Not the End of the World

by Christopher Brookmyre

  ‘Shit, well I guess I better get up.’ Larry yawned.

  ‘Honey,’ she said, moving her other hand around his body until it rested on his thigh. ‘Will you be mad if I make a confession?’

  He laughed. ‘How do I know until you’ve made it?’

  Sophie drew her left hand up slowly until it cupped his balls through his shorts, at the same time pulling his fingers down away from her stomach and inside the elastic of her panties.

  ‘I set your alarm an hour early last night,’ she whispered. ‘It’s only just gone seven.’

  Endorphins, hormones and adrenalin were still coursing through Larry’s body for much of the morning, providing a rejuvenating retreat that went a long way towards maintaining his composure while all around him the world had turned into a hyperactives’ kindergarten where some clown had given all the kiddies Gatorade. He could withdraw for a few moments now and again, step outside his thoughts and just be inside his body, feeling the tingle of his skin, the buzz through his muscles, the languid ache in his cock. He wished he could hand some of this stuff round, try and calm everyone the fuck down for long enough to forget whatever they were all so worked up about. He’d thought about St John’s speech, how when you broke it all down there didn’t seem any greater evil in the Legion of Decency’s world than consenting adults getting laid. It struck him that if they’d all worry less about other people getting it on and concentrated on doing it themselves a bit more often, then none of this shit would be necessary. No legions, no banners, no missions.

  ‘What you doin’, baby?’

  ‘I’m makin’ a banner. Got a moral crusade to go on.’

  ‘Shit, you got energy to spare? Put the paintbrush down and come back to bed. Relax. Just get laid and you don’t have to hate nobody.’

  ‘Ooh, baby, hurts so good. Banners? What was I thinkin’ about . . . ?’

  If only.

  He knew he was ‘gonna have to get down to the PV right away, they’re all having a collective canary’ well before Bannon told him to; before he’d even left for the station house. There were uptight movie-biz suits in close proximity with religious fundamentalists, and St John had shaken the jar. That was why he hadn’t wanted to get up.

  ‘A walk in the park, sir, huh?’ he couldn’t resist reminding Bannon.

  ‘Hey listen, Freeman,’ Bannon replied, after rolling his eyes. ‘Don’t be wishin’ it to get worse just so you can say, “I told you so.” Right now it’s a storm in a teacup, okay? I want you to calm everybody down, make out it’s no big deal, all right? Show these guys you ain’t worried, and if you ain’t worried, they shouldn’t be neither.’

  ‘Oh, sure thing sir, I’ll get right on it. What do you want me to use, cannabis? We got some of that down in Evidence you could let me have, maybe?’

  ‘No, Larry, I want you to use your natural calming influence.’

  ‘Do I make you feel calm, sir?’ he asked with a grin.

  ‘Oh sure. Every time I see your ass walk out that door. So get the fuck down to that hotel and I’ll just be calmness personified.’

  Paul Silver was not calmness personified. Not that Larry was expecting him to be, having had to flash his badge at the clamouring protesters blocking Damascus Drive before they would move aside to let him take his car up to the hotel entrance. He recognised the slogans on some of the placards from St John’s Epistle to the Caucasians yesterday, and given that most of them were printed rather than painted, he figured neither the speech nor the protest were improvised.

  ‘UnAmerican Festering Filth Market’ was the favourite, rendered in the same style as the AFFM’s logo. ‘Save the world from celluloid sin’ was also popular.

  ‘Shouldn’t you guys be across the road with the rest of your Festival of Light buddies?’ he asked a group of them, as he tucked away his badge again.

  ‘The Light is all around,’ one guy replied.

  ‘Well, you got that right,’ he’d muttered, shielding his eyes as the protesters vacated the space between his windshield and the infamous PV glare.

  ‘So aren’t you going to do anything about them?’ Silver asked. They were in the hotel manager’s office, Larry sitting in a chair watching Silver pace back and forth. It looked like his hair was on gimbals, so little did it seem to move as he walked the carpet. Larry kept expecting it to stay still each time Silver turned about-face, his head and body pivoting underneath it.

