Even in a midtown crowd contact was always tricky because of the danger of entrapment, but with pedestrians and traffic swirling around you could casually float by, sniff out the situation and drift away unrevealed if it didn’t feel right. Under the frowning warehouses on Bale Street, deserted and echoing after midnight, it was harder to pretend you were there for anything else. So George carefully hid his forbidden Birdie in a fetid empty crate, strode out onto the rain-glossed cobblestones and made straight for the man in the dark. “Excuse me,” he began as timidly as he could. “I seem to be lost.”

“Maybe I’m what you’re looking for,” a familiar nasal voice gloated from the gloom, and Altman stepped triumphantly into a cone of ginger light.

Altman. Only yesterday the gray vulture had pinned the teenager against a wall in the musty, green and black hallway. Leering and stroking himself he had abused his position as Super of the building, weaving promises of repairs with threats of exposure, his breath so close and wet and soured by hard liquor…

For a mere second George froze. Then thinking fast, letting anger carry him, he raised his voice in a desperate hope that somehow someone would hear him.

“I knew it! Sick bastard! Pervert! I knew I’d find you here. I’m going straight to the Police…”

“There’s no need to shout,” a serpent hissed from the shadows.

George’s heart skipped a beat. Literally. He jerked to his left and was shocked by a powerful geometry: a short, stocky Vice Officer flanked by two tall, big-boned Black Helmets had materialized from the darkness.

“Officer, I’m… so glad you’re here,” George gushed, gasping at recovery. “This sicko has been hitting on me for months. Yesterday, he physically attacked me… again! I came here to see if I could catch him...”, then added with what he hoped would sound like the expected disgust, “with his pants down.”

“Admirable indeed,” muttered the Officer. At the slightest gesture from his black-gloved hand, the two indistinguishable goons began to frisk George, looking, no doubt, for his Birdie.

“I commend you for your zeal,” continued the Officer as the men handed him the contents of George’s pockets. “And for taking such risks...” (indicating the empty street with George’s identity card) “to further the Party’s program for a better society. I must point out, however, that despite the grossness of his tactics Agent Altman is, in fact, one of us.” He added with considerable venom, “…now.”

Finding nothing incriminating, the Helmets returned to their post behind their chief, who took a single step forward.

“You are quite the local hero,” he oozed swiping the plastic card against an elaborate keyboard and screen strapped to his left wrist, “…George. And a young man like you deserves attention. Believe me, I won’t forget you or what happened here tonight.” His eyes shone as if made of glass while he handed George back his things.

“Altman!” he barked and spun on his heel. The Helmets parted to let him through and followed in formation. Altman paused for a moment, hands behind his back, and bowed slowly from the waist at the departing authorities. Turning only his head, he smiled at George with enough acid to melt lips (if he had any) and trotted off to catch up. George hung his head and watched the ripples in a puddle at his feet. He heard toll, clear as the first time, those four awful words, “One of us… now”, and wondered if he could ever visit Cee’n’Vee again.

***

Carl and Vernon, his closest friends, got away with living together because they were cousins. They had helped him make his “Silent Birdie” from clean computer scrap (as in “a little Birdie told me”; “silent” because a voice could be recorded and identified). Just an hour earlier, in the dark tomb of the alley by his building, George had very cautiously switched it on.

It was Altman’s night off, and the stinking, leaking garbage bags were piled high enough to hide George from any Helmets or Snitches on patrol. The blank blue screen glowing in his hand, he had nervously passed over the “Attract” button and chosen the one marked “Seek”. In less than a minute a map of his neighborhood appeared with a thin yellow line weaving north from a blinking dot in the alley. “Somebody’s lonely tonight,” he sighed gratefully. Adjusting his threadbare scarf and turning up his useless but fashionably stiff skinny collar, he stepped out under the amber lamps.

Following the blinking light across town, warily glancing into his pocket to confirm this turn and that, he had begun to feel anxious. Not about his encounter. George knew he was exceptionally handsome for 19. Through his fair complexion a heavy, smooth, prematurely perfect beard glowed almost blue after he shaved. He had only twice been rejected, and then by men seeking something very specific.

