Houston, 2030: The Year Zero

by Mike McKay

  Chapter 17

  Mark decided not to return to the Station. Initially, he wanted to wash himself at Frederick's plant, but discovered its water was not any better than in the landfill pond. He selected the safer option, and came to West Canal, a quarter-mile from their own backyard. Lucky enough, it was raining. He needed neither explain his wet clothes to Mary, nor apologize for abusing their water supply.

  The neighbors had a long standing dispute, if the West Canal could be used for drinking. Some pointed the water originated from Sheldon Reservoir, and thus should be safe enough, if only all the neighbors upstream did not use it for laundry. Others insisted hence the most had no other way, soap should be allowed in the canal, and for the drinking water everybody must go to the community well or even all the way to the Reservoir. In Mark's family, they preferred the latter, and the canal water was only for veggies.

  Shivering under drizzle, Mark undressed to his underpants and tried to wash mud from his clothes. The canal smelt of cheap soap and dirty latrine. Soon later, the distinct landfill odor had joined the bouquet, and almost made Mark throwing up. Fatty mud refused to dissolve. After cleaning his clothes and shoes the best he could, Mark tried to wash himself. Granted, he would need a shower at home to feel more or less fresh. Unfortunately, the shower would be equally cold. The day had been cloudy from the morning, and their barrel had no chance to catch any sun.

  At least, his trip to the 'Fill was not entirely useless. Despite the advice from Washington, Mark found the girl. Jasmine and her brothers did not need to sleep it the trench anymore. Perhaps, Jasmine found herself a better job. Frederick Stolz was very impressed with her practical knowledge of plastics, even if she did not know any Chemistry. As a bonus, Mark made reasonable progress on the investigation front. He did not like if any questions remained unanswered. Now all the information fit into the picture, and the last crime scene contained no mysteries. Apart from the mystery of the serial killer identity, Mark reminded himself.

  With a bit of luck, Alex would deal with Joe Vo. Not by the Uzi guns, as in Mark's imagination. Too perfect for a solution. Even during the golden pre-Meltdown times, the Police and the FBI did not eliminate organized crime. Their best hope was to keep the gangsters under tight control, a fine dynamic balance.

  How Alex once put it, a classical ballet of sorts. This guy in black is our villain. And this handsome young man in white – our hero. They jump, and turn, and spin, and wave papier mâché swords. The triumphant brass sounds must eventually come from the orchestra, so the villain can hit the stage in agony. But then, at the very end, the villain in black and the hero in white appear hand-in-hand in front of the public, bowing, in the row of the other dancers, – to enjoy their well-deserved standing ovation.

  “And now imagine,” Alex said, “instead of the paper sword, the white hero pulls a real one. And chops the villain – in little pieces. Blood all over the stage! The head flies to parterre! Or, the black villain, instead of a triple pirouette, makes a for-real Karate kick, and the white hero is carried away with permanent brain damage. No standing ovation! The matter of fact, most spectators will be rather disappointed with the show. You must not violate the rules of the art!”

  “The Police and the Mafia can happily co-exist. Like those heroes and villains on stage. We deliver a perfect show: day in and day out. What we really fight, and from both sides, are unorganized crime and unorganized militia. In my ballet example, it's like the spectators, after getting few shots of Cognac too many during the intermission, climb onto the stage and try to dance alongside the pros. No-o-o, we don't want any of those bozos around!”

  When Mark phoned Alex, Russian Bear was positive he could fix the issue.

  “No problem,” he explained Mark, “now we have all the information we need. If pulling info out of Joe Vo is next to impossible, giving him the right hints is easy. A matter of right conversation strategy.”

  “What strategy?” Mark asked.

  “Simple. I will give Joe a friendly call. First, we talk weather. It's unusually wet for April, isn't it? Then, we talk hobbies. I boast my brand-new gas torch. I kid you not: it can be set for any temperature, from six hundred to thirteen hundred degrees! A must-have for your garage! Recommended! Then, I tell Joe he is fifty-five already and should pay close attention to his health. With your smoking and drinking habits, Joe, you should consider regular proctologic exams!”

  “All this sounds peaceful enough.”

  “Absolutely. Then, we start talking the running business, and I will ‘leak’ Vo the FBI got a good grip on the Butcher case. He will show no interest, of course, but he will listen. He has been keen enough to send Lien to the funerals, after all. I tell Vo: we've learned the dead girl is an unlicensed hooker, that she is from GRS, and we're closely watching her remaining siblings. These kids are our primary witnesses for the Sheldon Butcher case! If something happens to these kids at all, I say, – I will find whoever did it and give a free gas-proctologic exam!”

