The Milkman: A Freeworld Novel (21 page)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“Are you the Milkman?” Sylvia asked again.

John turned his attention to McCallum. “It would seem you’re going to get your answers.”

“No one’s more surprised than me,” McCallum said. He addressed Sylvia. “I don’t imagine I can get you a cup of coffee. Snyder, do we have tea? The kind with no caffeine?”

“Water, coffee, wine and milk,” Synder said with a sneer. McCallum grinned. Mad, nasty and she was still hospitable.

“I’m fine,” Sylvia answered.

“And you, sir?” McCallum asked Samjahnee, who opened his mouth and paused. He looked to McCallum like a kid who got found playing hide‘n seek. He never thought he’d be noticed.

“Nothing for me, thank-you,” Samjahnee managed after recovering.

“Well I’m ready.” McCallum went to the coffee machine and went about serving himself with careful deliberation.
Milkman? Movie?
McCallum began to sketch the picture in his head. The lines were fuzzy. The meaning began to take shape regardless.

“What else you involved in, John?”

Synder came along McCallum’s side. She made the motions like she wanted coffee too. He caught the questions in her eyes, though. She was a rabbit with two holes and thinking seriously about using one right now.

“Film everyone,” Sylvia said to Samjahnee out the side of her mouth. “We’ll fill in names and shit latter.”

Samjahnee panned the camera in his left. Snyder swung the round, glass coffee pot and doused the orb in a scalding back sheet. Samjahnee screamed and dropped the camera. Snyder set the pot down on the table — she didn’t want it to break — and ran.

“Whoa, Snyder,” McCallum jerked in her direction, and stopped. “You all right?” he asked Samjahnee. He saw Snyder disappear through the back and knelt next to Samjahnee, who yanked his dripping, steaming sleeve back from his gleaming red hand.

“I’ll get some ice.” John jogged off to the right.

“Asshole cheese,” Donna said, stirring the soup.

Sylvia remained focused on the far end of the kitchen. She touched her glasses and moved her attention to her cameraman. Who, McCallum realized, wasn’t the only one with a camera. He’d used glasses like that, putting them on people inside a skimming operation or sex-for-work scam. She’d taken video of Snyder, who it seemed really, really didn’t want her image posted around the big wide world.

“I didn’t expect her to be so camera shy,” Sylvia said.

“Thank you,” Samjahnee said, “These second degree burns will be fine, boss.”

“Of course they will. Everyone gets coffee spilled on them from time to time. How’s the camera.”

“I’ve rolled them through fires.”

“Excellent. This stuff is seething. I love it.”

McCallum stood. He glanced back at the back end of the kitchen. Snyder wasn’t coming back. He thought about chasing her down, then thought some more. Best to get to the root of a problem.

He picked up the orb, bounced it in his hand twice, and said, “Donna, stand back a ways.”

The woman backed up without acknowledging him. McCallum tossed the camera into the soup. A thick splash rose and fell

“Filthy butternut,” Donna growled.

“HEY!” Samjahnee sat and reached for the other camera. McCallum got there first.

“Excuse me,” Sylvia said. “I wouldn’t do that.”

McCallum tossed the second orb into the soup. “Couldn’t see why you would.” He stepped around the rising Samjahnee and grabbed Sylvia’s arm.

“I don’t think so,” she spat.

“I do apologize.” He ripped the glasses from her face and threw them into the pot as well. “Donna, could you be a dear and wipe that up for me.”

The woman picked up a towel and started sopping up the liquid on the side of the pot and around the stove. “Messed up mother.”

“Bullies never come across well on camera,” Sylvia said.

“I don’t intend to be on camera,” McCallum said. “Didn’t I just make that clear?”

Samjahnee took two steps, intended to retrieve his equipment, McCallum figured, so he said, “Take five, pal.”

“I appreciate the enthusiasm,” Sylvia said, “but I’ll direct.”

McCallum fought the urge to squeeze Sylvia’s arm more tightly. She didn’t struggle. People usually did. And the lack of physical fight fascinated him.

John returned with a towel, hanging like a hobo sack. “Here you go,” he said to Samjahnee. “Hold this on your hand for as long as you can stand it.”

“After you get the cameras,” Sylvia added.

McCallum let go of Sylvia and passed in front of her. He leaned back on the counter, next to the stove with the big pot of soup and crossed his arms.

