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****** ***** The Online Magazine ***********
****** ***** of Amateur Creative Writing ************
---------------------------
======================================================================
December 1989 Circulation: 483 Volume I, Issue 4
======================================================================
Contents
Etc... .................................................. Jim McCabe
Editorial
No One Ever Said Time Travel Would Be Easy ...... Phillip McReynolds
------------------------------------------ Fiction
Master of Delusion ..................................... Jason Snell
------------------ Fiction
A Night on the Net .................................... Jeff Okamoto
------------------ Fiction
******************************************************************
* *
* ATHENE, Copyright 1989 By Jim McCabe *
* This magazine may be archived and reproduced without charge *
* under the condition that it is left in its entirety. *
* The individual works within are the sole property of their *
* respective authors, and no further use of these works is *
* permitted without their explicit consent. *
* Athene is published quasi-monthly *
* by Jim McCabe, MCCABE@MTUS5.BITNET. *
* This ASCII edition was created on an IBM 4381 mainframe *
* using the Xedit System Product Editor. *
* *
******************************************************************
Etc...
Jim McCabe
MCCABE@MTUS5.BITNET
======================================================================
Not only does this month mark the end of a decade, it also flags
the end of Athene's very first volume. It seems that the beginning of
the nineties makes as good of a place as any to start the next one.
Keeping with the spirit, Athene will also be sporting a new look
after this issue, helped in part by an upgrade in the software used to
make the PostScript editions. I was tempted to incorporate some of
the improvements into this month's issue, but decided against it for
two reasons. Most importantly, I wanted to maintain some consistency
within the issues of this volume. Secondly, this one was already late
enough as it was.
Speaking of late, expect January's issue to come out in the
second half of the month. I will be gone on vacation from December 21
through January 6, and so I won't be able to read my mail, much less
work on the magazine. Since my size purges mail older than two weeks
of age, there is a good chance that any mail sent before December 26th
will get lost. Because of this, I wouldn't try to contact me until
after that date.
Dan pointed out an error with the Quanta information in last
month's issue. The Bitnet node listed is incorrect, and should be
CMCCVB instead of CMUCCVMA.
I would like to thank everyone who contributed stories since the
last issue! This month brought in more submissions than usual, a
trend I only hope will continue as Athene gains more readers.
Finally, I send a big "thank you" to you, the readers, for your great
support and encouragement throughout these first few issues!
-- Jim
No One Ever Said Time Travel Would Be Easy
By Phillip McReynolds
DBEATTIE@MSSTATE.BITNET
======================================================================
Jesus Millagros looked up from under the blue '57 Chevy in his
small Los Angeles garage to see a fish-faced man snooping around the
auto-body-parts littered the shop.
"May I help you, Mister," he asked as he rolled out from under
the car and wiped his hands on his greasy coveralls. The fish-faced
stranger cautiously approached the small Mexican man and took his hand
firmly.
"Name's Azul, Gordon Azul, and I wonder if you can do a job for
me."
The stranger led Jesus out into the parking lot to a brand new
1973 tan Volare. There was no licence plate on the car and it still
bore the dealer's decals upon its windows. "Caramba!" Jesus cried.
"Great wheels, man. I'll bet Nixon can't afford one of these!" The
stranger said nothing. He went to the trunk, opened it, and with-
drew a roll of technical drawings and blueprints. He brought these
over to Jesus and spread them out on the hood.
"I want you to make some alterations," the stranger said.
Jesus studied the drawings with care. He was not at all sure
what all the symbols stood for--he had no idea what the equations
scrawled along the margins of the document meant--but he easily
recognized most of the parts and modifications specified in the body
of the plans.
"You want to do this to a car?!? Are you sure you don't want to
be talkin' to a rocket scientist instead of me, man? This is some
pretty weird shit. Even my brother Julio doesn't have a car that..."
Gordon took his hands from the diagrams where they had held the
sheets spread out on the hood of the car and grabbed the Mexican's
shirt by its wide collars, hoisting him into the air.
"Can you do it?" Gordon hissed between closed teeth.
Startled, the little man was happy to oblige this ill-tempered
honkey. "Yeah, sure man! You pay and Jesus will play! I'll make any
changes you want--just put me down!" Gordon dropped him, turned
around, and began walking away, down the street.
"I'll be back on Friday," he said over his shoulder.
Jesus gathered himself up, straightened his collar, and picked up
the blueprints. As he did this, a wad of crisp C-notes fell to the
ground out of the papers. "Holy Maria," Jesus said to himself as he
walked back into the garage, crossing himself and counting his loot.
Jesus worked diligently over the next five days. He spent a lot
of time in the mechanical engineering section of the UCLA library, as
well as in the sections on experimental physics and applied
thermodynamics. He ordered parts from parts houses all over the
basin. A few had to come from as far away as San Diego, Chicago, and
Duluth. He spent every waking hour in the project, often working 23
hour days. A few of the parts he had to machine himself, relying
primarily upon the technical specifications given in the blueprints.
The lamps of the garage burned continuously as Jesus shaped and
rearranged the guts of the infernal machine. As he was working, he
had no idea what end this engine was meant to perform. After he had
finished installing a set of parts, he would try out various theories
as to their function. None suited him. In all of his fifteen years
as an auto-mechanic and body man, he had never seen anything as
strange as the components he was so meticulously packing into that tan
Volare.
By sunrise on Friday morning, the job was complete. Every
modification had been performed. Every technical specification
fulfilled. Jesus stood back and admired what he had wrought as the
early rays of the sun glinted on the chrome of his beloved. "I wonder
when the gringo will show," he wondered to himself. "Time enough for
a test drive, maybe?" "Naah, better not," he thought, remembering the
strength of his mysterious customer. "It could use some paint,
though..."
Gordon arrived at sunset to find a glistening tan Volare (with
three new coats of tan paint) fully equipped with front and rear
hydraulics.
A red stripe starting from the front fender on each side made its
way along the sides of the car, expanding and finally exploding in a
blaze of glory in red-yellow-orange flames painted on the rear
fenders. Raised, knife- blade encrusted, Spartacus-style hubcaps
finished the masterpiece. Jesus Millagros stood with his arms crossed
in pride as Gordon completely ignored every one of these cosmetic
additions.
"Is it done?" Gordon asked bluntly.
"Yes! She is finished!" Jesus beamed back at him. He had
expected at least some praise for the fine job he'd performed, but
none was forth- coming.
"Good," said Gordon. "Here's your money," he said as he handed
Jesus another wad of 100's. "Get in."
Jesus was perplexed. "Is she not beautiful, senor? Don't you
want to open her up and look her over? Her parts have been installed
just as you ordered. She is..."
"Get in," Gordon repeated, as he opened the door and lowered
himself into the driver's seat. Jesus said nothing as he got into the
car (pausing to admire the fiery sheen of the hood as it was
illuminated by the dying rays of the sun.) Gordon started the engine,
and to Jesus, it purred beautifully, although with a dampened fury
that he'd never heard in a car before.
