Not a Jot More
I was listening to the second of Bach’s cello suites when Dante started emptying his bladder on the Oriental rug. The headphones must have obscured his faint bark but truth be told, he’d given me the usual warning look and I didn’t move fast enough.
I went to the back window to start scouting for the Uberwolves. Dante knew they were outside prowling the empty fields around our home even though they never barked. I would only discover them after they made a kill and began to howl. We lived in a brick and stone house up on a ridge and for that, we were grateful. Wood houses were a rarity these days. The Uberwolf was mostly from the gray wolf variety but was more ferocious as a hunter. Some uncertain interbreeding had taken place inside of the glens of the Adirondacks after the great ocean rise flooded the Hudson River Valley. That had been followed by the longest drought on record. Then a six-month stretch of hurricanes wiped out what was left of residential housing communities and commercial businesses from sinkhole washouts and seawater flooding. The wolf packs had moved farther south. Former roadways became jagged stretches of moonscape. From the sky they looked like long wounds with black and gray bandaids stripped off and strewn about in scattered pieces. I saw it all two years ago when a Federal Marshal flew me to Albany for $1,000 cash so I could cop some albuterol for Mary. Back then, if you had currency stashed you could still get by, but things like booze, antibiotics and a good bag of weed were more useful now.
I ran for the gun and grabbed some paper towels and vinegar from the storage room. Supplies were getting low. You couldn’t walk outside when the Uberwolves were about, but if you shot one from a window, you might be able to scare the others away long enough to drag the corpse inside. If you were lucky, you might have a deer sighting. Easy to shoot but getting to the remains before the canines was almost impossible and herds were rare.
It was Mary’s idea to keep lots of vinegar in storage since it had many uses. We hadn’t spoken for a month, since the day my satellite phone stopped working. Cell phones were pointless. The phone companies had stopped trying to repair the landlines that held it altogether. Most cell towers were now useless sculptures or were acting as flagpoles to mark territory—their critical parts already harvested. Most of the carriers were bust anyway.
“John, the vinegar will keep forever. Look for the canvas-top trucks in the next convoy; they usually have a pallet or two. Victor told me they are taking booze and wine in addition to cash. You might have to let go of that last bottle of Blanton’s but you should get a full pallet for that.” Mary was a great negotiator.
Victor, a close family friend, got stuck in Connecticut with her when they used a Humvee to get to the Hudson River. He was originally from the eastern end of the Allegheny plateau in Pennsylvania and would often reminisce about how beautiful it was there. He said it was still good for growing crops and that we should consider a move. Mary agreed, but I wasn’t interested. “We should hold our ground,” I’d said.
A private ferry was running across the water when they started their trip but later sank after a bad storm came over the Taconic Mountains and put it on the river bottom. The Rip Van Winkle Bridge was the only river crossing still open, but no one considered it safe anymore. Land-pirates on either end were staked out night and day.
I dropped the vinegar and paper towels next to Dante’s new piss puddle and ran upstairs to crack open a window for a view of the entire pack. They were moving in two groups. The lead wolf in the closest group was facing the house. My hope was that taking out the alpha member first would scare off the pack long enough to do the retrieval. It usually worked. I was not a hunter but had figured out how to use my neighbor’s .30-06 after he died from diphtheria. He’d offered it to me in his last days and I accepted. It had a Nikon scope that was easy to adjust. Hunters I knew who’d taken deer and black bear used to say: "Aim for the heart, right behind the shoulder." Under the present circumstances I was ignoring that advice thinking that a dramatic headshot would scare the other pack members away. Bang! It worked.
I hurried down the stairs and went to the door, slipping on two pair of brass knuckles and heavy leather gloves. A man-wolf skirmish might arise quickly; faster than you could aim and shoot a gun. In those cases, slugging it out was the only choice and every blow counted. If one wolf tied you up for more than several seconds, the pack was on you. Dante followed me but I made sure he couldn’t get outside. They’d almost gotten him the last time.
The alpha lay in a heap on the edge of the old hayfield. The pack had moved backward, and I didn’t like the way things looked. If they moved ahead, in the same direction they’d been traveling, chances were better they’d keep going. I moved quickly. The vultures hadn’t arrived yet and the red-tailed hawks circling above were more interested in snatching rodents before the wolves did.
When I got to the carcass, I grabbed it by a back leg and dragged it along the ground as fast as I could. He was heavy—several meals worth, but it would mean salting the leftovers, since the freezer was too much to keep going on our solar panels. None of the wolves followed, choosing to stay in place and look on like they were observing a memorial service.
