Beep beep. Beep beep.
Hahahaha. Looks like my plan worked. If I could set my alarm clock to 7 o clock, I would be able to avoid being woken up and startled by Marion. It looked like I'd done it. It looked like I'd finally... oh.
Marion was sitting at the computer, riveted. Luckily she was now using headphones, and she seemed to be going through pretty much every video she could find on my computer. All legal, of course... eh, who cares, I'm wanted for kidnapping now. She'd probably call it "Sticking it to the conservative creative industry" or something. Trying to talk to Marion about incentivising is like trying to talk to a hungry lion about empathy.
As I approached her, she looked round, and quickly closed the window she had opened. I couldn't be entirely sure what she had been watching, but judging by the extremely bright colours it had probably been animated in some way. Hmmm, perhaps she had felt a kindred bond with the huge eyed characters. Or maybe...
"Fred!" she shouted, interrupting my thoughts and shattering the peace of the early morning, "Why haven't you been helping?"
"What?" I said, "I've been asleep. And you didn't seem to be doing any-"
"For your information, I was doing important research" she said, clearly now on the defensive, "While you were being idle! The conservative establishment never sleeps!"
"Yes" I said, "But the individual members of the establishment do. And, to be honest, I'm not even sure what I was supposed to be doing while I was asleep. Care to tell me?"
"Shutup!" she said, clearly frustrated. Ah. Note to self: try not to talk to Marion early in the morning. A frustrated Marion is a danger to everyone. "And help me wake up the others, will you?"
She moved over towards Raymond before I could stop her, and shook him violently. The resultant scream of horror was loud enough to wake even Tyrone, who awoke looking groggy and confused. Also, looking at him now, he seemed to be correct about his wounds. Only a small amount of scar tissue remained to evidence his horrific wounds the day before.
Which left Monica. She seemed to, once again, be asleep in an impossibly strange position - this time she seemed to be kneeling, sitting on her heels. The position looked extremely unconfortable, and quite how she could go to sleep and keep her balance like that was beyond me. I crouched down in front of her, and thought about how to wake her up. However, just as I was reaching out to touch her shoulder, she opened her eyes. Fully. I recoiled, and fell over backwards. Jesus... having those eyes suddenly staring into you felt like being impaled. She rose in a single movement that made me think of a swan unfolding its wings.
"Good morning, Squad!" she said, beaming. I was already worried by the backpack she seemed to have on her back - the one that she could be using to conceal her shotgun. That probably meant we'd be doing something rather stupid. "Today we are going to the... Cradberry's Erzatz Ornery Residence!"
There was a collective gasp. I had certainly expected something crazy, but I hadn't been prepared for this suggestion. This was tantamount to suicide. After all, the CEO Residence was far more than a home for a few old conservatives.
Perhaps I should explain. For a long time, CEOs have enjoyed their vast salaries, buying huge mansions and extravagant lifestyles befitting their pay. However, one day a CEO named Cradberry realised that, as unbelievably decadant as his lifestyle was, he could still find room for more consumption. He saw that if all the CEOs pooled their wealth, they would be able to create one gigantic, incredible, unbelievable building that would put even the greatest monuments of the world to shame. Each CEO would get a wing of the building, and they would be able to share the extravagant services provided inside. The idea of CEOs adopting a form of socialism may seem strange - but it's not so strange when you consider it allows them to each live far more lavish lifestyles. Wait, did I just write that? Perhaps all this time with Marion has caused me to think like her. Moving on...
"The CEO Residence..." I said, carefully, "The CEO Residence... the same CEO Residence that has guard dogs throughout the mansion trained to sniff out people who aren't carrying money? The same Residence that required more man hours to build than the pyramids? The same Residence that-"
"We are going to perform a raid!" said Marion cheerfully, blissfully ignoring my input, "We will storm the Residence and find out their secrets!" Huh. How was she going to do that? As if guessing what I felt from my less than enthusiastic facial expression, she said "We'll just find a safe. Safes always contain neat stuff. Raymond says he is pretty good at it" I looked to Raymond, who seemed to be trying to look up at the ceiling and whistle casually.
