by Unknown
I do not work late at the office; last to arrive and first to leave, that is my privilege from my authority and rank. But that day, I should have sensed that something was amiss. I arrived, and there was an email waiting from the Camden Health and Safety Executive. It was addressed directly to me, which was unusual, as I only ever give out my assistant’s email address, not my own, and never to anyone who might be a bother. It said; Dear Mr Parch, please be aware – this evening, an Inspector will call.
I forwarded it to my assistant with the note – deal with this fucking shite. She apologised and I deleted it from my computer, but then, when I looked again, the email had returned, still on my screen. Please be aware – this evening, an Inspector will call.
I deleted the email again, and then deleted my ‘deleted mail’ box, just to be sure, and went to take a meeting with a client who deserves to lose, who will, of course, win, because that’s why he hired me.
When I came back, the email was there. I thought it had been re-sent, but the time stamp on it was the same: received, 9a.m., Camden Health and Safety Executive. An Inspector will call.
I dismissed it as a computer thing, but it irritated me, that something on my computer should be disobeying me. I shouted at the tech boys, who apologised, said they’d look into it, and so I went on lunch, and left them to it, but when I returned they hadn’t finished, so I shouted some more, and they ran away, and I sat down, and ignored it.
Fuck the Health and Safety Executive, I told myself. I’m Jeffrey Parch. I’m going home.
I made to leave the office at 4.30 p.m., to avoid the rush hour. But as I went to go, the coffee machine by the door began to shudder and whine, a sound of crunching metal from inside its shell. I didn’t worry about it – not my problem – but as I walked by, it suddenly gave a shriek and from every nozzle at once spurted boiling grey coffee, splattering across my shirt. The burning was only a second but when I looked down, my shirt was covered, ruined. I swore at the machine, at my secretary, at anyone who happened to be near-by, and stormed back into my office. I didn’t have a clean shirt at work, hadn’t ever needed one, so my assistant ran out to fetch me another shirt. Beyond my office window, I could see rain begin to fall, thick swarms that twisted and spun against the wind, and I looked down to see grey bodies heading for the Piccadilly Line, umbrellas and newspapers over their head, and swore again because now I’d have to push through the commuters, fight my way through rush hour, the chance for an easy time, gone.
My assistant took nearly an hour to return, with three tasteless shirts that were too tight round the cuffs, too loose round the neck. I told her she was a stupid bint who couldn’t understand a tape measure if she tried, and she ran away, went to hide in the toilet.
I pulled the blind down across my office window, and changed my shirt. By the time I was done, the floor was deserted. It seemed I had only taken a few moments to put on my new clothes, but in that time, unseen behind the blind, the people had gone. Computers were silent, lights were dimmed, even the cleaning ladies didn’t seem to be bothering for the night. The only sound was the rain, pounding now against the window, audible against the silence where computer fans and ringing telephones should have been.
Fuck it, I thought.
I need a drink.
I picked up my briefcase and headed for the door, but as I put my hand on the panel, the door opened of its own accord, swinging inwards and forcing me back.
A woman stood in the frame, a grey satchel at her side, a pair of glasses pushed high up the line of her nose. She had dark brown hair, freckles across her cheeks, a cheap, bad suit of some thick wool, and a clipboard under one arm. A badge hung about her neck, with a green cord and black writing and as I stared she said, ‘Good evening, Mr Parch. I am Ms. Reddish. I am the Inspector.’
I’d almost forgotten about the email, and now, late, irritated and stinking still of cheap coffee, I couldn’t have cared less. ‘Fine,’ I blurted. ‘My assistant is crying in the toilet – she’ll deal with you.’
So saying, I made to move past her, but she put her hand against my chest, not hard, but firm enough to stop me in my tracks. In truth, I was so amazed I would have stopped anyway; not in all my years of law and negotiation had anyone ever so brazenly asserted themselves against me. ‘Mr Parch,’ she said, ‘I believe the young lady, your assistant, has already gone home. Indeed, it is you, Mr Parch, I am here to see.’
