Swan Song

In the wooded southeastern corner of the Central Unified School District’s unincorporated sector, up a dirt drive way, past security cameras, hidden microphones, pitfalls, booby traps, and tripwires was a tiny A-frame house.  Inside that house lived a man who had given up all hope and resigned himself to his fate.

You wouldn’t know just by looking at it, but the tiny wooden cabin was, pound for pound, more heavily fortified than Fort Knox.  The walls were eighteen-inch dense rammed earth and could stop anything up to and including a .50 rifle cartridge.  He knew…he had tested it.  Maybe it could’ve stopped something larger, but the .50 was all he had to test it with.  Explosives could’ve gotten through, but anyone getting close enough to plant them would have to get past some serious hell to do so.  The windows were double ply bulletproof glass, and the doors were burned from T1 armor plate steel.

The occupant of the house had been extremely busy lately, and his efforts made sure that two things would survive a nuclear war—him and cockroaches.  So at least he’d be in good company, having preferred the company of cockroaches to other humans for some time now.

But there would be no nuclear war.  Not for him, anyway.  He was going to die soon.  Pity.  Testimony from the Los Alamos tests claimed that the burst from an atomic explosion was actually a beautiful thing to behold.

Inside his fortified bunker, John Steiner had little do but wait, sleep, and eat the cans of beef-a-roni and iodine-purified water he had stockpiled.  No calls from his supervisor had come in the last several weeks and it only meant one thing—his employer had no further use for him.  And people the Board of Education had no more use for seldom lived very long to reflect on their lives.

His tenure with the Central Unified School District’s Board of Education Behavioral Correction and Social Dogma Enforcement Division was not a very long one, but it had been eventful.  It wasn’t bad gig.  It had let him put his finely honed talents to use and the stipend he received from the Board of Education was enough to keep in beer and cigarettes, with just enough left to construct his mini-fortress.

He wasn’t sorry to see it end.

He had only just given up any notion of free will and made the decision to throw the events of his life over to the whims of fate.  His past was a violent one, usually at the whims of others.  His only real attempt at self-determination ended in absolute failure; leaving a trail of wreckage, bullet holes, and bodies in his wake.  But always, even after his occasional successes and colossal fuck ups, he always ended up where he started.  His professional career with the CUSD/BOE/BCSDED was nothing more than a stepping stone to nowhere.

The very next day after “The Incident” (as it came to be known in official reports), as he recuperated in a hospital bed, he threw his hands out, and shouted, “Fuck all!”  Why bother?  Take things as they come.  If it needs fixing, fix it.  If it needs hurting, hurt it.  If it needs doing, do it.  Otherwise, leave it the hell alone.  He tried his best and ended even worse than when he started.  He scraped some money together for a new place, and shut himself off from the world.  He only emerged from his private world for work and supplies.

So far, the new world view worked well for him and freed up a lot of time for the things he enjoyed: watching TV, cleaning guns, and armoring up his new house.   He never even entertained the idea of dating again.  He had tried, but he wasn’t even sure what love was.

And so freed from the idea of self-actualization and the burdens it entailed, he was actually enjoying himself.  As mid life crises go, this turned out to be a happy one.

But then the calls from the Superintendent stopped and, with them, his income.  His retainer stipend ended, and he knew his life would soon follow.  Nobody crossed the Board of Education, let alone make an attempt on their life.  Everybody knew that, and nobody was stupid or unhappy enough to do anything about it.  Except for him.  And now he knew he would pay the price.  He had run a few human physiology labs in his time and now he wondered if one of those stupid, grinning skeletons that hung in the class was going to be his.

But if he was to die, then let it happen—suffocated under a pile of corpses that he had created.  He pored over every book on survival and improvised munitions he could dig up and turned his cozy little home into firebase Steiner.  Every closet and cupboard had a loaded gun stashed in it.  He drilled watch holes and concealed them with shrubs.  He cut down every tree and bush that obstructed his line of fire.  The acreage around his house was turned into a veritable no-man’s land.  He slept under a blanket of flak jackets and snuggled up with his M1 Garand.  He had more modern firepower at his disposal, but it the only one that had never malfunctioned.  It had never let him down.  Besides, it could cut through body armor like it was paper.  Turn cover into concealment, as they say.

