The Shift of Numbers (15 page)

"I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered."

George Best

It had been nearly a week since Gordon had requested the safety equipment from Bill and
,
true to his
word
,
they had gone to a laboratory supplier that afternoon. The interior of the smal
l hut now looked very different:
a fume cupboard
took up most of the far wall; l
ab coats, goggles and facemasks hung
neatly from hooks by the door; n
ew glassware, with safety lids, gleamed and shone through the window of the sterilisation unit. Gordon stood in the doorway, complete with thick rubber gloves and lab coat, surveying his new domain. He
smiled. I
t had been nearly 2 days since his last coughing fit.
I must be getting better…

Then his hands began to tingle, like pins and needles. Ripping off the gloves as quickly as possible, he gaz
ed at his palms. Minutely examining each square centimetre
of exposed flesh unde
r the bright fluorescent light, h
e watched intently as he lost the feeling in the tips of each finger. He co
uld feel the cold, icy numbness
move down towards his palms, shards of thin
,
invisible ice penetrating each vein. He clench
ed his fists a couple of times;
at least he thought he did, but nothing moved. His stomach churned with fear as he let his gaze move past the tips of his fingers. What he saw terrified him. Everything was numbers. Every edge, glint of light, wall, piece of glassware, was made up of rows of numbers. As he turned, his mind processed something that was out of place, that didn’t conform to the pattern. At first it was j
ust a dark blob of normal light;
then, as he tried
to focus, horror gripped him. It
was sat down, cross-legged,
sporting a manic grin across its white-
bearded face. The figure blur
red against the background as it
moved from the seat to within inches of Gordon, all in the space of a heartbeat. He tried to raise his numb hands to protect himself but they just flopped around on the ends of his arms helplessly.

“Ha HA HAAA.” The bearded face erupted in sound,
which then
slowed down like a bad
audiotape. T
he mouth
, wide open, spewed
forth wet
, fishy vapours. Gordon
watched, transfixed
,
as the face moved left, then right, faster and faster, until it was a blur, vibrating uncontrollably. Gordon’s eyelids clos
ed slowly as he felt himself lo
sing consciousness.

“NO YOU DON’T. You ain’t
gettin’
away so easy this time.” The voice penetrated his skull, sla
pping him awake. “I
is
only try
in
’ to help us. Why can’t you
see
s
it?” Gordon, now fully awake, stared i
nto the motionless face. “G
o and get that money.”

He barely felt himself moving out
of the hut and across the field. H
is mind seemed disconnected from everything about him. The ground looked spongy and transparent with millions
of numbers swirling, like stage-show smoke
around his feet. He felt he might sink into them at any moment. Time moved out of conscious thought as he reached Bill
’s
garden, the s
pade already in his hand, wheel
barrow to his left. He patted down the soil, just as he found it, wheeling the barrow full of money down the hill towards the hut.

*

The car tyres screeched a complaint as another corner was taken to
o
fast for comfort. Tim gripped the door handle as
‘
S
ir’
fiddled with his mobile phone. They were coming up on the Whitehead Bridge, a half-mile
long
national landmark famed for it spectacular views over the city port and as a suicide ‘hot-spot’. Tim gazed out of the window into the night, glad of a straight stretch of road, the pillars and ironwork beams flashing hyp
notically past his eyes. He
spotted a few already but this 1 seemed to be fresh, flowers tied tightly with string around an iron strut. Som
eone had scrawled the words, ‘F
or Neil’, in white chalk underneath.

“So…
you off on holiday this year?”
h
e said to Tim, more to break the silence than for any genuine interest. They both knew where they were going, and to what end, so it seemed pointless regurgitating the discussion they had had earlier.

“If I still have
a job after tonight, who knows?
”

“You don’t have to come with me.” He said it as a question.

“I know.”

“Then it’s not your job you should be worried about. It’s an interrogation room.”

They travelled the rest of the journey in silence, both appearing to be contemplating their possible fates. Over the bridge and back in the city they made their way quickly to the clandestine government building. The exterior was small, about the size of a small shop, with no indication of its function. It was nestled snugly in between a lawyer’s office and a dentist, sharing a mish-mash of architecture that only a city bombed during a great war could boast. They pressed a buzzer next to an unassuming door and
,
after showing ID, were let inside and directed to a metal
elevator. The journey downward
seemed to take an age, taking them deep into the bowels of the earth. They disembarked and walked swiftly in the only direction they
could, down a
brightly-
lit
corridor, emerging into a
huge circular room with a lofty,
domed ceiling. Michael was sat at a desk in the middle next to a lurching mechanical beast that seemed to be ejaculating bank notes.

“What the
hell
are you 2 doing here?” Michael said quickly, rising and walking swiftly over to them. “I’m still r
ecovering from our last meeting.” A
s if to prove the point
,
he removed a small bottle of pills from his pocket and took 1. ‘Sir’ looked
up at the cameras.
Tim shuffled uncomfortably.