The old Florida room had become my butchering station. It was well lit, and the salt stayed dry there. I was able to do most of the work with a sharp axe and a gourmet Henkel knife. I’d figured out how to install a pulley on one of the upstairs dormers. This made it easy to properly slit the animal’s throat and hang it for a good blood drain. The only trouble came from vultures, so I kept a BB gun by the window. That usually worked.
I cleaned up after Dante and moved back upstairs to watch over the hanging feast while listening to the second cello suite. The D-Minor flourishes brought some dignity to our setting and helped me express my gratitude to the predator-turned-prey hanging from the dormer. I could see that the roof antenna was still in place, despite heavy winds from last night. Good. I’d be able to talk to Mary on the ham radio. At the end of the second suite we tuned in. Dante sat next to my chair and we listened on the planned frequency. Mary was always two steps ahead and had figured out how to evade the roving bands of land-pirates who might be eavesdropping. She gave me the code word Hamlet. In the message, I’d be addressed as the protagonist. She’d be Gertrude, always standing in the wind and speaking to the Prince of Denmark. If the wind was blowing east, she was still away. If the wind was blowing west, it meant she was on her way home.
The land-pirates were now a commonplace. Often a motley bunch: former inmates, bad cops and unscrupulous military officers who had access to weapons caches. Stealing and bartering kept them armed. The successful ones traveled in Humvees or jeeps while most of the upstarts used dirt bikes.
Dante and I listened to a woman report a violent skirmish on the river near the Beacon Bridge. Armed men had overtaken a supply boat that was crossing over to the Orange County side. Someone else was offering dried meat—they didn’t say what kind—for Azithromycin. “We’ll meet you along the Hudson Highlands,” they’d said. Lots of busy chatter, mostly people offering barter deals while making oblique references to where the transactions could be completed and how flexible terms might be. Nothing was straightforward.
After about thirty minutes I heard Mary’s voice. Dante sat up.
“I wonder if you hear us, Hamlet? Laertes and I feel a westward wind. But alas, I must tell you it has already passed the stone palace and moved on. Thank you for the companionship these past few years. I hope you’ll find your Ophelia and reconsider taking action on your own.”
Mary, is that you?
“Not a jot more, Hamlet. Goodbye.”
The wind was picking up and the bloodless wolf began to sway back and forth. Dante flopped down and closed his eyes. It was time for the third cello suite, so I put on my headphones. The butchering could wait.
© Kevin Swanwick 2019
I was listening to the second of Bach’s cello suites when Dante started emptying his bladder on the Oriental rug. The headphones must have obscured his faint bark but truth be told, he’d given me the usual warning look and I didn’t move fast enough.
I went to the back window to start scouting for the Uberwolves. Dante knew they were outside prowling the empty fields around our home even though they never barked. I would only discover them after they made a kill and began to howl. We lived in a brick and stone house up on a ridge and for that, we were grateful. Wood houses were a rarity these days. The Uberwolf was mostly from the gray wolf variety but was more ferocious as a hunter. Some uncertain interbreeding had taken place inside of the glens of the Adirondacks after the great ocean rise flooded the Hudson River Valley. That had been followed by the longest drought on record. Then a six-month stretch of hurricanes wiped out what was left of residential housing communities and commercial businesses from sinkhole washouts and seawater flooding. The wolf packs had moved farther south. Former roadways became jagged stretches of moonscape. From the sky they looked like long wounds with black and gray bandaids stripped off and strewn about in scattered pieces. I saw it all two years ago when a Federal Marshal flew me to Albany for $1,000 cash so I could cop some albuterol for Mary. Back then, if you had currency stashed you could still get by, but things like booze, antibiotics and a good bag of weed were more useful now.
I ran for the gun and grabbed some paper towels and vinegar from the storage room. Supplies were getting low. You couldn’t walk outside when the Uberwolves were about, but if you shot one from a window, you might be able to scare the others away long enough to drag the corpse inside. If you were lucky, you might have a deer sighting. Easy to shoot but getting to the remains before the canines was almost impossible and herds were rare.
It was Mary’s idea to keep lots of vinegar in storage since it had many uses. We hadn’t spoken for a month, since the day my satellite phone stopped working. Cell phones were pointless. The phone companies had stopped trying to repair the landlines that held it altogether. Most cell towers were now useless sculptures or were acting as flagpoles to mark territory—their critical parts already harvested. Most of the carriers were bust anyway.
