by Jim Stark
The three adults—the talkers, not the monks—chatted briefly about the purpose of the couple's visit. When a lull occurred, Sébastien felt it was one of those moments that he could shape freely. “I heard about your—” He was going to say “caper,” but that sounded loaded, or could be taken as such. “I heard about your rather—uh ... rather daring moves with USLUC,” he settled for. “I guess I'd like to say thanks."
"Thanks?” said Randy.
"Well ... for stopping the demonstrations and the vandalism,” explained Sébastien, leaving out any reference to the controversial aspects of the caper. “That ... could have gotten right out of control, had you not—"
"Randy! Lucky!” shouted Venice as she ran down the hall, followed by the two Roy children.
Randy scooped her up by the armpits, twirled her around, and planted a juicy kiss on her cheek. “So, you're a TA now!” he exclaimed as he put her down. “My little sister—a teaching assistant! Wow!"
Venice shook hands with Lucky, and then said, “Oh, this is stupid,” and gave her a big hug. She and Lucky had faced on the Net once, when Randy was home last time, and Venice knew they could be friends for the rest of their lives if they wanted to, if they just made an effort to begin. Then she went on to hug the three monks, who appeared never to have been hugged before. Venice had been told that it was kosher for a Human Three girl up until she had breasts, and she explained matter-of-fact to the astonished monks that it was also okay even after she had her own breasts. “As long as I think it through first and accept the tingle-angle as part of the overall transaction,” she said.
"So ... what's up?” she finally asked of her brother. “How come you guys came up to Québec?"
Randy and Lucky said that it was a surprise birthday visit. They wanted to save the engagement announcement for later, when everybody in the family was together, and they found themselves hoping that Sébastien's kids would not realize that Venice didn't know, and that they would stay mum about that part. “Can you get away from your TA responsibilities and come with us to the estate?” Randy asked.
Well, then Chantal and Rejean wanted to go too, and of course Venice wanted them to come along for all the fun, and then naturally Chantal and Rejean wanted their dad to come too, and Venice said: “Can they all come, Randy? Please?"
"I'm sure they don't have enough room in their car for all of us,” said Sébastien.
Well, Venice just up and asked about that, and it turned out her brother had three cars sitting in front of the school, not just one, and apparently Venice was particularly close to these two kids, and Sébastien was her new hero, and Human Threes went with the flow sometimes, even for family events, and Sébastien was always asking about her Aunt Julia anyway, and hoping that he'd get to meet her again, like he had at Victor-E's “free store” when she got him back into the teaching profession, the telling of which caused Sébastien to blush crimson, and caused Randy to capitulate completely.
"Hell, the more the merrier,” he said. It wasn't about presents anyway. It was about being with the people he cared about, and while the Roys were total strangers, it seemed they had become emotional in-laws, via Venice.
Chantal was sent by her father to tell some other teacher that she and her dad and her brother and Venice were leaving for the day. “I don't even have to be here on Saturdays,” Sébastien explained to the visitors and their monkly entourage.
"Tally ho,” said Randy when Chantal came breathlessly back and they all headed out the door.
Chapter 79
SO WHAT'S THE PLAN?
Saturday, May 14, 2033—2:45 p.m.
Sébastien Roy sat sullenly in the rear seat of the last car, the following car, with three silent monks. Two were in the front, and one sat beside him ... all pretending to be so holy, he thought. The seating arrangement had been decided upon at the school. Venice had insisted on riding with her big brother Randy and his girlfriend Lucky in the middle car, and of course the two Roy kids wanted to be with Venice. Sébastien had done the dad thing, the adult thing, and let them have their way, their fun, even if it meant that he had to ride for maybe twenty minutes with three mutes from the Middle Ages.
As the trio of rented cars made its way down Highway 148 towards Quyon, Sébastien watched little hands playing sky-conductor through the back window of Randy's car. His kids loved singing and conducting their “dancy songs,” and he had watched Venice at the school when she'd taught them these gyrations of joy. He'd been thrilled when Venice began coming in every weekend. She was terrific with all the kids. They loved her, she loved them, and he harbored a secret hope that one day, perhaps one day soon, Venice would be his ticket to seeing Julia again. Today?