"We're going for a test drive," Gordon said. "Ever been to the
Los Angeles Speedway?"
"Sure, many times, Senor." Jesus was disgusted. Cars were his
life. He lived, ate, and breathed paint primer, axle grease, and
ether (respectively). Ever since he had worked on his first
automobile at the age of thirteen, he had always served the steel,
chrome, and glass god with a zeal that was atypical, even in his
neighborhood. This car, in which they were now passing under the
amber streetlamps of Greater L.A., had become his idol. It was
mysterious and beautiful and it seemed to have a power that was not of
this world. It had taken every bit of knowledge and expertise that
Jesus had acquired over the years to assemble this monster of
mechanical mastery.
As they pulled into the unlit speedway, the security guard was
conspicuously absent. Gordon slowly pulled onto the track and put the
transmission in park. "Get out," he said. Jesus got out of the car.
"You're here in case anything goes wrong. I'm going to make three
laps around the track to pick up speed. Stay out of the way. I don't
want your intertia to slow me down one bit. If I haven't made the
third lap in twenty seconds or less, I want you to wave this
flashlight at me," he said handing a flashlight to the mechanic. "Got
it?" Jesus nodded his head. "Do you have a watch?" Gordon asked.
"Several," Jesus replied.
"Good."
Jesus closed the passenger's door and stepped out of the way.
Gordon revved the engine several times and threw the car into gear.
The wheels squealed and the car was gone, already well into its first
lap. Jesus bit his lip.
The small man looked at his watch. The Volare did its first lap
in sixty-one seconds. The second in thirty. Jesus swayed to the
music of the high-pitched squeal of the engine. As the car came
around for its last lap, he studied it carefully. It was going over
three- hundred miles per hour, and yet it seemed to be handling as if
it were only doing sixty. Tears welled in his eyes as he saw his
beautiful beast race by for what would be the last time. Gordon was
finishing his last lap. Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, he was almost
around... nineteen... Jesus trembled with the beauty and excitement
of the thing he had helped to bring to life. Twenty! Gordon was
around!...but he wasn't stopping. Faster and faster he went. The car
continued to race around the track, its tires beginning to glow redly.
The high- pitched wine had become a wail. The air crackled and
smelled faintly of ozone. The ground shuddered. The sky opened up.
Great hosts of angels came down and danced and flitted around Jesus'
head. Suddenly, a great wall of flame sprang up in front of the
five-speed, automatic, family-sedan-shaped demon.
And in an instant, it was over.
An explosion rocked the ground. An enormous fireball shot from
the place where the car had (apparently) collided with the barrier
wall. Flaming shards of metal and ash rained down upon Jesus' head as
he watched the brilliant demise of his beloved. All that remained was
the chassis and tires (all blown). The hydraulics had remained in
tact. The skeleton of the car sat in flames as it jerked up and down
with the nervous twitch of a decapitated insect. Other than that, all
was still--except for the crackling of the embers which rained down
upon Jesus' head.
* * *
Jesus wept.
* * *
Gordon's eyes felt as though they were going to jump out of their
sockets, turn a cartwheel in the air before him, salute, and whistle
"Dixie" in the cloud of ammonia that had coalesced about his body.
Upon his exit of the car (in 1972) the glass of the windshield had
retorn his face on each side from the edges of his mouth to his ears.
It had not taken much force to reopen the scar tissue along the sides
of his face and the auto-glass had not yet melted from the heat of the
explosion. Gordon, of course, had had nothing to fear from the
destruction wreaked by his slightly modified 1973 Volare. He had left
1972 and was now hurtling backward through a glassy tunnel filled with
the past events of his own life. He struggled to raise his hand to
his wound. The viscous liquid that encircled him restricted his
motion and, in the end, he gave up all attempts at wiping away the
blood and simply rode the current. The life of a time-traveller is
never easy. The horrors of life: college, boot camp, and the senior
prom, hurtled past him with dizzying speed. Occasionally, a figure in
the menagerie would reach out and try to draw him into one of the
blurry scenes. Mary Jo Simpleton, summer camp, eleventh grade,
necking in the woods. Her tiny hand pressed through the walls of the
multicolored tunnel, glowing redly for an instant before receding into
the mists of time. Attempting to reorient his hurtling body, Gordon
managed to get his face up over the rest of his body, but his feet
kept wanting to fly up behind him, forcing him into a double
somersault. Finally, he managed to face forward (or backward,
temporally) in a more or less upright sitting position.
Up ahead, at the end of the tunnel, was darkness. He was now
nearing the end of *his* portion of the journey. Scenes of his early
years were now flitting by with an ever-increasing speed so they
appeared about as dim as did his memories of those same years. From
the end of the tunnel a great wailing noise resounded. Someone was in
great pain. Suddenly, legs spread wide surrounding a large vagina
loomed before him. Would he be able to make it? "I really shouldn't
have eaten that cheeseburger in '73," Gordon thought to himself,
remembering the size and weight restrictions imposed by time travel.
He braced himself for impact. The soft material, at this speed, had
the force of hitting a brick wall at thirty miles per hour. Just
barely, he squeezed through the small opening. An instant later,
Gordon lost consciousness in the sweet taste of amniotic fluid.
The surgeon looked nervous behind his white mask. This woman was
far too old to be having a child. The labor had already been hell
(the last seventy-two hours of it.) However, it now looked as though
she was going to make it.
"That's it, Mrs. Azul. Easy. Now B R E A T H ! That's good!"
A nurse blotted the sweat-covered forehead of the middle-aged woman,
whose screams and moans filled the delivery room. "We're just about
there, Mrs. Azul. Now one or two more good pushes, and we'll have
him," said the Doctor. He now took an instrument that vaguely
resembled ice-tongues and approached the birth canal. "I'm going to
have to pull him out by the head," the doctor warned. "Now, when I
give you the signal, push. OK, now, PUSH!"
The doctor reached into the body cavity and now pulled at the
tiny head that appeared at the opening with his metal instrument.
"One more time." He almost had him, then, there was the sound of an
explosion somewhere within the body of the middle-aged woman. The
doctor lost his grip upon the baby, badly scarring its tiny face on
each side from its little blue mouth to its little blue ears. This
child would carry these scars for the rest of his life. The doctor
fell backward on the floor as the woman's body shuddered again. There
was another dampened explosion and a loud "Pop!" and suddenly the baby
shot out of the opening, flew five feet across the room, and landed in
a pile of linens that were being stored there. A nurse rushed over to
the place where the baby had landed.
The EKG responded with a steady "Beeeeeeeeeeeeee..." The woman
was dead. Suddenly, the scream of a newborn infant's first tears
filled the room. There was much applause.
