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In the beginning, there was an office. It
felt like the beginning, at least to Doug. Mostly because the
office was small and non-permanent. Fine, he was working out of
a tent.
But They had paid for it. So he was grateful to Them.
Doug imagined, as much as his forty-five year-old,
entrenched-in-Government-for-20-years brain was able to, that
would be how this period of history was taught to kids in
schools. ‘In the beginning, there was an office.’
This was
ground Zero, which is different to floor Zero, which was the
ground. Or, the Corporates wanted him to think this was ground
Zero. Whoops. Them. He wasn’t supposed to call them … anything
other than Them.
They had an annoying habit of just showing
up for meetings --
“We need to talk.” Before he’d even
finished the thought, there was a voice by the door. Tall man,
in a fedora, but nothing else. Actually, he was wearing a suit,
but it helped Doug to imagine his oppressors naked. Except that
this one looked horrible, even when clothed. So maybe he’d best
stop pretending.
There was a guy in a suit.
“What.” Doug
was already sick of them.
“We need to be sure you’ll govern
in a way that is … beneficial.”
“Ah, Monday morning. Never
too early for a blackmail.” Doug smiled falsely.
“We prefer
to call it … negotiations.”
“Well I’d prefer to call it a
party, but I can only call it what it is.”
“Fine. It looks
like this. You do what we say, or we kill you. Then we do what
we say anyway. So in either case, what we say gets done. You’re
best just to obey.”
“You sound like my mother.”
“Did she
threaten to kill you?”
“One time I forgot to hang out the
washing, and it escalated.”
Paper slapped down on a desk, followed by a
round of muffled shushes.
“Another one.” Judy declared, with
no emotion at all.
“Did somebody forget to hang out their
washing again?”
“No, this one’s for breathing … this one’s
for wearing purple, and this one’s for a public display of
affection in the workplace,” her secretary, Carol, replied.
“Oh, what PDA was it?”
“Just a high-five. Carrying a
two-month prison sentence.”
“And is there possibility for a
pardon or do we have to full-scale battle stations?”
“I think
we could maybe try for a pardon. The Mayor is easily swayed.”
“Especially when it’s windy, yeah. I remember him fighting with
an umbrella during a tornado once.”
“Because that would help.
Question is, how we deal with this flood of cases.”
Judy and
Carol looked around their office. There were ten other lawyers,
five of whom were dealing with the influx of cases in various
ways, by either opening files, or attempting to use files to
arrange lines of powder. The other five were ferrying files,
more often than not from one of the types of working lawyer to
the other.
“We’ll have to keep trying, like we are now.”
“But we can’t keep up. Deal with ten in a day, sure; but we get
twenty new ones.”
“Oh, look, another. This one’s about
someone forgetting to wash their hair.”
“Fine or sentence?”
“Fine. $250,000.”
“Offences against the Profit Laws will be
prosecuted with a fine of not exceeding $250,000 or a prison
term not less than one month.” The speakers in Falkland City’s
underground network had been commandeered by the Government.
They just used them to blare propaganda or warnings about
punishments. The trains were never on time anyway.
Antonia
was also late, not that it made much difference. She’d still end
up waiting for the correct train, even though in theory it
should have left half an hour ago.
Somebody bumped her as she
made her way through the mostly stagnant crowd of people waiting
for the train that had yet to arrive.
“Watch it, you
knobcheese,” she yelled, but the man didn’t even hear over the
cacophony of other people. Nobody bumped into her again after
that. Too much risk of punishment from the Profit police because
of the disruption.
She worked in fast food, and enjoyed it,
for quite similar reasons. There was no such thing as being a
bad customer anymore, because that carried a life sentence in
prison. Five minutes out of your life waiting for slow food, or
thirty years from your life waiting for the slow release of
death.
She’d finished work and was headed to a bar to relax.
Well, relax without relaxing.
The train arrived just as she
got to the platform, so perfectly on time, half an hour late.
She didn’t look behind her as she boarded, leaving probably half
the people that were waiting, still standing on the platform.
Doug sat in his office (large tent) and
watched the paper pile up, then blow around when someone left
the flap open. But that was bureaucracy; pile up the paper and
then don’t move it at all. Explained why nothing got done
anyway. Every so often he’d walk outside for a bit; had to. He
needed to breathe deeply every so often, and his office lacked
enough space to move his head. You couldn’t swing a cat in
there, and he’d know. He’d tried it when a stray wandered in and
startled him. There was still a tear in the fabric of the back
wall.
“Praise our Corporate masters,” a drunk guy drawled as
he stumbled past. Doug wasn’t sure if he was serious, he could
possibly have been attempting high-level satire. Problem was,
that was how it came out in real life. The Corporates
had saved them. They
could, conceivably, be thought of as gods. If they hadn’t
stepped in after the Event to rebuild society, it would have
been lost, and humanity would have died.
So it didn’t play
well as a joke when people said things like that. Because
humanity had crawled to the Corporates and begged for help, then
the Corporates had provided it, in the form of a safe society
and no global problems. Mostly because the global problems had
gotten so bad they’d become good again, sorted themselves out.
But in exchange for what? Free will? Free food? Free wifi?
Speaking of which, he needed to talk with the tech guys. His
Facebook feed didn’t scroll itself.
Antonia went to bars to get away from the
tech guys. Noisy, arrogant men, she thought. Or meek, quiet
little meowing noises you could step on and still wouldn’t
notice. The profession didn’t so much have a sliding scale,
rather than two extremes. It had been radicalised, if you like.
She walked into the wall of noise and cheering, and sat at the
bar, looking at the barman – who she’d known because she’d come
here for fifteen years, since she was … fifteen. Don’t tell Mum.
She’d pinned her brown hair back. Needed to be able to see the
person you were punching. She wouldn’t get into fights … on
purpose. Just if they were forced upon her.
The more she sat
at the bar, the more it annoyed her.
“Antonia, you need to
calm down. They’ll hear …”
“So what if they hear! I’m sick of
this city and the … way it works! People just … live. Heads down
and don’t notice anyone, and that’s all fine. But then people
can relax and all the ‘fun’ just explodes outwards and I just
don’t get it. Why does there have to be both?” She was getting
gradually more worked up.
“You really need to calm down. It’s
not that bad …” The bartender, Josh, pleaded.
“How can I just
be okay with it?” Antonia wasn’t taking the hint.
“Have tried
turning it off –” Josh tried to go for a techie joke.
“Shut
up!” Antonia laughed, but slightly too loud.
She was tapped
on the shoulder by a guy in navy.
“Antonia Stevens, you’re
under arrest for breaching the Profit Accords.”
Antonia sat across from Doug. Judy sat next
to her, writing things on a pad. Three people was too many to
fit in the tent, nevertheless they’d crammed in.
“You cost
the bar money because people avoided it because of your
outburst.” Jane clarified.
