Part 43: 8:23-9:09: Lieutenant Bumblefuck
Chapter 43: 8:23-9:09: Lieutenant Bumblefuck
ARIST: [Medium: Success] You decide to talk to Joyce once more. Not for any real reason, just to share some information and see if maybe she’ll tell you that story about Insulinde.
JOYCE MESSIER: “Hmh,” she nods with well-contained curiosity.
ARIST: [Challenging: Success] God*dammit*, shut the fuck up about this!
Well, let’s get down to real business, then.
JOYCE MESSIER: “*Taking* it…” She looks toward the colourful mountain of crates, like toy blocks rising above Martinaise.
PERCEPTION (SIGHT): [Medium: Success] Green livery changing into red, blot by blot.
JOYCE MESSIER: “They most certainly are not.” Her eyes return to you. Krenel has a thousand men on their payroll. The next batch will be a platoon of twenty men and a gunship.”
KIM KITSURAGI: “I’ve seen the Union’s forces. They’re better organized than these mercenaries. They also have the support of the people of Revachol West. It will take more than Krenel to wipe them out. Wild Pines will need to send more and better-equipped men. Make no mistake, ma’am… I am sure you have the money. The question is how many years and how many lives you are willing to sacrifice.”
JOYCE MESSIER: “Everything affects the decision making process, detective.”
KIM KITSURAGI: “Officer…” The look on Kim’s face conveys uncertainty. He doesn’t even sound angry.
JOYCE MESSIER: “What will I do…” she says slowly looking around.
COMPOSURE: [Medium: Success] Her arms fall to her sides, her spine relaxes.
JOYCE MESSIER: “The nations who colonized this isola called theirs *Mundi*. The World. It was all they knew, all they thought would be. That there would be something more was a gamble. Akin to another world—or life after death. The pale was thought to be impenetrable, perpetual.” She points north-west. “Irene La Navigateur, the Queen or Suresne, sent *eight* expeditions, one after the other, into the mass at the edge of the world. Five of the crews did not return. Two did, but had lost their minds.”
JOYCE MESSIER: She nods. “There was no precedent for such an undertaking. People thought she was punishing the admirals, or had gone mad, or both… Until after *years* of trial and error—and the development of a *strict* psychological regime imitating the creation process of poetry… The eight expedition returned, sane and intact. They told of a new continent of matter. They told the queen and her councillor, Dolores Dei, that the pale had begun to condense, day after day, hour after hour, minute after minute. Slowly raining down until it formed a vast ocean.”
PERCEPTION (SMELL): [Medium: Success] The air is cold and scented with petrichor.
KIM KITSURAGI: So does the lieutenant. His mouth is slightly open as he looks to the sky.
JOYCE MESSIER: She nods. “The phenomenon has never again been encountered. For a time the crew thought they were experiencing a hallucination. The mast-hand proclaimed ‘L’Insulinde! L’Insulinde!’—the signal to wake up. But they could not. They were sane and conscious, as islands began to appear on the horizon… There are 78,000 uninhabited islands in the Insulindian archipelago, officer. The freckled face of god,” she smiles. *“Après la vie, la mort,”* they summarized it for the queen and Dolores Dei; “Après la mort, la vie encore! Après la monde, le gris. Après le gris, le monde encore!”
INLAND EMPIRE: [Medium: Success] After life, death. After death, life again. After the isola, the pale. After the pale, isola again.
JOYCE MESSIER: “On the second day a Great Skua was shot down above the flagship Lysergique. The bird was preserved and brought back. Along with pollen.” She looks to the sky, then back at you.
JOYCE MESSIER: “In your defense—it is a nasty creature, who plucks food from the throats of lesser birds. Yet much like Revachol, it is also magnificent. And rare. Imagine the suzerain of seagulls.”
JOYCE MESSIER: “The nations of Mundi proceeded to discover five more isolae—or they discovered us—all in the rush of the great interisolary reconnection… But these others weren’t uninhabited. We had to kill people there, wipe out indigenous populations, gunboat economies. Or they came to do the same for us. Or had done to each other. But here…” she spreads her arms.
JOYCE MESSIER: “It is.” She pulls the hood over her head. “Soon it will be spring and everything will blossom.”
ARIST: [Medium: Success] You didn’t actually suggest she do that… but you didn’t leave her much of a choice, did you?
JOYCE MESSIER: She puts her hand in the rain. She’s silent for a second. “We will see.”
KIM KITSURAGI: “Ma’am… This may well unravel property law this side of the river. If that occurs, we may never see the end of this kind of confrontation. The next time there will be two strikes…” he looks toward the harbour. “Then four, then a hundred.”
RHETORIC: Workers of the world unite!
ARIST: [Challenging: Success] The idea of more strikes doesn’t sound so bad until you realize the people who benefit are just going to be more Evrart Claires…
JOYCE MESSIER: “What happens will happen.” She takes the end of the rope in her rain-slick hand and starts untying the knot.
