Voids

by Jeffreys, Tim

  “Hey, man…” The black guy nods towards me, but he isn’t looking at me, he’s looking towards the stairs. I turn and lock eyes with Kevin Vantax as he comes down the final flight. “I hope you’s bringin’ the fifty you owes me.”

  Vantax begins to answer the black guy’s request when it dawns on him who the guy in the overcoat is and why he’s here.

  I pull my gun and aim it directly at him. My wrist hub flashes green, but I hardly need the affirmation.

  Vantax stands and stares, but then opens his arms in supplication. “Fuuuuuck…” He looks towards the ceiling, “I didn’t get no fucking paperwork, dude…!”

  “Save it,” I reply wearily. “Heard it all before. Are you Kevin Vantax?”

  “You know I fucking am dude, so what? You’re just going to strip me of my manhood? Just like that?”

  “It’s the law. You had your chance to appeal.”

  “How can you do it? How can you walk in here and strip a man of everything that makes him a man? If it were some dumb bitch doing your job, I could understand, but you? You’re a gender traitor, that’s what you are. A goddamn gender traitor!”

  I’m bored already, and just want to get this over with, so I launch into the spiel. “Kevin J. Vantax, date of birth…”

  Before I can finish the legalities, I feel a huge arm come from behind and grip me in a stranglehold. It’s the burly black guy; he’s vaulted the reception desk to restrain me and is now using his other arm to grab at my gun.

  “Fuckin’ Clauberg piece of shit…You love it, don’t you? Playin’ God.”

  “He…he had his chance. It didn’t have to—ack—come to this.”

  “Buuuuuullshit, man. Buuuuuullshit. How many rich folk’ve you sterilized lately? How many of those south of the river? Or is it just us bottom-feeders that get the gun? Ya know what that is? That’s fuckin’ genocide, man.”

  “Everyone gets—argh—everyone who…It’s the law.”

  “Fuckin’ Clauberg, man, I oughta…”

  Before he can finish his sentence, I snap my head back and catch him full in the mouth with a blow that nearly knocks me unconscious. His teeth sink into my scalp and maybe even stay there, for all I know, as I strain to lower my head again in an effort to butt him one more time. He’s a strong son-of-a-bitch and his arm is squeezing my airways. Vantax stands against the wall as if he’s watching a movie. His expression turns from bewildered fear to sheer anger as he heads towards me.

  Using the black guy’s arm for support, I lift both feet off the ground and launch a vicious two-footed kick into Vantax’s advancing chest.

  He flies back as if blasted by a shotgun, his arms splaying out either side as his momentum carries him crashing into the wall. There’s a snowfall of plaster.

  I continue to struggle with the black giant who still has a vice grip on my wrist that prevents me from bending my shooting arm. The gun slips from my hand and bounces on the carpet.

  I stamp hard on the bridge of his foot, hoping to crack some toes, and he screams. I had been using my other arm to relieve the pressure from my neck, but despite my best attempts I can feel my eyeballs bulging and my lungs straining desperately for air. I plunge my hand into the pocket of my overcoat. The pocket seems as voluminous as an empty sack and at first I can’t find what I’m looking for. I estimate the brief time I have to react before I black out—six seconds, maybe. Once I become unconscious it’s game over. My hand grips a cube of hard rubberized compound plastic: a Taser I pack for backup. Strictly against agency procedure, but I’ve been in tight spots like this before and these days I’m not taking any chances—three seconds—I summon all the energy I can muster to jam the device into the black guy’s tree-trunk thigh.

  His grip becomes even tighter as he’s hit by 50,000 volts of electricity, then his body contracts in a static fit. My vision begins to shut down amidst enveloping black clouds. I gurgle, strings of drool dribbling down my chin from numbed lips, until at last he flings his arms out wide and releases me from the suffocating clinch. He looks like he’s in the midst of an epiphany, his arms outstretched as if he’s accepting the Lord Jesus into his sinful heart. He remains standing, locked in a startling cycle of electrical impulses that makes him jig on the threadbare carpet.

  I wheeze like a man dragged from beneath the sea. Vantax lifts himself from the floor and hurls himself at me once more. Blindly, I hold out my arm and Vantax, Kevin J., runs straight into the Taser I’m still holding. He lets out a yelp and recoils back, his whole body vibrating, his teeth clenched in an almost comical grin.

