They walked back past the pen thrower who smirked without looking up, and soon thereafter emerged back into the land of the living. The guy stood in the door chomping on his gum. He’d run out of friendly and replaced it with what could only be called contempt.
“So we’ll get back to you with our report,” Tonic said.
The chewing stopped for a moment. "What report is that?”
“I’m sorry, we weren’t properly introduced,” Tonic stepped forward with his hand extended, “I’m Spencer Tonic, this is my partner James Finny. We work closely with the fire marshal.” Translated: We drink beer with firemen.
“I… I, well.” His eyes narrowed. “I thought you were P.I.’s?” it came out as a question.
Finn flipped out his phone. “I tell you what Mr…”
“Mason, Dennis Mason… I’m the
assistant
office manager here at JHS.”
“Hmmpfh,” Tonic said.
“I’m filling in.”
“Right,” Finn said. "Well then we’ll give you a chance to impress your boss despite the fact that you’ve been busting our balls.”
“I didn’t mean…”
“Why don’t you go downstairs and evacuate that tinderbox. Clear that emergency door, and get back to us,” Finn said. “Because we run a friendly ship here, we’ll give you twenty minutes.”
“I’ll have Roos take care of it right…”
“Why don’t you do it,” Tonic suggested. "You know, make sure it’s done right. I’ll tag along.”
The guy disappeared with Tonic smiling in his wake. Mr. Big League Chew been willing to give rent–a–cops shit all day long, but he feared the Fire Marshal–and with good reason; that was one blacklist you didn’t want to be on.
Finn leaned against the wall and fished out a cigarette. He was a pragmatic smoker, and this was a practical moment to be sure: Less than two minutes later the kid from downstairs stumbled out into the bright light. His tie was loose around his neck, a noose in waiting, and he shielded his eyes. He too was looking for a cigarette.
Finn had one ready. "Don’t you blister when you get in the sun?”
The kid took the cigarette and turned against the wall to light up. "Yeah," he said after the second puff. “I can’t see myself in mirrors anymore either. Fuckin’ sucks.”
“’Bout time for a career change?”
“Nah, this ain’t bad. Money’s for shit, but it’s everyday man. Way better when Adolf isn’t down in the Führerbunker with me.”
“Which one is Adolf, the gum chewer or Irv Hack?”
“Pervy.”
“Never met the guy.” Technically true.
The kid drew hard enough on the cigarette to burn a good quarter inch off of it’s length. "No loss.” He peeked down into the dark hallway, then said, “You guys are cops right?
“Yeap.”
“What do you want with Perv?”
“I thought maybe you’d tell me,” Finn said.
“Well, I know some things.”
Finn had the sudden and urgent need to see if the kid was allergic to bullets. It’d been a long, long week and it wasn’t even close to being over. He shoved his hand into his pocket and found a wadded up dollar bill. He tore it in half, handed him a piece, and said, “There’s more where that came from, and I’ll just assume that you’re happy that I’m letting you catch cancer on my dime.”
Roos didn’t try to come off as indignant, he was too excited to rat out his boss. “Perv drove his car into a bridge last night. Unfortunately, there was no body.”
“How’d you find that out?” Finn asked automatically.
“That’s my job.”
“Where?”
“Up on the Beltway somewhere. Heard from a guy it was really fucked up. But he was gone. Wanna know why?”
“Enlighten me.”
“He drinks a lot. Does some coke too. All that shit doesn’t mix very good in anyone, especially him. When he’s doin’ both it’s really tight downstairs.”
“So you think he ran off to dry out before he had to face the music?”
A shrug. The kid blew smoke, but the swirling wind kept it in a cloud around his head.
“Why’s he got private dicks following him around?” Finn asked.
“His ex–wife doesn’t get her alimony methinks,” Roos flicked the butt into the gravel.
“You want to call me when Hack comes back around?”
“For the other half of that dollar, sure.” This kid was alright Finn decided, just guilty by proximity. Finn handed the other half over and then tried to filter through the bullshit as Roos rattled on like a finch happy to be out of its cage. Hack bothered him for no reason. Yes, he was a conceited prick, and yes he had spent the last few months using a guy on the inside to pass along dirt on a handful of good cops, himself and Spence included… but Finn dealt with people like Hack everyday. Like half of the people in his line of work, he didn’t really believe in the idea of
gut feelings
but like the other half, he spent a lot of time chasing around leads based on that same slippery sensation.
