| "ANGEL'S TONGUE ON MARS" BY CALLUM HOUSTON |
Kim Effinger and his wife Catherine had just enjoyed a guilty, and very expensive, treat of T-bone
steak, fried banana, and French fries (Cathy's fries: a showering of vinegar and a sprinkle of salt;
Effinger's: slathered in a catsup, vinegar, salt and steak-grease sludge) when the call that would
haunt Effinger's nightmares for the rest of his living days came. Catherine, scraping a plate of steak
bones into the trash, answered the phone and emotionlessly told Effinger it was for him. Sitting
comfortably in the living room in front of the warm fireplace, he'd set down his glass of Grand
Marnier and switched on the intravision. Effinger knew instantly when the agent informed him that
Vadas wanted to meet with him in an official capacity not a social one, that the government must
surely be threatened by a catastrophic meltdown of one kind or another. And if they felt they
needed to pull him back in, having been retired from public service for a month under seven years,
then whatever crisis loomed was beyond any hope of averting - it signalled desperation, as the
government has no shortage of soldiers, in his opinion all just as capable as him of waging tactical
military operations. When the brief conversation ended and a date and time had been arranged,
Effinger regretted Cathy had picked up the phone, rather wishing she had simply let it ring.
Effinger thanks the driver and steps out of the electrocarriage, wrapping his scarf and parka collar
tightly around his neck, sealing it from the biting November evening air. A guard meets him at the
gate and escorts him to the front door where he is greeted and welcomed inside. Effinger can smell
the sweet odour of alcohol - vodka, he thinks - underneath the stale, musky fragrance of Vadas'
aftershave. And beneath the booze and cologne he can smell cold, sour sweat, the fear kind of
sweat. He looks into the man's eyes. The glassy, unfocussed gaze confesses to Effinger that the
Prime Minister is quite intoxicated.
"Kim, I want to say right off the bat how sincerely proud I am - we all are - of the years of
dedication you've given to the country," the Prime Minister says, putting a hand on Effinger's
shoulder and extending his other one. Effinger shakes his hand and realizes the Prime Minister has
offered only his fingers. In Effinger's view, far too delicate a handshake for the leader of the nation.
Prime Minister Michael Vadas was, and still is, the youngest prime minister ever elected in Canada
- just thirty-four years old when sworn in - and Effinger can't help but think when he looks at him,
This man is too young for the job.
"I've summoned you from - I sincerely hope - a happy retirement," the Prime Minister says,
ushering Effinger into a meeting room at his 24 Sussex Drive residence in Ottawa. An aide takes
Effinger's parka.
"Happy is not a word I would use to describe my three years away from the service, Mr. Prime
Minister."
"No? Has it been unpleasant in some way? Have a seat." The Prime Minister motions to a chair.
"I trust everything is well with your family?"
"I'm a warrior, to put it bluntly," Effinger says with a matter-of-fact shrug. He settles into the chair.
"We've got a cottage on the beach, Fawkes Lake, and I've taken up fly-fishing. The other day I
bought a telescope. But my place in this life isn't looking at the stars up there in the sky. It's
planning a military manoeuvre or being in the midst of a battle of some kind."
The Prime Minister nods his head in earnest agreement, seating himself opposite Effinger. "I know
what you mean, Kim. I've become intimate with the particular drug you're talking about. The
competitive urge to rule the world responsibly, morally, to make a difference, to lead a productive
government, to fund a cancer cure or build a bomb more powerful than the one your enemy has,
that kind of thinking, it's an addiction, a pathological addiction, that simply cannot be turned off at
the end of the day like an intravision channel. Sets into a man like rot, doesn't it?" he adds bitterly.
It feels to Effinger as though the Prime Minister isn't talking to him, he's just talking. Vadas gently
lifts his left leg, folding it over his right and then clasps his hands over his knee.
"We need you. We really do," the Prime Minister tells Effinger. "There's a revolution taking hold.
Probably same as the last one and the last one before that. You're here because intervention is
required."
"I've been through two revolutions so far. The source of the havoc is the same every time these
troubles cycle through - hotheads and agitators."
