“Sure, our fine police will catch the ringleaders; none of us have any doubt about that. But when will the next wave of maniacs storm our nation’s capital in broad daylight in order to steal this foul substance or to rob merchandise in order to barter for it with their criminal cohorts? And what if instead of wearing feces next time they’re wearing armor and wielding swords?!”
This brought a shudder. Selegania’s police were prohibited from wearing armor or bearing swords, as these were seen as a sign of imperialism and monarchy, both of which were viewed as utterly antithetical to the nation’s republic.
“What will our police confront the threat with then? With clubs?!
“Let this foolish youth state the obvious! We will either outlaw this pernicious substance, or we will be forced to turn our nation’s police into armor-wearing, sword-wielding knights as if we were Sodorf, Dachwald, or Sogolia!” he stated with disgust.
“But, colleagues wiser than I will ask, What about Article 8? Does Article 8 not forbid criminalization of this substance? Allow this youth to give his opinion that it most certainly does not!
“Is Smokeless Green not poisonous?! Tell the store owners confronted with madmen worse than the legendary savages our forefathers vanquished that these fiends were not partakers of a poison!”
And now, feeling that he was perhaps at the apogee of his persuasiveness, based upon what his hawk-like eyes seemed to tell him, he decided he had better deliver his coup de grace.
“Esteemed senators, I shall now propose a bill entitled The Safety in Selegania Act, which shall criminalize this insidious substance!”
“What about Article 8?!” shouted Lord Felder, a senior senator. Technically, the rules of senate decorum required that a senator first be acknowledged by the senate president, but longstanding senate practice had relegated this strict rule applicable only to junior senators.
“And would you have gentlemen thrown in prison for what they decide to consume?!” Lord Felder shrieked, a long, blue vein bulging from his neck.
“Gentlemen, let me assure you—men of means will have an exemption in SISA. SISA is precisely about protecting gentlemen from the fiends that have plagued our city over the last several weeks, frightening away patrons from business establishments and even scaring some gentlemen away from their own businesses!”
This seemed to put Lord Felder at considerable ease, and Senator Hutherton made a quick mental tally of this and the probable reason therefor.
“It would never survive a constitutional challenge!” shouted Lord Landers, another senior senator, with a tone that suggested he was far more concerned with the logistics, rather than the morality, of passing an unconstitutional law.
“This vile substance is poisonous!” Senator Hutherton shouted, but without looking directly back at Lord Landers, but rather surveying the room confidently as he said this, not wanting to Lord Landers to feel like the rebuttal was directed at him but rather the rest of the senate.
“I have personally interviewed eyewitnesses who have seen men die from inhaling this foul powder! Both sworn depositions and notarized affidavits can be made available!” Senator Hutherton quickly added with an almost religious conviction in his voice. He hoped he hid the enormous gulp that descended his throat after this fib left his lips like a ship on a dubious mission. It had not been for a lackadaisical attitude that he was forced to play this card without first making sure it would pass scrutiny.
It was Ambassador Rochten, after all, who had insisted he could arrange for certain events to unfold that would make the atmosphere right for a bill like SISA, but Rochten had withheld all but the vaguest of details from him and told him to just worry about getting the legislation ready and that he would “know when the time was right to proffer the bill.”
Hutherton had doubted he would, but after the most infamous vandalism spree in the recorded history of the city’s capital had occurred, just days later he had started drafting with zeal. Once he got to the point he was visualizing the potential arguments that might come from the senate—which he did by alternating between addressing the chairs in his study as his audience and sitting in those chairs and challenging the proposals—he had found himself asking the proponent of the bill if he had any proof the substance was poisonous in anything more than a figurative sense, and upon asking that question he had quickly risen from his chair, reassumed the orator’s position, and proclaimed boldly that he had eyewitnesses to its poisonous effects, available to testify in sworn depositions or via notarized affidavits.
He had then quickly run back to the imaginary, pesky senator’s seat and said, “I’ll need to hear from them before you get my vote!”
This had sent Hutherton into a panic and practically sprinting off to the Gentlemen of Selegania Club. However, unlike in his previous visits, Ambassador Rochten was nowhere to be found. Hutherton had religiously attended this irreligious locale every night since hoping to come across the magical genie who always seemed willing to grant another wish, but he seemed to have disappeared.
Thus, Hutherton realized it might boil down to a good old-fashioned bluff. He had practiced several, and he waited apprehensively to see what would happen now.
To his immense surprise, in spite of an intense stare emanating from Lord Landers, he made no further challenge. Although Hutherton felt the antithesis of confidence in that moment, his well-practiced body language conveyed supreme confidence, and Lord Landers, sensing the sentiment in the senate was turning in Hutherton’s favor, had felt it too risky to call Hutherton’s bluff. In fact, he didn’t know it was a bluff.
