The Ratting Club

By S. F. Kyd

Life is good for twenty-two-year-old George Hastings. He has a beautiful girlfriend. He’s just landed a terrific job even though the unemployment rate is near eighty percent. He’s alive and thriving (no small thing for a young black man) in Charlottesville, Virginia, one of the most peaceful cities in the United States of America, a free and prosperous nation ruled by Olivia, its beloved, if somewhat bloodthirsty, hereditary president. Meanwhile, for petite auburn-haired Madison Rose, high school is a blast (even if her teachers are all robots) and graduation will be even greater. The whole world beckons to her and her best friend Heather—anything is possible! But then people around George start getting killed. He suspects a connection with his job, but discovers that he can’t quit—it’s death to try. Next, Madison is abruptly thrown out of school and finds herself hunted by a pack of assassins. As George and Madison plunge deeper into the nightmare that their world has become, their lives aren’t the only things at stake. When the only way to survive is to kill, will they be able to hang onto their humanity?

• Language: English
• Publisher: S. F. Kyd
• Release date: May 30, 2020
• ISBN: 9781370631308

S. F. Kyd

S. F. Kyd has for many years lived south of the Mason-Dixon line (Maryland, Georgia, Virginia) and has spent all of those years writing in a variety of genres. As a fiction writer, Kyd explores the many ways people struggle to love in a world scarred by prejudice and wanton cruelty. Proceed at your own risk.

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The Ratting Club

by S. F. Kyd

Copyright © 2019 by S. F. Kyd

Smashwords Edition

Part I. Beneficial Research

Wednesday, February 27

George Hastings thought Olivia looked like a well-made SexBot. There was something artificial about her ripe blondness, and her smooth pale skin was more fleshlike than flesh. But her eyes, serpentine and deadly, were totally convincing, and at this moment they were turning him on.

He worked on hiding his arousal from his girlfriend Sarah Whiting—who was lovely but far from deadly, and just now pointedly ignoring the screen on which Olivia was getting her drain unclogged by some bald naked white dude. Sarah was sitting right beside George on a sofa which was more or less covered with green upholstery, over which generations of owners had spilled coffee, beer, and other substances best not dwelt upon. Aside from the flat-screen TV and a battered end table, the sofa was the only piece of furniture in the living room of this rundown apartment in a formerly prosperous neighborhood of Charlottesville, Virginia. Sarah was leafing through a magazine, turning the pages a tad faster than if she were actually reading it. Disapproval rolled off her like vapor off dry ice.

George laughed at the TV screen. You gotta get a load of this, he said. "I can’t believe what she’s doing!"

"She’s not doing anything, said Sarah. It’s fake."

It’s the kind of thing she does, only crazier. Like the shit she pulled last year at that big dinner?

The Correspondents’ Dinner. Yeah, that was outrageous.

Tongue down the guy’s throat and hand in his pants right up there in front of God and everybody, while husband number, number—

Sarah was looking at the screen now. Four.

—was scowling there in the audience, looking like he wanted to kill her—

Got it the wrong way around there.

George said, She’s all about flaunting it and rubbing your face in it. Remember what she wore to the Oscars that time?

"Did she wear something? I wasn’t sure."

"I swear you could see her pussy. Wouldn’t mind if she rubbed my face in that."

Sarah swatted him. "Behave! She was showing off her new clit ring—you know, the red, white and blue one there were all those rumors about. You can see it here. Maybe it is her. She’s got a nice body."

For thirty-five. George squinted for a closer look, but the camera zoomed out before he could get a glimpse of the infamous ring. Olivia clutched the bedsheets and howled as the man sweated behind her.

Sarah said, Thirty-five isn’t so old.

Olivia and the man changed positions. It was over-the-top filthy now, though to tell the truth George couldn’t see much, since the lighting was dim and the camera angles unrevealing. I maybe would’ve voted for her if I would’ve known she was into this kinda shit, he said.