“And that’s a crime?”
“As much
as ‘wearing purple’ or ‘being an Accountant’.”
“Wait –”
“I
know, it’s odd, but the Corporates like their finances
unaudited. Who’d have thought?”
“And where do you sit on the
issue?”
“Of what?”
“The system.” Antonia asked her
question.
Immediately, Judy and Doug in unison leant forward
and whispered really loudly; “the walls have ears, you can’t ask
things like that. Come on!” they settled back in as Antonia
realised the state of her mistake.
“Oh, it’s just … it’s such
a pointless crime … can’t you …” she sniffed, and Doug noticed
she was close to tears, “can’t you pardon it or something?”
“I can’t just pardon every crime that comes here,” Doug looked
left then right, “even though I may want to. Ahem. That’s just
the way the system is.
“You’ve really dug yourself a hole.”
Judy remarked drily about the state of the nation.
“How’d you
know my last name?” Doug wondered.
“That meeting wasn’t unhelpful.” Judy
remarked as Antonia walked out of the tent and Doug attempted to
pole-vault his desk in the background to gain re-entry.
“But
he can’t pardon me. He said so …”
“Did he?” Judy pulled a
scrap of paper out of her pocket. It only said ‘maybe’, but
Antonia got the message.
“When’d he write that?”
“Before
we even got there, he must’ve had it prepared.”
“Creepy.”
“Or resolved. There’s two types of men, and basically it’s
either one or the other.”
“How will we know?”
“We won’t
until it’s far too late.” Judy kept talking as they got into a
car, which immediately drove off at speed. Futuristic
self-driving cars were a small price to pay for the Corporates’
dominion. So was the taking of all liberty and bending of the
populace to their will. Small prices, tolerable.
“Oh! I just
remembered I need to stop at the bank,” she declared as the
car’s satnav changed course automatically.
“Bank?”
“Need
money for your case, never know which witnesses we’ll need to
bribe!” Judy said this in lighthearted tone, and with a smile.
Antonia wondered how much truth there was to it.
“And I’ll
just wait here?”
“Yes. You just …” Judy didn’t finish before
the car arrived. She got out and left Antonia alone in the
machine.
Antonia saw Judy notice a homeless guy sitting
outside the bank, and slightly hesitate before entering. Almost
like she would have not gone in, if she could have.
There was
a couple behind Judy that hesitated and made the opposite
judgement call. Not five minutes after they left, cops showed up
and wasted no time in pulling truncheons out and beating the
life out of the guy.
Antonia opened the window. Almost going
to intervene. Almost. She heard …
The cops looked down at the dead body and
shrugged.
“You’re under arrest for the loss of profits to the
seventeenth sector as a breach of The Fifteenth Accord …” the
cop droned in monotone to the corpse. Purely for show, but the
estate would get a bill. It would be gutted by post-death
lawsuits. Dying was expensive, if you did it wrong … Judy came
back, flustered; interrupting the train of thought.
“They’re
prosecuting a corpse …” Antonia was speechless.
“That
happens. At least those lawsuits are … open and shut.”
“Open
up family drama while you slam shut a coffin?”
“Pretty much.”
“But that’s …”
“Profitable. And that’s all that matters.”
“These are people!”
“Are they? What’s his name?”
“How’d I
know something like that?”
“Well, if you think about it,
that’s their whole point. He’s not a person because he doesn’t
have a name, so far as they know. So mistreating him isn’t a
problem.”
“Except that it is because what about Justice?”
“What about justice? The only laws are the Profit accords now,
and if you commit crimes like that you’re more profitable dead.”
“But he just sat outside a shop!”
“As soon as it stops
someone from going in, it’s a problem. Nothing I can do, nothing
we will do. Our responsibility is to you and your … situation. I
hope you realise that.”
“I … yes … uh.” Antonia quietened
down, as Judy fastened her seatbelt and the car set off again.
“Speaking of,” Judy stated calmly after a short and slightly
awkward pause, “let’s start on your case.”
“Left it at home.”
“N – no, not your briefcase. Talk to me about Friday and how you
came to be sitting in my car.”
Antonia told the story while
Judy listened and the car drove itself. They would arrive back
at the office soon, and it was important for Judy to have the
full picture. Although Judy could have been talking about the
paintings she’d ordered over the internet.
“So she said they just came up behind her
for no reason.” Judy opened Antonia’s file and slid it across to
Carol, who started to write. They sat across from each other
like they were in a business meeting – because they were.
“That makes them sound like rapists. I’m sure it wasn’t that
bad.”
“I dunno. Some of the cops …”
“Anyway …” Carol kept
writing on the file while Judy recounted Antonia’s story.
Antonia sat in the reception area of the law firm spinning on a
chair and wondering what had gone wrong with the world. But it
was probably the dizziness. She heard the odd line of the
conversation between the two lawyers and wondered how long it
would last.
“And do you think a poor-man’s defence will work
here?”
“I don’t see why not – it’s not like Antonia’s
swimming in money. She did choose
that bar.”
“Oh yeah
the one famous for hook-ups, rubdowns and lots of snorting.”
“But then she just ordered a drink there. Why?”
“Nobody ever
goes to that bar to drink, so the prices are low. Easy.”
“Hey, I’m right outside!” Antonia yelled through the walls, and
the two women struggled to contain their smirks.
“This is
necessary information for your case!” Judy called back, as the
women laughed again.
Eventually Judy recovered enough to say
“and Julius Trotman’s the prosecutor.”
This sobered Carol
up. “Oh, really? That’s serious.”
Antonia heard this from the
reception area, so she pulled out her phone and googled the guy.
Oh ew, the haircut.
And the face, I mean … why. He certainly looks like a lawyer,
but he doesn’t have to look like that.
Says he won some
competitions, but that was years ago. Years and years. Oh. He
was in Law school. Oh. He’s really good at this. Oh no. I’m
really in trouble here. And they’re saying the trial starts
tomorrow …
Antonia could tell something was wrong as
she walked into her house. For one thing, the door was open.
The Government. She
arrived at that conclusion unceremoniously, like it was
predetermined. Of course the Government would search my stuff. Maybe they’d find an
asthma inhaler that would be used as evidence. But they wouldn’t
have left the door open. They’d have locked back up at the end.
So they’re still here. Someone --
Then she saw him.
Calmly flicking through books on a shelf. A small, relatively
ineffectual man in a high-vis vest. So he was doing less than
nothing to stay hidden.
“What are you doing in my house?”
Antonia asked, the opening question.
The man turned away from
the shelf. “Your house? Not any more, you’re in prison now.”
“Haven’t been convicted.”
“Formalities.”
“Your attitude
towards justice is … enlightening.”
“So are these lights.
Where did you get them?” He put the book he was currently
reading in a bag.
“What was that?”
