The Needs of the Many

[Cactus]

June 10, 2018
Lorentech Oil Press Junket Room
Chattanooga, Tennessee

As a local reporter, Carl Fredericks was used to covering his share of strange events. Chattanooga wasn't the biggest city in the world - hell, it wasn't even the biggest city in the state, but there was enough going on in town to keep him busy, and usually at least a little interested in whatever puff piece he had to come up with along with it. This hadn't been the dream when he'd started out — far from it, actually — but the more he'd put his time in for the city, the tougher he'd found it to extricate himself from its clutches. Before he'd known it, the youthful man filled with piss and vinegar who was determined to change the way that the average American thought about things like race and equality was just another middle-aged man living the average suburban lifestyle. Happy wife, happy life - temples filled with grey and his belly just a little too full just a little too much.

The truth was, nothing much of note ever really happened to Carl and after all these years, he'd made peace with that. He no longer needed to change the world; he just needed to inform those within it. Anything he could do to make it a better place for his children; that had ended up being enough. Covering local fairs, interviewing municipal politicians, and bringing note to issues that mattered? That had become routine; not that there was anything wrong with routine. He'd gotten used to routine. Carl enjoyed it. Routine gave him the chance to go fishing on the weekends with some of the boys from the paper. Routine allowed him to be there for all of the school plays, all of the baseball games, all of the swimming lessons. Most importantly, routine let him be a good husband. Everything else worked itself out from there.

So when Carl's routine was thrown for a loop, as it had been today, frankly - it pissed him off.

As he sat waiting in the press junket room of the Chattanooga headquarters of Lorentech Oil, he wore a bit of a scowl on his weathered face. Truly, he knew that he shouldn't complain. Carl's younger self would have been chomping at the bit to be in this room, surrounded by press from all over Tennessee; some even further by the looks of them. Many of them had that hungry look that certain reporters had; waiting for a crisis to come to pass to try and be there on the front lines, to get reactions as they happened.

Goddamned vultures.

Shoulders sagging a little, Carl sat in a chair in the front row of the room - prime real estate, and a spot that he'd received more than a few glares about occupying. Here he was, some nobody from the local beat, and he was all the way up at the front? Well, what was happening was national news and since it was happening in his own backyard, he'd be damned if he allowed some fancy-ass cracker from some rich right-wing paper to send him to the back of the line. Pfft. White folks. The irony of his own thinking made him smile; perhaps inappropriately given the circumstances. Rich white people were the whole reason that all of the reporters were packed into this small press junket room, anyway.

The smile fell away from his face rather quickly. This was not a time to be jovial, not even at all. Rumour mill notwithstanding, nearly every single person in the United States of America knew what had happened to the now-vanished buses of students from George Hunter High School on their return trip home from Washington, D.C. Few were willing to say it, but everyone was thinking it. Whenever a bus full of high school students went missing from somewhere in the United States, there was only one conclusion and it ended up being correct every single time.

Survival of the Fittest had returned.

The very thought brought a shiver down Carl's spine as he waited for the press conference to begin. He'd never covered any of the other attacks and while he'd been a young man when kids had started disappearing en masse back in the aughts, it had managed to stay off his radar for his entire reporting career.

Until now.

There hadn't been any formal announcement made by the United States government regarding the disappearance. The Internet was rife with speculation and inference and most newspapers had chosen to keep it as a vaguely tragic disappearance rather than raise the alarm right away; which was laughable. They all knew. It was almost a foregone conclusion when the buses hadn't been found broken-down at the side of a road.

That particular element was why this press conference had gotten an awful lot of buzz from both the local and national press, of course. There were a myriad of different community members who seemed to be impacted by all of this. There were community leaders, people who were industry giants, folks in the religious communities, hell - even Bob Schmidt, a freelancer who was often in and around the paper that Carl himself called his own had a kid who went to George Hunter High School. He felt a flicker of guilt at his earlier levity as he saw Bob across the room, fiddling with his own tape recorder and quite obviously trying to keep a brave face. His own daughter was among the missing. The poor bastard was doing an admirable job of keeping his cool; Carl was certain he'd have ripped a goddamn hole in the wall and gone searching himself if one of his kids had been taken. Especially considering the reason they were here. One of the students who had been on that bus happened to be the son of one of the founders of Lorentech Oil who happened to be from right here in Chattanooga.

They'd taken all kinds.

Speaking of - Carl flicked the record button on his tape recorder as the company's public-relations officer; a ratty-looking middle-aged woman, stepped to the microphone. She leaned forward and performed her introductory duty before quickly shuffling off to the side.

"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome co-founder of Lorentech Oil, Mr. Steven Lorenzen and his wife, Karen."

As the pair calmly strode across the room to the podium in the centre, Carl couldn't help but be impressed with the presence both adults exuded. This was obviously not their first time in the limelight, and Carl recollected to himself that Mrs. Lorenzen happened to sit on the board of Aurex Pharmaceuticals, a formidable position in its own right. These were not people to be crossed, especially not by a lowly local scribe as himself. He made a mental note to stay out of their crosshairs and blended into the crowd.

---

"Good mornin' everybody," Steven started, his Tennessee drawl thick as he allowed himself a moment to take in the media presence. "Thank y'all for coming on such short notice."

As he'd suspected, there were a great many television cameras in the room, and he could see logos for affiliate news stations that might just broadcast worldwide. Good. He needed this to reach as far as it could. His jaw was clenched, though his tone had started friendly, his heart was anything but. For his next words, he dropped his practiced Tennessee drawl, leaving the good-old-boy businessman façade behind and leaving a powerful and authoritative one in its stead. Steven wasn't here to put on a show - he was here to deliver a missive.