“We need to talk. I
t’s important.” ‘Sir’ winked surreptitiously then looked up at the cameras again, raising his eyebrow to emphasise the point. Michael looked at him blankly until he realised what he was trying to get at.

“Ah, don’t worry, the cameras don’t record sound.”

“Still… if we could go somewhere a little more private?”

“I think I
would prefer to stay right here,
” Michael said firmly.

‘Sir’ seemed to weigh up his options then nodded slowly.
“
Okay
then, fine. We need your help. L
et
’
s start from the beginning. Inside the money you make is a GPS trans…”

He stopped talking as Michael let out a laugh.
“You
really
think I didn’t know?”

“Obviously.”

“So, now you know.”

“Do you know that the computer is showing an error message?”

“I didn’t know that…” Michael replied, his eyes losing focus, thoughts shifting around inside his mind.

“Do you know what’s going to happen next?”

“I’m guessing that your computer system will finally be brought online. Congratulations.”

“NO,” he snapped.
“No congratulations. Do you have
any
idea what is going to happen when everyone finds out what we have been doing?”

“Lower crime rates?” Michael offered.

“With no other consequences
,
I suppose?”

“Like what? A safer society?
”

“Open your eyes
,
old man. How do you think people are going to react to the fact that we’ve been watching their every move for the past 9 years? Get used to hearing words like civil unrest.” His face grew redder as he spat out the words.

Michael shook his head.
“Pah. Y
ou’re overreacting.”

“Really? I don’t think so.” He turned away from Michael and stalked away
,
out towards the door, leaving Tim behind.

Michael smiled and looked directly at Tim, the lines in his forehead creasing upwards. “Do you know why I’m not angry with you? And do you know why I’m at work today?”

“I don’t understand
,” s
aid Tim with absolute honesty.

“I should be angry with you, the MSD, t
he world in general. But I’m not and do you understand why?”

“No idea…”

“I
understand that while some thing
s we have to do are unpleasant they are very necessar
y. That’s why I’m at work today.
I d
idn’t call up my boss and say, ‘S
orry
,
I can’t come in today
.
I was briefly tortured at the MSD.
’ No I did not.
I haven’t missed a day since I started. I’m here because it’s my place, my job,
my
duty. I have fought for th…” Tim walked away leaving Michael talking to himself, he could just make out a ‘how dare you’ over the sound of the mechanical clanking.

He made his way out and up to the car where the man was sat on the bonnet.

“You change his mind?” h
e asked with a thin smile.

Tim couldn’t help but let out a brief hopeless laugh.
“No…”

“Hah, I knew as soon as he said that he knew about the money that he wouldn’t be open to our idea.”

“Why?”

“He must know the commander quite well to be privy to that kind of information…I just hope he doesn’t tell him how we just acted.”

“It’s all right. A
t least we didn’t ask him.”

“Yes, I’m quite sure the commander would have frowned upon the head of the MSD asking the printer to ‘knock up’ a few more notes in order to get the books to balance…”

*

Bill had called Gordon up to the house. It had been a day of rumours and whisperings among the workers as Bill had called them all 1-by-1 up to the house for a chat. They had noticed that their numbers were thinning out after about the 4th was called for and didn’t return. By mid-afternoon, the remaining men, including Gordon, held out little hope of a reprieve and sat around in silent melancholia. Gordon was the last to enter the kitchen, presumably because he was the last to join the farm, and was greeted by an unhappy-looking Bill. They sat down.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to let you all go. The farm is going unde
r. God only knows what the missu
s is going to say when she gets back from holiday.” He slum
ped, defeated and tired into his chair.
“Everyone’s cut their orders since that news program. There’s not enough cash to pay next week
’
s wages.” He scratched his head. “I
’ve no idea where it’s all gone.
I thought we were doing all right… But then I
’ve never had a head for figures. T
hat’s always been the wife’s department.”

Gordon looked at Bill’s sad face, wanting to tell him about the money but at the same time realising that he would have been fired anyway. This way he was fired and a millionaire. Bill’s wife on the other hand deserved no pity. “I need a drink
,” h
e said
,
at last.

The pub was quiet with only 2 customers:
Bill and Gordon. Even the barman had disappeared, telling Bill solemnly to help himself,
and to add it to the slate. The barman’s
disposit
ion had indicated that he knew
all about the farm and wasn’t expecting the tab to be paid any time soon. Bill went behind
the bar and poured Gordon a la
ger. He got himself a large whiskey and took the bottle out from behind the bar and over to a table.

Within the hour
, Bill was asleep, his arm
enfold
ing
the nearly empty bottle. Gordon had just finished his 3
rd
pint when the toilet door banged opened, bring
ing
with it a fragrant breeze. He cast an eye quickly down the bar, over the worn wooden surfaces and cheap imitation brass fittings. Squinting to focus on the dingy entrance of the loo, he could just make out a mass of white hair and a red nose. At distance
,
it looked like a cherry bakewell, resting precariously on top of a mound of old brown clothes.