“Just us taking stuff
we could use against you. You can’t stop us, so you might as
well just tell me where you got the lights.”
“They came with
the house. What else have you taken?”
“Your door keys for a
start,” the man reached towards Antonia. “You really would want
to hand them over.”
“Because that’s not creepy.”
“I
thought the high-vis vest made it less creepy, but maybe I was
wrong.”
“But what evidence is there? My conviction isn’t even
major.”
He put down the book he’d just picked up and read off
a sheet of paper from his pocket. “Lost profits to the pub;
$100.”
“See, that’s nothing!”
“Would you pay $100 to be
freed?”
“Well, I, um …”
“Seriously, that could settle
this.”
“I don’t have $100 spare, I …”
“Unlucky.” The man
picked up his book and continued flicking.
“You know all
about me but I don’t know anything about you, it’s not fair!
You’re acting as my executioner and I don’t know your name.”
“John. And what else would you like to know? Favourite colour;
yellow, obviously,” he gestured at the jacket. “I came to the
city after the Event, as one of the few that travelled and the
Corporates had jobs. That’s all this is – a job. If I could let
you off, I would; but you were arrested. Nothing I can do.”
“But you just said there was – that I could pay $100.” Half a
plan was forming in Antonia’s mind.
“Then you said you
couldn’t. So there’s nothing I can do, I’m afraid.”
“So you
can’t do anything because you don’t want to?”
“Basically.
Unless …” he paused and considered the next sentence, “you could
give me information about the Resistance?”
“Resistance?
There’s a Resistance? Who are they and how can I join?”
“That’s more or less exactly what I’m asking. Except I feel like
you’re legit.”
“No, I can’t … help.” Antonia moved forward
slowly. Time to get out of here.
“That’s too bad,” John said
as he went back to flicking.
Antonia moved fast, swiping the
bag of evidence from the floor and striding towards the door
with fast, purposeful steps. The man couldn’t catch her, as he
threw the book he was holding across the room to stop her
escaping.
I need back
to the lawyers. They’ll be able to help.
“She’s escaped.”
John talked into a cellphone. “She’s escaped and is on the run.
Find her and then we won’t even need a trial.”
“We need assurance that this won’t happen
again.” A massive man sat across from Doug, and cast a shadow
over his whole body. Or at least that’s what it felt like.
“And it’s assurance I can’t provide, because I don’t even know
what ‘this’ is.” Doug barely held his own against the impassive
wall of suit that the Corporates had sent to his office for
their weekly meeting.
“People are breaking the rules, and
that’s bad for business.”
“But you should know by now that
running a city, in any state, is bad for business.”
“There
must be a way to make it less … bad.”
“Summary executions? I
think they tried that in another city and it worked …”
“But
that just makes us unpopular and turns the people against us in
the long run.”
“Imagine why I’m trying to do that …” Doug
leant back in his chair, smugly. Then karma caught up with him,
he overbalanced and fell backwards. The Corporate he was being
interrogated by walked over to help him up.
“Thanks, uhh …”
Doug suddenly realised he didn’t know the guy’s name.
But the
Corporate stayed entirely too close to Doug’s face. “Listen
here, boy. You listen to us and follow our instructions or we’ll
be forced to take … actions.”
“Actions? Like silencing
me? But then how would
you rule the city.”
“You think you’re irreplaceable?” The
Corporate was almost angry, then he paused. “Hmm, there’s a song
about that, how’d it go … anyway, we want you to strip …”
“Whoa, there. Calm down, we only just met.” Even in stress, Doug
was quick to quip.
“… strip back the people’s power of
choice, make life more mundane.”
“Then they’d just blindly
follow, because people that don’t need to think … stop
thinking.”
“That’s our plan. And people who don’t think are
easy to control. And control is good for business.”
“Control
is good for anything.”
“You’re still causing us trouble, sir.
How much,” the Corporate intoned, pulling out a chequebook,
“would it take,” he continued, finding a pen somewhere in his
massive coat, “for you to stop being painful?”
“That depends
on what you’re asking me to do after I sign.”
“I’ve told
you.”
“But there’s no contract, and you know as well as I do
that a verbal contract is bullshit if there’s no witnesses.”
“Twenty million dollars?”
“Whatever it is, I’ll do it.”
“Everybody has an amount they’d sell out for. You just have to
find it.”
“When do we start with this systematic oppression
of the people?”
“When we say so. We’ll be in touch.” The
Corporate finished, acting as if the deal were closed.
“And
if I refuse?” Doug saw a flaw in the plan.
“We can have
another ‘you’ in a minute.”
“Oh, that’s how the song went …”
“Song?”
“Nevermind. So where do I sign?”
“I don’t have the
paper with me. Can grab them just now, wait up.”
He left, and
Doug had the presence of mind to think;
they’re not doing this all for control. They’re hiding something.
Then the guy came back and Doug signed the contract anyway.
Twenty million dollars …
“The Government’s covering up an enormous
conspiracy.” Emily, a fresh-faced journalist was rehearsing
lines she’d written just hours before. She was standing on a
beach that was empty apart from the ten people in her camera
crew and the two hundred people protesting the story’s
publication that were jeering and yelling from behind
barricades. So basically, it was like any other Tuesday.
“We
ready?” Emily asked a cameraman, and he nodded. The team was
ready to go whenever she was.
She paused. Then: “Good
evening. We bring you a story of –”
Somebody sneezed and she
stopped talking. Sighing, she groaned “okay, let’s start again.”
“Hello, ladies and gentlemen.”
“Hello.” The protestors from
behind the camera chorused, ruining another take.
“You’re not
going to let me tell this story, will you?”
Deafening silence
from the protestors, but Emily still got their message.
She
sighed. She thought back to the hours she’d spent crafting the
script in her office and many extra hours she’d spent hiding in
her boss’ stationery cupboard so that she could get the sign-off
on the piece; the celebratory dance she’d done in the office
when it had finally gotten granted – then the table she’d broken
and had to pay for; the fact that she’d had to endure the camera
crew’s chat-up lines and write her own devastating put-downs in
response – the early ones had tended more towards ‘stick it up
your arse’ which could be countered with ‘stick what up where?’,
but some of her later ones had sidetracked the guys so that they
stopped pestering her, and, in one specific case, walked into a
lamppost.
It would end like this, on a sunny beach but unable
to film. Well, she’d maybe be able to film in a studio, but it
would be terrible.
A guy with a megaphone stood up. “You need
to step away, and come with us.” As pickup lines go, pretty
terrible.
“Make me.”
“By the order of …” the guy kept
talking but Emily wasn’t paying attention. Crap. They were
serious.
“Fine. What do you want?”
“The Mayor …” the guy
kept talking but Emily wasn’t listening. Crap. They were
serious. The guy kept talking as she followed him into a car, as
he drove the car back to the city, and as he parked up outside
the mayor’s office, although, thanks to an impressive gust of
wind the Mayor’s office was also outside, and the structure of
the tent it would normally have been inside was rolling away
like a tumbleweed.