So he waited, and the empty Beef-a-roni cans started to pile up.  He ran out of caffeine pills and his cozy little cottage started to stink like a locker room.  He had read of this--assault strategy lesson one.  They were trying to wear him down physically and emotionally, then he would be easy pickings.

He remained vigilant, but the body needs what it needs.  Eventually, he succumbed to sleep.  When he woke, he checked his watch.  He’d been out for eighteen hours.  If they had wanted to take him out that would have been the time.  The sensation of impending doom subsided.  Every day after that he became less vigilant, and was soon able to sleep without nightmares of armored men crashing into every opening into his house.  His life of catlike readiness soon atrophied into sloth and inactivity.

The then something even more unexpected happened.

The call from the Superintendent of Schools came in the early afternoon, when John was only just getting out of bed.  There had been no calls for the six months since The Incident, no attempts had been made on his life, and he was just beginning to enjoy life again.  He had looked forward to a leisurely breakfast, a leisurely patrol of the premises and its defenses, followed by a leisurely afternoon of TV, followed by a leisurely dinner.  He knew it was the Super before he even answered the phone.  Only one person in the district had the phone’s number.

It took him a while to find the phone, eventually finding it in the pocket of a pair of jeans he had been meaning to launder for at least a month.  The battery was almost drained completely.  He flipped it open and put it to his ear.  He still held on to a shred of hope that it was a wrong number, or at the very least, not a prelude to an attack.

“Good morning, sunshine.”  The voice on the phone sounded mechanical, having been run through several layers of encryption and decryption.

John automatically fell into professional mode.  “The sunrise was beautiful this morning.”

“Planets revolve around the Sun.  Not vice versa.”

“It’s not a vice to be versatile.”

The line was secure, so the security protocols were dropped.

“John, it’s been a while.  You sound tired.  Are sleeping too little or too much?”

He had almost forgotten what the Super sounded like, but the prospect of any more days of pills, relaxation, and game shows immediately shattered.  He sucked in a breath and let it out slowly, trying to sound as sick as possible.  “Sorry…I’m getting over a…thing.”  That “thing” being his now accustomed to life of leisure.

“Regardless, I need you dressed and in my office to discuss your next assignment.  This one’s long term.  Permanent, maybe.  That and there’s a stack of stipend checks waiting for you here.  You never signed up for direct deposit.”

That woke him up.  Not the money, but the prospect of employment.  “Permanent?  Why?  Did someone die?”  Most jobs were short term.  A day, maybe a week in the case of illness.  In spite of the pleasurable rut he was in, the idea of being useful once again was appealing.  He was getting a little flabby, after all.  And a permanent assignment?  He looked around at the tiny A-frame he inhabited and immediately thought of the improvements that a steady paycheck would bring.  Maybe some shutters over the plexiglass windows.

“No.  No one’s dead.  Lost their mind, maybe, but not dead.”

John glanced at the TV.  The Armory Channel was taking viewers on a tour of the Heckler and Koch factory in Oberndorf.  “Shit,” he murmured.  He set the TV to record the show.   He knew he would never watch it, but it was a small consolation.

“Shit?  What?  You don’t like working?”

“Me?  No sir!  I’m up for anything!”  He could tell his boss was pissed, and it pleased him.  His old self was coming back with a vengeance.

“Anything?”

John looked around at the fortress he called his home.  “Yeah.. anything.”

An hour later, John was dressed and standing in the Superintendent’s office, as promised.  The Super was not an overbearing man, but the trappings of his office did a lot to convey the weight of his authority--enormous polished mahogany desk, stuffed leather chairs, a thick plush carpet over a polished hardwood floor.  The hides of extinct animals adorned the walls.  Every hard surface had been buffed to an almost blinding sheen.

The Super was sitting at his desk when he arrived.  He eyed John over the rim of his business-chic glasses.  Apparently, John’s months of solitude had taken a turn on his appearance.  “John, when I said ‘dressed,’ I assumed you had the sense to dress PRESENTABLY.”

John pretended to take offense, looking over his loose robe and old t shirt, down to the untied combat boots on his unsocked feet.  He shrugged, playing at being oblivious to whatever wrong he had committed.

