The Project, II

[Click here for Part I]

A maid walked in. Evan recognized her as one of Sam’s servants. He supposed Akara had decided to be economical as she had become a fixture, unlike her predecessors. Despite her dowdy attire, she reeked of tawdry inelegance. She carried a tray of bread, sausage, cheese and milk setting it on the table in front of Evan. As she walked away Evan heard her feet transition to the tile. The click of her steps faded as she disappeared deeper into the complex.

Sam heard a knock on his door. He roused himself, but only enough to look around. Sam examined his new wallpaper. He supposed it was better than the drab gray walls. Akara had clearly had a theme in mind. Bananas gaily covered the walls though not in the repeating patterns of most wallpapers. Each fruit fell gently in its own way, piling softly in at the baseboards. Some were greenish others carried light bruises but all looked about ready to eat. Sam wondered how long it had taken Akara to make each one unique. Lark stepped into the room holding a steaming cup of coffee. She set the coffee on Sam’s bedside stand and sat gracelessly on the bed. Lark reached out and handed a folder over to Sam. He grabbed it with his thumb and forefinger. Before he had read the first sentence she was gone.

The first month of the project had begun much like the one before it. His orders were to train his PEF unit daily. Out of the blue, a ghost town had been appearing about two miles from the middle of the white tipped forest. He heard the workers and saw the spotlights at night. One night he had taken his unit on a night jog through the woods only to find a surprisingly well-dressed foreman greeting him with blueprints. The blueprints seemed to point toward a small city being built in the future, but for now only shells of buildings rose out of the snowdrifts. In the last week, he had been given exercises to do in the ghost town. The PEF jogged daily into the forest to tag the walls with paint or put holes in targets.

Today, though, there were no drills. Sam had his first post-project mission. He found himself in front of six brand new sedans parked in the underground garage next to the barracks. They looked nothing like the scrap heaps heaving along the streets. He wasn’t even sure which factory they came out of. They had none of the distinctive stylings of Acorn, Sapling or the rare Restars. They were smooth, clean and sophisticated. Words that hadn’t described a car rolling off the factory floor in 30 years. The emblem located only on the steering wheel vaguely resembled a primate in the pose of The Thinker. The convoy left the airfield to travel along a miraculously pristine road. No matter how far away from their base they drove the road was freshly plowed and yet Sam never caught up with the plows.

The sedans ran fast and quiet. Hardly perturbed by the little snow on the ground, they broke through the mountain passes with ease. Since they were making unexpected progress Sam took the first opportunity he could to commandeer a vacant lot. There he had the team practice attacking and defending the convoy. The white cars proved to be much more capable than the lumbering trucks he had grown up driving around greater Trigo. Their white forms gathered speed as if they were meant to sprint rather than straining to break 120 kph. The men left the lot in high spirits wondering why the itinerary called for them to drive through the night. It had been standard PEF procedure to make camp instead of attempting to make headway with the few working lamps. To Sam’s surprise, the lamps turned night to day projecting nearly a half mile out. Invigorated by their electro-mechanical windfall the miles shrunk to their destination.

As they neared Trigo they passed the dark towns watching as shabby scavengers and student patrols alike stared awestruck as the PEF lamps lit up the night. The glossy sigils on the students green armbands stood out next to the swaying beams of their flashlights. The students tended to gather ’round bonfires partly to keep warm, partly to beat back the darkness. The occasional government building sported the only streetlights for miles.

The students had taken to the streets during the first savings nights. After the 3rd energy edict, they made sure the households didn’t keep the lights on past 9 pm. What had started as a measure to conserve power turned into a show of loyalty as houses began turning their lights off earlier and earlier. Years later as the rolling brownouts began, it became harder to tell whether people were turning their lights off or if the power was out altogether. The scavengers were another phenomena altogether, mildly tolerated by the student patrols they often came to an understanding either with fists or with bribes. Self-important hall monitors had turned into an entire subculture as youth increasingly took to nocturnal living. The Duma had eventually moved classes to the afternoons as attendance dropped to embarrassingly low levels. The students reached an uneasy peace with the older generation as they each seemed to keep out of each other’s way. By the time employees were returning home students were in school. By the time students were flooding into the streets most responsible people were already in their homes functioning by candlelight.

