felt a twinge of relief when the boys-in-blue arrived in their black vans with Christmas lights flashing. Several cops wandered about as they tried to work out what to do before a lieutenant ordered them to push back the crowd and cordon off the area. A senior officer—a haggard-looking woman with washed-out red hair, possibly in her mid-forties—approached the steps where we sat. I gently eased Dorothy to one side and showed the cop my ID. The woman paused to consider the card and then my face with that usual edge of distrust and disgust rolled into one.
“What the hell happened here?”
“The place was hit.”
“Well, obviously. Illuminate me. What the hell business is it of Seeker Branch?”
“None. I just happened to be here at the time. Looked to me like some disgruntled customers didn’t appreciate the soup of the day. Male. Caucasian. They were well armed.”
“They were Devs!” Dorothy chimed in.
“Maybe,” I said. “They looked the part, but I wouldn’t swear on it.”
“I see. Possible Devs shooting up a place and a Seeker just happens to be here. Tell me—were you in the Dome on Activities? And if so—why weren’t we warned?”
“He wasn’t here on business,” Dorothy cut in. Business? I thought. I wasn’t fond of that word in relationship to Activities. Made it seem twice as dirty, and it was already filthy.
“Do you mind letting him answer?”
“She’s right. It’s her birthday. We were just here to celebrate.”
“So, you’re a Seeker. Off-duty or not. Did you nail any of the bastards?”
“I stabbed one in the leg. That’s all I was able to do. I didn’t have my gun.”
“You’re not packing?”
“Only this corkscrew.” I held it up. “I had a steak knife too, but I think one of them took it with them.”
“Quirky. Why no gun?”
“I’m under suspension from Seeker Branch.”
“I see. This gets better and better. So now we’ve got two fugitive Devs, one injured, and a suspended Seeker with a corkscrew.” She barked a few quick instructions into her shoulder-mic and then sighed. “This is a mess. I’ll need a full statement. You up for that?”
“Like I have a choice. Look, there’s something you guys should be aware of.”
“Yeah?”
“They were packing police assault rifles.”
“You’re joking.”
“No.”
“You’re positive?”
“Abso-fucking-lutely.”
“Where in Jesus’ name would Devs—or anybody for that matter—get a hold of our assault weaponry? I haven’t heard reports of any stolen equipment.”
“A very good question.”
“Bloody hell.”
Dorothy broke away from me and stared at all the injured and dying. Tears were coursing down her cheeks, but I could tell she was beginning to pull herself together. The cop gave her a once over.
“Say, don’t I know you? Shit, it’s you, isn’t it? It’s really you—the Channel 405 Weather Girl. I watch you all the time!”
saddle up
Over the course of the next few days, I was put through seven different debriefings with all sorts of muckety-mucks. They felt more like lectures than interviews, like I was being told what happened rather than asked, which I found a bit odd.
Case in point—during the debriefings I highlighted, underlined, gold starred, and harped on the fact that the assailants had flaunted police assault rifles, yet nowhere in my ‘official report’—that is, the one I was pushed to autograph—did I see this allegation repeated. Wherever their armaments were mentioned it was always sanitized to ‘automatic weaponry’.
After I signed off on ‘my’ abridged report, they smiled and thanked me, handed me a reinstatement contract effective immediately, and gave me back my service revolver.
Back in the saddle, I spent the following day at my long neglected desk in the offices of Seeker Branch proper. My job gave me a surprising level of access to police records and files as a matter of course—admin must’ve thought Seekers would need to be able to savvy up on their targets, though I never did and I doubt anyone else took the trouble to either. I did a bit of digging on their servers and found no reports whatsoever on stolen or misappropriated police armaments in the past year. Even stranger, I came across Forensics’ findings from the restaurant, which made no mention of any empty cartridges or spent shells.
Something was clearly rotten in the city of Melbourne.
lost in transmigration
Four days after the massacre, it went public. The evening news on Dorothy’s network had an interview with some happy chappy named Dick Fantl, a fifty-something Assistant Commissioner of Police Services, with the words ‘Deviant Relations’ stuck in brackets beneath his title. I lived, breathed, and choked on the industry, yet had never heard of him.
His mug segued into footage from the restaurant’s security system—prefaced by a warning that some viewers might find it extremely offensive. What followed was a tightly edited reinvention of the attack, a montage of bullets shattering plates, blood splattered walls, and an occasional unidentifiable body strewn across the floor or a table. Of particular note, the assailants were never shown.
The clip ended and was replaced by computer-rendered mugshots of the Devs-at-large with ‘DEVIANT ALERT’ in all caps above them and a request to ‘Call this number now if you recognize these men!’ underneath. They were crap likenesses—I couldn’t make the connect and I’d seen the boys.
Then a reporter took over on-location and proceeded to fill in details. I rolled myself a cigarette while they showed clips of twisted bodies, ambulance staff with stretchers, and quacks trying to save lives. There were a bunch of hysterical, bloodied patrons being interviewed, followed by some police officers I’d run into and some others I hadn’t.
The reporter’s voice shifted. “But in the midst of this tragedy we also find triumph, for in the face of terror one man was not afraid.” My face filled the screen and I heard myself say, “I’m from Seeker Branch” like some kind of suave secret agent. I dropped my half-rolled cigarette. It was a clean edit and absolutely out of context. I didn’t even remember saying that, though I suppose I must have at some point while talking to the copper. I picked up my cig from the floor and did my best to repair it.
Next up, there, at the base of the white marble staircase, was another shot of me, this time holding Dorothy. The reporter led the camera over to us and the camera zoomed into my face. I actually remembered this part—it was when I yelled obscenities at him, shoving the camera aside. But before it got to that, I was reduced to a snapshot inset in the upper right corner while the news anchor’s mug filled the screen and he was detailing who and what I was and how my heroic actions had saved countless lives. Then the anchor’s face softened from its serious, informative inflection to something akin to pride. “But who is Floyd Maquina, really?” he challenged us.