The guy didn’t come into the office, he
just let Emily find the imaginary entrance door and walk in.
Even though Doug could see Emily struggling to grasp an
imaginary protocol that wasn’t really there, much like the door
she was pretending to open, he didn’t get up to help her. There
were Rules.
She sat down.
“So tell me,” Doug asked, as
etiquette demanded, “what are the Corporates planning, and how
can we stop it?”
“Memo from the Mayor.” Judy picked up a
piece of paper that had slid on to her desk somehow, and passed
it to Carol without properly explaining it.
“It just says the
Corporates have done something.”
“Raped our lifestyle and
culture is what they’ve done.”
“That’s two things, Judy. The
note only says one.”
“The note also says we need to
investigate it. But how do we even start –”
Antonia burst in
the door.
“First of all,” she said, panting, “I’ve made a big
mistake.”
The two lawyers nodded, wanting her to continue.
“And second of all I’m on the run from the cops and here’s the
evidence they have against me. What’s been happening here?”
“Oh, nothing, the Mayor just wants us to investigate what the
Corporates have been doing to control the society and maybe put
a stop to it, and …” Judy paused, squinting at the memo in her
hand, “… he’s sent us a news reporter who has some information
that might help.”
“Why’s he done that, rather than just
telling us what she knows?”
Judy shrugged, “I dunno, but at
least if she’s pretty we’ll have some eye candy.”
Carol
leaned across and whispered, “you’re not really allowed to talk
like that any more.”
Emily’s information was useful, because
it had been gathered and interpreted over months of careful
research. Antonia’s was … helpful to use to see how the law
would be interpreted, but too specific to be of much practical
use. After about three o’clock and Judy’s tenth cup of coffee,
they ran out of mugs.
“But I just don’t see how we can use
any of this to take down the Government.”
“Oh, not seeing
things isn’t a problem – I stopped seeing after my sixth cup of
coffee.”
“This is serious, what is a universally recognised
way we could fuck the Government over and then make them change
the system because this one’s no good.”
“Why would we have to
tank the company?”
“People only want to change systems that
don’t work for them, even if they do work for someone else. So
we just need to flip that …” Judy thought for ten seconds, then
arranged a meeting with Doug. He showed up at the office in
under ten minutes.
“Sir, I know what we should do.”
“Oh,
no. What …” Doug was fearful, he’d learned about the passion of
a lawyer by this point.
“We need to tank the company.”
“Why?”
“Because their methods don’t work and the best way to
prove it is to just straight up dive off a cliff.”
“You’d be
fun playing Russian Roulette. So … you’re saying you’d kill your
livelihood to spite a system that you think doesn’t care about
you?”
“Well, almost. But it’s not system-general, because
otherwise why have I not taken issue with you, the living
embodiment of the system?”
“Living what of the who, now?”
“That is your function, isn’t it?”
“Well, I guess if that’s
your plan, I can’t stop you …”
Carol brought folder in from
the other room. “You’ll never guess what!” She cried, using a
fake-excited voice. “We just made a ten million dollar loss!”
“But we made a profit last year …” Judy interjected, as Carol
threw the folder out the window.”
“Sorry, we what?”
“Is there nothing we can do?” Judy and
Carol had formed a plan, then taken Antonia to the prison to be
held before her trial. The guard that processed her was
relatively handsome, but the lawyers had explained that, no; it
wasn’t that kind of a holding.
“We’ll keep working; but the
way it was, we were holding a fugitive. At least here, the
city’s responsible.” Carol hadn’t explained the plan to Antonia
fully; why would she?
“So how long will I be in here?”
“Could be a day, or a week …”
“And I just sit here and
imagine all the horrible ways I might die?”
“Either that or
try and get off with that guard …” Carol might have been fifty,
but she knew how the younger generations thought.
“Tempting.
But I think I’ll stick to worrying about my death.”
“Good-o.
See you soon!” Carol chirped, in a singsong voice as she slammed
the cell door shut.
“Wait! Nevermind, they’re gone.” Antonia
sat back on the ‘bed’ the prison had ‘provided’ and thought
about all the ways she could die in here. None by choice, mind.
She sat, and waited.
“And we’re gonna bust her out? How?”
Judy asked Carol as they headed back to their car.
“That
guard isn’t a prison employee, he’s an intern for us – and he
quite fancied Antonia, so maybe two-for-one …”
“Two for one?
You’re not jumping in there, too!”
“Oh, shame. But, um,
anyway; he can release her on his rounds, and sneak her out.
Nobody really cares about anyone in the prisons – they’re all
unprofitable on the outside, even the guards. The absolute
minimum point for profitability, a prison. Even a
well-functioning one, and these are … not.”
“So basically all
the guards will band together to free her, is that what you’re
saying?”
“I hope.”
“And if they don’t?”
“Then we’ve
just got them both killed.”
The guard received a phone call,
just before dinner that same day. “Perkins. Ah yeah. Will do.
Okay. Wait, she said what about my ass?”
Then Doug received a
phone call about twenty minutes later. “The prisoners are
rioting. We can’t hold them back. There was an escape. We aren’t
profitable. But you can’t spread that …”
So Doug phoned
Emily; “the prison is unprofitable, and the Corporates won’t be
able to deal with it. Do what you gotta do, and make things up
if you need. I’ll cover you.”
Within half an hour, the story
was published and the Corporates couldn’t stop it. They held a
meeting in one of their secret underground bunkers.
“Who even
escaped?” One man in a suit said to another man in a suit.
“Girl called Antonia Stevens. She …”
“Has connections to the
Resistance.”
“Connections we might need, now. We could’ve
killed her before, but …”
“She’s more valuable alive.” They
concluded, as a headline blared from a TV: “Falkland City
Justice Under Fire Over Fire In Prison Riot.
“Oh, and the
whole city’s in meltdown, but we’ll get to that.” A footnote,
perhaps. But a valuable one …
The judge’s gavel banged against the desk,
and Judy sat down in the court room. Normally, Antonia would
have arrived by now; but Judy chalked that up to traffic
problems. The city always had traffic problems. Either traffic,
or trafficking – both of which caused problems with the law, and
both of which created lawsuits that Judy had dealt with in the
past.
Antonia waited in her cell to be collected
by the police to go to trial. She heard keys in the lock of her
cell door, then it swung open. Her eyes adjusting to the unusual
brightness, she noticed it wasn’t coming from the hall lights,
but instead from three torches held by men in suits.
“What do
you know about the rebellion?” One of the less-tactful
Corporates said.
“Resistance? That it’s measured in ohms?”
She only got the one quip in before one of the Corporates used
the end of his torch to knock her out.
“Put her in the van.
We’ll deal with her later.”
