There was a static hiss and then a monotone voice transmitted back. “Control, go ahead.”
“Nominal check,” the gunnerman said. “Surname Calloway, first name Ryan.” He relayed Ryan’s date of birth and the three of them waited in silence.
“Ryan Calloway is known on the system. Not wanted, not missing and no convictions. If he’s in company with a Robbert Calloway, stop and search.”
Still not satisfied, he stared again at Ryan’s photograph. “What’s your business here?”
“My own.”
The gunnerman stepped out of the booth and stood in front of Ryan. “Cut the attitude lad. I’ve not seen you at this checkpoint before and you’re not getting through unless I say so. Now what’s your business?”
“He’s with me,” Alia said curtly. “You know I’m from Old Straybeck and he’s a friend of mine.”
The gunnerman weighed up her answer, deciding if it was worth the hassle of upsetting a girl who would no doubt have important and influential parents. “Alright Miss,” he said. “But I suggest you choose your company more carefully.” He leaned into the booth and pressed the gate release.
“Thank you,” she said when Ryan was through. “But the company I keep is absolutely no concern of yours.” She linked her arm through Ryan’s and they walked up the street. A few steps later, he unhooked his arm and Alia could tell he was silently fuming.
“Sorry,” she said.
Ryan took a breath. “Do you see what I mean now? How can it be right for him to talk to me like that? I’ve done nothing wrong. I should be allowed to go wherever I want.”
“It isn’t right,” she said. “But it’s how it’s always been.” Ryan bridled at the comment and she put her hands up to pacify him. “Wait, just hear me out. That’s why I’ve brought you here.”
They walked in silence down the wide open streets of Old Straybeck. She wondered if Ryan had ever been here before. From the way he gawped up at the rows of grand, white-washed houses, she doubted it. Eventually, Alia stopped outside an enormous double-fronted building. Its door was framed by two bulging stone pillars and the huge windows were criss-crossed with lead mullions.
“That’s my house,” she said.
“What?”
“Until just over a year ago, I lived there.” She pointed up at the top-right window. “That was my bedroom.” She could tell by his face that Ryan didn’t believe her.
“I suppose you had servants too?”
“We had people that helped around the house and I had a nanny. But we didn’t treat them like servants. They were more like family.”
There was an ornate metal bench nearby and Ryan plonked himself down. “I don’t understand. I’ve been to your house. How could you have lived here?”
She took a seat beside him. “My Dad used to own a factory in the worker district. It was one of the biggest in Straybeck.” She could feel his eyes fixed upon her, but she continued the story. “My Dad was not an evil man Ryan, and he was never cruel to his workers. Do you remember the strikes ten years ago? Well his was the only factory not burnt out. That means something, doesn’t it?”
She didn’t wait for an answer. “A couple of years ago, he hired two new foremen. They were starving and needed work and because of that he hired them over more qualified people. But pretty soon, problems started in the factory. Machinery broke and money went missing. The rest of the workers, who had never concerned themselves with politics, were suddenly holding meetings and calling for strikes.
“Slander and lies about my father spread though the work force. People said that he was going to lay off half the staff so that he could pay the rest lower wages and work them longer hours. By the time he figured out who was to blame, it was too late. The foremen he had hired out of pity had turned the factory against him.” Tears swelled to the corner of her eyes and she blinked them onto her cheeks.
“They forced the lock to my father’s office and beat him unconscious. They carried him down to the factory floor and tied a rope round his neck. Then they hooked it over one of the rafters and took it in turns to pull him in the air and let go. It was nearly half an hour before the seveners broke through and carried him to a hospital.”
When Ryan put his arm around her shoulders, she leaned into him, burying her face in her hands. Despite the numbing effect of the tablets, the tears wouldn’t stop. She wiped them away with the cuff of her jacket and straightened up.
“You think the gunnermen are evil and the workers are all victims. You think that, because it’s all you’ve ever known. Well that’s not my life. They’re not victims. Not to me.” Ryan hunched forwards, his chin on his hands, silently studying the pavement below.
“What a mess,” he said eventually, allowing a deep breath to escape.
“What?”
“All of it. This whole city.”
Chapter 21
Years ago, there had been an idea that the Government could eliminate unemployment throughout the City States. They spent millions regenerating the Worker Districts, creating enormous new factories and power plants. Thousands of unemployed were relocated and drafted into work in a move that Premier Talis hailed as the end of their economic depression.
The reality wasn’t quite like that though. The huge fall in unemployment was only achieved by offering the workers a stark choice. Work or starve. While lines of desperate young men came to the factory gates, the bosses rubbed their hands and dropped wages a little more each day. People who had no business being on the factory floor, those with broken bodies or broken minds, were forced to toil for endless hours at the machine face.
After he was released from The Cathedral, Robb almost starved in the months it took to recuperate. Eliza earned a pittance as a trainee nurse and she couldn’t support them indefinitely. So as soon as he could walk, Robb went to the factory like everyone else. He stood straight and tall while the foreman spoke to him and then he was given a job at the busiest munitions plant in Karasard.
