Matthew Tysz - The Last City of America

Calum turned his eyes to his aide, told him to shut the door. He leaned in to meet Grakus, steam from the coffee moistening his whiskers. “How?”

“The competitiveness I mentioned,” said Grakus as he played with the steam from his mug. “An opportunity to crush a notorious rebellion like yours can drive the commanders against each other. I can set it up so they’ve weakened one another well by the time they reach your ranks.”

Calum took time to think, and Grakus let him. For a whole minute, Calum sat back, looking at his desk, looking at the drawer that held his train.

The underhost just stared, motionless.

Finally, Calum returned the gaze and said, “Weakened or not, we’ll still have to fight them eventually. Even if we did have the munitions, we don’t have nearly enough men.”

“I can supply you with both,” Grakus replied immediately. “More followers from the streets, and guns. Funny thing about being the underhost: I don’t control the military, but all of their stored hardware is run by the Munitions Administration. And guess who runs the administrations.”

“Still…” Calum shook his head, cupping his mug tight. “The entire Chicago army…?”

“Impossible, I know,” said Grakus. “I’ll still need a commander on my side. To clean things up. I’d have him step out of the competition while the others tear one another apart. I would use his army to bring the battle to a close as you pick the commanders off from a fortified position. The battle ends, you and I select a new host.”

“And who will that be?” Of course, Calum already knew the answer to that.

“Darn, now you figured out why I’m helping you,” Grakus snapped his fingers.

Grakus was obviously a typical politician. At least, typical in terms of the East and West. Not insane, but clearly selfish. Calum could live with that. There may well be problems between them when Chicago was overthrown. But by then, the Chicago military would have been weakened. Besides, what could go wrong accepting Grakus’s offer that couldn’t go wrong rejecting it? Nervous as he was, Calum didn’t find the decision difficult.

He stood. “Well, Mr. Grakus. It’s gonna take me some time to process this.”

“Take your time, sir.” Grakus rose and shook his hand. “Just remember how long we’ve all been waiting for this, and how much suffering is taking place with every moment we wait.”

The administrator of hospitals had the most pristine office in Chicago. Stark white carpet, cherry oak walls, Brazilian walnut desk with a surface so reflective that everything on it had a twin. A grandfather clock. A hutch with statuettes. Everything in the office was manufactured before the Founding, putting them on a market of higher demand than heroin.

Today, it was especially clean.

A framed painting of his own production, portraying the disciples eating Christ as he hung on the cross, had been taken down. It wasn’t classy. His jar of tongues, collected from the lovers of rivals for proud display on his shiny desk, now occupied a low drawer.

He had to make things proper because the underhost was proper—much more so than the last underhost. Even the man’s guards were as clean as surgeons, and they were classy enough to keep their guns concealed beneath their ironed wool suits. Very impressive.

Rouge had stood when the underhost entered, sat when the underhost sat: straight up, their hands at their sides.

The endurance of sanity held in this Grakus’s eyes, just as it held in Wilco’s eyes. But this man held an even greater endurance. His eyes were certain, accurate, content. Rouge began to wonder if the propriety was genuine. The suspicion was easy to miss, and surely everybody else had missed it. Still, the company was enjoyable.

The underhost began by informing Rouge that he was exploring the administrations to acquaint himself with his new responsibilities. He opined that healthcare was the most important one. He was very political, like Studebaker before him: a lucky man trying to stay alive.

“I understand drugs are often stolen from the city’s hospitals and clinics into a rather lucrative drug market,” he looked at Rouge almost accusingly. “It’s said that many inside the hospitals are assisting in this thievery, paid off by the drug lord, um… the Emperor of Needles, I think they call him?”

This matter had obviously been brought up many times with Rouge. By the host, his various underhosts, by the commanders. He gave Grakus the same auto-response he gave the rest. “I can’t directly oversee every item in our inventory. But the commanders can stop these items from fueling organized crime. The fact that they don’t is neither my responsibility nor my problem.”

Grakus smiled. “I’m told you actually sent an assassin after one of them. The commanders.”

“Allegedly,” Rouge corrected.

He remembered it well. At the time, the plan seemed perfect. The assassin was talented and experienced, but Wilco was a little better. He not only intercepted the assassin, but got him to reveal who had hired him, although the latter may have merely been an educated guess on Wilco’s part. The distraught commander appealed to Underhost Studebaker to have Rouge dismissed from his office. The host was so amused by the matter that he instead dismissed the case. Wilco was livid, and no doubt stricken with a paranoia that clung to him even still. Rouge considered it a victory.

Grakus took the conversation down a more personal path. He asked Rouge how he came into this field—if it had been his first choice. Rouge hesitated, said no. Grakus didn’t press. He asked Rouge what motivated him, what he ultimately wanted for himself.

“I doubt the underhost has the time to take a philosophical survey on all of his administrators, your lordship—”

“Grakus, if you please.”

“Grakus,” Rouge looked deeper into the underhost. His smile faded to a frown, descended to a scowl. “Why are you here?” Everyone in Chicago, Teddles himself, was afraid of the look Rouge was giving Grakus just then.

Like the rest, Grakus was indeed frozen. He didn’t even twitch. Soon, he would glance at his bodyguards just to make sure they were still there. Then he’d check his watch, avoiding eye contact, emphasize how busy he was and wrap this meeting up.

Like clockwork, Grakus glanced at his guards.

And the guards started leaving.

But Grakus did not. He sat calmly, smiling at Rouge.

Rouge continued his deep stare, but it was like looking into a tunnel. Silent and deep, the tunnel just stared back. The last guard left and the door was shut. He noticed the ticking of the clock, which he had forgotten since the conversation began.

“You have an insight my inferiors tend to lack,” said the underhost.

“I’m impressed you’ve sensed it so quickly,” said Rouge.

When his mother died, she left young Rouge with what remained of his own life. They were shards. They were few. He gave them all to Chicago. In turn, Chicago completed him. He was an organ: neither the heart nor brain, but something the body couldn’t live without. And now some man, who knew as little about Chicago as Chicago knew about him, was underhost. And he was luring Rouge into a trap.

“I’m here because I want to make use of it,” said the underhost. “Such as the hosts and underhosts before have not.”

“Liar!” Rouge forgot his love for propriety. He sprung to his feet, knocked the golden desk lamp over. “Nobody sees anything here!”

Grakus received the words, ignoring the outburst. “But I am not from here.”

Rouge clenched his fist around a paperweight, so tightly that his arm trembled. “You don’t know a thing about who I am.” He didn’t try to hide his willingness to make the underhost stop smiling.