The Debt Collectors War

Chapter 13

A cold wind was blowing off the mountains they had just flown over as they landed at another base. They were still in Canada, still close to the border, at some kind of regional processing and monitoring centre the field personnel used as a rear-area safe zone.

A local official met them as they climbed out of their plane. He was Jackson, he said, and was already talking as they got out, saying he’d been told to expect them, and they would have all the cooperation they needed.

He was holding out his hand towards Ellie too, apparently without thinking. Holding out his hand in a way no-one in the civilised world had done in generations. It was a nice sentiment, Ellie thought, but now she didn’t know what to do.

Jackson just kept holding out his hand.

Ellie looked at it for a moment, and Jackson didn’t take the hint, so in the end, slightly embarrassed, Ellie said, “I’m sorry, but I don’t…”

Jackson flushed. “Of course,” he said. “I’m so sorry. The local customs…”

“No worries,” Ellie said. “It’s fine.”

They bowed to each other instead.

The plane had stopped beside to some kind of operations centre. It had probably been the terminal, back when this had been a small local airport. Jackson led them inside the building, and kept talking as he did. He was self-conscious now, Ellie thought. He was nervous, thinking he’d made himself look bad to the visiting VIPs, and so was talking too much, self-deprecatingly, just to fill the silence. He said sorry several times, and then started saying he’d gone native, that they all had here, that the facilities were primitive, and they had too much contact with the debtors and local people, and that they even ate food which had actually been grown in the ground and it was surprisingly pleasant once you got used to it, that he felt healthier and had more energy when he did.

Ellie just walked. She didn’t answer. Jackson seemed so nervous that anything she said might just make him worse. This was probably the first time he’d had any direct contact with their corporate headquarters, she thought. Or indirect contact, really, she supposed, but Jackson didn’t know that.

Ellie walked, and pretended to listen, hoping he’d quieten down on his own, and stop talking about food. She hoped, but Jackson didn’t. Every so often she glanced back at Sameh, making sure Sameh was still there.

Sameh was just following along, looking around, trying to look placidly terrifying. Apparently some of Sameh’s earliest memories were of old-time special forces soldiers, real special forces, from an actual nation-state’s army, and what had impressed her the most was their relaxed, attentively curious manner. They had seemed almost innocent, unabashedly nosy, and careless about their own personal security too. That manner had impressed her as a child. Later, thinking back, Sameh had realized they’d been so aware of their perimeter security they hadn’t needed to seem to care about what was close to them, and she’d also realized their nosiness was cultivated, a sham-innocence to disarm others, and she had seen its value and had cultivated it herself. She walked behind Ellie, and looked at things as she did. Signs and passing people and the view out the building’s windows. She stared at Jackson sometimes, too, when he said especially odd things. Mostly at the back of his head, since he was walking ahead of her, which probably didn’t have quite the effect she hoped, but she stared.

And Jackson kept talking.

Jackson wouldn’t stop talking. Ellie wished he’d shut up. He was mostly talking about food, which was just rude, and how wonderful dirt-grown food was. Of course, he said, it did look like it had been made in the ground, and yes it came from markets where it was handled by vendors, and could have been touched by anyone, absolutely anyone, and yes it was sometimes still crusted in dirt. But dirt could be washed off, Jackson said, and food could be sterilised thoroughly, and the benefits of eating that way were extraordinary. All the personnel here, at the base, had had become quite taken by the idea of traditional food, he said. It was good for morale, and gave them all something to do, rather than just opening packets.

As he said that, Ellie suddenly understood what was going on. Jackson was thinking about performance reviews. He didn’t know who Ellie was, or why she was here. He didn’t know, because he didn’t need to know, so he was being safe and talking up his management innovations to someone he thought was from head office. Ellie wondered if she should say something, but decided not to disappoint him. He’d probably be happier not knowing. He kept talking. He was still embarrassed by his earlier bad manners too, she thought, and seemed almost guilty about his peculiar diet, now he’d been caught at it by someone from headquarters.

He was obsessed with his diet. He was talking about it far too much. He began talking about slicing and boiling and peeling food, and the quaint old ways they were all embracing, and finally Sameh seemed to have heard all that she could stand.

“For fuck’s sake,” Sameh said, suddenly. “That just sounds disgusting.”

Jackson looked back at her, quite shocked, apparently upset. He swallowed, and then went quiet and after that didn’t say any more.

Ellie wondered if she should say something reassuring, so he didn’t feel too bad. She decided not. He was a long way from anywhere here, stuck at an outpost at the end of the world, and a reminder of how civilised people behaved politely might be useful for him next time someone visited. For the visitor’s sake, if not his.

She grinned at Sameh, though, when Jackson wasn’t looking, and Sameh made a little mocking half-bow as she walked, and seemed quite pleased with herself.

It wasn’t even that Sameh was practically fussy, Ellie thought. Neither of them could really be as fussy as most people about what they ate. They couldn’t be, and still work in the backward parts of the world they did. Ellie wasn’t utterly nauseated by the idea of eating dirt-grown food rather than processed, or of using non-automated bathrooms, or of touching other people, or doors, or even of toilets that didn’t flush on their own and taps that needed physical contact. She didn’t think she was squeamish. She was a solider. She’d eaten some odd things when she had to, and used a hole in the ground as a toilet. She wasn’t horrified to know that some people ate food which had been made in the ground, where animals and people shat. She wasn’t nauseated by the idea of food being grown rather than manufactured, not nauseated like her parents or the people she had grown up with in Australia would be nauseated, but she wasn’t entirely comfortable with it all either, and would rather not have things like this thrown in her face.

And it wasn’t that Sameh especially minded what Jackson ate either, not the way that a person from Shanghai or Lagos would probably mind. It was more just that he talked about it so very, very much, and Sameh just preferred not to think about things like this, Ellie supposed. To not think about where things she ate came from, and who had touched old-style doors before she pushed them open. Ellie preferred not to think about all that either.

The problem was fixed, though. Sameh had shut Jackson up. He was suddenly subdued. They all walked in silence, through the base, apparently heading for the operational centre.

Ellie felt bad for Jackson, but relieved he’d finally stopped talking about food.