Houston, 2030

by Mike McKay

  Almost instantly, there was Samantha's voice: “Daddy!”

  “Samantha? Are you all-right?” Mark yelled.

  “…Yeah,” Samantha did not sound very certain. Given the circumstances, an ‘all-right’ was an exaggeration.

  “Frederick? Martin? Jasmine? The boys?”

  “Mister Sto…” Samantha choked off. It sounded like if she was gagged.

  “You better shut up, dear. Your Daddy doesn't need to know the disposition,” the watchman said instead. Then, louder, for Mark: “OK, man. Now you know your girl is alive. Happy? So! To make sure we have full understanding between us… Do you want the full understanding, man?”

  “Sure,” Mark yelled back. The situation was not in his favor. Apparently, Spalding, or whoever he was, had multiple hostages, including Mark's daughter.

  “OK. For the perfect understanding, man, I got to explain you what I have in my gun. I have the balls, man. Minié balls! Heard of such a thing? So it works like this. If I shoot it up through your daughter's lower jaw, her face will stay here. Nice, and pretty, and a little surprised. But for her brains – you'll have to walk up all the way to the highway. Comprendere? Now, your daughter and me, nicely and quietly, will cross the yard and go into the boiler room. Please make sure you don't make any sudden moves, buddy. My shotgun – it has oh, so sensitive trigger. Tell me you understand it right, buddy.”

  “Got it,” Mark replied. He wondered who else would be amongst the hostages, and where were they located? Frederick and Martin – as the very minimum. Interesting, where were the Hobsons, and also the stoker – Mr. Kingsley, and his daughter, Cherry? Logically, the rest of the hostages must be in the boiler room. That was why ‘Spalding’ wanted to get in there: to control the situation and be able to use all the hostages in his negotiations. However, it was unclear, why Samantha was behind the reactor number two and not with the others.

  “Well, here we go,” ‘Spalding’ shouted, “as I said, no surprises!”

  In the narrow passage between the reactors two and three, slowly appeared Samantha and the watchman. Mark's daughter was in the front. She was in half-torn T-shirt and old jeans, rolled up to the knees, barefoot, and drenched to the skin by the heavy rain. Over the girl's mouth there was a piece of silver duct tape and her hands were apparently tied behind the back. ‘Spalding’ had the shotgun trimmed to Samantha's neck.

  “OK, girl. Slowly and gently,” the night watchman encouraged Samantha. “Excellent. Excellent! Now: do not turn. Face your Daddy, and slowly move to the left. Watch your feet and make sure not to slip. If you slip, it may turn very ugly, do you get it?” He walked behind Samantha's back, minimizing Mark's chances for a clean shot. Even if he had one, Mark would not dare to shoot. Only in the movies a head shot would kill instantly, and the hostage would be freed safe and sound. In reality, if the perpetrator had the barrel pointed at the hostage, and the finger – on the trigger, the last convulsion would be more than enough for a deadly shot. Over the full century of the hostage situations experience, the FBI learned it hard way. Even if a sniper placed a perfect shot through the criminal's forehead, the hostage would get ‘his’ or ‘her’ bullet with the probability exceeding ninety-five percent.

  The watchman and Samantha continued in this sideways fashion across the yard and finally reached the opening in the brick wall, which led to the boiler room. Mark saw how ‘Spalding’ reached out with his left hand and picked up a flashlight from the workbench. Then, both he and Samantha disappeared behind the boiler room brick partition wall. The voice of ‘Spalding’ suddenly came into the ‘office’ much quieter, but so distinct, Mark almost jumped on the spot: “Well-done, buddy. I am happy you did not shoot.” Mark saw that between the ‘office’ windows, a plastic pipe was coming down from the ceiling, with kind of sound bullhorn at the end. The night watchman's voice was coming out of this pipe.

  “Oh, I see, I got you scared, buddy? Arne calls this: a ‘sounduit.’ Like a short of ‘sound conduit,’ see? One of his clever inventions. Actually, he built it for me, personally. In the night, if the boiler cools down, here, in the boiler, – he has a little bell. I hear it from the ‘office’ and come over to throw in some more firewood… All right! Now – we are all settled nicely, the comm link is established, and you can start our peaceful negotiations. Is it so in your FBI handbooks?”