  I bend at the waist and suck in gulps of air whilst my two assailants jitterbug around me. Taking one final breath, I swing around and land a punch square on the trembling jaw of that hefty sack of shit, sending him down against the front of his own reception desk. The desk cracks, giving way to his enormous, collapsing body. I reach down and pick up my sterilization gun, then turn to Vantax, who has barely recovered.

  “Kevin J. Vantax, date of birth, the twelfth of January, 2028, I’m here to inform you that under Section 12 of the Absent Fathers Decree, dated twenty-fourth of the twelfth, 2046, you are guilty of neglecting the children you have sired with multiple mothers, and so according to paragraph sixty of the decree, you have officially waived your human right to further procreation.”

  Then, without hesitation, I place the goggles over my eyes and aim the gun at Vantax as he lies helpless on the floor. The electric jig now segues into the familiar merry puppet dance, as the snaking bolt of brilliant white arcs immediately to his groin and annihilates his reproductive system. As evanescence overcomes him, I can’t help but snort disdainfully and I spit a wad of phlegm onto the carpet. I take the official envelope from my inside pocket as I watch the Bunny jerking at my feet. Tiny bubbles swell from between his clenched teeth. I throw the envelope down onto his grimacing face.

  “Here endeth the lesson.”

  ~

  Outside, I look to the sky. The air is tart, but for once it feels good to breathe it in. A light rain begins to fall and I cross the street towards Trib’s Eatery, a place Emily and I often frequented in the early days of our marriage.

  She always loved Trib’s. I could never really see the appeal, but back then I’d do anything, go anywhere, to make her happy. I’m almost surprised to find myself standing outside the joint. It still looks the same as it did ten years ago. I’m hungry and in need of a place to sit down, so this will do fine.

  It’s packed inside. I find a small booth by the kitchen entrance and check the menu. Seal meat cake and two rice balls. The plate arrives and I toss the pickle into the ashtray and swallow one of the rice balls whole. It’s disgusting, and my throat hurts taking it down, but my empty stomach accepts it gratefully. I suck some squid frappe from the Tetra Pak and cut into the meat cake with a plastic knife. I chewed on an oleaginous mouthful and, looking up, I glimpse Emily through a forest of human figures.

  Emily!

  At first I can’t believe it’s her, but then I catch a good view of her profile. I don’t need the facial recognition scanner on my wrist hub. My wife is sitting in a booth not twenty feet away.

  She’s talking to a man, well, not talking exactly, more laughing with. And then she reaches out and strokes his face. I recognize him too—it’s a guy she works with. Flint…something. He’s a looker: movie star handsome. I raise my arm to aim my wrist towards him. The hub screen flickers as the software syncs with the central database. The waiter walks in front of their booth, for a moment confusing the scanner’s algorithms. I reset the parameters, and soon enough the screen glows a negative scarlet.

  FLINT TORINO II: MALE. DATE OF BIRTH: 06-09-20. ADDRESS: 444 LEXINGTON AVENUE, 10th DISTRICT. NO OUTSTANDING WARRANTS. NO PREVIOUS VIOLATIONS. CODE 15. BIOMETRIC REF: 6664748FD4.

  Flint Torino opens his perfect mouth and says something that makes Emily blush, and then he laughs out loud. Emily laughs again too, and looks down at her drink. She takes a sip and then somebody blocks
my view. I shift in my seat and crane my neck to see Emily leaning forward over the table. Then she sits back down in her seat. Had she…kissed him?

  I almost stand up, but realizing I might draw attention to myself, I instead slouch lower into my chair. Suddenly I feel pathetic, exposed in some way. I chew steadily on a piece of meat cake, grinding it to a pulp between my molars.

  Emily looks across at the waiter and he comes over and hands them the payment chit. She searches her bag, pulls out the graphene MiniCOMPAK I gave her for Christmas and scans the chit.

  Torino is even letting her pay! I can feel my temporal artery throbbing as I glare at this corporate fuckweed.

