The Weapon - Genesis - part 11
By Diana the Valkyrie
The dam


"Scrambled eggs and toast with marmalade, yummy. But where did you get the
eggs?" "I robbed a couple of nests." "Wendy!" "What?" "What about the poor
birds?" "Oh, and you think hens don't mind either?" "I suppose." "Anything in
the newspaper?" "Sex scandals, NHS failures, wars, another Legionnaire's
victim, a food scare, more taxes on more things, flood ..." "Flood?" "A dam
gave way, eighteen casualties, damage." She came round behind him and read the
paper over his shoulder. "How about that one, then?" "Not a lot of point,
kitten, the damage is already done, it's just a clear-up job now." "I bet a
flying bulldozer would come in handy, though." He looked up at her. "You
could, couldn't you. But they should be able to clear the mess up without your
help." "But suppose there's people stranded or something. House flooded, no
food, not enough evacuation helicopters?" "You want to be a helicopter or a
bulldozer, which?" "You know what I mean." "I'm sure they're coping." "But it
wouldn't hurt to pop over there and take a look, would it?" "I suppose not,
Colorado, where's that?" "America someplace, come one, let's go." "Wait a
moment, Wendy, let's get a few things together first." "I've got all we need
right here," she said, standing tall with her arms held apart. "Uh. Water.
Sandwiches. Warm jacket. Credit card. Passport. You might not need this stuff,
but I do." "Nonsense. All you need is me, and I'm ready for lift-off." He
sighed, and took a last look round the room. He walked into her embrace, she
kissed him, wrapping her cape around him as she did, and then he felt the
familiar press of three g as she lifted him off into near-earth orbit.

"Wendy, there's been something I've been meaning to talk to you about." "You
have a complaint about the in-flight entertainment?" "You know I don't. No,
it's your name." "What about it. I don't have a name, you decided you wanted
to call me Wendy, or Kitten when you're feeling, you know, so what's the
problem?" "It's what other people call you. 'The Weapon' isn't right, I mean,
it doesn't sound right." "But that's what I am." "Yes, but what you are, and
what you are called, isn't the same thing." She sighed. "OK, suppose we just
tell people I'm Wendy McCrae?" "Hey, I like the sound of that. But no, that's
too ordinary." "Then what? Queen of England?" "No, you can't be that, the
job's already occupied. But what you are, is you're the defender of humanity,
right?" "No, that's you, Duncan. You're the Wielder, I'm the Weapon that you
wield." "Yeah, I know, I know. But the fact is, without you I'm just another
tubby middle aged man with a bad knee, the only thing I can attack with any
chance of success is my refrigerator. How about 'Defender of the People'?"
"Sounds bloody pompous to me," she replied. "Yeah, but you can't let everyone
call you 'Wendy', you've got to maintain a kind of aloof dignity?" "Aloof?
What keeps the lain out?" He groaned. "You know, if anyone ever doubts whether
you're human, that right there is your proof." "OK, OK. I'm Wendy McCrae,
informally known as Kitten, formally called 'The Weapon, Defender of the
People'. I came here without a name, now I've got half a dozen."

Seven minutes later, they were weightless, half an hour later they were
touching down. "These trips are too quick now," she complained. "Too quick for
what?" "You know what." "Work first, play afterwards. Look, there's the
breached dam, what a mess! Did you see any people standing on rooftops waving
for help?" "No, I didn't, but look, there's a bunch of vehicles near the dam,
let's go see what that's about."

It was a temporary headquarters, the base of the rescue and damage control
operation. It said "Kettering Construction" on the side. "No receptionists,"
commented Duncan, "go straight in, kitten." She landed outside the biggest
cabin, and opened the door. Seven heads swivelled to look at the new arrival.
"Hi, guys," she said, "Here I am. How's things going?" "Who are you?" asked
one of them. She stood by the side of the table, hovering several inches in
the air, her arms folded under her breasts. "I'm the Weapon, Defender of the
People, if you need a flying bulldozer I'm your girl." "Jeez, that's all we
need. Fuck off, lady, we got real problems here."

She turned to face him, resting her hands on her hips. "Stand up, asshole." He
remained seated. She moved to stand behind him, turned his chair to face her,
and pulled him out of his chair. "I said, stand up," she repeated, softly. She
was frowning, and her hands were clenched tightly into fists. "Now, do you
know who I am?" she asked, her fist gently stroking the tip of his nose. He
was silent, unable to speak. "You've got some real problems here, it might
just be that someone like me can help with some of them. You still want me to
fuck off?" She floated, vertical, in the air above him, he had to look up at
her. Her breasts blocked his view of her face, and the knuckles of her fist
moved to stroke his cheek, very lightly, very softly, but emphasising his
complete helplessness in her hands. He coughed, then coughed again. She turned
away from him in contempt as a paroxysm of coughing crumpled him up. She
addressed the other guys. "So, how did this happen? Was it an explosion,
sabotage, what?"

