The retail banking division was a busy place that day. The clerks sat at their tables, logging and tracking the information from the tellers, the loan officers and the other customer-facing staff. The Commercial Loans office was in a welter of activity. Loans were going out at an unprecedented rate, and at unprecedentedly low interest. There was also a flurry of whispers. Young men and women striding purposefully in and out of the bank, arguing with tellers, with managers. More senior, older people, having the same arguments more quietly and more forcefully.
Xiasai was an utterly ordinary young man. A father of three, married into the second generation with ambitions for his children to marry into the main line one day. He lived in slightly nicer than average Clan apartments, which he could afford thanks to the cushy bank job. A teller had few opportunities to graft, but there was always extra income to be found by the motivated. His wife, used to a certain standard of living, was plenty motivating. Theirs had been an arranged marriage, and not a happy one.
The Raging Flood Group was in trouble. He didn't want to join this group, but some classmates pulled him into it, and nowhere better would have him. Their accounts were mostly frozen, and their businesses seized. Temporarily! He believed, firmly, that it was temporary. Their secret patron was a great man. A truly great man. One who could shake the Ramparts with a word. This was a temporary setback, and the loyal would be rewarded and elevated above all others. He was proud to say that he always said the right thing, or he would be if anyone ever asked him about it. No one ever had.
He didn’t know why so many of the group’s seniors were coming through the bank. They looked pissed. Some even glared at him and left without speaking. All he could do was keep his head down. Some people had approached him with offers. He hadn’t accepted yet. He wanted to run it past some of his seniors in the group. But passing a little information, reporting a few things that maybe weren’t one hundred percent accurate? For really serious money? He would be a fool not to!
Xiasai worked through lunch, naturally. Some said that lunch was an important networking opportunity, but he believed that it was more important to be seen as a hard worker. He sucked on his little stimulant lozenge, let it numb the pain in his feet, and carried on serving with a smile. He would eat tonight.
Security started picking tellers off the floor, and taking them to the back offices. Xiasai felt his bowels freeze. Rumor had it that Purchasing had to buy a huge new batch of cleaning supplies for the Guards. So much blood and… other… fluids to clean. The tellers came back out again, thankfully. He breathed out. They were escorted directly from the building, their bank robes stripped from them at the door. His lungs seized up and he forgot how to breathe in for a minute. The customer at his window had to snap to get his attention.
Xaisai noticed that most of the fired tellers were from the Raging Flood group. That. Wasn’t good. He needed to pee. He really, really needed to pee, but he couldn’t leave the window. He never left his window once he was on shift. It would look bad. There was a big queue. He couldn’t just ask someone to cover for him. What if he looked guilty? He furtively looked behind him, pretending to search for a deposit slip. He couldn’t see Xiaponse, the floor manager, but he could see the guards watching like vultures. And that little sleaze Xiafan was hanging around “filling” too. She would be the first to rat out someone, whether she saw anything or not.
He was sweating. He knew he was sweating. He didn’t dare wipe his sweat. What if they saw him and wondered why he was sweating? What did they know? Worse, what did they suspect? He heard the rumors, suspicion was more than enough to get a Senior Principal hauled to the cells. A teller probably didn’t require even that much. He heard about what they do down there. With their little needles and big hammers. He really, really needed to pee, but he didn’t dare move. Not one inch. If he moved his feet even a little, they would haul him away and break his bones and he would die in pain and in the dark.
Xiawu came storming in. His wife appearing in the bank was not a relief. Xiasai barely had time to process her presence when she shoved aside the person standing in front of his window.
“Moron!” She spat in his face. Then punched him in the nose. He reeled back, blood spraying. “What kind of shit for brains moron did I marry? How the fuck are you still working when your dumbass has been fired?!”
“I’m not fired? I didn’t move my feet.”
“What the fuck are you talking about? Who gives a shit about your feet? You. Are. Fired. I know you are fired because we got fucking evicted an hour ago! Yeah! Right when I had Janet and Sisi over for lunch. And we got evicted because your dumbass got fired and we don’t qualify for the apartment any more!”
“That. That’s not possible?”
“Your shit is scattered across half the hall, fuckface. The fines are racking up, and you really can’t afford them.”
“Fines?”
“Gods you are so slow! What were my parents thinking? You know what, I don’t want to do this in private. Here.” She tossed papers at his bloody face. “I stopped by Central House on the way over. We are divorced. Don’t worry, they already emptied the joint account. I should have most of my dowry back, if not any of my time or youth.”
