Overkill - a short story

Raymond gazed across the dusty plains at the towering mountain range in the distance. Mirages played with his perception as the first rays of the sun stroked the dry desert floor. He could just make out the snow-capped peaks stretching across the horizon in the early morning light.

“We live in a bloated capitalist world that doesn’t care about the devastation its economic games ravage, only the value of the numbers it can plaster on itself,” said Dresden standing at his side.

Raymond sighed. “I know. You’re preaching to the converted.” The mountains seemed to float above the desert. He wished he was climbing one of those peaks. Imagining the path to the summit, his next step, breathing the rarefied air at high altitude. Climbing was meditative, therapeutic. A type of therapy Raymond knew he needed.

“The system spits in the face of those trapped inside it while the billionaires it spawns look idly on like they’re watching a movie they’ve created. Every corner of the planet is plundered for fossil fuels. And now they’re trying to exploit the solar system too.”

Raymond looked at Dresden. She was ranting. When she was in this kind of mood her stream of consciousness could not be stopped. He had tried and failed. He agreed with most of what she said, but she could be a little extreme at times. She was interrupting his peaceful moment. He tried to shake her words out of his head and concentrate on the distant peaks. When he was hiking, he sensed the nature as an unpredictable energy, a tangible thing, an autistic animal with wild mood swings. Compassion and malevolence in equal measure. “It might be a good thing if they all fuck off to Mars,” he muttered.

“They treat the Earth with contempt. They’ll leave every part of society in ruin.”

The backbone of the continent was a jagged line of broken pinnacles, treacherous precipices, and towering pillars stretching over seven thousand kilometres through seven different countries. The gnarly spine of a deceased behemoth. Raymond hoped he could find time to lose himself in the Andes while he was here in Chile. Working with Dresden could be stressful, it was pointless to argue or question her. He had enough to think about. His mind was constantly congested with plots, plans, processes, decisions, and secrets. Too many secrets.

The distant peaks turned pink as the first anaemic rays of sunlight hit. Raymond sighed again and walked slowly back to the pickup. Dresden followed, strangely silent as she got in and drove into the sunrise. She stopped the dirty old pickup at the verge of a low ridge, they got out and walked to the edge without conversation. Raymond got the binoculars and adjusted them to bring into focus the scene beneath. A collection of massive flat sheds that made up the Carne de Vacuno Valdez. It was just before six and a stream of workers made their way on foot across the dusty plain towards the farm.

Raymond could faintly hear the distressed bellowing of thousands of cattle. He had researched this place, an industrial farm and abattoir that force-fed growth hormones into distressed cows packed into prisons. The dung was cleaned out when it was overflowing and dumped in a landfill. The conditions were appalling. Offal, bones, and carcasses were left to rot in a pit. The owner of the facility, Mr. Hector Valdez employed hundreds of people at this farm, one of twelve he owned and paid them a pittance. He treated his workers like his animals, with arrogant disdain. Bullying and abuse was rife. Raymond could see a black swarm of flies circling above like a sentient cloud of methane.

Hector Valdez was currently lying in a mound of dung at the bottom of a cage in the biggest shed. They had abducted him as he was leaving an expensive restaurant, paid off the girl he was with and took him to the farm. It was easy to break in, there was no security. Raymond and Dresden had debated the best course of action with Valdez. Raymond wanted to scare him enough to teach him a lesson. They talked to him for a couple of hours, although Dresden did most of the talking. She told Valdez if things didn’t improve for the workers and the animals at his farms, they would be back to torture him again. Or worse. Valdez cursed at them, threatened them, eventually broke down and tried to buy his freedom. Dresden insisted that they leave him there, cable tied to the cage with the anxious animals. Raymond reluctantly agreed, they couldn’t just let him go. That was Saturday night, and the Monday morning shift was about to start. Valdez had been there about thirty hours.