  ‘Right now, no sir, I’m not. They aren’t breaking any laws. They’ve got a democratic right to protest and they are staying outside the boundaries of the hotel grounds, so they ain’t trespassing.’

  ‘But they’re intimidating the delegates. Can’t you cite them for threatening behaviour or something?’

  Larry laughed a little. ‘No,’ he said, smiling. Bannon knew Larry better than he had given him credit for. He was naturally reacting to Silver’s agitation by relaxing and giving off the impression that there was nothing to worry about. He had been so long in the company of his worries, he’d forgotten how adept he was at riding the storms of other people’s. He began to recognise the two-handed dialogue: freaked civilian going hyper, laid-back cop amused at the former, and with a galvanised feeling he began to recognise the latter as the old Larry Freeman, finally showing up for duty again after extended compassionate leave. In fact, he suspected that while everybody had been giving him time and space, the therapy he’d really needed was some quality chaos.

  ‘Think about it, Mr Silver,’ he told him. ‘These people are all pumped up with moral indignation. If I bust any of them, they can add state oppression to the mix, and you’ll have twice as many out front tomorrow. In my judgement, the worst thing you can do right now is react. It’s basic schoolyard psychology.’

  ‘You’re saying we should pretend like it isn’t happening? We’ve been identified as the source of all evil known to humanity and you’re saying we should just ignore it?’

  ‘You’ve been identified as the source of all evil known to humanity by a guy who’s gone on national television to say that this whole city’s about to be wiped out by a tidal wave. I’m saying don’t dignify him with a response. As soon as you do that, then you are, in the world’s eyes, taking him seriously. Nobody else is, why be the first?’

  Silver ran a hand through his rigid hair. That’s gotta hurt, Larry thought.

  ‘Well maybe you should ask Tom Wilcox of CineCorp whether he’s taking it seriously, Sergeant Freeman. Because he had red paint thrown over him as he came in the side-path entrance first thing this morning, by protesters shouting about violence in the movies. Protesters who, I suspect, had tipped off the news crew that managed to film the whole thing for Channel Five’s breakfast bulletin.’

  ‘Really? I was too busy to catch the news this morning.’ He smiled to himself, just a little, couldn’t help it. ‘Hotel security get these guys?’

  ‘No, there was a crowd. Hard to see who actually threw the paint. But I’ve also been told by Alice Kilgour of VentraFilm that they had slogans daubed on the walls of their offices in Burbank last night.’

  Larry nodded, trying to look sincerely concerned. ‘This Mr Wilcox, is he okay? Does he want to file a complaint?’

  ‘I don’t know. I imagine so. I’ve been so inundated with calls over this whole Luther St John thing that I haven’t had time to talk to him yet. I think the hotel manager went to see him earlier, sort him out with a shower and a loaner suit.’

  ‘Well, give him a call,’ Larry suggested. ‘If he wants action, I’ll see him right away. I’ll get straight to it. Otherwise . . . schoolyard psychology, Mr Silver.’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ he said, flipping open his electronic organiser and looking up the number of the CineCorp stand.

  The door opened and a flush-faced woman in a tan suit walked in, holding a glinting Coke can to her forehead and sighing loudly. She put down the can and smiled, approaching Larry with an outstretched hand. She was tall, early forties, jet black hair streaked minutely with isolated str
ands of grey. She looked formidable but attractively approachable with it.

  ‘You must be Sergeant Freeman,’ she said. ‘I’m Conchita Nunez, manager of the hotel.’ She glanced aside at Silver, but he had turned his back as he muttered quietly into the telephone.

  ‘Tough morning so far, Ms Nunez?’ Larry enquired.

  She rolled her eyes and took a gulp from her can, still smiling. ‘Diverting,’ she said. There was a radiance about her features which suggested to Larry that this morning’s events weren’t entirely her idea of a bad time. ‘Can I get you a drink, Sergeant?’

  ‘No thanks. You look more in need of refreshment.’

  ‘I’m all hot and bothered. Running around the place, telling people not to panic, but that’s part of the job.’

  ‘Hey, that’s my job too. Maybe between us we can convince Mr Silver here of the same thing.’

  ‘Huh!’ she said with a toss of the head. Not convinced. Larry smiled.

