Tuesday, August 14—07:34:29
“Boss, you feeling okay?”
“Would you quit asking me that?” Jen replied. “I didn’t get much sleep, that’s all.”
“What’s it like?”
“What?”
“Sleep.”
“Oh, God … Another time, okay?”
If they ever figure out how I can have kids, I will remember what it feels like to have my curiosity crushed under the heels of a tired adult.
Jen said, “Let me know as soon as the captain’s in the building.”
Yesterday, when we got back from the EOB, he had already been gone for the day.
“And let’s try to confirm who Archambault reports to in the government,” she added. In Jen’s dictionary, let’s is an abbreviation for “Chandler, here’s another crappy job you need to get your sorry ass on, and even if you succeed you’ll get not a shred of thanks.”
I love Jen, but, I mean, really …
“And make me a summary of the coverage of the counterfeit treatment. Across the country.”
The last was the easy one because it was a simple mine-and-synthesize job. I zipped it up in twenty-three seconds, and Jen then flipped on her screen and read not only about the gruesome deaths but the increasing public hysteria. The latter because humans are humans, and our country has worked hard to starve the public education system and turn private education over to religious zealots. Ergo, science facts vanish in the face of science opinions, and opinions, last I checked, were talk shows, not science. Water fountains were turned off in several cities, masks were appearing in a few others, kids were being yanked from day-care centers, and some of my beloved fellow police officers were wrestling into baby-blue rubber gloves and masks whenever they got within ten feet of a member of the public.
I had Jen watch a recent speech given at an annual meeting of one of the big pharma companies. The CEO referred to the horrible events unfolding around the world and asked for a moment of silence during which everyone seemed to be checking stock market quotations on their phones. He warned anyone “out there in the criminal world” who thought they could counterfeit the treatment that they were playing with people’s lives and that their attempts would fail. He cautioned the public “today, tomorrow, and forever” to report any rumors or any offers of the treatment. “You will save lives. Your children’s, your parents’, your neighbors’. Perhaps your own.” And he reassured investors that profits from the treatment were secure. “No one who can afford it will be dissuaded from the treatment—in the past five years, we’ve had a perfect success rate. And the loved ones of those who choose exit will never be disappointed with the official attenuated version. Those markets are secure and intact. In fact, the atrocity created by the counterfeiters means it will be a long time before anyone tries again to make a street version, for the simple reason that no one wants it enough to pay for something that will certainly kill them.”
Tracking down who Archambault reported to in the US government, if anyone, didn’t produce any satisfactory results.
“Jen,” I said, “the captain’s here and his dance card’s open. Maybe I could—” But damn if she didn’t click me off like I was the plague itself.