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IIIII N N TTTTT EEEEE RRRR TTTTT EEEEE X X TTTTT
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I NN N T E R R T E X XX T
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I N N N T EEE RRRR T EEE XX T
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I N NN T E R R T E XX X T
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IIIII N N T EEEEE R R T EEEEE X X T
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Volume 2, Number 1 - January-February 1992
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INSIDE THIS ISSUE
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FirstText / JASON SNELL
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Star Quality / MELANIE MILLER
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Half-Moons and Sunfish / JOHN REOLI, JR.
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To Comprehend the Nectar / LOUIE CREW
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Multiplication and the Devil / DANIEL K. APPELQUIST
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A Handful of Dust / DANIEL K. APPELQUIST
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Gravity / JASON SNELL
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The Unified Murder Theorem (1 of 4) / JEFF ZIAS
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Editor: Jason Snell (intertxt@network.ucsd.edu)
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Assistant Editor: Geoff Duncan (sgd4589@ocvaxa.cc.oberlin.edu)
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Assistant Editor: Phil Nolte (NOLTE@IDUI1.BITNET)
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--------------------------------------------------------------------
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FirstText / JASON SNELL
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Another year has dawned, and I'm back here again.
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Welcome to 1992, and to the first InterText of this year. I hope
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I'll still be bringing you InterText into 1993 and beyond, but that's
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now in the hands of various Journalism School admissions officers
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around the country.
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At this time last year, in addition to covering protests against
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the impending Gulf War for my school newspaper, I was involved in
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designing my new net magazine, tentatively titled InterText (I never
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did come up with a better title), and searching far and wide for
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stories that I could put in issue number one.
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A year later, I think we've produced our best issue to date. The
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stories in this issue are all first-rate. First up is The Unified
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Murder Theorem by Jeff Zias -- a first for us, because it's a four-
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part serial. Rest assured, the whole thing is written and in my hot
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little hands right now. It's hard to describe what Unified Murder
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Theorem is about, but I can say that it's gripping stuff, and well
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worth reading.
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Another first in this issue is our first story (or so I think) by
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a professionally published author. Louie Crew, who has published
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hundreds of works, is a professor at Rutgers University. His
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contribution this issue is the story To Comprehend The Nectar.
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In addition, we've got a good cyberpunk-style SF story from new
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writer Melanie Miller, and a somewhat pastoral piece by new writer
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John Reoli, Jr.
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And to complete my ever-so-exciting synopsis of this issue's
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stories, I'll mention what is not an example of nepotism -- our final
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two stories are by the editors of Quanta and InterText: Daniel K.
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Appelquist's "Multiplication and the Devil" and "A Handful of Dust"
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and my own "Gravity."
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Just a note to readers and writers -- the appearance of stories
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by Dan and myself in these pages by no means proves any sort of
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conspiracy (Oliver Stone take note) or old boy network. All
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submissions we receive are judged solely on merit, not on the identity
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of the writer. I'd never dump another story just because I had a story
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by Dan or myself.
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So please continue to submit your stories. I've already got a
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couple lined up for next time -- which is the first time that's
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happened in the year I've been doing this -- but we need as many
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stories as we can get.
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Since I began this column by discussing one year ago, perhaps I
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should continue the anniversary spirit by mentioning that our next
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issue will be a special first anniversary issue. I'm hoping to have a
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special cover for the PostScript version and more goodies. Be sure to
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submit stories or articles soon if you'd like to be in the anniversary
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issue.
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One other thing I'd like to mention is how amazed I've been at
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the international flavor of my subscription list. InterText is now
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sent to, among other places, Russia, Germany, Great Britain, Sweden,
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Switzerland, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Japan, China, Australia, and New
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Zealand. Our circulation is slowly climbing, as well -- at last count,
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exactly 1100 people were on some distribution list. And that doesn't
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count the people who FTP InterText from some site without asking to be
|
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put on the distribution list.
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Be sure to let us know what you think of InterText. The great
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thing about computer communication is that one can receive almost
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instantaneous feedback. You rarely if ever get chances to receive
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replies from the editors and writers of mainstream magazines -- but
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InterText lists the addresses and names of its editors and writers. If
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you have questions or comments of any kind, please feel free to mail
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us.
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Enjoy the issue. Take good care of yourselves. We'll see you back
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here in two months.