“Cameraman, ice your burns.” McCallum said. “Director, stop making sounds or I will lodge a carrot in your throat to assist you with that. John, you can talk. In fact, I insist.”

“I need—” Sylvia started. McCallum grabbed a carrot off the counter, flipped it in his hand and pointed it at her like a sword.

“I’m not the Milkman,” John said. “That would be Emory Leveski.”

“Him?” McCallum said. “I put him on work deferral.”

“You’re an op?” Sylvia popped.

“Amber Systems Security.”

“Shit,” Samjahnee added.

Sylvia laughed. “Too awesome. You’ve got to let me get a camera. This is like skipping a grade. Like skipping a fucking grade, my new best friend.”

“This Milkman business,” McCallum said, “It’s not exactly company business is it?”

“The policy is unclear,” John said.

“But you and Leveski didn’t want anything to do with an investigation.”

“So you are involved,” Sylvia stated, moving towards the stove.

“Was,” John said. “Past tense.”

McCallum walked towards the back of the kitchen.

“Where are you going?” Sylvia asked.

“I’m running after the girl,” he said. “I don’t do that nearly enough.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

At the front gate, a woman held a baby. McCallum watched her from the window in Snyder’s room. Snyder wasn’t there and he wanted to search for her but that woman and the baby— they looked like acrylic cutouts in an oil painting. Clean, fresh, and out of place. She turned, back and forth, at the hips, like she was in a train station, looking for her ride.

He walked down the steps, out through the doors and onto the parade grounds. Dusk was about to give way to night. The sun wasn’t helping the air anymore. The chill grew. Most everyone drifted to the left where John Raston and Donna set up a table to serve soup and bread. His stomach gurgled as he walked, straight ahead, towards the main gates. He focused on the newcomer. If Synder had made it all the way here from the equator, she’d certainly survive another couple of minutes without him. He didn’t want it to be that way. As he thought it, he came under a powerful urge to tell her she wouldn’t have to scurry around alone any more. She could settle. He’d see to it.

After he took care of this.

McCallum knew the woman with the baby. He’d talked to her, just a few months ago. She’d been stressed, worried, beaten down like nearly everyone he met on the job. Special, though. Not a person of interest, not a victim. She’d been something else.

She focused on him. As he approached, she must have realized he aimed at her. He knew he had an air of authority around him, an inescapable aura, like the fumes clouding a skunk. Her mouth opened as he closed in. Addled surprise, he called it. A sudden, sad realization he so frequently delivered.

“You,” she said. “Shit.”

“Mrs. Leveski.” McCallum’s mouth remembered a step before the rest of him.

Her eyes welled up. Her lips moved without making a sound. A chant, it seemed, to ward off evil. She bounced the quiet little girl on her hip.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I…” She turned back towards the gate. She wanted to bolt. “Don’t know, really. I really don’t know.”

The gates flew wide. Four men swaggered through, dirty, ranging in age from late 20s to an early fifty, McCallum thought. Work pants, loose shirts and jackets. They moved as a gang, taking in the whole scene, fully expecting to be the new center of attention.

All of McCallum’s hairs stood— neck, arms, legs. The kid on the far left, 175 pounds, mid-twenties, carried a chain over his shoulder. Medium gauge, so that it was neither slow nor pointless. He’d been in fights before. Taking him was going to hurt. Next man in went 220 easy. He walked with his arms back and gut out. Thirty something, bushy hair. No discipline, no martial training, he probably relied on his muscle pack. The kid on the far right might have made thirty. Tough to tell under all that hair and dirt. Maybe he weighed 150, if wet and fully dressed. He carried a pipe low. Ten-pounder, two-feet long, McCallum guessed.

That left the oldest guy, in the middle, the one fixated on Lillian Leveski. You’d think he just fond his Easter basket the way he grinned. He had a lot of true muscle, the kind made from years of hard labor, and moved with the confidence of someone who’d won about a thousand yard fights.

They all had matching clunky, white ceramic bangles on their left wrists. Industrial cuffs. The mark of an alternative work detail. These men moved like a gang because they were. A chain-gang.

McCallum touched his wrist, forgetting the cuff sat on his kitchen table, 25 miles south. He couldn’t signal he was an op, open a live channel so control could monitor his situation, dispatch backup and an ambulance to save his life.

Lillian clutched her baby more tightly. McCallum moved in next to her.

“Where is he?” the man demanded.