  “Gas-proctologic?”

  “Almost like a standard proctologic exam, only with a gas torch. As the history goes, the original version of this delicate medical procedure was developed in Russia, back in the nineties. The Police used it for speedy recovery of forgotten computer passwords, and the Mafia – for money transfers: from one secret Swiss bank account to another. Or was it the opposite way around? Sadly, the technology was inferior, and they utilized electric soldering irons, with no temperature controls. Barbarians!”

  Mark shivered. You would never guess if the Bear described real things or imaginary. “OK. To this, I am sure, Joe will listen.”

  “Not even because of the gas torch. For starters, Joe made enough money on Amelia alone, and hopefully would prefer to keep his ass intact instead of going after the Hobson kids. Secondly, he doesn't want to be associated with the Butcher in any way. Bad for his business. Finally, I believe, I am famous around the local gangs. After my last publicity stunt…”

  “Wow! You did shoot that poor bastard in the foot, did you?”

  Alex chuckled and repeated word-to-word what he told the judge: “I have no recollection, Your Honor. The gun had no fingerprints, right? I believe no good policeman should do such a thing…” Then, he chuckled again: “strictly between us, partner, the idiot shot himself. Bloody macho! His cartridge in the chamber, his safety – off. And a faulty catch for a bonus! Wanted to show me how proficient he was with the gun! But humbly, who am I to spoil him such a nice story? The young man may lose his face…”

  Mark had no doubts that Alex had mastered his part in the classic Police-versus-Mafia ballet. Sadly, with the world falling apart, the methods on both sides were getting less and less civilized. All these gruesome nose jobs, and beauty spas, and now the gas-proctologic exams… How cool when the worst-case scenario was to send somebody to sleep with the fishes!

  Another achievement of the day besides the investigation: he visited Frederick's plant and checked on Samantha's new job. The last three years, Mark promised himself so many times to come and see what exactly Mike had been doing! From Mike's stories, the job was a lot like a mad scientist lab and dealt with nasty chemicals, but Mike came home happy, and every Saturday – with a little bundle of cash in his pocket. Frankly, Mark was afraid to go. He did not mistrust Frederick's judgment, but kept hearing all these horror stories about the garbage recycling workshops and their total disregard to safety.

  True, Mark had been shocked at first. When he and Jasmine came to the plant, Fred and Samantha were draining yellowish synthetic gasoline from the bomb. Irritated with fumes, Mark's eyes instantly became watery, and he sneezed several times. Like in a sick science-fiction movie, Samantha and Frederick had heavily scratched plastic goggles, their noses were pinched with clothes line clips, and in their mouths both had corrugated plastic pipes. On the opposite side, the pipes joined into a large-diameter sewage riser running o
nto the roof.

  “Step back,” Frederick ordered, momentarily pulling his pipe from the mouth. Because of the clip, his voice sounded funny. He took a deep breath from the pipe, preparing for the next sentence. “This will only take another minute or two.”

  The gasoline stopped dripping from the drain valve, and Frederick turned the handle. He took one more breath from his pipe, plugged the end with a plastic cap and let the pipe go. “OK, all clear. Have to re-load this one, and we're done for today,” he approached Mark and removed the goggles.

  Mark smelled the air. The gas fumes almost dissipated. “What are these pipes, Fred?”

  “We call them snorkels. Arne's invention,” Frederick explained, “we used to have respirators, but their filters eventually become pretty wasted. It's difficult to get good phenol filters now.”

  “Wow, it's so cool!” Jasmine said. “The paper shop had no snore-kills. Bertie and Millie always had red eyes from working with gee-paw-claw-reete!”

  Frederick smiled. “Working with what, again?”

  “Gee-paw-claw-reete, sir. Like a bleach. For making re-circled paper white again.”

  “Oh, that's sodium hypochlorite! How did you remember it all: gee-paw-claw…?”

  While Mark introduced Jasmine to Frederick, Samantha finished with the jerrycan lids and approached the trio.

  “Sam, have you tested the potash weight yet?” Frederick asked.

  “Almost done, Mister Stolz. The titration is ready, just need to finish my calculations. Five minutes, tops.”

  “Great! And you, Jass, may go look around. But categorically, don't touch any valves, OK?”

  Mark glanced down and discovered that his daughter was working barefoot. “Samantha! What the hell happened to your boots?”

  “Ah… the boots?” She made a worried glance. The industrial rubber boots were still secured under the trike seat, exactly as she put them at home.

  “Samantha, you promised Mom to have your boots on. This morning, remember?”