  Silver finished his call.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Tom Wilcox doesn’t want to file a complaint.’

  ‘So he sees the wisdom in keeping a low profile?’

  ‘No, not exactly.’ Silver now looked more baffled than perplexed. ‘He says CineCorp have closed deals for just about everything on their slate in the last two hours, for the US and three European territories. He’s apparently got them lining up along the corridor looking for tapes to view, and it’s going to be standing room only at their première screening in the AMC multiplex this afternoon. Turns out the buyers are just dying to see what sort of explosive material provoked this morning’s little incident. He says he’s telling the trade press it was “a gift from God”.’

  Larry laughed, looking across to Nunez, who waved her hands as if to say she wanted nothing to do with it.

  ‘You see, Mr Silver?’ Larry said. ‘I know you’re shook up because you could do without this whole St John thing, especially your first year in charge, but it’s here now, the genie’s already out of the bottle, so just ride it. Things are gonna be a little crazier than you anticipated this week, but remember that it isn’t a problem until it’s a problem. Now, what I recommend you do is get out there and walk the floor, talk to the buyers and sellers, make out you think it’s all a great joke. They know your job is to worry about this shit, so if they look at you and you ain’t worried, they ain’t worried.’

  Silver sighed loudly. ‘Okay,’ he said, nodding, ‘okay. And I guess that should work for me too. I look at you, you aren’t worried, so I shouldn’t worry.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘But when I go down there, I’ll be faking it.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘But they won’t know that.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘So how do I know you’re not faking it?’

  ‘You don’t,’ Larry said with a smile, getting up and heading for the door.

  He had just emerged into the bustle of the lobby when he heard a voice calling his name.

  ‘Sergeant Freeman, Sergeant Freeman.’

  He turned around to see the manager’s assistant running towards him from the stairwell that led up to the offices he had recently vacated. From the pallor of her skin and the fear in her eyes he could guess it wasn’t that he’d left his keys behind.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Not here,’ she said breathlessly, taking hold of his arm. ‘Come back upstairs, quickly.’

  She hurriedly keyed in the access code on the door leading to the stairwell, then ushered him inside and closed it again.

  ‘Upstairs to Miss Nunez’ office, quickly,’ she urged, in a semi-whisper. ‘There’s a man on the telephone saying there’s a bomb in the building. Said he’s going to level the place so that the “filth market” can’t take place.’

  ‘So what’s the rush?’ Larry said. She thought he was joking. ‘If I miss him, I’ll catch the next guy later on.’

  ‘What next guy?’ she gasped, dismay flashing in her eyes as she trotted up the stairs, but Larry wasn’t saying.

  When he strode back into the office, Silver was standing on the carpet chewing his knuckles while Nunez sat at her desk talking into the telephone. Silver tried to give him a chastising now-will-you-take-me-seriously glare, but Larry’s grin unnerved him too much.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Nunez was saying into the mouthpiece, looking up at Larry with worried eyes. ‘We are treating your threat with all seriousness, sir.’

  Larry leaned across the desk and hit the silence button on the phone.

  ‘Tell him he’s got to talk to me. It’s procedure – you can’t evacuate without it. Do it.’

  She nodded nervously. He released his finger.

  ‘No I didn’t cut you off, sir,’ she said. ‘No, I wouldn’t mess you around. But I can’t evacuate the building right now. I have a member of the police department here and I need his clearance first. It’s his call. I’m going to put him on.’

  ‘Very good,’ Larry mouthed as she handed him the phone.

  ‘Hello sir. My name is Sergeant Larry Freeman of the LAPD. I understand you are warning us of an explosive device here in the Pacific Vista hotel.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said a male voice. Larry pressed a button to put the incoming signal through the speakerphone. ‘A bomb. A big one. I’m warning you, I’d get everybody out of there right now if I was you.’

  ‘Yes sir, safety is our first priority. And I’m assuming you wish to avoid human casualties, otherwise you wouldn’t be giving this warning, which is why I need to ask you a few questions about the device. I don’t suppose you’d be prepared to tell us whereabouts in the hotel it’s planted?’

  ‘You’re darn right.’