Quiet! said Sarah, alarmed.

"What, you think we’re bugged? Who would bother to bug us? Hey! Can we try that?"

In your dreams. Sarah leaned closer. Look at her face.

Everybody knows what Olivia’s face looks like.

I mean her expression. She’s doing the things you’re supposed to do, but she’s not feeling it.

It was true. She was going through the motions, but there was no passion in her eyes. She’s made of ice, he said.

Sarah hunched her shoulders. This is not going to end well.

"This is porn, and it always ends the same way. Look at the guy’s dick!"

It’s not just a porno, said Sarah. "It’s Olivia."

Just a minute ago you said it wasn’t.

Well, it is.

The man was getting worked up, near the end. The woman, though, was becoming calmer—eyes shining coldly. The fun hadn’t started for her yet.

Sarah shivered and clutched George’s arm. This is bad.

Bad? Look! said George, laughing as the man leapt up and unloaded, porno fashion, then stood holding himself in his hand, looking awkward. In porn, an orgasm was supposed to end the scene, but this scene was still going on and he didn’t know why.

The woman patted the bed beside her and said, Come. In a single syllable, Olivia’s smoky voice was unmistakable. There was command in it, and menace too. George’s mouth went dry.

The man lay down, still awkward, sensing his powerlessness.

Olivia turned on her side, one arm and one leg over him. "That was good for me, Mike. Was it good for you?"

Y-yes, he stammered.

"Oh, relax, dearie. She kissed his cheek. You’re acting like you never did this before. But you’re a pro, aren’t you? Look at this penis!" She flicked it with a fingernail, and he winced.

I—I gave that all up years ago, he said.

Then what are you doing here, fucking me for money?

It was . . . it was—

It was a lot of money, I know. Don’t be ashamed of making an honest living, Mike. I have great respect for people in your profession. You always deliver value.

Mike was annoyed, showing some life now. Listen, he said.

She talked over him. I’m going to give you a token of my respect, Mike. A going away present.

You don’t have to— he said lamely.

Don’t be silly, darling! What would you think of me if I let you come all the way up to D.C. without giving you a present? Wait here.

No! Sarah whimpered.

The woman jumped out of bed and skipped out of the frame. Trying to look casual but failing, Mike moved his hands as if to cover his crotch but caught himself, remembering what he was being paid for.

Half a minute later the camera panned and zoomed out to show Olivia approaching with an impish grin and a big handgun. Here’s your present! she sang.

Jesus, said George. Sarah gasped.

No, said Mike, scrambling upright, pressing himself against the headboard, raising his knees and hands.

Olivia said, "I can’t let you go out there and tell everybody about the sordid and disgusting things we did, Mike. It would completely ruin my reputation!"

George snorted, Yeah, right.

Wait, said Mike urgently. I’ve got a family—a wife and son.

"A son—isn’t that sweet! Does he have a cock like yours? Maybe I’ll ask him to pay me a visit."

He’s an honor student—

And a wife, too! Do you do to her what you just did to me?

"Please, no!"

Laughing, she raised her gun and fired. Mike grabbed his stomach and rolled onto his side. George leaned closer, horrified but fascinated. Beside him, Sarah was perfectly still. Mike raised his hands to cover his face as the laughing woman fired again and again, chest, head, stomach, replaced the magazine and fired till he was still—a bloody mess.

Olivia said, Well, that was fun! Let’s do it again real soon, shall we, Mike? When he didn’t answer, she turned to the camera. Did you get it all, Sam?

Yes, ma’am, said a man’s voice, just a little shaky.

Upload it to my personal server, as usual, and delete it from the camera. And would you be a dear and call the cleaners? And turn that thing off.

Yes, ma’am. The screen went dark.

That was totally fake, said George, forgetting that he’d argued for the video’s authenticity minutes before.

Sarah said, It looked like when people die for real. Not like in the movies, where it’s a dance the way they die, but real life, where you don’t plan how you fall down or how you’re going to lie. You just land however.

