The Outlier #2: Migrants Read online

come in a little brown truck and shovel it out the back, and then tamp on it back and forth a few times, which is not what I call “fixing”. It's always the same two men, Hilbert and George. I swear they must have the most lenient contract with the city, for they never do a half-decent job, and yet they are called upon every occasion. I suppose they are related to somebody somewhere. It's the only explanation! We have a lot of corruption in this town, you know. I could tell you stories. Why, when I was the president of the Fourth Fidelity I knew about all the shady goings on. Not that I would ever tell, mind you, I'm far too civic-minded to cause a scandal, besides which a wise person knows which side of the sandwich has the butter on it. Is that how it goes? Does a sandwich have sides?”

  “Please show us where it went next,” Dillon asked politely. He had his tablet out and was jotting down a bunch of numbers and other stuff that looked like meaningless scribbles to the Commander, but she knew that he had his own language for this kind of thing, a sort of personal encryption that no computer or security expert could ever hope to crack.

  “Yes, of course,” Miss Moss replied, and the threesome proceeded around the corner. Eventually she led them to all five previous of the shifty pothole's previous locales, finally arriving at the site of the current one, where they encountered the hole's regular companions, the aforementioned Hilbert and George. Miss Moss made introductions all around. Hilbert was the older of the two, a thick, dirt-faced man in an orange jumpsuit and grubby gloves which he kept on while shaking hands. George was a strong and smiley young man who, despite looking like he just stepped out of the shower, was the one who did all the work. He wore regular street clothes – jeans, t-shirt, running shoes – and no work gloves, but held the shovel and was just about to start in on the filling.

  “Could you wait just a minute, please,” Dillon asked him. “I'd like to do some measurements if you don't mind.”

  “It's nothing to me, mister,” George said, leaning on his shovel and displaying his perfect teeth.

  “You have a license or something?” Hilbert wanted to know. “Can't just go measuring stuff without some paper says you can.”

  “A license?” Dillon stood up, turned towards Hilbert,and said, in his most calm and confident manner, “Of course I do.”

  “Well, okay then,” Hilbert shrugged, not even bothering to ask to see it. “Just checking, you know. A man's job is his job.”

  The Commander shook her head. It constantly amazed her how her boss was able to get away with pretty much anything without hardly even trying. It must be something about being a billionaire, she decided for the millionth time. It wasn't like he was oozing charisma, at least not the kind she would notice, but people who didn't even know who he was somehow fell into a habit of instant obedience.

  Dillon crouched down beside the pothole and pointed a small, hand-held laser-guided gadget around its perimeter, then slowly maneuvered the thing in a downward spiral around the sides until it got to the bottom of the hole. The tool made a series of short, sharp beeps while it transmitted a set of figures to the tablet he held in his other hand. Then he stood up, switched off the gadget, put it back in his pocket, and studied the results on the tablet screen for a moment.

  “Y'all done yet?” Hilbert wanted to know, at which George immediately proceeded to start shoveling dirt from the back of their pickup into the hole. Dillon didn't bother to reply. Instead he thanked Miss Moss, and started back towards the car. He walked quickly, the Commander striving to keep up by his side, while Miss Moss lagged farther and farther behind, which didn't have any effect on her attempt to resume her babbling.

  “You do see they are all the same hole,” she tried to tell him, but Dillon gave no indication that he was paying her any attention. The rest of her chatter went unheard.

  “It's curious,” he said to the Commander.

  “Is it?” she asked indifferently. She knew that he would not be listening to anything she said, so she never bothered to say much.

  “I need to know the precise longitude and latitude of the present location of that decaying squirrel in Chicago.” he said.

  Immediately the Commander was on it. She whipped out her phone and began making inquiries, first consulting her checklist for the name and number of the correspondent who had reported the roadkill, then calling that individual and requesting the information, which the individual was unable to provide as requested but was able, after running out of his house and down the block, to give her the address in front of which the dead rodent was presently placed, and the approximate distance from the house to the point in the street where it lay. From this information, the Commander was able to calculate the data her boss needed to know.

