The Ministry of Labour Transition
by Joel McKay
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Table of Contents parts: 1, 2, 3 |
part 1
Ajay Beakman set a cup of steaming decaf in front of Ray that smelled like caramel and wood. Expensive stuff. Julia, Ray’s partner, sipped liberally from a glass of pop. Beakman was welcoming them into his office as if they were prospective clients, all smiles, hellos, pleased-to-meet-yous and thank-yous.
The small talk lasted two or three minutes. It was the usual pitter-patter: “It’s really raining a lot for September, isn’t it? Normally it doesn’t show up till after Thanksgiving.”
“We wouldn’t know,” Ray said, “we’re from the Corridor, not far from Ottawa.”
“Just port into the Garden for work then?” Beakman asked.
“E-Garden is our focus, yes,” Ray answered evenly.
He cast his eyes to the outer wall of the office, which overlooked the narrow fingerlings of the cold North Pacific as it stretched into Canada’s Pacific coast. There was Coal Harbour, Burrard Inlet, and the North Shore beyond. Vancouver Camp, he thought, the last remaining vestige of civilization on the West Coast.
He could remember when there had been boats and freighters dotting the inlet, a seawall wrapping around the old park and heavy industrial operations along the waterfront on the North Shore. Now it was all gone, reclaimed, leaving only pristine virgin forest. It was beautiful, and he guessed this was how it must’ve looked to the first explorers who guided their tall ships into the Strait of Georgia.
Yet still there was a startling emptiness to it, which left him with an irrational fear of being left behind in E-Garden once the project was done. It was probably why he’d never taken the Ministry up on its offer to relocate here. He still liked to port home, to civilization, as often as possible.
“What’s the Corridor like these days?” Beakman asked, rubbing his hands nervously. “I’ve heard... things.”
Julia waved him off, “None of that is true. It’s like it always was, just with more people. You can make a good life there. We have,” she said, looking at Ray.
He felt uncomfortable when she said that, not least because it left the impression he was closer with Julia than he was. They were just partners, and that’s all they’d ever be, Ray mused.
But there was something else too, a bit of a sales pitch in there for another part of the country, the part everyone had been resettled in when their homes, cities and provinces were dismantled as part of the Reclamation. The same thing Ray and Julia were tasked to assist with in E-Garden, or the province formerly known as British Columbia.
He’d been born and raised in the Corridor, though back then it had different names: Southwest Ontario, the Greater Toronto Area, the Ottawa River Valley, Greater Montreal. The Corridor was a policy decision, a resettlement area for everyone who once lived west or north of Sault Ste. Marie or east of Quebec City.
Life was good there, but it did have its issues, like any place that was overcrowded with a sudden influx of immigrants not there by their own choice. And, as usual, Julia was glossing over the facts to make her job easier, an idiosyncrasy that really got under his skin.
His thoughts turned to his conversation with Julia moments before they walked into Beak Softscripts.
“Julia, it’s the last one of the week. And it’s been a long week, let’s go easy. Just the facts. The truth,” he’d said. “We want to avoid complaints, if at all possible.” That’s how you get fired. When you get fired, there’s no going back.
Ray didn’t have enough credit to maintain his townhome payments without steady income. Getting fired wasn’t an option.
Beakman turned away from them and poured himself a coffee. He stopped talking, something Ray guessed was unusual for the techpreneur. He didn’t look like a software engineer, more a salesman: smart but not overly dressed, an easy smile, firm handshake, and articulate tongue. Ray had met a thousand like him. It always started congenially, that is until reality set in. How much had he raked in last year?
“Beak Softscripts, founded in 2135 by Ajay Beakman,” Julia had explained as they’d climbed the four-storey walk-up in what was left of downtown Vancouver. “Twenty employees. Revenue last year was $60.3 million, most of it local clientele, year over year revenue growth of three hundred percent, and for two years running... but only a few additional employees.”
Ray had thumbed the fancy siding clad onto the walls outside Beak’s main entranceway.
“Organic alloy plank... phew-ee that’s expensive,” he’d said. “He’s managed all this in only five years? Interesting. Once we get a look at his financials, I bet we’ll find he’s sitting on a wad of cash.”
Julia’s thin, dark eyebrows had arched mischievously then. This was the part of the job she loved the most, Ray knew. Playing the detective, finding out what each business owner had hidden under the rug. And then taking it. All in the name of the Reclamation.
Beakman took a seat on a white leather divan across from them. Julia’s glass was three-quarters empty. Ray hadn’t touched his mug.
“So how long do I have?” Beakman asked, his eyes darting between them.
