by Steve Liszka
Chapter 7
By the time Taylor reached the glass fronted headquarters of SecForce, his head was feeling marginally clearer. Waiting outside Captain Mason’s office, he made sure to sit underneath the air-conditioning unit, gasping as the cold air made contact with the sweat on his back.
On the wall next to his office, there was a copy of the famous picture of Mason that had dominated the newsbites a few years before. It showed a large group of angry demonstrators pushing towards him. One was holding a tatty banner aloft which read ‘Free market = Slave Labour’, whilst his companions armed themselves with metal pipes or planks of wood.
Mason could be seen standing firm in front of them; his left arm outstretched with his palm up, halting the crowd’s progress. His right arm was drawn back behind him, waiting to unleash the club he was brandishing on the next person who pushed too far. At his feet, lay the unconscious or possibly dead form of a man he had already dealt the club to. Blood streamed from a deep gash on the fallen man’s head, pooling around Mason’s feet.
The picture had been taken not long after Triage was put into place, the hostiles being a small factory worker’s union. They were demonstrating after they had all been sacked when their place of work was converted into one of the first production centres. From that time on, the owners would be using immigrants and prisoners to make the goods the factory produced, and much to their approval, payment to their new employees would no longer be a necessity.
Whilst he waited, Taylor watched as a long parade of men in white overalls walked down the corridor clutching large, heavy-looking boxes. They were heading towards the stairs that led to the top floor of the building. As he idly thought about what they may have been doing, Mason’s pretty young secretary announced that her boss was ready to see him.
Mason always made him wait a suitably long time before their meetings commenced. Taylor was sure it was just to hammer home the point that he was the more important of the two. The man was something of a rarity; a senior officer who had come up through the ranks, rather than most of the new blood who had moved in from corporate management positions. Despite being one of the men so to speak, he was still an arrogant bastard who couldn’t resist a photo opportunity. Taylor liked Mason though, and compared to most of the other offices who knew nothing about security matters but spoke instead about profit and risk, and insisted on using terms like ‘corporate sustainability’ when discussing operations, he was by far the best of them.
Entering the room, Taylor was greeted by Mason’s massive bald head, which sat on equally broad shoulders. His bushy moustache may have looked camp on another man but in Mason’s case it was an essential piece of furniture to fill some of the excess room on his face.
Taylor’s hand was swallowed up by Mason’s iron grip as they shook. He tried his best not to grimace as the older man squeezed his paw.
“How are you keeping kiddo?”
“Pretty good, Cap.”
Being an avid fight fan, Mason loved Taylor. When he first got back from Canada, Mason had pulled out all the stops to make sure Taylor would be working for him, or at least that’s what he told him whenever he got the chance.
“I hear you’re fighting tonight.”
Tayor nodded, “You coming?”
“I’d love to boy, but I’m snowed under here.”
Taylor shrugged.
“And after what went on yesterday,” Mason said accusingly, “I’ve got even more to worry about.”
His face grew serious as he combed his fingers through his moustache,
“I’m sorry about what happened to Rogers, he was a good soldier.”
“We’re not soldiers anymore, we’re security personnel remember?”
Mason tutted, “Different name, same shit.”
Taylor leant forward in his chair, “So Cap, you going to give me another man?”
Mason laughed and opened up his hands to show he was not concealing one up his sleeves, “Where from?”
“What about one of the new recruits?”
“You’ve already had your recruit. You’ll get another when the next lot finish their training.”
“And when’s that going to be?” Taylor asked, sounding a little more aggressive than he’d intended.
Mason raised his eyebrow, “Come now Taylor, you got by for six months without Goldman, you’re just going to have to do the same again. It shouldn’t be more than three or four months maximum.”
Taylor shook his head, “You know something Cap, if you weren’t such a frail old bastard I’d have to beat the shit out of you.”
Mason gave a hearty laugh that made his chest shake,
“Listen sonny, you may have been a hotshot once but you ain’t no match for this old dog. I’d have to be in a coma before you got one over on me, and even then I think I’d still take you.”
Taylor joined his boss in a quiet chuckle.
“So what’s going on outside,” he asked when the joke had worn off, “who are all those guy’s shifting boxes?”
“That’s a good question,” Mason answered, not caring if he sounded patronising. He leant forward and lowered his voice,
“And one with a very interesting answer at that.”
Mocking his boss, Taylor enthusiastically leant forward so their faces were only inches apart, “I’m all ears, do tell.”
Before Mason could divulge there was a knock on the door,
“Guess that’s him. I’ll tell all later,” he whispered before giving his protégé a wink.
The door opened and Freddie Milton walked in, meeting Mason in the middle of the room. I bet he doesn’t try to crush that fucker’s hand, Taylor thought. After a few hushed words, Mason left the room only for Milton to occupy his chair. Taylor went to stand but was quickly motioned to stay where he was.
