Tobacco-Stained Mountain Goat, page 17
“Nice van,” I manage.
“Now that we’ve cleared that up, I’m Harry Jones, you can call me Hank, and I’ll be your guide this evening. Floyd, here, might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he and I are in charge. So shut up and for god’s sake keep out of our way. If we need to tell you to duck twice, it’s too late for you.”
“Floyd, can we do something about this?” Berman turned to me as if we were buddies or something.
“Sure. Hank’s right. We’re not interested in you or your camera. You gum up the works.”
We passed through the police checkpoint into Richmond, setting off on foot despite the heavy rain. It was impossible to drive more than a few metres into this precinct. Debris was piled high everywhere and visibility was zilch. Berman looked absolutely ridiculous picking his way through the rubble—beneath his coat and an ill-fitting flak jacket, he was wearing a tailored 1970s style three-piece check suit. Annabelle had stayed behind with the van, lucky her, and the poor camera guy had to traverse this terrain while filming us.
Richmond District was, for lack of a more original term, a dead-zone. Once upon a time it was a popular shopping destination, but it’d been hit hard during the Depression. The government had briefly intervened in its decline and attempted redevelopment, but the costs involved blew out of proportion and those involved were convicted on embezzlement charges and Relocated. The powers-that-be ended up declaring the entire district off-limits and left it to fall apart.
The district had effectively become so bad that, officially, it didn’t exist. Now, legally, nobody was allowed in here without a clearance certificate and only an occasional police recon was sign that the authorities remembered this place at all. But people did still live here—most of them foreigners who’d illegally smuggled themselves into Melbourne before the city was closed off. However, these inhabitants of Richmond District didn’t even rate as statistics on government charts. They were non-people, stripped of even the meagre rights doled out sparingly to the rest of us. There was no way for them to reintegrate with our society—if one did show their face somewhere they’d be instantly carted off to a Hospital, never to be seen again. In many ways, though, the shadowy residents of this district had already been Relocated—out of sight, out of mind.
Lately, there was the persistent rumour that Richmond might be the future location of another Dome, since you can never have too many. It was to be a complete reinvention of this part of the city, with (at least, according to the most majestic tales) an eighteen hole golf course so extravagant that it’d qualify as one of those New Wonders I was talking up earlier. Just rumours, mind you, but hardly surprising. The premium on real estate (and therefore, the potential value of this district) was the most compelling reason to believe it might actually come to pass—the city’s population of twenty million lived in sardine-like conditions and would kill for this extra living space. Reinventing this wasteland could make certain people very, very rich.
Regardless of what it might become, the streets and alleyways of this place were currently a maze of pot-holes and crevasses, flooded with rivers of refuse formed by long-clogged drains. The tall warehouse buildings and rundown arcades were shuttered with sheets of tin or worn-out Hylax plasti-guards. At night, it was near pitch black.
By collating the Controller’s reports with various tidbits of info we were given by Seeker Branch, we’d narrowed down the Devs’ most likely turf to only a couple blocks in the heart of Richmond. On our way there, that hack journo wouldn’t shut up, badgering us with inane questions about the district, about Seekers and Deviants, and what our ‘tactics’ would be. He had his camera operator running circles around us the entire time. It made me dizzy.
We didn’t see anyone else—and with the amount of noise this media circus was throwing about, I didn’t expect to. Once we reached our destination, we set up surveillance on the third floor of a boarded-up warehouse. This vantage point offered a scenic view of desolation, along with all the major access points to the area. The gutted department store that Marjorie had fingered was right across the road, connected to a row of triple-storey shops. Our new home stunk of mould, the floors and walls were damp, and everything was covered in a blanket of muck—years of dirt and dust mixed with the rainwater, grime, and pollution.