  “I tell you this, ‘Spalding.’ What's your real name, by the way? You leave all the hostages and come out. I will let you walk out of here. No shooting and no hot pursuit, understand? This I can guarantee you. What comes next, – is your own luck. Run away quickly, and you won't get caught,” while Mark was saying this, he did not waste time. He picked up a piece of broken glass from the floor and a roll of duct tape from one of the shelves, broke a leg of one of the stools, and now was making himself a makeshift periscope to be able to see the yard without the risk of getting shot.

  “My name will do you no good, man. Sure, I am not Spalding, you've guessed it right! Call me ‘Rick,’ it will be close enough. And I will call you: ‘Mark,’ if you don't mind? As for leaving the hostages and walking away, you, Mark, are probably joking. As soon as you get to the place where your cell phone can pick up the bloody signal, all the State of Texas Police will be on my tail.”

  “Well, let it be ‘Rick.’ And how do you know, Rick, that my phone doesn't get the signal now? Maybe, I am already sending an SMS for a backup?” Now he tried his handiwork, sticking the improvised ‘periscope’ beyond the window edge. The reflection was not exceptionally clear, but at least it was possible to see something. The yard was empty. He put the gun on the floor and pulled out his phone. There was no signal.

  “Well, Mark, you are probably not entirely familiar with the Houston infrastructure maintenance. For your info, nowadays, the mobile communications are fixed on the first come-first serve basis. Which means, there is a strong competition: whoever is the first to arrive. If the telephone guys win – then, most likely, the antennas will be fixed. But if the bloody ‘strippers’ happen to be first, then this particular area will be out of coverage. Forever! Did you know they now have a special high-power winch to rip the cables from the ground?” It was an absolute truth. For example, in Mark's cul-de-sac, the cellular phone signal was perfect, but a little further to the east, – there was a ‘hole,’ already for over half a year. The tower was apparently disassembled one night by the ‘strippers’ crew. Now go about half a mile to the east, and you could see the locals marching along the dirt paths with their mobile phones raised above their heads. That was their method of sending and receiving e-mails and SMS: activate the phone, and walk west, until you get into the coverage zone. In any case, before the end of the hurricane, no one would repair the local tower, and the probability that Mark would get the signal from here was very slim.

  “Well, Rick,” Mark proposed, re-holstering the phone and picking his gun from the floor. “Let's do this. I will throw my cell phone out of the window. And you will pick it up on the way. Samantha left her phone at home. Frederick's phone – you probably have it already. The Hobsons don't have a phone, as far as I know. What about the Kingsleys? You can take their phone too. So you will have at least two hours to disappear in the rain. Nobody gets hurt, and all stay alive…”

  “Let's do this, Mark. You throw out not only your phone, but also your gun. Then, I'll tie you up, with the rest. After the hurricane is over, somebody will find you. And so, I will have a couple of days to make my escape from the State of Texas. As you said, most importantly, all will be still alive.” The night watchman did not take Mark's bait about the Hobsons and the Kingsleys, so the exact number of the hostages remained unknown to Mark.

  “You can't be serious, Rick. I'll throw out the gun, and you will shoot one of your Minié balls through my head?” If the FBI had snipers sitting on all the roofs, Mark could consider offering himself as a hostage in exchange for his daughter and the rest. However, the snipers were not there, and disarming in front of the criminal was n
othing short of an elaborate suicide.

  “Let's talk about your alternatives, buddy. What if I mark the time now? Say, five minutes. And at the end of these, mind you, Mark, very short five minutes, – I'll fire one of my Minié balls straight into the head of your good neighbor, Frederick R. Stolz, PhD? And the highly-organized brain of our PhD flies all over the place! Do you understand what an irreplaceable loss will it be to the modern chemical science? Here, our PhD turns his head and rolls his eyes. Probably, he doesn't want a Minié ball in his forehead, hey, Fred? And then, I will time another five minutes – and shoot again. Your Samantha will be the last to go, so you will have plenty of time to reconsider my offer.”