‘That’s fine,’ I grunted, side-stepping round her. ‘Make an appointment.’
‘I have an appointment. The appointment is now.’
‘No it’s not.’ I was already sidling round her, but this insufferable woman blocked the door. ‘I’ve got a very important meeting…’
‘No you don’t, Mr Parch. You have a type-three summoning circle inscribed beneath the carpet on your office floor, and two unlicensed mystic objects that I can directly observe about your person, to wit…’ She indicated with the tip of a biro pulled from the clasp of her clipboard, wielding it like a movie star with a cigarette holder, ‘…your ring with its charged grade three glamour, and your pendant of mystic warding.’
I guess you could say that, for the first time in a long, long while, I was surprised.
‘May I come in, Mr Parch?’ she said.
***
Who becomes Health Inspectors?
Who wakes up one day and decides that that’s who they want to be?
Fucking society. We live in fucking fear of crossing the street, of driving a car, of saying hello, saying goodbye, summoning a gremlin, blessing a chair, all because something might go wrong. Like we’re children, too dumb to know that every bacteria-swimming breath we take, may be our last.
Health Inspectors.
They don’t make the world a better place.
All they do is take the responsibility away.
***
She said, ‘Have you filled your BI12?’
I said, ‘What the hell’s a BI12?’
She said, ‘I take that as a no.’
I said, ‘Tell me what the fuck it is and I’ll tell you if I’ve filled it.’
‘Your Abjurement in the Workplace Assessment Application.’
‘Well no, I guess I haven’t filled one of those out recently. Maybe my secretary…’
‘The form has to be filled out directly by the applicant. No agents or seconds may act on the applicant’s behalf. Any wizard or other practitioner of the mystic arts who is incapacitated to the point that they cannot fill out form BI12 should not be permitted to invoke lesser demons of the nether reaches.’
She spoke – all the time – with the flat neutrality of a computer, producing its logical results. More; she spoke as though I too were a computer, not a wizard of the hidden circle, capable of understanding things even when they had words of more than three syllables and a mystic sigil stuck on the side. I knew that voice; I’d met lawyers who used it before. It was the level, rational voice of a woman who could say the stupidest fucking things you’ve ever heard, but who thinks, by saying it slow, you might not notice.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘I guess I’d better fill out a BI12. Do you have a copy?’
‘You need first to file an APO23.’
You can play the game, or you can not play the game.
Sometimes playing is the only way to get the prize.
I played.
‘Okay. What’s an APO23?’
‘Application to be registered with the council as a magic practitioner. Once you have filled your APO23 and the appropriate witness declarations, you may fill out your BI12 for the specific branch of mystic enterprise you may be performing in the workplace.’
Witness declarations?’
Her eyes were pale green-grey, and, if she hadn’t been a robot, I might have found them entrancing across a glass of dry white wine. Now they stared at me like I was a cat stuck up a tree, she a dog-loving fireman, and she said, ‘Mr Parch. You wield great mystic power. Do you think it appropriate that you be entrusted wi
th that responsibility without suitable witnesses – respectable citizens – first being called upon to testify to your character and civic spirit?’
‘Never been a problem before.’
‘On the contrary, Mr Parch. It has always been a problem. You simply didn’t realise it until now.’
I ground my teeth, and fixed my smile. ‘Well, Miss,’ pushing the words out between my locked jaw, ‘Why don’t you just leave all the paperwork here and I’ll get it done.’
Her lips thinned. ‘I do not have all the relevant documentation. You must apply to your local council.’
‘Wizardly, or government?’ I quipped.
Quipping was not appreciated, it turned out.
‘I don’t think you understand the severity of the situation, Mr Parch.’
‘Oh but I do.’
‘I’m not convinced of that, Mr Parch. You have violated Health and Safety protocols at work. You have endangered the well-being of your colleagues, of visitors to this abode, and of any mystically attuned adepts who happen to be in the vicinity.’
I shrugged. ‘Guess I didn’t know.’
‘Ignorance of the law is not defence under the law.’