"And that's what we've got here. The hooligans have broken in and they're ransacking our way of
life. They've grasped hold and they're not letting go this time.
"Must be something serious if you need to conscript an old-timer like me."
"It is, Kim." The Prime Minister touches his stomach and a look of devastating pain appears upon
his face. He looks upward ruefully with a grimace and Effinger can hear him mumble the word
"bastards" under his breath. Then he looks at Effinger and asks, "Will you excuse me for just one
moment?"
"Absolutely."
Prime Minister Vadas walks into the adjacent bathroom and closes the door partially shut behind
him. Effinger hears a faucet turned on and tap water running, obscuring the sound of the Prime
Minister vomiting, puking fiercely into the toilet. The Prime Minister splashes cold water on his
face and a minute later he emerges from the bathroom wiping his cheeks, his forehead, his chin,
with a white towel. He returns to his seat with Effinger.
"You're drunk," Effinger points out, forcing himself to imitate a half-smile. He knows how they feel
about leaders steering the ship under the influence of alcohol. They don't like it.
"I've had a drink. Yes I have. A couple of them. Doesn't change the message I'm about to give
you."
"What needs to be done, Mr. Prime Minister?"
"The city coddles organized crime, Ef. It harbours terrorists, and to hear Langdon tell it it's simply
another revenue stream." The Prime Minister glances at the ceiling and asks Effinger, "You hear
that gnawing up there? We've got rats in the infrastructure. I've got poison on my fingertips.
We've attempted diplomacy. Ultimatums are given and ultimatums are ignored. Opportunities are
tabled in good faith inviting them to join the country in recognizing Canada's criminal law and her
constitution and what do they do? They arrogantly snub their noses at us like we're irrelevant. The
federal government irrelevant for Christ sakes? Haughty pricks."
"What region are you talking about, sir?"
Prime Minister Vadas stares at Effinger mutely, paralyzed and unable to speak, his face
horror-stricken as though having just received horrible news.
"Perhaps you'd like another drink, sir?" Effinger asks calmly.
"Another drink. Yes. A very good idea." The Prime Minister snaps awake. "Another glass please,
Tom. One for Kim here as well." He signals to an aide sitting in on the meeting and glasses of
vodka are served to the two men.
"Thank you," Effinger says to the aide and to the Prime Minister. "What region are we talking
about here, sir?"
"We may lose the west coast over this, Ef," Vadas cries. "God, how I don't want to be the prime
minister who's seen as allowing BC to be hijacked from confederation. It doesn't have to be
inevitable. My God, at least when Quebec seceded they held a vote! The residents of Vancouver
were given no referendum when their government unilaterally chose to break away from Canadian
rule of law."
"So we're talking about Vancouver?"
"Of course. The disaster I've got on my hands makes the FLQ crisis and Meech Lake - combined!
- look like a Sunday school picnic."
"You feel you have to go in? What about irradiation?"
"Yes, it would be nice if we could do it that way but the stove doesn't get the frying pan hot enough
to fry the egg, if you know what I mean. The system doesn't have the juice required to be
meaningfully effective. I've no choice."
"No, of course you don't," Effinger concurs.
"It's a hell of a goddamned rotten pickle we're in. Our international neighbours to the south and in
Asia agree that Vancouver must be brought into compliance by use of armed military force. We've
got seven days from initiation of deployment till this agreement matures. If after seven days we
haven't installed an alternate government of quote unquote friendly officials, a multination coalition
takes over the operation from us. Seven days! What does that tell you, Ef?"
"Tells me they plan on coming in no matter what."
"Some very powerful nations want that city kicked, kicked very, very hard, and if we don't do it - to
their precise and exact liking - they'll come in and do it themselves. They'll do it themselves!
There's no avoiding it. Either way you look at it we've got war."
"What kind of damage has been requested?"
"You'll receive specific targets, primarily large landmarks and governments buildings, government
structures. As I've said, they want Mayor Langdon and his people out of there, a new team - our
team - put in."
