The Stringers, page 5
“I suppose you have a point. I’m still irritated at it, though.”
Mr. Webble gave me a worried look. He entered my cubicle, leaned against the wall, and sipped on his tall cup of coffee, the contents of which were foreign to me. He had a peculiar recipe for his own brew, refusing to share the ingredients with anyone.
“I detect something disconcerting in you,” he said. “May I inquire as to what it is?”
I shrugged. “It’s nothing. At least nothing I could describe exactly.”
“I can’t imagine what would upset you, after you beat the Times to a piece they should have had done before you.”
“I can’t argue with you on that. Nevertheless, I have yet to feel any pride in it.”
“What? Why not? It’s the best piece you’ve done so far, and all of them have been stellar! I’ve been very impressed.”
“I don’t know. It’s like building a house and stepping back to admire it, only to feel like you didn’t build it, or someone else helped you build it and you’re trying to take the credit for it. Or worse; you think you built a house, but all you did was build a shed.”
Mr. Webble grabbed at his ponytail as he laughed. “That is a very interesting analogy to make. I’ve never heard it put that way before, and I’ve had some strange apprentices walk in through that door before.”
It was evident from his restless stance that he had grown uncomfortable with my attitude. People didn’t normally open up as I did, regardless of how well you knew someone. It just wasn’t done. You were supposed to keep some things to yourself. You could speak indirectly of such matters, but never so openly. Why, I don’t know. Maybe at some point in time people realized it was best not to know everything about the people around you, either out of shame or fear.
But I felt an urge to do so, nonetheless. Otherwise, it seemed like I had to lie about myself in order to adhere to etiquette. And since Mr. Webble was conveniently standing there, and I regarded him as someone I knew quite well, it didn’t seem odd to convey my lack of elation over the whole thing.
Another thing I had been proven wrong about so far.
Taking several more long sips of his coffee, Mr. Webble scratched the side of his head, then faked receiving a message from another student as he excused himself. I dropped my head into my hands as I leaned over my chair, wondering why I felt so miserable.
I wasn’t given much time to sulk, for I received a message from Casey informing me he would be in the newsroom within a few minutes with his ISA mentor, giving me just enough time to finish some personal correspondence with several friends of mine from high school and to complete an assignment involving a short read. My Prizm slowed down, however, as I was skimming over the text, probably due to an overload from too many apprentices accessing the network simultaneously. Mr. Webble had promised to get the bug fixed at the beginning of the month, but incidents continued to occur.
Casey strolled into my cubicle, leaning with one hand against the corner.
“I saw the public information request you sent,” he remarked. “On the City Council minutes from a meeting four months ago.”
“Yes.”
“How does it pertain to your story?”
“Councilman Chang has made claims about previous statements he made during council meetings, and I am trying to confirm them.”
Casey chuckled. “I see.”
“Personally, I don’t think he did say these things.”
“Isn’t that a little biased for a journalist?” he asked.
“It’s my opinion,” I said. “But it’s not going into the story, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Good. Just making sure. It’s going to be my job to ask those questions, I hope.”
I pulled him up a chair next to my desk. He slid into it like the cubicle was home to him, unbuttoning his coat as he threw it over the side of the wall. His relaxed features indicated the meeting with his mentor had concluded without much castigation.
“What did he say?” I asked without an introduction.
Casey threw a hand of dismissal over at the window as he scoffed. “My mentor is not very happy with his life, so he has decided to take it out on me. He told me I had the wrong kind of attitude for an ISA intern aspiring to be an officer.”
“Indeed? And what did you tell him?”
“I asked what sort of attitude an ISA officer is supposed to have.”
“And?”
“He didn’t really give an answer. His face just got redder until he looked away. He and I have a tumultuous relationship, to be sure, but I’m not too concerned about it. I get my work done on time and complete all the assignments he gives me, and last time I checked there isn’t a proper attitude requirement among the qualifications for the position.”
“I get the impression it isn’t you he’s angry at.”
“No. It wouldn’t be a stretch to assume other aspects of his job that don’t involve me could be the source of his angst. I do know while he’s mentoring me he’s also been handed a significant investigation concerning the illegal publication of illicit newspapers.”
Newspapers.
In and of itself, the word meant nothing, except describing the old printed format on which news had been published. Without any other context to go with it, the word had no value or meaning beyond the image of a framed copy featured in the Bellevue Historical Museum.
But with the right tone, the word would instantly cause me to stiffen up, a chill running down my back. Whenever Casey used that word, he also used that distinct tone, the kind that one also used when discussing rape, murder, and kidnapping.
“Are these the ones from Seattle?” I asked.
“One can’t know for certain. He’s tight lipped about it, and I can’t blame him. Security around those cases is tighter than a clam shell. Merely talking about them in the open can land you in the deputy director’s office for an hour’s worth of chastising.”