Dresden nudged him and pointed to an ambulance appearing over the hill. He adjusted the binoculars and watched through the heat haze as the medics arrived and pushed through the crowd of workers. They spent a long time inside the shed. When they re-emerged, pushing Valdez on a gurney, there was no sheet over him, but he was not moving. It was hard to tell if he was alive or dead. He was covered from head to toe in purulent yellow dung.

They stood in the dust as the sun rose. “He has to survive, or this will have been pointless,” muttered Raymond. He turned and looked at Dresden. He didn’t know much about her history despite the jobs they had completed together. She didn’t like talking about anything except what was wrong with the world. And there was a lot of wrong. She was small but fierce, emanating anger and indignation. In between her ranting there was long periods of brooding silence. Raymond often felt as if he was being evaluated by her, his worthiness for some secret future mission being measured.

“Whether he’s alive or dead, this won’t change anything.”

“I hope you’re wrong. We need to scare the likes of Valdez enough to make them change. We have to believe people can change.”

Dresden put her binoculars down and looked at Raymond. Her eyes were dark and cold. She took off her cap and scratched her shaved head. “People like Valdez will never change. They are so overwhelmed with greed and arrogance they are incapable of change. Things like this might raise awareness, but nothing will change.”

They stared at each other for a moment. They were on the same side, but Dresden was much more extremist and confrontational. Raymond felt strangely nervous in her company. He wondered what she was capable of.

“This belief that people can change, it’s bullshit. We won’t get anywhere with misplaced faith and hopeful optimism.” She spat the words out distastefully. “We need a more direct approach.”

Dresden held his gaze until Raymond looked away and lifted his binoculars. The medics were performing resuscitation on Valdez. They looked reluctant. They were doing a half-assed job. They probably knew what a tyrant Valdez was, and they didn’t want to get covered in smelly cow dung. It wasn’t long before they gave up and covered him with a sheet. No-one looked overly concerned.

“He’s dead, drowned in shit. What a way to go.” Raymond grimaced at the thought. “We left him there too long.”

“Good,” said Dresden quietly.

“It’s not good. There will be another Valdez. We need to convert these people, not murder them.” Raymond was angry but he felt no remorse. His only concerns were for the workers and the animals. Their missions had sometimes indirectly led to fatalities, but this was different, they had caused Valdez’s messy death. He was a tyrant, but he wasn’t supposed to die.

They stood side by side in the hot morning sun watching the crowd dissipate. The ambulance drove off and the workers slowly made their way into the factory. Production would continue. Raymond’s console chimed alerting him he had been booked on a flight to Brasilia that night. He sighed, no time for mountain climbing. No time for therapy.

***

Raymond wasn’t surprised to be paired with Dresden for the next job. He often worked alone but their mysterious benefactors had obviously decided they were an effective cell. He would normally receive instructions with a time and place and target, details on the nature of the job and the required equipment. Raymond would do his own research on the people involved but the shadowy organisation he worked for usually had intelligence not available in a general search. He didn’t know who or what the organisation was. There were no names and no contacts. Dresden looked typically unimpressed to see him, she didn’t say anything as he climbed into the pickup truck.

They drove in silence away from the city of Brasilia. Raymond stared out the window at the placid blue Paranoa Lake. Dresden concentrated on the road ahead. It was a long drive north and Raymond slept intermittently. When he woke up, he looked at her, wondering. “What got you started in all this?” he asked eventually.

She glanced at him briefly. “We aren’t supposed to talk about our personal life, you know that.”

“It’s a long drive. They have us working together again. They must have their reasons. No harm in getting to know each other a little.”

“You first.”

Raymond sighed. “It wasn’t anything specific. I was a little rebel, hanging out on the streets of San Francisco, taking drugs, tagging buildings and getting into trouble. I never really took anything seriously but protesting and activism seemed like a natural progression.”

“What was your first job?”

