by R. P. Wolff
“Tell me about it. Working at McDonald’s is no picnic. I’d trade places with you.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right. I guess I shouldn’t complain. It could be worse.” But Lance wanted to scream instead of just complaining. He couldn’t continue this life. He fantasized hanging himself to release the pain. Sure, riding the bus and train was certainly better than working at McDonald’s, but he was an attorney and former governor. He needed work that stimulated his brain.
“So what are we going to do, man?” Pete asked. “We can’t just sit around and do nothing. Do you have any plans?”
“No.”
“Has anyone approached you on your route?”
“Like whom?”
“Like the underground, you idiot. What do you think I’m talking about?”
“Yeah, like someone is going to get on my bus or train and ask me if I want to join an underground.”
“No, I’m sure they would be more discreet than that.”
“You’re dreaming, Pete. Everyone out for themselves. There’s no organized underground.”
Lance thought about Pete’s theory. During his routes, Lance saw no evidence of any resistance or underground. Everything seemed peaceful. People got on his bus, flashed their hand underneath the scanner, and a yellow light would light up for an infidel, a green light for a Mater, and a red light for a malfunctioned freedom chip or a missing freedom chip. He only saw a few red lights in his first two weeks. When this happened, a guard would enter the bus a few stops away from the pickup, and the guards would inspect the person. On each of these occasions, it was a faulty chip. Nonetheless, the people had to get off the bus and go with the guards. Lance noticed that they returned the next day. They said that they put a new chip into them. On both occasions, the people were infidels.
Pete kept mumbling, but Lance ignored him, walked to the bedroom, and dropped into his bed.
The next morning was the same routine.
The DART train rail system was different than the bus system. Customers flashed their Freedom Chips to ride the bus, but the DART train was somewhat on the honor system. Riders entered the train without flashing their chip, but there were guards on the train that would do random audits and check the chips. After a while, the guards knew the regular riders and wouldn’t check them.
As Lance was driving the train and staring straight ahead, like he was in a trance, he came to a stop and viewed his mirrors to see how many people were getting off and how many were waiting to enter. In his peripheral vision, he saw a white piece of paper under his door. At first, he thought it was garbage or maybe some kind of Mater advertising. He quickly picked up the paper and opened it. It was a specific letter to him.
He crumbled it, put it in his pocket, and peered through his window to see if any passengers saw him. How could they? The window was small at eye level. They couldn’t have seen him pick up the paper.
As the train picked up speed, he pulled out the paper, but he turned again to see if anyone could see him through the window. There was a guard in the distance standing with his back to Lance. The letter read:
Governor,
I can’t tell you my name because it was extremely risky for me to send you this letter. There is an organized resistance that needs your help. If you are interested, go to the post labeled 1A at the Frankford station on your first route tomorrow. Have both hands in your pockets and stand there. Someone will contact you if it is safe.
If you have read this message and are interested, do something at the Buckner station. Instead of changing the sign to the green Frankford sign, change it momentarily to the red Parker sign. Leave it there for a few seconds. This way we will know that you found the note.
Be careful, destroy this note, and don’t tell anyone. The Maters have spies.
Lance gasped. At first his hopes were up, but then he thought this could be trap or some kind of Mater test. They were testing him to see if he was loyal. If it was a trap and he changed the sign to the Parker sign, the guards might arrest him on the spot. He could just deny it and say that it was a common mistake and he corrected it right away, but he had the note. He had to get rid of this note before he got to the Buckner station in case it was a trap.
He cuffed the note in his lap and read the note again before he started to tear it into little pieces. He would have to throw it out the window and hope that no one noticed him. Should he do it all at once or do it in phases? He decided that phases were better because if anyone saw him or found the pieces of paper, they couldn’t put the puzzle back together.
He inhaled, opened his side window, glanced back to see if anyone was watching. They weren’t. He casually threw out about half of the pieces of paper and exhaled. He waited. He figured the guard would come rushing into his booth, but nothing happened. He exhaled again.
Two stops later, he did the same thing, and nothing happened. He sighed in relief as he didn’t have any evidence on him.
As he was riding to Buckner, a little more relaxed now, he thought about whether it was a trap or real. What if there was an organized resistance? What did they call themselves? If there was, he would join under one condition: they had to help him find his wife and daughter. He smiled. He hoped it was real.
Lance held his breath as he came to a stop at the Buckner station, the end of the line. He exhaled. Now was the second risky act: changing the sign to Parker. He did it momentarily, changed it back, and waited for the guards to arrest him. He closed his eyes. After a few minutes, he opened them and realized that no one was coming. He exited his booth, walked out of the train, and headed towards the farthest train facing the other way. That would be his new booth, which faced in the opposite direction. He did this mundane task over and over each day, but now he had a mission or a hope.
◆◆◆
Lance made it to his apartment complex without incident. No guards stopped him.
He opened his apartment door to find, as always, Pete lying on the couch.
“What’s up?” Pete greeted him.
“Nothing,” Lance said. The note specifically said not to tell anyone, so his instinct was not to tell Pete.