---------------------------------------------------
Phillip is a senior, majoring in Philosophy at
Mississippi State University. His philosophical
interests center around epistemology, literary
criticism, and the philosophy of language. His
current philosophical project has been to "whip the
dead horse of Logical Positivism until it is
nothing but a bloody pulp." Even so, he remains
convinced that Rudolph Carnap is one of the premier
philosophers of the last two centuries, next to
C.S. Peirce. He has also been influenced by
contemporary literature, especially Thomas Pynchon
and Allain Robbe-Grillet. Phillip's most
noteworthy accomplishment to date, he says, is his
marriage to the "beautiful and talented" Rebecca
Beattie McReynolds.
---------------------------------------------------
Master of Delusion
By Jason Snell
pa1033%sdcc13@ucsd.edu
======================================================================
"Don't worry," I said to her in a calm voice as we sat in my room,
which was darkened just enough to project the right mood for a first
hypnosis session (well, that's what I've read). "I can't make you do
anything you don't want to do, and this first session will only get you
prepared for later. You won't forget anything, and it won't even seem
like you're under hypnosis."
She nodded and smiled. "I'm not worried," she said, "I don't know
if you know it or not, but everyone at school trusts you."
I nodded, while laughing a little bit inside. The small two-page
hypnosis guide I got from the local computer hacker was the only thing
separating me from all the other people at the high school, including
Sandy.
"Now, I want you to sit back and relax." I took a candle out of my
desk drawer. Her eyes, which had begun to drift closed, popped open.
"What's the candle for?" she asked, not as suspiciously as
curiously.
What was it that the "Guide to Hypnotism" had said?
"The candle is to, uh, relax and calm you, so your mind is more
susceptible to suggestion. That way, I can begin to prepare you for
the next session."
"Oh, okay." She closed her eyes, and left it at that. I honestly
don't know why these people trust me. I certainly wouldn't trust
myself.
"Now, relax and concentrate on the candle flame. Watch the flame
slowly move back and forth. As it moves back and forth, you can feel
yourself becoming calmer. All your stress leaves your body, and you
are completely relaxed. Your mind is floating free of all tensions,
and your worries have left you." My relaxing talk went on for a few
more minutes, but I was wondering if I really needed it. After all,
everybody always seemed to be completely relaxed in my presence.
"You are now experiencing hypnosis," I said in my soft tones, "and
it does not feel in the least bit menacing. This is but the first in a
series of hypnosis sessions which will increase your self assurance and
my Biology grade. You can now open your eyes and the hypnosis session
will be concluded."
As she opened her eyes I blew out the candle and walked over to
the window. I pulled the shade down, and it rolled back up into place
at the top of the window. Light filled the room.
"Well, that's all for today," I said to Sandy. "We can do this
again... maybe next week?"
"Sure, that'd be nice," she said in a relaxed tone. My little
suggestions seemed to work wonders.
On Wednesday, I called Sandy and asked if she could come over on
Friday. She said she could stop by for a few minutes, but she was
planning on doing things Friday night. I didn't bother to ask what.
Partying's not my kind of thing. If I lost control of my faculties, I
might let it slip that I'm not as competent as they all think I am.
And I can't let that happen.
Friday, after school, I met Sandy on the way to the school parking
lot. I don't have a car, and it's just as well because I'd probably
wreck it in a split second.
Now let me make this perfectly clear-- Sandy's a really nice girl,
and she's actually quite pretty, but I was never interested in her.
Really. Now, I know that guys like me always seem to have a reputation
for slobbering all over any girl who might give us the time of day, but
that's just not true. Besides, my friend Steve always had it bad for
Sandy. He wanted her. Everywhere she went, he followed. In fact, he
was the one who suggested I get Sandy as my subject.
Do you get the impression that my hypnosis experiment wasn't
exactly based on scientific curiosity? Very smart, my friend, very
smart. Indeed it wasn't.
So, anyway, Sandy and I got into her car, a cute little '68
Mustang, and we drove on over to my house. She had her car radio
blasting "Tequila Sunrise" and was wearing tight blue jeans and a denim
jacket. I must tell you, I felt like quite an important guy, riding
out of the high school parking lot in a hot car, driven by a cute babe,
blasting some tunes. And we were going back to my house, no less. Not
bad.
Then again, everyone thought I was an expert before then. No
doubt I just hypnotized her into being this way. Yeah, right. I
couldn't hypnotize a chicken into laying an egg. Hell, I couldn't
hypnotize it into clucking.
When we got to my house and had gone inside, I pulled out my
calendar and began planning when we'd hold the next four hypnosis
sessions over the next week. Then I'd have the entire week to write up
my report and get an excellent grade in Biology. The teacher loved me,
and besides, he probably thought I was an expert too. My Biology grade
was most definitely cake.
"Tommy," Sandy said to me in a deep, sexy voice, "I want you to
read something of mine. Would you?"
My voice went up two octaves, but I still managed to squeak out
"Sure!" to her. Sign me up for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and fast.
Either that, or gag me and tie me to a tree.
Sandy took a piece of paper from her purse and handed it to me. I
unfolded it and found that it was a poem. A love poem. The first
part, "My heart's passion is for you/My life breaks without you near"
was really dumb. But I liked the end bit: "Wherever you go, my Love,/I
will follow in the skies above." I mean, she rhymed love and above.
Now that's good poetry.
"Now that's good poetry," I said to her.
"Really? Oh, thanks, Tommy! I'm so glad you like it!" She gave
me a kiss on the cheek. Sigh.
After we completed our little planning session and poetry
workshop, we headed for the door. As I opened my front door for her, I
began to speak out words that I had been composing for all of-- well,
all of two seconds. They dropped right out of my mouth.
"I really want to thank you, Sandy. Without you, my Biology grade
would be in serious trouble." Yeah, sure. "And you know how hard it
would have been for me to find anyone willing to volunteer to be
hypnotized-- hypnotism scares people." Mister humble.
She batted her eyelashes at me, in a way that made me wish Steve
was here to see it. "Oh, Tommy," she said, "every girl I know would
have done this. Anything to be able to experience you in action." I
don't know whether there was an underlying meaning to that statement,
but I was afraid to find out.
"Oh. Well, whatever," I said.
I guess I'm just the master of impromptu speaking. Somebody
please stop me, before I stick both of my feet in my mouth.
She bid me farewell, muttering a typical high school "seeyalater",
and was about to turn around when my good buddy Steve, wonderful master
of timing Steve, walked up the driveway. Sandy turned around, and,
seeing him, smiled politely. She then turned around, crossed her eyes
at me, and got into her car. I guess it was her sly way of telling me
that she liked me better than him.
Sandy had started up the car and driven out when Steve's voice
crept into my head.
"Oh, man, she smiled at me," he was saying in his pathetic
love-induced tone which I had heard far too much for comfort. "This is
great. Now look, Tom. I called her up, begged her to call you, and
she's now your hypnosis subject. She wouldn't have done it if it
weren't for me."
I didn't have the heart to mention about how well-loved I was,
about how all of the girls wanted me to pick them for my Biology
project.