Freddie Milton was easily the most powerful man in Hope City and according to the experts, a modern day prodigy. He was the City’s CEO, not just overlooking what ClearSkies did but also all its umbrella organisations too. As this covered every function of life in the City from fuel and sewerage to security and schools, Milton pretty much ran the place. How he managed to oversee all these things was a mystery to Taylor, who couldn’t even look after himself and five other men. What made it even more amazing was that Milton was only thirty-seven years old.
To look at him it was hard to believe the power the man wielded. He was well dressed and good looking in a preppy sort of way with thick brown hair that was just beginning to grey around the sides. His jaw line could have been used to advertise razor blades. Milton held himself well, like a man who knew his own importance and wasn’t afraid of others knowing it either, yet there was something about him that suggested that he wasn’t quite as confident as he liked to appear. Taylor had noticed that he struggled to hold a person’s stare for any length of time and occasionally, when making one of his speeches about how ClearSkies was improving life for everyone he would redden up, as if embarrassed by his own words.
Maybe it was because after he conceived Triage, many people, particularly those in the Old-Town, had wanted Milton dead. For a while he was public enemy number one, even among some of his peers. He had survived an attempted poisoning and still walked with a slight limp as a result of the car bomb that had killed one of his bodyguards and almost cost him his life. These events however, had taken place in the early days, long before people realised if they played things right they could make a whole lot of money out of the new world they found themselves living in.
Milton adjusted himself to the form of Mason’s chair before beginning.
“So Mr Taylor, how are you. It’s been quite some time since we chatted.”
He spoke confidently but refined in his American accent, like a politician or one of the morons who read the newsbites.
“Please, call me Taylor. Only the tax man calls me Mr and it makes me nervous.”
Milton’s beaming smile lit up his face, “Of course, and call me Freddie.”
; Taylor nodded, knowing he never would.
Milton didn’t have his own office; he would never have had the time to be there. Instead he liked to get out in the field and borrow the space from one of his underlings when it was required, and everyone knew that was only when things were serious.
He interlocked his fingers and placed his hands on Mason’s table, “So what can you tell me about what happened yesterday?”
“Not a lot really, we were on patrol, Rogers was taken out, we took them out.”
Taylor was deliberately obscure in his response. He wanted to know what Milton was fishing for.
“I read in your report that you interrogated the girl before…” he paused, “before she-”
“Tried to blow us up,” Taylor interrupted. He could see Milton felt uncomfortable saying it.
“Precisely. I also read that she mentioned something about the Shepherd to you.”
As Taylor nodded, Milton’s outlook grew serious,
“Now I want you to think carefully,” he spoke like he was engaging with a ten-year-old, “was there anything else she said that you may have forgotten to mention in your report? I appreciate this must be difficult for you at such a stressful time. I can only imagine what it must feel like to lose one of your men.”
Taylor’s hunch had been right. Something was up.
“Not really sir,” he answered, “the girl just said that he was coming and to be ready for him.”
“He?”
“Sorry,” Taylor replied, quickly realising his error, “I just assumed it must be a man.”
Milton smiled, shaking the mistake off, “Was there anything else?”
“She did say something, just before she released the grenade.”
The suited man’s eyes narrowed, “Go on.”
“She said ‘This machine kills innocence’.”
“Oh yes,” Milton answered absently, “I read that in your report. Strange choice of words don’t you think?”
Taylor got the distinct impression that this was not something that worried his boss.
“Anything else?” he asked, not waiting for a response, “even something you may not necessarily think is important.”
Taylor thought about it for a few moments and had begun to shake his head when something struck him.
“Well there is one thing,” he said, “it’s not so much what she said, just an impression I got, that’s all.”
“Anything will be helpful,” Milton’s voice was laced with understanding.
“It was the way the girl looked at me. In all the time I’ve worked the Old-Town, I’ve never seen hatred like that in a person, especially one so young. The other thing is, whoever this Shepherd is, I think she had total belief in them.”
Milton sighed and lent back in his chair. Even though he had promised himself not to, Taylor used the silence as a chance to voice his own concerns.
“Can I ask you something sir?”
His question was met with the warmest of smiles, “Of course.”
“Is this something we should be worried about, me and my men that is?”
Milton’s smile didn’t even waiver, “Not at all, in fact it’s a good sign. It means that the terrorists have finally realised that thanks to the wall, their days are numbered.”
His face suddenly reddened as he anticipated Taylor’s thoughts.
“Not that I’m suggesting that losing one of your men was a good thing, of course. And just so you know, Mrs Rogers will be receiving her husband’s full pension. My people are arranging it as we speak.”
Taylor gave him a grateful smile, knowing that Rogers’ family had been lucky. It wasn’t always guaranteed the money would get paid out in cases where a death had been caused by an act of terrorism, even if the victim was an employee of SecForce.
Sensing the end of the conversation Milton rose to his feet. In complete contradiction to Mason, he almost stroked, rather than shook Taylor’s hand.
“Thanks for your time and sorry for bothering you on your day off.”
Even when he was worried, the man still managed to be polite.