Sébastien rolled down his window and craned his neck as the three cars approached the guarded entrance to the Whiteside estate. He was awestruck by the grandeur of the elevated stone mansion, the top of which was visible through the trees. It's ... as big as our school, he thought. Venice had told him about this wonderful place, and he looked forward to seeing the inside, and meeting Venice's parents ... and maybe seeing Julia.
He couldn't seem to muster the cojones to just go over to Victor-E and visit Julia, but he also couldn't get her out of his mind since he met her that day at the “SST free store.” His life went from “sucks big time” to “couldn't be a whole lot better” after his fortuitous encounter, but it was not the need to thank her in general that spurred his hopes. Yes, he wanted to thank her, for sure, but he'd been impotent for two years, and he'd recently felt a strong stirring every time he thought about her. And it wasn't just her body ... well, it wasn't not her body, but it was more ... or could be.
He now knew what a “CQ” was, not just as a bit of Evolutionary trivia, but as an experience. His had gone from two digits to more than a hundred and sixty just in the last few weeks. Six-fois Bellehumeur, a kind man and the principal at his school, was always telling him he was a “natural Human Three,” and the other teachers had agreed. (So had his students, and when they said so, it always tangled up his tongue and made him blush.) He had allowed himself to revel in the hormonal attraction for Julia, but he knew better than to befriend her (or anyone else) for that reason alone. He had no idea if he could form something resembling a relationship with a girl ... woman ... who was “retarded,” but other couples survived and thrived in spite of worse disabilities, and the truth was, at least for now, that Julia was very much his “superior” in terms of CQ. He had no idea if she was in the market for a man, or a primary relationship, or a dad for her baby when it came, but he wanted her to know that his body was ready to end its sexual rebellion, and that it was because of her. That alone deserved a huge thank-you, whatever the long-term prospects between them.
The first rented monk-car eased up to the stone security hut, and two Patriot agents approached quickly. One guard stayed with the lead car while the other, a sturdy looking fellow with a dark mustache, followed the silent monk-thumb back to the second car in the parade. He was surprised to see Randy at the wheel and Venice in the back, with her two pals. “Christ, we just sent a car over to the school to get your sister,” he told Randy excitedly. “We couldn't raise you on the Net."
"I had my Sniffer turned off,” said Randy. “We all do. Is something wrong?"
"You and your sister have to get out to the lodge right away,” the guard whispered conspiratorially into Randy's ear, “but I just can't let these other people in. My orders—"
Randy put a flat hand up to create a hiatus, and got out of the car. Nothing annoyed Venice more than whispering, and Randy got the powerful sense that something was in fact wrong. There was an air of contained urgency, and the agent standing beside the lead car looked disturbingly nervous. Randy led the mustachioed guard a few paces away, by the elbow, for a tête-à-tête. “Okay, what's going on?” he demanded to know.
"It's ... not up to me to say,” tried the guard, “but I'm afraid I can't let all these other people in. My orders are—"
"Th
ese ‘other people’ are with me and Venice,” said Randy bluntly. He was only a pup at eighteen, and the Patriot guard seemed to be about thirty, so Randy felt strange to be laying a power trip on the man. “Now you let us through—all of us!"
"I'm ... really sorry,” said the guard, “but my orders are—"
"Your orders,” interrupted Randy, “are to call my dad or my mother on your Sniffer, NOW!"
"I'm—uh—afraid they're—uh—not available to take any calls,” said the guard, who looked far more frightened than belligerent. “My orders were ... very specific. Patriot was trying to locate you and—"
"Your orders,” snapped Randy, “are to let us through, and if you don't, you'll lose your job. Now open the fucking gate,” he said as he turned and got back into his car.