"So you've got to do this for me, Tom." Then he started with his
scheme. "We agreed that if I got Sandy to be your guinea pig, you'd
hypnotize her into loving me."
"Oh, was that the plan, Steve? I seem to recall something vaguely
along those lines." I had agreed to Steve's plan, of course. If you've
been paying close attention, though, you'll realize that I had
absolutely nothing backing up that little promise of mine. Relaxing
her was going to be tough enough as it was.
"Good. Thanks, Tom!" Steve was happy again. "Can I watch Dave
with you?"
Sure, I told him, I'djustloveit. Watching Letterman with Steve
was a seriously lame experience. Not only were the subtleties of
Stupid Pet Tricks beyond his grasp, but even the meaning of Paul
Shaffer completely eluded him. Simpleton.
He was probably my best friend, though, so I put up with it.
Saturday was a pretty lousy day, in the grand scheme of things. I
was, of course, anxiously awaiting my second special session Sunday
with Sandy. You know that any event involving that much alliteration
has gotta be good. But that was still a day away, and so my Saturday
was instead spent with Steve. What a weenie.
I mean, first off, I had to listen to him moan and complain about
Sandy, which was bad enough. But then he conned me into going to the
movies with him.
Going to see the new Stallone movie might sound fun to you,
especially if you've got the I.Q. of wood pulp, but to me it sounded
like no fun sent down to walk among us in human form. Come to think
of, that was Steve, too. The personification of no fun.
So, what did I do? I went to the movies with him on Saturday
night, to see Sly blow stuff up.
About twenty people were outside the theater, in line to see
Stallone, I guess. At the door, one of those typical employees at the
Cinema 10 was selling tickets-- he had what I could only call big hair.
Piles of it. Poofing up all over the place. There were ten screens in
the place, all about the size of a shoebox (with mono sound, no less)
and they probably had fifteen employees for those ten screens. And
they all had big hair.
While Steve was rambling on about one thing or another, about how
"cool" it was when Stallone shot at communists or homosexuals or
whoever he shoots at, my eyes were scanning the line in front of us. I
was specifically looking at a girl, about seventeen, standing in the
middle of the line. She was about 5'6", with teased blonde hair. Her
lips were shiny with red lipstick, and her eyes were shaded with dark
blue eyeshadow. She looked great.
From the neck down, it was even better. She was wearing a tight
blouse, her fair-sized breasts straining against the buttons. She wore
a tight leather miniskirt, which drew my attention to her legs, made
even more appealing by the black stockings she wore. And, at the
bottom, spiked heels.
She looked at me, snapping her gum (they always snap their gum,
girls like that), and I stopped slouching, pushed my hair back from my
forehead a little, just to be subtle, and smiled at her. She smiled
back, and then licked her lips. Soft pink tongue over bright, shiny
red lipstick. I wanted her.
And Steve was with me, damn him.
I listened carefully when she and the two girls she was with
reached the ticket window, and discovered that they were going to see a
comedy. Thank God-- I wouldn't be able to accept a girl who actually
wanted to see Sly in action. So what if she popped her gum?
Anyway, Steve and I bought our tickets and went into the fifth
theater. In there we found a huge collection of mental misfits, many
more than I'd ever seen before. They wore Rambo T-Shirts. One couple
sang the Over the Top theme while they arm-wrestled.
All of this time, of course, I was planning my escape from Steve.
I figured that if I excused myself to go to the bathroom, he'd probably
go with me. Steve was like that. If I went to get refreshments,
though, I might be able to go alone and offer to bring some back for
him. Then I was home free.
Steve had me get him a small Coke and a medium popcorn-- he gave
me $20 to cover the Coke-and-corn. My plan worked like a charm. Of
course. It was my plan, after all.
The comedy that my girl had gone to see with her two friends
started five minutes after ours. In other words, while Steve sat
through the trailers-- which were no doubt advertising another movie
featuring an adult and child switching bodies, or maybe a second-rate
comedian teamed with a dog, or, better yet, a second-rate comedian
switching bodies with a puppy-- I could set about wooing my desire.
Wooing my desire-- that's right, isn't it? That's how the Romeos,
the Don Juans of history put it, isn't it? I doubt they talked about
trying to get into a girl's pants. I really do. Talk like that was
for, uh, uncouth cretins. So I walked into the still filling theater
(it wasn't Bargain Night-- all seats $3, so it wasn't that full) and
looked for my woman and her two friends.
They were six rows back, and three seats in. My love was on the
aisle side, and there were three empty seats next to her. I set a
course for the middle of the three empties, warp factor one Mister
Sulu, damn the (photon) torpedoes.
I sat down in the chair. Lock phasers on charm. Then I turned
and looked at her, feigning surprise. She smiled.
"Hi!" she said in a high voice. Well, I didn't expect poetry.
"Hi there," I said, shrewdly, and wiggled my fingers in a sort of
low-profile, cutesy wave.
"Aren't you Tommy Baker?" she asked me, saying my name in the way
you might say the name of a movie star.
"How do you know that?" I asked in a semblance of modesty. How
did she know it?
"Oh, you're kinda famous around school." She cracked her gum.
"You're hypnotizing Sandy Chambers, right?"
"Yeah, that's me." I smiled. "What's your name?" Oh, I must be
the king of originality.
"Trish. Trish Brooks." She paused for a second, but I was
enthralled, watching her lips, her eyes, (her breasts), and said
nothing. Fortunately, she continued. "You know, Sandy's pretty lucky.
I would have been glad to let you hypnotize me-- just for a chance to
see you in action."
Hadn't I heard this somewhere before?
"Wow. Thanks." Me, the master of dialogue.
Then a thought came to mind. I don't know why I did it, but I
did. It just slipped out of my mouth, probably because of some
chemical reactions a bit lower down in my body.
"Say," I said slyly, "I don't know about how I'm progressing with
Sandy. I might need some more data from someone else."
She gave sort of a questioning half-smile. "Really?"
"Sure! If you're interested, and you have some spare time during
a few evenings over the next week or so..."
"Great!" she said, and smiled again. Those lips. Wow. We
watched the movie together, just us and her two friends.
I've never been so glad that Stallone movies tend to run longer
than comedies. I managed to bring Steve his Coke and popcorn toward
the end of the climax.
"Where have you been?" he asked faintly as he kept his eyes fixed
on the screen.
"Long line," I murmured, and handed him his nourishment. He gave
an understanding grunt and left it at that. What a guy. What a moron.
Sandy was out like a light. I had really done it-- but, then, one
episode of Cosby would have probably done the same thing. It was a
good idea not to get cocky.
"Imagine yourself on a cloud," I said. "You are resting
peacefully, with a slight breeze caressing your gorgeous body." I guess
positive reinforcement during hypnosis is always a good idea.
"A tingling sensation begins to work its way through your toes,
moving slowly up through your feet, making them warm, heavy, and
relaxed."
