Family shit happening, so I won’t be able to give this the pass/polish I normally do until later, but didn’t want to delay the post. So those of you reading right now get a rare glimpse at an earlier draft. Genital warts and all. (Usually I remove them with a belt sander).
Sixty
“Thanks for buying us time,” Tucker said, an instant before Drake appeared.
“It odd when you do that,” he said.
“It’s weirder when he doesn’t, and just talks telepathically so the rest of us only hear half the conversation,” Mikaela said.
“How are things going with your couriers?” Tucker asked.
Mikaela scrolled through the texts on her phone to make sure she hadn’t missed any. “The one in Washington just finished up. The dupe in New York is apparently stuck in traffic. But they’re hurrying as best they can.”
“You up for this?” Iago asked. “You’re not spread too thin?”
“I don’t think I’m like jam. I think once a dupe is here there’s no more energy required from me. But I’m hoping we don’t have to find out.”
“I think I have a better idea than hope.” Drake disappeared. An instant later, the first ICE agent rounded the corner. He turned, behind him, as Drake reappeared and dropped a handgun at Mikaela’s feet. The ICE agents started marching again. Every few seconds, Drake would reappear in their midst, take the gun from an agent and be gone before they could even react. Most had been disarmed, and the procession was just on the edge of earshot, when Drake appeared behind Louie, who spun around, and hit him in the face with the butt of his sidearm. Drake started to fall, and teleported so that he landed beside Iago.
“That was a real bad idea,” Tucker said. “Before this moment, I was happy to let you walk away. But you’re assaulting students- my friends. On campus. In front of the eyes of the world.” He gestured to the cameras half the students were holding up.
“I am a Federal Officer. I have a sworn affidavit from a witness declaring this school is harboring an illegal- knowingly. You try to stop me from proving it, or if I do, you can kiss your federal funding goodbye, and probably your state funding, too.”
“Given your history of sending armed gunmen to this campus, I don’t think anyone would fault us for questioning the veracity of your claims,” Tucker said.
“What are you implying?” he asked, seething.
“I’m stating as a provable fact that you were instrumental in aiding, abetting and arming the assault on this school last year. I’m stating that you gave the gunmen who threatened the students and teachers here secret governmental weaponry designed to neutralize Breed abilities. You even gave them a few suggestions about the best time of day to assault the campus, a few little tidbits from your time in the Marines about the best ways to destabilize local authorities.”
“Provable how? Because courts have already ruled against evidence gathered through technopathy as unreliable, and confessions given in the presence of telepaths as inadmissible.”
“Provable in that we’ve got the receipts. They’re currently being vetted by journalists across the country. We can also prove that your IP address was logged when that purportedly anonymous tip you’re acting on emailed you. And I’m fairly certain that won’t qualify as exigent circumstances; certainly wouldn’t get you a warrant, which I suspect is why you haven’t bothered to try.”
“That true?” one of Louie’s subordinates asked.
Louie swallowed. “Of course it isn’t. She’s just trying to hurt morale.”
“Not cool,” another agent said.
“What?” Louie asked, turning angrily in their direction.
“Misgendering him. Not cool. We’re here for an illegal. That’s no excuse to be transphobic.”
Louie rolled his eyes. “It’s a shell game. This whole day has been. Make us waste our time, resources and energy on a raid they had no intention of letting us carry out. Then stimy us at every step. You ask them and they’ll tell us it’s because there’s a problem with our paperwork, or one of tone. That if we tried it over again, they’d totally be on board. But they’re not. They hate our entire mission. This isn’t about caring that we dot our ‘I’s- they want us to stop existing.”
“I feel like he’s telling on himself,” Tucker said. “I trust the rest of you are smart enough to hear it.”
“This has gone too far,” Louie’s subordinate said. “It’s one thing to rifle through some refugees dainties on the strength of a fake tip. But this is a school– one that not that long ago had to fight off an armed insurgency.”