  “Latitude, 41.494159, Longitude -87.751686”, she reported. “Do you need the address as well?”

  “Forty one and four nine four and one five nine, got it,” Dillon merely muttered in reply while he punched the number into his tablet. He stopped in the middle of the street, and fingered his pencil-thin 1940's-style movie-star mustache.

  “We need to go here, and we need to hurry” he said, handing the tablet to the Commander. She tapped her phone against the top left corner of the device, and returned it to him. The coordinates had been transferred to her own device and with another tap of her finger she conveyed that data to the car.

  “Say goodbye to Miss Moss?” she mumbled, knowing from long experience that Dillon Sharif had already completely forgotten that person's existence. She herself did not care at all about such formalities. Her mind remained focused on the duties at hand. They got into the car and drove off without another word to their pothole tour guide who was left shaking her head and clucking about manners.

  The Commander led them swiftly and directly to the address her boss had provided, which turned out to be a fire station several blocks away. Dillon popped out of the car and strode into the office, where three on-duty firemen where lounging about, munching on chocolate raised donuts and drinking black coffee from Styrofoam cups.

  “I would like to report an impending calamity,” Dillon said to the nearest one, a large gruff looking man who wore a too-small, light blue railroad-engineer's cap on top of his too-large, sweaty and balding head. The man glanced up at him.

  “There's forms over there,” he snarled, jerking his head towards a yellow Formica counter jutting out along the wall. The counter contained several grubby plastic holders, none of which housed any papers, and a set of pen-holding chains which held no pens.

  Dillon briefly noted the condition of that ledge, and repeated his earlier statement, adding, “this is not going to be good.”

  The gruff man turned to his companions and gave them a look which made them suddenly explode in guffaws.

  “Okay I'll bite. Where's the fire?” the first man asked, turning back to Dillon. This made one of the others choke on his bite of donut and spill his coffee all over his pants leg.

  “Dang it!” he shouted, jumping up.

  “Genius,” the other one cracked.

  “Hey, stuff it,” the first guy said, clenching his fist and getting ready to fight.

  “Guys, guys,” the gruff man calmly stated, still looking directly at Dillon and lifting another donut to his mouth. “We got us a calamity to attend to, ain't that right, mister?”

  “Yes,” Dillon told him, checking his watch. “In nineteen minutes from now, a very large sinkhole will open up directly beneath this station. I suggest you remove all vehicles and any important equipment right away. The damage will be extensive, but you can mitigate the loss and expense if you take immediate action.”

  The fire chief still held the donut directly in front of his face as he stared at Dillon.

  “Who the heck is this clown?” he asked no one in particular.

  “Some kind of junkie?” guessed the coffee spiller.

  “Nut job,” volunteered the other.

  “Looks like a junkie,” the first one repeated. “That stupid cap.”

  “My name is D
illon Sharif,” he informed them, “but that is not important. What matters is that you take immediate action to avoid some rather costly damages.”

  “Dillon Sharif, eh? Dillon Sharif. Are we supposed to know you or something? Like you're some kind of famous, hey, wait a minute. Dillon Sharif. I do know that name.”

  “Yeah, boss. That's the guy that ruined the lottery,” said coffee spiller.

  “Yeah right,” said the other one. “The freaky rich guy.”

  “Seventeen minutes,” Dillon said, consulting his wristwatch. “This will also affect the convenience store next door. I have to go and inform them also.”

  “Wait a minute,” the gruff man stood up, revealing just how imposing a figure he was. He was at least six five and carried more than three hundred pounds, clearly a former football player, possibly professional considering that with all that and his age he looked to be still in excellent condition.

  “Let me get this straight,” he said, leaning over the desk and squinting at Dillon. “You're telling me that a giant-ass hole is about to swallow up my station without any warning or anything. Where did you come up with that? What's your evidence? Why should I believe you?”

  “Yeah,” the coffee spiller complained, “and anyhow we all liked playing the lottery. Thanks a lot for that.”

  “Shut up, Jenkins,” the chief commanded.

  “Sixteen minutes,” Dillon said.