“I say we review the bill, and then we vote!” said Lord Felder, who looked at Hutherton with a mischievous eye. The erstwhile bulging vein in his neck seemed to have calmed significantly.
“I am humbled by this honor,” said Hutherton, holding sixty parchments in his hand, one for each senator, including himself. He had gotten the copies made at the local printing press just one day before.
The bill read:
“The Safety in Selegania Act:
“The consumption, possession, or sale of calinus ominesferus (also known as Orgone, Smokeless Green, and other names) by anyone below the rank of gentleman, or the sale by anyone (including a gentleman) to anyone other than a gentleman, shall be henceforth a Class B felony punishable by twenty to forty years in prison. A second offense shall be a capital offense. For purposes of this section, a gentleman is anyone with a yearly income of at least 200,000 falons; with monetary assets of at least 1,000,000 falons; or with fee simple absolute title to at least 1,000 acres of land actively used for agricultural production.”
The senators began poring over the act with the severest attention to detail. But their attention became most focused when reading the definition of “gentleman.” They were not all partakers of Smokeless Green. In fact, most of them were not. But word about this amazing substance had been spreading like wildfire around the city’s elite social circles, and unlike its treatment in the newspapers, it was not all bad press.
Stories of all-night parties were already starting to work their way around the gossip vines of the capital, and more than one senator was wondering whether he might feel inspired to try this substance at least once. And, as the saying often went in the senate, “It never hurts to have an exemption from a prohibition.” Furthermore, gentlemen were different. The wild hooligans who had vandalized the plush downtown shopping district were likely ill-bred thugs from the city’s foulest slums, individuals without the proper rearing to be able to handle something like Orgone.
Chapter 9
You sniff—you die, Koksun told himself again.
He had no doubt it was true, and he also had no doubt he was not going to die. He had overcome far too much in his life for this to be the end. Eight years of grueling training as a Varco recruit, being pushed past his physical and mental limits so many times he had lost count. Before that, four years of surviving on the street on his own, his only teachers in the art o
f survival the dexterous, nimble-fingered pickpockets of the capital city—Metinvurius. Even now, in the midst of the darkest gloom of his entire life, except for the death of his parents, he couldn’t fight back a subtle smile as he remembered the way some of those two-bit hoods turned pickpocketing into an art worthy of the city theater.
Like actors dressed to interpret their character on stage, young Koksun saw them dress the part of rich businessmen to get close enough to their wealthy targets and pick their pockets dry. Or to confidently pass off a bad check as a real one. And then there were the robberies. He studied these astutely, as some of the best pickpockets revealed they were equally adept at taking things by force, while not permitting the final brutal act of force to completely negate the artistic element of their craft.
Through the use of wigs, uniforms, masks, makeup, false teeth, false missing teeth, and many other props, these strapping young men could play the part of the elderly street peddler, police officer, banker, fireman, clown, blind beggar, or whatever particular character seemed to best fit the situation to not arouse any suspicion before razor-sharp knives were firmly pressed against the victims’ throats.
They worked in coordination with the camaraderie and fearlessness of wolves but with an uncanny intelligence for men whose formal education had likely ended at the fifth grade. And their inventiveness did not stop with costumes. Acrobatics were well within their comfort zone. He had on one occasion seen them stop a heavily guarded stagecoach bearing a large amount of gold for a local bank via the use of a fraudulent police officer.
The officer inspected their paperwork carefully, occasionally barking out an objection, such as, “YOU CALL THIS A PROPER SIGNATURE?!” in order to ensure the oversized, well-armed bodyguards inside the stagecoach kept their attention towards the front of the coach, rather than to the back, where three youths small enough to seem harmless were tying ropes around the back wheels.
“Well, everything SEEEMS to be in order!” the police officer had announced to the driver.
Then, in a performance worthy of a standing ovation, he had cried, “HEAVENS!” as the stagecoach suddenly started moving backwards. It was being dragged towards the side of one of the many nearby buildings. No sooner had it hit the side of the building than it began to elevate.
Thinking there were robbers behind them pulling on the wagon, one of the bodyguards jumped out, sword in hand, ready to cleave in two the first one he saw. But he saw no robbers. Instead, what he saw was a rope tied to the back of the stagecoach and going hundreds of feet up in the air towards the top of the building.
“Secure the gold and get out of there!” he shouted to his comrades inside.
This brought no immediate action. They were in an area of Metinvurius where it seemed to them much safer inside the coach, and as they were not looking at what their companion was, the cost-benefit analysis seemed to favor staying put.
However, when they looked out the window and suddenly saw they were being separated from the sweet protection of terra firma, they needed no further encouragement. No longer concerned in the slightest about the gold they were sworn to lay down their lives to protect, they leaped like kangaroos out of the coach, crashing down onto a small market stand and smashing a good number of fruits and vegetables in the process.
