“I’m guessing it has to do with the election. Maybe kill the big candidates. Or the undesirable candidates. Hell, maybe they are all taking turns hiring him to kill each other.”
“What about the Ank, though? They weren’t killed,” she said.
“No one gets any value killing Ank. Unless they’re anarchists. And anarchists can’t afford quality assassins. I’m guessing it was a warning. The Ank were making noise about the election right before they got attacked. And they would probably have sponsored some candidates—maybe all of them. This might make them sit out the election for fear of a return visit.”
“What do we do about this 19-10 guy?” MTB asked.
“Not much. I’ll tell all the major pols to ramp up their security and take some precautions to prevent him from portaling in,” I said.
“How would they do that?” Valia asked.
MTB gave her a dirty look.
“Sir,” she amended.
“Just surround themselves with people or things and keep moving. From what Delovoa told me, if you just walked around, 19-10 would never be able to portal near you because you move faster than he does.”
“People can’t walk forever,” MTB said.
“No, but they could sleep on the train or in their cars. I’m writing down some ideas and I’ll give it to all the major candidates at the same time so no one feels left out.”
“Are we going to post more guards on them, sir?” Valia asked.
“We can’t spare any,” MTB said.
“I agree. The city is still the city and it comes first. I don’t even know what a Governor is. So far, the people I’ve seen running for the job aren’t worth saving.”
“We should have guards on you, Boss. In case this 19-10 guy comes for you” MTB said.
“Unless he has something a whole lot bigger than those pellet guns, I’m not concerned. And I don’t want anyone hanging around my apartment while I’m sleeping. I see enough of you bums.”
“What’s with all this weird furniture?” Valia asked about my heart attack-helping sculptures.
“Shut up, new guy,” I said.
The doorbell rang and MTB got up to answer it for me.
“Hello,” I heard a chipper, unfamiliar male voice say. “Are you the man of the house?”
MTB looked back over his shoulder at me and opened the door wide.
Standing there was a strange, tall man in an ugly blue-green suit. He had the hugest teeth and smile you’d ever seen. Not mutant-big. It was just a big, phony smile.
As he looked into my apartment and saw a bunch of uniformed Kommilaire sitting around me, he wasn’t fazed. In fact he was encouraged.
“Ah, I hope I’m not interrupting.” He took off his hat and gave an extravagant bow, sweeping his arm to the side as if we, or he, or my apartment was royalty. “Could I have a moment of your time?”
“Are you selling something?” I squinted.
“Oh, no,” he protested. “The only thing I’m selling is good government.”
And he said it so earnestly I simply had to know more.
“Who are you?” I asked.
He walked around to all of us and handed us cards from his hat.
“My name is Aevenpor Rowden and I’m running for City Council.”
I couldn’t read the card because the writing was too small.
“What is the City Council?” Valia asked.
He almost jumped into her lap in his eagerness to answer.
“I’m glad you asked, young lady. It is a community representation empowering a voice of the people in the management of their legislative process.”
“What a load of crap,” MTB said.
“In real words, what will it do?” I asked.
“Make laws, spend the city’s resources, set taxes,” he replied.
“Taxes?” I said. “Good luck with that.”
“Will it influence the Kommilaire?” MTB asked.
“What’s that?” our budding City Councilman asked.
“The police of the city,” Valia answered.
“Sure. They’ll set all the rules they have to follow and their practices. Work quite closely together.”
“Do you know—” MTB started to say and he was pointing at me, but I interrupted him.
“Eh. Eh. It was nice of you to drop by. We’ll definitely consider you,” I said.
“Thank you for your time!” He replied, and showed himself out. “Have a fantastic day!”
“He’s probably the most qualified one,” I said, when he had left.
CHAPTER 17
Scree! Scree! Scree!
Even over the music the scraping could be heard. I walked into the club dragging my “portable” chair. It was about a thousand pounds. I attached the chains from my arms and scooted along.
MTB was with me and he peered around the club like he was checking for trouble—which he probably was.
“Relax,” I said, “we’re on our night off.”
“Do we get nights off?” he asked.
I pushed my chair by a table and realized I had completely destroyed the club’s cheap panel flooring.
“Whoops.”
A server came over, looking concerned, which was an appropriate reaction when the Supreme and Deputy Kommilaire step into your place of business.
“Is there something wrong, Hank?”
“Yeah, we need drinks.”
“I’ll have a Voke chilled,” MTB said.
“Give me ten of those,” I said.
The server hurried away.
“What do you think of the new guy?” MTB asked me.
“I like her. She’s smart. A little bit headstrong. Feisty.”
“Is she going to replace me?”
“What? No. She’s new. Doesn’t know the city. She’s not even a full Kommilaire yet.”
“She isn’t? What’s the next step?”
“I don’t know. We agree. Appoint her. Give her a badge.”
“We’ve never done that before. I just assumed everyone was a full Kommilaire. Is she a half-Kommilaire or something?”
“I guess we should have talked about this. I don’t know. We’ll figure it out tomorrow.”
There weren’t a lot of people in the club, but those that were here avoided us. It was obvious we were killing their buzzes. But so what? We deserved a break.
“I think Valia can bring a lot to the table,” I said.
“How? She’s tiny. Not great with a gun. Bad in a fight. Talks too much.”
“We’re not the Navy, MTB. We got to stop pretending we are. The Navy is gone. We need a softer handle on things.”
“You think the Totki will respond to soft, Boss?”
“Remember a few weeks ago we saw that woman in her kitchen.”
“No.”
“Her husband had just been stabbed.”
“Lot of those.”
“On 80-and-Three Street. End of the day,” I prodded.
“Oh. What about her?”
“So I was the first one in the kitchen, checking to see if it was safe, and what does she do?”
“Nothing.”
“No, she saw me come in and I’m standing there all,” and I motioned up and down my bloated body, “and what does this lady do seeing me?”
“Screams.”
“Then you go in. What does she do?”
“Screams.”
“What if Valia had gone in? Little Valia. Red hair and freckles.”
“That’s discrimination.”
“Not if it’s good. We can’t push this city around anymore. It worked for a while but it’s wised up to how strong it really is. We can’t be a bunch of male chauvinists like we own the place,” I said.
“We’re sitting in a strip club, Boss.”
I looked around at all the working men and women dancing.
“Exactly. I’m old. Too old to change. I have a panic attack if someone offers me a brand of beer I’ve never tried. But I can get this city ready for when I’m dead and gone.”
Our drinks came and I slammed mine. The alcohol would do little to me—it wasn’t Delovoa’s super toxins. But I liked the ritual.