“One night I convinced some friends to tag a Shell supertanker berthed at the wharf. We painted the word ‘murderers’ in five-meter-high lettering down the side of the ship.” Raymond glanced at Dresden who had the beginnings of a smile playing on her lips. “It got some attention on the news channels. Most San Franciscans have no love for Shell, we became instant heroes. Shell didn’t react at all. They didn’t even bother to paint over it. When the ship came back months later, ‘murderers’ was there on the side. Faded but still readable.”

“Sweet story,” Dresden actually broke out with a proper grin. “I remember seeing the pictures. That giant supertanker sailing around the world branded with murderers. But it shows they don’t care about public opinion. Shell is too wealthy and powerful to bring down by conventional means.”

Raymond looked at her wondering what unconventional approach she would take. But he didn’t want to ask. He didn’t want to be subjected to another diatribe about the breakdown of society. “You haven’t told me anything about your past,” he said.

Dresden’s smile disappeared. “No, I haven’t. I might tell you one day.”

They reached the yard in the middle of the night after a long drive through felled forests. It was a massive, fenced area lit up by floodlights and patrolled by security guards with Alsatians. They parked off the road, got their backpacks, and stealthily made their way to the fence. Raymond cut a hole and they slipped through. His heart was beating fast as they crept around the massive harvesters that lay dormant like sleeping dinosaurs, breaking the lock on the fuel tanks and injecting a mixture of molasses and grit into each one. There was a variety of logging equipment. Skidders, excavators, loaders, feller bunchers and giant trucks. They worked quietly and methodically, avoiding the guards until all the equipment had been sabotaged.

Raymond drove back through the night. Dresden sat beside him, staring at the road ahead. He tried to make conversation as the adrenaline from the job faded, but she was uncommunicative. He flicked on the radio and found a talkback show. Raymond understood some Portuguese. Late night lunatics were the same all around the world, full of sad stories and demented conspiracy theories. They got back to Brasilia just as the first flickers of a red sunrise were playing on the horizon. As Raymond was driving over the Ponte JK, Dresden ordered him to stop. He was slightly shocked, these were the first words she had spoken in hours. He pulled over to a viewing platform on the bridge. Dresden got out without a word. She retrieved her backpack and disappeared into the darkness between the floodlights. Raymond sat there for ten minutes, then eventually got out and looked around. He was just about to start calling her name when she reappeared, walking up the empty bridge. Her backpack had gone.

“Take me back to the hotel,” she said.

Raymond slept late, waking up to the notification chime on his phone. It was Dresden asking him to meet her at a bar by the lake. He was surprised. She had never given any indication she thought he might be worth socialising with. She was so hard to read. He had a shower, scrubbed away the fatigue and caught a cab to the bar. He didn’t recognise her at first, wondering why this blond woman was waving at him. She was wearing a hairpiece, makeup and a bright floral top which totally transformed her, drinking a colourful cocktail and taking pictures of the lake like a tourist. Raymond ordered a beer and fries and sat down, still tired from their mission last night and slightly confused by Dresden’s appearance.

“Isn’t it beautiful,” she gestured at the lake.

Raymond lowered his sunglasses and took in the view. Lake Paranoa glistened blue in the afternoon light. Little sail boats, windsurfers and paddleboards cut shapes across the sun-drenched surface. The Ponte JK’s three arches stretched across the water. The steel and concrete bridge was an architectural marvel, connecting the airport on the eastern side to the city centre.

Raymond had questions. Why had Dresden changed her appearance? She had never given the slightest indication that she had any interest in him outside of their missions, so why had she contacted him? Why here? At a lakeside bar. Was this a date? He was still too fatigued to think properly, he tried to relax and drink his beer. Dresden seemed agitated. She kept checking her phone and looking around furtively.

“Need to be somewhere?”