"And...?" Effinger fixes his hard stare on the Prime Minister's brown pupils and bloodshot eyes.
The Prime Minister picks up his glass and leaves his seat and walks to the wall, looking sightlessly at
a painting of a rural autumn day with a wooden fence along a wheat field and a letter box on the
side of a dirt road leading to a farmhouse. Finally he answers Effinger's unspoken question. "They
want casualties of not less than two hundred and fifty-five thousand."
"And to whom are we supposed to deliver a quarter million body bags?"
"If you hit the right targets intelligence reports will suffice, proof won't be required," Prime Minister
Vadas says, turning to face Effinger.
Effinger struggles with the paradox for a moment then grabs hold of it and boxes it, suppresses it.
Attacking one's own country runs contrary to his philosophy of the role of the armed forces. The
military's might is to be harnessed to defend a nation's citizens, not to slaughter them on the order of
a foreign country. He's not a philosopher, though, he's a warrior, like he told the Prime Minister. A
warrior who takes his orders and gets the mission done to the best of his ability.
The meeting room door opens and two officers enter carrying briefcases. "We'll take it from here,
Mr. Prime Minister," one of the men says to Vadas.
General Kim Effinger, once retired, now returning to active duty, leaves his seat and walks to the
door.
"Ef?" Vadas says.
Effinger turns around. "Yes, Mr. Prime Minister?"
"Nobody loves this country as much as me. You do know that, don't you?" Profound sorrow is
evident in the Prime Minister's voice. "You...understand?"
"Of course."
Effinger and the officers leave the building and seat themselves in a waiting electrocarriage, quickly
driving off to an information briefing across the city. Vadas dismisses his aide, leaving the Prime
Minister alone in the room. The ignorant savages have finally destroyed the dream once and for all,
incapable of foreseeing the consequences of their short-sighted plundering, he despairs dismally.
How did we ever let things get so far out of hand? The Prime Minister goes into the bathroom and
grabs a sealed bottle of painkillers from the cabinet, noticing his worn, exhausted reflection in the
mirror and then leaves the meeting room and walks up the stairs to say a final goodnight to his wife
watching the eleven o'clock intravision newscast from bed.
steak, fried banana, and French fries (Cathy's fries: a showering of vinegar and a sprinkle of salt;
Effinger's: slathered in a catsup, vinegar, salt and steak-grease sludge) when the call that would
haunt Effinger's nightmares for the rest of his living days came. Catherine, scraping a plate of steak
bones into the trash, answered the phone and emotionlessly told Effinger it was for him. Sitting
comfortably in the living room in front of the warm fireplace, he'd set down his glass of Grand
Marnier and switched on the intravision. Effinger knew instantly when the agent informed him that
Vadas wanted to meet with him in an official capacity not a social one, that the government must
surely be threatened by a catastrophic meltdown of one kind or another. And if they felt they
needed to pull him back in, having been retired from public service for a month under seven years,
then whatever crisis loomed was beyond any hope of averting - it signalled desperation, as the
government has no shortage of soldiers, in his opinion all just as capable as him of waging tactical
military operations. When the brief conversation ended and a date and time had been arranged,
Effinger regretted Cathy had picked up the phone, rather wishing she had simply let it ring.
Effinger thanks the driver and steps out of the electrocarriage, wrapping his scarf and parka collar
tightly around his neck, sealing it from the biting November evening air. A guard meets him at the
gate and escorts him to the front door where he is greeted and welcomed inside. Effinger can smell
the sweet odour of alcohol - vodka, he thinks - underneath the stale, musky fragrance of Vadas'
aftershave. And beneath the booze and cologne he can smell cold, sour sweat, the fear kind of
sweat. He looks into the man's eyes. The glassy, unfocussed gaze confesses to Effinger that the
Prime Minister is quite intoxicated.
"Kim, I want to say right off the bat how sincerely proud I am - we all are - of the years of
dedication you've given to the country," the Prime Minister says, putting a hand on Effinger's
shoulder and extending his other one. Effinger shakes his hand and realizes the Prime Minister has
offered only his fingers. In Effinger's view, far too delicate a handshake for the leader of the nation.