They teach you how to die in acting school. We’re gonna see that guy again in some other video.

Sarah stood. "Maybe you will. If you’ve got to watch stuff like this, would you wait till I’m not around?"

Sure. Sorry. He was sorry, too, and felt that he should take Sarah more seriously than he did. She was good, loving, beautiful—way better than he deserved—and she shouldn’t have to watch that awful video if she didn’t want to.

Sarah said, I saw a job listing you might like.

What? In a second, annoyance eclipsed his guilt. He knew he should try harder to find work: they had been living on odd jobs, hand to mouth, since Sarah had lost her job at the library three months before, and now they were facing eviction in a matter of weeks. Still, he didn’t appreciate her nagging. He was looking for a job, in his own way—a way which, she sometimes pointed out to him, seemed not to involve consulting job listings.

Internet researcher for a company called Beneficial Research, she said. It said you could work from home, flexible hours.

"You could do that job."

"Yeah, but you’d do it better. You’re a genius web surfer. And I’ve got a good feeling about that McDonald’s job. Wouldn’t it be great if we both had an income? I left the ad up in a tab for you."

He went to the computer on the rickety, coffee-stained table in the dining area, looked over the tabs in the browser, and clicked on one. After a few seconds he said, Yeah, I guess I could apply for this.

Good! she said, pleased with herself.

He waited for her to go, but she sat with an expectant look until he said, I’ll take care of it. You don’t have to ride herd on me.

Okay. With skeptically arched eyebrows she carried her magazine to the bedroom.

Left on his own, George scanned the news. It was the usual—enemies defeated, gangs and terrorists rooted out, the happiness of the people soaring ever upwards. Images from the video kept invading his thoughts—the joy on Olivia’s face as she’d entered with the gun, the actor’s bullet-riddled body.

He watched it again, skipping straight to the shooting and slowing it down. Everyone knew what death looked like. Beggars died of starvation in the streets and you had to navigate around their emaciated corpses till the Sanitation truck came for them. People died in their family homes, when they had homes and families—most people had held the hand of a dying relative. Every few months, a battle would erupt on a downtown street and the slain would lie there till Sanitation got around to them. And occasionally you’d see something even more disquieting—a woman in an Olivia gown thrown from a speeding car, a man nailed to a construction wall, three-piece suit and abdomen slit open. Of course: even Top Dwellers had to die.

And then there were the execution videos, which had been a regular feature of American life ever since, a few weeks after Olivia had succeeded the Old Man, her brother having been assassinated, she had hanged her first husband Dale from an oak tree on the South Lawn and posted a video of the event alongside the Easter Egg Roll and the meetings with foreign dignitaries.

That was ten years ago. George’s parents, protective of their only child, had forbidden him to watch the video, so he’d watched it in secret. Men in suits had dragged the First Gentleman, bellowing with fear and indignation, across the lawn, thrown a rope with a noose over the branch of the tree, and hauled him kicking into the air. The twelve-year-old boy had watched with queasy fascination for a good quarter hour till the man was no longer moving—appalled how long a person took to die in real life when movies made it look so quick.

Olivia went on TV that same night, wearing a shimmery gown and an extravagant updo, with her arm around a tanned and handsome but rather nervous young man who was never again seen in public after that. She explained, "I’m just devastated, dears. I loved Dale more than my life, but he couldn’t grasp that he wasn’t running things. This nation can only have one president, and that’s me."

After the execution video got hundreds of millions of views and Olivia’s approval rating spiked, all of her executions were carried out in public, the places and methods varying according to her whim. Watching these videos, George, like a great many Americans, became a connoisseur of the things you could do to a human body to end a life. Hanging, garroting, flaying, firing squad, beheading, burning at the stake—these were terrible to watch, but there was comfort in their official character: rulers had been using these methods to dispose of inconvenient citizens for thousands of years. By contrast, Olivia’s murder of her hapless lover seemed personal and petty.