“What?” Louie asked, his voice thundering.
“Jesus fucking Christ, Devin, they are so obviously holding back. You could probably pick one of them at random and they could have killed all of us with barely a thought. That’s abjectly terrifying- which is why I think most of us agreed to help today- but they so obviously aren’t the aggressors here. They have been acting defensively. Patiently, even. This isn’t right. We’ve all felt it, in the pit of our stomachs. We know this isn’t right, and we were all too cowardly to say so, let alone do anything about it. And me stating that- it isn’t brave. We are way too late for ‘brave.’ Who here hasn’t brutalized some immigrant we suspected was innocent? Who here hasn’t threatened a perfectly legal green card holder, or someone with a valid visa, because who’s going to believe them? Or fucked with a dreamer just because we could? This isn’t right; none of it. These kids are just here to learn, to make our world- and our future- better. And the best thing we can think to do is try to scare them into doing it someplace else? No. I’m done. I can’t tell anyone else how to do this, but I’m done.” He set his phone, his keys, and a gun on the street and turned back towards the hill. The crowd of agents parted to let him through, but he hadn’t even cleared them before he was joined by a second.
“You may not all have the spines to do this job any more,” Louie barked, as still more agents walked. “That’s fine. Scurry home with your tails between your legs. I won’t say a word to your agents in charge; I’m sure they’ll figure out what kinds of cowards they have working under them. But the rest of us have a job to do. The rest of… us,” the crowd was nearly gone, but one was still standing with him.
“We don’t,” he said, and held up his phone while turning up the volume on a news broadcast. “Multiple outlets are reporting that DHS tech was used in the domestic terrorist attack in Bellingham last year. Agency spokespeople have denied any official involvement, but were unable to rule out rogue elements within the Department acting unilaterally. ‘What I can tell you, unequivocally, is that official governmental policy is to acknowledge and respect the civil rights of all citizens and legal residents, regardless of genetic disposition or so-called Breed status. Any agent found to have coordinated with non-governmental actors in comission of these attacks will be prosecuted as co-conspirators and treated accordingly by this department and this government.”
“Thanks for buying us time,” Tucker said, an instant before Drake appeared.
“It odd when you do that,” he said.
“It’s weirder when he doesn’t, and just talks telepathically so the rest of us only hear half the conversation,” Mikaela said.
“How are things going with your couriers?” Tucker asked.
Mikaela scrolled through the texts on her phone to make sure she hadn’t missed any. “The one in Washington just finished up. The dupe in New York is apparently stuck in traffic. But they’re hurrying as best they can.”
“You up for this?” Iago asked. “You’re not spread too thin?”
“I don’t think I’m like jam. I think once a dupe is here there’s no more energy required from me. But I’m hoping we don’t have to find out.”
“I think I have a better idea than hope.” Drake disappeared. An instant later, the first ICE agent rounded the corner. He turned, behind him, as Drake reappeared and dropped a handgun at Mikaela’s feet. The ICE agents started marching again. Every few seconds, Drake would reappear in their midst, take the gun from an agent and be gone before they could even react. Most had been disarmed, and the procession was just on the edge of earshot, when Drake appeared behind Louie, who spun around, and hit him in the face with the butt of his sidearm. Drake started to fall, and teleported so that he landed beside Iago.
“That was a real bad idea,” Tucker said. “Before this moment, I was happy to let you walk away. But you’re assaulting students- my friends. On campus. In front of the eyes of the world.” He gestured to the cameras half the students were holding up.
“I am a Federal Officer. I have a sworn affidavit from a witness declaring this school is harboring an illegal- knowingly. You try to stop me from proving it, or if I do, you can kiss your federal funding goodbye, and probably your state funding, too.”
“Given your history of sending armed gunmen to this campus, I don’t think anyone would fault us for questioning the veracity of your claims,” Tucker said.
“What are you implying?” he asked, seething.
