may as well not have. All it looked out upon was the office building across the street and the ones on either side. Only by standing directly against the window and looking directly upward could he see the red Martian sky. Only by looking directly down could he see the street level. His office was a place that he had rarely been in on a weekend before but the current crisis had forced him, as well as most of the other representatives, in on their traditional day of rest.
At the moment he was sitting behind his desk, staring at his Internet terminal, kissing the ass of yet another high-level ERE lobbyist, most of whom had also been called in on days off. 'I understand,' he was telling the suited image before him. 'Believe me, I don't think any of the reps, no matter what party they're in, no matter what corporation funded their campaign, will have any problem voting for an investigation into Whiting. She's crossed way over the line. She's no longer one of us.'
'That's what we thought as well,' the lobbyist told him testily. 'But we've already received some disturbing rebuffs from the other reps we do business with. Two of them are starting to hint that public pressure may force them to reconsider their previous stance.'
'Public pressure?' Cargill scoffed, feeling nothing but contempt. 'What the hell does that mean? There ain't no such thing, especially not in
'Those are our feelings as well,' the lobbyist said, his Earthling accent thick and crisp. 'But we just wanted to make sure that everyone that we've...
'Oh you can bet your ass that I'll do the right thing,' Cargill said. 'Whiting is as good as gone.'
'We're glad to hear you say that,' he said with a smile.
They exchanged a few more pleasantries with each other and then signed off. Once the terminal was blank Cargill sighed and opened his desk drawer, taking out a bottle of Vodka. He poured himself a healthy shot and put it in his stomach. He then lit up a cigarette and took a long, satisfying puff.
His terminal flared to life again a moment later, his secretary's face staring out if it. 'Sir,' she said to him, 'do you have a minute?'
'Why?' he asked wearily. 'Is another one of those damn lobbyists calling? How many more goddamned times do I have to reassure them?'
'It's not a lobbyist,' she told him. 'It's Linda. She'd like to have a word with you.'
Linda Clark was his chief of staff. She was also his mistress of more than six years. 'Send her in,' he said, smiling at the thought of a little sexual tryst in his office.
But Linda was not interested in sexual activity at the moment. Her young, pretty face was all business as she came in through the sliding door. 'Vic,' she told him, 'we have a problem.'
'Who the hell doesn't have a problem today?' he asked rhetorically.
'It's about your constituents,' she said, sitting in the chair before the desk without waiting for an invitation.
He rolled his eyes upward. 'You mean the vermin? What possible problem could there be with them? As long as their Internet programs run and their intoxicant credits keep rolling, they stay in their little shithole apartments.'
'They've been sending emails to you,' she told him. 'A
He was having trouble believing her. 'A lot of emails from the vermin? Impossible. How many are we talking about? A few hundred? That can't possibly...'
'Try two hundred and ninety-six thousand,' she interrupted. 'And that's as of the last five minutes or so. They're still pouring in at a rate of more than a three hundred per minute.'
'Two hundred and ninety six
He hadn't. 'That's correct,' she assured him. 'One hundred and sixty-three thousand came in last night, within the two hour time period following Whiting's speech. Now it seems that a second wave of them is underway. The numbers started to pick up about 10:30 and have been steadily climbing since. Of course we haven't been able to open them all — there's simply too many for that — but we've had the computer scan them all for basic content and every last one of them is a threat for recall if you vote for Whiting's investigation.'
Cargill shook his head a little. 'Incredible,' he whispered, unable to think of anything else.
'Let me show you a typical one,' she said, 'Just so you know what we're dealing with here.' She looked at the ceiling, where the computer voice recognition microphone was installed. 'Computer, load and play one of the emails received in the last hour. Select randomly.'
'Loading,' the computer's voice said.
A moment later the screen cleared and showed a scruffy, thug-like young man in his late teens. The text on the bottom identified the sender as: Jeffrey Creek, Age 19. Creek was taking a puff on a cheap marijuana pipe that had been fashioned from discarded food containers. He held the smoke for a moment and then blew it directly onto the camera lens, momentarily blurring the image. When it cleared, he began to talk. 'Check it, fuckface. The name's Jeff Creek and I'm one of your constituents here in this shithole known as Helvetia Heights. I ain't never voted for nothing or no one before but you can bet your ass that if you start fucking around and trying to impeach Laura Whiting, I'll be the first motherfucker to sign a petition to kick your ass out of office. And then once that petition is all signed and legal and they ask us to vote to get rid of you, I'll be signing on to do that shit too. Don't fuck with Whiting, my man. Don't even think of fucking with her. That's all.' The image blinked off and the computer informed them that the recording was at an end.
'How uncouth,' Vic said, disgusted. 'Do they really expect me to take that kind of thing seriously?'
'That's a pretty typical recording,' Linda said. 'I've looked at several hundred of them myself and his sentiments are basically what they're saying.'
'Who really cares what those ignorant vermin are saying?' Vic asked. 'So they figured out how to log onto the email program and send mail. What of it? You don't really think they'd actually be able to mount a recall campaign against me, do you?'
'I didn't think so at first,' she said. 'But now... now that two hundred and ninety-six thousand of them have sent email saying the same thing, I'm not so sure.'
'What?'
'More than a quarter of a million and counting,' she said. 'All of them angry, embittered shouts by the people you represent. Whiting told them that they have a constitutional right to vote you out of office and they've apparently locked onto that thought and embraced it. Surely among quarter of a million there are a
'I hardly think so,' he said. 'That requires work, something that the vermin avoid like the plague.'
She shook her head. 'Don't underestimate them, Vic,' she said. 'They may be unemployed but they are not ignorant. They're frustrated with the system and they blame the politicians and the corporations for keeping them where they are.'
'That's ridiculous,' he said, automatically spouting the company line.
'Ridiculous or not,' she said. 'It's what they believe. They will be watching the assembly on Monday morning. They'll be watching and when the Lieutenant Governor asks the legislature to open hearings into Laura Whiting, they will take note of how you vote. It is all public record under the constitution. And if you vote to impeach her, I have no doubt that by the time the day is over there will be hundreds if not thousands of vermin out in the Heights getting fingerprints on petition screens. Within a matter of days your recall will be on the ballet and they will vote you out. They can have you back in the private sector in less than a month.'
Vic's mouth was wide as he listened to her. What she was saying was so bizarre, so unheard of. 'How can I tell my sponsor that I'm not going to vote the way they want? How can I tell them that? If I don't do what they tell me to, they'll withdraw their funding for my campaigns and they'll find someone else to give it to.'
She shrugged. 'Which action will kill you first?' she asked. 'You can at least rest assured that you're not going through this alone. From what I hear all of the other reps are getting email in even bigger numbers.'