She ignored him, checked her phone again, then stared at the bridge. Raymond followed her gaze. The bridge was busy with late afternoon commuters and freight going to the airport. He could hear the rumble of traffic slowly inching across and see the smoggy haze of exhaust staining the air above, reminding him of the cloud of flies. Suddenly the middle of the bridge exploded. A heavy thud echoed across the lake and Raymond could see cars being flung into the air. Suspension cables snapped, whipping across the disintegrating bridge, cutting cars and trucks in half. The middle of the bridge had been severed and vehicles plunged into the water below. Two more explosions at each end of the middle arch that propelled more cars and people into the air. The noise reverberated across the lake with sonic booms. The arch fragmented, giant pieces of concrete and rebar crashed into the vehicles below, then the entire middle section of the bridge collapsed into the water.

Raymond was stunned. He couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing. It was like a blockbuster action movie, happening so fast. People around him in the lakeside bar reacted differently, some screaming and running away, some had their phones out, enthusiastically recording. Dresden sat watching, she had her phone filming the devastation, her face unreadable behind her sunglasses. The middle of the bridge had disappeared, broken away and sunk. The concrete arch above it was breaking up, pulled down by the suspension cables into the churning water below. At each end, the bridge slumped into the water, cars and trucks teetering on the edge before tipping over and plummeting down. The bridge had cycleways and pedestrian paths in both directions and Raymond could see bodies being crushed by concrete and cables. The collapsing structures eventually settled. Broken arches dangled huge chunks of concrete from swaying rebar. The rumbling noise of the explosions dissipated and was replaced by sirens and screams. Small waves from the falling debris lapped the lake shore in front of them. Dresden took a sip of her drink.

“You did this!” Raymond whispered furiously, remembering their unscheduled stop on the bridge the night before. Dresden glanced at him, a tiny smile playing across her lips.

“You fucking did this!”

“Keep your voice down.”

Raymond was horrified, confused, angry and scared. He felt like he should do something. But what could he do? He had just witnessed the deaths of hundreds of people. The destruction of a kilometre long bridge and he was sitting here with the person responsible. He couldn’t believe it. He stared at Dresden. “You’re insane,” he hissed.

She stopped recording and put her phone down. “Maybe,” she said.

Raymond didn’t know what to do. He had been a criminal for so long the thought of calling the police or any authorities never entered his head. “Why? Why would you do something like that?”

“Just relax. Drink your beer. Don’t draw any attention.”

Raymond shook his head and cursed. He drained his beer. “But why?” he asked quietly.

“You know why.”

Raymond shook his head. “You can’t go around killing people.”

Dresden shifted in her seat, leant back and sipped her cocktail. “It’s the only way to make my point. And there’s too many people anyway, we could do with a few less.”

“Your point? What is the point? You’re not going to win the climate war if you’re not free to fight for it. You’ll be caught and executed as a terrorist.”

“Yes, most likely. Look, it’s a waste of time attacking the corporates. They don’t care, like your Shell supertanker story. We have to attack the infrastructure society depends on. You want people to change, to be less selfish, to reform and start thinking about their footprints rather than their bank accounts, right?”

“Yes.”

“Do you see any evidence of that actually happening?”

“Well, I think people are slowly beginning to realise…”

“Fuck slowly. We haven’t got time for slowly. We haven’t got time for people to begin to realise that electric cars might be a good idea. We need drastic action now or we are all fucked.”

“But how is destroying a bridge and killing hundreds of people going to help?”

“It’s going to make people think twice about driving their cars if there’s a possibility they might get blown up on the way to work.”

“But what about the cyclists, what about public transport? Innocent people trying to earn a living, to feed their families?”

“The entire capitalist system needs to be abolished. It’s so ingrained within generations of slaves that we can’t imagine anything different and it’s getting worse every day. We’ve been running around sabotaging polluters and tyrants for years now and nothing has changed. The rich get richer, and the planet is still terminal. Our soft approach isn’t working. And no-one is innocent.”

“You’re too extreme. It’s overkill. You can’t just go around blowing people up, murdering civilians. Do they know about this? Our benefactors? Are they endorsing this?”

