Robert Parker - Snow Storm

“I see.” Burke said trying to second guess the good doctor and failing miserably.

“My point is it was only ever in common use in the former Soviet Bloc.”

Burke was now very awake and it wasn’t the espresso.

As he woke he realised he couldn’t move. He struggled against it but something restrained him at the feet and the wrists, even, could it be, the neck?

He could remember the pub, the drinks. Most of them he’d chucked aside or hidden when no one was looking. So why was his head so fuzzy? He’d met… but that couldn’t be right, could it?

There was a lot of background noise, loud metallic banging and heavy machinery. He must be on an industrial estate. Had somebody spiked him? Was that it?

“ Ah, back in the land of the living,” boomed a voice behind him, causing his heart to pound. “I’m impressed. You do seem to have a high tolerance for your tranquilisers. But then I seem to remember you always did.”

It was. How could this be possible? And why?

“ What is this?” His words were slurred - the effects of whatever chemical was doping his system. “Why?”

“ For the greater good I’m afraid.”

“ But…”

“ You got in the way, that’s all. Don’t think of it as personal. This is merely a business transaction and you unfortunately are collateral damage. You of all people should understand that.”

“ But.”

“ I know. You explained it all in great detail last night. I don’t expect you’ll remember, but, well, I felt I owed you something of an explanation at least. You may not be able to see the bigger picture but you do have the consolation of knowing it wasn’t entirely your own fault and really there was nothing you could have done.”

He struggled, pulling at his restraints trying to get free, knowing it was a futile gesture. Instinct drove him to it even though he knew there was no way out.

“ And so to business I’m afraid. This shouldn’t hurt as such and I’m reliably informed it should at least be quick.”

“ You can’t,” he shouted, feeling the anger and rise now. “You know they’ll come for you.”

“ Oh quite. In fact I would go so far as to say I’m counting on that.”

He felt the tightening round his neck, slowly at first and then all at once. He kicked with legs that wouldn’t move and screamed with a voice that wasn’t there.

The county buildings were cold. The draft drove a constant circulation of damp December air round the ancient stairs and upwards, permeating the building as a whole. They were in the function room next to the kitchen on the first floor, where the mock châteaux’s high windows looked out over the town’s festively lit gardens and the Mercat Cross.

This particular meeting of the community council had been convened for over an hour and they had so far only managed to wrangle over the placement of double yellow lines down one of the side streets. One faction’s opinion was that they were needed as sometimes it was an outright struggle to get past something parked in the lane and this could cause delays.

“Delays in what?” someone had asked. This was Wigtown after all. If you wanted to be in a hurry you’d picked the wrong place to live. There were choruses of approval from others at this.

Why was it, someone else asked, that certain residents of the town wished to stay so firmly in the dark ages? It was all very well having the scenery and living in a remote corner, but why did it have to come at the cost of progress?

Eventually the matter was drawn to a close or some kind of stalemate and the meeting moved on to the latest applications for planning consents to build wind turbines and the evil inefficient overrated view polluters or environmental saviours they were, depending on the various stand points.

After they had ploughed through this and most had lost the will to live, the man in the pin striped suit was introduced, though the nature of his visit had been a subject many pondered during the preceding discussions, owing to the fact that his carefully thought out getup had all the subtlety of a sledgehammer.

He was announced as Giles Herriot-Watt of the law firm Farquhar and Donaldson in Edinburgh and duly stood to address the room.

“Good evening,” he began, in an accent that seemed stuck somewhere between Edinburgh, the Home Counties and San Francisco. “I represent a company called Brentwood which as many of you may be aware, has recently made a significant commitment to investing in this area in purchasing the industrial complex at Baldoon.”

There were nods of approval round the room. This being a small town in a sparsely populated area, everyone knew the land round Baldoon had transferred hands recently and there had been a fair bit of discussion of it around the town, mainly from farmers worried about the cost of the feed they bought there sky rocketing along with every other overhead. There were even rumours about a factory and the jobs it might bring to the area.

“And to that end,” the suit continued “as a gesture of good will and a sign of my clients long term commitment to their partnership with this area I have been asked to set up a scholarship fund for the town, helping gifted students to cope with the high cost of uprooting themselves to study in areas where, let’s face it, the cost of living may be somewhat prohibitive.”

Another chorus of nods from the heads in the room followed by a slow growing round of applause.

“My clients have also asked to remind everyone that it is imperative they retain a modicum of privacy in their operations at Baldoon. Some of the development work being undertaken in the complex is of a sensitive nature and as such could be prone to acts of industrial espionage. This is a matter my clients take very seriously and as such they are willing to offer a reward to anyone reporting any information relating to such activities.”

This time the nods were more confused and disjointed, as was the round of applause.

With that he thanked them for their time and made a sharp exit.

Tongues were not long in starting to wag.

Burke was woken by the phone at around five, having been battered yet again by the other half’s restless feet. He’d tried to relax as much as possible, continuing his way through a Battle Star Galactica box-set – the original 1978 series not the new version, which despite the hype, he hadn’t yet found time to digest. He couldn’t see how they could top the original, with Lorne Green post Bonanza and Dirk Benedict before The A-team. They’d even cheekily put a Cylon Robot in the opening sequence to The A-team for Benedict to shoot a look of vague recognition at.

Rachel didn’t approve of this particular fetish. She continued looking at Baby Gap online, save for the odd troubled glance over the top of her specs. She later explained that she’d been watching him as he took turns at smoking his e-fag and practising shuffling cards in ever more elaborate fashions. She wished he would learn how to relax.

He told her not to worry as he picked up a copy of a John Belushi biography in an effort to read himself into rapid eye movement.

Sleep eventually did find him and he drifted into a dream where a plague swept through the city turning everyone it touched into zombies. There was a cure, a pill you could take but it was only available in a hospital that looked suspiciously like the security queue at Edinburgh airport. He waited for what seemed like forever driven mad by the screams of a small child behind but when he looked there was no one there. After a wait that seemed unending he arrived at a security gate and tried to go through but froze as a strangely familiar bell went off.