Black Marks on the White Page Page 10

  —And the explosives were fake.

  —The explosives were fake. The Mountie supplied the plan and the pressure cooker bombs that weren’t bombs. My clients committed no crime.

  —That’s your Press Secretary for the White House moment. Hammer that again and again. Now tear down the cops.

  —They were just sick kids. Manipulated by cops who had failed to detect the XXXXXXX pipe bomber heading to Seattle and then LAX. Failed to detect the 1985 Air India bombs at YVR, failed to nail XXXXXX XXXXXXX for all the Downtown Eastside missing women in Vancouver. The cops needed a win. They’re what Canada’s known for — our poster boys: Mounties and Maple Syrup!

  —Yes, build the picture of a desperate police force, with a string of failures behind them, who will do anything for a win. And these sick kids are soft targets they can turn into terrorists, not the real deal.

  —Can we meet to go over this?

  —No. I’ve got enough people who hate me already.

  2. #NEWAR456-89Flag22-1 ENCRYPTED DARKNET BLOG POST

  I tell tourists ‘traditional’ stories. A girl ‘on the verge of womanhood’ is warned of the Wild Woman of the Woods. Her parents tell her that this female monster is a cannibal. The girl goes down to the river by herself. Sure enough, the Wild Woman appears, old and wrinkly and wild hair. She invites the girl back to her house.

  The girl is sick of her parents being on her case all the time and she’s not afraid of any crazy old lady, so she follows. The house is deep in the woods, a total dump to look at but when the girl goes inside she’s amazed to find it full of riches. The girl stares at all the food and tools and furs and treasures crammed inside. The old witch comes up behind the girl, strokes her hair.

  ‘Oooohhhh, you have beautiful hair. Ooooohhhh, I wish I had hair like you.’

  Which freaks the girl out totally, so she says she’s late for salmon supper and bolts. The old lady cries out, ‘Oooohhhhh, come back, let me stroke your hair—’ The girl doesn’t hear the rest as she’s running, running for her life. But she’s lost … panics … then hears the friendly river, runs to it, and finds her way home. Her parents have been worried sick. The girl confesses she met the Wild Woman of the Woods, went to her house.

  The girls’ parents are pissed. The Wild Woman eats children! No one has ever seen inside her house and lived to tell the tale! The father makes the girl take him to the Wild Woman’s house. He brings his big canoe-carving chisel. First they can’t find the house, but then they hear the old lady wailing — ‘Oooooohhhhh I want young girl hair.’ FYI she was always making that weird Ooooohhhh sound before she said anything, like old people make when they try to stand up after sitting down for too long, and complain about their bones … and their joints … and teeth … and their constipation … and everything … except worse with this Wild Woman. Like the sound of wild wind through rotting trees.

  They follow the ‘Oooohhhhhh’ to the Wild Woman’s house. The father knocks on the door, then stands in the shadows. The Wild Woman comes out, smiles through broken rocks for teeth at the girl, then suddenly reaches out to grab her. But the father jumps out and hammers the chisel into the neck of the Wild Woman. Cuts her head right off … And that, folks, is how we get the Wild Woman of the Woods mask. See it here on the wall of the Sweetgrass Cultural Centre. Be sure to buy your genuine local Aboriginal Indigenous First Peoples handcrafted souvenirs before you finish the cruise.

  But first, back to the story, what does it mean? Any ideas, folks? … And all I get back from the tourists are these blank bannock-brain looks. LOL. But I keep at them.

  ‘What does this story teach us?’

  ‘Um … Listen to your parents.’

  ‘Right on! But our Elders also say the Wild Woman deserves to have her head chopped off because she has a house full of riches but doesn’t share them.’ Then I stare at the old ladies with lots of bling just a little bit too long — that always gets me good tips. ‘But that’s not all,’ I say. ‘The old witch also deserves to have her head cut off because she’s old but wants the young girl’s hair. She wants to be young again. She’s vain. She can’t accept that we all grow old and die. So she kills young people and eats them.’ And that’s when I try not to look at the old ladies with dye jobs, facelifts, boob jobs and botox, but I do … for just a little too long. Then I smile, my sweet smile, because really I’m a pretty Pocahontas telling traditional stories between the salsa lessons and meeting the Norwegian fishing-boat-trained captain for a photo op — Captain Stig Stinkfist, who still smells fishy no matter how much Calvin Klein cologne he drowns himself in.