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--------------------------------------------------------------------
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Star Quality / MELANIE MILLER
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I remember. . .
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Benjamin Grayson opened his eyes, struggling out of the dream. He
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had been with Alicia Wilcox, his co-star, in a scene from their latest
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movie -- smooth, blond Alicia, and the dreamscene had moved beyond an
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acceptable rating into censored territory. His fingers slipping
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underneath the velvet strap of her monogown, exploring the feel of
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silky skin. And then, that thought --
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I remember. . .
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An image, textbooks on an old wood desk. Grassy lawn, with blue
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sky above it. It had a flavor to it, a texture of dread and
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anticipation, pushing him away from Alicia, out of sleep. An old,
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treasured fear.
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Of what?
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Slowly, he focused on the bedside clock. 7:30 p.m. projected in
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ruby holograms, hanging in the darkness. Time to get up, get ready for
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the party. It wouldn't do to keep the head of a major Hollywood studio
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waiting.
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And he would never do something as rude as that, although he
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could if he felt like it. Benjamin Grayson was one of the elite of the
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'20s. Stars. And he was under contract with Maximillian Hiller, the
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agent of the decade. Everyone wanted to belong to the Hiller Group,
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and only the best, the hungriest, would be admitted. Maximillian
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(never Max -- he hated diminutives) didn't handle anything else.
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All of Maximillian's clients were stand-outs in some way.
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Professional, other agents said with envy. Maximillian never had to
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cover up embarrassing pasts, arrange special hospital stays, pay off
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local law enforcement. The Hiller Group were actors first and
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foremost, dedicated to their craft. Not to providing filler for the
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tabloids.
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And part of their craft was to project an image. As Maximillian
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suggested, Grayson arrived at the party just late enough to make an
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entrance. The eyes of the crowd -- all people involved with the
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Business -- crawled over his skin agreeably, feather-light massage on
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the ego. Something clicked inside his head and he went into automatic
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pilot: Benjamin Grayson, The Actor. Watch him walk and talk, folks,
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like a real human being. Gossip about him, wonder who he's sleeping
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with this week, what his next 3-D will be. And, in a softer tone, how
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long can he last?
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To hell with it. I'm a star.
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Grayson kept the grin up, easing into the crowd. Nod here, kiss a
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cheek there, get into the groove of things. Project.. He saw
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Maximillian with Alicia, and waved. And when a director intercepted
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him, launching into a not-so-subtle film offer, Grayson managed to
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catch Maximillian's eye.
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"Benjamin, my boy, good to see you," the agent said, cutting into
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the conversation. Maximillian looked like the ideal parent -- six feet
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tall, a strong, kindly face, dark hair edged with gray at the temples.
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The only thing that spoiled the image was his eyes, a curious shade of
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light, oddly flat blue. "Enjoying yourself?"
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"Naturally," Benjamin replied, giving the agent an wide smile. He
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glanced at Alicia (I remember) and faltered. "Jorge and I were
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discussing his next picture," he said, as if to explain the break.
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"Which Benjamin would be perfect for," Jorge added, delighted to
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have Maximillian's attention. "The part was practically written for
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him, but he keeps dodging me -- "
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"Which he is supposed to do," Maximillian said smoothly. There
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was a new undertone to his words, an ice that casting agents and
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directors had come to recognize as a warning shot over the bow. Keep
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Off, Private Property. "All business deals are done through me, as I'm
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sure you know."
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Jorge immediately became apologetic. "I'm aware of that," he said
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quickly. "I simply wanted to run the idea past Benjamin -- "
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"Which you've done. Benjamin, why don't you escort Alicia around,
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while Jorge and I discuss his idea." Maximillian handed the actress to
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Grayson, then guided the director off to a corner.
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Alicia glanced after them, the demure expression melting into a
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smile. "This is the third time he's handed me off while he sets up a
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deal," she said, half-laughing. "I'm starting to wonder if I should
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ask for a cut."
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"I don't think you'll get it," Grayson said, grinning. "He's the
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top hustler in town."
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"I like it that way. It makes me feel more secure." She had a
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voice that had been described variously as soft, lilting, honeyed.
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Tonight, Grayson thought, it was elegantly sweet; champagne and
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strawberries. "By the way, he has some work for us afterwards."
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Grayson nodded, understanding. The host, and probably the
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hostess. It was part of the job when you worked with the Hiller Group.