‘Well pardon me, but when the law isn’t written in any of the textbooks…’
‘You will find the Camden Council’s Health and Safety Code clearly spelt out on its website.’
‘How clearly?’
‘Clearly enough, Mr Parch, that your defence fails to impress me.’
I had been sitting in my office chair up to this point, but now I rose, straightening up and, to my satisfaction, observing that I towered over her. ‘Miss…’
‘Reddish.’
‘Miss Reddish,’ I exclaimed, using the voice I usually charged five hundred and fifty pounds an hour for, excluding expenses, ‘I can see you’re just doing your job, and that’s lovely for you. I’m sure you’re very good at it. But I’m a wizard of the hidden circle, master of my art. I have spoken with ghouls and gremlins, spilt blood with the riven-kin of Watford, and shared finest single malt whiskey with the king of the Tuatha de Danaan in the misty court. I’ve heard the death song of the Southend Sirens, conjured goblin gold from beneath the Rotherhithe quays – I represented the Faerie Queen when she sued for fucking defamation! So don’t think you can come in here and lecture me like some fucking virgin schoolmistress.’
I didn’t raise my voice.
I don’t need to raise my voice.
For a moment she stood before me, looking up over the rims of her glasses, clipboard in hand. Then, very carefully, she slid her biro underneath the clip, put her satchel on the desk, opened the front pouch, and slid the clipboard in.
I began to deflate, satisfaction and pride.
She pulled her glasses from her face, folded them up, and tucked them into her jacket pocket.
Then she turned to me, her satchel held before her in both her hands, like a child clutching her homework, and said very simply, ‘And you did this without filing your C199?’
I’m good.
I’m not that good.
My jaw dropped.
‘Mr Parch,’ she continued. ‘You have just made some very serious allegations against yourself. I would ask you, as a courtesy, if you compiled the correct paperwork, but as it is, I’m afraid I must now inform you that you are sanctioned. By the power vested in me, on behalf of the Camden Health and Safety Executive, I invoke paragraph eleven, sub-section three and inform you that as of this moment, you are barred from mystic actions of any kind. Your vision will be blind, your fingers cold, the touch of breath upon your skin will be as ash, and no more shall the grace of your power flow through your veins. Should you wish to appeal against this, you have fourteen days to do so, in writing, at which point a session will be called to further assess your case. Under this circumstance, you may, under the Freedom of Information Act, request a copy of my written report, which I shall draw up with my findings on this case. Do you have any questions?’
I stood there, speechless and dumb. No one silenced me. No one spoke back to me as if my voice were not final. No one had ever tried. No one had ever dared.
She pulled her bag onto her shoulder, nodded her head once, face devoid of any pleasantry at all, and turned, walking to the door.
She put her hand on the handle before I roared,
‘WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?!’
My voice was the thunder of the underground train as it shook the room; my words sent paper flying up from the desk, made the windows hum. I raised my fists and with them came gaseous balls of flame, the black smoke of the dirty bus engine, the stench of burning coal, and as the Inspector half-glanced back at me from the door, I hurled all the strength of my power, all the fire of my blood upon her. She vanished instantly, consumed in a cloud of spinning blue and black, as the carpet crisped and the walls burnt, and when I clenched my fists the flame imploded, collapsing down to a point that sucked in all it touched, compressing it to no more than a pea of shattered carbon, compressed ash.
Then I stood, rocking on the spot, shaking from rage and exertion, my shirt sticky against my back from where the sweat had sprung. As the smoke cleared from the door, I could see the scorch marks running up the wall, past notices reminding the staff to bring fruit for Fruit Fridays, or memos pointing out that the photocopier was not to be abused for personal documents, and to always try to print double-sided. The floor was smouldering and black, and the door hung off one hinge, blasted away at the bottom, and where the Inspector’s ashes should have fallen there stood the Inspector.
Untouched.
Unharmed.
Not a crease out of place on her cheap, third-rate suit.
She coughed, just once, as the smoke cleared, swatting the fumes away from her face like an errant mosquito.