The Super pursed his lips like he was going to spit.  “You look like something the cat dragged in.”

“Well, I have been feeling a little regurgitated, lately.”

“Seriously, is this how you live your life?  Or do actually have a decent wardrobe you wear when I’m not around?”

“You said ‘dressed.’  I, as you can see, am dressed.”  These conversations were not unusual.  John was an insufferable bastard when dealing with authority.

“The spirit of my request…”

“Tut!  Tut!”  John waggled his finger in front of his face.  “Tut!  Tut!  The spirit of your request is debatable.  The words, however, are not.  I have adhered to your words, sir.  In the future, perhaps you should choose your words with greater care.”

“Your smell hasn’t even reached me yet.  I can tell it won’t be pleasant.”

John sniffed at his underarm and grimaced.  His boss had him there.

The Super shook his head, signaling that the discussion was to proceed no further.  He turned his attention to a sheaf of papers that lay on his desk.  As he picked them up and pretended to study them, John took the opportunity to sit and drum his fingers on the armrests of the only other chair in the office.  They sat, neither making the first move.  Two sharks trying to psychologically outflank one another.    John flinched first.

“And why, exactly, am I here?”  The playfully mocking tone was gone and his voice practically oozed sardonically.

The Super ignored him and pretended to nod at whatever page he was pretending to peruse.  He took a pen in hand and signed it.

“Heh.”

The Superintendent looked up raised an eyebrow.  “What?”

“That pen has no ink in it.”

The Super looked down at the paper he had thought he signed.  There was an indentation of his signature but, sure enough, no ink had been laid down.  He glared at John and dropped the pen in the trash.

“Do you even read what you’re signing?”

The Super crumpled up the paper and dropped it in the trash next to the pen.

“Do you even need a brain for what you do, or just a spinal column?”  John’s motives were as transparent as his glasses.  The allure of a new assignment was starting to wane, especially if it meant the usual bullshit he had to endure.  Hell, if he could get suspended he could make it back home in time for Double Jeopardy with a wad of uncashed stipend checks.

The Super wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.  He pulled an envelope from a drawer and handed it over the desk.  “You, apparently, are the new head of the District’s Maths and Sciences department.”

Of all the theories John had come up with regarding his new assignment, this was not one of them.  Though he held the envelope in his hand, it had been forgotten.  “The what of the what, now?”

The Super enunciated carefully, “The new…faculty chairperson…of the Maths…and Sciences…department.”

John had learned long ago never to reveal confusion, or any kind of weakness, so he forced himself to recover from the news quickly.  This was new, and he had no plan.  He was forced to improvise.  “Well now, that doesn’t make much sense, does it?”

The Super picked up his pile of papers and went back to pretending to study them.  “Oh?  And why is that?”

"Because as I’m sure you already know, I'm not faculty.  Hell, I’m barely even employed right now.  And I’m sure you recall the…unpleasantness."

“Unpleasantness?  Is that what you call it?  You caused eleven million dollars worth of structural damage alone.  And those pieces of art?  They were original, you know.  You just don’t get them at the dollar store.  Unpleasantness, indeed.”

“Fine…fine…mea culpa.”

“Add to that another six million dollars of security upgrades.  Oh…then there were the condolence letters to the security guards you killed during your ‘unpleasantness.’  Thank God their insurance plan didn’t cover accidental death or dismembership.”

“Heh.”

“That wasn’t a joke, dammit!”

“Alright alright.  I’m backing down.”

The Superintendent of School leaned back, stared at the ceiling for a moment, and let out a breath.  “Anyway, back to your concerns.  Believe me, you're the last person I would pick for the job and that's in addition to the fact that you're not even technically eligible.  In fact, had the message come from anyone else, I’d lock that person up, take the key, melt it down, and cast it into another lock for the cage."

Anyone else?  John wondered if his boss even wanted to tell him who ‘else’ was.  Well fuck it.  He wanted to know.  He didn't like unknowns in his life.  "Okay...so who then?"

The Super leaned back in his chair and gestured towards the envelope in John’s hand.  “Read.”

John suddenly wondered if he wanted to know now.  He pulled a single sheet of paper from the envelope.  The elegantly styled script of the letterhead sent a chill down his spine, which was something few things could do.  John had never figured out the power structure of the Education Department, nor where the Superintendant stood in it, but he knew only one authority ultimately mattered.