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The dream floated into consciousness again, overlaying the party. I
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remember. . .
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"What's the matter?" Alicia asked. She looked up into his face,
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smile turning down at the corners. "You faded out for a minute."
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"Nothing." He shrugged the dream off, back into his subconscious.
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"You want that drink?"
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"Of course. Then we'll entertain the peons."
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Two hours later, he took a break from the mingling. Drift from
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one group to another, be witty, amusing -- even if you were used to
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it, it could get tiring after a while. Alicia was still downstairs
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chatting with people in the vast ballroom, and Benjamin wanted a
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chance to be alone with the night sky, polluted as it was. He leaned
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out on a second-floor balcony, tracking faint traces of starlight that
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made it through the smog. Memories started bleeding through again,
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subconscious fragments:
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I remember. . .
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Another time, another place. Further east, where people only
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watched the stars on holovision, never thinking to become one of them.
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Maximillian had come to the campus right after graduation, where he
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met Tim McCarthy for the first time. Benjamin felt like a ghost,
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watching Maximillian and the boy walking on the campus's quadrangle.
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The sky had been blue, very clear, and the sun had been warm on their
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shoulders as Maximillian explained how the boy could make a great deal
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of money in the entertainment industry.
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Tim insisted that he wasn't an actor -- the commercial had been
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his girlfriend's idea. He wanted to be an agricultural researcher.
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Maximillian demurred -- acting talent wasn't necessary, not with the
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technological options at his command.
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"You look lonely."
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Not moving, Benjamin tried on a small grin that didn't seem to
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fit. "Not really."
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He glanced sideways. Alicia's profile was framed, outlined by the
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lights of downtown L.A. Classically beautiful. He tried to come up
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with the right answer, something that would describe the dreams he'd
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been having lately, but nothing seemed right set against a background
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of the city's light. Especially I'm afraid of my memories.
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They stood there in companionable silence, the cool night breeze
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ruffling through their hair, before he said, "Do you ever remember
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what it was like? Before?"
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Alicia sighed. "I don't think about it," she said. "You
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shouldn't, either. It only confuses you."
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"I know. But sometimes I can't help it," Benjamin said, the words
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moving sluggishly now. "It's like I'm being invaded by memories. I
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don't know what to do."
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Alicia shook her head, moving away from him. She didn't want to
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talk about it, he knew. Alicia was the ideal actress -- calm,
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competent, perfectly adjusted to the change in her life. She had a
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magic that critics kept comparing to the screen greats -- Gish,
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Hepburn, Streep. Great implants. Alicia was never confused. "Maybe you
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should go see Dr. Berringer," she suggested, brusque. "Have him take a
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look at you. You might need an adjustment."
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Unconsciously, Benjamin reached up and touched the skin
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underneath his right ear, massaging it with two fingers. That was
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where they'd gone in, with the surgical probes. "Maybe," he agreed.
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A small surgical procedure, the newest form of wetware, and Tim
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would have the skills of the greatest thespians at his fingertips,
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Maximillian said. The silicarbon circuits would interface directly
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with his brain, a biocompatible network riding the limbic ring. All he
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would have to do is think about the network, and it would generate
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controlled emotional states in response to incoming stimuli.
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You mean it's an artificial persona, Tim said, quiet. He'd heard
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about the procedure from friends, horrified at first, then fascinated.
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It wouldn't be me, just some software riding around in my head.
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You make it sound so nefarious, Maximillian answered, smiling.
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Like it's a form of mind control.
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Well, isn't it?
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And this time, Maximillian did laugh, the father figure amused by
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a fearful child. Of course not, he said. You would have control over
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your every thought, your every mood. Your implant would simply allow
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you access to a greater range of emotions, the skills you would need
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to be a great actor. Think of it as a built-in acting coach.
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"Anyway, I came out here to find you," she continued, her voice
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growing warm again. "Maximillian's waiting for us upstairs."
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"All right." Benjamin turned, willing the vagueness to be gone.
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He took control again, the smooth persona clicking into reality. Turn
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up the charm, boy. It's showtime.
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Grayson dug his toes into the satin, thrusting harder. The woman
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beneath him moaned, winding slippery legs around his hips, whispering
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obscenities under her breath to urge him on. Across the hall, he
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thought, Alicia was probably doing the same thing with the studio
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head, unless the man got into something kinky. Not impossible, but
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Alicia knew how to handle that.