He struggled for as long as his body would hold out, working without breaks just so he could keep up with the other machinists. On the third day though, exhausted and dehydrated, his legs gave way and he collapsed beneath a stack of aluminium sheeting. Blood streamed from a gash on his arm, but he doggedly got to his feet and began restacking the fallen metal.
The foreman ran over, yelling and cursing at Robb while the other workers kept their heads down. It was actually the floor supervisor, a quiet man called Don Wyatt, who intervened on Robb’s behalf and stopped the foreman throwing him out. He was one of those rare people, respected throughout the factory by both worker and management. Although he rarely spoke, his words were carefully considered and carried all the more weight as a result.
“That’s enough,” he said, one hand resting on Robb’s shoulder, the other removing a sheet of metal from his grip. The foreman fumed quietly at his side but knew better than to challenge Wyatt. Robb allowed himself to be led from the factory floor where he sank dejectedly onto an empty pallet by the huge roller shutters in the loading bay. Wyatt gave him a crisp white handkerchief to staunch the bleeding and he gingerly dabbed it against the cut.
“Don’t just pet it,” Wyatt grumbled and pressed his hand down firmly on top of Robb’s.
A man in his fifties strode past with an impossibly large coil of wire balanced on one shoulder. He pulled up short when he saw the blood on Robb’s arm.
“He alright Don?”
“Aye. Looks worse than it is.”
The man nodded and then hoisted his load back into place before continuing across the work bay. Robb had the feeling that Wyatt had something else he wanted to talk about.
“I’ve been watching you the last few days,” he eventually said. “You must have known someone would be. A past like yours.”
Robb glanced up. He had a fair idea where this was going.
“Relax. I could get rid of you for a lot less than dropping some bloody scrap metal.” The supervisor lowered his voice. “
So, The Cathedral huh? You were lucky to come out of there at all. I’ve known many that didn’t.”
Robb was immediately on his guard although he could sense no hidden agenda. Besides, there would be no purpose for this man to entrap him in a conversation. The gunnermen could snatch him away at any moment and he’d be simply one more disappeared worker.
“Can I be honest with you?” Wyatt said and then continued without waiting for an answer. “You’re not strong enough or fast enough to be a factory hand. You’ve flogged yourself half to death for three days and could barely keep pace with the other lads.”
Robb was stung by the words, but knew they were true.
“How long do you think you can do that for? A week? A month? Sooner or later accidents are going to happen and someone’s going to get hurt.”
“You’re telling me,” Robb said as he drew back the bloodied handkerchief.
Wyatt was unimpressed though and his forehead creased into a deep frown. “I mean seriously hurt. Or worse.”
“I know that,” Robb said wearily. “But what am I supposed to do? I can’t eat if I don’t have money.”
“I’ve always been a believer in second chances. God knows I’ve needed a few in my time.” Wyatt took a seat on the wooden pallet and unwrapped a paper bag filled with sugar sweets. “So, what I’m asking myself is can I use you for something else? You got a head for figures? Money and such?”
Robb caught his meaning. “I’ve done exams and I helped run the books for a builder’s firm last year. Before…”
“Before you were otherwise employed?” Wyatt suggested.
“Yes. Something like that.”
“Well it so happens - as of next week – that I’m short a member of staff on the corridor.”
The corridor referred to a row of offices that housed all the finance and administrative staff. Almost thirty feet in the air, it ran along the upper edge of the factory wall. There they sat, like bird’s nests, overseeing the factory floor with an interconnecting balcony that allowed the admin staff to move around without ever stepping foot among the workers. They had a place that fell somewhere between management and labourers and were welcomed by neither side.
For Robb though, there was no choice to be made. He had just publicly renounced all the ideals he ever held close. So taking a job where people avoided him was irrelevant. That same day he found himself climbing the circular staircase that took him off the factory floor. His uneven footsteps left the metal stairs ringing and when he reached the top he was sweating and panting for breath. There he stayed, while thirty years slipped through his hands and Robb found he was still working on the same corridor of the same factory.
Don Wyatt was long since dead. A heart attack claimed him four years after he gave that second chance. Staff came and went and Robb eventually became the old-timer. New workers stopped hearing about his past, while the older ones simply stopped caring.
The end product was a tired and worn out man, nursing his bandaged ribs the day after Saintsday. In a gloomy corner of the office he sat and balanced the books, filed reports and ran production figures. It had been over a quarter of a century since he left The Cathedral, but Robb finally realised this had been the real punishment.
Across the room, the corner speaker was transmitting government broadcasts that played continuously through their factory network. Very occasionally it allowed censor-approved songs to be played and Robb glanced up as the opening bars of a song crept into the office.
It was an old one, from when he had been young. A life-time ago. The soft lilting voice prickled his memory and set his hairs standing on end. Try as he might though, he couldn’t quite place the tune. Each time a certain refrain played through, he almost glimpsed it. Without thinking he stood up and limped over to the radio. The other clerks stopped their tasks one by one and stared as he went past. In the silence left by the absence of chatter, Robb let music fill their space and a voice carry him away.