  Samantha employed her standard evasion tactic. She smiled, looked at her feet, as if she just realized she forgot her sandals, and wiggled her toes. “But Dad! It was raining all night! The mud is so-o-o soft today!” She always had a suitable excuse. If raining, the ground was ‘so-o-o soft,’ if sunny, – ‘so-o-o warm,’ and in the winter it could very well be ‘so-o-o cool.’ If pavement looked clean (and no pavement was really clean since the Meltdown), she called it ‘squeaky-clean.’ And if not, – the words were either: ‘such a nice dust’ or ‘such a nice mud in my toes,’ depending on weather. Always – enjoyable! Like: Dad, why have you never tried going barefoot yourself?

  Mark mentioned how Jasmine wiggled her toes in the mud. She probably wondered what the entire conversation was about. The rot-pit spec'list did not remember how it felt to be shod, and for her having ‘so-o-o soft’ or ‘so-o-o warm’ mud between her toes was neither unpleasant, nor enjoyable. Mud like mud, nothing special.

  “Please, Samantha. I don't mind if you go to school with no shoes, but you can't work barefoot at the 'Fill.”

  “Why can't, Dad? The mud is slippery! With no boots – it's way safer!”

  “Safer? What if you step on something nasty and cut your foot?”

  “But why should I step on something nasty first place? I'm not a sissy, like Mickey and Billy. I've been going with no tires since I was ten!”

  Frederick listened to their fight with a smile. He had cheap tire sandals, but not the chemical rubber boots, as one might expect at a mad scientist lab. “Mark, give my Chief Technologist a break. If Sam is comfy barefoot, it's perfectly fine. We don't leave broken glass around. Everybody work like this, and Moon doesn't fall to Earth. What's the problem?”

  He pointed at the workers across the yard who were sorting and shredding plastic scrap in front of reactor number one. No chemical boots were in sight, or any other footwear, as the matter of fact. Only a young man, at the top of scaffolding, had flip-flops on.

  “But… Fred, this is a chemical plant!”

  “A chemical plant, so what?”

  “You're a chemical engineer, you must know better! Back before the Meltdown, you had occupational safety regulations… What, is it all gone now?”

  “We have perfect occupational safety here, Mark. Take our snorkels. They allow us to breathe clean air while draining and loading the bombs. And after the bomb is sealed, nothing leaks out, and snorkels are unnecessary. This is called engineering control. Meaning we understand the hazard and address it – technically, as real engineers supposed to do. And for the safety regulations, not safety, mind you, but the ‘regulations’ part, they're all crap!”

  “Why so?”

  “Because the regulations are what they are. The regulations. Procedural controls. It means you have to do it right, or else! Before, our plant had a lot of these ‘no second chance’ procedures, but now only one left. All the rest were engineered out – we made them either foolproof safe or semi-automatic, by the engineering controls. Arne kept scratching his head how to automate this last one, so no human is required, but so far, no luck. It's tricky.”

  “But what about personal protective equipment? I remember, before the Meltdown, everybody had to wear PPE at all times. Not only in the industry. The Police and the FBI had the same rules too.”

  “Oh, the bloody PPE at all times! I had it in 'Burton – up to here!” Frederick pointed to his neck. “Put it this way. The engineering controls – are for those who are both hard-working and smart. You got to use your brain to invent the safe way, and then apply your hands to build the machine. Then, you may relax a bit. Your machine works, and you collect the cash. The procedural controls are for hard-working simpletons. Don't invent, do as we tell you, and do it right. And personal protective equipment at all time – for those who are either lazy or stupid. If you aren't smart to figure out how to pass your dangerous work to a machine, and aren't hard-working to do it by the book, – what's left? You may wrap yourself in all kinds of Nomex coveralls, and goggles, and a hard-hat, and crash-proof gloves. PPE helps. A little. Instead of a ninety-percent fourth-degree burn, you're in for an eighty-percent fourth-degree burn. Any better?”

  “Are you telling me PPE is not needed at your plant? Is everything so safe?”

  “I didn't tell you PPE was not needed! Just not needed most of the time. That operation I mentioned: pouring the neutralizer. It does require rubber boots, acid-resistant gloves, a full face shield, and a leather apron. Also, a pair of manly balls in your pants. Concentrated sulfuric acid is no joke! Will eat you through, right to the bones – in seconds. Most importantly, you got to pour the acid just right: not too slow, and not too fast, and keep an eye on your pressure gauge. If the bomb splits, no rubber boots can save your feet, and no apron saves the rest! In nearly four years this little plant had been in operation, I've never trusted the neutralizer to anyone, even Mike and Arne. You guys, have the brains and the balls, but not enough gray hair. Mind you, this neutralizer pouring is a two-minute deal, three times a day. But if I walk in rubber boots, leather apron, and chem-gloves – all day long, I will look an idiot! And soon become one!”