  It’s the same sweet smile I give the dumb white girl who wears the ‘Party with Pocahontas the Sexy Squaw’ costume to our Halloween party. The blonde bimbo who also adds a fake bullet hole to her head. I want to tell her about the real hole I saw in the back of my friend’s head, but I think — she’ll keep … They’ll all keep.

  3. #VETER347--67-21FLAG—MILITARY PYSCH-ASSESSMENT

  3 guys — big guys — beards — running holding bottles acid acid ACID

  3 of us — 1 me — stays — the 2 others herd the girls — 1 in front — 1 in back

  we r used to this — we plan — it’s our job: get the girls to the school — take a different route each day cos Taliban are waiting — watching

  me i turn — i can’t shoot — that’s not what we do — peacekeeping — they know that

  i hear the other 2 soldiers run — the girls run

  the 3 bearded guys throw the acid at me — my hand is on fire — i guess i put up my hand

  i punch one — we train bare-fist fighting — we’re used to punching heads — but the beards give them some buffer — more acid — i duck — my hair my head my uniform burning — think this is the day i die — they punch — i kick — they kick me — i’m down on the ground — burning — my jaw slack — broken — more acid — i will die here — in this dusty shithole street — more acid — still getting kicked — stomped — arm cracks — resigned — fuck of a way to die — more acid — lots more acid — but strange not burning — roll — blood eye sees shopkeepers come out to throw water on me — clean me — while i’m still fighting — roll — kick 1 beard in nuts — he figured i was a goner — i’m back in that biker bar off-duty — itching for a brawl — the boys send me in plain clothes — civvies off duty to pick a fight — so then all the rest of the boys can pile in and it’s all on — frowned on — not in the manual — but happens — more often than you want to know — keeps us fighting fit — throwing haymakers left and right — one eye acid blind — spit 1 tooth out — swallow 1 — scrapes all the way down — go ape — til 1 soldier comes back — takes 1 beard out — 2 beards run — shopkeepers throw more water — burning — cleaning — 1 soldier radios — more water — washing in street, stripping off naked to get acid off — probably not going to die today after all — going to Rammstein first class — then … home that’s what we’re doing there — taking girls to school — what you do every day and never think about — i’m not a hero

  4. #NEWAR66363YX-FLag19-ENCRYPTED DARKWEB BLOG POST

  Fave place to hang on Alaskan cruises is the hot tubs on top of the ship. Go there middle of the night, do a big bomb in the pool, then chill in the tub and watch the Northern Lights — Aurora Borealis — Arsaniit. Some old stories warn against whistling. That the lights are the Spirit of the Ancestors dancing and if you disturb them they’ll come down and cut your head off … I whistle. Sometimes the lights crackle back — angry electricity — but no one’s chopped my head off … yet. LOL.

  Security cams everywhere. They watch me from the bridge. See me in the hot tub. Don’t give a shit. Told them it’s ‘A Native Thing — I need to listen to the Ancestors.’

  I got 50 pounds of gelignite off some survivalist ecoterrorist type in Juneau hidden in my cabin. My roomate is Filipino. She never asks questions. They’re very polite.

  Q. Do you think it would be more impressive for a cruise ship to bl
ow up and take out XXXXXXXX Bridge while going under it? Or for the bridge to blow up and take out the ship below? Just jamming. LOL. PS: And that would be spectacular but so what? What difference would it really make? Pipelines are the new Frontlines #Dakotameansfriend #StopKinderMorgan

  5. #FRYER674-23-3Flag5-FACEBOOK POST

  Why is everyone so afraid of bombs? The Universe is a bomb.

  It should have been called THE BIG BOMB THEORY.