  “And what are your alternatives, Rick?” Mark replied, “let's say, you kill all the hostages. Then you will have nothing to negotiate with. No leverage. I will not let you go, rest assured. At the Station, they will eventually start looking for me. And I guarantee you. If you touch just one hostage, – you will have very, very, very slow death. If not me, our Sarge, the Russian Bear, he will find your ass and will slice you like a salami stick – bit by bit. First – we will shoot off your testicles, for example.”

  The night watchman suddenly burst out laughing. “With the testicles, you are too bloody late, buddy. I lost those back in Libya! Believe it or not, I have nothing down there in the pants. The bustards left me a little stub for the wee to come out! I call it ‘my clitoris.’ The battlefield version of a trans-sex surgery, so to speak. But – they gave me a shiny medal as a replacement. For the sexual satisfaction, hooray!”

  “And when, exactly, were you in Libya?” Mark decided to defuse the situation a bit. If the watchman was the Sheldon Butcher, the damaged genitalia perfectly explained why none of the victims were sexually violated.

  “Two thousand nineteen, man.”

  “Bull shit! In 2019, we had no war in Libya.”

  “Mostly didn't. But some of us were at war there. I was in the Firebirds! As the matter of fact, it was because we were there in 2019, the rest of the troops went there in 2020. It was such a nice proposition. A walk in the park! And we – we did everything damn right! Only, our brave Air Force created such a shit out of the entire deal. Well, it's not their first time to screw up the ground troops.”

  “Wait a minute, those Firebirds? Flame-throwers, or something like this?”

  “Ha! Flame-throwers! Your naivety makes me laugh, man. They did not tell you this in the FBI? F.Y.I., the Firebirds – a special unit! Like the Navy SEALs, but far more secret. We made it so, that Libya attacked America, and not the opposite way around… My suggestion, let's drop these old war stories and talk about something constructive.”

  From the ‘sounduit’ Mark heard some banging and scratching noise, as if someone was trying to break strong plastic. Now Mark was almost one hundred percent sure the night watchman was indeed the Sheldon Butcher. However, he decided to make it certain. “Well, the constructive conversation doesn't happen, apparently. By the way, tell me, Rick: what did you do to all the meat?” If at this time Rick replied: ‘With what meat?’ Mark would have to drop his assumption. Rick had his nerves stretched to the limit too. In such situation, it would be difficult to lie. And he had no reason to lie anyway.

  However, the assumption had been confirmed. Rick replied in a matter-of-factual manner: “With the meat? What can you do with the meat, man? Soup. Stakes. Wiener Schnitzel. Hungarian Goulash. All kinds of fine cuisine! Oh, the human flesh – nothing could be better! They say: those who once tried – cannot stop. For life.” In the sound pipe, there was again some banging noise.

  “So, did you simply kill for the meat?” Mark asked. The cannibalism and the Hungarian Goulash somehow still could not fit into a coherent mental picture.

  “Oh, no-o-o, buddy. If just for the meat – I would find some easier target. No. You must understand, they're in the woods: kissing each other, making love… And I am so-o-o jealous! Could not stand it! And if you kill, it feels better. For a while… Oh, man, back then Mike was working here… He tells me how your Billy bangs his Rissy, and I am like: damn! Here I am, with two arms and two legs, grinding my teeth, jealous! And to whom? To the useless, blind, armless dude! Almost wanted to kill him…”

  Perhaps, Mike was way too talkative, Mark thought. “You have never tried, Rick. Maybe, if you did, you would find someone who would love you – not only for your testicles.”

  “Yeah, right. As if I have never tried. Without the dick, man, nothing works quite right… And about the meat, – it's just a by-product. My grand-dad was a hunter. He always said: once you kill, must eat it. Should not let the thing rot in the woods. Besides, I did the same thing as our wonderful American government. But on the small scale, so to speak. A private venture. Of sorts.”

  “In what sense?” Mark asked.

  “Well, you, Mark, you don't look like a complete idiot. Why you didn't get it yourself? Perhaps, the FBI together with the CNN brainwashed you so well, you can't see it anymore?”