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He jerked again, and again, until it was finished. Naturally, he
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made sure the woman came first -- sometimes, he could even hold back
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until she had two orgasms, once even three. After love (because with
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him, it was love of a sort -- wasn't that programmed into the
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implants?), he slid off to the side, holding her. The after-sex
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comedown that women needed, he told himself. If you were going to do a
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job, do it right.
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In the quiet of the room, he felt the other memories sliding up
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to him, demanding notice. He tried to ignore it, to be the perfect
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actor. Maximillian had said this would happen. Sensory bleedover, he
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called it -- sometimes the implants didn't filter correctly. But
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tonight, Benjamin was too tired to fight. He let them come, shivering
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under their weight:
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Why me, Tim asked.
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Because you're the American ideal, Maximillian had said. They
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want your type, your voice -- they'll love you. Maximillian smiled,
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the cool charm turned up a notch. And because it would make us both a
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great deal of money, he added gently. Tim flushed, he mention of money
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tying a hard knot in his gut. There weren't many scholarships for
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aggie scientists anymore, and he had been living on loans and side
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jobs. And with graduation, the loans would start coming due.
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Five years with the Hiller Group and you would have the money for
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your bills, for a graduate degree, whatever you want, Maximillian
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said. Five years with us, and you will have financial freedom for the
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rest of your life.
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In exchange for five years of slavery, Tim said, horribly
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surprised at a sudden, tiny desire to believe Maximillian. An
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artificial persona was interesting when you were sitting around with
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friends in a safe dorm room, your mind still your own. The thought of
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actually carrying something like that in your head --
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I wouldn't call it slavery, Maximillian replied. It's simply
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acting, taken to the ultimate degree.
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The woman eased into sleep. Only then did he slip out of bed,
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gathering his clothes and looking for a bathroom where he could
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shower. Luckily, the bedrooms were connected with a palatial bath.
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Soundproof door, he noted, closing it behind him. Good.
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Alicia was already there, washing herself at the bidet. She
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turned, looking over her shoulder, and gave him a cheerful smile. "How
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was it?"
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"Not bad." Grayson went through his clothes, hanging them on a
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towel rack. "Better than last time. At least she was in pretty good
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shape. Yours?"
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Alicia shrugged. "About the same. He likes to be on bottom."
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Grayson grunted understanding, stepped into the shower to wash
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off the woman's sweat. After a minute, Alicia slipped in. "You mind?"
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"No." He handed her the soap, and received a sudsy washcloth as a
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prize. Like cats on good terms, they washed each other. Asexual,
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friendly.
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He was incapable of feeling any real attraction for Alicia, wet
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and slick as she was. He was sure she felt the same way -- Maximillian
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had suggested that a romance between them wouldn't be in their best
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interest. He reached down to turn off the water, when a showed
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appeared through the steam, watching them.
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"Lovely," the studio head whispered above the water's hiss.
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"Lovely, children."
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Grayson felt Alicia freeze, next to him. Waiting for the next
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suggestion, he thought disjointedly. Sure, we do requests, an insane
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voice sang in his mind.
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"I'd like to see a love scene." The man leaned up against the
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sink, his eyes slipping over them through the moisture. "Now."
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Compliantly, Grayson straightened up. His indifference melted,
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changed to desire. His need was reflected in her eyes, blue and eager,
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as she rubbed up against him, the water from the shower no longer her
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only wet. He grabbed her roughly, the way the studio head wanted him
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to hold her, the water beading on their skin.
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It had been the money that finally convinced him. A guaranteed
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$100,000 the first year; after that, the sky was the limit. Whatever
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his talent could pull in -- a million and up wasn't impossible, they
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had said.
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What if nobody wanted to hire me, he had asked. The
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administrative section of the Hiller Group just laughed. Maximillian
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hasn't picked a loser yet, they told him. Don't worry. You'll be fine.
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And he had. After the surgery, renamed Benjamin Grayson, he had
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co-starred in a fluff sitcom. Neilsens went through the roof -- the
|
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public loved him. After that, it was a string of steadily bigger
|
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movies, until he was signed as the star for his current 3-D, American
|
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Players. Women walked up to him everywhere, offering him their bodies,
|
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anything he desired. Men wanted to be like him. He was successful, a
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star, just as Maximillian planned.