It was where he was headed that made him uncomfortable: Bale Street, along the river, abandoned at night and too notorious for encounters to be safe. George kept to the shadows. Confident he was tall enough few would think him an easy victim, his body suddenly tensed when the yellow line abruptly ended in a solid red dot, and there, barely visible beside a loading dock, a lone man waited.

Why did it have to be Altman?

***
Minutes passed. George, with a sudden chill, realized he didn’t know which street had swallowed his persecutors or if they were still watching from some hiding place. Regardless, he had to retrieve his precious Birdie. He could probably make another, slowly but surely, but only Carl and Vernon had the software that was constantly updated and re-encrypted to avoid surveillance.

He traced his steps back into the shadows, knelt down and reached into the stained wooden crate. Nothing. In a panic, his hands scurried faster and faster over the bottom of the slimy box. Suddenly, smooth and silent as smoke, a black leather glove floated towards him, fingers so extraordinarily long that the shiny chrome Birdie in its palm looked like a toddler’s toy. The gentlest of whispers carried to him the words, “You should be more careful.” Inch by inch his stare crept up the familiar worn trench coat until, from an angle not experienced since childhood, he was gazing into the eyes of his father.

George jumped to his feet but could think of nothing to say. Blushing, he brushed the garbage off his wet knees. Slowly and very carefully, his father wiped the Birdie on his coat sleeve, slipped it into his own pocket and said, “Your fingerprints were all over it. All they had to do was scan…”

“Dad …” George began, but his father interrupted. “Let’s get out of here,” was all he said.

They were almost home before George could force words into the silence. “How did you…?” But his father stopped him.

“George,” he said without looking at his son, but with a caressing kindness in his deep bass that George hadn’t heard in years, “I’ve always known... well, at least as long as you have. It’s… it’s been our family problem for a while now, hasn’t it?” He took a deep breath and sighed. “I know it’s hard for you to understand my marriage to Nyra, why I let her make our lives so… so… But ever since the Party took over… Don’t you see? A woman with her position. I had to protect you…”

“But how did you know?” George tried again, then quit abruptly as they turned the corner and spotted Altman perched on their stoop.

“Ah. A touching sight,” the Super sneered as they approached. “Burt and George. Like father, like son?”

“Here, catch,” said George’s father reaching into his pocket, “I’m sure you’ll make good use of it.” He pulled out the Birdie and tossed it to Altman. Arching through the yellow streetlight it looked like a spinning wafer of gold.

George gasped, but Altman tossed the Birdie right back saying, “I’m sure you’ve wiped it clean.” Burt had judged his opponent perfectly, and George felt a warm flush of pride.

Altman snarled. “Tell your wife to enjoy her job... while she can. Thin ice has a nasty way of getting weaker the more weight you put on it.” He sniffed, jerked his long pointed nose up an inch, and stalked off down the street.

When Altman had disappeared, the older man turned to George, discreetly slipped the Birdie into his hand and said, “Hide it, son. Anywhere but in the apartment… And keep it clean.” Then he started up the stairs.

George stumbled into the alley, so grateful he again had no idea what to say to his dad.

***

A few hours later, he was yanked awake by relentless pounding, a thunder of “Police! Open up!” and his stepmother bellowing “George! See who it is!” She never answered the door herself, that was George’s job, but out of spite he chose to wait until she crashed into his room, grabbed him by the arm and dragged him down the unlit hall in his underwear. Furious, she made him open the door dressed as he was, while she posed defiantly in her faded pink robe a few steps behind, plump white arms folded as far as possible up the tattered soiled sleeves.

In the green and black corridor stood the Vice Officer and his goons with Altman in the rear, also in his bathrobe. After smirking at George’s near nudity the Officer addressed Nyra as if George wasn’t there.

“Madam Ward Captain, I’m terribly sorry to disturb you at this late hour, but it seems we have traced an illegal beacon to this building. In fact, to this very apartment.”

“Ridiculous!” she sputtered, shoving George out of the way. “I hope... Officer Vald,” she continued, checking the name above his badge, “that you are fully aware of whom you are accusing.”

