John Krygelski - The Aegis Solution

“I know. I mean, I know that you’ve been against it since it was first proposed when Walker was in the Oval Office, but something new has come up. Something that changes things.”

“What?”

“Elias!” Faulk almost barked, sensing that he had succeeded in hooking his former friend. “Not on the phone. If you don’t want to come in, I’ll come there.”

Holding the handset away from the side of his head for a minute, Elias stared down at the black blotter on his desk before saying, “No, I’ll come in. What time?”

“Now. I’ll send a car.”

“No. I’ll take the Metro. Pick me up at the station.”

The snow was falling faster than the taxi’s wipers could brush it aside.

Cutting through Elias’ reverie, the cabbie asked, “So, do you think they’ll ever finish the Silver Line?”

Without turning his gaze from the side window, Elias answered, “That would be too convenient.”

“It’ll sure cut down on my fares if they do.”

“Well, there is that,” Elias commented, reflecting on how different things might look to an individual depending upon his personal, selfish perspective.

The cab driver tried to continue the conversation, but the monosyllabic answers from his passenger soon dissuaded him, and silence filled the taxi. Even with all of his years of experience in this weather, Elias thought, it still intrigued him how even heavy snowfall could arrive with only a whisper of sound. Were this rain, the inside of the cab would sound like a snare drum played during a performance of “Taps.”

Thankful for the quiet, Elias thought about Aegis. It had been over fourteen years since President Walker’s daughter had killed herself, approximately twelve since the place had opened. Walker had received the gift of a second term from the electorate, partially out of sympathy but primarily because the unemployment rate had fallen to 4.6 percent during his first term.

His successor, now in his second term, was definitely not the same kind of President or the same kind of man. Where Walker had gone through his entire public life seeming to wear his heart on his sleeve, Jeffery Collinger, the former governor of New Jersey, was a hard-nosed, pragmatic politician who made a point of never displaying his personal beliefs in public. In several statements, mostly in response to questions about the institution, Collinger had consistently made it clear that such a place as Aegis would never have been built on his watch. Yet, he acknowledged the commitment that its very creation and existence implied and had vowed to keep his hands off.

Until now, apparently, Elias thought to himself.

His mind drifted back over the past twelve years and tried to recall a month or even a week that Aegis was not a part of the public dialogue. Americans had never been very good at being kept in the dark; this was no exception. It was obvious that the general public, and especially the members of the press corps, could not tolerate remaining ignorant of what was happening behind those walls. Speculation was ever present. The supply of so-called experts, who were plopped in front of a camera to give their opinions on the facility, its inhabitants, and the various legal and moral issues associated with it, seemed inexhaustible. Some of them appeared so often they might as well be drawing a weekly paycheck from the cable networks.

All of this attention spiked to new and dizzying heights whenever it was discovered that another famous singer or Hollywood celebrity had checked in. Each time, there would be renewed cries for “access” into Aegis. The public begged the government to allow television camera crews to go in — if not cameras, at least microphones; if not that, then a removal of the Internet blockade which encapsulated the facility so that emails could flow in and out. One of the entertainment cable channels had filed a civil suit in federal court, hoping a judge would order the Feds to open the floodgates. When the wife of a movie heartthrob checked in, he persuaded the L.A. county attorney to file a writ of habeas corpus, claiming that she was being held against her will and that Aegis was, in effect, kidnapping her. The writ was dismissed.

Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson and Luke in Phoenix provided air support enforcing the no-fly zone over the facility and, more than once, their pilots were forced to chase off helicopters hired by various media outlets. Some of the interdictions came perilously close to escalating into a messy situation.

No, Elias thought, people can’t stand not knowing something.

As if the ongoing media circus were not enough, not one or two, but three “reality” shows were broadcast on different channels. The theme for all three was the same: what would it be like inside Aegis? The respective networks dedicated huge budgets to building sets and creating partial replicas of the real compound for their casts to live within. The broadcast network aired an edited, two-hour version seven nights a week. The two cable channels also showed daily condensed programs but, in addition, offered live coverage, twenty-four hours a day, over the Internet. The networks all proclaimed that their casts were completely isolated from the rest of the world during the lives of the shows, but persistent rumors had continued to surface that some of the actors had been spotted at various restaurants and clubs in Hollywood. Of course, all of them were allowed a brief reprieve from the alleged sequestration so they could don their tuxedos and gowns for an evening at the Emmy Awards. And what was the popularity of these supposedly realistic depictions of life inside Aegis? The three shows occupied the first, second, and third spots in the ratings.

A few months ago, a sixteen-year-old girl, who lived in Racine, Wisconsin, left a note for her parents, telling them that she could not live in a world without her idol, some television actor whose name eluded Elias at the moment. Apparently, the news of the object of her teen crush checking himself into Aegis, because he could no longer cope with the fact that his show was being cancelled, caused her to buy a bus ticket to Arizona and follow him in.

Both of these incidents, of course, stirred up new rounds of demands from the public. The loss of the Racine girl did have an effect. Collinger proposed and Congress passed a provision which would build a new structure at the entrance to Aegis. The addition would be, essentially, a hotel — a hotel with a difference. All of the rules of Aegis would apply with one exception: new arrivals could not enter the main complex for thirty days. At any point during that time, they could change their minds and leave, essentially providing a cooling-off period. Construction on this staging area, as it was called, was just now beginning. A moratorium on the entrance of minors under the age of eighteen into Aegis was established and quickly ceased after two teens killed themselves, blaming the moratorium for their decision.

So lost in thought, Elias did not notice they had arrived until the cab came to a stop and the driver turned around and announced, “Here we are, West Falls Church Station.”

Elias took some bills from his wallet, paid the driver, and climbed out of the back seat, pulling his coat tightly around his neck to keep out the snow.

The Metro ride into D.C. was fairly smooth, the only jostling occurring as the train rode the rails laid on the original, 150-year-old Washington & Old Dominion track bed. Although recently reset and refurbished, that part of the line, which once carried passengers beginning in 1860, seemed determined to reassert its hard-earned antiquity.

Elias once again focused his eyes on the view through the plexiglass window. The initial portion of the route did provide some scenery. But as it neared the nation’s capital, the train plunged underground for the balance of the trip. Despite the absence of a vista, Elias continued staring blankly, lost in his own thoughts, comforted by the steady stream of warm air surging from the slot vent integrated into the window frame. Not once during the duration of the trip did he glance around at his few fellow passengers, a corner of his mind thankful that he had boarded the train after the crush of the morning commute, leaving the adjacent seats vacant.