"This is from..."

"The Board of Education, John...directly."

Though most people had heard of them, almost no one knew of the tendrils of power the Board controlled.  There was no shortage of rumors regarding the Board’s true nature.  Almost everyone had their own theory, and there were almost as many theories as people who held them.  Everything from all-powerful godlike beings who hurled lightning bolts to an immense supercomputer devoid of human frailties to bodiless brains kept alive in nutrient baths.  Their power, however, was never questioned.  As far as anyone knew, they ran…everything.

“Why the hell…”

“I already know what you’re thinking, John and, yes, there was talk of liquidation.  Frankly, you came very close to being ground into hamburger and served in the cafeteria.  But, let’s face it, there’s not a lot of people like you to go around, so I talked them out of it.  You owe me for that.”

John pressed his palms together and bowed.  “Namaste.  Many thanks, and such.”

“Anyway, that was the last time I’ve seen or heard from them.”

The Board of Education was rarely seen in public, but the Super had regular briefings and conferences with them.  The Board was power incarnate, and they always got what they wanted.  John was still alive because he was worth more to them alive than dead.  That was for certain.   His destiny was theirs to control.  Whatever they wanted out of him, it was worth more than the slight inconvenience he had caused.

He carefully read the letter, checking each word and phrase carefully, searching for whatever the Board’s angle for this new position might have been.

BOARD OF EDUCATION

CENTRAL UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT

CLASSIFICATION—PUBLIC

UPON IMMEDIATE RECIPT OF THIS COMMUNICATION, JOHN STEINER, CONTRACT EMPLOYEE IN GOOD STANDING OF THE CENTRAL UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT, IS TO BE APPOINTED FACULTY HEAD OF THE CENTRAL UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT’S MATHS AND SCIENCES DEPARTMENT.

ALL CURRENT FUNCTIONS AND RESPONSIBILITIES WILL BE RELEGATED TO QUALIFIED OTHERS.

MISTER STEINER’S AUTHORITY IN ALL MATTERS RELATING TO THE FUNCTIONS OF THE MATHS AND SCIENCES DEPARTMENT ARE ABSOLUTE AND NOT TO BE UNQUESTIONED.

The letter ended with an illegible scrawl that John assumed was the signature of the President of the Board of Education, nicely watermarked and medallion guaranteed.

John replaced the communiqué and handed it back.  “Still, this is…irregular.”  He was puzzled, but if this was the fate the Board had in mind for him, it was a good one.  Damn good, considering.

The Super took the envelope and replaced it on his desk in the exact space he had removed it from.

“Irregular?  That’s not what I’d call it.  This is more like…like…I can’t think of a good word for it.”

John felt control of the situation shift, giving him an upper hand in the conversation.  He leaned back in the overstuffed chair.  “Well, now.   I guess someone up there really likes me.”

The Super huffed and leaned back in his chair.  He carefully scrutinized John with an indecipherable poker face.  After a moment he opened a panel on his desk and pushed a button.  When he did, an almost undetectable, high-pitched whine filled the room.  The sound was at the very limit of human perception.   John knew what it was--an audio jamming signal that would disrupt any listening devices planted in the room.  Anyone tapping the room would hear nothing but white noise, a hiss that could be explained as a malfunction in the electronics.  John had heard the sound before, but never in the Superintendent’s office, though he knew had the Super recorded all his conversations.  He leaned in close.

“You’re wrong John.  Nobody up there likes you.”

John felt a tingle run down his spine.  Their back and forth banter was always antagonistic, but with a playful undertone.  But there was very real menace in the Super’s voice this time.  What was his boss getting at?

The Super dropped his businesslike affect and hissed like a cobra.  “Listen to me.  The Board of Education has lost it.  I have not had any communication from them in months.  Nobody has.  Not since The Incident.  And now, suddenly, this.”  He stabbed a finger down on the envelope.  “There are dozens of people more qualified than you.  And I don’t just mean their qualifications, either.  There are stabler people, more ethical people, people with far more control.  People that do what they’re told and don’t try to murder their employers.”