George browsed the web, curious what people were thinking about the video. Facebook had banned discussion of it, but opinion on other clearnet forums was divided, the arguments couched in vague polite formulas. On the darknet, opinion was unanimous that it really was Olivia in the video, having actual sex with a washed-up porn star named Michael Grossman, screen name Barry Pole, and killing him afterwards for the sheer fuck of it. Everyone agreed it was completely in character. She was America’s Caligula.

Okay, they were probably right. Olivia was a sadist and a murderer, and that was her in the video. It was just confirmation of what everybody already knew.

George returned to the job ad that Sarah had left for him and read it again.

Internet researcher. Reputable company. No experience necessary. Work from home. Flexible hours. No benefits.

Reputable company was bullshit—there were no reputable companies. But working from home appealed to him, even if home was bleak and uncomfortable, with shabby furniture and dirty blank walls. Flexible hours sounded good, especially if it meant he could work as much or as little as he liked. As for No benefits, what the fuck did that mean?

He clicked on the link, which took him to an online form headed Beneficial Research. He opened a new tab and Googled it, but couldn’t find a company with that name. It was probably a startup—one of those fly-by-night outfits that operated out of broom closets, stole as much as they could, and evaporated. In short, it was a bullshit job, and he wanted nothing to do with it.

Still, he had told Sarah he’d apply, so he’d apply. He ignored all but the required blanks and checkboxes in the application form and wrote,

There’s nothing I can’t find online, even if it doesn’t want to be found. You won’t be sorry you hired me.

He attached the worst picture of himself he had—one where he had been scowling at Sarah for taking him by surprise with her phone, and she said it made him look like a gangster. Then he clicked Submit and thought he had done reasonably well, considering that he didn’t want the job. He was rooting for Sarah to get the McDonald’s job: then the pressure would be off him for a while.

George wandered back to the bedroom, where Sarah, perfect brown body covered only by a sheet, set her magazine aside and gave him the smile that always undid him—that said all was forgiven, and he was welcome.

Tonight, it took some effort to concentrate on his beautiful girlfriend and not be distracted by thoughts of the video. He knew what Olivia was up to: she was letting everybody know she could take whatever she wanted—any man, and for that matter any woman. They were all hers to take for herself, play with, and throw out with the trash when she was tired of them. Well, good for her. It had nothing to do with him: her victims were politicals, actors, wealthy capitalists, and who cared about them? He was way too small a fry to attract Olivia’s attention.

Still, it was hot, thinking of those dangerous eyes, that body, which she loved displaying to the nation, the gun in her hand.

Baby, said Sarah, drawing his attention back to her warm brown eyes, her deliciously curved lips, the feel of her soft breasts brushing the skin of his chest. To hell with Olivia: here was everything he could possibly want in a woman. He kissed her and she overwhelmed his senses.

Thursday, February 28

George woke a little before eight. Quietly, so as not to wake Sarah, he pulled on yesterday’s clothes—the frayed work shirt and neatly patched jeans that were like a uniform, announcing to passers by that he was unemployed but not homeless. He went to the kitchen, where he made coffee and checked the news while it was brewing. No American news organization had anything to say about the video—they were waiting for instructions from Washington. Foreign news sites were blocked, and circumventing the block was a crime, though it was easy to do.

So the news was inconsequential and boring until, at eight o’clock exactly, the siren sounded at the nearby firehouse and the computer’s screen dissolved to a gray field with the presidential seal centered on it.

George held his breath. Every week or so, Olivia took over the nation’s TVs and computers, and the law required everyone to stop whatever they were doing until her business—an announcement or an execution—was done. Ever the exhibitionist, she was seated at a kitchen counter wearing a skimpy sheer nightie. George wondered if she had had her nipples surgically enhanced. They seemed to have gotten perkier since the last execution.

