The Voting Machine

A Good Day to Live

Twenty minutes later, we were crawling through the storm drains, making our way slowly east towards the strip.

"Another five hundred yards and this opens up into a sewage canal under the 15 freeway. Then we make a dash for it to the grate behind the Aria. That whole area west of the Strip is covered by the freeway overpass. They can't see it from satellite or helicopter. We run through there on the surface until we reach the drain that goes under the Babylonian."

"Why would we go back there?"

"Pam's still hiding in the hotel. Maybe she can help us."

"That's suicide, Luke. Why we going anywhere near the Strip when we're the target of a manhunt? We should be trying to leave Las Vegas."

"There's no way to leave the city, Temo. They've got the troopers posted at checkpoints on the 15 and every other route out of Clark County. They've got the National Guard in McCarran Airport. The Babylonian is our best bet. You said it yourself. No one knows the real floor plan. That's why they have those secret rooms where Shiro held the card games."

"But the hotel is the first place that Homeland Security will be looking for us. They'll have agents turning the whole joint inside out."

"Bullshit," Luke said. "That's the last place they'll be looking. That casino owner Marvin Perlson is a big time political donor and he's got all kinds of crooked shit going on in that place. He don't want Feds crawling around in there."

"That doesn't mean they'll give him a free pass."

"Big shots always get a free pass, you know that."

We took a turn in the tunnel and I felt the snap of glass cracking under the soles of my shoes. A few hundred yards ahead the path was lit through a street grill overhead. In the muted sunlight, a man was kneeling with his hands clasped in a prayer pose. There was a sleeping bag and a few bottles of water on the tunnel floor. We had wandered into someone's home.

I recognized the man from an earlier trip into the tunnel below the "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas" sign south of the Strip. His name was Nate, a desperate tweaker trying to get his life back on track.

"That you, Luke?" Nate said.

Luke let out a frustrated sigh. This was the worst time to run into anyone we knew, even if it was a homeless addict in a tunnel who even didn't own a TV playing the latest news on the terror alert. Up ahead we saw a ladder leading to daylight. Far above, the roar of unseen cars bellowed like a storm. We were coming up on the surface of the sewage canal.

"Leave us alone, Nate," Luke grumbled. "We ain't got time for chit chat."

"But I got to talk to you." He said scuttling behind us up a slope to the ladder. "You saved me."

"What the hell you talkin' 'bout?"

"You the one who convinced me to leave the tunnel and go to the Sunflower Clinic, Luke. You the one who told me I should get registered to vote."

"You went out and voted?" Luke said. "You sure you ain't stoned again, Nate?"

"No, I quit that shit, Luke. I been clean for weeks now. I get out in the sun light every day. I am making connections. I am a changed man since I met that politician that y'all's supportin'."

"You met Salinger?" I said.

"That's right. Salinger. He came right up and shook my hand. He told me that I had it in me to do something in this world," Nate said. "No one ever told me that my whole life. My own Ma and Pa never said shit like that." Nate was grinning. He could hardly contain his joy while retelling the experience.

"I thought life passed me by a long time ago," he continued, following us excitedly as we crawled up the ladder. "I figured no one would even have to bury me 'cause we's already underground. I woke up every morning thinking it was a good day to die. But then that Salinger planted a different seed inside my head. It ain't a good day to die. It's a good day to live."

"Well, we're real fuckin' proud of you, Nate," Luke muttered as we made our way to daylight. "But we gotta scoot."

We left Nate in the darkness, hanging from the top rung of the ladder.

We shielded our eyes from the sun as we crawled out to a concrete ledge under the freeway. Below us, a steep slope led into the canal basin, next to a single lane road for maintenance vehicles. Several hundred yards to the east, I could see the glittering casinos of the Strip. The government-issued sedan was already parked in the basin, with Polk and Decatur in the front seats.

"They've been waiting for us. They knew this was the only tunnel to the Strip."

"What's going on?" Nate said, scrambling up onto the ledge with us.

"Shut your trap," Luke whispered pointing at the vehicle below. "That's the goddamn FBI down there."

"I know all about that," Nate said. He wasn't grinning anymore. "I saw you shit bags on the news this morning when I was up at the clinic."

"You don't know what you're talking 'bout, Nate," Luke said.

"They said you was terrorists," Nate said. He pointed his index finger at our faces, as if he was practicing how he'd pick us out of a lineup.

"You don't believe that," I said. "You know us. Luke's the one that saved you."

"This is my chance," Nate said. "I turn you guys in and I can be somebody. Finally I can make a difference."

"Don't be a fucking idiot," Luke grumbled.

"Hey officers! I got them right here!" Nate shouted into the basin. His voice echoed through the concrete walls of the underpass. Polk and Decatur looked up at us. They drew their guns and stepped out of their car.

Nate tackled me and we both fell over the ledge. "Motherfucker!" Luke hollered as he watched Nate drag me down like an anchor. I was sliding down the concrete slope into the basin while Nate held on tight to my ankle, shouting at Polk and Decatur to make sure they were ready to apprehend us.

We landed in a pile of muck at the bottom of the basin and the agents were ready, pointing their Glocks in our face, the same ones that Luke had kicked across the floor in Fatima's store. I glanced overhead but Luke had already ducked behind the ledge, retreating into the shadows of the storm drains.

"Officers, this here is Temo McCarthy," Nate said proudly, rising up out of the muck. "He's the terrorist they was talkin' 'bout on the news."

"Who are you?" Agent Polk asked him.

"Nate. Used to be a tweaker down in the tunnels. But I am a changed man now. I want to help you guys."

Polk fired twice into Nate's chest and he fell back into the muck. She inspected his body as blood soaked into the sewage debris. She confirmed no signs of movement. Kneeling at the edge of the basin, she blew his face off with a final shot so it would be impossible to identify the body. She took a few minutes to gather up his teeth from the puddles and slip them in an evidence bag. 

"Aren't going to shoot me, too?" I asked as they cuffed me behind their car.

Decatur scoffed. "You should be so lucky." Then he threw me in the trunk.