Prime Minister Michael Vadas was, and still is, the youngest prime minister ever elected in Canada
- just thirty-four years old when sworn in - and Effinger can't help but think when he looks at him,
This man is too young for the job.
"I've summoned you from - I sincerely hope - a happy retirement," the Prime Minister says,
ushering Effinger into a meeting room at his 24 Sussex Drive residence in Ottawa. An aide takes
Effinger's parka.
"Happy is not a word I would use to describe my three years away from the service, Mr. Prime
Minister."
"No? Has it been unpleasant in some way? Have a seat." The Prime Minister motions to a chair.
"I trust everything is well with your family?"
"I'm a warrior, to put it bluntly," Effinger says with a matter-of-fact shrug. He settles into the chair.
"We've got a cottage on the beach, Fawkes Lake, and I've taken up fly-fishing. The other day I
bought a telescope. But my place in this life isn't looking at the stars up there in the sky. It's
planning a military manoeuvre or being in the midst of a battle of some kind."
The Prime Minister nods his head in earnest agreement, seating himself opposite Effinger. "I know
what you mean, Kim. I've become intimate with the particular drug you're talking about. The
competitive urge to rule the world responsibly, morally, to make a difference, to lead a productive
government, to fund a cancer cure or build a bomb more powerful than the one your enemy has,
that kind of thinking, it's an addiction, a pathological addiction, that simply cannot be turned off at
the end of the day like an intravision channel. Sets into a man like rot, doesn't it?" he adds bitterly.
It feels to Effinger as though the Prime Minister isn't talking to him, he's just talking. Vadas gently
lifts his left leg, folding it over his right and then clasps his hands over his knee.
"We need you. We really do," the Prime Minister tells Effinger. "There's a revolution taking hold.
Probably same as the last one and the last one before that. You're here because intervention is
required."
"I've been through two revolutions so far. The source of the havoc is the same every time these
troubles cycle through - hotheads and agitators."
"And that's what we've got here. The hooligans have broken in and they're ransacking our way of
life. They've grasped hold and they're not letting go this time.
"Must be something serious if you need to conscript an old-timer like me."
"It is, Kim." The Prime Minister touches his stomach and a look of devastating pain appears upon
his face. He looks upward ruefully with a grimace and Effinger can hear him mumble the word
"bastards" under his breath. Then he looks at Effinger and asks, "Will you excuse me for just one
moment?"
"Absolutely."
Prime Minister Vadas walks into the adjacent bathroom and closes the door partially shut behind
him. Effinger hears a faucet turned on and tap water running, obscuring the sound of the Prime
Minister vomiting, puking fiercely into the toilet. The Prime Minister splashes cold water on his
face and a minute later he emerges from the bathroom wiping his cheeks, his forehead, his chin,
with a white towel. He returns to his seat with Effinger.
"You're drunk," Effinger points out, forcing himself to imitate a half-smile. He knows how they feel
about leaders steering the ship under the influence of alcohol. They don't like it.
"I've had a drink. Yes I have. A couple of them. Doesn't change the message I'm about to give
you."
"What needs to be done, Mr. Prime Minister?"
"The city coddles organized crime, Ef. It harbours terrorists, and to hear Langdon tell it it's simply
another revenue stream." The Prime Minister glances at the ceiling and asks Effinger, "You hear
that gnawing up there? We've got rats in the infrastructure. I've got poison on my fingertips.
We've attempted diplomacy. Ultimatums are given and ultimatums are ignored. Opportunities are
tabled in good faith inviting them to join the country in recognizing Canada's criminal law and her
constitution and what do they do? They arrogantly snub their noses at us like we're irrelevant. The
federal government irrelevant for Christ sakes? Haughty pricks."
"What region are you talking about, sir?"
Prime Minister Vadas stares at Effinger mutely, paralyzed and unable to speak, his face
horror-stricken as though having just received horrible news.
"Perhaps you'd like another drink, sir?" Effinger asks calmly.
