by Joe Jarvis
"Sir!" The secretary exclaimed in his deepest tone (which was not that deep), jumping to his feet.
"SIR!" He yelled as Barry's hand turned the knob. The secretary slammed a large button on the side of his desk which automatically deadbolted the office door, but it was too late as Barry had just managed to swing the door open before the bolt shot out, suspended horizontally from the side of the door.
The secretary came hustling behind Barry his face blushing, "Mr. Drake, sir, I’m sorry I tried to stop him but he just came right in – "
"It’s okay, Benjamin, thank you, we’re all right," Drake said dryly without much emotion. His secretary left like an obedient dog, slightly ashamed for having failed his master. "Have a seat Barry," and Drake motioned toward a chair, interlocking his fingers and placing his hands in front of him on his desk. He didn’t speak, but just stared at Barry with his head tilted down condescendingly.
"Drake-" Barry said exasperated after a few moments of fidgeting in the chair, "why have you been ignoring me?"
Drake sighed and glanced to the side before meeting eyes with Barry again. Slowly he responded. "Barry… you know why I’ve been ignoring you, let’s not play this game."
"But other agencies are going over my head! I’m ruined! Ted’s release was frozen, and CCS got the warrant to search the cameras – which I tried to stop!" With this last statement Barry put his finger up, insisting he had done everything in his power to help the situation.
"Well that was stupid," Drake droned, bored.
"Stupid? STUPID?" Barry was in disbelief, raising his voice and sweating profusely, "Your Agents were on the recording! They would have been found out if I hadn’t delayed the search! Have you forgotten that I delivered on my side of the bargain! It is you who owes me! Yet I continue to bend over backwards – "
Drake raised his voice but remained otherwise calm and almost droll. "It’s over, Barry! I’m sorry, I truly am. But it’s over, and you’re finished. I’m not going down with you. I did all I could, but that druggie screwed up!" Drake shrugged. "That’s just the way it goes this time!"
"Well…" Barry was starting to hyperventilate, searching for something to say, some course of action to take to right this. "Well I certainly won’t release the evidence of AP’s wrongdoing now!" Barry attempted a triumphant tone which failed.
Drake raised his palms up while shrugging again with a slight head tilt, and talked softer in a comforting tone, "No one would believe you if you did, Barry." When Barry didn’t move Drake took out his mini-tab, "Tell you what," he transferred five thousand dollars onto a card which displayed the amount, and threw it down on the desk.
Barry looked at the money, his upper lip curled in disgust, and glared at Drake with greater disgust.
"Not enough?" Drake asked with fake sincerity.
"You might as well have dug my grave!" Barry growled, his dark tone showed he was accepting his fate, and realizing Drake was never his friend, despite his previous admiration for him.
"Now, Barry, you were screwed before I got involved... Just… well, maybe not quite as screwed."
Barry’s stare seared into Drake’s eyes while Drake looked back with the slightest of sympathy in his eyes, but strangely mixed with amusement. Barry shook his head, and stood up without taking the money on the desk. He took one more long look at Drake, nodding his head ever so slightly in cruel understanding with his jaw clenched. He turned around, and walked out of Drake’s office silently, shutting the door calmly behind him. Drake’s secretary looked at Barry with unsure eyes, not knowing what to expect, but Barry just walked tiredly out of the office without even noticing the secretary.
Stepping sullenly out of the NESA building Barry didn’t notice the men in casual clothing watching him from across the street. "He’s leaving Drake’s building," one of the men said to his CCS partner, nudging him into action. The team sent updates directly to Themis, along with any pictures or video they took.
Back in his office, Drake pressed a couple of buttons on his telescreen and Agent White appeared. Without introduction, Drake said, "It didn’t go so well with Barry. Let’s clean this up."
"Yes sir." replied Agent White, and the call was ended.
Barry stumbled into his house that night around 22:00, considerably inebriated. It worked out for Drake’s agents following him that he was drunk enough to leave the back door of his house, not just unlocked but, open. And perceiving the relative ease of this assignment, Agents White and Orange had let their guards down slightly, laughing about their target’s intoxication, which worked out for the CCS Officers following Barry, and by extension the Agents.
