Billy tabbs, p.7
Billy Tabbs, page 7
“Have either of you heard about the disappearances?” asked Billy.
“We’ve heard,” said George.
Ash nodded.
“I wasn’t sure if it was just from my neighborhood,” said Billy. “At first I thought maybe they’d been coming here.”
“Jenny and Helena thought the same thing when they joined,” said George.
“What do you think has been happening?” asked Billy.
“We don’t know. Darrow says maybe just coincidence,” said George.
“Hard to keep track of us all, anyway,” blurted Ash. “Especially these days. Missing. Finding. Missing. Finding. Who’s to say what’s really goin’ on. So crazy out there. And nobody cares about us so much.”
“But you don’t just disappear,” said Billy. “Something, or someone, has to make you disappear.”
“Unless maybe you’re making yourself disappear,” said George, though he didn’t himself sound convinced.
“Maybe it’s the authorities?” proffered Billy.
“Or maybe somethin’ else,” said Ash. “Anyway, that’s just speculation, that is. No point wastin’ time wonderin’ about it, I say.”
“What about here? Has anyone here ever gone missing?”
“Missing?” asked George.
“Ya, missing. I mean, left the group and not returned?”
Ash and George grew quiet.
“Not so much,” said Ash, after a tellingly long pause.
“What does that mean?”
Ash looked at George, who looked down, so Ash again looked to Billy. “I guess maybe there was one before,”
“Well, was there?”
“Ya. There was one here before,” answered Ash. “But it was different. Didn’t disappear exactly. But ya, there was one before.”
“What happened?” asked Billy.
“Just not here anymore,” said Ash, his logic bearing the same evasive tint that Billy had heard yesterday from the twins.
“What was his name?” pressed Billy. He felt two heads cock in his direction. Two heads. Four eyes. Six feet away. Most everyone else had gone to bed.
“What’s that?” asked Ash, purporting not to hear him.
“I said ‘what was his name?’” repeated Billy.
“So sure it’s a ‘him,’ are ya?” said Ash, followed by a nervous laugh. George stayed mute and kicked at the ground.
“Well, was it?”
“Ya, it was a ‘him’ all right,” said Ash. A pause. Hesitation. Billy held silent, forcing Ash to elaborate. “His name was Derek, but we’re not really supposed to talk about him too much, ’cause he’s gone now.”
“I see,” said Billy, who now wanted to talk of nothing else. He saw Marlon approaching from the corner of his eye. “What happened to him?”
“We’re not supposed to talk about it,” said George. He blinked his good eye and seemed apprehensive.
“Any particular reason?”
“Yes,” said George, the monosyllabic response dead-ending to Billy’s dissatisfaction.
Another pause. More hesitation. A second kick at the ground by George.
“A lot of information on the first night,” said Marlon, his mood suddenly as black as his hair. He looked at Billy and, seemingly with effort, softened his demeanor. “You must be tired. It’s been a busy couple of days.”
Billy prepared to deny it when a fierce yawn betrayed him. Yet, for Billy, it was as if they’d just placed a large box on a table—a box that growled, trembled, and puffed out small plumes of smoke from several unseen crevices—only to be told he ought not consider what might be inside. The clumsy moratorium on Derek only served to heighten the mystery, making Billy all the more inclined to ask questions; but given his fatigue, and the fact he’d only joined that night, he gave himself over to restraint and toed the party line.
“I’m tired myself,” admitted George, and with that, Billy was ushered into the lead railcar, where his spinning mind and unsated curiosity finally gave way to an exhausted, adrenaline-depleted slumber.
It was late morning when Billy woke up. He was refreshed, clear-headed, and alone.
He stepped down to the compound floor, almost immediately coming face-to-face with a member he’d interacted with only sparingly the night before, and if Billy had heard his name, he hadn’t listened well enough to remember it. He was older, with perfectly groomed locks of brown hair and, similar to Henry, more than a little extra weight around the belly. It struck Billy that he was surprisingly clean, given their living conditions.