“I bet he’s pissed at Ray,” Finn said in the middle of the rambling.
“Who?” Roos said. “Oh the little Boojie dude he had doin’ shit for him?
Oh yeah
.”
“What’s that mean?” Finn tossed his butt into the graveyard as well.
“He was goin’ over there last night. Left here pissed as hell with a bottle of somethin’. Bitched at me for
not
doing something he told me
not
to do, and then tore outta here to go ‘
straighten his ass out.’”
Roos mimicked Hack’s boozy voice, and it came out pretty well.
“He was going over
where
?” Finn blinked.
“To that dude’s house. He hadn’t been callin’ him like usual. He was freakin’ out. Can’t tell ya why, it’s like a confidential thing.”
Finn knew perfectly well what Ray hadn’t been calling about. "Why wasn’t he calling?”
“Well…” Roos hesitated and checked the door again. "Listen man, that guy, Ray… the Punjab, he’s the dude that’s on the Net now with that other dude.”
At least Finn knew that this Roos character wasn’t going to accidentally help someone understand what the fuck he was talking about.
“And Hack went over there last night? Did he get there or get eat a bridge first?”
“Dunno… I…” The door came open and Tonic came out with Mason in tow. Roos shut his mouth.
“Yep,” Tonic was saying. “I think it looks good now.” He looked over at Finn. Time to go?”
“I think so,” Finn replied.
“So we’re not going to have any trouble with the Fire Marshal?” Mason asked. He was sweating, beads clung to his face.
Finn and Tonic heard the squawking brakes at the same time and looked up to find the same old government sedan coming into the JHS lot. It cut the curb a little close and awkwardly lurched to a stop about twenty feet away. Finn took the opportunity to hand Roos his card. He'd scratched on the back –
call anytime w/info.
“The Fire Marshal is the least of your worries,” Tonic said.
“Good, good…” Mason said.
The detectives stepped out from the shelter of the building and into the wind. Their car was parked just past the Fedmobile, but thus far both agents were still sitting inside. Fuming probably. Tonic waved as they approached, his friendly little kid wave. But this time it didn’t get them past.
Agent Number One, or maybe it was Two, waved them over to the passenger side. Finn leaned down, half expecting to get the Seth Meek sinus clearing pepper spray treatment.
“What are you doing here?” the man asked.
Finn could see himself reflected in the guy’s glasses. He swept his hair into place and said, “Evidently the same thing you are, only faster.”
“Kidnapping…” the man began.
“Yeah, yeah. Look, we’re just following our own leads, we’ll make sure to call and let you know when we find your boy.” Tonic pulled up in the car at exactly the right moment, Finn hopped in without another word, and they left the JHS staff to deal with their new pals.
He explained what he’d learned.
“So either Ray had something going that we didn’t know about, or he was having a conscience attack right?” Tonic summarized.
“I guess. Maybe he liked the desk we got him,” Finn said. He thought for a minute, “I’m guessing ol’ Ray wanted out of spending quality time with Hack. A guy can only take so much right? Probably he figured that
he
was the guy on the inside now and was making up his own rules. Then he won the lottery.”
“For sure. Hack was pissed about losing his spy, pissed about being scooped when it counted, and just pissed for the sake of being pissed.”
“Enough to get tanked and go beat the shit out of Ray?” Finn asked.
“Prolly, if he could I mean.”
“Yeah…” Finn let the thoughts roll around in his mind. “Okay, here’s a question. Why’d he suddenly stop calling at 3:44am?”
“Because the PoPo had him assuming the position in some other city,” Tonic ticked off fingers as was his custom, driving with his knees. “Because he finally got through to Raymond on the phone…” Tonic stopped counting and looked over at his partner.
“Yeah,” Finn nodded. "Or he saw Ray jump into a car and followed him.”
Tonic was still driving with his knees, still looking over.
“Stop that shit.” Finn pointed at the wheel. “Let’s go find out if Hack’s name is coming up anywhere other than the impound lot.”
Chapter Fifty–Four
Tsatske
Seth and Ray sat upstairs against the pile of shelves that evening. His feet were still bound up so that he had to pogo around everywhere, but it wasn’t terribly uncomfortable compared to sweating in the basement with the two kids. They shared cool sodas that Seth had propped up on the windowsill, and it almost seemed normal.