One of the men put up his hand. "Yes?" "Please Miss, can I talk with you?"
"Sure, go ahead." He looked around. "Not here. Please?" She looked at Duncan,
Duncan nodded very slightly. "OK, come outside." The three of them left the
cabin, and stood outside. They could see the broken dam, water still pouring
over the breach. "I know what happened," he said, "and I'm scared." "Why?" she
asked. "I'm going to be the fall guy for this."

"Tell me about it." "The reason the dam breached, was that we had a lot of
rainfall, and the bypass pipes couldn't drain it fast enough, when one of them
got blocked. Because there were only three pipes. One of them was closed for
routine maintenance, valve replacement, stuff like that. So then the second
one got blocked, and while we were clearing the blockage, the third one
failed, the massive water flow wrecked one of the valves. And the water
pressure exceeded the design at the dam face, and the rest you know." "So why
are you the fall guy?" "I was the design engineer. They'll blame me for the
fact that there were only three bypass pipes, and for the weakness of the
dam." "If you were the design engineer, then it was your responsibility." "I
wanted eight bypass pipes, and that was in the original design. But the bean
counters said no, we had to get within their cost estimates, and we'd have to
make do with three. See, you really only need one, but you have an extra in
case it gets blocked." "So did you explain why you wanted eight." "Yes, but
that's engineering, and all they know is costs, they couldn't see the
difference between eight smaller pipes and three big ones, and the three big
ones were a lot cheaper. And they said, well, eight is overkill, you don't
need eight, you'd need all three to go before you had a problem, and that's
right. But that's what happened. We lost all three."

She frowned down at him. "So it's the bean counters' fault." "Well, it isn't
that simple. I got put under pressure, and, well. I didn't stand up to them.
And now eighteen people are dead, and there's all that damage to property, and
I signed off on the design. I'm going to be the fall guy, and I think I
deserve it too, because if only I'd stood my ground, but they said they'd get
another chief engineer, and I've got a wife and three kids to think of, and,
well. I was weak. I should have been stronger, and I wasn't, and there's
eighteen corpses because I was weak. My responsibility, my fault." He dropped
to his knees and started sobbing into his hands.

She looked down at him, then up at Duncan. Duncan shrugged his shoulders. She
knelt down next to the crying engineer, and pulled his head to her shoulder.
She put her arms round him and tried to soothe him. "Hush, shush, you did your
best, you couldn't have known that people would get killed." "It's like
murder, I'm guilty, I deserve whatever happens to me now" "No, no. I forgive
you, honey, what's your name?" "George. George Sparford. Thank you." She
stroked his hair, and looked up at Duncan again. Duncan looked doubtful. She
pulled the crying engineer closer to her, and held him tight while he wept.
"It'll be alright. I'll make it alright." He looked up at her, hopefully.
"How? Dead is dead. Not even you can ..." "No, I can't, but, well, I can do
stuff, I'll make it all right, I promise." She stroked his hair and hugged him
to her body. "I promise, everything will be all right" Duncan crouched down
next to them. "Wendy, what are you promising?" "I don't know, Duncan. You tell
me, what can we do?" He thought for a minute. "You know, there's never just
one cockroach in the kitchen," said Duncan. "What?"

"These people build dams, big civil engineering projects like that. If they
cut corners on one, then there will be others they skimped on. And some of
those will be dangerous too. Right George?" "Damn right. All the time, we get
told we have to cut out the overdesign. You want a safety margin of 100% in a
thing like this, and if you only get 50%, then, well, things fail. You have to
assume that things don't work like they're supposed to, or that they stop
working. And when human lives are at stake, you want a big fat safety margin,
and sure it costs a lot more. But the hell with the cost, that's what you do,
that's civil engineering. Or that's what you should do." "OK, George," she
said, "you're going to help me blow the whistle on this. I'm going to blast
this company apart. Kettering Construction is about to reap the whirlwind. Are
you up for it?" "Yes," he said, "maybe some good came come out of this
disaster. I know I couldn't take them on. But you? That's a whole different
league." She laughed. "Trust me, George, they don't stand a chance." "I do
trust you, actually, I'm not sure why, even though I don't know who you are."
"I'm the Weapon, Defender of the People, George. I'm here to save the world.
And right now, there's a bunch of guys in that construction company about to
see what I look like when I'm angry." George looked up at her. "Damn, I just
saw you angry, and it's not something I want to have to ever face." "See?" she
said, "now you just leave everything to me. You go home to your wife and kids,
don't speak to anyone. Give me your details so I can contact you."