“Indeed, Madam Captain,” he bowed with icy humility. “I’m sure a quick scan can clear you...” (he smiled at George) “...and your family. Of course, once a signal has been logged, I must…” A black glove, palm up, completed the sentence.

Nyra grunted, stepped aside and threw a glance of pure hate at her husband who, wearing only his rumpled brown-striped pants, guarded the door to George’s room. Vald motioned the Helmet with a blinking blue light above his right ear into the apartment and then followed with the second goon and Altman in tow.

The man in front made a beeline to George’s bedroom. As they all squeezed into the tiny cube, the second goon clamped a giant hand onto George’s arm while the first, tracking the signal, knelt down to reach under the bed with his truncheon. George almost fainted when, along with several balls of dust and an old sock, a blinking Birdie slid into the room.

“George!” snapped his stepmother; “Well!” crowed the Officer; “Ah!” purred Altman; “It’s not mine”, shrieked George in desperation – all simultaneously.

“Not yours?” taunted Vald. “But there it is. And it’s on!”

“How could you bring a thing like that into this house?” sneered his stepmother.

“He was probably getting ready to go out,” Vald thought aloud. “When we knocked he had just enough time to get undressed but didn’t manage to shut it off.”

“It’s not mine. It’s not mine,” George whimpered again and again, wincing from the tightening grip on his arm.

In his calmest, clearest, most penetrating bass George’s father said simply, “It’s a plant.”

The whole room froze. The light on the golden Birdie continued to blink.

Again in his deepest voice Burt suggested, “Why don’t you scan it for prints?”

Altman went pale and, breathing with difficulty, leaned against the wall for support. In the silence Vald nodded at his henchman who scanned the Birdie with a red laser from above his right eye and barked a code word into his mouthpiece to forward the data to Headquarters.

Ten seconds passed... fifteen..., and Nyra slowly turned her head to glare at Altman.

Still on his knees, the goon looked up at Vald and said, “One set of prints. Richter H. Altman.”

The room exploded. Everyone surrounded Altman, and everyone but the Helmets talked at once. But Altman shrieked the loudest, “How could I have put it there? How could I have set it off?”

“Officer, if you will allow me,” Burt interrupted, patient and reasonable. “I am a miniaturization specialist. We often have to analyze these things in our lab. For your department. May I have a look?”

Vald nodded. Burt grabbed a tee-shirt off the dresser and carefully picked up the flat metal rectangle by its edges.

“Yes,” he concluded. “See this number display? It’s a timer. The device can be placed in advance in the off position and then watched from a distance after it activates, allowing its owner to decide if the person answering the call is safe to contact. Richter has keys to all our apartments. He must have come in while we were out and planted this under my son’s bed.”

“Nooo...” howled Altman, sweating profusely. “It’s all a plot…”

“It certainly is,” snapped Nyra. “I’ve known for a long time how much you covet my position. But to stoop to this! Trying to frame a member of a Ward Captain’s family! Believe me, I’m going to personally see to it that you get plenty of time to regret your little scheme. Officer Vald, please…!”

And with much scuffling, bawling and banging of furniture, Richter Altman was escorted from the apartment. At the door, Officer Vald tipped his cap and began, “Madam Captain…”

“No apology needed, Officer,” she replied. “You have done the Party and my family a great service. It will be noted.”

He bowed and shut the door behind him. Nyra, pulling her robe in against the chill, turned to her bare-chested husband who stood with his arm around his son’s equally naked shoulders. “Burton,” she said without emotion, “I know as much about this as I want to know. I will take care of Altman from my office. And I don’t want to hear about this incident or anything even remotely similar ever again. Goodnight, George,” she added, and without looking at either swept past them and down the hall to her room.

Burt lingered in the doorway as George sat heavily on the bed.

“Dad,” said George. “Altman’s crude, but not stupid. And that Birdie was yellow. Mine’s in the alley. It’s silver.”

“It was mine, George,” he sighed.

George paused for a moment to take it all in.

“So you married Nyra…”

“To protect you, like I said.”

George nodded slowly and looked up again. “Thanks, Dad.”

“Don’t mention it, son.”

And they both smiled the same tender smile.

---