by R E Kearney
From its origin to its end, ICC’s 70 is a sealed, secure system with restricted entrances and exits into and out of ICC controlled and operated outposts such as Lymon or the ICC’s depots in the Metrostates. All of ICC’s throughway-hyperloops, previously America’s nationwide transportation system, are the same. Like the veins and arteries of a human’s circulatory system, ICC’s throughway-hyperloops stretch from tip to tip and end to end of Mid-North America.
Rube remembers how, years ago, interstate highways connected and energized small towns. Today, ICC’S throughway-hyperloops pass by them, isolating and killing them. A trail of rotting, ghost towns commemorating a forgotten past.
The ICC system is an autonomous entity unto itself. A nation within a nation. Although operating inside the confederation of twelve Metrostates, eight independent Sovereign States, the forty-two states of FUS and nineteen FUS administrated territories, the Chinese, Saudi and Russian owners are beyond all Mid-North American laws. Rube understands that a self-regulating, conglomerate government directs the ICC system, writing and enforcing its own laws and operating a personal army and air force – their ICC Enforcers. He has heard horror stories about the ICCEs and their brutality.
As Rube turns into the ME lot, his truck engine begins to choke and jerk. His fuel is finished. Gritting his teeth and rocking, he coasts halfway into a parking spot. The last gasps of his dying truck loudly announce his arrival.
Almost as soon as he stops, a humanoid physician-assistant robot with a robotic medical carriage arrives beside his truck door. Evidently, the Enforcers alerted the clinic to his coming. With the assistance of the humanoid PA-bot, Rube slides out of his truck and into the carriage.
Smoothly, silently Rube’s medical carriage carries him through the parking lot to a second set of guarded gates. Before allowing him entrance, another team of ICC Enforcers interrogate and inspect him. They do not like what they see and smell.
One of the Enforcers orders Rube, “Close your eyes and hold your breath.”
As soon as Rube complies, the other Enforcer begins spraying him with a pesticide, antibacterial and antiviral aerosol mixture. The sticky mist wets his skin and clothes. The Enforcer sprays Rube’s hair and beard until they are dripping wet. His lungs are aching for air when the Enforcer tells him he can breathe again.
Now that he is judged to no longer be an epidemic or pestilence threat, the Enforcers allow his carriage to proceed. Once inside the outpost, Rube is surprised. Lymon is empty. Sterile. Boxy, concrete structures are evenly spaced and aligned atop a flat concrete plate. Solar panels cover the tops of the concrete boxes. He sees not one human in this inhuman looking landscape. Except for a few drone delivery vehicles zipping along the vacant routes, nothing is daring to battle the hostile, afternoon sun and skin-ripping winds.
Without slowing, his medical carriage disappears into a hole in the side of one of the concrete boxes. Down a dim ramp he rolls, until an expansive, underground city of lights and statues and paintings and people explodes into view. Rube is awe struck. Looking left, looking right, looking ahead, he struggles to suck into his mind all that he sees. He cannot believe that this beautiful, bustling city lives hidden below the burning-hot concrete.
Rube’s carriage eases its forward motion to a halt. Then, without a sound it slides to the right through a doorway and into Lymon’s synchronous-interactive medical clinic. His carriage disassembles itself from around him leaving him sitting on a small, self-propelled gurney.
Two human attendants arrive, wearing masks, gloves and hazardous material handling coveralls. They glance at each other and simultaneously shake their heads in disgust. Rube is embarrassed. Now, in the presence of other humans, he recognizes his own filth and stench. He has been alone and stuck out in the desert for too long a time. As the attendant’s squint and eye each other, he realizes that he repulses them. He is just another foul, charity case, surviving on subsistence - one more Sist that they must sanitize and scent, so he is not so offensive.
Ignoring his weak protests, they cut away his sweat and dirt encrusted clothes, which they hurriedly stuff into hazardous material bags. He is not an injured individual to them. Not a man. He realizes that like his clothing, he is just more Sist refuse to them.
They roll him naked into an antiseptic shower where they scrub his front clean. Then they flip him over like a slab of meat and scrub his backside. Through his tangled hair and matted beard, they yank and tug a hand-sized, warm-water squirting rake. Not having been able to bathe for longer than he can remember, Rube is humiliated by the brown water and scum they peel off his body.