For my part, I’d done surveillance work dozens of times—it was an integral part of Activities. This was a bit unfortunate, as the pastime was a tedious, mind-numbing affair with even the best of company, though I’d never had to do it with a news-crew hanging on our every move. Berman would manically jump back and forth between on-camera commentary about the stress Hank and I were experiencing and off-camera rants about the filth, the damage it was doing to his suit and his expensive shoes, and the complete lack of action and/or dramatic tension. Of course, it was his attitude that created most of our stress in the first place.
“Tell me, Floyd—what will your next move be?”
“My mother wants me to find an apartment in the Dome.”
“No, I mean what is our next move here.”
“Ahh. The usual one.”
“The usual one? Which is—?”
“We wait,” Hank answered for me.
“For how long?”
“Until we’re ready or they’re up for it,” Hank and I deadpanned together. I put a mark on the wall, as I did every time Berman asked some variant of ‘when is something going to happen?’ He’d made such a habit of it that Hank and I had managed to turn it into a bit of a game, with an over/under bet for a round at Ziggy’s when we got back from this nightmare. I took the over.
“Don’t you have surveillance equipment you could set up at various locations?”
“Actually, Berman, that’s a fantastic idea—if we set it up right, maybe we can blow this joint and hole up in a comfy hotel, or at least set up something a bit more cozy with a blazing fire and some marshmallows.”
“Seriously?” Berman was probably smart enough to know I was joking, but his desire for some fresh roasted Italian coffee got the best of him.
“No. Not seriously. Anything we’d set up here would go walkabout in a matter of minutes.”
“But this precinct is off-limits. Who’d steal anything?”
“The people that live hereabouts.”
“There are people living here?”
“Yes.”
“They’re watching us watch for our Devs,” Hank added.
The reporter mulled this over. “That means the Deviants we’re after might know we’re here too?”
“Possibly.”
“Probably.”
“Then why are we just sitting and twiddling our thumbs?!”
“We really don’t want to go wandering blindly from building to building, with you guys tagging along and getting us all ambushed—do we? Wait. Don’t answer. It was a rhetorical question.”
“But isn’t it dangerous here?”
“Yes, but we’re settled in and it’d be tricky to take us by surprise. If we maintain a low profile, keeping to ourselves—and observe—maybe we’ll see something. Then we’ll act accordingly. It’s the best method in this situation.” We’d made it sound like we knew what we were doing, but it was all bollocks. Neither Hank nor I had any game plan other than to not get ourselves aired out. But it sounded better if we pretended like we knew what we were doing.
“Chances are that these Devs of ours have cleared out,” added Hank, taking the baton. “Once we’re done here we’ll move on to another location. Sometimes it takes days.” Hank lit another cigarette for me then offered the packet around. The others looked disgusted. As he leaned close to me to pass over the gasper, he spoke softly. “So, what’cha think?”
“That you’re brimming with faeces.”
“Likewise.”
“Glad to be of service.”
“Yep, this is getting to be a bit of a cack, isn’t it?”
Berman began to pace and then perched himself on a crate over near the door. He kept looking at his watch. At one point he seemed to be practicing his golf swings. Meanwhile, the camera kid opened this panel and that, fiddled with knobs, polished lenses, tweaked switches, and zoomed his camera about here and there. It was all so irritating.
My partner and I took turns using the only equipment we had—the infrareds—to observe the street and the dark windows of the buildings opposite. I could hear the sound of gushing water somewhere, and in the distance the howl of a police siren, most likely coming from outside the district. I wiped some grit off a windowsill and uncovered the tattered remains of an oval sticker with a single word printed on it, ‘if?’.
Over the next hour, Berman tried his best to get under our skin—and, once there, to peel it asunder—as he tormented us with a barrage of questions while the camera kid panned left and right and up and down between Hank and me. Then Berman got it in his head to stand by the window and launched into a thirty minute monologue about the ‘nerve-racking situation’, while his cameraman got all arty with the angles.