The white sedans pulled into a motel. The lights were on and Sam could hear a generator in the distance. A gaggle of students was gathered conspicuously at the office. Sam took the four men from his sedan to make sure there wasn’t trouble. A student guarding the door held up his hand. Powdered snow fell from his shoulder. Sam shoved him against the wall as Otto readied his rifle beside him making sure that the kid could see it. “You have no business here. This motel is being commandeered by the PEF under the orders of the Duma,” Sam said in a calm manner.

Otto chimed in “Go tell your friends.” The student pulled his hood down and brushed back his curly hair from his brow as he walked into the office. A few minutes later five students stood gathered in the doorway.

A tall student with wild hair eyed Sam. “What is the PEF doing in this part of town? Your office is on the other side.” Sam wanted to get rid of the kids before they found any more reasons to be suspicious. The student patrols were notorious for asking too many questions. The PEF had taken to telling them tall tales, this had unfortunately had only encouraged them. There were entire legends born out of lies told to keep the Student Patrols busy.

Sam decided on a sufficiently boring story. “We came to Trigo to pick up some documents from an official’s family. One of the historians is working on a biography and couldn’t be bothered to make the trip.”

The students looked disappointed. The one with the wild hair narrowed his brow: “Then you won’t mind if I take care of this manager for violating savings night.”

Sam took a serious tone “You will do no such thing. He is under orders from the PEF and is not to be touched.”

Otto whispered in Sam’s ear. “As soon as we leave they are going to come back for the manager.”

Sam added: “If we hear that anything happens to him I will consider it an attack on the PEF and I will personally come back to send all of you off to the west.”

This did not go over well. The students had been unofficially deemed the 12th protected class by the Duma after the 22nd Conference on Citizen Relations. Most PEF had avoided paperwork and potential court martial by letting them run wild. The occasional over-zealous mob had been put down but most student patrols had freedom to enforce the edicts of the Duma. The wild-haired boy began twirling a butterfly knife fuming as the rest of the students wielded pipes and clubs pulled out of book bags and oversized jackets. Sam decided to take advantage of the new management and do the local PEF a favor. He drew his pistol in a measured fashion. The boy began twirling his knife faster barely missing his own armband as he strode towards Sam’s. Sam put three bullets in his head to the shock of the kids. They scattered off into the swirling snow. The team slept well that night. There was no love lost between the student patrols and the PEF.

Sam woke early to enjoy coffee fresh prepared by the manager. Sam and Otto looked over the snow covered scene only to find their cars the only ones unburied, the lot plowed with a fresh path and no sign of the wild-haired leader. 30 minutes later the cars rolled silently out of the motel. They headed ten minutes the road dodging traffic and the mass of people milling about town. 45 minutes later, they rolled in front of the Bureau of Population Studies. Akara had instructed them to collect any and all information that the Bureau had on New Lima. It seemed liked an easy enough task, one normally assigned to a low-level bureaucrat, but Akara had insisted that Sam needed to become part of his national presence. Sam wasn’t sure what Akara meant by “national presence” but he was happy to be entrusted with anything of import. Akara had ordered that the building be surrounded. Sam wondered what they had to fear from a bunch of paper pushers. None the less every exit of the drab faux stone building was currently covered by the PEF. Sam considered whether or not to go in guns drawn. He didn’t like theatrics but he supposed that there was a possibility that Akara knew something he didn’t. Weapons at the ready Akara and the PEF entered the Bureau of Population Studies.

It was as if a riot, no a tornado was tearing up the place. Buttoned down office workers threw paper into flaming piles. Others smashed computers against the ground. Debris electronic, paper or otherwise flew through the air coating the office in a blinding particulate cloud. Otto fired in the air as Sam attempted to address the crazed suits over the crunches, thuds, and rending. “Everybody on the ground now!”

[Proceed to Part III.]

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