Of course, that wouldn’t make an ounce of difference when it came to what people thought. I’d disrupted the carefully maintained veneer of security that most people believed was solid and reliable, and for that, I’d be vilified and hated as if I were the Devil incarnate.
Then again, I was just getting started. By the time I was done, hatred wouldn’t be their primal response toward me.
Fear would be.
I took a few minutes and drove to a local sub shop and grabbed a sandwich and Coke from the drive-thru, and then returned to my post by the corner. The cop car hadn’t moved. I sat there enjoying a turkey sub with extra mayo and provolone when my watch alarm went off at noon. I took a moment to finish chewing, and then dialed the school.
At this hour, my kids were supposed to be in the cafeteria, along with most of the student body. There was little to no danger that anyone would get seriously hurt. I expected the school district would handle the crisis better than the untamed masses at the mall. After all, these kids practiced fire drills as a matter of routine. Somewhat surprising that the grown-ups didn’t remember those skills themselves.
This time, the explosion was a lot closer. I saw it as well as heard it. An enormous black cloud billowed into the air above the roofs of the staid, suburban houses before me. Seconds later, a loud boom washed over my camper, rattling the windows and reverberating in the cab. Somewhere, I heard a cacophony of car alarms begin honking obnoxious panic to anyone who cared to listen.
I didn’t immediately remember to finish chewing my sub. I set down my drink and turned up the radio.
“This is WPGI with a breaking news alert. A second explosion has occurred in the city of Ontica today. Preliminary reports are flooding in right now, but we can confirm that the explosion happened at the John Willick Middle School on 1180 Broad Street. We have no reports of casualties just yet, but this does appear to be the work of a serial bomber, allegedly Mr. Gerrold Smith. Mr. Smith was sentenced this past week for the armed assault of two Federal agents and a sheriff’s deputy serving a warrant at his property in May. Mr. Smith escaped custody when he attacked a court bailiff and shot the judge in his case, the Honorable Judge Julia Rawles. He later firebombed the courthouse where he had holed up after the assault in what police are now saying was a bid to escape. This morning witnessed the first attack—the first bomb attack, that is—upon civilian targets when an explosive device detonated at the Pyramid Mall just one hour ago. Sources within the police department have informed us that Mr. Smith has provided a list of demands, and has indicated that he will continue to strike civilian targets until his demands are met.
“Again, we have a confirmed report that a second explosion has now gone off at the John Willick Middle School on 1180 Broad Street. We have no reports of casualties or injuries of any kind, but we will keep you updated as we are updated.
“This just in: we’ve now learned that the chief of police, Captain George Tobol is asking—oh, wait a minute—we have a live feed? Okay. We’re going live to Captain George Tobol of the Ontica Police Department.”
I heard the sound of a hastily assembled news cast, and witnessed the same unfolding on the television set next to me. I took a long sip of cola and listened as the chief of police explained himself to the city.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, members of the press. We ask that you hold your questions till the end. Captain Tobol?”
“Thank you. I have a prepared statement. In view of the imminent threat that Mr. Smith poses to the community, we are asking people to go home. Make no unnecessary travel. Stay indoors. Avoid public places like libraries, post office, shopping malls, grocery stores, and restaurants. I have spoken with the superintendent of schools, and all classes for all grade levels have been cancelled for the remainder of the day. Buses will begin transporting your children to you as soon as possible. We want to ask that you do not go to the schools to retrieve your kids yourselves. We will get them home as safely and as quickly as is humanly possible.
“We also have had unconfirmed reports of looting at the Pyramid mall, and other places as well. Be assured that anyone seeking to take advantage of this crisis in this fashion will be dealt with severely.
“Regarding the explosion at the James Willick Middle School. Ah, preliminary reports—and I stress these are preliminary—suggest that the explosive device was hidden within the administrative wing of the school, near to the electrical panels and the gas main. The initial blast created a secondary explosion when the gas lines ruptured, resulting in significant structural damage to the facility. The phone lines were also disrupted in the attack, limiting our communications to cell phone. We do know that the bomb was evidently set to go off at noon, when most of the kids are at lunch on the far side of the building. We don’t have any evidence that the children themselves were targeted, or were ever a target, and while we do have some initial reports of casualties and severe injuries, none of them at this time are thought to be children. The attack appears to have been directed at the school, and not the students.
“To Mr. Smith himself, we would like to say the following: we have heard you. We have your list of demands, and we are working on them as fast as we can. We’re asking you, please, please give us the time we need. Please. There is no need for any further loss of life. If you wish to speak to us directly, we are ready to talk, to listen to what you have to say. Thank you. That is all.”
Chapter 17
I turned off the radio before the bedlam of reporters started assailing him with their questions. I already knew what most of them wanted to ask. There was nothing to be gained by listening to questions like, “Captain Tobol, what progress have you made toward catching this madman?” or “Can you tell us about the demands he’s made?” or even, “If Mr. Smith had already demonstrated a willing capacity to attack Federal law enforcement officials, why wasn’t there adequate security at his sentencing hearing?”