  6. #ALGOR45678-23Flag47890—GOOGLE SEARCH

  ‘The events of 9/11 were the greatest work of art imaginable for the whole cosmos. Minds achieving something in an act that we couldn’t even dream of in music, people rehearsing like mad for ten years, preparing fanatically for a concert, and then dying; just imagine what happened there. You have people who are that focused on a performance and then 5,000 people are dispatched to the afterlife, in a single moment. I couldn’t do that. By comparison, we composers are nothing.’

  —Karlheinz Stockhausen

  7. #NEWAR78834-flag7-ENCRYPTED DARKWED BLOG POST

  I wait til the end of the Halloween Party for Blondie, for when she is drunk. By then I know she’s a smoker — Marlboro. Follow her outside, ask for a light. She’s still wearing her Halloween Party with Pocahontas dress but the bullet hole on her forehead is lifting a little from the sweat. She sees me coming, gets the guilts, and scrapes the bullet hole off. I pretend not to notice.

  ‘Sorry, but do you have a spare cigarette?’

  ‘Oh, sure … So you smoke?’

  ‘Yeah, tobacco is traditional medicine for our people.’

  Try to keep a straight face, but then crack up. She laughs, relaxes. Wind is blowing hard so I get in real close. We make a little tent to light up.

  ‘See we made a teepee. We’re BFFs now.’

  ‘For sure.’

  ‘Thing about this part of the ship is there’s no cameras. A blindspot.’

  ‘What? The wind is too loud! What did you say?’

  ‘Go look out there,’ I tell her, pointing into the dark, ‘that’s my home.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘There.’

  She looks out into the darkness, leans out a little, then I do my best UFC move — a Double-leg Takedown from behind. Lift her legs, drive, flip, and she’s gone. Bombs away. I am a bomb. Come on, dare u to defuse me.

  8. #ALGOR889967L- FLAG 2—TWEET

  Sykes&Picot = original Middle-East t*rrorists carved up countries + Winston’s Hiccup — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winston%27s_Hiccup

  9. #ALGOR457 REC—2015-10-16 (transcript)—FLAG—AGENT-012 INTERVIEW

  —We love your algorithm.

  —Oh, thanks.

  —You know the ‘Friend Algorithm’ from The Big Bang Theory?

  —I have that T-shirt.

  —I guessed that. How much do you think it’s worth?

  —What, the T-shirt?

  —Funny. You know the Chinese would just steal your algorithm but we have laws.

  —Sorry, what’s this new job you want to talk about?

  —My colleague by the door and myself we wanted to chat, make an offer …

  —Are you trying to headhunt me because …

  —Citizenfour , you’ve seen it right?

  —What?

  —The documentary, it won an Oscar, about Edward Snowden — the whistleblower?

  —Oh … yes.

  —And Naomi Wolf — I believe you discussed her at your Book Club — well, she said that the only way Big Brother really works is if you know you’re being watched, right? No point in having a #Watchlist unless you know you’re being watched, right? So maybe Snowden was allowed to walk …

  —Look, I don’t …

  —You created an algorithm that can predict who will be next to leave a company … voluntarily. It works. You’ve made a small fortune because companies can significantly reduce the cost of losing an employee and hiring another one, right? If they can find these individuals soon enough, and turn them around, right?

  —Right. Who do you represent?

  —The CIA … (LAUGHS) Your face. Seriously, we want to identify who are the next Edward Snowdens, who has the whistleblower profile … and blow the whistle on them first. Two million bucks, that’s what we valued your algorithm at in the private sector. But if you helped us adapt it for governments, well, who knows?

  —What kind of clusterfuck nonsense are you talking?

  —Um … language, we do record these conversations.

  —Is this some kind of hidden-camera prank? I’m leaving.

  —So your friend, Karlheinz Stockhausen, he said 9/11 was the greatest work of art ever, right? You agree? I mean we’d find that on your browser history, right? … Right? Why would you look that up?

  —I like his music. Why …

  —You call that music. I tried to listen to his ‘masterpiece’, Kontakte? You’d have to be seriously disturbed to call that music. I mean there’s no beat, rhythm, melody, chorus … order. Do you know how many people work for Homeland Security?

  —No.

  —A lot. Do you know how many are fuck-ups? Criminals even? Cartel members? Too many. Homeland Security hired so many new people, new agents, new border guards, after 9/11, and we got the dregs, not to mention organised crime who saw an opportunity, and now … now we need to weed them out. And you can help us.