I had a question to ask Casey, but I paused before putting it out in front of him. I knew how sensitive the topic was to him, and others in the ISA. Additionally, I didn’t want to be overheard and have anyone get the wrong idea about me.
“Have you ever seen a newspaper?” I asked.
Casey inhaled deeply, his countenance turning from casual to somber as he straightened his posture. We weren’t supposed to discuss them at all, but like me, Casey needed someone to talk to about his work besides those in his office.
“The old ones, yes. The ones we have to deal with now? Not really. I’ve heard the officers talk about them, but you know the law; nobody is allowed to view them, let alone handle one of them unless it’s to destroy them. As for me, I’m not going to risk it. It’s not worth it.”
I nodded my head slightly. I myself hadn’t seen a newspaper, either, but ever since I had been little I had been fascinated by the concept. To a world a century ago, such a product would have been feasible. But I struggled with the notion of getting one’s news in a physical form, to have a story to read that couldn’t be updated once it left the presses, when a story on our news site could be edited an infinite number of times if need be. Stories didn’t just happen. They happened. They weren’t an event that occurred in a moment. History was a continuous flow of events.
But since they were also published beyond the regulatory influence of the ISA, it meant they contained all sorts of disgraceful material that would be immediately censored for the sake of decency. One didn’t have to think very hard to understand why. They were all written by unlicensed, unregulated reporters who simply wrote whatever they felt like, facts be damned. I failed to grasp on a basic level why its readership possessed the desire to obtain their information from such an inconvenient source.
The other aspect of newspapers that intrigued me was the content that got printed in them. I knew I would probably never see one to find out what exactly. Per federal law, a newspaper was regarded as a form of intellectual pornography, and was treated as such; it wasn’t illegal just to publish, circulate, or possess a copy. If you got caught with a newspaper on your person or in your home or on your property, it was a federal crime punishable up to twenty years in prison. Plus, your property would be handed over to the local law enforcement jurisdiction.
It seemed like a harsh sentence, and it only made me more curious as to what horrendous lies they published that would force the government to put such draconian laws on the books.
That was another one of the ISA’s many responsibilities. Aside from ensuring all published material met a high standard and censoring any statements that infringed on anyone’s rights or freedoms, they were also tasked with combating illegal publications like the newspapers.
My public information request for the video transcript finally came through, downloading onto my Prizm. I opened it up and watched the section of it where Councilman Chang had, supposedly, made his concerns about the bridge demolition known.
The video revealed nothing that the minutes didn’t already contain. Councilman Chang’s statement on the subject had been an offhand remark, not significant.
Casey picked up on my distress right away.
“Why so melancholic?” he asked.
I explained to him what I had just learned. He understood what it meant. I hadn’t spent days trying to uncover a legitimate story, but it was still frustrating to have someone make claims that they couldn’t substantiate and force you to do the grunt work to confirm. I couldn’t complain, however, because that was part of the job that I had to accept with a good attitude.
Tapping his fingers against his leg, Casey had a hopeful look I easily recognized. Whenever he had an idea, his eyebrows rose and his chin lifted up as he eyed the ceiling, as if appealing to a higher power for inspiration.
“Let me look at the video,” he said. “Send me the minutes, too.”
I had both sent to him, waiting as he brought them up in front of his eyes. He studied them diligently. His elevated eyebrows remained where they were as he hummed to himself, flicking one of his fingers off his chin.
“Let me ask my mentor about it,” he said. “He’ll know what to do.”
I didn’t protest, unconcerned about whether Mr. Webble would approve of me seeming to be go around his back. Though they were technically not involved in any way, because of the inherent nature of the ISA, he reported to Casey’s mentor, who was the ISA officer assigned to our news site. Ultimately, his mentor decided whether or not a story got published, so if he had a solution, it was logical to assume Mr. Webble would not protest.
After speaking to his mentor for a moment, Casey got off his phone with a satisfied smile.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “My mentor just discussed it with your editor. You don’t have to write the story.”
“Good,” I said with a huge sigh, resting my head against my chair. “I didn’t see how I was going to write it. What am I to write? There’s no story to it. Nothing happened.”
“Well, nothing from your end. You don’t need to write it. But they’re going to run a story.”
I turned to Casey with a perplexed expression on my face.
“Why?” I asked.
“It wasn’t Mr. Webble. This came from my agency.”
“Your mentor did this?”
“No. Someone else. Probably his supervisor.”
“They’re writing the story? But that’s our job as journalists!”
“I don’t know all the facts. My mentor was pretty brief about it.”
“What did he say?” I inquired urgently.
“He said that someone else was going to write it and the Record didn’t need to waste their time on it.”
The news should have relieved me. After all, I had just had a complicated situation taken off my plate, freeing me up to pursue other stories.
But I was still miffed about it. I knew it was within the bounds of the ISA to take the story. They had done so on numerous occasions in the past. Yet, I found it rude to have done so without asking me or at least informing me. Then again, knowing what Casey had told me about the efficiency of the ISA, it was surprising his mentor even knew.