“Of course, they are. They provided the explosives. Its’s only the fear of death that will change people Raymond. Shock them out of their complacent routines. This is a war. We are fighting a war and we’ve been losing. I know it’s drastic, but we need extreme measures to win. We can’t afford to lose. There will be collateral damage. Civilians will die. There are far too many people on the planet anyway. Humanity is like a plague on the Earth. Look at the damage we’ve done, in such a short time.”

“If you’ve got such a low opinion of humanity then who are you saving the planet for?”

Dresden looked at him and shook her head. “Humans will always survive in some form, but the cockroaches do a better job than us. You know I’m right.”

***

The courtroom was packed. Armed police were everywhere, dressed in riot gear, helmets, black armour bristling with weapons. The galleries were full of reporters, lights flashing, camera’s pointing, the excited murmuring commentary describing the biggest terrorism case in history. Raymond spotted Dresden on the other side of the courtroom. She was dressed the same as he was. Orange prison fatigues, slippers and shaved head. She rubbed her wrists as they released the handcuffs and their eyes met. She smiled at him. That crooked little smile that he had not seen enough over the last few years. She looked smaller, like she had shrunk. She looked older but she looked like a child. She didn’t look like someone capable of killing thousands of innocent people.

Raymond was not nervous. He knew their campaign of destruction could not last. He was resigned to the fact that he would be eventually caught, imprisoned and put on trial. He was amazed they had gotten away with it for as long as they did. He thought he should probably feel lucky to be caught in Europe where they had abolished the death penalty but there was no such thing as luck. Only fate. He knew many countries wanted them extradited so they could be executed. He was fine with that. He had spent a lot of time contemplating death. He and Dresden had caused so much death.

The judge arrived and waited patiently for the noise to subside. “The International Criminal Court will now hear the case against Raymond David Johansson, and Dresden Marta Herzhoff, for crimes against humanity. Terrorist actions resulting in over one hundred thousand deaths, in numerous countries around the globe. The court is now in session.”

The trial took weeks. Raymond sat there every day listening to the charges levelled against them. There were many. The prosecutor’s office was substantial and incredibly well-resourced describing in detail every act of terrorism they had committed. Some jobs he had forgotten about. He and Dresden had been working together for over two years, they had grown better at their campaign of destruction. He admitted everything. Blowing up motorways was relatively easy, they did their research, found the blind spots, and planted their bombs without detection. Attacking airplanes was harder. Raymond had to learn how to fly powerful drones with explosive payloads, but once he had mastered the skill of remote piloting, targeting the lumbering airborne beasts was easy. One drone in an engine was enough to bring down a plane. Even a near miss was just as effective. Once the passengers realised they had narrowly survived a mid-air attack they usually wouldn’t fly again. They were the lucky ones.

“Mr Johansson, you have consistently refused to name your benefactors. We know you and Ms Herzhoff had support. Technical support, and financial. This much is obvious. Can you explain why you refuse to name these people?”

Raymond looked at his lawyer. A court appointed lawyer who knew her career would be forever tainted by representing a monster such as Raymond, in a trial she had no chance of winning. She was reluctant from the start, obviously repulsed and slightly scared by Raymond but to her credit, she did her job as she was supposed to.

“Mr Johansson has absolutely no incentive to name these benefactors. He has pleaded guilty to all charges. He has taken responsibility. There is no one else to blame. What can the prosecution offer? A reduced punishment of one hundred life sentences instead of a thousand?”

“Learning the names of these benefactors would lead to further prosecutions and put an end to the extreme eco-terrorism that our planet has suffered from.”

“You cannot force my client to talk. We do not torture people here. Like I said, he has no incentive,” said the lawyer and sat down.