“So my client is innocent of the crimes she
is accused, because she would not have lost the establishment
any money, had she remained free. We will prove this in our
case.”
Carol, who had found her way into the courtroom during
the opening address, tapped Judy on the shoulder.
“Stop
talking, dear. We’re already losing. There was something else …”
she paused, remembering; “oh, yes! Antonia’s been kidnapped.”
Dark van. No light except from the
headlights. They hadn’t bothered to blindfold Antonia, so she
could see where they were going. Into the central city. She saw
some people with signs lining the streets. Not blocking, that
would be illegal. Just standing in single file on the footpath
with signs. Protests had started about the way the Government
was treating people. Peaceful, at least for now.
“Look at the
animals, thinking they know better.” One of the Corporates
sneered, and his friend, in the passenger seat, laughed.
“They don’t know where they stand.”
“On the footpath,
presumably.” Antonia quipped, getting dirty looks from both men.
Immediately after Carol passed on the
information, the judge paused, and tapped an earpiece it didn’t
even look like she’d been wearing. “Oh. Okay.”
Then she
looked up, “the case is dismissed on the grounds that someone
just paid me a lot of money to make it go away.” She paused, and
took a breath.
“But. It’s been brought to my attention that
your firm is unprofitable.” Her gaze shifted towards Judy.
“What? Mine?”
“Yes. So I’m sentencing you …” Judy stopped
listening at that point. She was too busy planning ahead. So
much could still go wrong in their plan …
The van pulled up at the Mayor’s office.
Antonia was slightly surprised by this, but the two officers
grabbed her and led her inside, then threw her into a chair in
the middle of the room. Doug was faced away from her.
“Protesters outside, sir. What do we do?” He asked. Doug waited
for just long enough before he answered.
“What does the law
say?” Doug looked up from his paperwork, and stared the cop
directly in the eye.
“Well, it …”
“Then do that. And don’t
stop and think about the kind of person it makes you.” Doug
looked around at the room, which had emptied somewhat after that
remark. He only saw a bedraggled prisoner tied to a chair.
“Ah, it’s you. I want you to tell me about the resistance.”
“Why do you not want protest, but you wanted to take down the
system?” Antonia looked up; confused, even in her weakened
state.
“Credit. You of all people should understand that
that’s how the Government works. This Government anyway. Credit
and debit, or credit and reputation; I need all the credit I can
get and the only way I can get the credit I deserve is if you
help me take down the system and then I get all the credit.”
“You get all the credit?”
“Yes.” Doug looked up, and Antonia
saw something in his eyes. “I get all the credit.”
“You do get how saying ‘this is all part of
the plan!’ over and over makes you seem deranged, right?” Carol
had just about had enough of Judy’s muttering; and given that
they shared a prison cell and there was nowhere to go, this was
perhaps the first step towards a hideous murder.
“What do you
propose?” Judy threw a thin cloth pillow she had been resting
her head on across the room.
“… not doing any of that? If you
have an evil master plan then good, but if not then please leave
me to suffer in my own private prison.”
“While also suffering
in the very real, actual prison? I think not.”
“Why not?”
Carol was fed up with Judy’s bullshit. She would later reflect
on how Judy changed the subject and ended up talking about those
clouds that look like elephants – and the fact that had she not
done that, Carol may well have gone insane inside her own mind.
Judy never directly answered Carol’s questions; but Carol would
eventually piece some version of an answer to most of her
questions together. Time would reveal all, she thought, and then
said out loud.
The guard that had just entered with the
pair’s lunch looked at her, puzzled. Then he backed away; “I
don’t get paid enough for this …”
“I just need you to come with me.” Doug
stood up slowly in his office, as Antonia sat, bound in her
chair.
“Stop being a creep. It doesn’t suit you.”
“Neither
do suits. I need you to tell me about the resistance.”
“Well,
there’s V=IR, and it’s measured in …”
“Not physics. Fucking
hell.”
“That’s the only Resistance I know of, though …”
“Then maybe we need to teach you a tough lesson. I reckon if we
put you in danger they’d come and rescue you.”
“Seems a bit
of a jump, doesn’t it?”
“I’m evil; my logic isn’t supposed to
make sense – now; oh! A jump! That’s what we’ll do …”
“I’m
sorry, you’ll what?”
Antonia tried to break out of her bonds and found that, much
like a beneficiary in a Ponzi scheme, the only way to free
herself involved watching her assets collapse.
Which is nerd
speak for: “she’d have to break her own arm”.
Worth it?
No. Maybe it was worth seeing where the whole … plan was headed.
Have faith, she
thought. They won’t kill
you because they think you’re of value. They won’t kill you …
yet.”
“Let’s get this show on the road, then.”
“What
are you so eager to die for?”
“Maybe I’ve realised that life
isn’t worth it. Or maybe this is a bluff. Or a double bluff. Or
…”
“I get it, you’re immensely clever, and I’m playing into
your hands. Except that this is
my plan, so how the
fuck could you be manipulating it?”
“That depends very much
on what the Corporates are up to.”
This provoked a reaction
from Doug, who leaned across his desk and grasped Antonia by the
arm.
“Don’t … say … their … names. They smell fear.”
“So,
are they up to something, or are you just a spineless, wannabe
clever person?”
“It could be both, no need to attack me!”
Doug gasped, then realised; “I said that wrong, didn’t I?”
“You’re useless and you admit it.” Antonia sneered, “How
useless.”
“So, if we paid the guard …”
“Shut. The
fuck. Up.”
“Say that again!” Judy growled, grabbing her
toothbrush in a fist. Carol flinched, unsure of where this anger
had suddenly come from. But she needn’t have worried, because;
as if by clockwork, a clock worked, and a guard entered with the
dinner. He surveyed the near-fight, then slowly declared; “okay;
you – solitary!” Judy was dragged out of the room, leaving Carol
on her own.
“Hmm.” Carol sat on the bed, eating Judy’s mashed
potato; “I suppose that’s one way to do it.” She could hear the
scuffle as it moved down the hallway and Carol’s world faded
back into silence. Silence, and mashed potato. Which was almost
worth it.
Judy put up the bare minimum of fuss. This was what
she’d wanted, and what she’d planned, but she didn’t want the
guard to know that. She pushed and pulled at his uniform and
tried to make herself as hard to control as possible, which
resulted in essentially a tango between one enthusiastic dancer
and one completely unwilling participant. The guard knocked on
the door of solitary with his one free arm, then dragged Judy
inside.
Judy used the forward momentum she’d built up by
essentially spinning around the kid to pull him in after her,
then quickly and purposefully lock the door behind her.
The
guard looked at the shut door in confusion.
“B – b – but –
but I’m not supposed …”
“And, he’s not very good at thinking
on his feet.” Judy declared as if she were an examiner holding a
notepad; which she was, because it turned out someone had left a
notepad in the room.
