by Olivia Joy
‘Oh my,’ Bathsheba said, her body willing her to feel surprised but her brand new Suppressitor fighting stubbornly against the current. ‘This is very out of the blue. Thank you so very much.’
‘Your reaction encourages us,’ said the one on the right. ‘In these turbulent times it is vital that our staff have their emotions in check. Last week we withdrew a job offer immediately after the employee became, shall we say, overexcited at the prospect.’
‘Emotions fade away,’ said Bathsheba sounding knowledgeable. ‘As an immigrant I can reliably say that it is much better without them. If you got a promotion at work in the Old World you would be happy for a few days. After that you’d go back to being normal, having forgotten the entire commotion. But in those happy moments, and the ones afterwards where you’ve stopped to dwell on it, you’ve wasted valuable time. Why waste time on a transient emotion when you can put it towards something indefinite? Like momentum. Progress of our country…’ She finished trotting out her patriotic monologue and took a deep breath.
The two personnel glanced at each other. A look of agreement passed between them.
‘Actually Ms. Ermez, we have a better job in mind for you. You have exactly the attitude the country needs in these troubled times. Your Suppressitor is new?’
‘Yes,’ she said, recognizing that this situation was quite unexpected.
‘Good. Your new job will be at headquarters and pay you considerably more than you already earn. You are better than a clerk. We think you will be well equipped to monitor our database against external attack. If you’d like to come this way…’
Bathsheba Ermez did so gratefully, not taking a second look behind her at the lolling corpses in purgatory.
* * *
‘Mr. DuPont.’ Henry said expectantly. Before his eyes a mirage popped up. A face was visible but its background was shrouded in deliberate murky fog. ‘I see that it’s tit for tat with the mirages, though I cannot imagine what you could possibly want to hide.’
‘Good afternoon, Mr. Excelsior,’ came the reply, which next to Henry’s voice, seemed rich with feeling.
Henry motioned to a nearby subordinate that now the technicalities were sorted, he could proceed to exit the room and kindly stop eavesdropping.
Zachary DuPont had an instantly amiable face; even from a split second glance at his profile it would be strikingly obvious that he was not of New America. He wore the expression of every emotion of humankind at once. The residue of laughter sat around his eyes, pain mingled in with his furrowed brow. Frustration could be read in the undulations of his dark hair. Meanwhile Henry’s face was impenetrable. Even if pain and fear could travel across the Atlantic and find a way into his body, it would be unable to find even one pore with a sympathetic opening.
‘Let’s cut to the chase, Excelsior.’ Zachary said. ‘You know full well that the world is appalled at what you’re doing. But I’m not here to berate you. I think you rather expected me to, but let’s not waste time.’
‘A shame,’ said Henry. ‘I do enjoy our verbal sparring. You get so het up. I should record it for educational purposes.’
‘I am a well-spirited human with feelings and emotions,’ said Zachary. ‘I’m living life as was intended in the beginning.’
‘Intended by whom exactly?’
‘We could sit and discuss the ontological argument, or I could get to the point and free your time for planning how to erase human faces,’ DuPont said.
‘Continue.’ Henry nodded. He was the only respected member of New American bureaucracy that Zachary DuPont agreed to talk to. Okadigbo was out of the question; too prone to hysteria lately, plus he didn’t really know what he was talking about. Henry did not mind taking these calls; he knew that channels of communication between the Old and New World were best left open, if only purely to acknowledge the wild accusations flying back and forth.
‘Okay, firstly. This happy gas you’re proposing…’
‘Ophelium, DuPont. Saying the name won’t infect you.’
‘This gas. Is it going to drift across the world? Have you any controls in place that will limit it to your land?’
‘I could pretend,’ said Henry, ‘but no. We don’t know if it will drift. We haven’t tried it.’
‘What!’ Zachary exclaimed, ‘how can you purport to have this ready when you haven’t even tested it! Do you know how serious this is?’
‘Well, we will gladly test it tomorrow on a land that is fertile, abundant with crops ripened by the sun, flushed with edifices from before the dawn of time… Sound familiar?’
