The already thoroughly repulsive profession of politics is made even more fun when you find yourself unwittingly staring into its face. Literally.
"So nice of you to join us!" Randall Wayne guffaws at me from the other side of the table. As I take in his smooth face – roughly eighteen years old, I'd guess, the same age as me – short hair, and overly athletic physique, just one word flows through my mind as I look at him: fuckboy.
Really, it's only appropriate. Randall is, after all, the heir to this country's most powerful political family. Their palatial mansion dominates their hometown of Pleasantville on the far side of the bay – rather aptly named, since, from what I hear, the Wayne family is anything but pleasant. His father, Sullivan Wayne, has been President of the Atlantic Republic for the better half of the last decade. For most people in my line of work, Randall would be well above the limit of who they would be willing to probe into.
I test the ropes holding my hands behind this squeaky old chair. I can already feel the one around my left wrist slackening off – judging from his breath, the one lackey who tied me up was probably not the most sober. "Please," I say, trying to put as much hollow pleading into my voice as I can. "I swear I knew nothing about any of this."
"No one enters the Vent with 'nothing to do,' girlie," he sneers.
He's right. The Vent – located to the west and a bit inland of the boardwalk and government district and all those parts of town where all the glittering glamour of the casinos and docks lie – is the part of Atlantic City that not even dirty trade money has reached yet. The Vent is little more than a broken grid of dilapidated houses infested by feral ghouls and mirelurks. The bridge into the Vent is constantly guarded, not to keep it safe, but to keep the Vent's denizens out. But to an armed party such as the one I now find myself a guest of, the Vent is a haven for the illicit. And this, I suspect, is why no one has bothered to have the area forcibly cleared out yet.
I look around, at Randall and his three armed lackeys. One stands by the door, and Randall and the other two stand around me in these crumbling remains of one of the Vent's houses. I'm sitting in what must have once been the dining room. It's night outside – as I can see plain as day through the gaping hole that had once been a toilet – and one of Randall's lackeys is holding a lantern, probably afraid to set it on a termite- and radiation-infested table in the fear that it would collapse. My plasma pistol is sitting on that table, about five feet away. If I could just to get it…
I don't have to wonder what these four are doing here – I already know. It's because of the stack of about a half dozen cases resting against one of the standing walls. One of them is why I'm here: it's a shipment of weapons. Energy weapons, to be exact, supposed to be on the next boat to Rivet City, still in the very case they were in when they were stolen by an armed gang from our present client's merchant house by the boardwalk.
"Now," Randall says, kneeling to put his face on level with mine, having circled the table once and come back. "What, exactly, are you doing here?" His breath, too, smells of alcohol, with the faintest hint of jet – trust me, I know from experience, that smell doesn't fade even hours later.
"I'm…well, I'm…" I fake a few stammers, just for accentuation. "…I was just passing through, visiting a friend. I must have been…to…to the wrong house."
"You're right! Well, it's no matter." He turns to his lackeys. "Father will be so proud when he sees the stash I've managed to assemble for him, on such a low budget, too." Yeah, there's the alcohol definitely loosening his lips for him. Of all the interrogators I've ever been privy to, Randall Wayne is by far the stupidest. It all makes sense now. Randall was hoarding stolen weapons as part of his stash. "And there's nothing you can do to stop me!" He pulls out a cigarette and lights it, blowing smoke into my face.
A fifth person walks in, a rifle slung across her leather-armoured shoulders, and a moving, shadowy mass in her hands. "Did you find anything, Elise?" Randall asks the newcomer.
"Just this damned cat," she grumbles, and places the shadow on the table in front of me. It uncurls itself to reveal a golden-brown kitten, who just rests on the table and stares back at me for a second, before curling again and closing his eyes. I allow myself a little smile: If Kaiser is here, then he must not be very far behind. All going according to plan.
"Why the hell did you bring it inside?" Randall.
"It kept trying to bite my leg," she said, the lamplight highlighting her scowl. "Besides, if we leave it outside, you know it'll just be food for the mirelurks. It...could be useful."