Julia straightened, obviously surprised by the question. Ray leaned forward, lifted his mug, blew the steam away and took a long sip. Yep, it is the expensive stuff, the kind you can enjoy without cream or sugar. Ray wondered if a chunk of the man’s profits were poured into extravagances like imported coffee, furniture, and office renovations. He wished he had a chunk of that money for himself. The things he could do with it. He’d heard of a few Ministry guys in the other Gardens running an extortion racket.
There’d been a lot of that in K-Garden, downright looting that hadn’t revealed itself until an RCMP investigation caught a dozen Ministry staff racketeering. It hardly made the news, as things west of the Corridor rarely did these days; the region was almost entirely forgotten, a blob of wilderness with issues so different than the cities where people lived that it just didn’t warrant the coverage.
Ray found out because an old friend was posted in Edmonton Camp during the final days of the Reclamation in that province. The only news out of K-Garden that eventually made national headlines had been its secession to join the lower forty-eight states before the project was complete.
Unsurprisingly, the Americans had welcomed the former province of Alberta with open arms, leaving a black mark of functioning smokestacks and pipelines in the western Canadian wilderness that seemed to thumb its nose at the entire idea behind the Reclamation.
There was a sick irony in all that, Ray often mused, especially juxtaposed with the ongoing work in E-Garden, which had long since proven itself as the most dysfunctional, time-consuming and costly national Reclamation project. And yet, here he was, sitting down with another business owner in Coal Harbour, about to extract the man’s profits to help pay for that national project and relocate him and any family he had to the Corridor to — how had the Prime Minister put it? — “incubate a new, clean, and sustainable national economy.”
“So how long do I have?” Beakman repeated, his voice a little more on edge.
“I’m sorry?” Ray asked, feigning ignorance.
Beakman set his mug on the table between them. He looked past Ray and Julia through a glass wall that afforded a clear view of the bullpen of desks where his staff busied themselves with the day-to-day grind of Beak Softworks.
“Look, I know who you are. You two walk around this city like grim reapers dressed in cheap navy suits and wingtip shoes. I knew as soon as you walked in the door that the clock was ticking. How long do I have to get out of E-Garden?” he asked.
Ray took another sip. He caught a glance of Julia shifting in her seat. She sat forward. Ray could almost feel her muscles tensing, readying to pounce on this asshole like a cat that’s lined up a mouse.
“We’re not here to provide you with a supportive timeline, Mr. Beakman,” Ray began. He signaled for Julia to activate the tablet. Her fingers rattled against the device and another hologram popped up. She pushed her hand over the top of the tablet, and the hologram jumped from her device to hover above the coffee table.
The image showed a letter addressed to Mr. Ajay Beakman dictating that, by Ministerial order, his business was to cease operations immediately and that employees of Beak Softworks had forty-eight hours to gather their belongings and transition out of E-Garden to the Corridor, where a Ministry official would assist with their resettlement.
Further, employees of the Ministry of Labour Transition would liquidate Beak Softworks’s physical assets. And, finally, any financial assets over and above those required to settle the business’s outstanding obligations and debts were to be immediately seized by the Ministry and used to defray the costs of the Reclamation of E-Garden. Thank you for your service to Canada, the environment and a new, clean economy, yours sincerely, the Minister of Labour Transition, etc., etc.
Beakman coughed out a half-hearted laugh, the kind you make when you’re not sure if someone is joking around and you want to be in on the joke as soon as possible to save yourself any embarrassment.
“You’re not serious,” Beakman said. “Forty-eight hours? We’re in the midst of a major project; I just signed two new contracts.”
“Mr. Beakman, I’m afraid we are serious. You’re ordered to comply with the Minister’s directive,” said Ray.
Beakman stood up, paced back and forth, hands on his hips, his head shaking slightly. He stopped, turned to Julia and addressed her. “Look, I can get you what you need. I just need a bit more time. Give me two weeks. I can let everyone go, sell the assets, get you what you need... I just... I just need a bit of time,” he said. “We can work something out, right?”
Ray’s thoughts wandered back to K-Garden. How easy would it be to cut a deal with this guy and line his pockets? He knew the answer and winced at it.
Then he looked at Julia. She looked momentarily unsure of what to do and Ray wasn’t sure how that could be. She was vicious when it came to their work. Ray’s eyes lingered questioningly on her a moment before he turned to Beakman. “I’m sorry, Mr. Beakman, this news is never easy—” Ray began.
“Why are you even targeting me? There’re hundreds of other businesses less profitable than my own just begging to be shut down and transitioned out of this garbage heap of a city. Go get them.”
“Mr. Beakman, please,” Ray said, standing up. He raised a hand, palm outward, a sign for Beakman to calm down. It didn’t work.