I’m sure that last question resonated in more than a few minds. People always want someone to blame—someone they can hold responsible. It’s too easy to blame the “bad” guy, and so they look to blame the people who should’ve known what the bad guy was up to. I remember witnessing this after 9-11. Couldn’t just blame the terrorists for hijacking the planes, no. We’ve got to go after the military and intelligence agencies and the President himself for not gazing sufficiently deep into his crystal ball to predict what was going to happen. It’s not enough that the law enforcement agencies in the United States are so good at catching criminals. We expect clairvoyance, too. We want them to stop crimes before they even happen, and arrest anyone who even contemplates disturbing our somnambular complacency.
This is probably what irked me more than anything. There was a reason the Food and Drug Administration came after my son’s milk supply, and it had nothing to do with whether or not the stuff was safe for him. Hell, there was a reason we had an FDA to begin with—and it had very little to do with real safety, and everything to do with crafting the illusion of safety.
The American people let the FDA happen. Just like they’ve let all other government agencies develop and grow. We whine like petulant children that the world is a dangerous place, and resolutely deny the responsibility we share as thinking adults to face those dangers head-on ourselves. Instead, we demand that “somebody ought to do something about it,” and “there ought to be a law!” without ever thinking that passing yet another law and asking someone else to do for us what we should do for ourselves only results in an expanding government at the expense of liberty.
You might ask why I bombed a shopping mall. What better symbol of our culture’s commitment to narcissistic complacency is there than these monuments to consumerism filling our landscapes and offering shiny baubles to those who want to pretend that the acquisition of these things is singularly crucial to happiness?
I suppose I went after the school for much the same reason. As laudable as literacy is, just when did it happen that education became the responsibility of t
he state, and not of the parents who produced the children in the first place? Schools are nothing more than artificial incubators of our nation’s future consumers—those naïve souls buying those baubles in the shopping mall and electing astute foxes who promise to keep them warm and well-fed, and never stopping to ask harder questions like, “What is the meaning of it all?”
The whole system was sick and dehumanizing. Was I just supposed to roll over and take it lying down when they stole my kids from me? Was I just supposed to throw my hands in the air and give up when corporate greed and government collude to turn my family into consumers of poison?
In a flash of insight, I’d seen it all and suddenly understood what was being done to us. It was as if Mary’s death had pierced the veil over my eyes, and I’d witnessed the hidden machinations of this corpulent parasite we called a society. Toxins that had already killed their mother would now be fed to the children without any regard for what it was doing to them all because some corporate lobbyist wanted to grease the hand of a career politician and make sure his company kept raking in the dough at the expense of my child’s health and safety. God forbid anyone should step outside the main stream and try to live more naturally, more organically—to actually live and breathe free air and enjoy the abundance of the earth rather than the mechanized glop of chemicals spoon fed to generation after generation of zombified eaters.
In my early days in Texas, I’d spent some time on a ranch. I clearly remember a ranch hand holding out to me a handful of feed and asking me if I knew what was really in it. I was only eight or nine at the time and uncertain how the world really worked. I’d shook my head, and he proceeded to blow my mind.
“It’s cow,” he’d said. His fingers traced the pellets in his palm. “All of it ground up, processed, packaged, and shipped back here to feed the next generation. See, they take the cow to the butcher, carve off the steaks, grind up the rest as hamburger meat or dog chow or whatever, and what they can’t use they mix with grain and turn into these tiny pellets.” He then turned and pointed to the animals dutifully munching through feed bags in their dung encrusted stalls and said, “They’re eating their parents. The stuff really fattens them up, too.”
Of course, that was in the days before we learned the value of grain-fed, free range beef, or the dangers of bovine spongiform encephalopathy. I truly think that if mad cow disease hadn’t been able to cross over to human beings, we’d still have no problem feeding the cows to each other, instead of making sure that cows eat grass the way God intended.
We still haven’t figured out that the same immutable laws apply to us as well. How long, I wondered, before some enterprising company did something along the lines of the Soylent Corporation in that old Charlton Heston movie, and started turning our dead into food? More to the point, would anyone still see it as troublesome? Or are we all so thoroughly catatonic that nothing can shake us from our self-induced comas?
I was awake, now. I might have been the only one, but I was aware. I saw what we were doing to our kids, our neighbors, ourselves. I saw how parasitic our government and corporate culture had become. The whole of our society was like the Greek myth of Ouroboros—that stupid snake eating its own tail, consuming itself in ever tightening circles until it finally disappears in a final bite of self-destruction.
I saw it all. And for just once, I wanted to give the people in this city a chance to see it for themselves as well, to recognize that the madness wasn’t in me, but in themselves for allowing such a society in the first place. Our country had been founded on we the people, and only we the people could take it back. After all, it was we the people who screwed it up, too.
I finished the last of my sub with these thoughts floating in my mind, and wiped my mouth on a napkin. Picking up my phone, I dialed Mark Durant’s number.
“What do you think?” I said when he picked up the phone. “Think I got their attention?”