“Grooming robots will now depilate you.” The masked attendants inform him, as they grab his shoulders and force him into a sitting position. “Do not move.”
From behind, the four armed grooming robot slides a soft cylindrical plug into each of his ears. The plugs hold his head in shearing position while simultaneously relaxing him with synthesized soothing sounds. A clipping and vacuum combination tool quickly removes his head hair and his beard. The robot shaves his skull and chin next. Then a depilatory cream is applied. Only his eyebrows and eyelashes survive.
Following his scrubbing and shearing, he is spread out before a virtual doctor advising her humanoid PA-bot about treating his swollen, shattered ankle. The PA-bot slides an augmented reality overlay and robotic surgical device around his left ankle. He feels a number of tiny stings around his ankle. Then, for the first time in hours, no pain.
“Oh, that’s so much better,” Rube mumbles as he succumbs to sedation.
While he sleeps, his ankle is rebuilt with 3D printed parts. In the adjoining room, prescriptive pain-killers are printed and packaged. He is barely awake, when the two attendants begin dressing him in a set of newly-printed, microfiber clothes. A flexible wrap surrounds his numbed, slightly swollen ankle. They push him into the outer room where his gurney reassembles itself into the medical carriage.
Ten minutes later, Rube is returned to his truck. The pain killers have dulled his throbbing and his thinking. Slumping against his steering wheel, he closes his eyes and disappears into his nightmares. He has nowhere to go and no way to get there.
SQUALOR
Swimming in sweat, Rube struggles to breathe. The heat inside his truck is baking him. Startled awake by yelling children, he opens his eyes and immediately realizes that he is not where he was when he fell asleep. He is not certain where he is, but he is certain that his truck and he are no longer sitting in the ME lot.
Peering out his windshield, Rube discovers that he has been dumped in what appears to be a salvage yard for old trailers, campers, recreational vehicles and fifth wheelers. Nailed to a leaning, rotting post a shredded flag hangs limp in front of a trailer with wood instead of glass in three of its four windows. In front of a recreational vehicle resting on six flat tires, stands a four limbed stick that was once a tree. A torn, blue tarp is melted on to the rusted roof of the camper. Pieces of paper and trash sprout from the hard-packed, bare dirt.
Among this crumbling clutter, Rube’s antique truck is an object of wonder and amusement for five bored boys. His is one of the very rare, internal-combustion-engine, human-driven vehicles still operating out here in the hinterlands. The curious boys have never experienced anything similar to it.
Two boys decide to use his driver’s side door as a drum and begin rhythmically pounding on it. To Rube, it feels like the boys are beating on his brain. He slams his palm against the truck’s horn. Bwaaaah! Bwaaaah! Shocked by the blaring sound they have never heard before, the boys scatter, racing for home. He shoves open his door and heaves himself out.
“Augh!” Rube crumples onto the ground in agony. Still slightly drugged, he forgot about his rebuilt ankle.
Rube’s scream of pain startles a mongrel dog cooling in the shade beside a rusting recreational vehicle. Leaping to its feet, the three-legged, mangy mutt charges at him barking and snarling until its chain snaps it to a halt inc
hes from Rube. The howling dog’s breath and slobber slaps Rube’s face. He is afraid to move.
“Cerberus! Sit!” Shouts a short, round woman jamming the recreational vehicle’s doorway.
Cerberus strains against his lengthy chain, desperate to shred Rube’s throat. Grabbing a broom from inside her vehicle, the woman wobbles down the steps pursuing her dog. Encased in a multi-stained t-shirt and stretch pants, that are straining at their seams to remain whole, she hurriedly waddles toward Rube. One sharp broom handle crack across Cerberus’ back sends him whining and whimpering and running to hide beneath her vehicle.
“Cerberus is my hound from hell.” The woman smiles displaying a mouth of missing teeth, as she extends her hand toward Rube.
Rube grabs her hand. She pulls him up until he is standing on his right foot and leaning against his truck’s door.
“Lean on my shoulder, honey.” The woman takes Rube’s hand and pulls it around her broad shoulders. “I got some water and food in my squat.”