“I swear, we’ll kill you for this …”
“But you’re useless, they’d only kill me if what I did cost them
money, and it won’t; because you aren’t even valuable enough to
justify your wages which is probably why you’re here instead of
being outside and doing something productive and profitable. So
this is what I want from you …” she looked up and saw tears in
the guard’s eyes.
She sighed, “Oh honey, this is the nice
version. What I need from you is this; who are the Resistance
and what do they want?”
“They …” the guard sniffed, “they
want to overthrow the Government.”
“And can they succeed?”
“Not with current information, but the Mayor has … got hold of …
the leader.”
“You mean Antonia. How did you know that,
anyway?”
“There’s a radio channel. They tell us everything.”
“Why did you tell me that?”
“Because,” the guard said as he
straightened up and Judy saw something in his eyes, “you won’t
make it back to your cell.” She saw a flash of metal and
realised he was holding a knife.
“So the Mayor is responsible
for everything that happens in prisons?” Judy said, seemingly
from nowhere, and the guard stopped, confused.
“Well, yes.
But I suppose your plan was to shut down the prison and get
yourself released; which you won’t be able to do!” he grinned
maniacally and Judy saw the metallic flash again.
Then his
phone rang.
“What? Outside? Now? The city? Oh, crap.” Then he
turned around and knocked on the door, and was free. That part
of Judy’s plan had failed. And now they knew her big-game plan
as well, and she couldn’t tell Carol.
The water looked cold. That was the first
thing Antonia remembered.
“I’m sorry, she what?” Doug was on
the phone, talking to someone that sounded, from the loud,
clearly spoken words that Doug was using, as if they were
panicked, or else stuck in a wind tunnel. Which Antonia could
only just hear over the rush of water passing underneath the
bridge they were standing on.
“Well, at least she’s in
solitary; can’t enact a plot when you’re on your own.” He hung
up the one call, and muttered under his breath. “… dissidents …”
He walked back over to Antonia, and had almost tied her to the
railing of the bridge when his phone rang again. He passed off
the tying duties to one of his assistants, and spoke into the
device.
“For fuck’s sake, what?”
A pause for a minute, in
which time Doug said nothing but his face when pale.
“I’m
sorry, they what?”
Another minute of silence in which Doug nervously rocked
backwards and forwards. Then he hung up.
“What’s the hot
goss?” Antonia couldn’t resist the snarky reply from her
current, and very much restrained, position.
“Oh, there’s a
lawyer in solitary confinement in a prison, and riots all over
the city.” Doug replied entirely too flippantly. “Nothing to
worry about.” Again, a complete lie.
“Sounds like fun. Are we
ready to get this show on the road?” Antonia asked, kicking the
railing.
“Right, yes. So, um, you just need to read what we
wrote, and we’ll …”
“Why are we on a bridge over a river?”
“Seemed atmospheric.”
“That a swift and merciless tide could
easily wash away old and outdated infrastructure?”
“… That’s
not the intended message.”
“Good. Then I’ll play it up and
your words will be meaningless.”
“You say you don’t know who
the Resistance are, and then you wonder why we don’t believe
you.”
“You don’t believe me because you’re a fraud who’s been
paid a lot of money to pretend to govern while the big
machinations happen behind a curtain.”
Doug was taken aback
by this. “I, um … quick. Make the film. We don’t have much
time.”
“Before people realise what a joke you are?”
“I
could push you.”
“Please. It’d be better than looking at your
face.”
“People of the Resistance,” Antonia yelled from her
position, as Doug flinched because she was standing right in his
face and the production team they’d somehow managed to hire to
film a ransom video scurried around trying to get the whole
speech on tape. Antonia took a not insignificant amount of
pleasure from their pain.
“People of the Resistance,” she
repeated after the team seemed more prepared; but Doug still
flinched like he’d been punched in the face; “we have your
leader, and will kill her unless you stop. Please stop, we’re
begging you. You hear the begging sound?”
Doug looked around
in surprise after Antonia went clearly off-script in a clearly
sarcastic way.
“You’re not gonna do the thing, are you?”
“Of course not, dipshit.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter. We only
wanted you out of the city.”
“Out of the city?”
“Your
lawyers are in prison and your prison is with me. So how on
earth are you going to get out of this one?” Doug announced with
significant amounts of arrogance. To which Antonia responded, as
of course she would, by headbutting the mayor in the face.
The prison ran like clockwork. It did this
for a number of reasons. Efficiency was key and it was important
to the Corporates that it would run unassisted if it needed to –
especially important given the whole industry was tailor
designed to be unprofitable. Leaving a prison to run on its own
was considered profit-maximising behaviour. So obviously it was
common practice. But this would pose a question – well, it would
pose many questions, but it would specifically force the
management of every prison to ask themselves a simple question;
‘what would happen if the prison couldn’t look after itself?’.
The fact that this question had crossed the prison operators’
minds meant that it had at least occurred to some people. But
not enough of the Government was prepared when the situation
flipped itself, and the society
outside the prisons
found itself in disarray. Guards that had been trained for this
were not allowed to act in the city’s ‘best interest’ and were
forced instead to yell from the sidelines in the vague direction
of cops that could barely pick up a helmet to put it on.
And
so the guards locked the gates and fortified their coffees with
rum. It would be a long … next little while, and they’d need,
well, rum in their coffee to get through it. But if they sealed
themselves off from the outside world, then the carnage that
gripped the humans outside who had suddenly realised their
oppression wouldn’t affect them. At least that was the theory.
The prison could go back to its carefully constructed hierarchy
of command that would get disrupted when somebody with enough
money came along and the guards would be safe inside a prison.
Safe inside while the world went to shit.
That is, until
Resistance agents get inside the prison and start enacting their
orders to kill prisoners and guards alike. But that won’t happen
for a little while, surely?
The head guard, Grant, had
thought all of this while surveying the road outside the prison
from his office in a guard tower, and being quietly pleased with
his ability to ignore everything that was going on in the world.
That is, he thought that – but only until a spade broke through
the carefully constructed carapace around his psyche, and the
carefully constructed carapace around his brain. His assailant
wore guard uniform, although he shouldn’t have been, and was
called Steve, although nobody called him that where he worked.
He was called Agent Nine, and he spoke into an earpiece while
wiping the blood from the tip of the spade.
“Got him. Who’s
next on the leadership team??” He waited, while the other end
said something, then; “write RESISTANCE in his blood? Well, okay
…”
Agent Nine looked down and realised he had two choices;
spade tip, or fingertip. Chose the more sanitary option, and
dipped his spade into the guy’s skull much like a quill would be
dipped into an ink pot.
“Okay,” he muttered, as he made the
first stroke on the wall.