From his Rome office, Zachary blinked in fury.
‘People could die for goodness sake!’
‘…but our people won’t,’ said Henry. ‘A shame you didn’t invent inoculations.’
‘What about…what about the long term effects on the human body,’ Zachary spluttered. ‘Did you consider that?’
‘The long term effects of Suppressitors seem to be fine.’ Henry said unfazed.
‘They’ve not even been around a hundred years! Your folk could be dying out in the next century.’
Henry stared. Zachary continued.
‘Fine, well will this endanger animals? I know you’re not big on anything with more legs than you, but this matter is of utter importance to many people.’
Henry shifted. ‘Animals are quite frankly, the least of our worries.’
‘That’s all? That’s ALL?’ Zachary bellowed in disbelief, his temples beginning to bead with sweat. ‘What kind of callous country are you?!’
‘A progressive country,’ Henry replied. ‘A country that is being brought down by its nosy neighbours.’
‘What do you want from us?’ Zachary pleaded suddenly, changing tack. ‘You know we will absolutely not let this happen, yet you seem completely unwilling to compromise. Give me some sort of a clue! This could spell the end of civilisation as we know it!’
‘Civilisation as you know it. And we want world domination.’ Henry said arrogantly. ‘You can either accept our ways or become a byproduct of our expansion.’
‘Excelsior, this is getting crazy. The world is in chaos. If you and I can’t pick out some sort of middle ground, I’m afraid…’
‘Afraid what?’ Henry returned smoothly.
‘Afraid we will have to consider war!’ Zachary finished, looking extremely harrowed. War was almost an obsolete concept in these days; the world was rather out of practise.
‘Now, now. Let’s not use words we shall regret,’ Henry said.
‘No, this time I mean it Excelsior!’ Zachary growled, ‘you’ve been antagonising us for decades, and foolishly we have sat on the sidelines. Well, the time has come. Back off or the rest of world will come down on you.’
‘I have to think of my own country’s interests first,’ Henry countered nonplussed. ‘We need Ophelium, it’s non -negotiable. If my country votes in favour of it, that’s when you can line up your tanks, or whatever it is you use these days. But until then you can tell your world to decide whether they’re with us or against us. And here’s a clue: there’s only one right answer.’
‘You will be feeling the planet’s wrath very soon,’ Zachary said, his head bobbing out of view. ‘I hope you use this time to think very carefully.’
‘Oh I will.’ Henry said beginning to stand. ‘I will be envisaging your pleasant demeanour when our Ophelium gas infiltrates your lungs…goodbye; don’t cry too much.’
ELEVEN
Bathsheba Ermez felt an all-consuming glow of contentment. Sitting in front of the extremely official looking mirage – one she thought she would never have the authority to see – she set to work ploughing through the latest amendments.
It was obvious that her predecessor had not been paying attention. For years the computer had been trusted to monitor itself, but for a number of reasons, the most prevailing being that jobs had to be created and that a human also monitoring the database was not such a bad idea, this task was now overseen by Bat
hsheba.
Her coworkers had ogled her curiously the first day she arrived at the office. The immigrant who had been promoted straight from the jail. It was almost unheard of. She had to be good. She took it all in her stride; her fresh Suppressitor was working like a dream. Her focus was second to none. She barely noticed when occasionally, various colleagues had a hissy fit and stomped out of the office, feverishly clutching their necks.
Absorbed in her work, she scrolled down the reams of names called to government attention. There were millions. She couldn’t possibly look through all these. Then she spotted a tab labeled ‘Amendments.’ Ah. This must be it. Selecting the tab, a much shorter list of around a thousand names popped up.
She had learnt in her enrolment that amendments were forbidden to everyone but a small minority. If the government made an appointment for you, you could be sure that they had thoroughly researched your schedule and plonked it on the one day when you were hoping to finish those odd jobs. Leisure and weekends did not really exist anymore. What was the use when the capacity to enjoy them had been diluted?