“Oh, hello there. Hello.” He was jocular, introduced himself as “Totter,” then engaged Billy in friendly conversation. Like Jacob, Totter spoke with a polished tongue that was unfamiliar to Billy.
Ash soon approached from the side. “Was gettin’ near ready to come in there after ya,” he remarked to Billy, at which point Totter bid them adieu and shuffled further down the platform toward Chuck, as if Ash’s presence had somehow steered him away.
“What’s his story?” asked Billy.
And so it was that Ash told him about Totter, whose most distinguishing feature was his skillful gift of gab. Some of the group even called him Teeter Totter, for his uncanny ability to spin around his listeners with such gentle persuasion that it would leave them teetering off balance. Convincing in his convincing, Totter apparently deployed this skill to evade unpleasant tasks, or to trade bad meat for good—yet on each and every occasion, he had his counterparts so off-balance that they were satisfied it was in fact he who had just done them a great and selfless service. Quick to Darrow’s side at most events, he was even quicker to nod in agreement with anything Darrow said with any degree of emphasis, and though no one seemed to know exactly what Totter did on a day-to-day basis, he explained how he did it so well that nobody seemed to complain.
“He’s harmless enough, I think,” said Ash.
Billy looked over to see Totter now chatting with their youngest member. Ash noticed as well. “You see him there with Chuck, now, right?”
Billy nodded.
“Just watch a bit,” said Ash.
So Billy watched, as Chuck’s face transformed from guarded obstinacy into fierce gratitude. Moments later, Chuck stepped away from Totter, made haste up the slope, and disappeared into the tunnel.
“There he goes,” said Ash.
“Goes where?”
“Probably off to some job Totter was supposed to do. Totter’ll convince ’em it impresses Darrow to volunteer for stuff when you got spare time. Maybe it does, even. Hard to say. That’s why it’s so tricky. Stuff he says kinda makes sense. At least, it makes just enough sense when you first hear it. And him bein’ so likeable and all. Got me once, even. Anyway, enough on ol’ Totter. We better get on to the Darrow an’ get yer first assignments.”
So it was that Billy spent the next several days shadowing various members of the group: He went on patrol around town to locate food sources with Ash, surveilled a potential mischief target with George, and helped Jenny and Ewen—who was appropriately nicknamed ‘Ears’—clean out the lead railcar.
In between missions Billy was taught tricks of surveillance, theft, and even sparring. The time commitments were a stark departure from the idle existence he’d previously lived. They were, however, not infinite, and when not assigned to a specific task or function, he was free to come and go from the compound at his leisure. To that end, Billy learned three secret ways of traveling between the subway tunnels and the surface, each of which was accessed by a short walk up the live subway tunnel.
In those first few days, Billy kept his eyes open and his mouth shut. He absorbed the workings of the organization, watching closely as the duty shifts cycled through. He observed the sharing of food and marveled at the mutual respect given and received, Totter’s antics aside.
He was most impressed by the group’s commitment to equality, having lived his whole life with the realities on the surface, where people so hopelessly embraced inequality and where, almost without fail, the greater the concentration of individuals, the greater the chasm between want and need. Their community of twenty-one had thus far avoided this sad dichotomy.
Jacob—Darrow’s fair-haired general—seemed most vocal about it.
“As long as there are people who feel they are better than others,” said Jacob, “that their lives are more important than even the humblest neighborhood wanderer, then the world will run askew.” Much to Billy’s delight, Bigwig types—by far the worst offenders—were targeted above all. “Our own world will never run askew,” added Jacob. “The tenets will preclude that.”
Billy loved the guidance provided by the tenets, which, he learned, were heavily influenced by Jacob. Some even believed that Jacob had scripted them himself, with Darrow merely giving the final stamp of approval and adding the ninth of his own accord. Yet, regardless of authorship, there they were to guide them all toward a better way of life. Billy had only been there three days, but from his perspective, the culture was clearly working.
