Hell is Empty

One

Hell is Empty

J. Maxwell

One

Global Union Citizen Database

File #9571932917

Name: James Howe

DOB: 4/28/2069

Birthplace: Tucson, Texas Republic

Nationality: Texan

Occupation: *UNDOCUMENTED*

Annual Income: *UNDOCUMENTED*

Current Address: *UNDOCUMENTED

Political Affiliation: *UNDOCUMENTED*

…

Stability: *UNDOCUMENTED*

Criminal Record: *UNDOCUMENTED*

The Commissioner groaned and slapped the console in his steel desk. The file vanished from the glowing touch-screen.

“A database breach?” the Commissioner grunted, his voice wearing from the exhaustion of a long day on top of a long life. “Impossible. Who is James Howe and why would he want his file deleted?”

“It’s not completely wiped, sir,” the Warden replied, standing cautiously by the door to the office. Although his days of furious outbursts had long passed, nobody was ever comfortable around the Commissioner. Warden Commissioner Wilman was a worn husk. Everyone knew this, but nobody discussed it. Everyone was still too afraid.

“Well, clearly we have his name and date of birth. From his birth certificate.” Wilman scoffed. “That’ll help us, what? Determine when and where he was born? Why don’t you go warm up the time machine, then?”

The young Warden flushed slightly. “I mean, we know which country he lives in. At least we don’t have to plunge through the bureaucracies of all nine Americas just to find him.”

“Not that they’d cooperate with us,” Wilman snarled under his breath. “Fine. Send word to the headquarters in Tucson that we want James Howe. We want him in our custody immediately. If Mr. Howe is not here,” Wilman threw his arms up, signaling the city of Chicago that lay around the Global Union headquarters, “by the end of the week, there is going to be serious disciplinary action in the Wardens Service. Can you be sure to make that extremely clear?”

“Right,” the Warden nodded rapidly, his voice trembling. Commissioner Wilman’s screaming disciplinary assaults were long dormant, but his eyes, small but penetrating, were somehow more terrifying. His eyes and the cool, calm posture he perpetually maintained, hands folded on his desk. And the constant, pulsating aura of disingenuous fatherly warmth that veiled him. It was all absolutely terrifying. “I’ll, uh—I’ll get right on that.” The young man ducked out the door. That was the day Warden Cole, a newly-promoted Senior Warden, learned to contact Commissioner Wilman via videophone, not face-to-face.

Spencer Wilman sat silently in his personal office, his meaty paw digging in frustration at his receding silver hairline. Offices like his, for the GU higher-ups, were maybe the only rooms in the Global Union headquarters that didn’t have that depressingly ubiquitous industrial design. Wilman basked in this.

After all, he had toiled up the ladder from a petty screen-pusher. He earned his place at the top of the Wardens. On the 103rd floor of the skyscraper he was literally and figuratively above all the grunts of the GU. On top of that, he was a Purple Heart awarded ex-celebrity veteran of the Anglo-Chinese War.

But he was in decline. He was drying up and withering away, and before long, there would be nothing left of him but a bunch of vague fearful memories.