The Obesity Police - Chapter One

Chapter One

By the time the Obesity Police knocked on Trini’s door he was already in an Obee safe house, this one in the basement of a long abandoned apartment building deep in the burned out section of Old Detroit. He sat alone at an old school desk eating the day’s free lunch - week old doughnuts and stolen Coke. Although the August day was unusually hot and humid, the basement remained cool and comfortable. There were half a dozen other people in the large room. Trini watched them in silence, trying to guess who was an Obee and who was an Indie. It was easy to assume the fat ones were all Obees and the others were Indies, but that wasn’t always true. Trini thought himself an independent even though the Bureau of Body Mass Index considered him at the low end of obesity. There might even be an undercover Rexic in the group. The government had no trouble recruiting the naturally skinny to plump up and spend a year underground trying to infiltrate the Resistance. The food was rich and free, and the money was good - fifty dollars a pound for every tax dodger brought to justice.
Trini dropped a piece of dried pastry to a waiting rat. The rat was as big as a tom cat and seemed as tame. Across the dim room, on the cracked concrete floor, a lumpy sleeping bag undulated briefly, then a loud fart. Seated nearby, a round man dressed in a dirty gray sweat suit rolled to his left, picked up an empty can, rolled back to his right, and threw the can at the gassy bag. “Pig,” he grunted.
Trini smiled and stretched back in his seat. He read the walls. The plentiful graffiti spoke to the age of this hideaway. Usually a busted den got scrubbed and painted, erasing the anti-government slogans. But Old Detroit was one of a handful of places in America where the Obesity Police still got shot and killed. “Fry the Lard Levy!” “Repeal the Blubber Bill!” “Fat & Proud.” “Butts & Guts = tons of power!” The letters wept hardened white paint.
Cigarette smoke curled around two bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling. They got their power from a series of extension cords which looped along the rafters and disappeared up the stairwell. In one corner a McDonald’s bag sat precariously on a full trash can. Nearby someone had arranged forty ounce beer bottles like bowling pins. The place smelled of bad habits.
Trini was expecting the Obesity Police ever since he had refused to pay his Fat Tax, and by doing so had joined the million or so other citizens protesting the government intrusion into personal lifestyles. He was notified of the neighborhood sweep by several sympathizers, who, although they paid their taxes, still aided those who civilly disobeyed. He had grabbed his pre-packed bag and made the safe house within an hour.
“What are ‘Butts and Guts’?”
Trini opened his eyes. A slim, young woman stood next to his desk, a puzzled look on her face. Her hair was neat and short. She wore clean jeans, a white top and new cross trainers. She looked down at Trini. “Do you know?”
Trini straightened up in his seat and looked in her eyes. She seemed sincere and perhaps young enough not to remember the Butts and Guts.
“They were a Political Action Committee formed to fight the New American Health act. They say politics make strange bedfellows and they were among the strangest. The membership was mainly southern rednecks with beer bellies and northern African-American women of ample proportions. Some newspaper guy called them Butts and Guts and the name stuck. Eventually they adopted the name themselves, and they got a lot of TV time, but of course it didn’t matter. The fat tax hit them hard.” Trini got up and stuck out his hand. “Trinity Fogwalker. Call me Trini.”
“Emily Barr. Pleased to meet you.” Emily looked around. “This place is creepy.”
“You obviously don’t pay any Fat Tax. What are you doing here?” Trini began to suspect she might be a bad actor Rexic. “Government send you?”
“Oh, heavens no. I came looking for someone.” Emily dug in her purse and handed a slip of paper to Trini. “Would you know him?”
Trini read the name. “What do you want him for?”
“It’s a personal matter.”
“Well he’s dead. Heart attack about a month ago.”
Emily took the paper back and put it back in her purse. “Oh,” she said and began to leave.
“If you tell me what kind of help you need maybe I can suggest someone else. Or maybe I can help.” He didn’t want her to leave. She was a good looking woman. “Let me walk you out anyway.” He caught up to her by the stairs and followed her up to the first floor and into the heat. The clouds were thin today and Trini squinted in the sudden brightness. “How did you get here?”