It was working. I could see her toes wriggling in her shoes. I
was actually hypnotizing her-- of course, all I had done was put her
feet to sleep, which wouldn't exactly get Steve a date. Unless he had
a foot fetish.
"The cloud is soft," I continued in my New And Improved Hypnosis
Monotone, "and your body is supported by that softness." The cloud she
was lying on was actually my bed. And no, I didn't buy the Garfield
sheets-- my mother did. Besides, Sandy said that they were cute.
"The tingling gently and slowly moves up your sexy legs, relaxing
them. Making them warm and heavy." I theorized that I could probably
have had my way with Sandy's kneecaps if I wanted to, but I was much
too big a man to do such a thing.
"That feeling moves slowly into your, uh, chest, making your
breathing relaxed as well." With that, she let out a deep sigh, her
breasts straining against her shirt as she made her final deep
inhalation. I knew then that I should have set up the video camera.
"And now it reaches your head. You drift away into the blue sky
as you rest blissfully in the cloud." That cloud was exactly where I
wanted her. I figured that it was about time to start the suggestions.
Sure it was.
"On a nearby cloud," I began, "you see someone drifting toward
you. As he gets closer and closer, you see that he's unbelievably
attractive. You seem to recognize him from somewhere..."
Sandy was breathing harder and harder. I wasn't sure if this was
the right thing to do-- besides, hypnotism wasn't meant to work so
well. I was afraid that if I suggested that the man on the cloud was
Abe Vigoda, Sandy would fall in love with him.
Nobody should have that kind of power.
"You told her it was who?"
Steve needed a little calming. I theorized that a blow to the
head with a frozen TV dinner might do the trick, but I decided to try
talking him down.
"Tom Cruise. Don't worry about it. I decided that it was far too
soon to have her fall in love with you." I mean, I wasn't sure if I
could hypnotize anyone before, but now I was afraid that I might be too
good.
"But why Tom Cruise?" he whined. I suppose I could have picked
some other media stud, like Val Kilmer, Kirk Cameron, William Shatner,
or Don Knotts, but I decided that Cruise would be safe.
"I wanted to see how powerful the suggestion would be, stupid!"
Oh, yeah, big shot-- make Steve feel dumb. Choose the hard jobs.
"So now she thinks that Tom Cruise wants her to be relaxed? Why
not have her think that he wants her to love me?"
"You don't get it, do you, Steve? Look." I sat down next to him,
placed my hand on his shoulder, and hoped that I could keep physical
contact at a minimum. "My Biology project is supposed to be about
hypnosis relieving stress in individuals. I have to make an effort.
Besides, she's got two more sessions, on Wednesday and Friday. I've
got plenty of time to make her love you. Or want you. Or whatever you
like."
Then Steve did something quite amazing. He smiled, let out a big
laugh, and patted me on the back. "Thanks, pal!" he said.
It was at this point that I wondered if a nice, smart girl like
Sandy deserved a gullible dweeb like Steve, especially considering his
horrible hypnosis plot. I mean, Sandy was one of the most caring and
feeling people I had ever met. She wrote love poems. She told me that
she cries whenever she sees a movie any more dramatic than the Three
Stooges. And sometimes she cries at the Stooges, too.
She was a beautiful person. Did I really have the right to force
her to love a guy like Steve?
Fortunately, it was a philosophical argument that I wouldn't have
to worry too much about. I had to get ready-- in a few minutes, I
would be having a session with a girl who had teased blonde hair, wore
leather minis, and cracked her gum.
They were pink this time-- her lips, I mean. And she wore tight
jeans and a short top that exposed her waist. But she was still
gorgeous, and I still wanted her.
Now, I know that I said I couldn't make someone do anything they
didn't want to. But you've got to remember, Trish told me that she'd
do anything to see me in action. So I figured that she probably liked
me already. I just had to bring it out.
And I know what I said about easing into hypnosis gradually, over
several sessions. But things had gone so well before, with Sandy's
relaxation and Tom Cruise on the cloud, that I figured I must have this
hypnosis thing down by now. So I didn't wait-- the first time Trish
Brooks came over for a session, we worked our way around to the cloud
pretty quick.
The guy on the cloud, the one she was amazingly attracted to, was
none other that yours truly. Who did you think I'd put on Trish
Brooks' cloud-- Don Rickles?
After I had finished the session, counting from ten back to one,
and filling in all of my typical suggestions of rest and relaxation,
Trish didn't seem much different. I guess that she was already
interested in me, and so it didn't make much difference.
Standing by the front door, I decided to make my move. "Trish," I
began, "I was wondering if you'd like to do something Friday night." I
was getting pretty good at this.
"Oh--" she smiled for a second, and then frowned. "I have
something to do with my family on Friday night. It's my sister's
birthday."
"Oh..." For a second, I thought that my hypnosis scheme was
nothing but a sham, that I was nothing but a phony, a fake, a
charlatan...
"I'm free Saturday night. How about then?"
...but just for a second.
"Saturday night would be great. How about dinner and a movie?"
"Sounds great," she said, and licked her lips.
I had the power. I really, really did.
Of course, I had known it all along.
It was Thursday when Steve got his list of demands to me. I had
already completed my Wednesday session with Sandy, which had went well,
even if it wasn't very exciting. I wasn't getting much data for my
Biology project, but I figured that I'd wait for the final session on
Sunday night before interviewing Sandy and assembling the report.
Steve's demands were scrawled in blunt pencil on a torn sheet of
binder paper-- it wasn't exactly neat. It looked more like a list of
demands that a terrorist might have. Except, of course, that it said
things like "Undying Affection" and "Everlasting Love", not to mention
"Faithful Devotion". It was as if the terrorists had kidnapped the
president of Hallmark Cards.
On top of all of those demands (which he made as if he was
ordering a pizza or something), Steve required that I force Sandy to
ask him out on a date. Steve was so gutless that he couldn't even
stand asking out someone who had been bent to his will by my expertise
in hypnosis. What a weenie.
So my Friday session with Sandy started to bother me. When we
were in her car, driving to my house, I began asking myself if I really
wanted to do this to her. Steve was just a geek, but Sandy was a
beautiful person. She didn't deserve him.
As we walked into my house and Sandy sat down on the bed, I tried
to think of ways to explain the reasons for my not hypnotizing Sandy.
He was such an idiot that I could probably work something up by Sunday,
when the experiment ended. And he'd buy it, as usual.
I mean, really-- who would doubt my word?
Sandy shifted on my bed as I began to finish my suggestions for
the day and bring her out of hypnosis. The suggestions had been
working great, too. She said that she hadn't gotten into any fights
with her parents in the past week, and that she knew that my hypnosis
was responsible. I had no way of knowing if my suggestion that she
cluck like a boneless chicken while she was in bed had worked.
"As you awaken," I said, "You'll feel relaxed and invigorated.
You will have the confidence to do well in life and in school, the
energy to put your best effort into all that you do, and a relaxed
attitude which will keep your mind free from stress."
