Pasha Malla - People Park

Starx said, On three. Olpert nodded. One, said Starx, and as two butchers with a side of meat they rocked the boy, salt sprinkling from the tarp. Cora shivered. Two, said Starx, the body swung pendulously out over Crocker Pond, and back. Rupe woke and said, Ma, are you crying? And Starx yelled, Three .

The body flew. The tarp unfurled. Salt scattered, arms and legs flailed, and everything disappeared into the mist.

There was no splash.

What the fug? said Starx. He toed the water: frozen solid.

Olpert still held the boy’s shoe. He looked from it to Starx.

He’s on top of the ice out there somewhere, said Starx, squinting.

The fog was without depth, a wall of white.

Starx took the shoe from Olpert, knelt, and slid it along the surface. For a second or two it swished over the ice — then vanished, went quiet.

Cora said, No, I’m okay. She petted Rupe’s hair, eased his head down to her lap. Go back to sleep, we’ll find your brother tomorrow.

The mist domed Crocker Pond. Everything was silent.

Fug it, Starx said. Ice has got to melt sometime. There’s salt out there too, right.

Olpert peered into the fog. Shouldn’t we go out there?

But Starx was on the horn with Griggs: Good lookin out, it’s done. What now?

And now? said Griggs. And now, Starx, B-Squad must disappear.

WITH THE WAXY white stick Sam marked two bright flecks on the door of the microwave. (Its clock too was locked at 9:00.) He pressed his forehead against the plastic, lined up his eyes: a match. Next were the holes. With his ducktaped hand Sam guided the drillbit into the door — a grinding sound, a smell of burning plastic, crumbly twists twirled onto the floor. Sam blew out the dust: two eyes stared back.

Next, putty. Sam pinched a grey gob out of the container and sculpted a half-inch volcano shape over the left hole, leaving the top open, and then the right, smoothing the ridges. He put his face up to them, the putty nestled perfectly into his eyesockets, he stared into the oven’s shadowy inside and moulded the two little mounds tighter, it was vital that no light or heat escape, or any air get in, and he smeared the putty onto his cheeks and up to his eyebrows, along the bridge of his nose on both sides.

He felt for the power dial. Found it. Paused. Okay, he said.

Sam breathed in with a great chest-filling gulp, and out, and thought of Adine’s face after the explosion: that raw pulpy mess, that death mask, that mask of blood.

The work was about returning to nothing. And as Sam stood there ready to rewind everything, staring into darkness, he wondered when it was over what he would see. Even darkness was itself something — nothing would be like space, in space it was always night. But no, night was something. Nothing was what you couldn’t see. Nothing was the space behind your head — if there was no space, if you had no head.

OLPERT FOLLOWED his partner into the boathouse, the wood splintered where the big man had shouldered the deadbolt through the doorframe. Starx groped in the dark for a lightswitch, flicked it on: the room was a jumble of nautical equipment, life preservers and flutterboards and oars and paddles and various small watercraft — rowboats, canoes, kayaks, pedalboats in stacks. It smelled of sawdust and mould.

Starx came at him with a pair of denim jumpsuits. Griggs said to get disguises, he said, handing one to Olpert. Starx’s uniform fell to the floor in a heap of khaki. He had nothing on underneath. Olpert was transfixed: so much man stood before him, everything so broad and fleshy and thick. Wrestling that massive body into the jumpsuit seemed equivalent to squeezing a ham inside a sandwich bag. In the end the pants clingwrapped his calves and the top flopped at his waist.

You too, candynuts, Starx grunted, we can’t be in uniform for when they ship us out tomorrow. Don’t look so forlorn, pal! Just a little break, a little holiday, till this all blows over. I need a different shirt though, maybe there’s a lost and found here or something. .

Starx wandered off and reappeared in a maroon Lady Y’s Back-2-Back Champs T-shirt, which fit him as a tubetop. Not ideal, he said, but better than —

Olpert was gone.

Bailie?

Starx stuck his head out the door, looked left, right, up the hill: mist, mist, more mist.

Bailie? Starx’s voice rang out over the common.

And then, to the north, he saw movement — a figure flitting down the path from Street’s Milk & Things. Starx nearly called out, but it wasn’t Olpert.

This person was small, a child, a tubby little guy in a red cap who descended with purpose at a light gallop. He reached the bottom of the hill, paused, transfixed by the cloudy bubble over Crocker Pond — waiting, maybe, for a sign.

GRIGGS.

Walters? said Griggs, chair-wheeling beside Noodles before the Orchard Parkway monitor.

And Reed, he’s down in the truck. Cathedral Circus is cleared. Only business with anyone in it was Loopy’s — she was in there, crying, but we sent her to the pub. Reed gave her a fivespot, told her to get a cider on us. Everything’s ready.

We see that. We’ve got cameras on the street and — he flicked channels — garden.

I’m up on the roof. Of the Grand Saloon. With the chopper. It’s clearing down on the street but still foggy as shet up here.

And you’re sure he hasn’t returned to his suite?

Raven? No, no way. We’ve had men in there all day. I mean, he didn’t have any luggage or anything like that but —

Fine. Is everything set?

Yeah, pretty much. The chopper’s rigged and ready to go. Hitch looks good, should be a breeze.

Good lookin out.

So do we go ahead? With the um, demobilization?

It’s going to land in that little parkette, correct? To the north of the Hotel?

If Reed guns it, it should, yes. Provided the chains hold.

They’d better hold!

They’ll hold, they’ll hold.

Griggs lowered the walkie-talkie. Noodles had wheeled away from the monitors to a corner of the control room. Feet up, he massaged his temples, a soothsayer conjuring a vision, eyes closed. Griggs hit TALK: You’re sure no one’s going to come through there?

No chance.

Okay, I guess we’re good to go then.

We’re good to go?

We’re watching, Walters, keep in mind.

So should we go ahead?

For fug’s sake, said Griggs, yes, go ahead.

Good lookin out, said Walters. Talk in a bit.

From the pickup’s trailerhitch a towline lifted and disappeared two storeys up the Grand Saloon Hotel into what was either sinking clouds or rising fog. A thumbs-up flashed out of the driverside window, the engine rattled to life, and for a moment nothing happened. Then Griggs’ walkie-talkie crackled. Okay, all set, said Walters, here we go.

The pickup’s engine roared, the tailpipe belched exhaust in a sooty plume, the towline snapped taut, twanging.

It’s moving, yelled Walters, the chopper’s moving, it’s dragging it to the edge!

The pickup inched forward, the chain trembled.

It’s about to go over, said Walters. Griggs, are you there?

I’m here, said Griggs. Noodles and I are watching.

The pickup strained, the towline flexed, Walters screamed, It’s going over!

The chain went slack. The pickup, released, went tearing up the road. Griggs waited for the crash as the illustrationist’s helicopter fell groaning over the side, plummeted six storeys, humbled to earth as an elephant to its knees.