  ‘I figured. Well, that’s your prerogative, sir. But I do need to know a little about it so that we can estimate what kind of distance we need to evacuate around the building. How big is the device?’

  ‘Big.’

  ‘Like what, twenty pounds?’

  ‘Bigger. Try forty.’

  Nunez closed her eyes. Silver looked like he was about to run to the bathroom.

  ‘And what kind of explosive is it?’

  ‘C4.’

  ‘Jesus, sir, you’re playing for keeps, aren’t you?’

  ‘Darn right. And don’t take the Lord’s name in vain.’

  ‘My apologies. Just one more question sir, and this is extremely important: we really have to know this. I’m assuming the device is on a remote trigger. Are you using a bilateral transept detonator or just the old faithful MUB linear?’

  ‘What? The second one. MUB linear.’

  ‘Uh-oh,’ Larry said to Nunez in a stage whisper, partially covering the mouthpiece so that the caller could still just hear him. ‘He’s using an MUB linear.’ He took his hand away again. ‘All right sir. I understand exactly how seriously we have to take you. I’m going to initiate a KMA drill right away.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Kiss My Ass,’ he said, and put the phone down.

  Silver’s eyes bulged in horror. The more phlegmatic Nunez just stared at Larry in anticipation.

  ‘Are you nuts?’ Silver asked.

  ‘There’s no bomb.’

  ‘You don’t know that. How can you be sure?’

  ‘Do you know what MUB stands for?’ Larry asked him.

  ‘Made Up Bullshit?’ suggested Nunez, with a raise of her right eyebrow.

  ‘Exactly. Just like bilateral transept detonator. Bombers first need to know how to build a bomb, Mr Silver. This guy didn’t. He just wanted to disrupt the party. Bombers also don’t wait around answering questions on the telephone, in case the cops are tracing their call.’ He turned to Nunez. ‘I’m afraid you’re probably gonna be getting more of these calls over the next few days. I’ll organise for a trace on this line so that we can maybe bust a few of them as a deterrent. The guys running the trace will also be there to talk to the callers, and they’ll soon let you know if there’s anything genu
inely worth worrying about.’

  ‘Thank you Sergeant,’ she said warmly.

  ‘Don’t sweat it. And Mr Silver?’

  ‘Yes Sergeant?’

  ‘Relax.’

  * * *

  Larry got back to the station house around two thirty, carrying a late lunch of coffee and half a sub, which in retrospect wasn’t entirely appropriate, but then he wasn’t to know. There had been a folder for him at the front desk, and he carried that in his left hand, coffee in the right and sandwich bag in his mouth as he shouldered open the door to the office he shared with Zabriski. There was a Latin-featured woman at Zabriski’s desk, looking up expectantly as he barged in.

  ‘Ee ight ith oo,’ Larry said through gritted teeth, kicking the door closed and dropping the bag on to a pile of newspapers on his desk. He found a space for the coffee then turned around to face the visitor, just as Zabriski came in the door with a similarly steaming polystyrene cup, which he handed to the woman.

  ‘Larry, this is Maria Arazon of the Californian Oceanowhatchamacallit. I forget, I’m sorry. I said she could wait here for you. I gotta go. I’m trying to keep the press off of the exploding shitbag thing at AmTrak. Last thing we want is copycats on a stunt like that. Miss Arazon, this is Sergeant Larry Freeman.’

  She put down her coffee and stood up, extending a hand as Zabriski retreated. She was young, late twenties, early thirties at the most. Her wide hazel eyes were bloodshot and dark-ringed, her hair as tousled as her T-shirt. Either she hadn’t slept or she’d slept in what she wore.

  ‘Good afternoon, Ms? Miss?’

  ‘Doctor, professionally. But Miss,’ she said, holding up a bare ring-finger. ‘As of about two years.’

  She looked unsure of herself and distrusting of everything around her, lost as to where she fitted in. Larry recognised it. The victims, the bereaved, they would often tell you something personal straight off that they’d otherwise never dream of mentioning to someone they’d only just met. He wasn’t sure why: maybe their defences were so shot they didn’t bother putting up the usual screens; maybe they needed to talk to someone like they were a friend, not just part of the state’s clearing-up machine, not just another aspect of this horrible process.