Clever

Alright.

I went back to that new pub again today. I was really worried about the guy I spoke to yesterday. He was there once more, sitting at the bar. The only other patron was Tommy Boyd who used to be in 'The Wide Awake Club' and 'Saturday Starship'. It was definitely him. He was just sitting in the corner, staring ahead, not saying anything. They had the TV on today. A big flat-screen in the corner. It was showing a sports channel but it was one of the sorts of sports channels that can only afford short spurts of cheap sports. They had some third division plank-kicking with a quarter-size screen-in-screen of a soggy beaver steeplechase. The sound was turned right down and the stuttered drone of a helicopter hovering somewhere overhead drowned out everything but the odd sizzle of high-pitched 's' and 'z' sounds from the commentary.

"Safunder..." I said, by way of greeting, as I walked to the bar.

"Saffuh..." the barman nodded in response. The other man just snorted derisively and said nothing.

I ordered pints for the both of us at the bar and put one in for the barman. I guess none of us were so much in a talking mood today - like Tommy Boyd in the corner. So we just sat and supped while the traffic and the helicopter and the 's's and 'z's rumbled and buzzed away.

Half the way down my pint, I felt the windows rattle slightly in their sills from the change in air pressure as the door opened and in walked two community support officers, annotated by their dark blue hat stripes. They came to the bar. "Safunder..." said the first with a nod. He was stocky and swarthy skinned with a thick black monobrow and a big square chin held in an eerie fixed grin. The other said nothing. He was tall and thin and had his hat pulled right down almost to the top of his long, beak-like nose. He leant his head back and his eyes seemed to be looking right up into the brim of his cap so that you could only see their whites. They flickered nervously in their orbits, as if searching skywards for something faint and distant. It was only when the barest noise came from Tommy Boyd, shifting his weight in the corner, that I saw the colour of those eyes for, immediately, they swivelled with uncanny speed and accuracy to the source of the slight fidget, locking on to the movement like laser-guided missile.

The dark round one spoke. "Gents, we're 'aving a little bovva with the ol' surveillance network round 'ere, today. We got a couple of blind spots. One's on the corner 'ere - area 4QNZ3, patch of ground two yards by four, just down from the pub. Both its cameras are aht - whossa chances, eh? We got a temporary choppa keeping watch this mornin'... an eye in the sky..."

He said "eye in the sky" with a slow, conspiratorially rising intonation - like he was telling a dirty joke - to which his colleague registered the first sign of following the discourse with a thin, wide smile on his gaunt upturned face.

The dark round one continued with jovial, twinkling eyes "...but we can't keep 'er up there forever. So's - we needs you boys to carry arahnd a couple of hand-helds for the day. Alright?"

He placed two small hand-held digital video cameras on the bar. The metal casings were pitted and both had bar code stickers on them. "We'll be back in to collect 'em tomorrow, lads."

His face then tightened a little in concentration, as he adopted a more officious tone, and canted: "All footage will be kept securely at Centadata by the Ministerial Authority for Municipal Archives and remunerated commensurately." Then he relaxed. "See boys? MAMA's gonna give you each a few Consumacreds for yer troubles." He paused for a moment, appearing to scrutinise each of us, then smiled, took in the sharp breath of a successfully concluded conversation, and tapped to attention.

"Safe Under The Watchful Eyes," he said.

"Safe Under The Watchful Eyes," his colleague suddenly piped up in a monotone of repeated litany.

"Safunder.." both I and the barman responded, half-heartedly. The man sitting next to me just stared morosely into his pint.

The officers left. The barman lifted up one of the cameras to examine it more closely. The other man at the bar and I just stared at the remaining device. As I sat, I steadily became more aware of the television commentary bleeding into the ambiance as I realised the sound of the helicopter was fading. Then, green lights on each of the cameras blinked on.

The other man got off his stool and stood. "Need the sieve?" the barman ventured helpfully, reaching down under the bar. The man shook his head, took a giant gulp of his pint and put down his glass by the camera which he pushed towards me.

"There you go," he said, "s'all yours, mate."

The barman placed the other camera down on the moist, branded towel of the bar and said, "you want this one, then?"

"I'm not having either," the man responded. Then, he reached out with his right hand and wrapped it around his left thumb, curling up the thumb and squeezing it down into its own fleshy heel. You know how much that hurts, right? Try it! Well, this guy just kept squeezing until there was a loud crack. He staggered backwards for a moment and I thought he was going to faint. But he just looked up at me with wide eyes and a nod, saying "hnn?" like he was trying to elicit approval from me for some clever act or idea.

He had broken his own thumb.

Then he held out his left hand, with its limply hanging digit, and cupped the palm around his right thumb. Letting strange sobs escape from his clenched teeth, he started to apply pressure again until another, louder crack sounded.

He was breathing shallowly and rapidly. He reached out for his pint with his right hand. Its thumb was shaking, well, more vibrating in weird spasms like a floundering fish. The hand slid up and down the glass, ringing gently as his trembling fingers tapped it ineffectually without being able to grip it.

"You see?" he said. "They can't use me now. They need our opposable thumbs. But I'm on to them. I'm way ahead. They can't use me no more. I'm free and at three o'clock she'll be back and she'll make it all better again with the ash and the slingbacks."

His face was green-white with shock and he was shivering. He crumpled to his knees, laughing, crying and blowing milky snot from his runny nose. "The ash and the slingbacks," he sobbed, "THE ASH AND THE SLINGBACKS..."