“This is bull. You guys are a bunch of snakes. Forty-eight hours? Are you kidding? What are my people supposed to do? What about my clients? My family relies on this income!”
“Mr. Beakman, please, keep your voice down. We can talk through the details with you. That’s what we’re here for, to provide information and connect you and your employees with the services they need,” Ray said, using the most calming version of his voice he could. “This isn’t personal. It’s happening to business owners such as yourself all over the country. The Reclamation is intended to clean up the landscape, fix all the harm that industrialization has caused.”
The sudden rage in Beakman’s eyes told Ray that last bit hadn’t worked. The government messaging never did.
“Bull, it isn’t personal. You guys love this. Always have. Shuttin’ down private enterprise and sucking up our profits all so you can squander it on some bogus public sector make-work project. I’m sorry people don’t have as much work as they’d like in the rest of the country, but why should I have to shut down so a dozen people in Sudbury or Quebec enjoy the government dole a little while longer?” he said.
That was when he punched the couch and flung his coffee cup across the room. Ray was wrong about him, the smiles and hello-how-are-yous had been merely an act.
Julia stood up. “Mr. Beakman, sit down.”
Ray turned to her. “Julia, no.”
Her hand shot out, palm facing Ray’s face as if to say, Shut it, old man. I’ll deal with this.
The viciousness was back. Ray felt his face burn with embarrassment. He was in charge here, not her.
“We’re shutting you down now,” she said, “because that’s the Minister’s orders, and frankly, we’ve learned from dealing with weasels like you if we give you too much time, you’ll siphon off as much money as you can and port to some tropical paradise that doesn’t have extradition treaties. So, yes, you’re shut down and it’s your job to tell your employees. We will liquidate your physical assets. We will inform your clients. And we will seize that nice little cushion of profit you’ve been sitting on the last two years.”
Beakman opened his mouth to reply, but he’d lost his nerve. He shut it. Ray could see his tongue moving around in his mouth as if weighing his options. He had no options. There aren’t any when the Ministry of Labour Transition showed up.
“Fine,” he said. “I’ll let them know. We’ll start shutting down now.”
“Given your behavior, Mr. Beakman, we’ll have our liquidators arrive within the hour. I sent a note to the CRA to immediately seize your business and personal accounts, as well as your wife’s. In the event you try anything,” Julia said.
Her eyes narrowed angrily at Beakman. Behind that face, Ray could see she was enjoying this.
And then she added: “And don’t even think about porting to K-Garden. All the lines are shut. If you want to join the Americans, you can do it without your assets.”
Ray closed his eyes and let his head fall at that. He ran a hand through his disheveled hair and tried to find the words to de-escalate the confrontation. But he couldn’t find any, an increasingly common problem. Julia seemed to revel in the work in a way Ray no longer did, perhaps never had. He didn’t like to approach clients the way she did, it wasn’t his way. He preferred the facts, a softer, more honest approach. She was a hammer when she needed to be, a confidant when she needed to be. A true chameleon. Ray was, well, Ray. And he feared he wasn’t as good at this as he used to be.
* * *
Outside on the street, the rain had stopped. Julia tapped on her tablet to close the file. She looked at Ray with a satisfied smirk.
“You were too harsh,” he told her. “We could’ve talked him down.”
Julia rolled her eyes and shook her head, “Ray, he lost it. He was yelling at us. That weasel would’ve sucked every last dollar out of that company if he could, and he’d have been in Panama by sunup tomorrow if I hadn’t done what I’d done.
“These aren’t mom-and-pop shops anymore, Ray. You heard what he called us? Grim reapers. They see us coming and they’re ready for it. Our role is to carry out the Minister’s orders: get it done by whatever means necessary. Sometimes that means doing what we just did, sometimes it means using honey and whispering sweet nothings in their ear until they give you what you want. But being the boring civil servant just presenting the facts doesn’t work anymore. Times have changed, Ray.”
Ray wanted to grab her wrist — no, more than that, he wanted to throw her up against the faux-granite siding of the soon to be torn down building they were standing in front of — and tell her times hadn’t changed, that they don’t really change at all. It’s always the same, it just looks different, has a different face. The only way you survived it was by seeing it for what it was, pushing through, steady, evenly, one step at a time. He lowered his eyes and breathed inwardly.
“Julia, you were too harsh. That was exactly the type of thing our Ministry receives complaints about. Complaints that work their way up to the Deputy Minister, then the Minister, and come crashing down on us. You want to do a good job so you can secure yourself work in the Corridor once we’re transitioned out of this place? Follow. My. Lead.”
* * *
Copyright © 2023 by Joel McKay