“John, the vinegar will keep forever. Look for the canvas-top trucks in the next convoy; they usually have a pallet or two. Victor told me they are taking booze and wine in addition to cash. You might have to let go of that last bottle of Blanton’s but you should get a full pallet for that.” Mary was a great negotiator.
Victor, a close family friend, got stuck in Connecticut with her when they used a Humvee to get to the Hudson River. He was originally from the eastern end of the Allegheny plateau in Pennsylvania and would often reminisce about how beautiful it was there. He said it was still good for growing crops and that we should consider a move. Mary agreed, but I wasn’t interested. “We should hold our ground,” I’d said.
A private ferry was running across the water when they started their trip but later sank after a bad storm came over the Taconic Mountains and put it on the river bottom. The Rip Van Winkle Bridge was the only river crossing still open, but no one considered it safe anymore. Land-pirates on either end were staked out night and day.
I dropped the vinegar and paper towels next to Dante’s new piss puddle and ran upstairs to crack open a window for a view of the entire pack. They were moving in two groups. The lead wolf in the closest group was facing the house. My hope was that taking out the alpha member first would scare off the pack long enough to do the retrieval. It usually worked. I was not a hunter but had figured out how to use my neighbor’s .30-06 after he died from diphtheria. He’d offered it to me in his last days and I accepted. It had a Nikon scope that was easy to adjust. Hunters I knew who’d taken deer and black bear used to say: "Aim for the heart, right behind the shoulder." Under the present circumstances I was ignoring that advice thinking that a dramatic headshot would scare the other pack members away. Bang! It worked.
I hurried down the stairs and went to the door, slipping on two pair of brass knuckles and heavy leather gloves. A man-wolf skirmish might arise quickly; faster than you could aim and shoot a gun. In those cases, slugging it out was the only choice and every blow counted. If one wolf tied you up for more than several seconds, the pack was on you. Dante followed me but I made sure he couldn’t get outside. They’d almost gotten him the last time.
The alpha lay in a heap on the edge of the old hayfield. The pack had moved backward, and I didn’t like the way things looked. If they moved ahead, in the same direction they’d been traveling, chances were better they’d keep going. I moved quickly. The vultures hadn’t arrived yet and the red-tailed hawks circling above were more interested in snatching rodents before the wolves did.
When I got to the carcass, I grabbed it by a back leg and dragged it along the ground as fast as I could. He was heavy—several meals worth, but it would mean salting the leftovers, since the freezer was too much to keep going on our solar panels. None of the wolves followed, choosing to stay in place and look on like they were observing a memorial service.
The old Florida room had become my butchering station. It was well lit, and the salt stayed dry there. I was able to do most of the work with a sharp axe and a gourmet Henkel knife. I’d figured out how to install a pulley on one of the upstairs dormers. This made it easy to properly slit the animal’s throat and hang it for a good blood drain. The only trouble came from vultures, so I kept a BB gun by the window. That usually worked.
I cleaned up after Dante and moved back upstairs to watch over the hanging feast while listening to the second cello suite. The D-Minor flourishes brought some dignity to our setting and helped me express my gratitude to the predator-turned-prey hanging from the dormer. I could see that the roof antenna was still in place, despite heavy winds from last night. Good. I’d be able to talk to Mary on the ham radio. At the end of the second suite we tuned in. Dante sat next to my chair and we listened on the planned frequency. Mary was always two steps ahead and had figured out how to evade the roving bands of land-pirates who might be eavesdropping. She gave me the code word Hamlet. In the message, I’d be addressed as the protagonist. She’d be Gertrude, always standing in the wind and speaking to the Prince of Denmark. If the wind was blowing east, she was still away. If the wind was blowing west, it meant she was on her way home.
The land-pirates were now a commonplace. Often a motley bunch: former inmates, bad cops and unscrupulous military officers who had access to weapons caches. Stealing and bartering kept them armed. The successful ones traveled in Humvees or jeeps while most of the upstarts used dirt bikes.
Dante and I listened to a woman report a violent skirmish on the river near the Beacon Bridge. Armed men had overtaken a supply boat that was crossing over to the Orange County side. Someone else was offering dried meat—they didn’t say what kind—for Azithromycin. “We’ll meet you along the Hudson Highlands,” they’d said. Lots of busy chatter, mostly people offering barter deals while making oblique references to where the transactions could be completed and how flexible terms might be. Nothing was straightforward.