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And his memories of life as Tim McCarthy were dimming.
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The sun was a faint shimmer over the Hills when he finally got
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home. Good party, he thought, throwing his jacket over the couch.
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Another one for the record books.
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The events of the night, after the party -- well, they didn't
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involve him, not directly. The sex had started after his first movie,
|
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with the producer and his wife. Grayson remembered it in a clinical
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way -- the quiet summons from Maximillian, being delivered to the
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hotel by limo. Wrapped up like a birthday present, he thought. It had
|
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been his first experience with a threesome, the feel of male skin next
|
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to his own. Maybe that was when the dreams began to bleed over into
|
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his conscious mind; the ghost of Tim McCarthy screaming in agony, he
|
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thought morbidly.
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He had asked Maximillian about the sex once, and the agent had
|
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explained it. These people were important in the Business, and wanted
|
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intercourse with the godhead of entertainment. Contact with beautiful
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bodies, nothing more. And it was part of their job to supply that
|
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contact to the right people, he'd added. Every member of the Hiller
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Group did it. Nothing new -- actors and actresses had been doing it
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for years. The implants was an improvement on the situation, a way to
|
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protect themselves emotionally. Let the implants carry you through,
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Maximillian had suggested before taking him up to that first hotel
|
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room. They'll know what to do.
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Still musing, he poured himself a glass of orange juice. Standard
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morning ritual -- orange juice, vitamin. More suggestions from
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Maximillian. Thank God we're not shooting until noon, he thought,
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shrugging off the rest of his clothes, standing in his briefs in the
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middle of the living room. At least I can get some sleep.
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He had wanted to talk to Alicia afterwards, but she had gone
|
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straight home. Instead, Maximillian had been waiting downstairs for
|
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him. Alicia told me you've been having some problems, he'd said,
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slipping into the father confessor role. Like to talk about it?
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And for the first time since Benjamin had started acting, he
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didn't. He didn't want to talk to Maximillian Hiller, father
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surrogate, chaperone, super agent. He wanted to work the memories out
|
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on his own. But Maximillian wouldn't hear of it.
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I told you that might happen, he'd said easily, on the way home.
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Your body's immunological system is reacting to the implant. We'll
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have Dr. Berringer look at it tomorrow.
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I don't want him to, Benjamin had said. But Maximillian insisted.
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It'll only confuse you if you allow this to continue, Benjamin, he
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said.
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My name is Tim, he said irrationally.
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Maximillian was silent for a moment. He finally said, in this
|
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place and time, your name is Benjamin. In two years, when your
|
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contract is up, you may decide to go back to that name. The agent
|
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smiled, and Benjamin felt chilled by that smile. Or you may prefer the
|
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one you have now.
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No, I don't think so. But the words brought a strange, deep
|
|
confusion. His life seemed to be a series of facets, beads strung on a
|
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chain. Somewhere, those facets had changed, become something new that
|
|
was called Benjamin Grayson. Did that make him real? And what did that
|
|
make Tim McCarthy? Unreal?
|
|
He could imagine the resurrection. The chain would snap, oh yes.
|
|
I can make the appointment for you this afternoon, Maximillian
|
|
said. Just a suggestion, of course.
|
|
Dully, he nodded. Make the appointment.
|
|
|
|
The implants were such a little thing, they had said, right after
|
|
the operation. Just to carry you along. And they'd led him into a new
|
|
life, something that Tim McCarthy had never imagined.
|
|
And the strangers? Midnight blending of flesh. It was another
|
|
part of the life. Nothing personal, he could hear Maximillian say --
|
|
it was only the body.
|
|
Changing his mind, Grayson carried his orange juice out to the
|
|
terrace, cool morning air marbling his skin. He looked over the
|
|
sleeping city and imagined them out there -- the audience that wanted
|
|
him to be what he was now, not the repository of someone they didn't
|
|
know.
|
|
And didn't care about.
|
|
Suddenly, he felt lonely, wishing for the memory of blue sky
|
|
again. Wanting a past he knew was his own. Knowing that it would never
|
|
be there.
|
|
|
|
Oh, I remember. . .
|
|
--
|
|
MELANIE MILLER (kmrc@midway.uchicago.edu) was raised by wolves on the
|
|
south side of Chicago (you'd be surprised how well canines adapt to
|
|
urban life), and currently performs double duty as an English major at
|
|
Purdue University-Calumet and an administrative assistant at the
|
|
University of Chicago. She is now editing her first novel, "Deus Ex."