  Then, out of the corner of my eye, I see a small hand dart across the table towards my half-eaten plate of food. On instinct, I grab at the hand and catch hold of it. The hand is attached to a boy, about ten or eleven years old. He squirms in my grip as he tries to escape. His hand feels as fragile as wicker, but I don’t let go. His hair is dirty and matted. I take him for a street-kid; this area is rife with them. He has a thin face, streaked with grime, and his big eyes seem to take up most of it. Even as he squirms he stares at the rice ball and half-eaten seal cake on my plate with obvious longing. Then something occurs to me, and before I can stop myself, I look around at the other customers packed into Trib’s. The thought fills me with a kind of terror I can’t properly identify, but it compels me all the same. I’m looking around in an attempt to confirm that the other people around me can see this boy too. I notice the harried waiter glances at the boy and a wave of relief washes over me.

  Letting out my breath, I look into his face.

  “Hungry?” I say to him.

  He stops wriggling and stares at me in mute anticipation.

  I let go of his hand and push out the stool opposite with my foot. “Sit down.”

  Eyeing me cautiously, he does as instructed.

  I wave to the waiter, trying to be as discreet as possible. I order another seal cake and two rice balls. “If you can eat this muck,” I say to the child, “then you deserve a plate of your own.”

  He says nothing. He just gazes at me, waiting to see if there’s a catch.

  “What’s your name, son?”

  He continues to gaze at me for a long moment, then says sullenly, “Otto.”

  “Where’re your parents, Otto? Is no one taking care of you?”

  Otto shrugs.

  I nod towards the window. “Tough out there, I’ll bet.”

  Otto still doesn’t answer and he doesn’t need to. It’s all written in his face—the abandonment, the fear, the desperation, the guardedness. I can’t even begin to imagine his life on the streets, dodging gangs and would-be-abusers and Government clean-up squads. What hope can he have? What kind of life is it when all you’re doing is surviving, day-to-day?

  For a moment, looking into his face, I forget all about Emily and her companion. I clench my fists and draw a deep breath. I’m filled with impotent anger. Look at this guy. He didn’t ask to be dragged into this world, and the people who brought him here couldn’t even be bothered to stick around and take care of him. I can’t help that familiar rush of bile rising through me like fucking magma, the same fury that compelled me to become an SA way back when. It would be better for Otto if he’d never been born.

  Seeing the waiter approaching with Otto’s plate, I let out my breath and say to the boy, “Better fill up before going back out there, eh?”

  Otto says nothing.

  The waiter—giving me a tart glance, probably thinking I’m grooming the kid—places the plate down on the table, twists on his heel and is gone.

  Otto, looking as if he thinks the plate might be snatched away again, tucks straight in.

  I return my attention to my wife and her companion. They’re standing now. Emily puts the COMPAK back into her bag, then Torino takes her coat from the back of her chair and opens it out so she can slide into it. He remains behind her and cups both her shoulders in his large hands before giving her a peck on the top of her head. Emily, my Emily, looks up at him and closes her eyes contentedly, and my misery is complete.

  Hurriedly settling my bill, I leave the boy wolfing down the last of his meal and follow after Emily and Torino.

  Stepping outside, I see my wife getting into a sapphire blue Meteor further down the avenue. The rain is much heavier now, so I pull up the collar of my overcoat and shelter under the canopy of a pawnshop next to Trib’s. I can see them talking for a minute as the rain streaks the windshield of the gleaming Meteor, then Torino checks the display panel and the hybrid whines into the incessant flow of traffic.

  By the time the Meteor pulls into the driveway of 444 Lexington 10th, it’s getting dark. I’m already there, parked fifty yards further along the avenue. The Meteor’s doors lift and Torino gets out and skips around to the near side to help Emily up from her seat.

  Charming prick, I think as I track the dashcam and zoom in on them both. Torino aims his key tag at the house and at once the interior lights up in a warm blaze, the front door swinging open. Torino puts his arm around my wife and, linked like this, they enter.

  I climb out of my hybrid and hurry down the avenue, treading on a carpet of creamy pink blossom that has fallen from the trees that line the sidewalk. 10th is an affluent district—even the air smells palatable here, though that may be due to the strong winds and heavy rain that is only now beginning to wane. I take a cursory look around, but the avenue is silent and I seem to be the only person around. I climb the slight incline of Torino’s driveway and crouch near the front window. I think of all the spyware available back at HQ, but there are some things you need to see with your own eyes.