  “Bull shit! What does it have to do with the government?”

  “Well, I enlighten you. Listen it. Our big guys in the Washington slowly eat America. And not even America! They eat the whole damn world! Cannibalize, so to speak.” The careful banging on plastic continued.

  “What the hell are you talking about? Cannibalize? How is that?”

  “Well, not in the literal sense. Not yet, anyway. But very close to it! Your oldest son, Billy? He came from the war, like a total damn waste. Without both arms and nearly blind, correct? May I ask you, what did he do in the bloody Venezuela? As a military engineer? Ah? He was pumping the remaining gas – on those goddamn minefields! Now your second son, Mike, is drafted. They will send him to pump some more gas. In Venezuela, or someplace else. As the probability goes, he will be back, most likely, short of a leg. Or two. And even that – only if he comes back at all. Where did all the meat: the arms, the legs, the dead – go? That's right: the meat is converted. Into the goddamn gas! And where does the gas go? Correct: to the big shots in Washington, DC. Got the logic, man?”

  “Don't you touch my sons, you bustard! William was wounded for the country,” Mark retorted. The other day, when they were drinking beer at the Frederick's deck, Frederick was saying the same thing, Mark thought to himself. Only instead of ‘gas,’ he said ‘oil,’ and instead of ‘Washington’ – ‘the Pentagon.’

  “Well, I have a right to talk about anything I want, man. The First Amendment is still standing. Besides, I myself did not spill my balls… on a golf course! Suffered for the country too. And for your Billy – I'm sorry. Wrong example. Emotional attachments, so to speak,” the Butcher agreed. “Let's not get personal. Let say, not your Billy, but an abstract young man from your street. So it goes: they draft the guy and send him to fight the war. Wham, bam, – and the guy has no legs no more! And what our wonderful, progressive, freedom-obsessed, democratic government gives him in return? A second-hand uniform. A medal or two. Plus a bundle of useless little pieces of paper: green, with portraits of our former great Presidents. Hey, vet, here is some money for you! Take it! No worries, we will print more. To your Billy, by the way, – how much did they throw in? For all his trouble?”

  “Nothing so far. Only a letter. Apparently, there is a three-year wait to get the first installment,” Mark admitted. The Butcher was telling the truth, and this felt terrible. And really, what did William, Kate Bowen, those crippled boys from Mark's cul-de-sac, and all these other disabled vets – get? In exchange for their ruined lives, for their lost arms and legs?

  “Exactly as I said, man,” the Butcher continued his explanation. “The parents are giving their sons, and getting back these little parcels with the postmortem medals. The boys are giving their arms and legs, and get nothing back, except for a big, empty ‘thank you for your service.’ Well, some lucky ones, like your Billy also get the freaking red buckets from the Salvations. Did you hear how thy call it now? ‘Social Optimum’! Enough food, just not to be hungry
, that's pretty much all, right? Now, from the boys let's switch to the girls.” Again, there was some strange noise of broken plastic.

  “You mean: the girls to be drafted next year?”

  “Oh, this is too. But this, so far, is not a mass phenomenon. And we are talking the mass phenomenon here. No, I am about this: the government forces the women to give births. As many, as each possibly can, right?”

  “As far as I know, nobody forces nobody.”

  “Yeah, right! The abortions – banned! Now for an abortion, both the doctor and the woman are sent to a labor camp for something like fifteen years. Three times more than for a common first-degree murder. The Pill – banned! The condoms – not banned, so far, but tell me: where is this secret shop one can you buy them now? All by the Law: a girl of fourteen, like your Sammy, for instance, – is considered to be a sexually mature individual. She can have consensual sex, get married, or give birth. Even register and become a prostitute – no problems, all the opportunities are open. Here, Mark, your Sammy nods in confirmation. She wants to say she is already… No, no, it's not what you may think. Yet! So far, she just wants to say she became a sexually mature individual! By Law! Did you get it? It's a breeding program! Everything is arranged just right, so the girls pup more babies and the government has more meat! For the future.”