Olivia stared into her coffee cup for a few seconds, then gave a start as if she’d only just noticed the camera. Oh! she said. "Hello, dears. I want to have a word with you about that video that surfaced last night. You know, the one that supposedly showed me having sex with a man and killing him. I saw immediately that it was part of a plot to drive a wedge between me and my public—the great Americans that have repeatedly entrusted the highest office in the land to me. I set the FBI to the task of finding the people responsible, and they literally worked all night to track down the man behind the camera—a cinematographer and producer named Samuel Puckett. I asked them to bring him around so we could get acquainted, and here he is! Hello, Sam."

The camera pulled back to reveal a corpulent middle-aged man seated on the other side of the counter, wearing an artificial tan, a Hawaiian shirt and a confident smile. This struck George as odd: he should have been panicking. Hello, Madam President.

Olivia said, Tell the public something about yourself, Sam. What kind of movies do you make?

Not your big features, he said. I mostly do commercials, like, you know, for local businesses. Weddings, bar mitzvahs, stuff like that.

Is that all?

When business is slow I do a little porn.

Like the video we saw last night. Tell the public about that video, Sam.

Well, it was . . . it was—

The first thing everyone wants to hear, I’m sure, is whether that was me in the leading role.

Oh, no! Of course not! That was an actress.

You made her up to look like me.

Yes, a wig and the right makeup—and she looked a little like you anyway.

And she was willing to kill a man on camera?

"Oh, he’s not dead. He’s another actor."

My investigators spent the night looking for him, but they haven’t found him.

Sam seemed to be developing a nervous tic in his left eye. Oh, ah, I’m sure he’ll turn up. It’s been almost two years—he could be anywhere by now. Give it time.

"Well, that’s a relief. You made quite a splash with this video, Sam. I guess you could say it spoke to people, you know—moved them. Tell us about your inspiration."

Flustered, he said, My inspiration?

"Yes. What kind of artistic statement were you trying to make?"

Thrown, he started to stammer. It was just a s-s-spoof, M-M-Madam President.

She leaned forward and looked into his eyes. "Oh, a spoof! You were making fun of something—or someone."

I guess, sort of—

Her smile put George in mind of a shark circling a tuna. Who were you making fun of, Sam?

He was sweating profusely. "It wasn’t exactly making fun—"

"You know what I think, Sam? I think you were making fun of me."

The camera zoomed in on his face. There was panic in his eyes. "Oh, no! Never, Madam . . . Madam President! It was . . . it was—"

Whoever disrespects me disrespects the presidency, Sam. Disrespects the nation and its people. We can’t allow that.

He was white and trembling. You promised . . . if I told everybody it wasn’t you . . . it would be all right.

"And it will be all right, Sam. It’s just that you won’t be a part of it."

Please, Olivia! I’ve always done everything you—

Before he could finish the sentence, a man in a dark suit stepped forward and shot him in the back of the head. He slumped over the counter and slid off his stool and out of sight.

The camera pulled back and Olivia turned to face it, smiling brightly. Now you know the truth behind the so-called Olivia snuff video, she said. And I’ve reminded you what happens to traitors in America. Oh, and one more thing: Congress met before dawn this morning and passed a law making it a crime to watch that fake video. All the major streaming services have deleted it, and you should delete it too, if you downloaded it, or you may find yourself keeping company with poor Sam here. Stay safe, darlings, stay out of trouble, and remember Olivia loves you.

She looked down at her breakfast and said, Oh, ick! There’s blood on my danish!

George was confused, wondering what, exactly, he had just seen. That was definitely Olivia in the video, and it was no skin off her ass if people believed it—so why had she killed Samuel Puckett? Well, it was no skin off George’s ass either—he put it out of his mind.

The coffee was finished but there was nothing to eat: George decided to walk out to a Wawa on Main. He let himself out of the apartment, descended the two flights to the building door, opened it, and cautiously peered out into the street. A smooth-faced man of around forty, expensively dressed in a light gray suit, was standing up by the railroad crossing fifty feet away. The man turned towards George with a practiced, ingenuous smile.