  “About the idiot part, Fred, you are surely exaggerating.”

  “Nope. The COMMON SENSE. All letters capital! PPE at all times was to prevent lawsuits from the injured employees. A proven fact: PPE did not decrease the number of accidents! You want to know why? If you wear PPE at all time, and not only if needed for the job in-hand, your COMMON SENSE goes out of the window. The people start believing somebody else has to do all the thinking for them: a manager, a safety officer, a CEO, whoever, but not you personally. Then, the brass comes around, and starts a new campaign: Safety is your responsibility. The workers nod: as you say, sir. No mutual trust, whatsoever. The director is a cheap buffoon, and his safety officer is a cheap buffoon, and the employees are all buffoons. Instead
of a working business, they have a dysfunctional circus – in goggles, metal-nose boots and Nomex coveralls! From this angle, the Meltdown wasn't necessary a bad thing. Workers re-learned how to think for themselves, and not blame the management for their own stupidity…”

  “Hey, but what about all these industrial accidents at the 'Fill, Fred? Today – three dead!”

  “Yep! The bloody Steam Scav! We told them right away: your design is not foolproof! You can't trust a human operator to throw the rope on the pulley exactly right, time after time, every time. Procedural controls! On the 'Fill, too many scavs are from the pre-Meltdown generation, all these former directors, safety officers, and other such marketologists and merchandizes. The former cheap buffoons, from the dysfunctional circus… But in any case, the Steam Scav accident today has nothing to do with wearing or not wearing PPE at all time. If a three hundred pound anchor is coming at you with two thousand pound pull, no coverall can save your guts. Make your coverall from carbon steel, and walk like a medieval knight! It will not help a bit.”

  Meanwhile, Samantha went to a cluttered chemical bench under the shed to fetch her notebook: stained and dog-eared, this treasure she inherited from Mike along with his trike and the rubber boots. She flipped the notebook to its elastic band and started her computations. The number-crunching was tricky. From time to time, Samantha stopped, bit the end of the pencil and banged her mud-stained toes lightly on the concrete floor. Finally, the math was completed, and the Chief Technologist came over to present her findings to the CEO.

  Fred scrutinized the page and nodded. “One hundred and twenty-two pounds. Sounds about right. This batch is not as good. But if I were you, Sam, I'd add four pounds. Remember what I told you yesterday about safety factors?”

  “Real engineers always wear both the belt and the suspenders!” Samantha reported.

  “Correct! Denny is nearly done with the scrap loading. Please go and ask him to give you a hand with the weighting. After that, the entire gang may go for a coffee-break. Remind them not to smoke around the bombs. We don't want any open fire in here!”

  “Right away, Mister Stolz!” Samantha turned to go, a little too fast to look natural.

  My daughter tries to prevent me from sticking her into the boots for the rest of the day, Mark guessed. The mud between her toes is so wonderfully soft. Frederick is right, should I give Samantha a break? Now the chemical plant did not appear as dangerous as some backyards in their own neighborhood, especially the ones, which used the ‘perfectly harmless’ Simpson and Kaufman fertilizer.

  “Samantha?” Mark called.

  “What, Dad?”

  “Your rubber boots…”

  “But Dad!”

  “I am just saying, it's OK. You have my, strictly unofficial, permission to work without boots at this plant only. But as far as telling our Mom, this conversation had never happened. Understood?”

  Samantha shined a megawatt smile, and answered as Mark once taught her: “I don't recall, sir. What conversation are you talking about?”

  “Oh, I see the FBI influence,” Frederick laughed.

  “But, Samantha,” Mark continued. “This permission is for this yard only! If you have to go outside, especially to the landfill, please, have your boots on. Promise?”

  “Real promise, Dad! Definitely! Absolutely!” She had no intention to put her boots on, but what could Mark do about it?

  Frederick started explaining his technological process: shredded plastic scraps were loaded into a bomb and cooked with alkaline and hot steam at such and such pressure, then pH was reversed with the neutralizer, and so on. He drew chemical formulas for Mark, but Mark was not listening.

  Instead, he observed how Samantha walked through the yard. She came to reactor number three, confidently put her bare foot on rusted scaffolding and tapped her finger on a pressure gauge. Satisfied with the readings, she approached workers at the base of bomb number one and picked a handful of shredded plastic from a bucket. Finally, Samantha started a conversation with the young man in flip-flops who was standing on the scaffolding platform with a corrugated snorkel in his mouth, feeding white powder into the bomb's open hatch.

  Our Chief Technologist at work! Another domestic Civil War battle was brewing.