“Well, I guess that’s that,” I remarked.
“I’m afraid they don’t feel the need to explain their decisions, especially to journalists.”
“Considering their whole purpose as an agency is to assist us, wouldn’t it be better for them to speak with us directly through you?”
“Normally, yes,” he said. “But like I said, it was most likely a deputy who did this.”
“What makes this so important to occupy their time and focus?”
“No idea. It’s an election year. Councilman Chang’s race is a close one. Whenever there is a lot of tension, the agency sometimes likes to assume full control over what’s published.”
“I don’t know if I like that,” I uttered quietly.
“I don’t either. But it’s better than what we had before, when we had chaos. I can’t imagine how they allowed just anyone to act like a journalist. All you had to do was create an account on a site and that was it. You could write anything and say whatever you wanted. There were no licenses or permits or anything. They used smear tactics, circulated outright lies, and ran stories that only showed one side of the story. Believe me, however inconvenient it is now, it’s better than in the past, when there were rogue sites on the Net spreading half-truths and rumors and gossip, misinforming the public.”
I couldn’t argue with Casey on that. I had just finished a journalism course covering the use of media in politics, from the 1800 presidential elections and World War I to Watergate and the Second Persian Gulf War. Whatever one cared to think about media, its influence and power could not be denied. It had the ability to ruin a politician’s career or, as early part of the twenty-first century had shown, elevate him to a place where he couldn’t have risen otherwise. As Mr. Larsen had taught us, such power was like a fourth branch of the federal government. It couldn’t just be left to its own devices. It had to be properly controlled with the same checks and balances.
Yes, we were dutifully trained on ethics, objectivity, and how to eliminate bias in stories, but that wasn’t enough. There had to be guardians. Media was like a garden. It had to have a caretaker, a groundskeeper to prevent overgrowth as well as weeds.
Left with no story, I contacted Mr. Webble and requested another assignment. To my astonishment, he replied that he had nothing to give me. I couldn’t help but notice that he had a nervous tone, like he was afraid of saying the wrong thing. What could he be afraid of saying to me?
“Are you quite certain you don’t need me to work on the story about the new zoning ordinance the City Council is considering?” I asked. “They’re set to vote on it next month. I thought an advanced piece on it would perhaps stimulate some debate among business owners in that area.”
Mr. Webble laughed guardedly. “I must say you work too hard, Roy. Please simply enjoy the afternoon. You can remain at your desk and see if anything comes up, but everything’s been covered.”
“You’ve got to give me something to do.”
“I’m sure you would be content with that. But I want you to be ready in case I need you to work on something else.”
“I can multitask.”
He paused, cleared his throat. “You’re worked hard enough on this last piece…yes, that’s it. Here’s what you can do. Conduct as much research on the bridge as you can. I can assure you it won’t be a dead-end story like this last one.”
“If it’s a dead-end story, why is the ISA taking over it?”
“I-I don’t know. I’ll ask them. In the meantime, see what you can find about the bridge.”
I took off my Prizm from my temple as I rubbed the skin. I then looked over at Casey. He had his chin in his hand, studying me closely. I turned my head to the side, as if to ask what fascinated him so much. He smiled behind a deadpan face, scooting his chair over to me like we were in preschool.
“What troubles you?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“It’s stamped on your face, and I’ve known that face too long.”
“Really, I’m just restless and wish to do more work, but Mr. Webble decided he doesn’t want me to do anything except research.”
I paused, then whispered with a hand cupped over the side of my mouth. “But that’s what I’ve done for two months. What more does he want from me?”
Placing my Prizm back on, I checked my mail to see if I had received anything from my father. That was certain to brighten my mood, to see a message from him congratulating me on my story. It meant more to me than a hundred likeminded messages, which is how many I had received so far.
My hopes died when I saw no response from my father. His status was currently at unavailable, so I couldn’t contact him, or at least he didn’t wish to speak with anyone.
Strange. I belonged to a very short list of people who were able to contact him at any reasonable time during the day. What could he possibly be doing that would detain him like that?
Casey persisted stubbornly. He wouldn’t let me go. He wasn’t a journalist, but he possessed the same natural curiosity as I.
“Tell me,” he said.
“It’s my father,” I said.
“What about him? Is he well?”
“Very well. But he hasn’t sent me any kind of message about my story that got published earlier today.”
“Perhaps he’s busy or hasn’t read it.”
“Impossible. He always reads my work. He has the new site on his newsfeed. He gets instant updates on all my articles published. When I wrote my first feature story on Judy Lee, the cross-country runner from Yarrow Bay, he was the first to respond to it.”
“I don’t know what to say. Have you tried contacting him?”
“He’s unavailable.”
“How often is he unavailable to you?”
“Only when he’s asleep or in the middle of something that he can’t be interrupted, but even when he’s asleep I can still alert him in an emergency.”
“Interesting. Are you afraid he didn’t like it?”
