Empire City

by Matt Gallagher

  “Finance,” she said. “Middle management.” If she didn’t get control of the conversation again soon, they’d find her name and look her up online, and then this little gambit of hers would backfire entirely. They’d believe a Tucker daughter would fetch a fortune.

  There was a short cry to her left. Someone tipped forward and landed on their shoulders and forehead, forming a body caret. The two militants looked at each other, then at Mia.

  “See if she’s okay,” Mia said. “I think that’s an older person.”

  They helped the woman up, taking off her blindfold and binding her wrists in her lap, so she could lean back against the wall. Mia thought she recognized her—a college professor and civil rights activist who’d written a book about ethics, citizenship, and the International Legion.

  In the midst of chaos, Mia thought, there is also opportunity. Some famous dead person had said that.

  “You should get her water,” she said, loud enough for the two militants but also for the other hostages. The woman was aware but disoriented. “And maybe a wet towel? It’s really hot.”

  The younger one took a step toward the bar but the older one stopped him. “Hey, officer! You’re not in charge here.”

  Some of the other hostages were stirring and began grumbling; through their pantyhose blindfolds they could see the two armed guards looming over the professor, either feeling bad for her or feeling jealous that she was able to set her back against the wall.

  “You’re in charge, absolutely,” Mia said, recalling from the SERE class the importance of projecting deference. “Just trying to help.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Given how this could look. Like, media-wise.”

  The older veteran’s nostrils flared. “Explain.”

  “Well. You have been very professional. But say this turns out to be serious, heatstroke, a concussion or something. Older black woman, mostly white vets… you know how reporters are. They might make it racial.”

  “We’re trying to recruit more people of color.” The younger militant looked upset. “We have a few Asians and Latinos. A Haitian runs our community force.”

  “I’m a doctor.” One of the bound hostages spoke up. “I can check on her!”

  The hostage next to him said, “Stop. You’re a dentist.”

  “Everyone calm down!” the older militant shouted, pointing his rifle into the air. “We got this.” He looked back at Mia. “The Mayday Front supports people of all colors, creeds, and orientations. We work for the good of all warfighters. For anyone who’s done their part.”

  “I know that,” Mia said. “But will citizens unfamiliar with your movement?”

  Choice passed through the militants like wildfire. Soldiers loved to complain about the decision making of their sergeants and officers. It was a proud tradition, one ancient as battle itself. But Mia had seen this quizzical look before, many times. They either rose to the moment or they didn’t.

  “We should let someone check her out,” the younger one said, putting his hand on the other’s shoulder. “The ma’am, she’s right. This could go bad.”

  “We should’ve brought walkie-talkies,” the older one said, mostly to himself. “No one ever listens to me.” Then he said he was going to find their medic to treat the professor, which really meant asking someone else for guidance.

  “Watch them close,” he told the other militant. “Back in ten.”

  And just like that, Mia Tucker cut down the enemy force by half.

  * * *

  Mia took a shallow, measured breath and sequenced through possible next steps. She’d caught some luck, being left the green militant instead of the skeptical one. If the professor was playing at illness, or better yet wasn’t, that would keep him distracted. Which would free her up to start communicating with the nearest hostages and gauging who could see, who could move their wrists, et cetera…

  “Psst. Mia.”

  The whisper was soft as light and she thought she’d imagined it until it tickled at her ears a second time. “Mia. It’s me.”

  She turned her head to the right and saw nothing. She turned her head to the left and saw nothing. She loosed a small cough, hoping, trying impossibly to convey: What do you want?

  It was Sebastian, the invisible man. He’d escaped, somehow, and was creeping around the ballroom. She wanted to tell him to stop, to go away, that she was in the middle of something and that she’d had training for this something and while it hadn’t been a lot of training it was still better than no training and she was making progress and that sometimes the best action was inaction especially around jumpy young men with guns and whatever it was he thought he was doing, he needed to stop, time now.