He hoped his bluff would work, and it did. He put the car in gear, re-activated his Sniffer, and called the monk driver of the lead car—the lead monk who had been given Lucky's Sniffer so Randy could navigate him from the airport south of Ottawa to the “3” school in Shawville. “Drive past the house, and stay to the right at the fork,” he directed cheerfully, to not upset the kids. “It seems that everybody is out at the lodge—it's just a couple of miles through the bush."
"I know the way,” said the monk. Randy didn't know how that could be, or why, but he let it drop. Maybe these weirdos are better at security than I imagined.
* * * *
Lilly Petrosian was in the fallout shelter at the great log lodge. She had been elected—not very democratically—to go outside and help cope with what sounded like an invasion, if the warning from Patriot had been accurate. She met Randy as he got out of his car, and she was struck again by the remarkable likeness between the boy and his father ... at least physically, she thought. “Hi Randy,” she said with a careful smile and a handshake—she wondered if she still smelled of skunk, but no one commented, and Venice surely would have said something if she'd noticed. “Can we—uh—talk for a minute ... alone?"
There were several Patriot people on the porch, and more near a big beige tent that had been erected on the beach, down by the dock, near the boathouse. There were half a dozen more scattered in between the private road and the parking area, and several more hovering near the hems of the bush. Randy had never seen that before. Patriot was hardly even necessary any more, since the Revolution, but they were kept on “just in case,” his dad always said. They knew to keep out of sight, and it seemed now as if they weren't even trying to keep a low profile. Something's wrong, he thought, even though Lilly had betrayed nothing in her voice.
"Venice,” he said to his little sister, “why don't you show everybody the dock and the boats and the hovercraft and all that? You can explore that new tent down there ... and tell them the story of how Grandpa rebuilt the whole lodge before you and me were even born, and all that stuff. We'll see Dad and Mum in a few minutes, okay?"
Venice looked at her brother sideways. Her eyes seemed to ask: Why am I excluded? I'm a Whiteside, and I am twelve years old! Randy stared back at her, and tilted his head very slightly in the direction of the Roy children. Venice “got it,” and now it was okay. It was for the little kids that Randy had asked, so she, Chantal and Rejean went skipping on down to the big dock, followed at an adult pace by Sébastien, Lucky and the six silent monks. It was a gorgeous May afternoon, and there were few mosquitoes ... and I do love telling that story, thought Venice.
"So, let's have it,” said Randy as soon as the last explorer was out of earshot. “What the hell's going on? Where's my parents?"
"They're ... fine,” said Lilly. “They sent me out to talk to you.” She led Randy to an open gazebo and sat him down. She really didn't know where to start. “Look,” she said, “I'll give this to you in point form ... there's so much to tell, and we've got some serious decisions to make, okay?"
"So do it, dammit,” ordered Randy, with a hand gesture that told her his patience was at an end.
"Me and Lars, Colonel Johannsen—you don't know him—are on the run from the WDA,” she began. “And Gil Henderson ... the famous New York Times reporter ... he's upstairs in Victor's bedroom doing an interview—no, not with Victor—Victor is in the fallout shelter in the basement, and he's ... dying. Gil Henderson is doing an interview with Lars, using an old analog camcorder, on how the WDA ... caused Victor's cancer, and—no, don't interrupt me—there was some refit work done on the plumbing at the lodge a year ago, and Lars's cover was—he was an apprentice plumber, but he was also a WDA mole who lived over at Victor-E. He was on the gang that did that plumbing work here. He put this lead box with a trap door—he pushed it up through the wall, I mean inside the wall, to a position only a few inches from the head of Victor's bed, so your dad got a Geiger counter from the shelter and he—I mean Lars—went up there and proved that the lead box was still there. When he was here before, doing the plumbing job, he pulled a cord and the trap door opened that released radiation near to Victor's head, and he was supposed to come back and remove the box later, but then the work order got screwed up or Patriot employed a different plumbing company or something, and that's how come the box is still there—either that, or the WDA never intended for him to go back and get it—we can't be sure. Lars didn't know what he was doing when he came here a year ago. They—the WDA—told him it was a listening device, but he knew from the weight of the thing that it had to be lead or gold or something like that, and when he found out recently that Victor had cancer, well, he pretty well knew he'd been a party to murder—that there was plutonium or uranium in that box—he didn't know, like to the extent that he would be caught when he was LVed, but ... he knew, the way people know things in their guts. He's Human Three now, so he's telling everything he knows to Mr. Henderson. I think they—well, Lars—might even smash the wall and take the box out, but it's dangerous stuff, so I ... I don't know—actually, he's probably done it by now. Your father is acting as the cameraman for the interview ... which started across the lake, actually, at the cabin.