In accordance with the seventh tenet, there was a fair division of labor, an equal rotation of tasks and missions, and symmetry in the number of hours worked. One day you’d stay inside cleaning and maintaining the compound, the next you might be assigned outside to gather food and supplies, or to scout for new food sources or potential targets. Morning missions rotated with evening missions. Outside work was much coveted, and the disbursements were always fair.
The same applied to the allocation of food and rest, in keeping with the fifth and sixth tenets respectively.
With regard to sleep, the subway cars themselves served as makeshift hotels. The first car, clearly the newest of the three, had soft, comfortable seats and was a perfect place to stretch out for a peaceful night of slumber. The second car was similar to the first, just older and larger, with the seating slightly worn and not quite as luxurious. The caboose, which was smaller than the second railcar, also had seating; but the seats were not only packed more closely together, they were also rigid and hard. Not surprisingly, all the members streamed into the lead railcar when it came time to sleep. Fortunately, it was large enough to accommodate every member, and with room to spare.
As for food, they’d discovered a variety of good sources from which to steal or obtain high-end cuts of meat and fish. The outside markets were ripe for the taking, but there were also stores and restaurants with lax security or back doors left ajar, and sometimes loosely manned delivery trucks. When these sources were exhausted, the group secured what they could from the street via refuse bins, or unwatched patio or picnic tables. Whatever food was “acquired”—regardless of who acquired it—was set down on the compound floor, and spread, as if ceremoniously, atop freshly laid newsprint directly beneath Darrow’s large office window.
The food was equitably consumed. One day a member might walk up and select a piece of chicken and some bread, the next day a piece of beef and some sort of vegetable. It worked on the honor system, and there was always enough of the good stuff to go around that nobody went long without. The preference, as could be expected, was for the best cuts of meat and fish. The sole exception was Helena, who’d long ago rejected all forms of meat and dairy. She would say that “the fruits of anguish taste bitter”—an aberrant philosophy among their kind. They would question why she’d care about such things, and she would question why they didn’t. Nevertheless, they respected her unique viewpoint, particularly as it manifested to their benefit with slightly increased portions.
They stole only food, necessities of life, and the tools required to further their schemes of social unrest. Darrow had impressed upon them to take from society only that which society had unfairly secreted away. They didn’t steal for greed, to sustain any addictions, or to support any particular vice. Some members did dabble in a bit of the weed now and then, but there weren’t too many places to find it. Even when they did manage to locate some, Darrow urged restraint, as it often made the user either too lethargic or too buoyant to work. “Keep off the weed,” he admonished them when there was serious work to be done. Yet consumption in leisure time was perfectly acceptable, and even Darrow and his generals would nip a bit of the good stuff from time to time. As with all things, moderation was key, lest they succumb to a taste for overindulgence. “We must never blight ourselves with such an illness,” said Darrow, “for it is fiercely resistant to treatment.”
“Inclusion in a large community changes you for the worse,” trumpeted Jacob. “Greed, ambition, envy, complacency, conflicting agendas, all inevitably give rise to disparity and inequality. One by one, values fall like dominoes. I’ve seen enough of this world to know that when you put enough individuals together, class trends begin to emerge, including a desire for power, a lust for materialism, and the abiding of inequality. It would appear to be a natural progression.”
Darrow himself cringed at society’s hopeless commitment to currency and decadence, jesting how “they will most surely be the end of me.” He condemned submission to authoritarian oversight, particularly disgusted by insular gated communities and security-laden condominiums that shunned undesirables.
“Just look how they treat each other!” said Darrow. “How quick they are to turn on one another!”
“And us?” he cried. “Humph! Always they move us on from one place to another, shuffled aside like rubbish. Can’t stay here. Can’t go there. Can’t rest an hour on their stoop without being run off of their property.” He delivered the penultimate word rather derisively, before adding, “And where is my property? Where is yours? Everywhere, it would seem. Everywhere. And anywhere. But nowhere.”
The words and concepts were deeper than anything Billy had previously been exposed to, but he inherently understood it. All of it. In one form or another, he’d seen it every day: selfishness, elitism, the weak and the forgotten being pushed out of sight by the strong and powerful. Some lives valued over others.
