‘I need to tell you something before you leave’, Vera sniffed. ‘Something I’ve been keeping from you. Something I have to say but which must remain forever our secret’.
Dick really wanted to say his final goodbyes and leave. He really didn’t want to hear another pledge of undying love, especially from someone whose face was rapidly resembling a creature from a straight-to-DVD horror film.
‘Benjamin was completely loyal to the Party’.
‘Pardon?’ Dick couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
‘He was framed for his crimes’, explained Vera.
Dick was stunned by this revelation. ‘H-how do you know?’
‘Because it was me who implicated him’.
Dick wanted to ask a hundred questions, well maybe not a hundred, but lots of them, but he didn’t need to.
‘I planted the damning evidence on him one night and then tipped-off the security forces’. Vera snorted like a wild boar, siphoning the mucous up one nostril like dirty water disappearing into a plughole. Ordinarily this would have made Dick recoil in horror but at this moment he didn’t care. He was hooked by Vera’s confession.
‘He was making my life very difficult’, she continued. ‘You remember I had private talks with him in the meeting room; well it was Benjamin who requested them. He told me you were a traitor and that I was covering for you. He said he’d use his party contacts to gather proof and expose the truth. I told him he was talking claptrap and that if he continued to waste my time I’d have to discipline him and that would not look very good on his permanent record’.
In a most unlady-like way Vera wiped her face with the back of her large hand before continuing. ‘That’s when he told me he came in very early one morning and found me asleep at my desk. It was the morning after I got drunk. The little bastard took the brandy bottle from the waste bin and put it in my hand before taking photographs and leaving, returning after I’d gone home. He said he was going to blackmail me unless I resigned so he could take my place and unmask you! My job is my life Jeremy. I couldn’t face losing my job… or you!’ Vera burst out crying again, burying her head in Dick’s chest. ‘And now you’re leaving anyway!’ Vera was now sobbing uncontrollably. Dick tried to give her a comforting hug but the wide expanse of her back meant he couldn’t quite manage to get his hands to meet. Only by breathing in could he even get his fingertips to touch.
‘I’ll take that with me to the grave Vera. Thank you for everything. I won’t forget you. No matter where I end up, I’ll always keep in touch’. Dick knew this was a complete and utter lie but it seemed an appropriately reassuring and consoling thing to say.
‘Good luck Jeremy!’ Vera wailed. ‘Now go! I don’t want you to see me this way!’.
She broke out of his grasp and Dick took one last look at her swollen, red, mucous-ridden face and had to agree with her sentiment. Leaving his identity pass on his desk he left the room without looking back. Taking the elevator to the ground floor, Dick said goodnight to the security guard in the lobby and walked out of the Ministry of Information for the very last time. In the cool night air Dick re-read the letter in detail. It confirmed that his new position took effect tomorrow and that he should report to the Party Headquarters at 0800. Dick decided to walk home that night, thinking about his future with a smile on his face. It was only a few weeks ago that he arrived in this strange world and now, here he was, relishing the no-doubt painful death of his ex-colleague and about to become a trusted advisor to the Leader.
Dick’s promotion to the Ruling Council didn’t just give him a new opportunity to gather information; it gave him a new impetus and motivation. Dick was determined to find out about this so-called secret weapon once and for all, and before David Parnell. He thought about Parnell’s entry to the Resistance being expedited by Taylor and smirked. ‘Fast tracked?’, he thought to himself. ‘You don’t know the meaning of the fucking word’.
CHAPTER 26
Dick underwent the usual identity checks when he reported to the Party headquarters the following morning but before he was allowed past security, he was asked to sign an NDA. Dick thought this was a very unusual request. Sure, the Nude Disability Act of 2003 had been worthy legislation that made it illegal to discriminate against disabled porn stars, and which made it possible for actors like John ‘Limpy’ Large and ‘Paraplegic’ Tiffany Titts to forge niche careers for themselves, but Dick didn’t see why it was relevant to him or his new job. Then he realised what he was being asked to sign was in fact a Non Disclosure Agreement, and that made far more sense.
This declaration stated that he would not reveal his new responsibilities or any aspect of his job to anyone. The document was worded so strongly that Dick was intimidated just scanning the text and felt threatened at the turn of every page. Dick expected that these restrictions would last forever, but discovered they actually existed in perpetuity, and that was a very, very, very long time indeed. The document didn’t actually state what would happen if he did break his pledge and Dick didn’t ask as he knew it would almost certainly be something that involved a long, lingering, agonising death. Dick signed the NDA and waited in the lobby, looking up at the trees and counting the squirrels scampering about. He’d just got up to eighteen, although he was concerned he may have counted the same particularly energetic one three times, when he heard his name being called in a monotone.
‘Mr. Brunel?’
An unremarkable looking man in his late forties approached. ‘I’m Stanley Carrington. Welcome to the Party headquarters. I’ve been appointed as your mentor’.
Nearly everything about Stanley was dull; his voice, his clothes, his posture, his handshake – and especially his name. The only thing about him not dull was his moustache, a fanciful waxed effort which proved Dick’s unwritten ‘Law of Facial Hair’ that stated that the extent of extroverted facial hair was in inverse proportion to the personality of the wearer. Stanley escorted Dick to a glass elevator and pushed a button marked ‘ten’. The voice of the elevator announcing the floors as they ascended had more personality than Stanley.
‘So, the Ruling Council’s on the tenth floor?’, asked Dick.
‘No. It’s not on any floor’, Stanley said in his dull way. ‘The existence of the Ruling Council is a secret and so is its composition. Members are spread across the whole building. They all have different job titles as a cover for their real roles’.
‘So what’s my job going to be?’, enquired Dick.
‘Assistant to the Deputy Assistant Under Secretary for Legislative Administration Ratification’.
Dick was disappointed. He wanted the prestige of being able to tell people, especially girls, that he was a member of the Ruling Council. That would have been impressive. It was a job title, Dick felt, which would make doors open and knickers drop.
‘Why that particular position?’ Dick said, trying to hide the considerable disappointment in his voice.
‘Because it’s so bland and innocuous that no one will bother to ask further questions about your work’, Stanley explained.
As the doors to the elevator opened on to the tenth floor Dick knew he was right. He couldn’t foresee anyone who he told about his job ever saying to him, ‘Wow, that must be interesting’ or ‘No way! That’s my dream career!’
Stanley showed Dick his office in the Legislative Administrative Ratification Department and helped him settle in. It was an office well-suited to an Assistant to the Deputy Assistant Under Secretary. Not too big and not too small, with office furniture that was not too grand and not too functional. Sitting down for the fist time Dick found his chair wasn’t too hard and wasn’t too soft. It was, Dick thought, the office that Baby Bear would have loved — if the Three Bears had been corporate animals.