  But she couldn’t say that. She couldn’t say anything. The militant guard was still ten feet from her, giving the professor a glass of water and two pain relievers from a cargo pocket.

  “I’m going to slide a butter knife under your dress on the right side,” Sebastian whispered. “Don’t worry, I won’t look or anything.”

  Mia wheezed between her teeth and tensed her back but she sensed the knife already placed and Sebastian already gone. She raised her eyes again and the young veteran was looking over at her, naked questions rolling across the flat berm of his face.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing,” she said, knowing it was too late. For the should-be Mormon pamphleteer, the quiet fear of being left alone now metastasized into panic. Because of Sebastian, she would be the focus of it. He walked over in four steps and hauled her upward with a jerk of her elbow. The butter knife lay between her feet, conspicuous as a bazooka. The militant looked at it for a few seconds, blinking. Mia regretted not telling him that she was pregnant, for the same reason she hadn’t earlier. Babies scared boys.

  “Ma’am,” the militant said, careful and conscious, which impressed her. The type of wars America fought in the world needed more soldiers like him. “I have to take you to the bosses.”

  “I understand,” she said.

  As he put her blindfold back on and led her to the ballroom stage, something inside her twinged again. She knew then that she’d be flying out of that ballroom, her child safe and settled within. No one else here, rich or poor, perpetrator or victim, superpowered or citizen, mattered the way that did.

  * * *

  What followed coalesced even in the moment. This made sequencing the events difficult for Mia, as she was asked to the next day by Bureau investigators. Her mind, her attention, had lain solely on escape. She’d seen the ballroom, yes, she’d heard the ballroom, yes, but had she known it, did she understand it? She thought no, and said so. Disorder was disorder, and disorder was anything but comprehension. She used her power to save her unborn. She did that and she did that alone. Anything else that happened was extraneous, disruptions for her captors and disruptions she was thankful for, but beyond her.

  Still, she tried.

  The young veteran walked her to the center stage, her hands bound behind her. She could see through the pantyhose blindfold, but not well. He’d secured it tighter than before. The governor, General Collins, and the detained celebrities had been cobbled together and put on their knees. Across from them, Pete Swenson and two others were being held in the same position but with rifles fixed on them. These men have forgotten their training, she remembered thinking, because an American soldier never raises a weapon unless they intend on firing it. Veteran Zero began shouting about the movie man, where was the movie man? One of the militants said they’d taken him to the bathroom but now they couldn’t find him, just his pile of clothes. That’d made Veteran Zero shout even more; who loses someone in a seersucker suit, he wanted to know, his protests bouncing off the ballroom ceilings. Then he’d slapped one of the kneeling men across the face, loosing a trembling echo of flesh and teeth.

  Her militant escort had cringed with the sound. Then he’d asked someone nearby what to do with Mia. “She’s been acting up,” he explained. “Found a knife o
n her.”

  “Put her with the politicos,” came the response. Then, “Wait.”

  Her blindfold was removed and another veteran in urban camo with rolled-up sleeves approached, studying her features like she was a zoo animal. The scrolled words “Essayons” and “Sapper” slashed across his forearms in angry, violent ink. A bald eagle tore across the side of his neck, Old Glory draped from its mouth. His interest ceded to recognition.

  “Captain Tucker,” he said. “I remember you. Your blue-blood family, too. You all are rich as hell.”

  He turned to alert Veteran Zero. Then, in something like a string, maybe, with pieces and beads almost certainly missing: a clash. A cry. A body on the ground, a body in urban camo. That body’s gun, floating, its sling free as a snake. Pete shouting, “Now, hostage! Fire fucking now,” his binds breaking apart like papier-mâché. Then Pete crashing into a group of militants. Unless the binds came off before that, and unless the crashing into happened before the floating gun. Either way, after and then, then and after, a shot fired. A shot, single and alone and assured. Then shots, all at once, many and together and hysterical.

  The silver tree of American Service glowing bright behind it all.