Raymond had changed a lot in the last two years. Thinking back, it seemed like a lifetime ago. He was a different person back then. He thought he was an outlier, a revolutionary, an eco-warrior fighting to save the planet. But there was no revolution, just spray paint. Those missions were just petty vandalism. An annoyance, a brief headline in the back pages. He had done nothing, achieved nothing, changed nobody. He had needed some convincing, but Dresden had been very persuasive, and she was right. Once he shed the fallacy that all human life is sacred and should be protected at all costs, he managed to compartmentalise all the death they caused. Why should death be such a big deal? Why should people be allowed to continue their blinkered, greedy lives of insatiable material consumption. Why would you want to be part of something so rotten? He and Dresden had achieved so much over the last two years. He was proud of their work, and the changes they had inspired.

“The death toll is currently over 150 thousand innocent people with more dying every day from injuries attributed to the destruction caused in your terrorist attacks. The cost of the damage caused cannot be calculated accurately but must be in the billions if not trillions when we consider the lost revenue from all the airlines and transportation companies. You have attacked twelve bridges. Six container ships and eight cruise liners. Thirty-seven of the busiest motorways in the biggest cities around the world have been damaged irreparably. You have destroyed fifty-five airplanes with another eighteen narrowly surviving after being attacked by your explosive drones. The pain, misery and death you have caused is unfathomable and unforgivable. You have both pleaded guilty to all charges which makes the two of you responsible for some of the worst atrocities in human history. There is no punishment sufficient for your crimes. Prosecution rests.”

The judge sighed heavily and shuffled his papers. “I am obliged to ask if the guilty parties have anything to say before sentencing is passed?”

There was a long silence in the courtroom before Dresden stood up. “I was happy once, even normal.” She looked at Raymond as she spoke, she had never talked about her past before. “I was married and expecting my first child. I found out I had lead poisoning from the tap water. Bayer pharmaceutical had been dumping toxic liquids that leeched into the water supply. My baby was stillborn. The entire gemeinschaft was contaminated. Bayer refused to acknowledge any responsibility and avoided any blame. That’s where it started, and this is where it ends.”

Dresden looked around the room. The silence was deafening. “Your honour, you are American?”

The judge narrowed his eyes as he considered the question. “Yes.”

“Can I ask how you travelled here to the Hague.”

“The Vestas hydrofoil.”

“That’s a sailboat?”

“Correct.”

“Two years ago, you would have probably flown in a passenger jet plane, yes?”

“I see what you are getting at Ms Herzhoff but the recent changes in global transportation methods have nothing to do with this trial, or your sentencing.”

“We all know of the worst environmental disasters in history. The Milan dioxin cloud, Bhopal, Chernobyl, The Baia Mare cyanide spill and Deepwater Horizon. But the fossil fuel industry has killed millions and brought the planet to the brink of extinction. They continue to extract coal, oil and gas when they know the damage and death they cause. They run sophisticated campaigns of disinformation, brainwash nations, they wash their facade in the blood of the people and make billions in profit that disappear straight into their superyachts. Those companies behind the exploitation, those individuals that profit, they are the real criminals. They are the ones that should be tried in your court.”

“Ms Herzhoff. Mr Johansson. You have pleaded guilty and taken responsibility for your crimes. But you have not been co-operative, refusing to name your benefactors. Investigations continue and they will be caught. The world has changed. Transportation methods that were once dependent on burning fossil fuels are now almost obsolete. Carbon emissions have dropped substantially for the first time in decades. Whether your two-year campaign of terror inspired a shift in global thinking, or not, only history, and the court of public opinion will decide. But none of this changes the fact that the two of you are guilty of crimes that will never be forgotten. And you must pay for these crimes. You will be imprisoned for the rest of your lives. You will never be free.”

Raymond looked at Dresden across the silent courtroom as the eyes of the world watched. Two years of subterfuge, secrets and schemes to destroy the global dependence on fossil fuels had made them grow close. Their trust and belief in each other had been absolute. They had a connection that was almost telepathic, beyond mere words. He looked in her eyes for the last time.