“What clever devices could they employ? What propaganda machine could possibly maintain this divide?” begged Darrow, to the receipt of myriad nods. “Why do people so readily accept the way things are? Accept a world that runs that way? We, on the other hand, will not.”
“The city is going to burst!” shouted Ash, followed by a hearty belt of the ninth tenet. George followed, then Ears, then the rest. Totter had cozied up to Darrow’s side, nodding forcefully with every few words from his leader’s mouth.
“I dream of the day we are no longer invisible,” cried Darrow. “For the day we are no longer deemed extraneous. I dream of the day that the people of society accept that we are just as important as anyone. That each of us, every single one of us, is as equally deserving of respect, love, and compassion as any person!”
Several more echoed the ninth tenet, their heads nodding in rapid agreement. Billy, like all the others, was enamored with Darrow. He said all the right things, his words flowing into their ears as ice water into the parched mouth of a dying man. He instilled within them a profound belief that if they all worked together as a unit, bit-by-bit, toward a single and unified purpose, they could make a difference. That their campaign would bring an increased awareness to their existence and their suffering—awareness of the overpopulation of their kind and of the societal forces that put them there in the first place. They truly believed that they could force society toward reinvention, given the recognition that their neglect would no longer be ignored or tolerated.
Yet as much as Darrow opened the bloom of their spirits, he was conversely closed about his own origins. None of the members, from what Billy could figure, knew with any degree of certainty from when and where he actually came. Speculation became hearsay became truth, but the truth was varied and clouded.
Some of the members said he was born into a wealthy family but spurned a life of excess and riches; others believed he was of the divine and received his direction from a higher order; others bore still more fanciful ideations. The pervading mystery only served to enhance his mysticism and power.
Whether Darrow was his first name or last was also unknown. It could even have been an alias. As for the “Glorious” moniker, there was some whisper that this was a descriptor Darrow conferred upon himself—though such a suggestion was tantamount to heresy, and the founding members were quick to dispute that Darrow had ever advanced such an arrogance-laden suggestion. Akin to the Immaculate Conception, they would simply state that he had “always” been the Glorious Darrow, and that was that.
There was a Machiavellian charm to Darrow, creating in his followers a unique dichotomy of affection and fear. His personality was equal parts David Koresh and Anthony Robbins. Magnanimous when he spoke, he not only condemned any society that favored some lives over others but also spent significant time extolling his clan’s virtues—praising their determination, diligence, and strength in surviving in the face of such obvious inequality. His passionate sermons mesmerized and captivated his subjects with a skill on par with even the most seasoned religious zealot, his eyes full of fire and hope. Yet the tension behind them betrayed an internal battle, a schism of sorts. On occasion his gaze would spontaneously wander, obviously caught up in some other place or memory—though on each occasion his focus would invariably, after a time, return to the present.
Whatever oddness existed, Billy recognized why the group followed Darrow with such unquestioning loyalty. Beyond his inspired and hypnotizing advocacy, he also provided them the security of guidance and leadership, and the structure of community, that most of them never had. He never held himself above any of them. He made himself available to all—frequently strolling around the compound platform and chatting with the members, welcoming their input—and his office door remained ever open.
Darrow imbued the group with the confidence that they were not alone in the world—they had each other, and they had him. That he would never let them go hungry, and would never let them be harmed. Woven into these promises, he’d fostered the conviction that each of them was just as important as any person, worthy of all the same rights, respect, and fundamental dignity that might be shown to any man or woman in the city, and that they each had a real purpose on this often harsh and cruel planet. From what Billy had observed through those first three days, Darrow had been good to his word. Nobody went hungry or wanted for any necessity. Their group was safe and secure; and, perhaps most important of all, they lived with a sense of purpose and pride that none of them had truly believed in before they met him. He frequently assured the group that “I will always place my ambition before your needs,” and the immediate cheers always washed away any negative interpretation of that double entendre.