Antonia’s head connected with Doug’s nose,
which … hurt. Hurt her face. Then she tried to wriggle out of
her bonds, which she’d assumed would just sort of fall away, but
they didn’t. This hurt her ego. One of Doug’s henchmen was
ambling towards her, slowly; carefully, like he knew she
couldn’t escape.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
the guy roared from about twenty metres away, as he lolloped
closer.
“Have sex with me.”
“What?” this change in pace
confused the guy, who stopped moving forward and stood about ten
metres off, looking confused.
“If you let me out of these
ties, I’ll get really wet.”
“I, uhh …” The guy hesitated, and
Antonia realised she’d calculated correctly; that the guy was
sexually frustrated and would probably say yes.
“So, what do
you say?” Antonia tried to position herself seductively against
the railing, limited by her … limitations, she wasn’t overly
successful.
The guy walked over and untied her, which Antonia
thought was too easy.
Too easy, but the next bit would be
fun.
“Get all wet, then.” The guy growled, and Antonia gave
him the largest smile she could muster.
“Sure,” she
whispered, then polevaulted backwards over the railing.
Falling into the river was easy to do, but hard to do right, so
Antonia found herself in freezing cold water with what felt like
heartburn because she’d essentially bellyflopped, while her
henchman friend was bellowing his head off from the bridge. She
couldn’t make out what he was saying, as she turned and swam
downstream, in the direction of the current. If she was
underwater for long enough, hopefully they wouldn’t know where
she’d gone.
She swam for what felt like a week.
In
reality, probably about half an hour.
After hitting a shallow
patch in the water, she stood up, and beheld a factory, or it
looked like a processing plant of some sort. The building was
metal, but seemed prefabricated. Had a ‘C’ on the side. What on
earth did the Corporates have a secret warehouse for, on the
banks of a river?
Antonia sighed. She’d have to find out,
now. Nobody else even knew about this place. She shook herself
off, then stepped out of the river.
Three days later, a guard opened the door
to solitary confinement, and Judy stepped out. Shielding her
eyes, she surveyed the corridor, and noticed the quiet. It
wasn’t usually this quiet. It shouldn’t have been this quiet.
The guard looked at her, as if expecting something from her.
Maybe he was waiting for her to fall over? Ask a question?
Something – Judy wasn’t sure.
She needed to get back to
Carol, so she set off back to her cell, leaving the guard to
shake his head in confusion and then follow in much the way that
a dog does when taken for a walk.
“The outside’s chaos.” The
guard said after he’d caught up. It was a question Judy hadn’t
asked, but one she’d wanted the answer to anyway.
“It seemed
quiet here …”
“You were just in solitary confinement.”
“No, after that.”
“The guards have … other priorities.”
They arrived back at Carol and Judy’s shared cell – and Carol
was nowhere to be seen.
“Uh, hey. What’s happened to Carol?”
Judy asked the guard, who’d stayed with her.
“Oh, you’re
being released, we’ve only come back here to collect your stuff.
Knew I’d forgotten to mention something …”
“We’ve been
released?” Judy asked as she gathered all three of her
belongings. “Why?”
“Some admin error. The system said you’d
been pardoned, and …” he trailed off, then reached into one of
his uniform pockets and pulled out a crumpled pile of bills.
“Oh, here’s some compensation.”
“Was the admin error …
significant?”
“Not really, just you and the high-security axe
murderers were released. Something about it being non-profitable
to keep you here.”
“What about the risk to society?”
“Society? Should be fine, as long as it makes money the system
will work. Have faith in the market, it will fix everything.”
“Except for, like … poverty or stuff like that, though; right?”
“Poverty? There’s no poverty here because it’s not profitable.”
“So you feed the homeless.”
“No. They kill the homeless.
Can’t be poor when you’re dead.”
By this point, Judy and the
guard had reached the front desk, where Judy was given some
clothes and asked to changed, then her prison badge was taken
from her and she walked out the door. Carol was waiting outside.
“Did I miss much?”
“No, not much,” Carol replied after the
women hugged. “Antonia’s found the Corporates’ secret warehouse
on the riverbank and is investigating. May be able to bring down
the Government but no, other than that, not much.”
Carol said
these things without thinking, without looking around and
entirely without regard for the guy standing behind a nearby
tree who raised a hand to his mouth and then spoke.
“Agent
Nine here; the lawyers seem to know something. Maybe that’s a
good line of inquiry.”
Doug walked into the Corporate Senate, not
entirely expecting to ever walk out again. He had only been in
the large, vaulted room three times before; once on his
coronation (or that’s what they called it), once after a few too
many drinks when he’d mistaken it for the bathroom and vomited
on the floor; and once after a particularly stressful meeting
when one of his bosses requested coffee and none of the interns
were free. He had a vague memory of the pillars rising the
twenty metre distance between the floor and ceiling, and of the
seats stacked like it would be in an auditorium, around the
lectern in the centre. Doug wasn’t sure the senators at the
highest seats would be able to see much looking down, other than
the dandruff of the guy in front.
“What do you want?” a voice
boomed through a sound system.
“I … I … I …”
“You let her
get away, didn’t you?”
Doug rubbed his head. It still hurt,
even though it had been six hours. “I don’t think of it that
way. I say that she would have escaped whether I let her or
not.”
“Nevertheless we lose a valuable lead on the
Resistance. We were aware of this. Is there anything else you
wish to tell us that we already know?”
“The lawyers were
released from prison with eth murderers. Admin error.”
“Not
an error. They were of no use to us, and profitability must take
a back seat until order is restored. Protests are bad for
business; have you seen the world outside? This is your doing.”
“I can fix it, I swear,” Doug was shaking. He wasn’t sure a plea
for compassion would work with the Corporates.
“We can fix it
too.” There was a pause, until Doug heard some movement behind
him. He found a massive man in a suit standing behind him,
holding a knife.
“Fix it … how?” Doug squeaked.
The man
didn’t even respond, he just stuck a hand out. Doug felt the
knife in his stomach, but didn’t cry out. Nobody that would help
was around.
The Corporate who had stabbed Doug spoke, and it
was the same voice that had been conversing with Doug
beforehand. “Court Secretary, issue a press release. Say there’s
a new Mayor …”
This press release would go on to be
circulated in the media, with commentators expressing mild
optimism at the new situation. There would be tightened laws and
increased Corporate control; but in ways the public liked. Or at
least that’s what the paper said. The new Mayor’s name was
Draigo, and he would inhabit Doug’s old office.
Antonia found herself in a large warehouse.
There was machinery on the floor, but a very high ceiling meant
that the equipment (which was reasonable in size) would have
looked out of place in the room if Antonia had been higher
enough off the ground to see it. She wandered around for about
an hour in between the equipment, wondering what each piece of
tech actually did. Which was okay, because nobody else was
around. The door had been unlocked, too. Either breathtaking
ignorance, or blinding arrogance on the Corporates’ part.
She
rounded a bend between what looked like two lathes, and
encountered a small man in a courier uniform and baseball cap.