"In other words,” she concluded, “the WDA killed Victor, and we think they killed Lester Connolly ... and Annette Blais’ husband Steve Sutherland ... and..."
"And!?” asked Randy, open-mouthed—he could hardly believe that there might be more.
"And maybe your Grandpa Whiteside too,” Lilly said. “Our problem is that—"
"They killed my Grandpa Whiteside!” said Randy. “The fucking WDA killed Victor and Grandpa and—"
"We ... really don't know about your grandfather, Randy,” said Lilly, touching his shoulder, and keeping her voice well below his, hoping he would take the hint. “We only know about Victor for sure, but that's enough ... Jesus, it's hard for me to accept too, you know. I mean I worked for these people, and—"
"This isn't about you,” said Randy testily. “Sorry,” he was quick to add. “I'm ... not mad at you ... it's just..."
Lilly waited, but Randy was still swallowing the awful possibility that the WDA had killed his Grandpa Whiteside. She decided to carry on.
"The problem we're facing now is how to get that videotape and two other tapes out of here and on the Net before the WDA stops us. The electricity to the lodge mysteriously failed while you were on your way out here from the mansion—that just happened a few minutes ago—of course they've got the generators in the shelter, but..."
Randy felt his stomach curl. “How could they...?” He had a sinking feeling of déjà vu. He recalled being told a long time ago that he'd been through something like this on a previous occasion, right here, and in similar circumstances, though he had only been a fetus when the old World Democratic Alliance blew up the lodge—before the LieDeck Revolution—as the first major shot of the Revolution, really. “You don't ... think..."
"Randy, we don't know what to think,” Lilly admitted. “We're trying to figure out what we should do. What we do know is that Victor bragged to me about bringing down the WDA—politically and economically, although not through violence. He said that to me, and
while I told him that his plan wasn't illegal, I had to report it all to my handler in the WDA...” Lilly cringed to realize that her handler, her actual handler, was none other than the man she'd thought was her boyfriend in Miami, the affable guy she had thought of even after the breakup as “good old Ed.” “And ... now that we know that the WDA is a ... a criminal institution, or at least it has a criminal element in it, well..."
"What the fuck was Victor doing, bragging like that? And to you?"
"Well, he was actually talking about his phase two economic model—maybe you heard about that—and he was telling me how it could save Evolution from the economic pressure that the WDA was applying, and how it might ultimately replace the capitalist system as the primary means of production world-wide.” Lilly felt weak to realize that Victor hadn't said that last part to her—not in so many words—and yet that was what she had reported to Control ... Victor's intent, his hope. She had no idea why she'd told that lie, to herself or to her handlers, and she wished she had Victor's prototype LieDeck with her to keep her in touch with her own misdeeds. It was with Gil Henderson and Lars, of course, being used to LieDeck-verify the interview upstairs in the lodge. She hoped she wasn't forgetting anything major in her summary to the boy.
"Anyway,” she continued, “Evolution has not only survived the WDA's assault, but now it's straining under the weight of a growth spurt that might double the movement's membership in the next few years. As things have turned out, the best defense was a good offense—for Evolution—but from the WDA's point of view, these developments could be seen as ... as sedition, and the WDA Charter—which is a humanitarian document in the main—is clear about the consequences of any kind of rebellion against its authority. The combined arsenals of the pre-Revolutionary nuclear powers were unified by General Brampton in twenty fourteen, and he proved during the Revolution that he was prepared to use it ... that is ... if he felt it was necessary, but of course he's not the official head of the WDA any more, so..."