I counted from 20 back to one, and then she slowly opened her
eyes. Her legs trembled a little as she threw her arms above her head
and stretched.
"Oh, Tommy," she said, "I feel so great!" She sat up, lifting her
head from my pillow, and dangled her feet over the edge of my bed.
"You've done so much for me, Tommy," she said. "I really owe you a
lot."
I smiled, deciding that it would be best to be the King o'
Humility in this circumstance.
"It's no problem, really," I said. "Besides, you're helping my
Biology project along, remember? Without you, there'd be no Biology
project. You're my subject! You're the key!"
Hey-- I had managed to be humble and throw out a big compliment at
the same time. Sometimes I impress even myself.
"How would you like to come with me to Brad Johnson's party
tonight?"
Brad Johnson? The most popular guy at school?
Party? Me, invited to a party?
With Sandy? Me, going to a party with a babe like Sandy?
"Sure!" I said, trying not to sound too excited, but failing.
"When would be a good time?"
"I'll pick you up at ten," she said.
"No problem!" I smiled again. It seemed to work well.
Sandy walked out the door, into the driveway, got in her Mustang,
and drove away.
I had just fast forwarded past the end of my pirated copy of
"The Full Figured Woman's Workout" that I watched every once in a
while and was preparing to watch last night's Letterman when the phone
rang. It was Steve again, and this time he seemed more anxious than
ever.
"I just talked to Sandy," he said.
Uh-Oh.
"We only talked for about a minute. She said she had to do a lot
of things before she goes out tonight."
"Uh-huh..." I said, trying not to give anything away.
"She didn't ask me out, Tom! Did you give her the suggestion
yet?"
"No, not yet," I said, trying to get him back on the defensive.
"I'm still setting it up. You don't want me to blow this whole thing,
do you?"
"You've had three sessions with her, for God's sake!" he cried.
"You should have been able to do something by now! She didn't even
want to talk with me!"
"Everything will be fine," I lied. "You'll get your woman, Steve.
Don't worry."
"I'd better," he said. Steve didn't seem to be buying my
explanation. "So, I'll be over at 7:30, right?"
Huh?
"7:30, Steve? What's at 7:30?"
"What do you mean, what's at 7:30? I'm coming over, and we're
going to watch Rambo III!"
"Oh... right. See you then."
Those Rambo movies only lasted two hours. Steve would be gone by
9:30. Plenty of time to get ready for the party.
Yeah, well, Steve got there late, and the movie was over two hours
long, so it finished at 9:50. At least I had enough foresight to
change into my party outfit before Steve came over. He didn't even
notice that I was wearing nice clothes.
As soon as the movie ended, I jumped up and hit the rewind button
on my VCR. I was hoping to get him out of the house as quickly as
possible.
There was a knock on the front door.
Now, any normal person would probably be panicked at such a turn
of events. I mean, I was going to a party with the girl that my friend
was in love with, and he was still a little mad about the fact that I
hadn't hypnotized her into loving him. You can see where Steve's
misconceptions might lead. He might come to the conclusion that I had
hypnotized her into liking me.
I didn't panic, though. Of course not. I would find some way
out. I could explain my way out of anything.
"Wait here, and I'll get the door," I said. Steve always did as
he was told-- he was like a faithful dog in that respect. Actually, he
was like a dog in a lot of respects, one of which was his intelligence.
He stayed in the room, just as I thought.
I went to the door and opened it. It was Sandy, of course, and
she looked better than ever. She was made up a little more, because
she was going to a big party. And I was going, too.
It was then that I figured out my grand scheme: I'd just yell to
Steve that I had to go with my mother somewhere, like to the store, and
ask him to close the door behind him when he left. A perfect plan.
That was, of course, when Steve walked out from my room, holding
his well-worn Rambo III tape, and looked at Sandy and I with bug-eyes.
"Sandy!" he said, shocked. "What are you doing here?"
I was about to wince. But I didn't have enough time.
"Tommy and I are going to a party tonight. Didn't he tell you?"
Ouch.
"You're what?" Steve cried.
Like I said, you can guess the inferences he made. I had, in his
mind, used my hypnotism for evil instead of good. The ultimate comic
book sin. (I always had a hunch that comic books comprised Steve's
entire reading list.)
After he was through yelling at me, he ran out the door, screaming
something like "Friends don't betray friends! I'll never be your
friend again, you jerk!"
I don't remember his exact words. But you get the idea.
Sandy actually looked a little worried, though. I tried to
reassure her.
"Don't worry," I said. "He's a real geek-- I should have ditched
him years ago. You know what he did tonight? He wanted me to watch
Rambo III with him." I laughed.
Sandy laughed a little, too. "Come on," she said. We started out
to the car.
Brad Johnson's house was filled with all sorts of popular people,
most of whom I did not know. Most of them knew me, though. I guess I
was more famous than popular.
"Tommy Baker," one tall, well-muscled guy said, "you're the guy
who's hypnotizing Sandy!" He reached out his hand, and shook mine.
"Glad to meet you, buddy!" he said, laughed, and drank some more beer.
"To tell you the truth," he said, "if I could hypnotize Sandy, the
first thing I'd do would be to make her take off her clothes!" He
laughed again, and slapped me on the back.
I wanted to tell him that I wanted to use my power for good, and
not evil, but that smelled like something Steve would say.
Sandy came walking over, then, and the guy turned to walk away.
As he passed her, he put his fist out in a thumbs-up sign, as if he
were a slimmed down, pumped up Roger Ebert (sort of an Ebert without
the daily supply of rasinets and goobers), giving me approval.
"Are you having a good time, Tommy?" she asked.
"Sure," I said. And I was.
"Great!" she said, "I'm going to go get something to drink. Would
you like me to get you something?" She was being quite hospitable
toward me. I felt more and more relieved that I hadn't made her fall
in love with Steve-- especially now that Steve had shown how much of a
friend he really was.
"Um, I'd like a Coke." I smiled.
"Just a Coke?"
"Yeah, just a Coke."
She nodded, turned, and walked across the room. I kept her in my
field of vision as she walked through different groups of people. Over
at the other end of the room, she picked up a can of Coke and a bottle
of beer. Just as she was opening the beer, a girl walked up to her.
They began talking.
Of course, I have no idea what they actually said. But I've
reconstructed the conversation by considering what happened after it
ended. So pretend that this is like In Search Of..., and I'm Leonard
Nimoy (just imagine I've got the pointed ears), and you'll be fine.
GIRL: It was nice of you to bring Tommy to the party.
SANDY: Well, he's been really nice, and those sessions of ours
have helped me a lot. He's done a great job.
GIRL: Sessions? I thought that you didn't work out and that he
had to find a new subject.
SANDY: What? Where'd you hear that?
GIRL: From Trish Brooks. She says that she's his new subject.
(At this point, Sandy set down her beer, an act that I am now
very grateful for. She still held my can of Coke in her hand,
however. At the same time, another girl joined in the conversation.)