“Uhh,” Antonia wondered, until the man shushed her.
“We
aren’t supposed to be here. I’m with the Resistance, and you’re
a valuable asset. Do you know what this stuff does?”
Antonia
shrugged, taking the man’s previous shushing more seriously than
he might’ve intended.
“It looks like the equipment they used
to make the bubble. The one the city’s inside.”
“Yeah. But
what’s it doing here, in a secret warehouse outside the city?”
“True, it’s almost like they’re hiding something.”
“Don’t get
sarcastic with me. You’re the Resistance guy, so clearly
something’s up. What’s your name, by the way?”
“Diego,”
replied Diego, and Antonia suspected he was lying.
“Right. So
how much longer are we gonna be in this clearly-dodgy warehouse
before we report this stuff?”
Diego didn’t respond, because
he’d found an old piece of paper lying on the floor. He picked
it up and read it, turning it over carefully, then spoke.
“See, told you they were hiding something.” Diego stated,
flatly, as he read some notes off a battered piece of paper,
then he passed it over. Antonia looked at the words, then
gasped. The equipment in the lab hadn’t been for the bubble at
all. It had been for a meteor that struck the Earth ten years
ago. The meteor that caused the Event.
Diego had already
moved to his phone. “Put this in a newspaper, now. Don’t care
which one; ‘Corporates
caused the Event. The Event was a human-engineered meteor strike
that massively decimated key crops and left humanity reliant on
the corporates for support and infrastructure. This system was
easily implemented on scared humans who then were quick to fall
in line when strict rules were imposed.’
Over the course
of the car journey back to civilisation with Diego, Antonia
heard the fallout of the Resistance’s press release – small
ripples like the restarting of the protesting and public outcry;
to larger ripples like the fact the Government were being sued
for unprofitability. How exactly the case for unprofitability
was structured wasn’t completely clear, but it had something to
do with public confidence affecting the markets and business
confidence, which would in turn push the profit margins …
anywhere at all. Which would be bad. Or something. The guy was
talking economic bollocks that Antonia didn’t understand. Which
kind of related to the whole situation, now she thought of it
from the back of the Resistance’s vehicle. She didn’t know what
she was doing anymore.
She was led to a darkened room with no
windows and only a single bulb in the middle of a large table
meant to seat about twenty people. There were maybe ten people
already there, just talking amongst themselves in low whispers
that suggested they were doing something wrong. One of the
people pointed her to a seat and she took it, sitting down just
as her driver started the meeting.
“So, we got her – and the
news that the Corporates have been manipulating the climate to
suit their agenda.”
“Do we have receipts?” One of the other
members – faceless due to the lack of adequate light, called out
from across the room.
“Receipts? This isn’t a petty argument
or a return of a product.”
“Why not, we’re returning the
Government, because it’s terrible.”
“What’s the warranty
like?”
“Not sure but we have warrants to search through their
offices.” The person arguing with Diego stated, and Antonia
began to realise the scale of the plan; since the statement’s
release they’d started a lawsuit and already gotten the go-ahead
for a lawsuit, and then begun collecting evidence.
But that
would mean …
“Antonia, tell us what they did to you, and what
you found.” Judy’s voice; calm, yet authoritative.
“Wha –
what are you doing here? And, um, it was just a warehouse, large
and mostly filled with machines it looked like they hadn’t used
in a while. And, um, they kidnapped me and wanted to record a
message but I escaped. Had to threaten to flash a guy, though.”
“So the Corporates have had this plan since the Event.” Judy
mused, then carried on, still lost in thought; “the guy that
picked me up said they had a theory but needed more information
– but wouldn’t say what they had. I’d say this is it.”
“And
we’ll use it against them in the trial?”
“Oh. So you want me
to do that? I mean it’s all good, but you should have asked
first.”
“We just thought it’d be okay …”
“Don’t mistake a
willingness to help for patriotism. That’ll just make you look
like an idiot.”
“But you’ll do it?”
“Yes.”
“What’s the
plan?”
“Well, we know they’ve broken the law; so much that
the law has just changed to allow them to do what they want. We
know they are responsible for the decimation of the environment.
There were conspiracy theories before, but this is the first
concrete proof that we have of something that’s actually gone
wrong.”
“If we negotiate well, we could fix the whole system
in one swoop.”
“In theory. Be careful with blindly hoping
that a system will just fix itself. First you’d need to identify
and fix the reason why it went wrong in the first place. So just
be carefu –” Judy attempted to calm the room full of
revolutionaries, but she entirely failed as an optimistic murmur
spread around the room.
Time spent on preparations passed by in a
blur so the next time Judy looked at her watch, the judge in the
Government’s trial was finishing up her deliberations.
She
looked at her watch because it had been a week since the
deliberations had started. Almost as if they were waiting for
something, or wanted to be noticed.
“Carol, what did the
judge say the last time you spoke with her?”
“She said
something like ‘Get out of the fucking bathroom’, I think?”
“No, I meant to do with the case.”
“We didn’t talk about the
case after she told me to get out of the bathroom.” Carol
smiled, knowing she was winding up Judy, then continued, “she
said the arguments were convincing and she’d have to think about
them for some time.”
“And have the as-yet-anonymous
Government lawyers said anything at all?”
“No, they’ve been
quiet. But what would you expect? They’re probably trying to
cover up their involvement.”
“The warehouse still exists, so
good luck with that.”
Carol gasped. “Unless they’re still
using it for something. What if their plan had a second stage?
That would mean they’d be able to re-exert control.”
Judy
looked at Carol and paused, for thought. “So then what? They
stall us with the trial and …”
Antonia finished the sentence
from the chair next to Carol. “So they were relying on the
theatre of it. Making us wait until they could enact a larger
plan.”
“They won’t be able to anymore, not now that we know
that’s their game.”
The judge returned with her ruling,
immediately after this revelation.
As if on some kind of cue,
the corridor outside the courtroom was suddenly filled with the
noise of protest, protest that had been echoing around the city
for weeks now.
“Your honour …” Judy asked the judge, as she
sat down. There wouldn’t be much time.
“The Government seems
to be trying …” Carol tried to compete with the noise of the
protest and … almost succeeded. They’d started banging on the
door.
If they made it into the room, the Government and its
system of rules would be deemed ineffectual and the whole system
would be implicitly finished.
“I find the defendant,” the
judge declared, looking at Antonia and raising the gavel.
Then the dam broke. With the loud snap, the doors to the
courthouse were prised open by the protestors outside, and chaos
overtook the room before the judge could complete her ruling. It
would be a further two weeks before the case would be finished,
with all the protest and upheaval that followed the interrupted
hearing.
Not guilty.
Antonia was free, of everything. The
case, her criminal charges, the arcane rules she’d been living
by.
Free. Not profitable, perhaps. But
free.