"Another drink. Yes. A very good idea." The Prime Minister snaps awake. "Another glass please,
Tom. One for Kim here as well." He signals to an aide sitting in on the meeting and glasses of
vodka are served to the two men.
"Thank you," Effinger says to the aide and to the Prime Minister. "What region are we talking
about here, sir?"
"We may lose the west coast over this, Ef," Vadas cries. "God, how I don't want to be the prime
minister who's seen as allowing BC to be hijacked from confederation. It doesn't have to be
inevitable. My God, at least when Quebec seceded they held a vote! The residents of Vancouver
were given no referendum when their government unilaterally chose to break away from Canadian
rule of law."
"So we're talking about Vancouver?"
"Of course. The disaster I've got on my hands makes the FLQ crisis and Meech Lake - combined!
- look like a Sunday school picnic."
"You feel you have to go in? What about irradiation?"
"Yes, it would be nice if we could do it that way but the stove doesn't get the frying pan hot enough
to fry the egg, if you know what I mean. The system doesn't have the juice required to be
meaningfully effective. I've no choice."
"No, of course you don't," Effinger concurs.
"It's a hell of a goddamned rotten pickle we're in. Our international neighbours to the south and in
Asia agree that Vancouver must be brought into compliance by use of armed military force. We've
got seven days from initiation of deployment till this agreement matures. If after seven days we
haven't installed an alternate government of quote unquote friendly officials, a multination coalition
takes over the operation from us. Seven days! What does that tell you, Ef?"
"Tells me they plan on coming in no matter what."
"Some very powerful nations want that city kicked, kicked very, very hard, and if we don't do it - to
their precise and exact liking - they'll come in and do it themselves. They'll do it themselves!
There's no avoiding it. Either way you look at it we've got war."
"What kind of damage has been requested?"
"You'll receive specific targets, primarily large landmarks and governments buildings, government
structures. As I've said, they want Mayor Langdon and his people out of there, a new team - our
team - put in."
"And...?" Effinger fixes his hard stare on the Prime Minister's brown pupils and bloodshot eyes.
The Prime Minister picks up his glass and leaves his seat and walks to the wall, looking sightlessly at
a painting of a rural autumn day with a wooden fence along a wheat field and a letter box on the
side of a dirt road leading to a farmhouse. Finally he answers Effinger's unspoken question. "They
want casualties of not less than two hundred and fifty-five thousand."
"And to whom are we supposed to deliver a quarter million body bags?"
"If you hit the right targets intelligence reports will suffice, proof won't be required," Prime Minister
Vadas says, turning to face Effinger.
Effinger struggles with the paradox for a moment then grabs hold of it and boxes it, suppresses it.
Attacking one's own country runs contrary to his philosophy of the role of the armed forces. The
military's might is to be harnessed to defend a nation's citizens, not to slaughter them on the order of
a foreign country. He's not a philosopher, though, he's a warrior, like he told the Prime Minister. A
warrior who takes his orders and gets the mission done to the best of his ability.
The meeting room door opens and two officers enter carrying briefcases. "We'll take it from here,
Mr. Prime Minister," one of the men says to Vadas.
General Kim Effinger, once retired, now returning to active duty, leaves his seat and walks to the
door.
"Ef?" Vadas says.
Effinger turns around. "Yes, Mr. Prime Minister?"
"Nobody loves this country as much as me. You do know that, don't you?" Profound sorrow is
evident in the Prime Minister's voice. "You...understand?"
"Of course."
Effinger and the officers leave the building and seat themselves in a waiting electrocarriage, quickly
driving off to an information briefing across the city. Vadas dismisses his aide, leaving the Prime
Minister alone in the room. The ignorant savages have finally destroyed the dream once and for all,
incapable of foreseeing the consequences of their short-sighted plundering, he despairs dismally.
How did we ever let things get so far out of hand? The Prime Minister goes into the bathroom and
grabs a sealed bottle of painkillers from the cabinet, noticing his worn, exhausted reflection in the
mirror and then leaves the meeting room and walks up the stairs to say a final goodnight to his wife
watching the eleven o'clock intravision newscast from bed.