"Well, that's all very well..." I said, carefully prefacing my statement with an agreement to avoid her activating her criticism filter, "But what exactly are you expecting to find?"
"Photos! Secret documents! Tax records! CDs! Videos! Anything!"
"so why would CEOs randomly leave sensitive information lying around in a safe?" I asked. I mean, surely if they had such incriminating evidence, it would make more sense to destroy it.
"I will be leading the raid" she said, changing the subject without even a pause, "I will be armed with my shotgun. If there is any danger, I will fight it off." Um, all the CEOs there have bodyguards. Did she really think someone armed with an old shotgun could take on anybody she wanted? "You, Raymond, will carry a pistol of the type you used to use as a security guard. Fred, you take the new gun you've got. I know you suck at shooting, but it's really easy. Just point the gun towards the target and pull the trigger. See?" Perhaps she should've checked to see if the gun was loaded before her demonstration. After a quick check to make sure that no liberals had been injured by the bullets that had been sent through the opposite wall, she continued. "Tyrone, you're in charge of access. Access through locked doors, of course. And Monica..." she looked towards Monica, who was staring blankly at an area of wall just to right of Marion, "You take along your notepad. We need a glorious report of what the Liberal Crime Squad have done!"
Great. So we had three firearms and a bit of muscle to take on a notoriously dangerous and highly secured compound. I looked towards Monica - wasn't she concerned for her safety? I mean, she was completely defenceless. Why didn't she react? Didn't she hear what was being said?
"Ok, then, everyone? Does everyone understand? Good. We'll get going right away!" I was about to protest, when she turned and looked straight at me. Where Monica's look could paralyse me, Marion's could melt my resistance and protests. As I looked at her, I once again found the words leave me. She turned to walk to the car, and was out of the room before I could say anything further.
We could've gone there by bus, but Marion insisted on taking the still extremely sort after and instantly recognisable car of the mayor. Marion called shotgun, of course, while Raymond and Monica sat in the back. Tyrone couldn't fit in any of the seats, but found that he could lie in the spacious boot. Well, I say spacious, but it was pretty cramped once we'd put 250 pounds of mutant in it.
Our drive was nearly uneventful, which was just as well as Marion had promised to shoot at any policecars who came near us. The reason I say "nearly" is because she decided to take a potshot at a traffic control vehicle as we went past. Luckily it was an awful shot that only punctured the tyres, but it was yet another near miss.
We finally arrived at the residence. Even though I had read so much about it it was still a very impressive building. From the outside it looked like... hmm... try imagining a tower block built in the style of a mansion and you might start to see. Outside, a goldplated statue of each CEO stood gleaming in the light, and being polished by some harrassed looking workers. There was also a gate. Rather a big gate that required a key card to access. Marion explained she had a plan, and told me to park the car. I said I wouldn't mind, and that pointing the shotgun in my direction was perhaps a bit unnecessary.
Getting through the gate was easier than expected. I had underestimated Tyrone's strength, and we just had to wait for a brief lull in activity to force our way in. Hmm, looks like we've already got "damage to property" on our list. It's wouldn't have been so bad if Tyrone had realised that this gate slid rather than swung open.
We were in. I couldn't quite believe it. We were wandering through the amazingly well kept, carefully manicured garden of the Residence (Marion said the garden had been "Watered with the tears of the common man", but I think she might have been confusing her political imagery). Anyway, we entered the front door, and found out why it wasn't so hard to get in.
The place was FULL of guard dogs. They wandered the corridor, sniffing almost anything suspiciously. We were wearing some poorly made suits (courtesy of the immigrants Marion had "liberated") but it would seem the dogs didn't care. They growled at us, and one of them was certainly about to bark. We hurried on through the building, trying to find something, anything useful, but there was nothing. Lots of doors to private quarters of CEO with virtually impossible locks, lots of priceless ornaments, no incriminating looking safes. We were about to give up, when we saw Diane Anderson.