Most of the amendments were made by executives much higher up than her. There were always strong reasons for this. Ultimately it was up to her to decide if the motive was for the greater good of the country or not.
She spent the morning tracing the origins of the amendments. Ever-efficient, her list had one more name by only half past eleven. Reinhardt, Amethyst, the mirage said. The name responsible for the amendment was Mr. Henry Excelsior. She tapped her arm and waited for the phone to dial.
* * *
‘Xandria, you said you wouldn’t come by tonight. I’m afraid I’m busy…’ Henry rapped, firm lipped without looking away from his mirage schematic. A large glowing grid of the New America filled the office from floor to ceiling. As Xandria tentatively approached Henry, she suspected he had subtly increased the size of the map so that it deliberately blocked her vision of him.
‘I just wondered whether you really know what you’re doing,’ Xandria said quietly, waiting for Henry to bristle.
Henry stared back at her emptily.
‘What on Earth do you mean?’ He pronounced the words slowly, as if each word was weighed down with a cautionary scimitar.
‘ I feel that…’
‘But do you really feel?’ Henry retorted aggressively. ‘Nobody feels these days. Cut out the clichés.’
‘Well have you thought about the breathing tax? How much to charge and so on? Will it be proportional to income?’ Xandria said, waiting for her Suppressitor to console her but to no avail. ‘And as for world domination, isn’t it a bit far, I mean, shouldn’t you live and let live?’
There was an agonising pause in which Henry’s steely eyes did not move a micron from her face.
‘This is all dull banality.’ Henry said finally. ‘Why do I need to discuss this with you? Your intellect leaves much to be desired.’
‘What an unreasonable statement, what could you mean?’ Xandria’s voice rose in shock. Maybe this was a side-effect of the injection. She had never heard of the opposite reaction occurring.
‘Your intellect is so low that you think amending the government database on my computer will not be found out.’
Her mouth hung. Quick, her brain urged, find an excuse. Now, now, now. But her brain could find none; she had not anticipated ever being found out. Distract him; stall him, her brain supplied. But the weight of his stare rendered her unable to form any thoughts.
‘Exactly.’ Henry said. ‘All I know beyond a shadow of a doubt is that you are the only person who had access to my office to make an amendment. I don’t know what it is you amended, and frankly I don’t want to know. What I realise now is that you could not care less if you brought my name through the mud. You’re very lucky that the nice lady at the government accepted my convoluted excuse. You could go to jail for that, you know.’
His face looked harder than she had ever seen. She had the urge to get out of his office as soon as she could. Her Suppressitor was not working, she was beginning to perspire.
‘It’s good you came by,’ he continued evenly. ‘I wanted to tell you that I never want to see you again. You may as well be Signed Off to me. Now go.’
She turned and whisked out of his office, squeezing her Suppressitor with all her strength until a few sprinkles of calm half-heartedly arrived as if to pat her on the back.
* * *
Some weeks later, Henry, Reginald and Okadigbo were summoned to an emergency meeting in the government headquarters. Okadigbo and a handful of rising government officials were already waiting in the boardroom when the Excelsiors arrived. Okadigbo rose gratefully; he had long since run out of awkward conversation with his subordinates.
‘Welcome, sirs,’ he said.
Henry nodded in his usual fashion and took a seat with his father.
‘We have been called today to catch up on the latest situation threatening our nation,’ Okadigbo said. The subordinates made noises of agreement, each competing to make the most knowledgeable sounding grunt in case there were appraising eyes watching them in the wall. ‘As we all know, Suppressitors have been breaking down to a greater extent than initially thought. The scientists thought that the brief glitches would be our biggest problem for a year at least. We thought we’d bought enough time. Alas, friends, we were wrong…’
Reginald interrupted.
‘We know all this. Did you hear only yesterday that old Edgar Ptolemy was rushed to hospital with suspected major Suppressitor failure? That’s irreversible!’
