Project Reunion (4 page)

That riveted the group’s attention. Apparently Popeye hadn’t told them any more than I had.

“Based on that video,” Emmett continued, “you weren’t aware that I’m the sponsor who pays your tax credits so you can eat. And the one who protects you from HomeSec.

“Because, boys and girl, what you’re doing is illegal. You are in clear violation of the Calm Act. Now I’m good with that. I’m happy to protect you. You’re providing a useful public service. I want you to keep it up. But there is a line. That line was crossed on Tuesday. Happily, no one died. This time.

“Now, I don’t know or care what you pay Leland. But every once in a while, I ask that you earn your keep with me. On Tuesday, Dee expressed this ask, as a favor to Dee. I’d like to correct that. You owe me. Dave, can you confirm what I pay you guys? Aside from keeping you out of HomeSec.”

“Full tax credits for 12, including dependents,” Dave confirmed. “Plus power and Internet. Emmett provides equipment, too, sometimes. He found us that replacement motherboard for the server.”

It was my turn to wriggle uncomfortably. I busted my butt all year gardening. My after-tax balance was not quite three full tax credits for myself and Alex, going into winter. And I got nothing for my work for Amenac or the community association. Granted, we all ate well in pre-tax food. Still, 12 full tax credits represented a lot of hard labor.

“Alright,” said Emmett. “You’re going to justify those princely salaries by giving Dee whatever she wants, to prove you really are a public resource worth feeding. Because that’s what we accomplish with Dee’s presentation at this summit meeting. We prove Amenac is worth our support and protection.

“Also, you’re going to do some civilian-side research and infrastructure to support my proposal for the relief of New York. You’ve already started on that. What Dave’s shown me so far is outstanding. Today I want to review progress with you and do some brainstorming and fine adjustments on that. This may be the only day I can work with you in person. I know what I’m asking from you is Herculean, but it’s still only one part of the plan. I have a lot to do on the rest.”

Our graphics designer Will raised his hand. Emmett nodded for him to go ahead. “With all we’re doing, what are you doing? Are you going to show us the rest of this grand plan?” Leave it to Will to imply that Emmett was lazing around while Will did all the work.

Emmett blinked, taken aback by the question. “I’ve got an epidemiology team proving out quarantine methodology. How to scale that up to millions of people. We need current reconnaissance on conditions inside the New York borders. Leland, if you have any intel you can share on that, I’d be grateful. Troop force levels and readiness training. Supplies and logistics, transportation. This is a major operation.” He gave Will a pained look. “Does that answer your question?”

“So it’s not just a volunteer rescue that Amenac is organizing?”

“I don’t see how it could be,” Emmett replied. “The border forces have to be persuaded not to shoot us. For instance.”

Leland cut in. He was attending in person today. How he managed to move around so freely, when he was known to be Canadian intelligence, I didn’t need to know. “Emmett, we do have some information to share. I’ll get the approvals straightened out, and have it to you by tonight, I hope.”

“Outstanding, Leland. Thank you.” Emmett turned toward the video camera, and said, “I think that’s all I needed for the group meeting. Thank you for your time.” He gestured a neck slice at Popeye.

Popeye confirmed, “Circuit switched.”

“Hello, again,” Emmett said to the video feed, which never stopped running. “Now I hope we are no longer on HomeSec’s feed.”

“Shit,” said Leland.

Emmett shrugged. “They already know you, Leland. Will was skating on thin ice. Will, you’re not entitled to demand operational details from the Army.” Will looked unrepentant, of course.

“In case anyone missed it,” Emmett continued, “Popeye and I found HomeSec’s circuit. We can now switch them in and out of your teleconferences. That’s not 100%. I wouldn’t be too surprised if one of you were a mole for HomeSec. One of my goals coming here today was to increase your security awareness. Yes, you’ve got permission to do what you’re doing, for the public good. But don’t even
think
about taking down the borders, or martial law, or the Calm Act. Or God help you, because I can’t. Got it?” He looked at each person in turn, getting a nod of assent from each of them.