GIRL 2: Consider yourself lucky that Tommy couldn't use you. I
heard that his geeky friend Steve was going to have Tommy
hypnotize his subject into falling in love with him.
GIRL 1: Gross! (This is an assessment that I agree with.)
Then Sandy turned and started walking very quickly toward me,
plowing through the groups of people that she had properly skirted
around before.
"Tommy, do you have another subject? And were you going to
hypnotize me into falling in love with Steve?" She yelled this to me
from halfway across the room.
It was at this point that I realized that I might be in the
middle of a little confrontation.
By the time Sandy reached me, she had about six people behind
her, three of whom were tall, strong guys. One of them was that guy
who I had talked to earlier-- the "hypnotize her naked" guy. You
remember.
"Um-- well," I stammered, "I'm also having sessions with Trish
Brooks."
"That slut!" one of the girls behind her muttered.
"And Steve did want me to hypnotize you into loving him..."
I was going to use my diplomatic skills to explain how I had
evaluated the situation and decided to use my abilities for good, and
not evil, but I didn't have the time.
That was when Sandy threw that can of Coke at me. So now you see
why I'm glad she set down the beer. Aluminum is lighter than glass.
Then those big guys started advancing on me, as if I had insulted
Sandy by even considering to hypnotize her into loving Steve. As if I
had hurt her by adding Trish as a second subject.
I mean, Mister "hypnotize her naked" was even coming to get me.
As if he was any better than me. What a hypocrite.
Nevertheless, he was a big hypocrite, and I've been 5'8" for
quite a while now. So I did the intelligent thing, and ran for my
life.
I got home at about 12:30. The moment I walked in the room, the
VCR began taping David Letterman.
As I slid into bed, I considered the day's events.
It wasn't so bad a day.
I had ridden myself of that geek, Steve. He would no longer
plague me with Sylvester Stallone. The can of Coke only hit me in the
shoulder, so I wasn't visibly scarred. Sandy had found out about the
true plan behind my hypnosis project, which meant that it would get
back to my Biology teacher. I suppose it might hurt my Biology grade,
especially if I had no project to turn in at all.
But what do I care? I mean, really. I'm still me, the same guy
I've always been. I'm still well known around the school, and I was
able to control a girl's desires through hypnosis.
And better yet, I had a date the next night.
So what if she cracks her gum?
---------------------------------------------------
Jason Snell is a sophomore at UC San Diego,
majoring in Communication with a possible double
major in either Media or Writing. He claims that
he doesn't resemble the character in "Master of
Delusion" one bit. His story "Into Gray" won him
$100 in high school, has been shot (in a much
altered form) as a student film, and appeared in
the first issue of Quanta. He is currently trying
to write something which "looks like cyberpunk and
feels like meaningful literature." He says he's
afraid that it will come out looking more like a
long haiku.
---------------------------------------------------
A Night on the Net
By Jeff Okamoto
okamoto@hpccc.hp.com
Copyright 1989 Jeff Okamoto
======================================================================
Thank God it's Wednesday, Johnny thought to himself as he walked
home. It was the only thing that let him let off steam from work.
Ever since taking that promotion to first-level manager, things had
only gotten worse. When he was just a programmer, all he had to do
was get the job done. As a manager, he had to meet unreasonable
deadlines, deal with the financial analysts, make sure the legal
department had okayed everything, listen to his employee's complaints,
excuses, and demands and still meet his personal goals. No wonder
some of them took the Concrete Swan Dive.
He checked his posture. Gotta be careful, he thought. If you
looked nervous, you were a prime target and the gangs would rip you.
If you looked tough, the gangs would still rip you, to see if you
really were tough. Unless you could fight them off or run faster than
they could, you'd end up the same way. Red Stain Street.
The streets hadn't been cleaned in years. They held the stench
of millions of bodily excretions, intentional and otherwise. The
concrete absorbed it all, mixed them into an exquisite odor, and
infused the air with it. Johnny didn't know how the beggars could
take it. Every so often, some new wretches would try to make it on
the streets. Many of them ended up dead, or worse. Food was
sometimes hard to find.
He punched his codeword into the door lock and slid it open.
Home, sweet home, Johnny snorted. The apartment, more like a rabbit
hutch he thought, was just large enough for a person to stay sane. It
consisted of a small main room, a tiny bathroom and small kitchenette.
A thin mattress occupied one corner, nearly buried beneath a pile of
dirty clothes. A plastic desk, almost too large to fit separated the
bed from the rest of the room. With it went a stained and old chair.
The only item of obvious value sat upon the desk -- his deck.
Stepping over piles of dishes, making sure not to spill their
contents onto the floor, Johnny threw his backpack on the bed. Last
time, the spoiled food damned near burned through the plastic.
Fortunately, it had only left a dark brown spot on the floor.
Selecting a not too dirty shirt and shorts, he put them on and sat in
the chair.
He ran his hands along the deck's smooth worn sides. It wasn't a
top of the line model, but it was good enough, he thought. Ripping
out a new set of diamond fiber patchcords, he plugged one end into the
deck, the other into the sockets on the backs of his hands. The
sockets were unnecessary and were expensive as hell, but Johnny had
had them since his college days. It was a mark of pride to him.
He felt them seat firmly. He powered on the deck and adjusted
himself in his chair, making sure that his head wouldn't fall and his
neck get stiff.
The Blind Spot slowly grew and surrounded him. After a few more
seconds, he was in.
Information technology had come a long way since Gutenburg first
perfected the printing press. Information, originally kept in the
minds of people, could now be stored on paper. As science and
technology improved, information was stored magnetically, then
optically, finally holographically, although biologically stored
information was "coming soon." In this day and age, print truly was
dead.
So too had the way people accessed information. With
bio-technology, direct links to the brain were possible. Electrical
stimulus to the optic nerve made words and pictures appear before
one's eyes. Similar stimuli to the other major nerves created
illusions of sounds, smells, tastes, and touches.
What shall I be tonight, he asked himself. While out in the Net,
he could, through the correct programming, make himself look to others
like anyone he could imagine. He settled on his usual persona,
himself with some cosmetic defects erased. He was comfortable in it,
like a favorite pair of pants. It also meant he didn't have to
role-play or over-play any specific caricature.
He'd been out countless numbers of times, yet it was always a
thrill. Leaving his home node, he entered the Net.
A comfortable darkness surrounded him; then suddenly a thousand
and more brightly lit points, other data on the Net, appeared before
him; like fireflies, they were constantly in motion. There were so
many of them, you couldn't discern a pattern. It looked like chaos
itself.
Though potentially as infinite as space itself, the Net reflected
the thoughts of those who'd given birth to it. He was almost
completely surrounded by the many structures that seemed to form a
tunnel surrounding the main routes, partially protecting newcomers
from acrophobia, though it was not the sky that caused the fear, but
rather the Net itself.