  The militant, the young veteran, the chandelier-admirer, the Mormon pamphleteer, whoever he was and whoever he wasn’t, a man of multitudes or a simpleton fool, falling to the ground next to her, blood spilling out of his throat and his eyes slipping up to her for—what, exactly? She didn’t know. She didn’t care, either. Because with him dying at her feet and the others running or standing, or fighting or figuring, she could rise and rise away, and that’s what she did, a swimmer’s ascent through air, finding a stained-glass windowpane cracked open at the top of the ballroom and moving through it, into the summer night. She flew and she flew and she didn’t stop flying until she knew for sure it was just them, her and her unborn, gone and alone in the black sanctuary of sky. Then she took them home.

  Riverbrook Sixth Grade History Exam (page 3)

  The Palm Sunday attacks occurred on Sunday, March 28, 1998, and were a series of coordinated terrorist attacks carried out on what American target(s) in Federal City? A) The National Cathedral

  B) The metro rapid transit system

  C) The Nixon Memorial

  D) All of the Above

  During the New Greco-Turkish War, who/what set off the nuclear device in Crete? A) Communists retaliating for American support of the Russian Revolution

  B) Greek radicals

  C) Turkish fascist militia

  D) U.S. military system malfunction

  Which singer turned politician served as President Haig’s vice president from 1984 to 1988? A) Bing Crosby

  B) Frank Sinatra

  C) Gene Kelly

  D) Elvis Presley

  During the Persian Coup, who made off with the deposed shah’s gold bullion? A) Kurdish rebels

  B) Shiastan militants

  C) The Persian Popular Front

  D) Unknown

  President Richard Nixon’s “Grand Bargain” with Chairman Mao included what? A) A new trade deal between the USA and China

  B) The end of the U.S. Navy’s blockade in the Taiwan Strait

  C) The end of Chinese military and economic support of North Vietnam

  D) All of the Above

  CHAPTER 12

  XAVIER STATION WAS a military processing center, one of the largest in Empire City. It had marked the beginning of Jean-Jacques’s military career, where he’d gone in high school to meet recruiters about the Legion, to learn how a fat immigrant could become a citizen by Spilling Blood for America. It’d mark the end of his career, too, someday: it was where area veterans went to face their medical tribunal.

  He’d seen a veteran with troubles the day he went to sign his enlistment papers. The man wore a camo boonie cap and had black pins for eyes. Both his legs were bandaged stumps and he kept sipping from a cheap plastic bottle filled with something the color of maple. A woman had been wheeling him around, a wife or sister or cousin, a plastered look of both resignation and relief across her face. They know, Jean-Jacques thought, understanding even then. They know he’s gonna fail and get sent to a colony.

  It was necessary, of course. America couldn’t have tens of thousands of vets with troubles walking around, breaking the peace. This was better for everyone. Like President Rockefeller had once said: “The colonies aren’t a great solution. But they are the best one.”

  Still, though, teenage Jean-Jacques had thought. Necessary things can be sad things, too.

  Barricades had been set up three blocks out from Xavier Station, so Jean-Jacques turned around, parked, then slipped in like sand through backyards and an alley. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected but it hadn’t been what he found. Emmanuel wasn’t joking, or exaggerating. There’d been a riot at the station’s gates.

  The night oozed police. There were dozens of them, some in uniform, others in jeans and tees, still others in cumbersome SWAT gear. Siren lights swathed the block in incandescent whites and reds. A mound of confiscated weapons had formed on the building’s concrete steps; pipes, bats, some switchblades, and a single flash-bang, listless as straw. One of the pipes glinted blue under the moon, smeared with blood.

  The air fizzed tangy bleach—tear gas, Jean-Jacques thought, nothing like it. A large homemade painting of a grim-faced soldier tied between two poles rested against the school gates, an act of tenderness that defied everything around it. It was in the Artibonite style, all bright impressionism and surreality. Loose cries and moans filled the dark, a serene anti-peace settling in. A handful of paramedics treated injuries, but most of the bodies scattered across the sidewalk were being helped by neighborhood people with homemade first-aid kits.