Leaning against her, Rube hops toward her rotting, recreational vehicle. Timidly, Cerberus crawls out of hiding and slinks toward the couple. With a whine, he sniffs and then licks Rube’s outstretched hand. Hesitantly, Rube lightly scratches the top of Cerberus’ bite scarred head. Now, they are three.
Inside her recreational vehicle, the woman helps Rube hobble to a chair next to a warped table covered with vacuum packs, air-tight containers, other kitchen devices, debris and two fat, sleeping cats. “Welcome to Squalor.”
“Oh, I don’t think it looks that bad.” Rube remarks, surveying her cluttered table surrounded by the RV’s messy interior. Assaulted by an intense, acrid stench of cat urine, his eyes and nose burn. Choking on the stink, he lies to make the bad better. “At least, you have electricity and cooling. My own trailer is in far worse shape.”
Chuckling, the woman softly punches Rube’s shoulder. “Not my squat, silly! Squalor is the name ICC gave our little camp…where you are. This is Squalor.”
“Sorry…I didn’t mean to insult…” Rube stutters. To escape his embarrassment, he extends his right hand toward the woman. “My name is Ruben Landwirt. I go by Rube.”
“Oh don’t worry honey, I know it’s a mess in here. My name is Fett Schmalz, by the way.” With the back of her fleshy, flabby arm, she shoves a row of vacuum packs, cartridges, and containers backward to clear a space on the table next to Rube. Her two cats flop from the table onto the floor where they growl and spit at each other before resuming their snooze. A cloud of cat hair and dander poofs into the air hovering above where they once lounged. “So, you hungry? As you can see, I got lots of food. ICC delivered our week’s rations of food and pain management drugs this morning.”
Fett retrieves a full medicine container from the table, twists it open and dumps its pills on top of a pile of identical pills in a candy dish. “Did they give you many pain management drugs? Actually, we just call them PMDs. Don’t really know what they are…don’t rightly care…only know that when I take them…I don’t feel no pain. Take two a day, every day, just in case. Best to prevent pain fore you get pain, I say. Besides, don’t got nothing else to do. PMDs cut my boredom, so I call them boredom management drugs…my BMDs. Some others call them docility drugs…you know…keep us easy to handle and control.”
Rube drags a container stuffed with pills from his pants and shows it to Fett. “I’ve got these.”
Pulling his hand holding the container close to her eyes, she inspects Rube’s pills. “Oh honey, these are good! These are valuable. Guard these. ICC don’t give us Sists no money, so we trade pills for personal things. You can get a lot of stuff for these. These can get you ten times more things than the PMD pills the ICC gives you when these are gone. Everybody gets the same PMDs, so it takes a lot of them for trading.”
Rube returns the pill container to his pants. “Thanks for your advice. I’ll use them wisely.”
Fett smiles and nods her approval. “Anyway, ICC always gives me a lot more food than I need, too. Cept for Cerberus, I’m all alone. I can’t eat it all. So, I’m really happy you’re here to help me eat it. Somebody to talk to, too. I don’t get many visitors, you know. Not many outsiders…new Sists, anyway. I’ve already heard all of the old, repeated stories from my neighbors. Most of them too drugged to move…real docile. So, I was real happy when I saw them dragging you in. Somebody new. So, do you want somethen to eat, honey? How about somethen to drink? I got some beer and soda pop.”
“Yes!” Rube is starving and also wants to stop Fett’s rambling. “I haven’t eaten for…well…I don’t know how long. What food do you have?”
Fett scans the table. “Well, would you like some ICC mock beef or mock pork or mock chicken? They all taste the same to me, but the beef is a little chewier than the chicken. More like real meat, I think. But, what do I know? I don’t even remember ever eating real meat…cepten for a rat once. Roasted rat. It don’t taste too bad. Just wanted to try it. Gave most of it to Cerberus. He didn’t seem to like it that much. He chewed on it and then he played with it. Choked and coughed it up out there in the…”
“Mock beef!” Rube announces loudly, in hopes of silencing her. Living alone, like a hermit, in the wastedland desert, his ears have not been flooded by this many words in years. His ears and head are beginning to ache more than his ankle.
