Plagues

Chapter 17

DEBT TALKS BETWEEN U.S. AND CHINA BREAKING DOWN. The headline jumped out at me from a newspaper left on a seat as I got on the bus from my session at Leo’s the next morning. Debt talks between the U.S. and China had been “breaking down” for years, ever since the “end” of the maniac outbreak. My eyes actually first dropped onto U.S. PRESIDENT LILIAC CALLS FOR “QUICK AND MEANINGFUL ACTION” IN L.A. Apparently, though the California government has been talking about the situation out there improving, the mayor of L.A. and the senator of California have been calling out for aid and reinforcements in L.A. Apparently, Asylum isn’t cutting it. A few L.A. residents, some who even live in the Valley, pretty far removed from South Central, demand WHO or at least Red Cross involvement. I smirked with a slight laugh as I breezed through the transparent article, thinking of Darwin.

I entered the lounge and saw Kali and Mikaela sitting next to each other on separate couches. Kali was listening to music while Mikaela was absorbed in a newspaper with the same sort of headlines as the one I found on the bus. Beside her was a small pile of several other newspapers, including the Toronto Star and The New York Times. Kali dropped out an ear bud and greeted me with a smile and a wave. Mikaela briefly flicked her eyes up to me and briefly smiled as I went and sat next to Kali. I looked passed Kali to Mikaela’s newspaper. She was reading an article about the investigation into the discovery of Matt’s body.

I didn’t see Darwin until lunch, but when I did I didn’t miss a beat in pulling him aside for a chat. We ducked down into the basement, mostly a utility area and office space for janitorial staff as well as there were washrooms. We went into a nook of lockers just under the stairs.

“What’s your game?” I demanded, folding my arms.

“What do you mean?” he replied, already tired of the conversation.

“You make such a fuss over Mikaela coming into our group, then you go ahead and just destroy Kali and mine’s effort to make this integration smooth. You just blow everything off and, like you do, just butt ahead and do it your own way with no consideration for the rest of us. And now, you’ve manipulated Mikaela again who, like you have said, is a very fragile person right now, and if she were to find out you were playing her, think of how unstable she would become then. Like, seriously, what the hell man?”

“I’m the one who made the fuss? More like I’m the one who was stating facts and got shit done instead of us just beating around the bush. I did us all a favour. I told her we were doing this all out of respect to her feelings and the memory of Matt and his career ambitions. This helped settle Mikaela and ACTUALLY smooth things over. She’s doing this for Matt now which means she’ll give us her full cooperation. You’re welcome.”

I couldn’t even think of a response I was so blown away by his arrogance, although his defense was a solid one. He didn’t seem particularly interested in my response anyway as he left me stewing to go over to the washrooms.

“Wait!” I said, following after him, him going and standing on the other side of the granite barrier from him at the urinals. “If Mikaela is such putty in your hands, how come she’s so feverishly reading articles in the newspaper about the investigation of Matt’s death, and the situation in L.A.?”

“Call it motivation,” Darwin replied over the sound of his fly unzipping followed by the tinkle of spray on porcelain.

“You know, when the police complete their investigation they’re gonna find out he didn’t wash in from the east. Then we’re all right back in the eye of the shit storm.”

“Or, given the nature of Matt’s condition, BIOTRANS will take over the investigation, if they haven’t already, rule it trespassing in a Red Zone and leave it at that. Thus my alibi holds, and we’re all fine.”

He gave a few shakes, did up his fly, and then washed his hands.

Lucky for us, Darwin was right. BIOTRANS took over the investigation from police before the day was out and ruled it the result of a trespassing in a Red Zone. Within a few days, forensics confirmed the identity of Matt, the police notified his family, and the news report was released. That was the end of it. Upon seeing the report on the six o’clock news I texted Kali to see if she had heard from Mikaela. Apparently, according to Kali, Darwin had already gotten to consoling Mikaela and was over at her place as we spoke. Kali also said Mikaela said she had been prepared for this. Darwin was then also right in that we did have Mikaela’s full cooperation.