He remembered it all. A night out in Karasard before The Cathedral. Before he had been transformed into this twisted wreck of a man. A chance encounter after too much beer. The first time he had heard that song.
Back then, there were the state-owned bars and the cooperatives. These were back-alley pubs where people brewed their own drink and sold it off cheap. The gunnermen – for a small fee - were persuaded to turn a blind eye; the brewers made a profit; and half a city got drunk very cheaply.
Robb and Farren had been in one of the cooperatives all day, drinking through their weekly wage. Fuelled by too much beer, they decided to see how the other half lived and swaggered across town until they found a glass-fronted bar in the Trade Quarter. They found a table in the centre of the room and waited for someone to take their order.
“I reckon I fit in round here,” Farren said surveying the other patrons. “Two glasses of the house beer please,” he called imperiously to the waitress.
“And two for me,” Robb added, setting them both off laughing.
She returned a few minutes later, carrying the drinks on a circular silver tray. She ignored their attempts to catch her eye and left their drinks without a word. Farren whistled softly as she circled the room clearing away empty glasses.
“Very nice,” he said.
Robb took a sip from his glass and nodded. Over the next couple of hours, the restaurant cleared out leaving just the two of them. Farren stumbled to the toilet and Robb sank into his chair, feeling hopelessly drunk. He watched the pretty waitress cleaning while music played from speakers above the bar. The song was an old ballad from years back, but Robb felt it suited the mood in the bar perfectly. For the briefest of moments, he was sobered by the beauty in the music and his eyes cleared.
Seized by a sudden impulse, he rose unsteadily and approached the waitress who was wiping down tables with her back to him. Before he could speak though, Farren returned from the toilet, seized her by the hands and dragged her into a space between the tables.
“How about a dance?” He slurred and tried to twirl her around like a gypsy girl.
“That’s enough now,” she said but Farren didn’t stop and stumbled against her before dipping her at the waist and forcing a kiss on her lips. She broke away, raising her voice. “That’s enough. Go now or I’ll get the manager.”
Farren flashed her that cocky grin of his, but Robb quickly apologised for them both. “You’re right,” he said. “We’re drunk.”
“It was just a bit of fun,” Farren said. “Don’t be so serious.”
Robb ushered his friend towards the door, walking backwards as he apologised again. “No, it’s okay, we’re leaving. Sorry.” He never saw the bar stool that tangled his legs and sent him flat on his backside. Farren doubled up with laughter and even the waitress smiled in spite of herself. Once they had left, she locked the door and changed the sign from open to closed. Robb made it as far as the first checkpoint before turning back.
“No way,” Farren called after him. “You’re ditching me for the waitress?”
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Robb shouted as he ran through the Trade Quarter towards the bar. The lights were out when he got there and Robb peered through the windows, trying to catch his breath. He saw movement at the very back of the bar and banged loudly on the glass. The waitress peered back, already wrapped in a thick coat.
“What?” she mouthed impatiently through the glass.
“I just wanted to say goodnight,” Robb shouted back. “And sorry for the way my friend behaved. And for falling over.”
She leaned closer to the window and glanced up and down the street. Apparently satisfied that he was alone and not planning to rob the place, the frown dropped from her face. “Don’t worry about it,” her voice was muted by the glass but she gave him a tired smile. “It’s been a long night though.”
“Sure, yeah,” he shouted back and then waited in silence, trying to think of something else to say. “I’m Robb.”
“Hi.”
“I could m
ake sure you get home safe, if you like?” At which point he wobbled forwards and hit his forehead on the window with a dull thunk.
“Are you sure about that?”
He rubbed his head and stared accusingly at the glass. The waitress smiled.
“Tell you what. Why don’t you go home, sober up, and if you can remember my name in the morning, come back and see me.”
“It’s a deal,” he said and staggered away from the window. He made it about three steps before turning back to see her waiting with a sly grin on her face. “You haven’t told me your name yet, have you?”
She shook her head. “It’s Eliza.”
“I’m Robb.”
“You said.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow, Eliza.” Robb tapped the side of his head knowingly and then stumbled home.
That was the first time he met Eliza. The next night he went back at closing time and asked her out. He knew she was too good for him, but somehow she never realised. Or if she did, she was kind enough not to say.
Back in the office, the song trailed away and Robb was left standing in silence with his hand still on the speaker. He muttered an apology, to no one in particular, and went back to his desk. Immediately the chatter resumed as though nothing of great importance had just happened.
Chapter 22
It had been two days since Ryan last saw Alia but in that time she had never been far from his thoughts. Her story was a hard one to make peace with. Born into the very best of Straybeck life, only to be dissected and discarded from it. It felt like he should resent her for her past. But if she was guilty by association to her father’s wealth and privilege, then what did that say for him? The thoughts circled his head, inevitably reaching the same conclusion. She was hurting and needed help. He wanted to be the person that helped her.
He knew there was nothing he could do about her father’s death, or about her living in a slum house in the Worker District. After two days of replaying their conversation though, he struck upon the one thing he could do to help.
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