“’Wu, what the fuck are you talking about!”
“You NEVER, NEVER call me that again! NEVER. You take my godsdamned name out of your mouth! I am Madam Xiawu to you, babydick, if you ever have the guts to speak to me again, which you fucking better not.”
“I. AM NOT. FIRED!”
Xiawu shook her head with disgust, cupped her hands and yelled. “CAN ANYONE EXPLAIN TO MY FUCKWIT EX WHY I KNEW HE WAS FIRED BEFORE HE DID?”
Xiaponse came striding out of her office looking irritable.
“Will you kindly shut up? Look around you. Look at my floor. You see people moving? No, they are looking at you being dramatic.” She glanced briefly at Xiasai and waved the guards over. “You want to know why? Because Housing processes eviction paperwork faster than Personnel does terminations. I was going in order of seniority. But hey, I guess you husband-”
“EX husband, those are the papers on his shoes.”
“Congratulations.” Xiaponse’s voice was drier than desert sand. “Your former husband just got bumped up the list. You are fired, Xiasai. What’s more, I am banning you from the bank. Not that you have anything in your accounts anymore. Good news is that the clan has other work for you.”
“But. But I never moved. I never even took lunch!”
“Yeah, you just popped pills all day. Nobody gives a damn about how long you stood in the window like a zombie. How you got the guts to slander a great person like President Xiatoktok I’ll never know.”
“I don’t-”
“Oh gods he’s stammering again.” Xiawu interrupted him.
This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.
“You were never going to be more than a teller, were you? Let me spell it out for you. Our President humiliated himself, put his life on the line, to make peace with the City. Do you remember the Reaving of the Rift Valley? Or the pictures of all those burned out apartment buildings in Sousien? I do. It’s really easy to talk trash. It’s a lot harder to stop a godsdamn massacre! So you will leave your robe, leave my floor and never offend my sight ever again! Sangfu, Rhett, take him away. Podrick wants him, I don’t.”
The guards grabbed him roughly, stripping his robe off as they dragged him towards the back door. His head was spinning.
“But, my group…”
“What group? You are with the River Rats? Some wiseguy figured out that your companies are broke, swooped in and bought out all their contracts. All that’s left is the land and more debt than the group can cover.” One of the guards grinned. “You guys all own a bit of the group, right? I wonder how big your piece of the debt is? Too much to keep working at the bank. But at least you get to work for Podrick. Lucky you.”
He was hauled out back and shoved into the waiting arms of a large man with soft hands and an odd funk to him.
“Hey there buddy. You must be lil’Sai. I’m Podrick, your new boss.” He set him on his feet, nodded at the guards, and started steering him away from the bank.
“That’s XIA-Sai. Just the given name-”
“Yeah, like I said. Lil’Sai. I heard you had some wardrobe concerns, and I thought, you know what? I got just the job for this fella if he should ever be out of work.”
They hustled through the city, heading over towards the tanneries. Mercifully they stopped a good way short, near the drovers' pens. The animal smell was thick. Podrick hauled him into a long brick building. Dozens of people were picking through heaps of sheeps wool. Dozens more were washing the fleeces in steaming tubs. The stink of the place was incredible.
“Welcome to your new job! Since you are new, we are starting you at the bottom. See these folks?” He pointed at the people carefully picking through the fleeces. They would lay a fleece on a table and start pulling out twigs or straw and stuck on bits of the sheep’s own droppings that clung to the wool. No need for gloves, apparently.
“That’s called skirting. It’s your new job, and it’s really important. You got to get the fleeces as clean as you can, because then the fleeces go to washing, and if there is too much crud on them, they can’t get clean. Which means that if, gods forbid, the dirty fleece ever reached spinning, why, a whole skein of yarn could be ruined.”
“I. I see.”
“Yeah, I knew someone concerned about uniforms would get the importance of this job. Now, this is a great job for a young go-getter like you, because you are paid for each properly processed fleece. Our supervisors keep a very exact count of how many fleeces you process that pass muster, you can be sure of that. The minimum shift is ten hours, but I bet you will be pulling extra hours in no time.”
“My things. My apartment. My kids. Where will I live? We live?”