Barry stumbled into his bar room, and managed to take a seat on one of the stools at the counter, almost falling off but stabilizing himself by grabbing hold of a beer tap. He let his success at arriving home and seating himself at the bar process, and let out a satisfied sigh as a drunken smile crossed his face. He was that level of wasted where even the impending doom of a shattered business and probable confinement seemed like minor obstacles, to be solved in the morning.
The bar room was dark and full of shadows, with just one bright buzzing light Barry had managed to switch on over the bar. It was an antique light up Crown Royal sign that Barry had bought years earlier – the company that made Crown Royal, of course, collapsed with the rest of the economy in the 2020’s. The ceilings were high and the room was finished in stained mahogany. Barry reached across the bar and managed to grab a proper whiskey glass without breaking it; he snatched the bourbon whiskey on the second try – the first time only the top of the decanter came off in his hand, which amused Barry to the point where he burst into a light fit of drunken laughter.
The Agents sauntered into the barroom, their shadows waltzing slowly on the wall. Barry was mumbling to himself, having poured his whiskey with relative success, wetting the bar top a bit in the process. His gaze seemed to rest at about bar level, which could account for why he didn’t notice the Agents in the mirror on the wall behind the bar. Standing in the doorway across the room, the Agents were surprised that after a minute Barry had still not noticed them.
Agent Orange shrugged at White with a smirk, grabbed a seat in one of the large maroon leather armchairs by the fireplace, leg crossed, and continued to watch Barry with an amused smile. After another 30 seconds or so, Agent White interrupted the mumbles.
"Hi Barry."
Suddenly the mumbling stopped, but it took Barry another few moments before he unsteadily swung around on the stool, and focused his eyes on the Agents with his head bobbing, and a hand on the bar for support. He gave a large hiccup which turned into a snort and chuckle.
"Gentlemen." Barry started quasi-politely, closing his eyes for a moment. Then opening his eyes, he continued with renewed energy, "Gentlemen! Of the esteemed – " he trailed off again. Another hiccup. "The honorable… Mr. Drake’s employees… thugs… hitmen… true renaissance men!" Laughing, Barry raised his glass – sloshing a bit onto the floor – to the Agents, who wore amused smirks, and then slugged down about half of the oaky liquid. "Please –" hiccup "– please, help yourself to a drink fellas," Barry theatrically added, actually lighthearted, gesturing to the bar, and turned around back to face the bar, planting his elbows on the surface. Every so many blinks he would appear to momentarily doze off, just to open his eyes with a jerk of the body or a hiccup.
"Don’t mind if I do," Agent Orange obliged as he fluidly stood up, and quickly crossed the room to the bar. He pulled a 16 ounce beer glass from under the bar, and filled it with the darker of the two beers on tap. He raised the glass to Barry, and with a crazy kind of smile and half closed eyes, Barry raised his glass as well. The two began to drink, and finished at the same time, pounding their glasses back to the bar triumphantly. Barry again started to chuckle, and Agent Orange joined him – laughing at Barry, not with him.
By this point Agent White had crossed the room and taken a seat next to Barry at the bar, observing the other two, amused. As
Agent Orange laughed heartily – his straight white teeth on full display – he looked back and forth to White and Barry. White was smirking which showed his dimples, and shaking his head in mock disapproval. Orange raised the decanter toward Barry and cocked his head, nodded toward the whiskey, raising his eyebrows in a questioning manner.
"Hit me!" Barry said, his eyes barely open, and Agent Orange poured Barry a tall glass of whiskey, before filling his own beer glass a second time at the tap.
"So, Barry," Agent Orange began as he topped off his beer and pushed the tap back into place, foam crowning the glass with just one thin white drop trailing down the side, "Did you ever manufacture that evidence against Atlas?"
Barry started mumbling and got louder as he spat out, "Atlas!" then sunk back into unintelligible mumbles. "I was gnnn… gunn… release when thah bech mol murd durd."