“Mr. Smith,” said a voice I recognized. “You did indeed. You got our attention.”
“Detective Rogan. To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“We were hoping you’d like to talk.”
“Indeed I do. I saw you at the press conference. Looks like Captain Tobol stole the limelight.”
He ignored my jab. “Then you know we’re trying to meet your demands.”
“Yeah. I also know a snow job when I see one.”
“No snow job. I promise you.”
“You’re lying to me. Ain’t no way you’re going to give into my demands.”
“Well that’s just not true, Gerrold. But let’s say for sake of argument that you’re right and there is no plane, no van, and no million dollars. What then? What do you have to gain by all this?”
“Maybe I just love a good fire.”
“Now who’s lying?”
I raised my eyebrows. Either Rogan was losing it, or he was changing his strategy. The last thing I expected from him was an accusation. “You sound like a man with a theory.”
He chuckled. I could hear the nervousness in his voice. The stress of it all must’ve been getting to him. Doubtless, his job was on the line. “No, no theories. Just an observation. You’ve got no real history of pyromania—at least none that I can see. That, and the thing about serial arsonists—the ones who do it cause they love a good fire, as you say—they always like to stay around and watch. You’re not doing that, though. Are you?”
“How would you know?”
“Well, we know you’re driving a red, Dodge camper with stolen plates—the ones you took off that drug dealer’s Camaro. And we know that you’re casing the home of Don and Janet Bauer, the foster family that’s been caring for your children. In fact, you’re parked around the corner from there right now.”
I felt the blood drain from my face. They’d been tailing me. Probably caught sight of me after I’d parked down the street from that undercover cop. He must’ve ran the tags before I left. I should’ve known better!
“Gerrold? You still with me?”
“All right. So you know where I am. You must know what I want, then, too.”
“Yeah. It’s not happening, Gerrold.”
“I want my kids back, damnit!”
“And I want my city safe. What we have here is good old fashioned Mexican stand-off. You’re a Texan. You know how these things usually end.”
“Usually with everyone getting shot.”
“We’d really like to avoid that.”
“I’m sure you would.”
“How about if we let you see your kids? Speak to them.”
“You know we’ve already played this game. It didn’t work out so hot for you back then. You can only close the net so far, and then you go and dangle my kids in front of me as bait, hoping I’ll walk willingly into prison for you. What I’m telling you right here, right now, is that that is not going to happen. I will not come quietly. And I will not lay down my arms. You’re going to return my kids to me, and you’re going to give me what I want—a clear path to freedom.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Because I’m not afraid to die, and I’m not afraid to take out other people with me. Innocent people, Rogan. They’re blood will be on your hands. ‘Cause you know what you’ve got to do to prevent it.”
There was silence on the other end. I checked my watch. It said 12:23. Less than forty minutes before the next bomb was due to go off. I only had two more, plus the final device I’d squirreled away against unforeseen contingencies such as this. But they didn’t know that. In fact, they had no idea how many bombs I had, or how big they were. And even though they probably had a couple snipers with a bead on me somewhere, they couldn’t take the chance that I wouldn’t detonate the rest of the bombs. That was the only reason I wasn’t dead or in handcuffs right now.
“Gerrold,” Rogan finally said. “I want you to listen to me carefully. We know you don’t actually want to kill people. The bomb blast at the mall was angled outward, toward the windows. Made a big, spectac
ular explosion, but it wasn’t nearly as deadly as it could’ve been had you turned it inward. And then there’s the explosion at the school. Designed to knock out the phone lines and the electricity—and I think it was just dumb luck that you set it near the gas main. I somehow doubt you even knew it was nearby. And you set it off at the lunch hour, when everybody’s on the other side of the building. Again. Big explosion. Lots of damage. Minimal injuries and no fatalities.
“But what really tore it for me is how you handled that drug dealer. Two officers show up at the motel, knocking on doors, looking for you, and inadvertently run into a drug scene where a young woman has just overdosed. That tweaker shoots and kills one of my officers and injures the second, and what do you do? Do you come out and thank him for saving you the trouble? No. Instead, you shoot the drug dealer, secure the scene, and provide first aid to my officer—probably saving his life. Those aren’t the actions of a wild lunatic hell-bent on killing a lot of people.”
“You forgot about the farmer.”
“You told Mark Durant that it was an accident, that he came at you, and your gun accidentally discharged. I find nothing in the evidence to dispute that. You probably tried to crash out on his property and he surprised you. Then he recognized you before you get away. We know you took his cell phone. In fact, we pinged its location, and we know for a fact that it’s still in the truck with you right now. It’s fairly easy to see how all this has just snowballed out of control. Don’t you think it’s time to put a stop to it?”
I shook my head, wondering if he could see me. “All right, Rogan. You got me. I’m not a lunatic. What I am is desperate. Maybe I don’t want all this to go down as it’s gone down, but don’t think for a moment that I won’t see it through to the bitter end. You have taken my kids from me. They’re all I care about. I have nothing else to lose.”
Spilled Milk, no. 1 Page 10
