The Zero

Remy picked the flashlight off the ground, extinguished its light, and handed it back to Markham.

The guy in coveralls talked to Remy as if he were in charge. “Like I told you up above, this is as far as we can go. Maybe after they get the fire down here controlled and pump out some of the lower levels. But even then, I doubt it.” The guy gestured toward the crushed cars. “You could try the lowest level, B-6, and then try to move up, but like I say, that’s seventy feet below the surface, and in this section it’s either on fire or under water. We could go north, but then you got the potential of gas from them old Freon tanks.”

Markham looked at Remy seriously. “What do you think?”

“What do you think?” Remy asked.

The guy in coveralls interrupted: “Look, I appreciate how important this is. I want you to know that if there was any way we could do this, I would… Because I think you fellas are the most important people down here, far as I’m concerned. I mean, I heard them talking about all them documents on TV. But this is a needle in a… haystack.” He looked around. “A really scary haystack.”

Remy looked around the garage. The collapsed corner troubled him. What was above that? How far up did the rubble go? To the pile? The Spires? Against another wall, a stream of black water minded its own business, flowing through the ruined garage into a fissure in the wall. Where did that water come from? Where was it going? And why was it black? These seemed like the real questions they should be asking.

Markham put his hands out. “Okay, Brian. You’ve gotta call the ball on this one. What do you want to do? Go back or follow the sewer line?”

“I don’t…” Remy surprised himself by laughing. “I can’t say.”

The guy in coveralls glanced at Markham, who sighed with disapproval. He took Remy by the elbow and pulled him aside. His voice was low. “What’s the matter with you today, Brian?”

Remy heard himself laugh again, maniacally. He said, under his breath, “I don’t have the slightest clue what we’re doing down here.”

Markham stared at him for a moment. Then he nodded. “Yeah, you’re probably right. Hell, even if we got to the floor where her firm kept their cars…” Markham walked over and folded up the blueprint.

“Were we looking for March’s car?” Remy asked.

“Yeah, when you put it that way, it does seem crazy.” Markham turned to their guide. “Brian thinks we should just turn back.”

The guy in coveralls sighed. “Thank you.” He looked over his shoulder, headlights of ruined cars peeking out from collapsed roof. “I don’t like it down here.”

Markham watched Remy for a moment, his face noncommittal. “Don’t worry about it, Brian. It was a long shot anyway. You made the right call.”

Markham and the guy in coveralls put on their respirators and moved back to the opening they’d crawled through. Remy looked around once more at the dusted windshields, which stared at him inscrutably. Then he put on his mask and followed the two men back into-

“MIDNIGHT SATURDAY I’m jacked up on some waitress, half-to bangin’ the ass off her when my fuckin’ pager goes off nine-one-one and I’m thinkin’ Oh shit, my wife found out I ain’t workin’ this weekend, right, but when I check the page, who do you think it is? Brian fu-u-uckin’ Remy, that’s who.” McIntyre gulped a breath as the guys barked laughter and Remy took the moment to glance around. About half the old detail was here, six of The Boss’s guys and five guys from the PC’s office – where Remy had been assigned for six months – twelve guys including Remy and Guterak, who sat at his right, laughing so hard he lacked the breath to say anything inappropriate.

“Right? Right? So Remy’s got body that night – and I don’t have to tell you which boss we were assigned to then, ’cept to say that poor Remy’s sleepin’ in one of the Town Cars outside some skank’s apartment in Alphabet City while the boss drills for soil samples, right-” The guys all laughed knowingly. “And that’s when the fuckin’ boss comes down barefoot with his pants undone, in a T-shirt – remember that? Remember, Bri? – stupid fat fuck, too goddam furious to use the phone, he wants to get in someone’s face because he’s gone and picked another whore with a tool, right? He’s out of his fuckin’ mind, wants every transvestite hooker off the fuckin’ street. That night! And this jackass is so in love with his own power and with his phony fuckin’ statistical results, he really thinks this can be done, right? Like it’s just a fuckin’ number on a graph – eight hundred or something. ‘So great,’ I tell Remy, ‘call patrol.’ But genius here-” McIntyre pointed at Remy “ – says the boss wants us to do it. And I’m like, ‘He wants us to do this?’ And Remy says, ‘Yeah. He wants us to do this. Right now.’ And I’m literally half in this fuckin’ waitress, on the upstroke, right? And I’m on the phone and I’m like, ‘Right now, Brian?’ And he says, ‘Right now, Billy.’ And I’m like, ‘All of ’em, Brian? All the whores?’ and this unflappable motherfucker here, this asshole thinks for a second, then says, ‘Well… I guess all of ’em with dicks, Billy.’”

The guys slapped the table and held their chests, doubled over, Carey’s high, squeaky laugh rising above the din.

“And I’m like, ‘How the fuck are we supposed to know which ones have dicks, Brian?’ And this brilliant son-of-a-bitch-”

Another delighted squeal from Carey stopped McIntyre’s story for a second, and the room dissolved into drunken laughter: deep, dissonant howls and hoots like a brass band warming up. Remy looked around at his friends and past them, through the filmy strands in his eyes to the banquet room of an Italian restaurant and then down at the checked table, covered with oval plates, gnawed scattered T-bones, surrendered piles of noodles and glimpses of garlic potatoes and green beans, spent shells of empty beer pitchers, wine bottles and highball glasses. For a moment he worried about their appetites, and wondered if they could ever be made full, these men, until this thought was replaced by a more important thought. Which glass was his?

“This! Cool! Mother! Fucker! Over he-yah!” McIntyre pointed to Remy again. “He says, ‘Well, from what I hear, you can tell by the hands.’ And I’m like, ‘You can tell what by the fuckin’ hands?’ And you gotta remember, while I’m talkin’ to Remy here I’m fuckin’ doin’ a pushup on this waitress, and that’s when she and I stop what we’re doin’ for a minute and we both look at her hands. And Remy says, ‘You can tell it’s a woman by her hands.’ And I’m lookin’ at this waitress’s big ma

“Aaaagh!” Guterak made a noise that sounded as much scream as laugh, and clapped Remy on the back.

“So all night, fuckin’ Remy and me are driving around lookin’ at hookers’ hands and I swear to God, they all look like dudes to us, right? And I got mixed feelings. First, I’m startin’ to panic… if the fuckin’ boss wants tra

Someone called out: “Ramirez!”

McIntyre pointed. “Right! Right! This fuckin’ mutt Kiko Ramirez, little fuckin’ Dominican pimp lived up off a hu