Emily looked up and down the broken street. The only vehicle sat on its rims amidst shattered glass, stripped of anything of value. Two flabby teens careened by on their power boards. Trini couldn’t tell if they were boys or girls. “The cab driver said he’d hang around for a while,” Emily said.
“He lied. You’ll have to walk out to Eight Mile to find a cab. They don’t come down here anymore.”
Emily flipped open her personal communicator and stared at the display. “No signal. Why can’t I get a signal?”
“Mega-Tel quit fixing the cell towers in Old Detroit. The power cables were ripped out for the copper. They went to solar but the arrays were always shot out within days. That’s why the safe house is safe. No cops, no Obesity Police.”
Emily turned and started walking. “That’s south. You want north,” Trini said. She did an about face then stopped and looked at Trini.
“You don’t look like you belong here either,” she said.
“I’m on the low end of the chart and I refuse to pay the Tax. The O. P. were doing a sweep of my neighborhood so I came here until things cool down.” Trini walked to the curb and kicked at a gone-to-seed dandelion growing through a sidewalk crack. The small puffs didn’t get far in the still air. “Chunk was a good guy.”
“Chunk?”
“Jim Nagy. The guy you were looking for. Everyone called him Chunk. Had a heart of gold. Then it stopped. But, hell, most people down here are good people. Most would help you. Me included. You must be desperate or dumb to come down here alone. Most people doesn’t mean all people. There are some bad eggs around.”
“I guess I’m a little of both,” Emily said. “Would you walk me out?”
“Let me grab my back pack.” Trini disappeared into the building and was back in thirty seconds.

They walked in silence, north on John R, past the stained facades of abandoned buildings, long the symbol of the failed economy and withered entrepreneurial spirit. It was three miles to Eight Mile road and the closer they got, the more signs of commerce began to appear. Pedestrians, cars, trucks, and even an occasional bicycle, grew more numerous as Trini walked Emily out of Old Detroit.
“Can I buy you a beer?” Trini asked.
“Is it safe?” Emily surveyed the street.
“Sure. Nobody here has anything any more so nobody mugs anybody. There’s a decent little bar in the next block. Quiet and cheap.”
Like most of the storefronts, the Ten Commandments Bar & Grill had bricks where the windows once were. Inside it was dim and smelled of stale smoke and old grease, with a faint touch of urinal cakes thrown in. The bar and decor had an 80’s feel about it. A dust-covered mirrored disco ball swayed silently over a small dance floor, now piled with broken chairs and cardboard boxes. Every bar stool had duct tape holding what was left of the cushion in place. The same repair scheme joined the cracked plastic front of a juke box to its dented body. The waist high tables were supported by plastic replicas of the Ten Commandments - round topped stone slabs. Most of them had graffiti added to the original rules. Most were illegible. Some were marginally funny. “Thou shall not kill.” unless it’s profitable. “Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife” fuck her instead.
Trini pulled out a stool for Emily. He reached under his shirt and pulled out a small revolver and laid it on the table. “An Old Detroit courtesy,” he said. Trini motioned to the bartender for two drafts. “Labatts.”
The bartender set the mugs down. “Eight bucks.”
Trini reached for his wallet, but Emily put her hand on his. “I got this. You’re doing me a favor.” She pulled a ten out of her purse and waved the barkeep away.
“Thanks,” said Trini.
“You’re welcome. Thanks for walking with me.” Emily sipped her beer. “That’s loaded, isn’t it?”
“Yup.”
The bar wasn’t air-conditioned but the lack of windows kept the temperature reasonable. Trini and Emily were the only patrons. Casa Blanca fans rotated slowly overhead. An occasional slap signaled the death of another fly that wandered too close to the bartender’s defended territory.
“How did you find the safe house?” Trini asked.
Emily turned her stool back to face Trini. She had been studying the eclectic mix of wall hangings. “I bribed a little fat kid on Eight Mile. Then I promised the cab driver a triple fare."
"Who gave you Chunk's name?"
"My parents," Emily said. "They met him at the Farms. They said I should talk to him before I visited them again. They didn't say why.”