After about thirty minutes I heard Mary’s voice. Dante sat up.
“I wonder if you hear us, Hamlet? Laertes and I feel a westward wind. But alas, I must tell you it has already passed the stone palace and moved on. Thank you for the companionship these past few years. I hope you’ll find your Ophelia and reconsider taking action on your own.”
Mary, is that you?
“Not a jot more, Hamlet. Goodbye.”
The wind was picking up and the bloodless wolf began to sway back and forth. Dante flopped down and closed his eyes. It was time for the third cello suite, so I put on my headphones. The butchering could wait.
© Kevin Swanwick 2019
Narrated by Kevin Swanwick.
Narrated by Kevin Swanwick.
POST RECITAL
TALK
[BR is the psychiatrist]
TN: We weren’t able to directly interview this story’s author, so we had to become very resourceful. We hacked into the NSA and were able to obtain secret audio surveillance files from the office of Kevin Swanwick’s psychiatrist. What follows is part of one therapy session.
BR: Kevin, we’ve talked about your roles in the technology workplace and as a husband and father. But you’ve hinted at something else… you also have a writer self. Tell me about that.
KS: Yeah, some poetry, fiction, essays, a few publications etc. Keep my day job, you know.
BR: Well… so tell me about your most recent work.
KS: “Not a Jot More”—it appears as a short, but it’s actually the first chapter of a longer work, which exists at the moment in my head. As you can imagine, that location is not necessarily stable, but neither is the world that John and Mary live in—they’re the main characters.... here on my phone… I’ll read it to you: “I was listening to the second of Bach’s cello suites…” (fade out)
TN: We’ve already heard the story, so we’ll skip forward in the session.
Return to surveillance recording
BR: Hmm, fascinating… that last line, “the butchering could wait.” Let’s revisit that later. Now clearly this story is not about your real life. Is it your opinion that fiction should step outside reality? Question it, undermine it?
KS: Reality changing fiction and fiction driving reality toward and away from what is there…and what is “not there.” Or apparently, not there.
BR: Hmm.
KS: What is that moving target of a joining that represents reality at one moment and then flutters off in the next? Where does one stand—when at a given moment—they have to commit themselves to it. What is “it?”
BR: Well… Did you notice you answer my questions with more questions? Rather abstract ones. Does it make you feel safe to hide behind philosophy?
KS: Am I flunking out of therapy?
BR: Ah, well… okay. So you’re challenging the nature of reality, by creating a rather dark vision of a dystopian future. Maybe this is an effort to fit a marketplace genre—science fiction or fantasy, right?
KS: Not so much. Here is one of those cases where a genre can be overcome by circumstance. If a story like this appeared twenty years ago, we’d probably recognize the setting as ponderously dark. Futuristic and exotic, perhaps. But reality keeps screwing with us. You start a novel and after you finish the first chapter, Australia catches on fire. You’re writing about people and wildlife and while you are doing it, you read news stories about one million animals in the wild perishing in a matter of days: kangaroo, birds, reptiles.
BR: Yeah.
KS: One million. That’s “reality” for you. So, when we’re looking into the nature of reality, we have to think hard about those words, don’t we? Starting with nature.
BR: Okay. You’re suggesting that the real world, perhaps nature itself, is on the very brink of collapse… into a chaotic world like the story describes. Does that imply a deep-seated fear, that you feel on the brink of collapse yourself, an emotional or psychological breakdown?
KS: I’m sorry. Where did you say the rest room was?
BR: Okay. Classic avoidance. Okay do you know where the story ends, Kevin?
KS: Of course, I do. Well, that’s the answer you’d expect from a writer, isn’t it? But I could be lying.
BR: Yeah okay.
KS: I wonder how people want the story to end. Darkness seems to have an advantage these days. For sure, reality is going to have to get in the ring with fiction and duke it out to see who wins the challenge at various points. Who or what owns that thing we rely on to take the next step forward or back?
BR: There you go again, answering my questions with questions.
KS: Well, the real-life dog that my canine character Dante is based upon has died since this first chapter was written. The creator of the story has been punched in the gut by reality.
BR: “Creator of the story”? I think you mean you.
KS: Okay, me.
BR: So, yes, John and by extension you, Kevin, would have gained solace from his loyal companion, wouldn’t he? What will he do now if his dog is gone, continue listening to Bach and then blow his brains out?
KS: You’re getting very dark.