KIM KITSURAGI: “That’s right detective. And next time you should confer with them before you go setting events in motion.”
ARIST: [Medium: Success] Oops. Sorry, Kim.
EMPATHY: [Medium: Success] Despite his words he’s not really sure whether to be annoyed with you or not.
JOYCE MESSIER: “Keep the peace—and I will keep my end of the bargain.”
KIM KITSURAGI: “How far along is Krenel’s *investigation*?”
JOYCE MESSIER: “A confrontation is imminent. They have followed in your footsteps… As your investigation reaches a climax, so does theirs. They are your shadow. Arm yourselves. Armour yourselves…”
JOYCE MESSIER: “Soon. I do not know precisely. They have cut off all communication, you see. They know I’ve been feeding you information. One last thing, Lieutenant Du Bois.” She starts the engine. “I’ve given the matter much thought and come to this conclusion: You’re not an amnesiac. You’re *insane*.”
JOYCE MESSIER: “No, detective—no one’s as insane as you.”
JOYCE MESSIER: “I’m over-exposed, baby. My travels take me through the pale dozens of times a year. I’ve got the longing—and I’ve got it *bad*.” She points to her heart.
JOYCE MESSIER: “The same strict psychological regimen the eighth admiral developed when he crossed the pale and discovered this isola—the *Volta do Mar*. It’s used by interisolary travellers and other troubled souls even to this day.”
INLAND EMPIRE: [Challenging: Success] Remember the truth of her.
ESPRIT DE CORPS: [Medium: Success] With worry in his eyes. He does not know if it was the right thing to do. But he doesn’t say anything.
We actually decide to internalize this thought. Why not? Something to remember Rejoyce Leyton by, the filthy liberal that she is.
ARIST: [Easy: Success] And now you’re just a bit curious: what *does* Evrart have to say about this?
PERCEPTION (SIGHT): [Challenging: Success] There’s a mean little glint in his eyes.
EVRART CLAIRE: “…did it look like a germ? Did it look like a piece of *bacteria*?”
COMPOSURE: [Medium: Success] His tone is totally different now. The jolly man of the people is gone and so is the smile.
INLAND EMPIRE: [Medium: Success] You get a sinking feeling…
ARIST: [Challenging: Success] Oh, you fucking *idiot*.
KIM KITSURAGI: “You wanted us to relay all this information to her…” the lieutenant cuts in.
EVRART CLAIRE: “That this is a takeover, that I want a war?” He nods, forcefully. “God, I hope you also told her about the drug trade… They absolutely hate getting their hands dirty with that.”
EVRART CLAIRE: “Harry, I bugged her cabin. I bugged her whole boat. I had camera surveying her boat. Hell, I even wanted to bug that thermal cup, but my boys advised against it.”
EVRART CLAIRE: “Hell no!” he exclaims. “They’d fuck it up. They can’t do anything right. I mean my *real* boys. My special task force boys.”
KIM KITSURAGI: “Where are these boys?”
EVRART CLAIRE: “Of course she did. Rich people have the best stories. About all the interesting things they’ve done and seen, all the beautiful places they’ve been to. It’s just sentimentalism. She can afford to be sentimental—and she can afford to lose as well.”
ARIST: [Formidable: Success] What, you want a medal? It’s been less than twelve hours since you made that decision.
EVRART CLAIRE: “What was always going to happen. We take the harbour and she fucks off to Ozonne, uncorks a bottle of wine, calls her partners and says they need to distance themselves from this nasty business before the big shit spinner splashes everyone.”
EVRART CLAIRE: “That it will, Harry. That it will.” A sincere smile crosses his face. “As to the *bad taste*—please. You’re not a sommelier, you’re a cop. You knew something. Something *big*. And you wanted to see what happens when you tell someone. So you told her. Anyone who’s ever been close to power will tell you: inside information is the sweetest thing in the world.”
EVRART CLAIRE: “Don’t beat yourself up, Harry. What you did was participate in history. When history calls, you *have* to pick up. You had no choice. A hard disco cop like you—I knew you weren’t one to resist temptation.”
KIM KITSURAGI: “You know what, detective? I am going to leave this out of my report and I suggest you leave it out of yours too.”
ARIST: [Challenging: Success] ...Good idea, Kim.
ARIST: [Medium: Success] You just *have* to keep telling people about the gun instead of taking the perfect opportunity to fuck off out of here.
EVRART CLAIRE: “My, my…” He lets out an appreciative whistle. “She’s quite the looker, Harry. You can’t imagine how pleased I am the two of you are reunited.”
ARIST: [Formidable: Success] And as you leave Evrart Claire’s office, sure you will not return, you curse your own idiocy. It wasn’t the capitalists you had to watch out for, but the mini-capitalist in the guise of a socialist, the one with everything to gain by exploiting the people he was supposed to be representing. Fuck.
RHETORIC: [Heroic: Failure] Another win for communism! Eat shit, corporate lackeys!