"For what? It's a cat –"
"Stupid man!" I hear a deep, guttural growl from the door, moments before the man by the door screams, simultaneous with a loud thunk.
Randall turns, his eyes widening. The super mutant standing at the door holding a greatsword in one hand as if it were no heavier than a pen. He is eight feet tall and every ounce of his body simmering in prepared anger, is clearly not someone he had come here expecting to fuck with. The others in the room turn their guns and start firing away in the direction of the newcomer. The mutant just roars and swipes in their direction. I see Elise trip over something and fall to the ground, her rifle skittering from her hands and across the floor.
In this chaotic mess, I finally rip my bonds off, stand up, grab my gun, and reach for Randall Wayne. Pulling his trembling body tightly against mine, I press the simmering barrel of the plasma pistol into his temple, eliciting a very childlike yelp from him. I grin; it's these kind of moments I love best about this job.
"Leave here," the mutant says at the other two lackeys, his sword now touching Elise's back. One is cowering in the corner by the remains of a television, the other is kneeling behind the table, as if trying to make a brave last stand. "Drop your weapons, leave Atlantic City, and I'll forget this ever happened." He looks down at Elise, now on the floor, looking up. "You too."
Within seconds, all three have left their weapons on the ground and hesitantly moved. I'm glad the mutant chose that, instead of extinguishing their lives here and now. As I know entirely too well, this is something he could have very easily done.
"Please, whoever you – whoever you people are!" Randall pleads, squirming in my grip. "I have – I have money! Five hundred credits – that's what, ten thousand in bottle caps? It's no problem at all!"
"I don't want your money," I growl.
"What do you want then? I can give it to you! I promise!"
"This." Remembering my training, I find the proper spot on his neck, and press. I hear him gasp, his muscles tense, then loosen, and his body slides into unconsciousness. He'll be out for the better part of a day.
"Thanks, Kenji," I say, after I've laid Randall gently on the floor.
The super mutant just looks at me with sad eyes, letting his sword arm droop. "Zoe, you know well I don't like doing this," Kenji says softly. "Next time, we have to come up with a better plan. Not this – whatever this was."
"Sorry," I say, looking away. It hit me that yes, I'd been absurdly, incredibly stupid, rushing in here like that. I'd forced Kenji to have to come and support me. And I couldn't keep doing that.
Feeling the chilly night air blow on my skin, I adjust my hat and coat, and walk over to the weapons stash. I find the case which has our client's name scrawled on its surface, heft it over my shoulder, and walk outside.
"Come on Kaiser," Kenji says, finding him peacefully sleeping away on the table. The kitten leaps into Kenji's hands, and he perches him upon the mutant's shoulder.
We walk outside onto the dilapidated street, Kenji sets up a flare. As we walk away to the east, where our boat sits, the flare bursts, shooting a rocket into the air. That should catch the attention of the police guarding the bridge.
Really, we've been quite fortunate. For all the things the Waynes control, the most pertinent one for us isn't: the Atlantic City police. That's under the control of Valerie Pulaski, a relative of the Pulaskis of Long Beach, the Republic's most powerful family before the Waynes came along. The two families have been feuding for some years now, and the police have been a constant thorn in the side of the Waynes. Valerie sure won't have any trouble trying to indict Randall on possession of stolen items, and use him as leverage against her political rivals. In fact, we might have just handed her the biggest present of her career.
Looking ahead, at the brilliant electric radiance of the Atlantic Republic's capital, at the row of pre-War beachfront high-rises lit up like nuclear winter had never happened, I see once again why this city captures the dreams of the wasteland so well. A bright spotlight has been perched atop the tallest building, shooting a beam of light straight for the stars – that's the lighthouse.
But when you've been in a business dealing with the layer beneath the luminescence for as long as I have, you know how truly deep down the dirt and the corruption in Atlantic City extends.
I know for a fact that there are other dreams, better dreams, elsewhere.