  Emily is sitting on an antique Ottoman, smoothing down the creases in her skirt as Torino stands at a wall-mounted bar pouring drinks into thick glass tumblers.

  The whole room demonstrates Torino’s refined tastes: cork-lined wall panels covered in sheets of iridescent platinum foil, contrasting with furniture carved from darkest Gabon ebony. The walls are decorated with African masks, and on the mantelpiece above the fireplace stand grotesque tribal figurines, all female.

  Torino hands a tumbler to Emily and then lowers his face to kiss her full on the lips. As he does so, and without looking up, he presses his key tag and I flinch back as his damask curtains close, steadily obscuring my view. For a moment I feel like a sad deviant in a strip booth who’s only been allowed five credits’ worth of titillation.

  Despite the anguish gouging into my guts like a burrowing animal, I pick myself up and stagger away across Torino’s perfect front lawn. Blood is thundering through my brain as I fall into my vehicle. I look up at the black obsidian vinyl covering the car’s interior roof; it could be black space through which I’m floating. Anyone walking past the hybrid right then may have seen my own internal dying of the light. If they’d looked at my face, they might have witnessed my own evanescence.

  But no one walks by. Not for a long time.

  Then she does.

  Emily.

  Her heels clip-clop along the pavement.

  I duck down in my seat, but she doesn’t even look at the hybrid. I watch as she trots away, turns a corner, and is gone.

  ~

  “Yes? Erk! What’s…going on…?”

  Torino’s voice is high-pitched as I squeeze his windpipe. I release my grasp and he coughs and bends slightly, rubbing at his Adam’s apple.

  “What in holy fuck…What are you fucking doing, man?”

  “You know who I am, and so you know why I’m here. Right? Get in there!”

  I motion towards the lounge and Torino reluctantly walks inside, never taking his eyes off my face.

  “Sit the fuck down.”

  Torino does as he’s told and I sit on the Ottoman, the same one Emily had perched on earlier. He wipes a nervous hand across his mouth and points towards the gun.

  “You use that on me, and it’s all over for you. You know that, don’t you?”

 
“You honestly think I care about that right now?”

  Torino looks like he’s about to elaborate, but then thinks better of it and simply stares at me, his mouth agape.

  “You know,” I continue, “I came here with questions, lots of them…” I become aware that I’ve clenched my fists tight, ready to stave this fucker’s head in.

  “I…I mean, we…” I swear Torino’s bottom lip begins to tremble.

  “Save it, eh? Truth is, I don’t really care anymore.”

  I feel a rush of fatigue lower my head and cover my face with my hands. Something must invite some courage back into Torino’s bones. His initial anxiety wanes and is replaced by an expression of disdain.

  “You disgust me, you know that?” He spits the words out like phlegm. “You do what you do and what makes it worse is that you actually enjoy it. Admit it, it satisfies you. Neutering people like goddamn animals with that obscene fucking weapon.” His fear now completely dissipated, Torino stands up and turns his back to me so he can look out his window. After letting out an exasperated laugh, he turns back to confront me with more of his invective.

  “You take everything that makes a man who he is and you destroy it. You deny him the very reason he exists: to procreate. You’re worse than a murderer. You kill hundreds…thousands!” He looms above me, bending at the waist and grabs at his crotch. He’s uncomfortably close to my face, causing me to flinch back a little. “You extinguish the flame; you annihilate the one true essence any man has to offer beyond himself, his ability to create life. You cast down the fucking gods, man! Yours is a Department for Infanticide!”

  My shoulders hunch, as if each sentence carries the weight of a rock I’m burdened with. I need to leave his house. I don’t want to be here anymore. I try to stand up but my legs buckle and I jerk sideways, colliding with a low table and knocking over a stack of leaflets. They thump to the floor, fanning out as they do.

  Torino continues his sermon, and though I try to muster up a response, I find myself speechless. It’s not Torino’s lecture that’s put me in this catatonic state; it’s something else, something far blacker. The deepest, darkest, blackest place that any person can find himself in, and in the face of it there are no words.