Pulling a vacuum package from her cluttered table, smiling, Fett proudly presents it to Rube. “Here it is honey, manufactured meat that’s almost fit to eat. You ever had this before? I like it hot. There’s a heating pack surrounding the meat. Just crush that red spot and wait five minutes and it’s hot. Got vegetables, too. Mixed vegetables are my favorite. Do you like mixed vegetables? I really don’t know what types of vegetables they are, because it’s all a paste. Honey, do you want some mixed vegetables? Or would you like some corn or beans or potatoes. They’re all about the same, I think. Do you want some, Rube? Rube, that’s your name. Right?”
Rube activates the mock beef package’s heater. “This is the same as the MREs I used to eat. They’re just labeled differently. I will take some potato paste. It’s not too bad. If that’s ok?”
“Certainly, I got several packages here.” Fett retrieves another package and sets it on the table in front of Rube. “You ever had real potatoes? I don’t think I have. I hear they grow real potatoes in Denver, real beans and real corn too...inside buildings. Call them vertical gardens, at least that’s what that Eject who come through here said. He said that’s where they manufacture all our ICC rations. In a big…”
“Eject? What’s an Eject?” Rube activates the chemical heater to warm his potato paste.
“What do you mean? You’re not an Eject?” Suspiciously, Fett scrutinizes Rube. “If you’re not an Eject banished from the Denver Metrostate, then what are you? Where’d you come from?”
Steam carrying the artificial aroma of roasted beef wets Rube’s face when he opens the mock beef package. “I was once a farmer southeast of here in the wastedlands near a ghost town called Tribyoon. Years of heat and drought killed all my crops and my animals...almost killed me too.”
Fett scowls. “A farmer? Out here? Now, don’t lie to me, honey…Rube. There ain’t been no farmers out here for years. Ejects, Culls, desert-drifters and ICC squatters, like me, yes, but not farmers. Some scrawny sheep and skinny steer chasers…yeah…way north of here. Anyway, I never heard of no farmers around here.”
Rube dismissively shrugs his shoulders. “Doesn’t surprise me. Where I come from, we pretty much wiped ourselves out. Sold our souls to the seed and fertilizer companies. Doubt farmers were any smarter or better up here.”
Fett nods her head in agreement, although she is not actually listening. She stops nodding and raises her index finger indicating she has a thought. “But wait now, you know…Rele…Rele Gieren…he was the Eject. He did say something about operating computers for Denver’s vertical gardens. So maybe, he was a type of city farmer. But, he sur
e didn’t look like you. Didn’t look used to hard work. He was young and clean, real handsome, but sort of soft.”
Rube chokes and coughs to clear his throat of the sticky, meat mush. Fett is lost in her recollections. She continues chattering, ignoring him
“Yeah, he weren’t nothen like any of my three husbands was. When their monthly birthright basic income allowances came, they’d get drunk or drugged up and then, they’d get mean. Beat me, sometimes.” A dreamy look captures Fett. “But, Rele was different. Oh, Rele had the softest hands…such a tender touch…made me melt…he knew how to…”
Loudly clearing his throat, Rube yanks Fett back to reality. “Water! Do you have water?”
She shakes her thoughts of Rele from her head. “How bout cold beer or pop? ICC gives us beer and pop. We got to buy water. Water’s expensive. So, how bout beer…it ain’t great…but I keep it in the chiller, so it’s cold. Beer ok then? Yeah? I’ll fetch it for you.”
Fett leans out of her chair, opens her grease-spotted chiller and pulls out two beers. She opens them, gulps down half of one and then hands the other to Rube. “Say, how’s that mock meat?”
Rube suspiciously smells and then sips some beer. He grimaces at the beer’s bitter taste. Sputtering, he swallows. “Well, it’s better than what I’ve been eating. That’s about all I can say for it. So where’s this Eject…this Rele fellow now?”
“I wish I knowed. I surely miss him. Been gone more’n a year. Pretty sure he’s in the desert.” Fett shakes her head sadly. “He stayed around here for a while. About three weeks. Slept in a tent...big tent…real comfortable bed…great bed. Had lights and cooling. I let him wire into my power and we shared my food. He left his tent, so I had it taken apart and pulled around behind my RV.”
Rube opens the potato package and peers inside. He frowns at the white, soupy substance. “So, why did he leave?”