J. Curtis - Calexit - The Anthology

As he rode through the neighborhood and past the park entrance, Andy wondered if Waters really worried about the state of the Colorado’s delta the way he said he did? Probably not. They’d met, no, collided was the word, at a conference in Pima that Andy and his allies from Natives United and Gila Free! had protested. Andy’d been waving a sign and chanting “Free the waters, free the waters.” One of the hydrologists had come over, read some of their literature, and had started laughing.

“This is so out of date!” He’d guffawed. “You need to keep up with the science if you don’t want to look any more foolish than you already do.”

That had stung, and Butterfly had snarled, “So what should we be reading?” The man had rattled off a list of titles, wrapping up with, “Or just go to the library and look up ‘Hydrology Today’.” Andy had. Given how many big, nasty water projects used computer controls, it made sense to study them along with his real classes. One of the girls had broken up with him over it, but she’d been more of a purist. Andy slowed for a stop-light, wishing the city would see reason and make the big rigs stay outside the residential areas, especially this time of evening.

What had happened to her, Evangeline it was? She’d been from San Diego. Had she joined the Brownshirt Brigade? No, he started pedaling again. She’d have gone to that environmental action youth group. Those bastards in Sacramento should have listened to their environmental people instead of screwing them over. Land before People, that had been the slogan they used to get the votes for secession. He’d show them what it really meant, if he could, even if it was four years later.

That night, Dominic stood on his back porch, watching the stars. If the houses would disappear, he could have also seen the San Francisco peaks north of Flagstaff. Monica, his sister, had loved the mountains. Now she and three of her and Lawrence’s children were dead, and poor Bobby still had nightmares about his and his father’s escape through the Sierras. Lawrence had done everything he could, but the monsters had secretly chipped Monica and the newborn when she had her C-section, and had tracked them when the family tried to escape. Monica— Dominic closed his eyes.

The monsters had televised her murder as a warning. He had not been able to call their mother before she saw it, and she died of heart failure not long after. Lawrence had almost managed to save Mary as well, but a bullet aimed at him missed, ricocheted, and hit her. She died before they could reach Reno.

Dominic didn’t want to kill innocent people. But there were no innocents in Cali, not any more. Certainly not in the government, or with the Hermanos de la Tierra . They’d killed his niece and nephew, working them to death in the Imperial Valley farms.

If Babbage was right, the Cali government would pay for those murders, for his nephew’s nightmares, for his brother-in-law’s unending pain and guilt. “Never, ever piss off the engineer,” Dominic whispered to the stars.

Chinmalis glared at Eloi. He gave her that lazy grin that meant someone was going to die, painfully, if he didn’t get his way. “They don’t work, they don’t eat, that’s tribal law. You don’t survive in this environment without everyone working for the good of the group. You know what the Ancestors said.”

Chinmalis wondered for a fraction of an instant if the Ancestors had really forced pregnant women to work in the poisoned fields, but forced the thought from her mind. “Is there another rotation available until the three deliver?” Rosa would probably go into labor that night, the curandera said. The other two weren’t as important, since they weren’t citizens of the tribe, but labor was labor and they worked hard, trying to earn their places.

“No. They work the north field, and the Chiles Verdes work along the river.” Where he could watch the younger woman ‘volunteers’ and quickly pull one from the line if he wanted her, Chinmalis knew, but didn’t dare say. No one criticized Eloi. He was connected to the Old Blood on both family sides, plus he had the political connections that let Los Hermanos de la Tierra take over so much land and water. “Any other questions, mi hija ?”

“No, compadre , none.”

He picked up a carved jadite cylinder off the desk and rolled it between his hands. “Do the verdes up north have any idea where their organic food comes from?”

“No. Or if they do, they probably pat themselves on the back for being so enlightened and supportive of minority agriculture.” She knew the sneering and condescension too well. Two thirds of the leaders of Cali had that same tone when they talked about reclaiming the land and returning it to those who deserved it. Moonbeam never had made good on his promises. And the Chinese, the ones who wanted even more food and to run the farms themselves? Even worse and just as damned racist as the Yanquis .

Eloi chuckled, low in the back of his throat, a predator’s sound. He stood, and Chinmalis backed out of the way, letting him go first out of the office. The air conditioners whirred. Chinmalis preferred to keep the building warmer, but Eloi had overruled her, as always. And he had a point in mid-summer, when the computers needed to be protected, but today when it was seventy degrees outside? She followed him down the hall. He turned right, going to his secondary office. She continued past to the main door, nodding to the muscular Hermano on security duty sketching at the desk as she left. He looked up from his drawing but didn’t say anything. She preferred him to the one who always leered at her.

Chinmalis winced a little as she stepped out of the shade of the broad patio around the Projecto de Imperio offices. The sun shone for the first time in a week, at least, and the white gravel and sand around the building gleamed. She put on her dark glasses and after some hesitation decided to go check on Rosa. The labor manager tied a bandana over her tight-braided hair, then a helmet and gloves. She climbed onto her little electric four-wheeler, started the motor, and headed north and east.

The track led through brown and white desert, brown with native plants and dirt, white where salt crystals clumped in drifts and small piles. The gringos had poisoned the land, abusing it and bringing the salt to the surface, then dumping chemicals onto their imported plants and destroying the great inland lake they called the Salton Sea. Some of the books claimed that it had been made by accident, but Chinmalish knew better. The river had carved the lake before the gringos locked the river away. Now only a tiny fraction of the waters that should fill the lake were permitted to trickle into the giant valley.

Chinmalish took her time, looking at the plants and stopping once to inspect one of the ak-chen gardens. The plants looked too wet, as if they had been gorging on too much water. The desert garden was meant for dry years, normal years. She considered moving some of the rocks to allow better drainage, then changed her mind. They needed to see how it worked, or did not work, in wet years. They knew how it worked in dry, at least farther east, in the Di’neh lands. Chinmalish made notes on her little data-pad and continued out to the north field.

Salt glittered on the edges of the huge expanse of leafy green. Stooped figures in floppy sun-hats and faded denim worked between the rows of strawberries and other produce, gathering the crops. The land was not as sick here as it was closer to the Salton Sea, but breathing the dust for too long, well… If the greedy tontos had not attempted to avoid doing their proper duties as citizens of Cali, then they deserved a lesson in earning their living. Most of the women and children had been caught trying to evade border patrols and sneak out, or had hidden their children to avoid being chipped. Except for Rosa.