Then turned to me.
‘No,’ the word slipped from my lips, without calling at my mind. ‘You can’t.’
No smile.
No rage either.
But no mercy.
‘Mr Parch,’ she said. ‘You really leave me no choice but to invoke Extraordinary Action.’
‘You can’t...’
‘You have been given every opportunity to co-operate, but have ignored the authority of the Executive and so,’ her hand slipped into her satchel, pressing against something inside, ‘I have no choice but to bind and compel you until such time as your case may be properly assessed.’ She eased the satchel open a little wider, and it seemed to me that something thin and red was winding round the end of her fingers, where they rested therein. ‘There is a waiting period on the assessments, but your case will be handled as soon as the backlog is cleared…’ Something living, writhing, slipped up from within her bag, coiled itself round her wrist, up her arm, bright crimson.
‘You can’t…’ I breathed again, as the realisation dawned.
‘…please do not be alarmed, Mr Parch. This is for your own good.’ So saying, she lifted her hand from her satchel, and with it came a stream of red, lashing out like a snake, expanding too fast to see, from a single chord to a writhing cloud that filled the room, a great beast of crimson that with one trailing end grappled itself to my throat, to my face, wrapped like a ribbon across my eyes, pinned my hands to my side, spun itself in a noose around my feet and tripped me, knocked me flat to the ground. I tried to scream, tried to struggle, but all I could see was the endless tape, brilliant red tape streaming from her bottomless bag; and then I could see nothing at all.
***
‘I woke,’ said Jeffrey Parch, ‘in Bank Station, on a bench on the District Line platform. There was no sign of the Inspector, no ticket in my pocket, no clue as how I came to be here. I tried to leave the station, but when I followed the Exit sign I came to the Central Line. From the Central Line I followed the Exit sign again but found myself by the DLR, then again, I rode the escalator up and was precisely where I began, stuck on the District Line platform. I tried to catch the train, but every train I take leaves Bank for the
darkness of the tunnel, and returns again, and again, and again, coming back to this very same station. I have walked the tunnels, but the darkness leads always to the point from where I began. I have followed strangers, but somehow in the crowd I always lose them; the police won’t arrest me, the station staff cannot see me, I show up on no camera or CCTV. I ride the escalators up and down, up and down, and I feel no hunger, or thirst, and the people do not stop to speak to me, because they are commuters, and in a hurry, and do not want to know.’
‘I have been here,’ he said, ‘For I do not know how long. Years, I think, though the station never stops and I cannot see the sun. Sometimes I think I am not the only one caught in this trap, catch a glimpse of a face which I think is as hollow as mine; but then the face boards the train, and vanishes to some other place, and I am left behind. The Inspector said there was a backlog on appeals, that this was … a holding place. She never said how long I would be held. I have screamed and begged, knelt and prayed, but my magic is gone and so, I think, is mercy. I have stood in front of the oncoming trains, arms open and soul prepared. I have stood on the live rail and thrown myself down the stairs and still I am here, and all that my actions seem to bring, are underground delays. I am cursed. I am lost. I am damned. I am sorry.’
He finished speaking, and held my hand, as though he had never felt human warmth before. His grip was so hard it hurt my fingers, and gently, I pulled away. At this, his face collapsed, his head swinging down, his shoulders curling in, and, at seeming nothing, he nodded to himself. ‘You don’t believe me,’ he breathed.
‘It is extraordinary.’
‘Is it?’ he asked. ‘Do you not sometimes see us, the prisoners of the underground, wandering the corridors without direction? Have you never fought against your local council, and lost, drowned in a battle you could not win? Do you never wonder who it was who stepped out in front of the oncoming train, and why? Maybe you don’t. Maybe all you hear is that there is a delay on the line. Maybe the rest doesn’t matter to you.’
I opened my mouth to deny it, to explain that I was a good person, a kindly person, and of course I wondered, and of course I cared, but he silenced me with a look and at once, I realised how weak the words were on the tip of my tongue.
