The Kill Room

with that vista. And who had inadvertently, to their surviving compatriots’ loss, driven Metzger into his new profession.
    With these thoughts, the Smoke coalesced, as it often did when 9/11 came to mind. The memories of that day used to be debilitating. Now they simply stabbed with searing pain.
    Let it go…
    His phone rang. He regarded caller ID, which reported, in translation, You’re fucked.
    “Metzger here.”
    “Shreve!” the caller blurted cheerfully. “How are you? Been a month of Sundays since we chatted.”
    Metzger had disliked the Wizard of Oz. That is, the wizard himself, as a character (he rather enjoyed the movie). He was furtive and manipulative and arbitrary and had ascended to the throne by false pretense…and yet he commanded all the power in the land.
    Much like the caller he was now speaking to.
    His own personal Wizard was chiding, “You didn’t call me, Shreve.”
    “I’m still getting facts,” he told the man, who happened to be 250 miles away, south, in Washington, DC. “There’s a lot we don’t know.”
    Which meant nothing. But he didn’t know how much the Wizard knew. Accordingly he would steer the course of ambiguity.
    “Imagine it was bum intelligence about Moreno, right, Shreve?”
    “Appears to be.”
    The Wizard: “That happens. That surely happens. What a crazy business we’re in. So. All your intel was buttoned up, double- and triple-checked.”
    Your…
    Choice of stark pronoun noted.
    “Of course.”
    The Wizard didn’t specifically remind him that Metzger had assured him Moreno’s death was necessary to save lives because the expat had been about to blow up American Petroleum’s headquarters in Miami. When in fact the worst that had happened was a woman protestor threw a tomato at a policeman and missed.
    But with the Wizard, conversations involved mostly subtext and his words—or lack thereof—seemed all the more pointed for it.
    Metzger had worked with the man for several years. They didn’t meet in person often but on those occasions that they did, the stocky, smiling man always wore blue serge, whatever that exactly was, and impressively patterned socks, along with an American flag pin in his lapel. He never had a problem like Metzger’s, the Smoke problem, and when he spoke he did so always with the calmest of voices.
    “We had to act fast,” Metzger said, resenting that he was on the defensive. “But we know Moreno’s a threat. He funds terrorists, he supports arms sales, his businesses launder money, a lot of things.”
    Metzger corrected himself: Moreno had been a threat. He’d been shot to death. He wasn’t is anything.
    The Wizard of Washington continued in that honey voice of his, “Sometimes you just have to move fast, Shreve, that’s true. Crazy business.”
    Metzger took out a fingernail clipper and went to work. He chopped slowly. It kept the Smoke from materializing, a little. Snipping was weird but it was better than gorging on fries and cookies. And screaming at your wife or children.
    The Wizard muffled his phone and had another muted conversation.
    Who the hell else was in the room with him? Metzger wondered. The attorney general?
    Someone from Pennsylvania Avenue?
    When the Wizard came back on the line he asked, “And we hear there’s some investigation?”
    So. Fuck. He did know. How had word gotten out? Leaks are as big a threat to what I’m doing as the terrorists themselves.
    Smoke, big time.
    “Seems to be.”
    A pause that clearly asked: And when were you going to mention it to us, Shreve?
    The Wizard’s stated question, though, was: “Police?”
    “NYPD, yes. Not feds. But there’s a solid case for immunity.” Metzger’s law degree had been gathering dust for years but he’d looked up In re Neagle and related cases very carefully before taking on the job here. He could recite the conclusion of that case in his sleep: That federal officials could not be prosecuted for state crimes, provided they were acting within the scope of their authority.
    “Ah, right, immunity,” the Wizard said. “We’ve looked into that, of course.”
    Already? But Metzger wasn’t really surprised.
    A viscous pause. “You’re happy that everything was within the scope of authority, Shreve?”
    “Yes.”
    Please, Lord, let me keep the Smoke inside now.
    “Excellent. Now, it was Bruns who was the specialist, right?”
    Either no names or code names over the phone, however well encrypted.
    “Yes.”
    “The police talked to