  A man in rags was leaning against the gates. He was breathing hard through his nose and still clutched a trash can lid as a shield. “What happened here?” Jean-Jacques asked him.

  “Holy blood. Holy redemption,” the man in rags said. His voice carried the starry lilt of a mystic.

  “Uh-huh.” Jean-Jacques ignored that madness and kept walking.

  Order had been cleaved from chaos, pockets of young men on their knees, surrounded by their less arrest-worthy friends. A collection of brown and black teenagers wearing flat-brimmed baseball caps held the most handcuffed, and the most accompanying police. Across the street were eight or nine white boys wearing new tan boots and black backpacks. Their clothes were nice, prim even, and a cold stun had sealed along their faces. They were new to this, whatever this had been. Adjacent to the weapons cache, a uniformed cop spitting fury was being held back by his precinct comrades. He wanted at one of the white boys. Another large group was too far away for Jean-Jacques to make out but seemed of particular concern to the plainclothes police. He didn’t see Emmanuel’s bird frame anywhere.

  One of the white boys in boots made a break for it, straight at Jean-Jacques. He’d slipped the cuffs from his thin wrists like grease. The police shouted after him but didn’t seem interested in a foot chase. Jean-Jacques reacted on instinct. He leveled the kid with a quick clothesline to the chest. The kid dropped to the ground, too stunned to do anything but hold at his neck and gasp.

  “Thanks!” Two plainclothes cops moved to the runner, cuffing his hands behind his back with emphasis. Jean-Jacques turned to move away, wondering why he’d mechanically sided with the fucking law. One of the plainclothes looked up.

  “Oh my God. It’s you. The Volunteer, right? Dash.”

  The young, fine-boned policeman stuck out his hand. Jean-Jacques gripped it with a quick squeeze.

  “You—you wouldn’t remember. But I was with 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marines. In Cyprus? I briefed you on targeting packets a couple years back.”

  “Semper Fi,” Jean-Jacques said. Of course he didn’t remember this babylon who’d been a marine. “Good to see you again.” But a warfighter connection could be of some use tonight. “The hell happened here, brother?”

  The
policeman shared what he knew. The ECPD had been alerted to the anti-colony demonstration; there’d been a recent increase in them, for reasons unknown. They tended to be loud and acrimonious, a lot of sound, a lot of excitement, but nothing more than that. Never violent. A great way to earn overtime, the policeman explained. Tonight, though—tonight had been different. He’d shown up late to the scene, just as the fists began.

  “The protestors started it,” the policeman said. “Definitely.”

  “With who?”

  “Oh. You’ve been away. The Sheepdogs, of course.”

  The Sheepdogs? A group of ex-military and retired police. They considered themselves keepers of peace, guardians, in a way, men with both a history of service and plenty of free time. They followed around various protests across the city, across the country, to fill the gaps of order. Protect private property. Serve as augmentee security for local police. Citizen’s arrests. That sort of thing.

  “Some can be assholes,” the policeman told Jean-Jacques. “Have a hard time remembering they’re not still in uniform. But they mean well. And they’re handy in spots. Like tonight.”

  Jean-Jacques hadn’t come to Xavier Station to talk about wrinkled-ass babylons playing at the past. He asked if the man had heard of the Mayday Front.

  The policeman shook his head. “Protest groups, especially the anti-colony ones, they’re kinda all over the place. Always a new group, a new name. Always splitting into different factions. It’s what the angry left does.”

  Jean-Jacques thanked the man for his time and kept moving. Radical war veterans attacking the homeland? Organized peacemonger militias? A gang of ex-police that called themselves fucking Sheepdogs? It was tough to keep straight. Get me back to combat, he thought. Get me back to the damn war.

  Still. Some of it seemed familiar to Jean-Jacques. America, abroad, it was all the same, even as the rules varied and the players changed. One name to the game. Pouvwa. Power.