She stood up, and looked at Duncan. "Come on, Duncan. Time to get Kettering."
She put her arm round him, and leaped up into the air. "Where are they?" he
said. "Oh," she said, "I forgot to ask. Hang on ... OK, it's at Greeley, 11th
Av and 25th, um, thataway ..." and she flew off to the Northeast, Duncan by
her side. "Hey, how did you find out ... oh, I know, you just went on the net
again, didn't you!" She laughed. "Magic isn't impressive when you know how
it's done, is it?" "Wendy, I know how you do it and I'm still impressed
nevertheless." A few minutes later, they arrived at Greeley; the Kettering
building was the largest in the block, hard to miss. She landed in a grassy
area in front of it. "OK, now we do the receptionist two-step," said Duncan.
She sighed. "Maybe not. Look, Duncan, you do the receptionist bit, I'm going
to be a bit more direct. Give me five minutes start, then you ask to see the
Big Potato, whoever it is, get her to phone up to confirm you're expected."
"But I'm not." "You will be. Where will the Main Man be?" "I'd guess top
floor, corner office, the one with the best view. But wait a moment, Wendy.
Strategy meeting." "OK, what's the strategy, my Weilder?" Duncan explained to
her how he thought she should play it. When he finished, she nodded. "Sounds
good to me. OK, I'll do it that way."

He watched as she took off, curved away from the building, then looped and
dived straight through a big window in a corner office, facing the river, on
the top floor. "Direct, yup. That's my girl!" She smashed though the glass,
and found herself in a large, beautifully furnished office, all oak panels and
burnished aluminium. And one very startled looking middle-aged man sitting at
a desk the size of Texas. "What the hell? Who are you?"

She walked towards him, flinging the heavy desk aside with one hand. She
growled as she put one hand on each of the arms of his chair, and leaned
forward, trapping him in position. "Who the fuck do you think I am, the tooth
fairy?" He tried to stand up, but he bounced off her chest, and sank back into
the chair. "I," she said, "am The Weapon, Defender of the People. You ... are
toast." "You can't get away with this." "Toast, baby. Toast. I'll tell you
why." "What?" She held him down with one hand, and clenched her right fist,
showing it to him. It looked to him like a small sledgehammer. "The Arkansas
Headwater Dam," she said, "let's talk about that for a moment." "A terrible
accident, appalling." "No," she said, "it wasn't an accident." "Sabotage?
Terrorists?" "No, asshole. It was your fucking accountants. They screwed up
the design. They cut the eight planned bypass pipes to three, and now you've
got eighteen deaths and real soon, as soon as this gets out, you're going to
be up to your neck in negligence lawsuits. Asshole." "Oh." "Now, you call down
to reception, and tell them to send up your visitor. And then you're calling a
main board meeting, with only one item on the agenda." "Which is?" "How you
guys are going to avoid spending the next fifty years behind bars." He closed
his eyes. She thrust the telephone into his hands, and he called his secretary
into the office.

Wendy backed off, and hovered by the broken window staring out over the river,
her feet twelve inches from the ground, her cape billowing around her in the
breeze. The secretary looked startled for a moment, but quickly regained her
composure, and started to make the necessary phone calls. Meanwhile, the
company president came up behind Wendy. "It's a long way down," he said. "No,
chum, you ain't going that way. That's the easy way out." "I didn't mean that.
I mean fifty years inside." "You're going to clean up the mess you made, or
else." "Or else what? You'll kill me? Are you threatening me? " "Yes. With
fifty years in prison. Or whatever the jury decides you're worth."

Duncan arrived, and looked around at the shambles she'd made of the office.
"Whew. You didn't go the gentle way. What's your name, Mister?" "Scott, Larry
Scott." Scott held out a hand. Duncan looked at the hand, looked at Scott's
face. "Asshole, you just killed eighteen people." "It was an accident ..."
"Shut up, Larry," said Wendy, very quietly, "save that for the jury. I've just
been having a look round your computer systems, there's a lot of real
interesting stuff there. You business suits and your obsession with paperwork.
It's all documented." "You hacked into our computers?" "Not hacked, Larry. If
you leave stuff out in the open, don't be surprised if people passing by
happen to read it. This building is wired, the data flows are going all over
the place, you only have to look at the packets to see what's there. And I
just did." Larry looked blankly at her. Duncan spoke up. "Think of her as a
mobile computer, asshole, and if you shout your secrets into her ears, that's
your fault."

The secretary came back into the room. "Most of the board is seated, Mr Scott,
when would you like to start?" He looked at Wendy. "Right now, honey, lead the
way," she said to the secretary, "and please join us, I want someone to take
really accurate minutes of this meeting." They walked into the meeting room.