“Good. Enough said.” With that, Emmett got off his high horse, and waded into what data we needed to support his proposal. The questions we were asking Amenac users online needed some fine tuning. For instance, we started out asking how many Ebola vaccines people had. That wasn’t quite right. The adjusted question was how many doses health authorities were willing to commit to the relief effort, for use by troops and volunteer medical personnel. And Emmett was interested in a frightening list of vaccines beyond Ebola, including cholera, meningitis, Hep A and B, rabies, typhoid, and yellow fever.

Emmett got on the phone twice to confer with his epidemiology team on Long Island. The first time was to inquire who used to have control over the civilian stocks of this stuff. The second was to ask whether there were treatment drugs we should be researching, in addition to the vaccines.

“Anti-inflammatory drugs – I like that,” he murmured after the second conversation. “So that’s a contribution anybody can make, later. We could have collection boxes for aspirin, ibuprofen, naproxen, acetaminophen, pink bismuth, first aid ointments, bandages – a whole slew of over-the-counter first aid stuff.”

“Why do you like that?” asked Popeye, puzzled.

“One of the goals on the civilian side is to maximize public involvement. Let every household and little kid say they helped save New York.”

“Shit, you’re serious,” Will commented.

“I am,” Emmett agreed. He sighed. “The idea behind the borders was that it was OK with us, for those people over there to die. Because we’re safe. If we do this, relieve New York, it’s because that’s not OK with us. Not OK enough. So are we clear on what we need on drugs? Because if we are, I want to move on to housing. You alright there, Dee?”

“I just... This is overwhelming.”

Emmett nodded thoughtfully. “Anyone else feeling overwhelmed?” There were reluctant nods. The group’s point of view had completely flip-flopped since Will arrogantly suggested that Emmett was making us do all the work.

“Gather round,” Emmett encouraged. We concentrated back toward the meeting lounge. “Look, let’s fall back a minute. Like I was telling Will earlier, you’re not trying to plan the relief of New York.
I
am. It’s an Army operation. You don’t have the training to plan that. But I do.

“Most of this stuff we’re asking donations for – the Army has all that. They’ve got Ebola vaccines, drugs, food stockpiles, hundreds of thousands of trained soldiers and medics. They want to hoard it. But they’ve got it. No way they’d commit to the operation otherwise. They’d never trust civilians to supply them. And I can get the data on their stockpiles from them. Persuading them to commit, is the purpose of the proposal.

“Now, this information you’re trying to gather civilian-side – there are only two things that civilians absolutely have to provide.” Emmett raised fingers to count. “One – the willingness to take in refugees, and let them resettle outside New York. Two – the food to feed them. Without public support for both, we can’t let refugees out of New York. OK?

“So don’t get too hung up on accurate data. Better data is cool. Just don’t let it paralyze you. What we need most is a real, concrete public conversation about this. Not public opinion poll crap like, ‘Do you believe someone else ought to do something about New York?’ Make it concrete. Make it personal. ‘Would you accept refugees into your home, and feed them?’ ‘Would you go to New York and risk your life to treat refugees?’ Any statistics you collect are going to have huge error bars. That’s fine. That’s my problem.

“But what I really need, to sell this proposal, is concrete evidence of growing public support. Evidence that says, ‘Hell, yeah, let’s do this!’ I want the city council of Buffalo to say, ‘We’ll take every refugee who has a relative in Buffalo, plus another 2,000, and we’ll house them in our high schools.’ I want Little Bunnykill to offer 10 dairy jobs. I want Persnicketyquaug to offer 150 acres of farmland.”

I grinned at his fictitious town names. Little Bunnykill would be a hamlet in the Catskills in upstate New York. He called a Connecticut town Persnicketyquaug when it argued with him too much.

Emmett continued, “I’d also like space for people to sound off that they’re completely opposed to this. So you could open a board where Fearford or Big Roadkill can say, ‘Hell no! We shoot looters and refugees!’ And let ’em say it. And another forum for people trying to debate it, maybe?”

Dave sighed, and started adding a whole new whiteboard to our brainstorming collection, on offering refugees housing. Mangal stepped in to help him on the technical end.