Trini half smiled. “Thinking of signing up? The billboards scream for new tenants.”
“I don’t want to live on a Farm. I just want to visit my parents.”
“Have you been out there before? They aren’t prisons. People come and go all the time...I think.”
“I visited them last year. Visitors are all given a super sales pitch to try to get them to join their relatives. Besides, have you ever heard of anyone leaving a Farm once they've signed up? It was the weirdest experience of my life. I don't want to go back alone. Now I won’t even know what that Chunk guy might have told me.”
Trini looked at her wedding band. “Won’t your husband go?”
Emily blushed. “I’m not married. I just wore it for safety.”
“Wouldn’t work down here.” Trini gave the barkeep another ten. “What was so weird about the Farms?”
“It was almost like stepping into a cartoon. Too fake. Too perfect.”
“Were your folks happy?”
“They said they were. And they seemed sincere. But I left with an empty feeling. More than just the pain of saying goodbye. I don’t know. They looked great - fit and fat - obviously. They were due for harvesting soon, which they both looked forward to. It earns them some sort of bonus food points or something. It’s all so disgusting, but it was the Farms or a really destitute old age for them.”
“Well, yeah. The whole concept is unbelievable. President Garcia was some kind of mad genius. He took an obese, lazy-ass, energy starved country and did what no one had imagined possible - convert the fat to fuel and make millions of people, not only be a source of diesel fuel, but love doing it. Work a little, eat a lot, give up your fat. Pay your Fat Tax with real fat. Jesus.”
“My parents weren’t obese and they certainly weren’t lazy.” Emily glared at Trini. “In fact, they joined as non-harvested - just workers - until their infirmities forced them into the non-mobile class. Then there is no choice.”
“I’m sorry. I just get a little crazy every time I think of people being used as a crop. I know that a lot of people join who are neither fat nor lazy. Just down and out due to a government that quit giving a shit about most of its citizens.” Trini finished his beer and motioned for another.
“Did this Chunk guy ever talk about what it was like living there?” Emily had calmed down.
“He loved the beer and burgers, but the ‘milking machines’ - his name for the liposuction needles - scared the shit out of him. Walked right out of his first harvesting. That put him immediately into arrears on his taxes. Joined the Resistance and managed to lose weight to boot. But it was too late to save him.”
“I didn’t think you could just walk out,” Emily said.
“I suspect there was more to it than Chunk let on. I know there are conditions that have to be met before they’ll let a person leave.”
“I know. I checked into getting my parents out. Didn’t tell them. According to the government I don’t have the resources to let them live with me. I doubt they’d leave anyway.” Emily pushed her second beer toward Trini. “Can you finish this?”
Trini finished his and downed hers. He muffled a burp and stood up. The pistol went back in his pants. Emily slid off her stool and picked up her purse. Trini waved to the bartender and opened the door into the city heat. Twenty years ago it would have been an Ozone Action day. Now it was just another smoggy summer afternoon - tough breathing for any thing with lungs.

* * * *
They reached Eight Mile Road and turned west looking for a taxi. Trini didn’t want to see Emily leave and he had just about convinced himself to ask if she wanted him to accompany her on her trip to the Farms. There was the risk of getting caught. If you didn’t pay your tax with money you paid it in fat. At Jail Farm you either did Patriot Labor until your BMI was 20 or you ate ten meals a day hoping your first harvest would square you up with Uncle Sam. The work didn’t scare him; he could make weight in thirty days or so. His opposition to the whole system was too great to give in. Working to make the Resistance an organized entity with political power was a full time job. He didn’t care to spend any time at Jail Farm. Too, part of him knew that he may not be strong enough to leave once the high fructose corn syrup kicked in.
“Would you like me to go with you?” Trini asked.
Emily stopped and flipped open her communicator. She looked at the display then closed it. “Thanks, but no thanks. I’m afraid you’d find me bad company.”
“Well I haven’t so far,” Trini said.
A white cab pulled up to the curb next to them. The driver got out and nodded to Emily. “He’s got a gun,” she said.
Trini spun around and was struck with an immobilizing dart. He collapsed on the hot concrete, eyes locked to the smiling Emily.