Charlotte Remora's
attitude morphed through several faces as she sat with the others.
Professional blank initially, to conceal her rage at losing
exclusivity for her station within minutes of airing quite likely the
century's hottest story. Startled next to realize her mouth was
hanging open and she'd forgotten to breathe as the full import of
President Morowitz's disaster established itself in the room. Finally
her camera-ready complexion betrayed from beneath by the clammy
pallor of helpless fear, which reflected a growing despair shared by
the small group.
They were slumped on
the studio's folding chairs. All but Dr. Knoe, who sat tending the
president on his cot in the alcove, and Brad Morowitz, dutifully
manning the camera for the record and whatever outlets remained
tapped into the feed. The sound was off, so the feed carried little
more than a still frame of an unconscious president. Even Dr. Knoe
for the most part remained outside the view. It seemed to Remora that
although Ruth Rose looked as worried as everyone else she'd become by
default the center of gravity in the room. Something in her
comportment, an implicit poise manifested so far as Remora could see
only by a tilt of the head, as if the former president was leading
with her chin and daring anyone to take a shot. Ruth's presence
mitigated for Remora a creeping sense of claustrophobia. Nonetheless,
she suspected that were it not for her appreciation of the irony of
being the only news reporter trapped in the eye of the cataclysm she
would spontaneously atomize to a mist of shrieking terror. As it was,
she joined warily with the others in the frozen surrender of
supplicants. Other than slight movements when Ruth and Joan
Stonebraker occasionally reached outside the bunker via their
cellphones the small group resembled mannequins in a department store
window.
“Can I have my
phone back, Joan?”
“Sorry, Charlotte,
it's not a secure phone.”
“You had no
problem when I used it before.”
“That was before
the White House had a chance to sic the NSA on us. As it is we have
to talk in code on ours.”
“Who you talking
to?”
“White House.”
“Who?”
“Charlotte.”
“Oh, sorry. I
guess that's why you're Secret Service.”
“Good guess.”
“OK, OK. So can
you tell us how they're reacting? In the White House?”
“They're in shock.
Like us.”
“So...”
“So I would
imagine are most people, in the country. The world, maybe.”
Ruth, holding a
cellphone to her ear, broke in, “We got a real problem”.
“No shit.”
Several voices.
“Kudlow and Edie
are down. Both of them acting like they've taken Vulcana.”
“What?” Several
voices, with Al Geddes's the loudest. Ruth winked at him. He nodded.
“Both of them at
the Gridiron dinner tonight. Somebody must've spiked the drinks.
There must've been at least a couple WACKO people there.”
“WACKO? Why would
WACKO knock out Kudlow? I mean Glick, sure, but Kudlow would do
whatever WACKO wanted. He's a lapdog.”
“Maybe she's
hiding. God, I hope so. Nobody knows where Homer Twining is either.
He's next in line. And Marie, Marie Crispin's out of the country.
Jeezus I hope Geoff pulls out of this OK. Anything, Liz?”
Dr. Knoe slowly
shook her head. Ruth rose, folded her chair and carried it into the
alcove. Geddes followed, shaking his head at Charlotte Remora as she
started out of her chair. He smiled and held a finger up,
hoping she would understand this as a temporary restraining gesture.
She rolled her eyes and sank back onto her chair. Joan Stonebraker
took over then and engaged the TV reporter in quiet conversation.
Geddes had the odd
sensation as he entered the alcove that he was approaching a bier,
except the aroma was more scatalogical than floral. The light was
low, and Dr. Knoe's strained face and slumped shoulders might easily
have been mistaken for a mourner's at visitation. She glanced quickly
at Ruth and Geddes, and turned back to the curled, silent form in
front of her. Morowitz was motionless except for the slow, barely
perceptible movement of his shallow, soundless breathing. Geddes
waved a hand back and forth as an effort to diffuse the malodorous
effluvia that grew stronger the further he moved into the cramped
enclosure.
“Dr. Knoe tilted
her head toward the cot, smiling tolerantly. “Presidential gas.”
“Jeezus, I hope
mine was never that rank,” said Ruth. “Anything you can do?”
“For the gas?
Nope. Not unusual, though, when the metabolism slows down. Digestion
takes longer, gets more complex.”
“I meant for him.
Politicians are always gaseous.”
“I'm not sure.
Haven't seen anything like this yet, not even with the mice.”
“Do you think he
took too much?”
“I don't think so.
I suppose Pink might've doubled the dosage accidentally, but I don't
know how that could have happened. Our equipment is state of the art,
and we follow procedure rigorously.”
“Never happened
before?”
“Maybe in the
beginning, during development, when we were testing different
strengths. Pink's still working on variations, but I'm sure he gave
me the standard version for this.”
“Could it be he's
just having a bad trip? I mean, this has LSD in it, doesn't it?”
“Yes it does, Al.
But if this is a bad trip it's the worst one I've ever seen. He's
unconscious. I think.”
“You think?”
“I've tried
talking to him, even touching him. I've gotten no reaction. None at
all, other than that his eyeballs are fluttering. That's an
indication of anxiety. But he could simply be in so deep a catatonic
state he's retreated completely into his head.”
“What do you do
for LSD, for a bad trip?”
“That depends. If
it's anxiety, a sedative can help. But I don't know what's going on
here. A sedative slows the metabolism. His is so slow right now a
sedative could stop his heart. If he's in an anxiety state in his
head, an amphetamine could cause irreversible psychological damage.”
“So...”
“We wait. I don't
know what else to do right now.”
“Hey, you guys!”
“What, Joan?”
“The Secret
Service and Bart Gladstone are meeting with the attorney general.
They're talking like they think there's a coups.”
“Oh, shit.” This
from Ruth. “I suppose it is, though, technically. Jeez, I wish
Morowitz would start babbling, or show any sign of life, for the
camera. Do they know about...”
“They know about
Kudlow and Edie. They think she's been drugged, too. And they have no
idea where Twining is, thank God. They're trying to reach Marie
Crispin. Secretary of state is next in line after the president pro
tempore.”
“Jeezuz, c'mon,
Geoff, say something!”
“They'll be coming
after us now. How long can we hold out here, Brad?”
“Kitchen's stocked
for a month, and six months after that if you can handle MREs.”
“Meals ready to
eat. Lordy, I hope we're outta here before then, one way or the
other.”
“Hungry, Al?”
Geddes waved both
hands back and forth over the farting president.
No comments:
Post a Comment