The two Agents exchanged another amused glance.
With a chuckle, White quietly commented to his partner, "I hope you didn’t get him too drunk."
Orange just shrugged with a smirk, as White turned to Barry and spoke.
"So that would be… on your safe drive?" he questioned.
Barry raised a finger as if he was going to make a point, but then put it down. He took another sip from his glass and again raised his finger. This time he stumbled to his feet and crossed the room to the doorway. Leaning on the door frame, he turned around to the Agents who hadn’t moved, but were staring at Barry blankly. Barry gave them a rapid shaky beckoning wave with the hand that wasn’t on the doorway supporting him. Understanding, the Agents quickly followed, Orange taking his beer with him.
In the kitchen, Barry put his finger against the DNA detector to allow a screen on the counter to light up and welcome him. "Izall ontheer" Barry stammered before collapsing into a kitchen chair still hiccuping every few seconds. White took his place at the screen and began typing and clicking. Orange stood in the doorway leaning against the trim, sipping his beer. A few minutes later White finished what he was doing, and wiped off the screen with a special cloth, before he clicked a button to make the screen recede back into the counter. Orange finished his beer, and licking his lips spoke to Barry who was nodding off at the table.
"Barry," Orange said loudly. "Barry!" this time, snapping his finger, he got his attention, and Mr. Barry looked up at Agent Orange like an obedient child. "Are you mad at Drake?" The agent asked loudly and clearly, a hint of baby talk in his words.
"I’m goig down." Barry said matter of factly with a shrug as he turned his gaze back to the table, "zall over, nufin lose." – shrug – "Drake down too?" – shrug – "Idunno- depends." Barry just kept shrugging, each time making the same ambivalent frown and repeating the last phrase, “Idunnodepends.” He tried to raise a glass that wasn’t there to his lips, only noticing when his hand touched his face, at which point he looked at his hand accusingly.
Agent Orange was looking at Barry and shaking his head in agreement, like a boss in the process of firing an employee.
"Come with me back to the bar," the Agent said as he turned in the doorway, and walked back toward the bar room. It took Barry a second to stumble to his feet, and Agent White walked up behind him to support him walking to the bar.
In the bar room Orange had put on a pair of black gloves, and taken a thin rope out of his pocket and was tossing one side over a sturdy light fixture in the center of the room. Agent Orange whistled a tune as he started tying one end of the rope in a loop. White led Barry back to his seat at the bar, and reunited him with his half empty glass of whiskey before taking the seat next to him once more. Barry huddled around his glass with both hands on it, elbows on the bar, head slumped looking into the glass. His hiccups were lighter and less frequent now, and he seemed to hardly even notice the agents’ presence anymore.
Still whistling Agent Orange strolled across the room and began looping the other end of the rope to an ornate metal hook embedded deep into the hard wood mantel piece. Before tying the knot, Orange looked up at the light he hung the other end of the rope on, adjusting for length. Sauntering back over to the bar, Orange poured himself another half glass of beer, and immediately downed it. He rinsed out the glass, and wiped it with the same material White had used on the screen, also wiping down the outside and brim of the glass, and the beer tap. Agent White also pulled a pair of gloves out of his side pocket, and put them on.
Agent Orange walked back across the room, resuming his whistling, and dragged an armchair to the center of the room, as White dragged a bar stool, taller than the chair, to the center of the room next to it. White then walked to the bar and helped Barry to his feet.
"Wherwe go-n," Barry sputtered, eyes intermittently opening.
"Up the stairs to bed," White said softly, nurturing. "Here’s a big step," he led Barry onto the chair, "And another big step" Barry was helped onto the stool, while Orange stood on his tip-toes to slip the noose around Barry’s neck, and tighten it. White was still holding Barry’s hand to stabilize him, "Now stand up straight, Mr. Barry." White used the same nurturing tone.
Barry had his hands out and his knees bent, shaking a bit, in an attempt to balance. Agent White stepped back, and Agent Orange kicked the top of the stool, which crashed to the floor at the same time Barry’s neck snapped with a clear loud crack. The agents looked over the room once more to make sure they hadn’t left any signs of their visit, and then left out the back door, the same way they came in.