"This isn't a briefing about company business. This isn't a conference. This is a message." He paused for effect. "A message for Mr. Danya and the terrorists behind Survival of the Fittest."

The room erupted in murmurs; Steven Lorenzen had said the words that no one wanted to say, he had acknowledged the rumours without saying a thing. If he was bringing this up, it seemed as though the rumours must have been true. Holding a hand up to hush the crowd, he continued, staring directly at the news cameras in the back of the room.

"Danya. You have my son, Connor."

More murmurs from the front row; this time Karen Lorenzen silenced a few of them with a scowl. Steven didn't even acknowledge them.

"Yesterday, two buses disappeared while taking our children home from Washington, and I know that you were behind it. You've done this again. Six times, we've stood back and watched this happen, so what's one more? Well," his voice was theatric in its intensity, but everyone in the room could see that he meant business, "now it's your lucky day."

The noise stopped, one could hear a pin drop in the room.

"As I said, you have kidnapped my son, Connor Lorenzen, and I am not about to sit idly by and let that go unpunished. So I have one message for you, Danya. One simple message."

---

Carl sat in shock as the crowd collectively inhaled and waited for Steven Lorenzen's public declaration of war against Survival of the Fittest. No one had ever taken a public stand against the terrorists since the destruction of STAR, and for a leader of industry to be personally impacted... perhaps they had finally rolled the dice one too many times. For just a second, Carl felt as though he were witnessing something important. He felt young again. As Steven looked to his wife, who nodded - as though giving permission, he felt himself leaning forward in anticipation. Something was about to happen.

It wouldn't be the something that Carl had expected, though.

"Name your price. I will pay any price for the safe return of Connor Lorenzen."

The room erupted in shocked outrage. Somehow, Steven's voice carried over top of them all.

"You hear me? Any price."

The words staggered the crowd, some of whom were likely people who had loved ones or friends missing as well. Steven didn't let the shock back him down; if anything his tone intensified.

"All I want is my son back. Just one teenager. Whatever message you're trying to send, fine. Send it. Do what you will with the others; I don't care. Just give me my son back."

The collected press was now horrified at the words coming from the podium. The ever-lengthy refrain from the United States government had always been that 'we do not negotiate with terrorists', and yet, it seemed as though some of their citizens had missed that memorandum. Even more appalling, Steven Lorenzen had just put a price upon the head of his own son at the cost of all the others. Carl Fredericks felt sick to his stomach. He wasn't sure why he'd been expecting anything different, though. Why would a rich, white oil man give two shits about anyone except for his own flesh and blood? Carl was disappointed that he'd let himself think more of the man up on the podium - if even for a moment.

The entirety of the assembled news corps were now yelling out questions and statements at the podium, shock and awe seemed to be the emotion of the day now. Many of them stood, trying to make themselves heard, all the while Steven and Karen Lorenzen looked out at the cameras. Steven took a step back from the podium, and Karen leaned in, her expression as determined as that of her husband.

"You know where to find us, Danya."

The two Lorenzens stepped back and quickly guided themselves off-stage, the collective press now almost entirely standing and yelling questions, accusations or foul epithets at the two. Carl didn't stand. In fact, the last thing he was feeling like doing was screaming in outrage. Instead, the sinking feeling in his stomach made him weak; he felt as though he'd been witness to an offense. In a manner of speaking, he had. What the two Lorenzens had just done was an affront to Chattanooga and everything that the community stood for. Carl couldn't help but wonder if he had been one of the parents impacted. How would he feel? How offensive would he find this particular display?

What if it worked?

Flicking the switch on his tape recorder, Carl let his hand fall to his side, bowing his head a bit as he closed his eyes. All that he could hear was outrage, venom, and hatred. This assignment was supposed to take the local angle, the human interest angle behind what the paper surmised was going to be massive national news within the next few days. He was supposed to humanize the students, their families, and make the world care - or at least, the local readership.

Carl knew that he wasn't a talented enough writer to humanize what had happened here today. Not that he doubted his own capabilities - of course not. He never had. But how could you possibly spin this in any other way than what it was: a desperate act from one percenters, who didn't give a rat's ass about their community, their neighbours, or their town. As he lifted his head up and allowed himself to re-engage with the cacophony of noise, Carl Fredericks thought about his own children. A few years prior or a few years from now, he could have been the one sitting at home, holding his breath and hoping that some way, somehow his child could find their way back from hell. There wasn't really anything that Carl wouldn't do for his kids; he knew he wasn't alone in that.

But not in a million years would he make a deal with the devil. Not when the price was sacrificing everyone else's children so that his could walk free. Pulling himself to his feet, Carl was startled by the violent reaction of the assembled news media. Shaking his way out of his own head, he realized that people were actually rushing the podium, looking for any possible way to get an extra comment, a clarification on what they had just witnessed. His stomach dropped as he quickly realized that there weren't just assembled news media personnel here. This had been low-key, coordinated, and most of all, not endorsed by any law enforcement personnel. Which meant that many of the people here were likely affected by the disappearances.

Which meant that people were not going to listen to reason.

People were going to be very, very upset.

I'd have been upset if it were my kids was the only thought that went through Carl's mind as he hesitantly tried to head towards the onrushing crowd. He barely got two steps before the zealous atmosphere of the room managed to come to a crux, someone screaming "Monster!" from the back of the room was all of the encouragement the crowd needed. The folks in the back started to shove, and someone's elbow came up.

Carl barely had a chance to react before all the room was full of stars.