Pundits called the Net an electronic counterpart to the human
circulatory system. Data packets were the red blood cells, holding
the vital information, transferring it from one "cell" to another, in
much the same way as the real one transferred oxygen. The analogy
broke down in two places. The Net's pathways were bidirectional, and
users were considerable more than mere red-blood cells.
As Johnny traversed the Net's routes, he could see the myriad
institutions that lined this portion of the Net. The highly
symmetrical and sterile multinational subnetworks, the more loosely
arranged but just as large universities and research centers, and the
small fry, the haphazard public networks.
He went at his usual pace, checking if anything new had been
added, something worth checking out. There was nothing new this time,
which surprised him. Normally the turnover rate was pretty high.
He stayed on the normal routes. Stray too far and you might get
lost permanently, as though the red blood cell decided to take a tour
of the rest of the human body. A very few had gotten lost and made
their way back, telling stories of demons, which were definitely not
believed.
He was also very careful not to approach certain nodes too
closely. Though quiescent enough now, if approached the wrong way,
especially the multinationals, their defensive sub-systems would
activate. Johnny had heard that some of the ultra-secure networks
used defense systems that erased yet another line between biology and
technology. Their security resembled the immune system. Special
drones would check how you were organized. If you didn't have the
right antigens, then antibodies would be produced to neutralize you.
Flatline EKG.
Johnny arrived in what was the electronic equivalent of Downtown.
Huge glowing signs beckoned to the Net travelers. Their barker
programs endlessly repeated the same spiel: "You won't find a better
sensory stimulus simulation anywhere else! Anything you want to do,
anyone you want to be! For only a minor charge, you too...."
He passed them by, like he always did. They were traps, he'd
decided long ago. They'd suck you in and fleece you for all your
credit before you could blink. He switched at the next nexus and
arrived at his destination: Chuqui's.
Nobody seemed to know if Chuqui was real or an AI. He was always
there, 24 hours a day, but no AI had yet passed the Petersen test.
The decor was different every night. Chuqui's looked like what
Chuqui wanted it to look like. Tonight it looked like Chuqui was in a
nostalgic mood. It was a combination bar and restaurant, the kind
that you found in the late Eighties or early Nineties. Period music
filled the air. The smell of fine wood grain and sizzling meat filled
the air.
"Hey Johnny, how are you?" asked Chuqui. He always recognized
everyone. Johnny wasn't quite sure how he did it. After hearing
about Chuqui's unusual talent, Johnny had tried using different
personas to fool Chuqui: he'd even come in as a woman once. Chuqui
always saw through it. So he just gave up trying.
"Fine, Chuqui, just fine," he replied. "Any action going on
here?"
"No, not really. The usual?" Johnny nodded in reply.
He walked past the bar that lined one side of the room, mementoes
of past dreams hanging on the wall above it, into a section of
restaurant stools lining two walls. You could watch the people across
the aisle watching you in the mirrors. Beyond that, a multi-layered
area with both booths and tables.
Johnny found himself a table and drank in the atmosphere. Chuqui
brought him his dinner. He smelled real steak, not the yeast he
usually ate. And his drink was a golden-colored beer in a frosted
mug.
He looked up from his plate and discovered that someone was
watching him from a booth near one corner. Johnny was sure that the
booth had been empty when he'd come in. And he hadn't seen anyone sit
down there. No matter, he thought, there were plenty of back doors
into Chuqui's and some people preferred not to walk in.
She was beautiful. Her brown eyes had small epicanthic folds,
with long lashes. Her hair was long and raven, bangs spilling forward
over her face. Her skin was perfectly smooth and tanned and her teeth
were a sparkling white, set in a smile between scarlet lips. She was
dressed in a shiny velvet-black dress, which was cut low enough to
reveal the swell of perfectly formed breasts. She smiled and winked
at him.
Johnny walked over to the booth and sat down across from her. He
caught a whiff of something indescribable which jolted his pleasure
center like an electric current. He had never smelled anything like
it before. But it was recognizable all the same. It was the
indescribable scent of woman.
"Hello", he said. He'd learned long ago that snappy pick-up
lines often didn't.
"Hello yourself", she replied. Her voice was low and husky. A
corner of her lips twisted upwards in a small smile.
"What do you think of Chuqui's tonight?" It never hurt to talk
about the place they were at.
"This is the first time I've seen it like this. Do you come here
often?"
"Yes, it's one of my favorite places. He always seems to come up
with the most interesting decors."
"You call Chuqui a 'he'. Rumor has it that Chuqui is an AI. Do
you know what I think?" The last was in a playful voice.
"No, what do you think", in the same playful tone.
"I think it's a computer with a human brain connected to it. An
experiment in permanent man-machine symbiosis. A rather powerful
tool, the computer's speed with a human's intuition. What do you
think?"
"That's an interesting theory. But what about sleep? A man
can't stay awake forever, and some people I know have stayed with
Chuqui for ten days straight. If he was human, he'd have gone crazy."
"Well, I'd be willing to bet that they didn't keep him constantly
occupied. That'd be how he could get sleep. A "Russian Sleep"
inducer implanted in the brain. Instant deep sleep for seconds or
minutes at a time. Granted, Russian Sleep isn't REM sleep, but the
computer could take over for an hour or two to cover for him."
It wasn't until some time later that Johnny noticed that he
wasn't intimidated by her intelligence. Her theory was interesting,
and she seemed to have thought it out completely. He was totally at
ease with her. And those beautiful eyes continued to look at him, and
that mouth still framed that smile.
Chuqui brought a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket that Johnny
didn't remember ordering. He expertly cracked it open and together
they shared the bubbly sweetness.
After finishing the bottle, he asked the inevitable question,
knowing she'd say yes.
They left Chuqui's and went over to a nearby love hotel. For a
fee, two or more people could rent a room by the hour or for the
night. The room was tastefully done, and looked much like an
expensive hotel suite.
They kissed, his tongue and hers nuzzling, his pleasure center
being jolted repeatedly. Then she stepped back and shrugged out of
her dress. Johnny was not surprised to find that besides the dress
and her shoes, she wore nothing else. He caressed her silky skin
while she undressed him. Then she gently pushed him onto the bed and
she straddled on top of him.
They moved together as men and women had done for thousands of
years. As they got closer and closer to the explosion, she seemed to
blaze like an aurora borealis.
He fell asleep with her head on his chest, his arm laid across
her smooth back.
Johnny woke up back in his seat, his chin on his chest, his neck
painfully stretched. He jacked out and switched off the deck.
After stretching the kinks out of his neck, he took a shower, two
one-minute blasts of tepid water. It felt oily and only slightly
brown. Putting on the same shirt and tie as yesterday, he
hop-scotched his way back to the door and left. Time for another
lousy day at work. After another night on the Net.
---------------------------------------------------
Jeff Okamoto is currently working for
Hewlett-Packard. He is an avid Japanese animation
fan and is a staff writer for Animag, an American
magazine on Japanese animation. He is also fond of
gaming and reading.
---------------------------------------------------
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