“This should work out well for you,” Seth said as some headlights slid past the papered front windows.
Ray hesitated, feeling uncomfortable with the idea of profiting off of this kind of thing, but he nodded. "It could.”
“I want it to be.”
“Why?”
Seth flicked the tab on his soda can. “I want it to be so big that you can’t walk away from it yet.”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“It’s better for me if you
want
to stay here. If it’s more
profitable
to stay here.”
“You mean, you’d rather have me be thinking about book deals than a pat on the back from the FBI?”
Seth shrugged. "Something like that.”
“Mr. Meek…” Ray began.
“Seth.”
“Yeah, sorry, right. I've got a couple thousand questions for you, but not one of them is
may I please leave now?
I haven’t had that great of luck in life with being either idealistic
or
pragmatic. I never thought I’d have kids, but I have four. I never thought that I’d be anything but a lawyer, but I’m not.” He adjusted his legs. “There are lots of things about life that haven’t worked just the way I thought that they would, but…”
“What? Compared to me you mean?”
“Yeah. It’s a terrible thing to even think, but seriously, all of my problems are shit compared to yours.”
Meek’s arms were draped back over the stack of boards, the soda can hanging from one limp hand. A drunken freshman at his first kegger, that… or a recently crucified Christ. “You’re wrong actually Ray.”
Ray felt relief at hearing his first name included in Meek’s vocabulary. "How so?”
“My problems are moot. They’re over. I have nothing to dread, nothing to hope for. You, on the other hand, have a whole life of worries ahead of you. Want me to prove it?”
“Sure.”
“Well, I can show you the numbers,” Seth opened his laptop, pulled up the feed information that was still coming in, and turned it so Ray could see. “When we started this morning, less than a hundred people were watching the live feed. When I turned the cameras off this afternoon, there were four hundred thousand. Hits on the website, the indictment page, are at fourteen
million.
It’s been what? Ten hours, something like that.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah. So you’ve got some things to think about don’t you?” Seth nearly smiled. It was clear that Ray didn’t quite get it yet. “You’re the one on the inside. You get the whole story, I’ll tell you everything, and you get it exclusively.”
“Thank you.”
“I chose you for what you could do for me, no thanks necessary. I'm using you. But consider it Ray, if every person that watched the tape today, every person that went to the website or just talked about what a motherfucker I am for doing all of this… if every one of them bought your book for a buck…” And then Ray surprised him.
“Do I get to vote?”
“What?”
“On the indictment, I’d like to vote.”
“Sure, I guess,” Seth said. “If you want.”
“I think there’s enough evidence, from a grand jury’s standpoint I mean. Anymore, the idea of reasonable doubt has everyone so skeptical that it’s hard to do anything short of having a videotape of … well, you have it. There’s no doubt that they did it.”
“Not really, no. Why’d you quit law school?”
Ray leaned back on his elbows. “Because it was all bullshit. It's all about numbers. My
success
was going to be measured by conviction rates and sentence–years – the numbers trumped logic. And it didn't matter if I was defending or prosecuting, there was no choice. I couldn't do anything that felt real. I couldn't do… good." He paused, reflecting and then added, "What’d your wife do?” The question was natural in the context, but came out feeling raw and jagged.
Meek answered as if it were just another notion about a past he could only vaguely remember, "Defense." Seth rolled another soda across the floor. “Listen Ray. Just tell the truth. You’ll walk out of here in the end. I’m not gonna go nuts and waste everyone and then off myself. You don’t have to cater to my psychotic whims, I’m rational enough to convict. Any jury that ever got a hold of
my
case would probably gas me in a second. I’m really fucking with the law. Bad. I’m doing everything that the system is designed to head off, and I’m doing it for one reason.”
“What’s that?”
“I’m selfish.”
Ray shook his head. "How do mean?”
“I failed my family. It’s not just revenge, and all that about making the world change… that’s just a dream and we both know it. It’d be nice if people would learn something along the way, but in the end it’s about me I think. Maybe I just want everyone to hurt like I do… that's fucking selfish as hell. Simple.”
“Doesn’t seem very simple.”
“It is. But that’s something that works for me too. Regardless of what people think about this, most of them will be forced to look at themselves and ask the question,
what would I do?”