He stood up and headed for the door, stopping in his tracks after a few steps,
“Oh and Taylor.”
“Yes sir?”
“Don’t forget my wife’s lesson this afternoon.”
Chapter 8
Looking around at the gorged faces of his fellow diners, Taylor started to think the people in the Old-Town were lucky. They may have been hungry, but at least the morbid obesity that clung to the diners surrounding him like a bloated shadow would never be a problem for them.
He used the paper napkin to wipe the remnants of his lunch from his face. Opening it up, he inspected the patterns the grease and ketchup had made. He tried to see if he could make out any obvious images, the way psychiatrists did with the ink-blot tests they did on the mental-cases. Seeing only bloodstains, he squeezed the napkin into a tight ball and threw it onto his empty tray. He would have been content to sit there for the rest of the day, using the fast food to help soak up the booze in his system, but he needed to get a move on if he was going to make his appointment on time.
As he got up to leave, Taylor picked the small white device he had been playing with from the table. He didn’t really have any use for a sonic sequentializer, but at least it was expensive and guaranteed to keep the spending police off his back for a little while. The girl in the shop had to stop herself from laughing when he’d shown such little knowledge regarding the object he was about to purchase. When she realised his limits, she spoke slowly and with a raised voice, the way people do when communicated with someone who speaks a different language or is hard of hearing. He pushed the object into his pocket, weighing up the likelihood of ever using it.
Leaving the restaurant, Taylor emerged straight into the bustle of the City’s consumer zone. There may not have been any vehicles allowed in this part of the City but the noise from the bustling construction site ahead of him more than made up for it. Judging by the size of its footprint, it looked like another shopping mall was being rushed up. He glanced at the mall situated just behind it, wondering if this new monolith was really necessary.
If the Old Town had changed so dramatically since Triage was put into place, it was nothing compared to what had happened to the City. Ever since the perimeter fence had been erected, the place had changed beyond all recognition. It had been quickly decided that as it then stood, the layout of the former city was a relic of the old system and no longer fit for purpose. Every building that once stood there had to be ripped down and replaced with newer, bigger and better models.
When the conservationists complained, they were told that this destruction and rebuilding of the City were an essential part of Milton’s plan. In order to kick-start the economy, massive amounts of money would have to be invested in reconstruction and engineering. Without this injection of capital, things could quickly slip back to as they had been in the darkest hours of the depression. That all this money would be going to the company that Milton worked for was certainly not a cause of alarm, it was for the greater good after all. And so they stayed quiet when the old stone buildings were knocked down and replaced by steel framed constructions that quickly sprung up from the ashes.
It was also decided that these cities deserved new names so as not to be confused with the historical eyesores that has once stood in their places. At first they were going to be christened after some of ClearSkies’ many offshoot companies, but deciding this was too crass, they opted instead for more subtle choices. Some of the cities were named after the physical landscape they inhabited such as, River, Mountain and Lake, which Taylor didn’t mind. Others were given names that represented human aspirations such as Liberty, Justice and Truth, which he did.
On the edge of the building site he watched as a small, chubby man in an ill-fitting shirt yelled at a much larger labourer, clad in an orange jump-suit. He furiously jabbed his finger at the man’s chest, warning that if he didn
’t work harder he’d be sent back to the workhouse. The bigger man apologised profusely before being sent on his way. As he turned, the little man kicked him viciously in the ass.
The foreman’s threat of the workhouse had been a reference to the production centres. The term he’d used had been outlawed in polite conversation many years before. ClearSkies’ pubic-relations team had through intense research, proved that the word carried too many negative connotations. It wasn’t that the Victorian workhouses were oppressive places where the half-starved creatures who inhabited them were abused by their masters in the name of profit, but more importantly, the name was seen as old fashion. This was a far more serious faux pas, viewed the same way as calling disabled people spastics.
The labourers on the building sites were seen as having the best jobs of all the production centres inhabitants, or ‘producers’ as they were nicknamed. It meant they got to work outside, which even on a dark, freezing day or when it was a hundred degrees in the shade, still beat being in the centres. The fact that since the government had abolished all health and safety laws, deaths on these sites had soared, did little to stop the producers applying for outdoor work. The skilled workers on the building sites; the electricians, plumbers, plasterers and bricklayers were all inhabitants of the City, even if they were at the bottom of its social spectrum. Taylor thought this put them just above SecForce employees like himself.
He had to watch his step as he weaved through the shopping-bag laden crowds. Even though ClearSkies owned all the companies that filled the malls, the illusion had been created that each was in some way distinct and different from the other shops that surrounded them. Again, research had identified that more money could be charged for products if there was a feeling of exclusivity to them. The malls liked to carry the pretence that the shops were individually owned with each selling superior goods that singled them out from their so-called competitors. It was only when shopping for groceries and other essentials, that ClearSkies did not bother to hide the true nature of the business from their customers. Built on the outskirts of the City were a number of vast macromarkets, so big it required a half-day just to venture from one end to the other.