‘I knew this,’ Okadigbo confirmed quickly, secretly feeling spores of anger multiplying deep within his core. He had not known this. There was no longer any form of news shared within the country. All the important information was circulated by the government. Anything else was surplus; an unnecessary diversion. Damn the Excelsiors. Everybody ran to them with the news, never to Okadigbo.
‘Poor guy,’ Reginald mused. ‘They say the only time it will work is when he begins to giggle uncontrollably. His Suppressitor kicks in after about a minute. Other than that he’s stuffed. Weeping like an old world crazy, they say.’
‘We need to bring the country under control. We have not seen such pandemonium since the Inauguration.’ Henry said. ‘Perhaps Ptolemy’s is a rare case, he was getting old. If we advise everybody to go about their business as usual and avoid inflammatory situations, then hopefully that will see us through until at least August the fourteenth.’
‘And if the county vote no?’ Reginald prompted.
‘Impossible.’ Henry said. ‘Our country knows what is best for them; the vote is purely a show of democracy.’
‘But we have been using this interim period wisely, yes?’ Okadigbo asked greasily. ‘We have been carrying out all the right tests and suchlike, so that when the country votes ‘yes’ we can proceed immediately?’
‘It’s not as simple as that.’ Henry said, exchanging a glance with Reginald. The subordinates sat unmoving. ‘We have tested Ophelium in a small-scale manner. But we cannot be certain of its large-scale effects until we actually roll it out nationwide.’
‘Good, then let’s try it for a day on August the fifteenth.’ Okadigbo suggested. ‘Iron out any creases while we still can.’
‘Not so easy.’ Henry said. ‘Zachary DuPont is certain that the gas will blow over to the Old World. Actually, there’s no reason why it won’t. He’s threatened war if we go ahead, even for a small-scale trial.’
‘What!’ Okadigbo shrieked, wildly looking around the room for anyone with a similar reaction. There was no-one. ‘I can’t tell people this! We’ve not had a war since forever!’
‘Compose yourself,’ Henry said impatiently. ‘We’ll face that hurdle if we come to it.’
‘We will come to it I’m sure,’ said Reginald grimly. ‘There’s no way we will find an alternative to Ophelium in time. We need this stuff like the air we breathe.’
‘Then we’ll need to start planning,’ Hen
ry said briskly. ‘We can persuade some countries to join us, that won’t be difficult. Wheel out some robots to do our bidding, see if we can revoke the anti-robot law…’
‘Stop, stop!’ Okadigbo shrilled. ‘You cannot talk about war so flippantly…and no, I won’t calm, put those faces away! I am not stupid, this is serious. What were you doing all this time, twiddling your thumbs? I trusted you implicitly; I have now lost face to the entire country. Nobody wants to waste time going to war, what will become of our nation? All these years down the drain thanks to a bunch of eejits who have great big ideas but can’t get off their lazy bums...’
Okadigbo stood up violently and in a rare show of defiance stalked out of the room as dramatically as he could with his heavy feet.
‘You people make me sick. ‘Calm it, calm it’….I’ll show you calm…’ He continued growling until his voice disappeared out of earshot, but it took a considerable amount of time before the same could be said about his feet.
Henry regarded the subordinates with no change in his expression.
‘Now, the second thing we wanted to discuss…they still haven’t found Voss…’
TWELVE
Today was the big day. August the fourteenth. The day that the country would decide whether to press forward with Ophelium. The weather was one of those completely fair days, when the sky was sufficiently bright with a constant promise that at any minute the sun could break through, except it never did. Outside on the streets one could hardly guess that such a monumental event was dangling ahead in time. The cars whizzed by as usual in perfect silence, people bustled in and out of skyscrapers quite as normal, some accompanied by disgruntled looking mirages that only they could see.
‘Watkins, make sure you get that report to me by tomorrow or I swear I’ll skin you…’
‘What time do you call this, Jacobssen?’
‘Good morning sir, do you have the prototype?’
‘Space trip? I’d love to…’
It seemed that the city had forgotten what the date was; either that or they were too efficient to notice. Such a well oiled society, it kept moving with no time for idle postulation.