“Will you get the indictment?”
“Yes.”
“You seem sure.”
“I am. An indictment is safe. People want to see what’ll happen next. Their morals won’t get in the way this early. Later… probably, but now it’s a good bet.”
“Have you looked?”
Seth smiled. “Look for yourself.” He brought up the Indictment portion of the website, touched ‘sign in’ and watched as the page loaded.
The Grand Jury is a body of individuals who are chosen to decide if indictments should be issued. If a Grand Jury decides that the evidence is strong enough to hold a suspect for trial, it returns a bill of indictment charging the suspect with a crime. After viewing the evidence, if you do NOT think that the accused should stand trial type, “No Trial” here:
After viewing the evidence, if you DO think that the accused should stand trial type, “Yes Trial” here:
The simple wording repeated, first in Spanish, and then in six other languages.
“Here’s your chance to vote Ray,” Seth said.
Ray leaned over the computer and typed, “Yes Trial.”
“That’s why we’ll get the indictment Ray. Did you say yes because you believe the evidence or because you’re curious about what might happen?”
“Both.”
The following page loaded.
Your vote has been recorded.
Current voting status:
No Trial: 219,288
Yes Trial: 2,746,811
“There were about half that number of total votes before all of this came up on the evening news. And the BBC is running it now on their website, probably tomorrow morning too. That’s only a couple of hours from now for them. But you can see where it’s going. People are curious. They want to see what I’ll do.”
“There’s something else that I don’t understand, but I think… will make for a good part of the story.”
“That’s what you’re here for Ray.”
“How are you hiding all of this? The voting, the webpages, the live broadcasts… all of it has to lead to somewhere doesn’t it… like this room?”
“Sure. But it all leads somewhere that no one will want to talk about even if they can find it in time. There will be lots of red tape, I'm counting on it.”
Ray was taking notes now on his khaki pant leg. “I’m listening.”
“First of all, all of this is encrypted. It’s my system, and I was the one who built it for NSA. It’s random in a way that is going to be awfully difficult to break down because it uses the most random thing that we know as a key – atmospheric noise, and it’s sitting there on their server. After 9/11 the funding for computer surveillance went through the roof, so did the bandwidth needed to survey the field. That place is buzzing hot. So my encryption keeps the heat off of my broadcasts, and the NSA supplies a big black hole in which to cuddle up and hide for awhile. Have you ever heard of the SETI project?”
"I dunno…"
"Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence."
Ray just watched, mouth open.
"SETI did something back in 1999 that opened up a new possibility in my head. There were some others too, but what the guys at Berkley did with the BIONIC system was simple and brilliant. They provided zillions of users, who had a tiny bit of bandwidth, with a piece of software that could analyze a small section of the enormous amount of radio data that they were getting from outer space. All in hopes of finding ET."
"And all of the little pieces make up one big piece… you're using the world like one big computer."
"Absolutely. And there's no way to stop it just so long as we stay hidden for a little while. If a broadcast goes out, it's out. It spreads like a virus.
“Won’t they shut you down?”
“Eventually. But who knows I’m doing it? Not even them yet probably… but when they find out, will they flip a switch and flat-line their whole system? They might not even know I did it until this is all over, this is a grain of sand on the bottom of the ocean for them. And say they did… the tapes are already out there now. All I have to do is send it up to Youtube or even a
single
active wiki… the most basic form of Internet will take it from there… few hours later everyone who wants it, has it, right? It’s geometric. If you start with one film, and square it each hour for a day… one viewer, two, four viewers, sixteen, two hundred fifty six… you’re a computer guy, you know? Word gets out. It’s why the Internet is what it is."
“Yeah…" Ray said, remembering his conversation with Finn when it seemed just hypothetical.
“Now you understand why I want you thinking about the millions of dollars you’re going to make?”
“Gotcha.”
“Good, so no offense when I tell you that it’s about time to get back to bed in your comfy chair?”
Ray’s face told the story, but he said nothing. Clearly he wasn’t looking forward to going back down there for another night of blissful conversation.
“It won’t be long now. Just a few more days,” Seth lied. “We’ll give you some time to fill up your pants legs with scribbles.”
“I’ve got more questions,” Ray said.
“And we’ve got tomorrow. It’ll be a long day.”