Once they recovered from the shock of their fall, they looked up to see that the coach was stalled around fifty feet in the air against the side of the building, and descending rapidly towards it, looking like monkeys in afternoon play on a tree of many vines were several rascals rappelling. They were so shocked at what they were seeing that they forgot the best strategy would have been to start engaging in a little target practice with the first-class crossbows they had in their possession.
But they were too hypnotized by the spectacle, which rendered dull the most impressive circus feats they had seen previously. Within moments, the rascals entered the stagecoach, which seemed to have stopped its ascent, and attached a rope to the gold chest inside.
“THEY’RE ROBBING THE COACH!” the police officer shouted in convincing horror.
No sooner had he said the words than the gold chest began ascending the side of the building, pulled by unseen forces.
In horror, they watched as it grew fainter and fainter in the sky until disappearing over the side of the top of the building.
“I ARREST YOU IN THE NAME OF THE LAW!” shouted the officer to the three dazzled bodyguards. “I know an inside job when I see it!” he added for emphasis.
The bodyguards offered no resistance as he put handcuffs on them.
“You!” he shouted to the erstwhile coach driver, who had jumped off the second he saw the horses’ hooves leave the ground (although he had the humanity to first free the horses by pulling a lever that disengaged their harness), “Go get help! I’m gonna have my hands full with these three rascals!”
No sooner had the coach driver turned the corner when the officer told the furious owner of the demolished food stand, “Watch these three hooligans for me! I’m gonna need backup. If they move, use this!” and he handed him a large club. The food stand owner accepted it eagerly, and his eyes suggested he might use it whether they moved or not.
Koksun sprinted after the police officer, who was going around towards the opposite side of the building, which was precisely where Koksun expected he might find some interesting goings-on anyway. He noticed that in a quick motion the officer grabbed something on the back of his distinctive red shirt (the color of all city police officers in Metinvurius) and pulled it abruptly over his head, suddenly leaving him in a dull-brown overcoat and looking like the vast majority of the men around that area.
Koksun ran as fast as his young legs would take him, and as they neared the back end of the building, he suddenly heard a loud crash emanating from where the circus had taken place. Upon reaching the back of the building, people were running frantically to either side of the street, so he quickly decided it would be a good idea to do the same.
The next thing Koksun saw was about a dozen bulls angrier than a swarm of hornets thundering through the street. They were tied together, and trailing behind them were the remains of a rope. He looked around and realized the police officer had disappeared. He looked up towards the top of the building, and just in time too because he saw a rope being rapidly pulled up the side of it, painted so cleverly like the building itself that its presence was almost imperceptible.
He looked at the base of the building and saw a massive pulley attached to the concrete base. Its thick, massive frame looked more than capable of fitting the rope that undoubtedly had been present there just moments before. In front of the pulley, was a food stand. Meanwhile, everyone else was awestruck at the sight of the angry bulls. He gave them a brief glance before turning his attention back to the apex of the concrete giant in front of him, and although he couldn’t be sure, he thought he saw a couple of figures moving around up there, but they quickly disappeared from view. Then, they reappeared briefly at the top of a neighboring building and then disappeared completely.
Koksun’s research did not go unnoticed. A few of the accomplices noticed the all-too interested boy who had not only stood goggle-eyed enthusiastically watching the whole thing from start to finish (long before it had taken a turn for the dramatic that caught the attention of all passersby) but had then sprinted after the police officer with an even more unnerving interest and then proceed to give quite the “up and down” to the building when he should have been watching the angry bulls stampede off like all the rest of the distracted pedestrians with little more than air compartments in their heads.
That night, Koksun was seated in an alley underneath several boxes, which formed the roof of the location that had served as his home for the last few months. He was chomping on an apple he had swiped (he didn’t waste time on convincing himself he “borrowed” things, as some thieves do), along with a yummy piece of bread, and he analyzed the whole show cheerily that he had been privileged to watch
earlier that day.
The way he figured it, two massive pulleys like the one he saw attached firmly to the concrete base of the building must have been attached to either side of the top of the building. The rascal kids who had tied the rope to the back wagon wheels worked for the “police officer,” who was not really a police officer but likely a higher-up in the gang that had carried out the daring robbery (which he assumed because the police officer seemed to have the most difficult job). Bulls were often led through that area, due to the presence of a nearby slaughterhouse and thus would not have aroused undue suspicion.
The occasional exaggerated inflection in the police officer’s words were likely the signal to someone at the top of the building on his side, who then probably gave a hand signal to someone on the other side of the building who then likely either yelled something down or made some kind of hand or flag signal to someone on the other side of the building who then likely cracked the whip or did whatever it took to get those bulls moving, which then started hoisting the coach up in the air on the other side of the building while looking like they were simply being taken to the slaughterhouse.
The Republic of Selegania Boxed Set: Volumes One through Four Page 22