John Birmingham - Without warning

With that he turned and walked away from the delegate from Spokane, wondering how the fuck anyone from Spokane got a ticket here in the first place. All Vusevic represented was a burnt-out ruin of urban wasteland.

‘Whoa there, Nelly! You’re gonna throw a shoe, stomping off like that.’

Kipper pulled up at the sight of Jed Culver, who’ d just emerged from the crush around the refreshments table. He seemed to live there, and it was taking its toll. The guy looked like he hadn’t slept. His face was puffy and dark bags hung under his eyes.

‘Sorry, Jed. Not today, man. I’ve got a world of fucking hurt on my shoulders.’

‘Who doesn’t, Kip, who doesn’t? Just a word in your shell-like. Won’t take a minute.’

Kipper frowned at the odd phrasing, until he remembered that Culver had worked in London for a couple of years. Or he said he had. Sometimes with Jed you were never quite sure when he was feeding you a line. The engineer sighed, exhausted. He really was buried by work, and being called down to the conference floor to get reamed out over the air-conditioning hadn’t improved his mood. He hadn’t slept last night, after the Gestapo, as Barb called them, had left. Partly because Barney Tench had stayed until just before dawn, attempting to win him over to the cause. His friend had left in a police cruiser of all things. ‘Not everyone in uniform wants to be the Fuhrer,’ Barney had explained, winking.

Kip shook off Culver’s guiding hand and continued on his way to the exit. The lawyer fell in beside him, not saying anything. Just grinning and waving at the other delegates as he passed them, even those who Kip knew for a fact he hated. How the hell he did that was a mystery for the ages. When James Kipper didn’t like someone they didn’t die wondering.

‘You going back up to your office?’ Jed asked, as they left the auditorium behind.

‘Yes, I am, but…’

‘Great. I’ll come with you. Come on.’

‘Don’t you want to be here for the vote?’ the engineer enquired. ‘It’s on soon, isn’t it?’

‘Already lost that one, Kip. So no, I have other plans, my friend. Come on.’

He reluctantly allowed Culver to tag along with him, mostly because he knew the man was congenitally incapable of taking no for an answer. Kip could have blown him off, but he knew that by the time he reached his office many floors above, this expensively suited fixer would most likely have been waiting in his chair with a big dumb grin on his face.

‘That doesn’t sound like you, Jed, giving up because you can’t win.’

‘Who says I’m giving up?’ Culver asked in reply.

Kipper spared him a glance and was disturbed by the wolfish smile he found there. ‘What’s happening, Jed? This really isn’t the morning for it.’

‘No, that’s where you’re wrong, Kip. This is very much the morning for it. This is the morning the American people – what’s left of ‘em, God help us – take back their government.’

They entered the elevator, which Kipper had tried to shut down without success – the city councillors had baulked at that power-saving measure. Jed punched in the number for the Engineering Department’s floor, before smiling graciously and using his arm to bar the way of a young woman who’d rushed up behind them to share the ride. ‘Sorry, darlin’. Do you mind?’

She did, but there was nothing she could do about it as the doors slid shut.

Kipper bristled at the impoliteness. ‘That wasn’t very nice, Jed, and it was wasteful,’ he chastised the lawyer. ‘And what are you crapping on about anyway? You already said you were going down in that vote this morning. Blackstone is gonna get his congressmen, whether the rest of the army wants it or not.’

Jed put a finger to his lips before gesturing around the elevator. Kip sighed with exasperation, but after last night he wasn’t so quick to dismiss paranoid speculation about surveillance.

The lawyer nodded. ‘Well, you’re right about one thing, Kip. Not all of the military wants this situation. Ritchie and Franks are dead against it.’ Culver looked around as if addressing an unseen audience. ‘And nobody in uniform is arguing in favour of it, of course. But in the end they’ll accede to the wishes of the people.’

‘But people don’t want this,’ Kipper said. ‘Some people maybe, but not everyone. This is just fear and craziness.’

‘Well, fear whispers loudly downstairs, my friend. Come on.’

A bell dinged as the elevator came to a stop. Kip made to step out and head for his office but Culver grabbed his arm and directed him towards another room.

‘I had this one swept fifteen minutes ago,’ he said quietly, pulling the door closed behind them.

‘You what?’

‘Found this…’ Jed pulled a small electronic device from his breast pocket. ‘Don’t worry, it’s been disabled.’

Kip stared at the tiny piece of technology as hackles rose on his back. ‘Sons of bitches.’

‘Nah, amateurs, Kip,’ Culver corrected him. ‘Rank fucking amateurs playing at big boys’ games. Now, come to the window. I want you to see the sort of view you miss when you work indoors all the time.’

The chief engineer followed Culver to the window and looked down on his city. It was a relatively clear morning, the first in a while. A few grey clouds scudded out near the mountains to the east, but otherwise the sky was clear, save for two army helicopters holding position over the bridges across Lake Washington. And then he saw them – a sea of colour, a teeming, seething mass of humanity, streaming onto the bridges and heading for the city centre.

‘What the hell?’

The crowd had already swept past a small army roadblock at the eastern end of the bridge and were beginning to string together a long procession that took up every available lane.

‘The wishes of the people, Kip. I didn’t think they were being heard downstairs either. So I invited them all here to have their say.’

The engineer was speechless.

‘You’re a local – how long do you think it will take them to walk that distance, Kip? To get them here, I mean, beating on the doors of the Municipal Tower?’

Kipper shook his head. ‘Not long, I guess. If they’re allowed.’

Jed Culver snorted. ‘If they’re allowed! What, did I wake up in Soviet Russia this morning? They’re American citizens down there, Kip. Your neighbours and friends. Nobody tells them what they can or can’t do. And sure as shit, nobody tells them how they’re gonna govern themselves.’

Kipper pressed his head to the glass, which felt cool against his sweating brow. ‘How did you do this, Jed, without anyone knowing?’ he asked quietly.

‘Without Blackstone knowing, you mean? I had some friends – some of them friends of yours, actually.’

‘Hey buddy, sorry to keep dropping in like this.’

‘Hello, sweetie!’

Kipper spun around to find Barney standing at the office door. And next to him was Barb, holding Suzie on one hip.

‘Holy crap, Barn, they’ll fucking lock you up, man! And Barb…’

‘Daddy said the rude word!’ squealed his daughter.

He pulled up, realising he’d just dropped an F-bomb in front of his six-year-old child. Damn.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Daddy shouldn’t have done that, darlin’. It’s just that he was a little… surprised. And kind of upset.’ The bomb diffused, Kip turned to the two adult visitors. ‘So, what’s going on here?’

Barney was peering out of the doorway and back along the corridor, where his former co-workers had begun to gather and point at the slow-moving crowd snaking across the bridges. One or two saw him and waved. He smiled back before returning his attention to his old friend.