“Anything new on the route?”
Why does he keep asking me this? Lance wondered. “No.”
“Well, you seem like you’re in a pissed-off mood. What’s the matter?”
“What’s the matter? I tell you what’s the matter. We are fucking slaves. That’s what is the matter. What kind of question is that?”
“Sorry, bro. I didn’t know you were on your period.”
Lance chuckled. “Yeah, I guess I forgot my balls on the train.”
Pete chuckled and sat up on the edge of the couch. “Look, I agree with you. This life sucks. We must find a way out of this. I can’t take it anymore. I’m going nuts.”
Lance couldn’t have agreed more. He pondered whether he should tell Pete about the note. Pete was his buddy from prison. He had the “B” branded into his forehead. He needed Pete. He couldn’t do it himself. He needed a sidekick.
Lance sat next to him on the couch and gestured for him to cover his Freedom Chip more completely to prevent anyone from listening. Lance whispered, “Something happened today.”
Pete’s eyebrows rose. “Oh yeah, what?”
Lance glanced around the room to make sure no one was mysteriously in there. “Someone made contact with me today,” Lance whispered in a voice which was barely audible.
“Who?”
“I don’t know. They left me a note.”
“What did it say?”
Lance paused, wondering how much he should tell him. “It wants me to meet at a specific spot tomorrow at a specific time.”
“Are you sure it isn’t a trap set by a Mater?”
Lance shrugged. “It could be.” Lance thought about this. What if it was a trap? If he went to the post A1 on the Frankford platform with his hands in his pockets, would he get arrested? Maybe the resistance was just a joke.
“What tim
e do you have to be there?”
“Just before my first train route.”
“What else did the letter say?”
Lance shrugged.
“Come on, man. This is the most exciting news that I’ve heard for over a year. Don’t keep me hanging.”
Lance stared at the “B” and figured it was safe to tell Pete some more. Lance whispered into Pete’s ear, “You were right. There is an organized resistance, and they want me to help them. They addressed the letter to ‘Governor.’ They know who I am.”
Pete smiled, which seemed odd because he never smiled. For that matter, hardly anyone ever smiled, including Maters. It was such a sad, miserable world.
“So is that it?” Pete asked. “What else did the note say?”
“For your own protection, the less you know, the better.”
Pete hesitated but nodded in agreement.
Lance said, “I hope they can free my wife and daughter, but that seems like wishful thinking.”
“Hey, don’t lose hope.”
◆◆◆
The next morning Lance could barely do his bus routes because he was so apprehensive about meeting his contact. If it was a trap, Lance might go back to prison. He couldn’t have that. He would unleash the bees, which were no doubt nearby lurching in the background just waiting to serve him. He would make a run for it with the help of the bees.
After a few hours, he made the walk up the ramp to the Frankford station. He quivered. He felt like he was moving in slow motion and that everyone was watching him. There was always a group of five to ten people making their way to the train.
Lance glanced up at the post labeled A1, which was about twenty yards away. He slowed to see if anyone was lurking around. No one was there. He decided that he would go into his conductor booth first and then go back out. The train wasn’t due to leave for another twenty minutes, so he had time. He planned on monitoring the post to see if anyone hung around it.
He thought it was a terrible spot to meet, so wide open. Maybe that was better. He wasn’t sure.
He entered his booth, closed the door, and looked out his window and shrieked. One of the guards was staring at him.
Oh no, they caught him before he even tried to meet with the people. It was a set up.
The guard gestured for Lance to open the window that faced inside the train. There were only about five people in the train, but they were all seated away from his booth towards the back.
Lance slowly slid open the window.
“What do you think you are doing, infidel?” the guard asked loudly so the passengers could hear him.
“Nothing. I’m just getting the train ready for the ride. I just got here.”
The guard glared back at the passengers, who turned their heads away.
Then the guard whispered to him, “Don’t go. It’s a trap. Someone found out.”
The guard’s sudden change mystified Lance. Was the guard on the resistance’s side? He wondered.
The guard turned and glared at the passengers again trying to intimidate them.
The guard turned back to Lance and whispered again, “I have to go, but I will talk to you tomorrow. Don’t tell anyone about this conversation. You follow?”
Lance gaped. Conversation? What conversation? Lance had just listened.
Lance nodded to the guard.
The guard walked away from Lance and started checking the passengers for their Freedom Chips.
Lance sat in his conductor’s chair and stared straight ahead. What just happened? A Mater guard was on the resistance’s side, and there was a resistance. But just as he realized it, he felt like someone had just punched him in his stomach. There was only one person who could have told and that was Pete. Was Pete a spy? Lance asked himself. No, he had a branding and had been in prison with Lance. He lived with him in horrible conditions and had to work at McDonald’s.
Lance sighed thinking about Pete. Did he really work at McDonald’s? Lance had never seen him work there and really didn’t know what Pete did while Lance was working. Lance just assumed that Pete worked at McDonald’s. Did Pete tell on him or was it the Mater guard that was playing tricks on Lance? Maybe the whole thing was a setup to make Lance think that Pete was a spy when the Maters had Lance thinking that he was working with the resistance.