BR: But what is a survivor and how do they survive? And what does that mean to you—“to survive?”
KS: Well, Mary….
BR: Yes, yes. Let’s look at the Mary character. In a dream—which, in a way, all fiction is—every character is the dreamer. Mary is an aspect of you. The story is not exactly clear: is she dying perhaps, or has she simply decided not to return to John? And what does it mean to Kevin?
KS: You ask a lot of questions. I thought this was non directive therapy.
BR: And by the way, what’s up with the names, John and Mary? Why not, for instance, Aloysius and Hildegard?
KS: Mary. Well I have family members by that name. One was a Nun. Grew up Catholic where the name Mary has all kinds of imagery associated with it. Among those—whether you are a believer or not—is strength and endurance. I mean think about it. Even if you strip away all the dogmatic trappings, this was a young woman who gives birth in poverty and crisis circumstances. She discovers at some point—depending on which Gospel you read—that she is giving birth to the Creator, the Big Dude and she doesn’t remember getting close enough with Joseph to make that happen in the usual way. And Joseph; pretty modest fella. Couldn’t be the father of you know who.
So, she deals with some pretty tough stuff and then has the storytellers describe her own divinity much later—and that gets controversial. So, what does a storyteller do with “Mary” when the world is ending? She’s been condemned to the circumstances but can still make choices. Does she keep her virtue?
BR: Hmm, it’s telling that you just said nothing about John. Why do you suppose you did that?
KS: John. As far as we know, he likes Classical music and can kill predatory animals, but it seems like he’s taking direction from Mary, doesn’t it?
BR: Okay I see. You’d rather not explore John, or you don’t really know him. We can come back to that. Let’s look at your allusion to Shakespeare and Hamlet. Hamlet is known for his indecision… and Gertrude, his mother, for her unfaithfulness. Are they John and Mary?
KS: Oh, you’re getting warm.
BR: And let’s revisit that last line: “the butchering can wait.” It’s more than just related to the wolf carcass. It resonates with visions of the general slaughter to come. There seems to be no hope for the world—the world being you. Look into yourself and tell me… is that true?
KS: I’m a vegetarian.
BR: Okay. You’re doing it again with avoiding my questions…
TN: After that, the therapy session takes a turn away from the story and into private details that we can’t reveal on a podcast. One question is, why is the NSA interested in Kevin Swanwick? Perhaps his story is not what it appears to be. Maybe it contains coded messages vital to national security. Maybe he is actually a deeply embedded Russian mole. Or working for Wikileaks. Whose side is he on? Are there even sides?
[BR is the psychiatrist]
TN: We weren’t able to directly interview this story’s author, so we had to become very resourceful. We hacked into the NSA and were able to obtain secret audio surveillance files from the office of Kevin Swanwick’s psychiatrist. What follows is part of one therapy session.
BR: Kevin, we’ve talked about your roles in the technology workplace and as a husband and father. But you’ve hinted at something else… you also have a writer self. Tell me about that.
KS: Yeah, some poetry, fiction, essays, a few publications etc. Keep my day job, you know.
BR: Well… so tell me about your most recent work.
KS: “Not a Jot More”—it appears as a short, but it’s actually the first chapter of a longer work, which exists at the moment in my head. As you can imagine, that location is not necessarily stable, but neither is the world that John and Mary live in—they’re the main characters.... here on my phone… I’ll read it to you: “I was listening to the second of Bach’s cello suites…” (fade out)
TN: We’ve already heard the story, so we’ll skip forward in the session.
Return to surveillance recording
BR: Hmm, fascinating… that last line, “the butchering could wait.” Let’s revisit that later. Now clearly this story is not about your real life. Is it your opinion that fiction should step outside reality? Question it, undermine it?
KS: Reality changing fiction and fiction driving reality toward and away from what is there…and what is “not there.” Or apparently, not there.
BR: Hmm.
KS: What is that moving target of a joining that represents reality at one moment and then flutters off in the next? Where does one stand—when at a given moment—they have to commit themselves to it. What is “it?”
BR: Well… Did you notice you answer my questions with more questions? Rather abstract ones. Does it make you feel safe to hide behind philosophy?
KS: Am I flunking out of therapy?
BR: Ah, well… okay. So you’re challenging the nature of reality, by creating a rather dark vision of a dystopian future. Maybe this is an effort to fit a marketplace genre—science fiction or fantasy, right?