Morning came with no change in our situation. The kid began the day by filming the various waste strewn on the floor. “Why all the waiting?” the kid piped up as he zoomed in on a pair of plastic chopsticks. It was the first time I’d heard him utter a single word and I was already wishing he’d kept his trap shut. “Why don’t we get this over with?” he bleated. “Where’s the action? Why’re we just hanging round here like a bunch of losers—?”
The stakeout turned out to be a complete fizzer—the Devs in question were long gone. By the third day we were pretty damn sure that nobody was inside the department store, so we decided it was time to leave the roost and undertake the next part of our investigation, taking a peek for the Controller. Berman and the camera guy insisted on going with us.
The department store appeared to have been lived in recently—it was still filthy, but the muck wasn’t as deep as it was in our warehouse. Hank and I were having fun making use of our CQB training (“Clear!”) as we searched the interior. Berman was having a field day, finally getting some action shots.
It didn’t take long for us to discover the Controller. He’d been filled with daylight good and proper. He was strung up naked with his arms stretched out like he had been crucified. His chest was pretty much gone—there was blood everywhere. It reeked.
“Jeez.” Hank looked ill.
“I don’t get it. Devs don’t usually take the time to redecorate. Since when’ve they grandstanded?”
“Maybe they’re severely pissed off.”
“Must be, to do a fella up like that.”
“At least he died in style.”
“Can you actually die in style?”
The camera kid was filming everything. Bernard was fuming—he’d got the shot of a lifetime, but knew as well as we did that there was no way the censors would ever let this part air on the telly. This was some seriously fucked up shit.
“Okay, mission accomplished. Let’s go home, kids.” I took one last peek at the dead Controller and frowned.
the things i do for melbourne
The next day two very serious looking suits scooped me up from my apartment and chauffeured me to the central offices of Management Control Division inside the Dome. They were kind enough to inform me on the way over that I had a meeting with the newly appointed head honcho of MCD, Tom Richards. I’d never heard of him, but office gossip, much of it sourced from Hank, was that big changes were afoot as the organization elbowed its way into its new role.
Once there, I was dropped off with Richards’ secretary, who was clad in a tight-fitting paisley ensemble that still had an outrageously inflated price-tag attached to her jacket. She brusquely informed me I was late and that I was imposing upon a very busy man before she ushered me through a large, oaken door.
Tom Richards was perched behind a desk the size of an automobile. It was difficult to gauge his age—he looked thirty-ish, but he’d obviously undertaken the whole gamut of cosmetic enhancements. He had absurdly chiseled features complimented by a resoundingly firm cleft chin, and the overall effect was amplified by a deep bronze complexion. There was no end to these phony people, and for the life of me I didn’t understand why anyone actually chose to look like this.
His suit was a pricey designer number complete with shoulder pads that made the outfit reminiscent of an old American footballer’s uniform, set off with a garish polka-dot tie. Oh, he also had a chihuahua sitting on his desk directly in front of him like some faux Bond villain. This duffer was pure class.
Richards motioned me to the leather armchair in front of his desk and bade me to sit with a flash of exceptionally large white teeth. Those were some perfectly aligned chompers. The man came across as supremely confident, exactly the type of big noter I’d cross a busy street to avoid.
“Maquina, Floyd Maquina, at your service.” I just couldn’t resist taking a potshot at the guy.
“Such a breath of fresh air, you are. I was told about your dry sense of humour, and have been very much looking forward to it. You do not disappoint. But Floyd, I can assure you I’m no Ernst Blofeld—and you’re no James Bond.” He settled back into his chair and stroked his tiny dog.
“Um. Yes, sir.” I’d underestimated this guy—he not only saw right through my jab, but handled it with aplomb.
“Just call me Mr. Richards. After all, we’re friends, aren’t we?”
“Sure.”
“Glad to hear it. Would you care for a cup of coffee?”
“I’m fine. Thanks. I had a strong homebrew this morning.”
“Harriet makes a superb cup and we have real milk. Are you sure you won’t change your mind?”