Emmett had to bow out for a phone call. I followed him into the loft kitchen, because I saw the point of impact when he answered the phone and got some news. He swallowed, and looked increasingly grey. I offered my hand, and he gripped it.

“Investigation? ... The home’s locked down? ... No, I’m tied up today... This is not your fault. Not in any way... I wish I could be there for you, man. In the meantime, take of yourself, OK? I’ll call you later.”

“What happened?” I asked softly after he ended the call.

“Mass shooting again,” he said, and folded me into his arms. “Darlin’, tell me I should be doing this proposal, instead of doing my job.”

I squeezed him back. “You should do this proposal. You’ve never stopped doing your job, Emmett. Whose turf?”

“Teague, North Haven.”

“Delegate?” I suggested. “Vito and Andy Teague seem to like each other. And Vito just went through this last month in East Haven. It might help him, to support Andy.”

“You’re a smart lady, you know that?” Emmett didn’t wait for a response. His phone was already back at his ear. “Vito? Need a favor...”

I was used to this. Emmett’s work life consisted mostly of followup phone calls. I gave his hand a parting squeeze and went back to look over the whiteboards. I’d started another whiteboard of my own by the time Emmett rejoined me.

“Did I just make it better or worse, on the last round?” he asked.

“The target is public support?” I confirmed. “I think that helped focus a lot. Took the pressure off the numbers, shifted to provoking conversation and keeping a database. The database design,” I pointed to one of the whiteboards, “just got revised. Aside from pro or con New York, there’s the question of why New York and not Boston-Providence. That’s what’s going on over there. And the drug and vaccine survey is ready to implement. Big movement on all boards. You did good.” I grinned at him.

“What’s your new board? ‘Sales funnels’?”

“Yeah, people don’t happen along online by accident. We funnel them in with ads. We’re not selling anything, but it’s the same concept. I didn’t have a good picture of how to funnel before. Now I do.”

“Anything I can do?”

“Not just now. Maybe you could hang around another hour and go where people have questions. I need to do some mock-ups.”

I was so deep into developing a graphics mock-up with Will, that I missed Emmett’s all-hands invitation to an apple gleaning the next day. But he kissed the crown of my head before he left for bed.

Chapter 4

Interesting fact: Connecticut’s main agricultural products were milk, poultry and eggs, hay, apples, sweet corn, peaches, and maple syrup. Only about 350 farms in the state earned over $100,000 a year – in sales, not profit. Average apple yields were 11,000 pounds per acre, and 20 million pounds for the state.

Every once in a while, a day struck me as infinitely better than life before the borders. The weather turned out heart-stoppingly beautiful for the apple gleaning. Bright dry mid-morning sun left sharp shadows on every leaf, making the candy box colors pop in the autumn woods. The trees still wore mostly summer green, but yellows, scarlets, and oranges were on the rise, as stressed trees turned early. The fiery maples would peak in another week or so.

There was barely any traffic on Route 1. Gone were the summer and autumn weekend traffic jams, as tourists flooded through Connecticut on the way to the Cape or the islands. Gasoline and diesel were tightly rationed. Only electric cars were on the road. Without exhaust fumes, I could smell the salt air and mown hay even from the highway.

I pulled into the orchard to park on the grass, and breathed deep of fermenting apples. For a moment, after I turned off the car, there was no underlying machine growl anywhere, just a breeze rattling the leaves, distant seagulls, and insects. A hawk soared lazily above, sailing the air currents. A few orchard personnel lazed around a barn-red sales shack a hundred yards up the gravel road.

“This the right place, isn’t it?” my foster teen Alex prompted from beside me in the front seat. Now 15, he’d shot up lately. He was only my height when I fostered him, a year ago at Thanksgiving. He was already a couple inches taller. His soft boy features were disappearing as firmer lines showed through a perfectly clear ruddy Hispanic complexion. That kid was a looker, for sure. Girls were already vying for his attention. I wasn’t sure any of them had broken through his gentle shyness yet. But if not, that would change soon.