As the Agents walked down the sidewalk away from Barry’s house, the Corner Cop Security tail snapped some long off blurry pictures of the duo, and sent them over to Themis with a note about the two agents visiting Barry that night.
Back in the bar room one more shadow was added to the regular array. It swayed slowly on the wall, and on the bricks of the fireplace. Barry’s body hanged, lifeless in the center of the room, with the Crown Royal sign over the bar offering the only flickering light.
The main story the next morning was the evidence release from Barry Arbitration which supposedly pointed to Atlas Protection as tampering with evidence in order to nail Ted Lanta for the murder, and thus avoid the destruction of the Lanta distillery business when Ted took over. Atlas Protection had managed to survive the first wave of angry customers and dropped policies when Barry first announced the reversal of Ted’s indictment, but this was even worse. Customers didn’t want to hear that they had to wait another month for the independent assessment of the evidence to see who was really at fault.
Usually the office would be like a ghost town on a Saturday, but Atlas Protection was in full damage control mode. Atlas was forced to offer all sorts of incentives just to keep his customers, and AP was running low on operating cash, having waived thousands of fees for customers until this was all settled. With all the news out, banks were not interested in taking a risk to loan AP money. Mr. Atlas wondered if he would be able to keep the company afloat until the final review came out.
He decided to give Molly a call to ask if BER could release some details that would at least cast doubt on Barry Arbitration’s legitimacy. Molly agreed to give an interview to preview the BER report on Barry Arbitration that was scheduled for release on Monday. Mr. Atlas was watching as the interview came on a popular news feed.
"Frankly, we want to urge all customers to wait for the independent review before deciding whether to keep Atlas Protection or drop their policies," Molly explained. "Even BER’s report scheduled for release the day after tomorrow will give some signals that this scandal may not be all it is chalked up to be. At this time, I can confirm that Mr. Barry of Barry Arbitration took a personal bribe to transfer one of BA’s cases to another arbitration agency. Because of this action, and others, BA will be downgraded by Business Ethics Review. While BER has no direct knowledge of the case of Atlas Protection, we would advise skepticism of anything to come out of Barry Arbitration."
The station cut back to a reporter, "That statement coming from Molly Metis of Business Ethics Review reg
arding Barry Arbitration, the morning after the evidence against Atlas Protection was made public. Mr. Reed Barry has not been reached for comment, and could not be seen entering his office, or leaving his home this morning. Repeated attempts to call and knock on his door have not – hold on I am getting some updated information as this story unravels.
"I am being told that a female friend of Mr. Barry’s entered his home this morning, and inside, found Mr. Barry hanged, in an apparent suicide, with a suicide note written on his counter tablet. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Further details to come as this story takes a dark twist. Indeed customers may want to withhold judgment of Atlas Protection until all the details are sorted out.
"In other news, Transcend Space Travel has announced a breakthrough technology that will allow customers five day travel between Earth and Mars. Stocks surged nearly 2,000% after the initial announcement…"
Mr. Atlas stared at the screen with his jaw agape. Feeling a twinge of guilt, Atlas realized he was happy that Barry had killed himself, because this made the evidence release fade in comparison. Now the focus would be on what made Barry kill himself, rather than on the evidence – fake as it may be – against Atlas Protection. Atlas instructed his employees to bring up the suicide, but try to remain civil, in an attempt to deter customers from dropping their policies. The independent review could not come soon enough.
Eating breakfast, Officer Themis had been watching the same interview as Atlas. As he learned of Barry’s "suicide" he nearly spit his coffee across the room. On big cases, Themis turned into a bit of a workaholic, and had already seen the pictures of the two agents leaving Barry’s house the night before. But CCS was the only agency with that information at this time, and there was no other reason to suspect that his death was not a suicide.
"I’ve gotta get to the office!" Themis burst out to his family as he quickly pushed his seat out and grabbed his jacket and portable.