But if that was the case, the Maters wouldn’t find out about the resistance, if it did exist, because the Maters were only pretending to be a resistance. They wouldn’t go through all that only to make Lance believe that he was dealing with the true resistance, so Pete had to be a spy. Pete must have alerted the Maters, who were going to arrest Lance at the train station. That motherfucker, thought Lance.
An automatic female voice informed the passengers that the train was leaving in one minute. It was time. After a minute, Lance started the train on its route to Buckner Station.
Lance had to think of how he was going to handle Pete going forward. Surely, the Maters would have informed Pete ahead of time that Lance didn’t take the bait. The Maters would wonder why Lance didn’t meet the person at A1. They would probably speculate that someone alerted Lance. Maybe, or hopefully, Pete would be in trouble with the Maters.
Lance was glad that he had many hours to think about a strategy to handle Pete going forward. At a minimum, Lance had to act natural and not alert Pete that Lance was on to him. Hopefully, after a while of no activity, the Maters would transfer Pete to someone other person. Lance needed to notify the resistance.
He wondered if the resistance had a name and how they operated. How did they communicate? Where did they live? How did they get around? Did they ride on his busses or trains?
He thought more of how to handle Pete. Although he planned on acting normal and not confronting Pete, he still needed to have a response for the proposed meeting at post A1. Should he deny it or say the person didn’t show up? He wasn’t sure.
◆◆◆
Lance sighed before he opened his apartment door. He knew Pete would be there to greet him with an interrogation. Lance had decided on his long train ride to act naturally but deny that he ever got a note in the first place.
Lance opened the door, and Pete was standing by the kitchen, which was odd because he usually was lying on the couch. His hair was a little disheveled and his shirt was untucked.
Without any pleasantries, Pete asked, “Hey, how did it go today?”
“Oh, it went okay,” Lance said casually.
“Did you meet up with them?”
“Meet up with who?” Lance tried hard not to smirk.
“The people you were supposed to meet up with.”
“Oh no, Pete, I was just kidding about that.”
Pete frowned and moved toward Lance. “What do you mean?”
“There was no note. I wasn’t supposed to meet with anyone. I was just messing with you, man. I was just trying to get you off my back.”
“Bullshit, man, come on. What happened?”
“I’m telling you it was nothing.” Lance noticed that Pete clenched his fists at his sides. Pete did not think it was funny. Lance continued, “There’s no note. There was no one to meet. Ah, I was just joking with you. You didn’t think I was serious?”
Pete moved right up to within a few feet of Lance and pointed his finger at Lance’s face. “Look, I know you were serious. You were very serious. You were very detailed about it. Just stop jacking with me. How did it go?”
Lance worried that Mater guards would barge into the room, arrest him, and torture him until he revealed the source of the Mater guard. Lance stepped back a foot, and said calmly, “Look, I’m telling you that there was never a note. I was just joking. Do you really think someone slipped me a note and told me to meet by a stupid post? I made it up. That’s ridiculous. I can’t believe that you believed me.”
Chapter 23
Zelda walked around the garage area where her adopted father and mother discovered her some thirty-six years ago. The place was a shrine now as it was th
e official location of the Awakening Day. Holy Maters managed the facility. It was the number one tourist spot in Dallas surpassing even The Sixth-Floor Museum, where President Kennedy was assassinated.
Today, Zelda’s guards held back the tourists while Zelda toured the facility. Six Secret Service agents surrounded Zelda’s every move. Hundreds of Maters, who were ecstatic at the sight of their holy Mother, waited outside kneeling and praying.
Right after the Awakening, her father donated the car that he owned at the Awakening, so the facility positioned his car in the exact place as on the Awakening. Even the green car that had the teenagers who were trying to take the baby, was confiscated and was also on display in the approximate spot where it had been before it sped away. Those were the only two original cars left at the Awakening site.
Her father had told her that the museum had done an excellent job of recreating the scene because he thought it look exactly like he remembered it.
She stood by her father’s car and peered out to the garage while holding a large picture of the people at the Awakening. There were three people whose faces were indecipherable. Was one of them her real father or mother or were they both there? She wondered. She felt that if she visited the Awakening again, she could maybe discover something that her idiot Secretary of Treasury, Bruce Wade, couldn’t uncover.
It was clear to her that one of the three people was one of her parents. She just needed to find them if they were still alive. “Damn,” she said aloud. Two Secret Service guards turned towards her but then turned back quickly, realizing that it wasn’t anything dangerous going on.
She suddenly thought, why couldn’t Bruce figure it out? It was so simple. Why not just do a DNA search to find her real parents? How stupid could Bruce be? Of course, that would assume that her biological parents were criminals at one time for their DNA to be in the FBI database, but it was sure worth a try.
She told the guards to give her some space and privacy because she needed to make a phone call. They gave her enough distance, so she could make a private call.