The veterans turned to him.
“No, sorry,” Frank waved them aside. “Won’t work.”
“Spill it out, boy,” Barney pointed his knife at him. “It’s for us to decide whether it’ll work or not.”
“Exactly,” Max glanced at the clock over the fridge. “Hurry up.”
“Right,” Frank rummaged through the pile of notes and pulled out a sheet. He turned it to the veterans so they could see a diagram with a few questions jotted down underneath. “What would you say if the migrants were supposed to start a war in New York? Only they don’t know about it yet?”
“In which respect?” Barney munched on a carrot.
The coach lowered the rifle onto his lap.
“Easy,” Frank shrugged. “They’ll make them do it.”
“How exactly?” Max asked. “You just can’t let go of this migrant theory, can you?”
“First, a question,” Frank said. “Do you agree that there is a connection between Claney and the baldies? I think it’s pretty obvious.”
“I only saw Claney. And he was on TV,” said Barney finishing his carrot.
“I do,” Max nodded to Frank. “Their skin is too smooth to be natural, I have to agree.”
“Accepted,” Barney flicked the carrot end into the bin and reached into a bag for a new one.
“Good,” Frank glanced at the paper. “Kathleen told me something once that I dismissed as irrelevant. At the time, I thought she’d dreamt it all up. It was something about transplanting one person’s memories into another. I didn’t know then that she worked for Memoria, did I?”
Barney choked and burst out coughing. The coach reached out and tapped his back.
“I’m — agrh! — sorry,” Barney twisted his arm and pointed his thumb at his shoulder blades. Max slapped him as hard as he could. “Much better now.”
Barney cheered up and spoke louder,
“I’m sorry about that. For a second, I imagined Max’s memories being transplanted into my head. And his and mine, into Maggie’s.”
“This is exactly what I mean,” Frank said. “What if the idea behind the Vaccination is to prep the migrants for a war? The talks start. The President arrives. And then the shit hits the fan. A previously trained group acts first and the others join in.”
“So you think,” Max patted the rifle butt, “that they want to kill the President and blame it on the migrants?”
“Exactly. Now, Gautier has somehow heard about the Vaccination project. Alternatively, somebody leaked the information on purpose, in order to provoke our Steel Lady.”
“We digress,” Max said.
Frank paused, searching for the right words.
“This is what Kathleen came up with. By transplanting the required,” he raised his finger, “I said, the required memories, you can give society a perfect professional force. Thousands of brain surgeons, architects, engineers and researchers…”
“And well-trained soldiers,” Barney butted in. The coach nodded.
“And soldiers,” Frank said. “It’s plain irresistible, don’t you think? Thousands of people gaining access to skills they didn’t have before. Just like that,” he snapped his fingers.
Barney screwed up his face.
“Provided they pay,” the coach mumbled. Frank dismissed the remark and went on,
“And once these soldiers acquire certain combat skills — say, in an urban environment, — then they can confront the police. They can trigger rioting…”
“Wait a sec,” in one practiced motion, the coach pushed the bolt into the breech, fitted the recoil spring and snapped the breech frame cover shut. Then he cocked the firing mechanism and inspected the rifle. “Do you really think that Claney’s fighters are migrants?”
He aimed the barrel at the ceiling and pulled the trigger. The hammer clicked. The coach leaned the rifle against the window sill.
“Now that sounds closer to the truth,” Barney deftly chopped the carrots and peeled the onions. “This way nothing leads back to him. He’s got them to pull his chestnuts out of the fire.”
“I think so, too,” Frank went on. “It’s not so easy to arrange for a normal citizen to disappear. Now migrants are different. No one gives a damn about them. There’s an entire new generation grown up behind the camp’s fence. Okay. Let’s assume they did plan some organized rioting, but…”
It hurt him to speak of Kathleen impersonally, as if she was just a missing link to the past events. But he forced himself to go on,
“…but Kathleen could have found out about it. She must have tried to throw a monkey wrench in the works. Then Memoria had to cover up their tracks and changed their plans.”
“At the moment, this is nothing but a theory,” Barney pointed out. “As is the killing of the President and of their lab babies.”
“Actually, they work very well together,” said Max.
“Let’s start with the Vaccination, then,” squinting, Barney turned away from the table and wiped away his onion tears. “What’s so special about it? Who does it threaten and how?”
“We’ve already worked out a thing or two about it,” the coach said. “If what Frank’s said is true, then after the press conference people will line up for the Vaccination from here to hell.”
Barney and Frank nodded.
“This program threatens the migrants and their current situation. They feed New York. They provide electricity and drinking water. Their waste disposal sites work overtime. If you think about it, it’s the same everywhere. Migrant camps all over the country are responsible for the cities’ sustenance. Migrants are everywhere. They clear the debris, they work at construction sites, they clean the streets…”
“They don’t have oil,” Barney interrupted him.
“So what?” Max smirked. “The government is obliged to give it to them. If camps decide to stop supplying food, water and electricity, cities will starve and face epidemics.”
“That’s crisis,” Frank said. “Administrative crisis.”
“Created by Memoria’s forcing everyone to have their memories erased. What we have now is a generation of brainwashed wooses, too used to their fake joy and prosperity and running to the nearest Memoria branch at the first sight of trouble.”
“So you think that now they want to rectify the situation?” Barney lifted his hands in dismay. “That doesn’t sum up. Too much too soon.”
“What did you want?” Max stepped toward him. “That’s a conspiracy for you. Why would they traumatize the population? Those with blue and green bracelet lights couldn’t care less, anyway. And veterans like ourselves… we’re getting old. We’ve lost our grip on the situation. We’ve lost our gut feeling,” he glanced at his rifle.
“I’m not talking about it,” Barney waved his knife in Max’s direction. “What I want to know is who is supposed to start the war? Logically, it should be the migrants. Right?”
Frank nodded.
“Claney said that their leaders — of which there are quite a few — would be the first to try the Vaccination. Which means,” Barney threw the knife onto the table, scooped up a handful of chopped carrots and showed it to Max, “They’ll be offered one thing and given quite the opposite.” He threw the carrots back and picked up the knife. “Then they’ll have the upper hand. Hundreds of thousands, ready for war, flooding the streets. Drowning New York in blood.”
“How do you suggest they do it?” the coach asked nonchalantly. “How are they supposed to keep those hundreds of thousands under control? This isn’t a minor group of street fighters. They must have a clear objective. How can they program it in?”
“Easy!” Barney stuck the knife into the cutting board and wiped his hands on his jeans. “Think of the personality correction program they use in prisons. I don’t think the Vaccination is going to be much different.”