The Super was right.  John hated authority, but he wielded it like a sadistic jailer with a bullwhip.  He grinned.  Whatever the reason for its existence, the letter on the desk made John his boss’s equal, or at least close to it.  “Is that dissention I’m hearing?”

The Super snapped back, “Listen to me you asshole.  That letter changes nothing.  As long as I’m sitting in this seat I’m still in charge of you.  Now I can’t tell you how to do your new job, but I can and will watch you like a hawk.  Understand?  You still answer to me.”

“I get it…you’re the boss.  Good of you to set me straight, though.  I get a might uppity at times.”

“I want weekly…no…daily reports on everything.  Every half-assed decision, every stupid conversation, every wasteful expenditure.  You should be pushing up the daisies, right now, John.  The fact that you’re here right now with that letter means that something very strange, and very big is UP.”

The letter he held in his hand suddenly felt very heavy.

John dropped his own attitude for a moment.  “What, exactly?  How ‘big’, do you figure?”

The Super shook his head.   “I don’t know, John.  But you said it yourself.  Maybe no one up there up likes you, but they definitely want you for something.  And face it, you’re the last person that should be put in charge of anything.”

John looked over the letter again, his newly found fatalism started to take hold.  If he was being put there to do something, whatever it was, why fight it.  Hell, he may even have some fun in the process.  Gears in his head were turning.  “I’m going to need a copy of that.  And on the same letterhead.  Medallion stamped and guaranteed, too.  Just like the original.”

The Super switched off the jamming device.  John couldn’t tell if he was happy or pissed over the way their private conversation went.  “Already on its way.”

John puzzled over the contents of the letter some more.  Was it sent to him by mistake?  Meant for someone else with the same name?  He dismissed that one.  It wasn’t an uncommon name, but no one else employed by the Department of Education had it but him.

The Super thumped his desk and John was shaken from his reverie.

“Per the letter, the position starts immediately, John.  You may want to get yourself cleaned up.  Any questions?”

“Just one.”

The Super pinched his nose between his eyes, like he had a migraine coming on.  “What is it?”

“Is it weird that I have a boner right now?”

“It would be weird if you didn’t.  You’re dismissed.”

Deep in the subterranean depths under the Department of Education Headquarters, in a hardened concrete bunker, the eight members of the Board of Education lay in their hospital beds.  Each was immobile, tethered to a litany of monitors, IV drips, respirators, and pumps.  None moved or spoke as each was tended to by his or her own team of doctors, specialists, and nurses.  The room was filled with the hisses, beeps, and quick speech of an emergency trauma ward.  The only movement of the members themselves came from faint currents of air that swayed the sparse, white hair on their heads.

To an outside observer, they were comatose, or possibly dead.  But that would be a mistake.  Their eyes were open and alert, and their lips and tongues were moving almost imperceptibly.  Tiny microphones attached to their throats recorded, amplified, and sent their inaudible speech while wires attached to their skulls transmitted their thoughts and reactions to the hub of their human network.  Their bodies had long atrophied, but their craniums remained their normal sizes, giving them a hydroencephalic look.  Tiny blue veins that ran through their temples throbbed with the rhythm of their heartbeat monitors.  Each housed a brain that would put the world’s geniuses to shame.

The members of the Board of Education were arrayed in an octagon.  At its center, the President of the Board sat in his throne--a tiny, wizened figure unmoving in a tub of nutrients.  If anything, he appeared even more ancient and decrepit than his colleagues.  Tubes ran from his neck, filtering and circulating his blood.  A kidney dialysis machine hissed and pumped nonstop.  Machines monitored his heart and respiration functions.  His musculature had completely wasted away and he appeared as not much more than hundred year old cadaver.

His brain, however, was as clear and calculating as a supercomputer .  He was the hub of the human network that surrounded him.  Their words, their thoughts, and their impressions were all fed to him and melded together into singular, unified thought.  The President was the soul of the Board of Education.

The Superintendent’s meager attempt to hide the conversation amused them.  High definition cameras monitored the office from every angle.  They zoomed in on the faces of its occupants.  Mouth movements, gestures, and facial expression were analyzed and interpreted in real time.  Yes Superintendent was being defiant, but not dangerously, though.  All that mattered was that wheels were set in motion.

At the eye of a whirlwind of thought, the president smiled.