“What are you talking about?”

The man walked up to her. He looked so happy, McCallum thought. A big, yellow-toothed smile, hands on his hips, about to burst into laughter. “We were hoping this would be hard.”

The other men spread into a circle. McCallum tensed, bent his knees, moved his arms out a few degrees from his body. This had become the kind of scenario they instruct rookies to avoid at all costs.

“There a problem here?” McCallum asked.

The man didn’t look at him. “No one’s talking to you, asshole.”

“You need to be using that kind of language around a child?”

The man looked at McCallum. Not the face. The arms and legs. He assessed, McCallum figured, trying to decide how much a scuffle might cost him.

“You got a cock in this fight?” the man asked. “Or you just trying to be all shining armor and shit?”

These guys wanted to fight. It was just a matter of when. McCallum needed the baby out of the way. A little surprise wasn’t bad either. He rammed an open hand into the 50-year-old’s windpipe, drew his hand back, closed it and punched him hard on the end of his nose. The man fell back, gasping.

“Run,” McCallum said to Lillian.

The kid with the pipe actually stepped back. What a moron. McCallum had all the room he wanted. He ran, jumped and spun, kicking the boy across the face. He landed, punched him in the center of the stomach and grabbed the pipe. He cranked it out of the kid’s hand and turned. The 50-year-old clutched his throat. The other two men had to move around him, giving McCallum an extra second. He crouched and snapped the pipe against the hairy kid’s right kneecap. The kid screamed and collapsed as McCallum stood.

Lillian turned and the older guy took a fist full of her sweater. McCallum raised the pipe. The other two men rushed him. As he figured, the big guy had no technique. He swung a big ugly punch. McCallum smacked it away with the pipe. The younger one whipped his chain, catching McCallum on the lower leg. He hadn’t expected that. The dumb ones always went high. He pivoted and stomped the chain with his free foot, almost ripping the links from the kid’s hands. Bad position. For both. McCallum needed to—

The big guy bear-hugged him from behind. Immobile. Tight on air. McCallum flicked his wrist and conked the man on the head with the pipe. The bear hug loosened and McCallum shoulder-rolled the man onto the ground. He skipped left. He’d smash the young guy holding the chain and—

“Give her back!” Lillian screamed. McCallum heard others come running. He couldn’t decide if that was good or bad. The oldest man held the baby over his head. She hung by her clothes. McCallum only knew she could breathe by her crying.

The man looked at McCallum, who stood frozen, panting, slowly realizing he’d lost. “Tie him up before you beat him dead.” The man’s voice sounded weak and sandy.

The big guy wrapped McCallum’s legs in his arms and flopped him on the ground. McCallum lost the pipe. He curled as someone from behind kicked him in the kidneys.

“Where is he?” The 50-year-old tossed the crying child under his arm, carrying her like a log. McCallum could tell it hurt him to speak.

“Give her back.” Lillian clutched at the air.

“Put the baby down,” McCallum said. Someone jumped foot-first onto his head.

He knew a bunch of the ollies had gathered. The show had been loud. He couldn’t see or hear anything specific. Sudden pain in the thigh. More pain in the head. Fuzzy lights in what would’ve been his field of vision could he open his eyes.

“What kind of man doesn’t come running to protect his child?” the older man asked.

Lillian’s lips trembled through a wet, sloppy, “Just, please, give her back.”

“Maybe the kind that ain’t here yet. Maybe we made better time. Could be.” He coughed.

A kick to the knee. A kick to the arms McCallum held over his face.

“I said tie him up. We’ll do him after we got the runner. He might be here right now watching or he might still be making his way. So secure this asshole and then start looking around.”

McCallum heard one of the female ollies yell, heard something crash and felt himself dragged and rolled. He didn’t fight as they tied his wrists. He concentrated on his breathing: Sharp pain in, dull pain out.

The big man dragged him, turned him over and propped him against the wall. They’d used the nylon cord that had held an ollie’s shack together.

“Gem,” the man ordered, “close the gates. Conner, Teddy, take the prisoner. We’ll stick over at the fire. See if Emory shows up for his kid.”

Gem was the big guy
, McCallum said to himself.
Conner and Teddy the two younger guys, with weapons.

“Lady,” the man handed Lillian her baby. “Keep this thing from getting noisy. Or I will.”

He walked through the makeshift village in the direction of the operative’s quarters. Lillian followed, eyes locked on her daughter.