“I’m cool.”
“Very well.” Richards looked a bit disappointed as he leaned over and pushed a button. “Miss Marker, could you bring me in a coffee? Don’t forget the milk and sugar. That will be all.” He drummed his fingers lightly on the surface of his desk. “Now then, Floyd, do you have any plans for this evening?”
What kind of question was that? “No, I haven’t scheduled that far in advance.”
“Good for you. There’s a big match tonight—a Semi-Final. You probably know about it. Are you interested in the cricket?”
“Not really.”
“Oh?”
“Put it down to an abject fear of that hard-as-hell leather ball.”
“That’s a darn shame.”
“Yes, sir. A darn shame.” The trembling dog was bulging its eyes at me.
“It should be a good contest. The World XI have to win in order to stay in contention for the finals, and if we beat them, it will be a series white-wash. I hope they annihilate them and that Aussie traitor of theirs. Plus, Miles Mander is aiming for his five hundreth wicket and Mike Zane should hit his three thousandth run! Big milestones all round, don’t you agree?”
“Exciting stuff.”
“Yes, sir. Most assuredly.” The secretary came in and delivered his coffee. He sniffed it, nodded, and then he took up a new angle as she left the room. “I’ve had my eye on you. We’ve had our eyes on you. You were great in the footage from your recent Activities session.”
“You think so?” Was he being sarcastic?
“You came across very well.”
“Nothing happened.”
“All the same, we’re very happy with that and with you.”
“The nothingness?”
“That was incidental.”
“If you say so, sir.”
“I do, I do.” He was twirling the antique silver spoon that had been delivered with his coffee. “Let me tell you that we are all very proud of you. For this and for your actions at that restaurant, Holberg’s, the other week. You’ve helped to place Seeker Branch—and the Division in general—in a very good public light. Positively well done.”
“I was just trying to protect my sister. I wish I could pretend there was more to it. But there wasn’t.”
“Well, what matters here is the impression that has been made. Nobody else in that room could have done what you did. You saved many lives that night. And that means Seeker Branch saved lives. You’re a bloody hero.”
“I wouldn’t know anything about that.”
“I’ve got a good feeling that you may have this month’s customer service award all sewn up.”
“Hurrah.”
His grin flickered briefly. “But the best news I’ve left until last.”
“The best news?”
“That’s right. Mr. Deaps himself has taken an interest in you. He wished me to pass on his gratitude.”
Deaps. Wolram, E. In Bed With W.E.D.
“Hylax,” I substituted somewhat stupidly.
“Why, yes. Hylax funds Management Control Division, and as I’m sure you know in addition to being CEO of Hylax, Mr. Deaps takes a personal interest in Deviancy Control. He’s the most important man that you—or I—could ever hope to impress.” The man rose and came around the desk—with a slightly simian gait—to shake my hand with a vice-like grip. “Good day, Floyd. We’ll be watching.”
“Just so you know, I have a habit of letting people down. Don’t expect too much of me.”
“Don’t worry, Mr. Maquina,” he said with a glint in his eye, “I expect you to shine.”
boob tube
Hank had been spot on—he was cast as the faithful if slightly bumbling Watson to my snarky and cynical Holmes. Berman and Co. at ITC had somehow taken our ho-hum stake out and turned it into an edge of your seat reality TV special. They even added a funky background riff that hit all the right notes.
You could tell the bastards worked hard at developing my ‘image’. They’d edited in a few shots of me doing a slow burn directly at the camera as if I could see right through the telly into the hearts of all the people watching at home—though in actuality I’d likely been just glaring at the camera kid for making too much noise.
At another point, Berman’s assistant Annabelle appeared all dolled up on screen, purring, “Floyd is a very, very special guy,” followed by a quick little lip nibble. Then they cut to a shot of me half-smiling in the acid rain, cigarette in hand, giving the idea that maybe we’d shared some sort of moment together.