  —Weed them out?

  —Weed them out.

  —What would you do to them?

  —They’d be … managed, found another career. Not your problem.

  —So you seriously work for the US Government?

  —No. No. We are a private company who pitch projects globally to various governmental bodies. And we have a great hit rate. Get a lot of research grants. Sure, governments have people paid to do research for them but it’s often bureaucratically cumbersome. There’s all these checks and balances, and whistleblowers — Enemies Within — so it’s easier to outsource. So … so tell me, what are the secret signs someone is thinking of leaving their company?

  —Um … they update their LinkedIn profile.

  —Right. I don’t think that’s really what we’re looking for, but what about the books they’ve read? Movies they’ve seen? I see you watched Captain Fantastic, the movie with Viggo Mortensen. You like those off-the-grid, anti-establishment, let’s celebrate Noam Chomsky Day types? I preferred him in The Lord of the Rings. Did you like it when Viggo came out of his hippie bus, flopped out his junk and talked about how even animals have a penis? I mean, seriously, what kind of weirdo listens to Stockhausen? I mean my kids could …

  —You know it ruined him.

  —Who?

  —Stockhausen, what he said about 9/11. It doesn’t matter what a revolutionary he was in terms of musical composition and electronic experimentation, now that’s all he’ll be remembered for.

  —Uh huh. And how would you like to be remembered? As the guy who turned down the deal that would make him a multi-millionaire, and make his lovely wife and two kids happy forever? Or the loser who got ripped off by some Chinese Dark Web hackers who stole all his secrets and left him with nothing? It’s up to you. So what else? What else might be a sign someone is a whistleblower? I mean, trouble with intimacy? Intimate relationships with women, with men, children? Missing parents, messy divorce, reacting against authority, truancy at school, drug use, watching Mr Robot over and over? How would we measure that? Factor that all in? What about IQ? Are they frustrated smart people? Or angry stupid people? Is there a genetic predisposition to being a terrorist? A genome? And how can we really do ‘extreme vetting’ and ‘ideological tests’ when there’s so many liars in the world. What’s a true test of morals? And ethics?

  —Isn’t that somewhere near Sussex?

  —Funny. You have a quirky sense of humour — a dark sense of humour? Would that be a factor? How could you measure that?

  —I … I have no idea …

  —That’s okay. We’d ask for a whole swag of R&D money, based on your
past success. And you university types, you’re pretty good at writing proposals for research grants. Money for nothing. Then we’d pitch it — like a movie. Like Minority Report for real, for whistleblowers — future crimes. Terrible title for that movie, by the way. They could have done a whole lot better. I mean it’s not about minorities. But, speaking of which, you’d have to factor that in, right: ethnic/racial/religious status as predictor? So, what do you say?

  —I say … you’d need access to all the data on past successful, and failed, whistleblowers. That’s the only way you could develop a new algorithm.

  —But for you to have access to all that you’d have to be screened further. I mean we threw our algorithm at you — browser history, phone records, bank payments — relax, you did good, but we’d have to go a whole lot deeper, down to the bone, suck out the marrow … of you.

  —And I’d need to discuss this with …

  —You can’t tell anyone.

  —But …

  —You can keep your business, oversee, delegate, but our deadline is to pitch to clients on February 14th for Valentines Day: Love your country, buy this algorithm.

  —That’s … terrible.

  —So join us and make it better.

  —I can’t just …

  —We know. We’ll visit again soon. But, seriously, that Twitter account? — Delete it. That ‘Sykes and Picot plus Winston Churchill’s hiccup’ sort of tweet — that Amateur Hour stuff won’t wash with our clients. And watch what you Google. And this conversation didn’t happen.

  #ALGOR-ENDS SEC#457 REC—(transcript) FLAG— ORANGE (Time 3:12)

  10. #NEWAR66777983-68999t34-flag17—ENCRYPTED BLOG POST

  Fuck The Walking Dead! Native People already live post-apocalypse. We already had the Evil Alien Invasion, the brain-eating Zombies