Conner and Teddy lifted him by the arms and pushed him down the muddy path. Gem stepped to block him. He drilled a finger into McCallum’s chest.

“You gonna die tonight,” Gem said. “I’m gonna watch the life come right out you eyes.”

* * *

Sylvia recovered her glasses and put them on, even though they smelled like trash. She wanted to puke, though she pretty much always wanted to puke. The baby pressed on her stomach. Not her figurative stomach — not that middle area everyone calls their tummy even though it’s really a mass of intestines, pancreas and liver — she meant the actual stomach, the small, rubbery cavern you sent your chewed food. The baby used it as a kick bag. He or she needed to get out and hit the gym.

She walked out to the circle that had collected around the fire. Rough, haggard people sat on a log, eating soup from mismatched bowls. The air was cold, but she liked it. Cold air fought the pukies.

“Gets dark fast here?” she said.

Samjahnee walked two paces behind her, his cameras in a backpack. “This light’s no good.”

“We’ll fix it post.”

“I need the gear to get anything.”

“We best wait on that.”

A cluster of maybe a dozen ollies and four men she hadn’t noticed before sat around the fire, eating. The op had his arms behind his back, seemingly tied up. John Raston sat next to him like the log was 200 degrees. He couldn’t keep his ass steady. It went a long way towards explaining what all the yelping might have been about. But not all the why.

“What did I miss?” she asked.

“Look at that?” one of the younger, new guys said.

“This place just gets weirder,” another of the men said. She knew he was the leader, though not from any due loyalty or rank. He’d slit your gut for a beer. Sylvia knew that by sight. She’d seen it before, on Tobacco Road. She decided to make a headcount of low-functioning high grades. She panned, caught sight of a woman with a baby and stopped.

“Hi,” Sylvia waved. “She’s adorable.”

“Thank you,” the woman said.

“You two don’t look like no ollies,” the leader said. His voice had a grit-in-the-vacuum cleaner quality.

“Aren’t you clever.” She turned to John Raston. “Is the Milkman here?”

“No,” John grumbled.

They were straying from her script. Her subject was absent and the op had been arrested, she presumed by the thugs. Served him right, the big bully. Making her glasses smell like garlic. If she wanted to finish her film, she’d have to sit here with these nut-structures and men so bold as to tie up a Systems Security operative. Who did that? Who risked that kind of break in policy?

Samjahnee put his hand on her shoulder and his mouth near her ear. He said, “we should go” with next to no air.

“No,” the leader said, “seriously, I can’t figure out what the likes of you two are doing here.”

“Just passing through,” Samjahnee said in full voice.

“Why don’t you have some soup? It’s not half as shitty as I expected.”

“Thank you,” Samjahnee said, gently pulling Sylvia backward. “But we had our fill inside.”

“Aren’t you looking for someone? Didn’t you say milkman?”

Sylvia touched her glasses. “Do you know the Milkman?”

“I don’t. What’s funny, though, is I’m looking for someone and you’re looking for someone. You think maybe they’re the same person?”

“I can’t imagine us having any mutual interests.”

“You’re a lippy one. Gem, give the lady your seat. I like talking with her.”

The man that rose looked like a barrel with arms and legs and a head stuck on top. His pants, shirt and jacket had sat at the bottom of a tool chest too long. His gaze had calluses.

“Can you take him?” Sylvia asked Samjahnee.

“Out to dinner.”

“I hate to see a good piece of log going to waste.” She crossed the circle and fell onto the space Gem had left. The baby made sitting down so inelegant. She hated it. Wobbling diminished her authority.

The leader man looked like pale driftwood. He kept still, but his eyes darted around, always passing the op on their trips into the darkness that was quickly encroaching on the party.

Gem stood next to Samjahnee, bigger in every way. The op sat between John Raston and a young man with a chain over his shoulder. Most of the other people in this group were ollies, in her estimation. The battered, holey, unmatched layers of clothes. Excessive, matted hair. The way they mumbled or stared or twitched. She’d thought often of doing an ollie film. She assumed a good deal of comic drama ran through the tiny enclaves like this one. She had also assumed she’d hate the setting. The stench, the grime, the drool and the danger. Everyone had cautionary tales about an ollie camp. Usually a friend of a friend. Now she had a story first hand. And hoped it didn’t turn into one of those profoundly icky tales.