“I’m stating as a provable fact that you were instrumental in aiding, abetting and arming the assault on this school last year. I’m stating that you gave the gunmen who threatened the students and teachers here secret governmental weaponry designed to neutralize Breed abilities. You even gave them a few suggestions about the best time of day to assault the campus, a few little tidbits from your time in the Marines about the best ways to destabilize local authorities.”
“Provable how? Because courts have already ruled against evidence gathered through technopathy as unreliable, and confessions given in the presence of telepaths as inadmissible.”
“Provable in that we’ve got the receipts. They’re currently being vetted by journalists across the country. We can also prove that your IP address was logged when that purportedly anonymous tip you’re acting on emailed you. And I’m fairly certain that won’t qualify as exigent circumstances; certainly wouldn’t get you a warrant, which I suspect is why you haven’t bothered to try.”
“That true?” one of Louie’s subordinates asked.
Louie swallowed. “Of course it isn’t. She’s just trying to hurt morale.”
“Not cool,” another agent said.
“What?” Louie asked, turning angrily in their direction.
“Misgendering him. Not cool.”
Louie rolled his eyes. “It’s a shell game. This whole day has been. Make us waste our time, resources and energy on a raid they had no intention of letting us carry out. Then stimy us at every step. You ask them and they’ll tell us it’s because there’s a problem with our paperwork, or one of tone. That if we tried it over again, they’d totally be on board. But they’re not. They hate our entire mission. This isn’t about caring that we dot our is- they want us to stop existing.”
“I feel like he’s telling on himself,” Tucker said. “I trust the rest of you are smart enough to hear it.”
“This has gone too far,” Louie’s subordinate said. “It’s one thing to rifle through some refugees dainties on the strength of a fake tip. But this is a school– one that not that long ago had to fight off an armed insurgency.”
“What?” Louie asked, his voice thundering.
“Jesus fucking Christ, Devin, they are so obviously holding back. You could probably pick one of them at random and they could have killed all of us with barely a thought. That’s abjectly terrifying- which is why I think most of us agreed to help today- but they so obviously aren’t the aggressors here. They have been acting defensively. Patiently, even. This isn’t right. We’ve all felt it, in the pit of our stomachs. We know this isn’t right, and we were all too cowardly to say so, let alone do anything about it. And me stating that- it isn’t brave. We are way too late for ‘brave.’ Who here hasn’t brutalized some immigrant we suspected was innocent? Who here hasn’t threatened a perfectly legal green card holder, or someone with a valid visa, because who’s going to believe them? Or fucked with a dreamer just because we could? This isn’t right; none of it. These kids are just here to learn, to make our world- and our future- better. And the best thing we can think to do is try to scare them into doing it someplace else? No. I’m done. I can’t tell anyone else how to do this, but I’m done.” He set his phone, his keys, and a gun on the street and turned back towards the hill. The crowd of agents parted to let him through, but he hadn’t even cleared them before he was joined by a second.
“You may not all have the spines to do this job any more,” Louie barked, as still more agents walked. “That’s fine. Scurry home with your tails between your legs. I won’t say a word to your agents in charge; I’m sure they’ll figure out what kinds of cowards they have working under them. But the rest of us have a job to do. The rest of… us,” the crowd was nearly gone, but one was still standing with him.
“We don’t,” he said, and held up his phone while turning up the volume on a news broadcast. “Multiple outlets are reporting that DHS tech was used in the domestic terrorist attack in Bellingham last year. Agency spokespeople have denied any official involvement, but were unable to rule out rogue elements within the Department acting unilaterally. ‘What I can tell you, unequivocally, is that official governmental policy is to acknowledge and respect the civil rights of all citizens and legal residents, regardless of genetics or so-called Breed status. Any agent found to have coordinated with non-governmental actors in coordination of these attacks will be prosecuted as co-conspirators and treated accordingly by this department.”