His phone rang. He answered it by reflex. “Yes?”
“Am I lucky! Got the Soap Salesman first try! How’s it goin’, Soapy? Everything under control?”
It was Green Huey. Oscar’s heart skipped a beat as he snapped to full attention. “Yes, thank you, Governor.”
How on earth was Huey inside the lab’s phones? Kevin had as-sured him that their encryption was uncrackable.
“I hope you don’t mind a late cold-call, mon ami.”
Oscar sat slowly on the laboratory floor, bracing his back on a metal cabinet. “By no means, Your Excellency. We live to serve.”
“That’s mighty good of you, Soapy! Lemme tell you where I am right now. I’m riding in a goddamn helicopter above the Sabine River, and I’m lookin’ at a goddamn air strike.”
“You don’t say, sir.”
“I DO SAY!” Huey screamed. “Those sons of bitches blew my people away! Black helicopters with missiles and automatic weapons, murdering American civilians on the ground! It was a goddamn mas-sacre!”
“Were there many casualties, Governor? I mean, besides that un-fortunate French submarine?”
“HELL YES there were casualties!” Huey screeched. “How could there not be casualties? Woods on both sides of the river were crawlin’ with Regulators. Total operational dysfunction! Too many spooks spoil the broth! A total screwup! Goddammit, I never ordered those pencilnecks to dump you and the Genius Girl inside some god-damn fake ambulance!”
“No, Your Excellency?”
“Hell no! They were supposed to wait patiently and catch you when you were sneaking out of the lab together on a hot date. In that context, an abduction woulda made sense. The problem with nomads is mighty poor impulse control. Not what I wanted, boy, not on my agenda! I just had something that I needed to show ya, that’s all. Right now, you and me and the ladylove coulda been puttin’ our feet up, with parasols in our drinks. We’re supposed to be havin’ a scientific summit over here, we’re supposed to be ironing out all our difficul-ties.”
Oscar narrowed his burning, grainy eyes. “But the abduction team had a mishap on the road. They arrived late for the rendezvous. Your reception committee became anxious. When a federal SWAT team arrived unexpectedly, a violent encounter ensued.”
Huey was silent.
Oscar felt his voice rising to a high, rapid-fire gabble. “Gover-nor, I hope you’ll believe me when I say I regret this event even more than you do. I can understand that it would have been of considerable political advantage to you if your agents could have ap-prehended us during a scandalous rendezvous. We’d have had very little recourse then, and it would have been a very effective gambit on your part. But let’s face facts. You can’t simply physically abduct a lab director and a federal official. That’s not how the game is played. Commando adventures are politically foolish. They rarely work out in real life.”
“Huh! Well, you seem to have managed a commando attack pretty well, bubba.”
“Governor, when I arrived here two months ago, comman-deering this lab by force of arms was the furthest thing from my mind. But given the circumstances, I had no other choice. Now just look at our situation. It’s critically overburdened with extraneous factors. It’s no longer simply a question of you, and me, and Senator Bambakias, and the scientists on Strike, and your loyal fifth column inside the lab. That was a very complex situation! But now we have federal SWAT teams, semicompetent Regulator goons, armed teenage girls, software attacks, libelous black-propaganda operations… It’s all spinning to-tally out of control!” Oscar’s throat constricted in a shriek. He yanked the phone from his face.
Then he deliberately placed the phone against his ear again, as if it were the muzzle of a revolver. “This is going to cost me my Senate career. I suppose it’s petty of me to mention that, but I enjoyed that work. I regret that. Personally.”
“Son, it’s all right. Calm down. I know what a promising Senate career can mean to a young man like you. That’s exactly how I got into politics myself, don’t you see? I was Senate chief of staff for Dou-gal of Texas when we built that lab in the first place.”
“Governor, why have we come to this? Why are you trying so hard to outsmart me? We’re both very smooth operators. We’re out-smarting ourselves out of all sense and reason. Why didn’t you just call me in for a private conference? I would have gone to see you. I would have negotiated. I’d have been happy to.”
“No you wouldn’t. Your Senator wouldn’t have stood for that kind of mischief.”
“I wouldn’t have told him about it. I would have gone to meet you anyway. You’re a major player. I have to talk to the players, or I’ll never accomplish anything.”
“Then the poor bastard really is through,” Huey sighed. “You really don’t care a hang about ol’ Bambakias, you’re runnin’ around behind his back. Poor old Bombast Boy… I never had no thin’ against him; hell, I love Yankee egghead liberals who can’t park their bicycles straight! Why on God’s green earth did he ever get on my case about some pissant base-finance hassle? I cain’t put up with that! I cain’t have some freshman Senator yankin’ my chain when he’s got no grip on reality. A hunger strike, for Christ’s sake — hell, I didn’t starve him! He’s rich, he could afford a lunch tab. He’s got no common sense at all! You’re a smart boy, you musta known all o’ that.”
“I knew that he was an idealist.”
“Why’d you even pick on him?”
“He was the only one who was willing to hire me to run a Senate campaign,” Oscar said.
Huey grunted. “Well! Okay then! Now it’s makin’ sense to me. I mighta known it was you all along, because you’re a boy who’s got some starch and fiber. But why the hell did you wind him up and send him after me? Who are you, anyhow? What the hell are you doin’ inside my favorite science lab? You don’t even know what they’re up to in there. You don’t even know what they’re worth!”
“I have my suspicions,” Oscar said. “They’ve got something cru-cially important to you here, and it’s worth plenty.”
“Look, I need that lab. I need those people. Sure, they’ve got something very special going on. I wouldn’t fuss so much, otherwise. I was gonna demonstrate the app for y’all. It would have changed everything.”
“Governor, don’t try to mystify me. I already know what you were planning for us. Greta and I would have vanished into some offshore salt mine, where you and your industrial spies have been developing neural technology. It’s a big neural breakthrough that’s got you so anxious, and it has something to do with mind control. It’s just like the animals in here. We would have turned into well-mannered zombies. We’d have become your de-feralized pets, and we would have agreed to anything you said. That’s your ultimate network attack: subverting the human nervous system.”
Huey barked with astonished laughter. “What? Who do you take me for, Mao Zedong? I don’t need any brainwashed robots! I need smart people, all the smart people I can get! You just don’t understand!”
“So what am I missing, exactly?”
“You’re missing me, boy, me! I love my state! I love my people! Sure, you despise Louisiana, Mr. Harvard Business Boy — it’s corrupt, it’s too hot, it’s half under water, it’s dirt poor, it’s poisoned with years of pesticides and pollution, it’s all outta gas and oil for you Yankees to burn in the winter. Half its people speak the wrong goddamn lan-guage, but goddamn you, people are still real here! My people got soul, they’ve got spirit, they’re authentic real-live people! We’re not like the rest of the USA, where people are too sick and shocked and tired and spied-on even to fight for a decent future.”