Diane Anderson was something of a legend around here. For one thing, she was the only CEO of a major company in the entire country. It wasn't easy rising to the top when the odds were stacked against women so much, but Diane... was something special. Her ruthlessness and willing to destroy anyone in the way of what she wanted was legendary, which is why she had made it in the corporate world. There were reports - she had stripped entire companies of their money, leaving thousands jobless. And she had stabbed her long term partner in the back over a takeover deal, leaving him bankrupt. Diane had been dating a string of the finest men around, but they never seemed to last more than a week. Perhaps it was her general distrust of everything and everyone - she certainly couldn't afford to trust anyone in her position. Moving my eyes away from her, I saw the guard standing next to her. He was... big. And he looked exactly how a bodyguard should look - wideset shoulders, bald head, black sunglasses. Diane looked at us disdainfully.
"What the hell are you doing here!?" she said, "You have 5 seconds to explain yourselves before I call the cops!" This was not an idle threat. The police were regularly called to the CEO Residence. And, weirdly, none of the criminals they were meant to apprehend ever came out alive, since they were "resisting arrest" or "regrettably and accidentally killed". This was seriously bad.
I was about to say that we were just making a delivery and were leaving, or something, when Marion opened her mouth. I turned to her in horror as she said, "We are the Liberal Crime Squad! Go away, there's an important raid in progress!" Ugh. I knew she could be rash, but saying something like this to a famous CEO and her bodyguard? Wasn't this the kind of talk that would get us all shot?
"Brian" said Diane, quietly, "Please show these people the 'exit'". Brian moved forwards to grab us, but Marion leaped away. As Brian turned, she brought the now sawn off shotgun out of her bag.
"Stand back!" she yelled, pointing the gun straight at Brian, "Resistance will be met by force!" Yes, she had learned most of her lines from old movies, it seemed. On the other hand, Brian didn't look too worried. I looked Tyrone, who was looking uneasy. Raymond was looking around for a possible escape route, and Monica... wait, where the hell was she?
Brian laughed. "Put it down, girly" he said, smiling and gesturing towards the gun, "We both know you're not going to shoot. We both know you couldn't take a human life."
"Get down" growled Marion. The note in her voice was very, very different to any I had heard before. There was also a wild look in her eyes... oh god, this wasn't going to end well.
"Nah" said Brian, "I know you people. You're all the same. You come in, thinking you can blast anyone you like. It's not that easy, you know" He moved towards Marion, and attempted to take the shotgun. "Just put it down, gir-" BOOM.
Marion had pulled the trigger. The bullets had emerged from the end, and hit Brian square in the face. His head was blasted apart, and he was sent flying backwards into a crumpled heap on the floor. Marion's eyes still had the same wild quality about them, and she turned to point her gun at the now terrified Diane.
"So, you gonna try and appeal to my better nature too?" she said, the gun levelled straight at the cowering CEO, "Conservative scum like you don't deserve to live. You destroyed thousands of lives, you've been the cause of endless misery. I won't hesitate to shoot you too. So for fuck's sake get on the floor now!"
Diane did as she was told, lying on the floor. Unfortunately, Marion's blast seemed to have activated some kind of alarm, and police were probably already on their way. "We can use Diane to get out" said Marion, still with the same anger in her voice. What had triggered it? The fact that Brian thought she couldn't kill? Was this just to prove a point to Diane? Was it to prove a point to herself? Anyway you look at it, we're now wanted for murder.
Marion picked up Diane and held an arm around her. She pressed the shotgun upwards into her lower jaw. "One false move, you're joining Brian, ok?" Diane, now in tears, nodded. Or tried to nod, since the shotgun made it difficult to do it effectively. I looked around. Raymond, Monica and Tyrone were all nowhere to be seen. It would seem that they had scarpered. Now I was left alone with Marion and a sobbing CEO, with police cars bearing down on us rapidly.
Perhaps this career change wasn't such a good idea.
To be continued. Sorry about the cliff hanger, this "short story" is just really long
. Maybe I should start planning their length properly...
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Topic: The Fires of Revolution - A Liberal Crime Squad Story - Part 15 (Read 16986 times)