This wasn’t a good time to go out after all: breakfast could wait. George put his hand in his pocket, hoping the man would think he was armed, and backed into the building. The man stepped forward and said, Hello, George.

Don’t come any closer. I’ll shoot you.

The man held up his hands to show George they were empty. I liked your application.

Yeah, well, you weren’t supposed to.

It’s a good bit of money for a little bit of work.

You gotta do better than that, with all these motherfuckers in suits begging me to pretty please take their jobs.

The man laughed. Fair enough. You want to know why I’d offer you a job when you made no effort to impress me.

Something like that.

We’re in the business of answering questions the government asks us, but we’re even more in the business of making easy money. Governments everywhere leak cash, and smart businesses know how to position themselves so it drips into their bank accounts. I like employees that work hard enough to make us money, but not so hard they fuck it up for everybody else.

I don’t fuck with the government, said George stubbornly. My girlfriend’s gonna get a good job with McDonald’s.

Maybe you don’t fuck with the government, but the government fucks with you. McDonald’s is advertising precisely one job in the city, sweeping up and monitoring CookBots and AutoServers, and they’ve got ten thousand applications. That’s what happens when the unemployment rate is pushing eighty percent. I’m offering a job right here and now that’ll pay more than McDonald’s—more than ninety percent of the jobs in this city.

You should offer it to my girlfriend. She’d do great work.

Maybe she would, but I’m offering it to you.

Why are you here? Why not write or call?

I like to get a look at the people I’m thinking of hiring—see how they react to me.

George scowled. You don’t want a record of this conversation. You’re hiring off the books.

It’s for the best—both you and the company will save a lot in taxes.

Reputable company my ass. You’ll get yourself shot on the Downtown Mall. The Mall was a tree-shaded street open only to pedestrian traffic, a favorite hangout for the whole city, including, occasionally, assassins.

Folke said, We’ve been around nine years, and we’ve never yet gotten in trouble. And anyway, it’s me that has to worry, not you. Look—you’re on your way somewhere. Let me walk with you, and I’ll tell you more about the job.

The man seemed harmless enough. Okay, said George, and descended the steps, keeping his hand in his pocket.

Side by side they threaded the urban obstacle course of trash and cracked pavement. The man said, Beneficial does contract work for the Justice Department, analyzing data gathered by government agencies and other contractors. It’s frankly dull, but the work is steady and it keeps the wolf from the door.

A homeless woman, weathered and ragged, approached the man in the gray suit, saying Can you help me out, Mister? He said, Fuck off, and she said, Asshole.

The man continued, The government collects huge amounts of communications data and filters it in all kinds of ways, from simple keyword searches to sophisticated language processing algorithms—but artificial intelligence is far from perfect, even in this enlightened age, and they need human eyes to tell them whether what their computers think they see is really there. There’s no substitute for human intelligence, and that’s what we’re in the business of supplying.

So I’d be reading. They rounded the corner onto Main. Beggars called out to them as they walked, but they ignored them.

Yes, said the man, and in fact we call people in this position readers. It’s an easy job—all you need is basic literacy and a tolerance for boredom.

It’s not exactly internet research.

There’ll be some of that too. But if we posted an ad long enough to explain the job in detail, nobody would read it.

They were in the Wawa, George studying a rack of plastic-wrapped pastries. How much money we talking?

This is piecework, so it depends how much you want to do. But maybe five, six hundred in an average week. More, once you catch on.

Catch on?

To the fact that this is not back-breaking work. You’ll be looking through material we send you, seeing what else you can find to fill out the picture, answering questions that aren’t worth asking and whose answers nobody gives a rat’s ass about. You can get away with a certain amount of skimming, even faking.

George was starting to warm up to this man. So what it comes down to is you’re looking for people with some ability but not too much ambition.

That’s about the size of it.

I guess I could try it out for a while. See how it agrees with me. When do I start?

"This afternoon, if you’ve