KS: Not so much. Here is one of those cases where a genre can be overcome by circumstance. If a story like this appeared twenty years ago, we’d probably recognize the setting as ponderously dark. Futuristic and exotic, perhaps. But reality keeps screwing with us. You start a novel and after you finish the first chapter, Australia catches on fire. You’re writing about people and wildlife and while you are doing it, you read news stories about one million animals in the wild perishing in a matter of days: kangaroo, birds, reptiles.
BR: Yeah.
KS: One million. That’s “reality” for you. So, when we’re looking into the nature of reality, we have to think hard about those words, don’t we? Starting with nature.
BR: Okay. You’re suggesting that the real world, perhaps nature itself, is on the very brink of collapse… into a chaotic world like the story describes. Does that imply a deep-seated fear, that you feel on the brink of collapse yourself, an emotional or psychological breakdown?
KS: I’m sorry. Where did you say the rest room was?
BR: Okay. Classic avoidance. Okay do you know where the story ends, Kevin?
KS: Of course, I do. Well, that’s the answer you’d expect from a writer, isn’t it? But I could be lying.
BR: Yeah okay.
KS: I wonder how people want the story to end. Darkness seems to have an advantage these days. For sure, reality is going to have to get in the ring with fiction and duke it out to see who wins the challenge at various points. Who or what owns that thing we rely on to take the next step forward or back?
BR: There you go again, answering my questions with questions.
KS: Well, the real-life dog that my canine character Dante is based upon has died since this first chapter was written. The creator of the story has been punched in the gut by reality.
BR: “Creator of the story”? I think you mean you.
KS: Okay, me.
BR: So, yes, John and by extension you, Kevin, would have gained solace from his loyal companion, wouldn’t he? What will he do now if his dog is gone, continue listening to Bach and then blow his brains out?
KS: You’re getting very dark.
BR: But what is a survivor and how do they survive? And what does that mean to you—“to survive?”
KS: Well, Mary….
BR: Yes, yes. Let’s look at the Mary character. In a dream—which, in a way, all fiction is—every character is the dreamer. Mary is an aspect of you. The story is not exactly clear: is she dying perhaps, or has she simply decided not to return to John? And what does it mean to Kevin?
KS: You ask a lot of questions. I thought this was non directive therapy.
BR: And by the way, what’s up with the names, John and Mary? Why not, for instance, Aloysius and Hildegard?
KS: Mary. Well I have family members by that name. One was a Nun. Grew up Catholic where the name Mary has all kinds of imagery associated with it. Among those—whether you are a believer or not—is strength and endurance. I mean think about it. Even if you strip away all the dogmatic trappings, this was a young woman who gives birth in poverty and crisis circumstances. She discovers at some point—depending on which Gospel you read—that she is giving birth to the Creator, the Big Dude and she doesn’t remember getting close enough with Joseph to make that happen in the usual way. And Joseph; pretty modest fella. Couldn’t be the father of you know who.
So, she deals with some pretty tough stuff and then has the storytellers describe her own divinity much later—and that gets controversial. So, what does a storyteller do with “Mary” when the world is ending? She’s been condemned to the circumstances but can still make choices. Does she keep her virtue?
BR: Hmm, it’s telling that you just said nothing about John. Why do you suppose you did that?
KS: John. As far as we know, he likes Classical music and can kill predatory animals, but it seems like he’s taking direction from Mary, doesn’t it?
BR: Okay I see. You’d rather not explore John, or you don’t really know him. We can come back to that. Let’s look at your allusion to Shakespeare and Hamlet. Hamlet is known for his indecision… and Gertrude, his mother, for her unfaithfulness. Are they John and Mary?
KS: Oh, you’re getting warm.
BR: And let’s revisit that last line: “the butchering can wait.” It’s more than just related to the wolf carcass. It resonates with visions of the general slaughter to come. There seems to be no hope for the world—the world being you. Look into yourself and tell me… is that true?
KS: I’m a vegetarian.
BR: Okay. You’re doing it again with avoiding my questions…
TN: After that, the therapy session takes a turn away from the story and into private details that we can’t reveal on a podcast. One question is, why is the NSA interested in Kevin Swanwick? Perhaps his story is not what it appears to be. Maybe it contains coded messages vital to national security. Maybe he is actually a deeply embedded Russian mole. Or working for Wikileaks. Whose side is he on? Are there even sides?
Music on this episode:
Cello Suite No. 2 by JS Bach
License CCO 1.0
Cello Suite No. 3 by JS Bach
License CC BY-NC-ND 3.0