“Already covered. Well, I can’t help with your stuff. Might want to sell it or something. Or the kids. Maybe your wife will take them? There is always the creche. But, on the positive side, this job qualifies you for housing right here in the factory. You will be in a twelve person dorm, so you will never be lonely. Why, I hear that a top bunk just opened up. Prime real estate in the winter, keeps you that little bit warmer at night. Ain't that swell? Don’t worry, the rent is deducted from your pay automatically, as is any debt you owe. One less thing to worry about. And if you work hard, in just a few years you might just be promoted to washing, with the extra money that comes with it.” Podrick patted him “fondly” on the shoulder. “You are going to fit right in here, lil’Sai. I just know it. We are going to take really good care of you.”
“President Xiatoktok?”
His head snapped around at the unfamiliar voice, but he forced himself to act calmly.
“Yes, what is it?”
“I thought you might want to be told- there is a mass firing going on in the retail division. It seems that an interest group, the Raging Flood, went bankrupt and consequently all their members failed the probity requirements for Bank employment.” The middle aged lady drew in a deep breath and continued. “The Raging Flood was one of the groups bad mouthing you. Passing pictures. Laughing. I thought you should know that they are gone, and won’t be missed by the rest of us.”
“Ah. Thank you very much. Duty!”
“Yes, President?
“Record the present time on the same sheet as before. Then write “One Move.” Send it with my compliments to Xiatokmia and copy Xiatokte.”
“Two twenty-seven in the afternoon, One Move. I will send it out at once.”
“Thank you for letting me know what’s going on in Retail. I’m not familiar with that interest group, and I expect I will soon forget they ever existed. Gold does not mingle with dross. As I think you well know.” He stroked his neat little mustache, stiffened with a touch of wax. “I will remember your service.”
“Oh, thank you President Xiatoktok, but really, this was more… My grandmother died during the Sousien Massacre. It’s not the kind of thing you can really forget. Every time you talk to someone, you wonder. Is this lady cracking jokes and fixing my shoes going to be part of the mob? How about the nice old guy who sells apples next to Grace Square? Because it’s not that it could be anybody, it’s that it is everybody. So. Thank you.”
Xiatoktok nodded calmly. “My duty. But thank you for your kind words.”
By two forty-five, everyone knew that the Raging Flood group had collapsed in a day. They were victims of a sudden attack by a consortium of small traders led by a third rate company called Apaata and Innik Grain Merchants. Who were trading under the name A&I Mercantile as of early afternoon. They changed the company name on the charter. They felt the new name better represented their true stature.
By three, word had spread from the bank that A&I financed their take over with outrageous amounts of leverage in the form of shockingly low bank loans. Word also spread about the pictures shared by the Raging Flood Group, and a loudmouthed lout by the name of Xiasai.
By three fifteen, only the most socially dense hadn’t heard that an early morning courier made a delivery from the President’s office to A&I. Contents unknown, but obvious. Rumors of a hidden relationship between the President and A&I started circulating at speed. They were the last to see him before the assassination attempt. Did they try to warn him? Was this the President returning a favor? Or had they always been his pawns?
By three-thirty, it was the universal understanding of the bank staff that Xiasai was currently having the shit kicked out of him on the way to one of the secret mines owned by the President. He would labor in the dark until he died. None of his kids were biologically his. This was a mercy, as they wouldn’t have to live with his piss running through their veins. His former wife was alternately pitied and whispered about. Was she in on it? What did she know, and when did she know it?
By four, there were two competing theories. The first was that President Xiatoktok, placing Clan above self, agreed to take the Presidency knowing that he would have to clean up the mess left behind by Fatty ’Lu. Fatty ’Lu was a traitor. Everyone knew this. He had been working for years to undermine the Xia in Cold Garden. It took someone with guts and resolve, someone like President Xiatoktok, to come in and set things right. The President was nothing less than a martyr for the Clan.
The second theory was that this was all strategy on the part of Bloodless ’Tok. He deliberately engineered the situation to garner sympathy and to divide his enemies in the Clan. To lure out the hidden players. His tools in the city were consolidating his personal power. He was using Clan money to strengthen his forces, and weaken his enemies. Now he was just netting the little fish to starve the bigger fish he would go after next. Martyr? It was all a scheme.
The pictures vanished from the bank, and the Xia Clan largely seemed to agree they were in bad taste. Hidden whispers ceased, or got a lot more hidden. Bribes were not refunded, and the bribed declined to make good on their promises. At least not now.
The Duty Secretary thought about the two notes he took, and swore blind that he would never take another bribe. He had an inside source. Xiasai had been blinded with hot needles before being stripped naked and sent to the very bottom of the mines. It was madness to cross President Xiatoktok.