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
Half-Moons and Sunfish / JOHN REOLI, JR.
|
|
|
|
Mark smoothly whipped the pole backward. The tip bent, wiggled,
|
|
and jerked. He focused on the line out in the water. The struggling
|
|
creature played it, making small S-shapes and the almost-circles of a
|
|
stretched spring.
|
|
"I bet it's a bluegill. Feels like it," he said.
|
|
"It's a sunfish," said Deavon. "I can see it from up here. Guess
|
|
you're lucky today," he said, pulling in his line.
|
|
Mark reeled the fish up to the clay bank and dragged it out of
|
|
the water. A long, thick strand of green moss had gathered where the
|
|
leader was attached to the line. He could see the orange belly of the
|
|
sunfish blazing through the moss.
|
|
"Watch out for his spines," said Deavon. "It'll hurt like hell if
|
|
he sticks you with one of 'em."
|
|
"I know."
|
|
He raised the fish by the line, slowly pulled away the moss, and
|
|
tossed it aside. The sunfish arched its fan of spines and curled its
|
|
body in defense. Cautiously, he inspected it to see where it had been
|
|
hooked. The bright afternoon sun reflected off of the sunfish and
|
|
struck Mark in the eyes. He swung the fish away and turned from the
|
|
glare. The fish flopped hotly from the motion.
|
|
"It's pretty big. Looks about seven or eight inches long." said
|
|
Deavon.
|
|
Mark put the fish on the ground. Expertly, he slid his fingers
|
|
down the line to the fish's mouth and then gave the hook a quick
|
|
twist. There was a slight tearing sound as the barb came out of the
|
|
cold stiff flesh. He stood to kick the muddy sunfish back into the
|
|
water.
|
|
"What are you doin'?" exclaimed Deavon.
|
|
"I'm putting it back in. I just don't want to get one of those
|
|
spines in my hand," said Mark.
|
|
"Are you crazy? Sunfish is good. I'll take it home if you don't
|
|
want to."
|
|
"Ok. You can have it," said Mark.
|
|
He put the fish on one of the metal clips of his chain stringer
|
|
and dropped it into the water beside his pole. It puffed and flapped.
|
|
He could see the red gills swell with each of its breaths. Like a
|
|
runner after a marathon, he thought; then baited his hook and cast
|
|
again.
|
|
The line hummed like the high voltage wires overhead, and the
|
|
sinker made a muffled pluiff when it hit the water. Mark reeled the
|
|
loose ringlets of slack, rested the fiberglass pole into the Y of a
|
|
stick, and hung a small fluorescent bobbin between the second and
|
|
third eyes of the pole.
|
|
Not far from shore, the late June heat rose in waves from a
|
|
rusted, metal plate laid across two parallel stone walls. Standing on
|
|
its edge, Deavon whipped a bamboo pole over his head. A red and white
|
|
plastic bobbin, round as a billiard ball, jerked; then plopped onto
|
|
the smooth green water. He put the pole on the plate. The bamboo was
|
|
sandy brown like the cattails on the other side of the reservoir; its
|
|
shadow curved across the ripples of water. Small bluegills cautiously
|
|
approached, then nipped at Deavon's floating line.
|
|
"That's an awfully big bobbin, Deavon. What do you think's gunna
|
|
pull it under, Shamu?"
|
|
"Catfish. I saw a couple sittin' off of this plate when we was up
|
|
on the road," he said in mild defense.
|
|
"Those fish looked about three feet long. There aren't any
|
|
catfish in here that big. You probably saw carp. Besides, you know
|
|
catfish eat off the bottom. Your bait's hangin' four feet below that
|
|
bobbin and probably fifteen feet off the bottom. No catfish is gunna
|
|
come up there. Some baby bluegill's gunna eat your nightcrawler and
|
|
you won't even know it because that bobbin's too big for him to pull
|
|
under," said Mark.
|
|
"You just worry about your own line. I saw your hook baited with
|
|
velveeta cheese. What are you gunna use next, a ham sandwich?"
|
|
"Deavon, I'm fishing for trout, not some sewage sucker."
|
|
"Trout. There ain't no trout in here. Shiiiiit, you're lucky you
|
|
caught that sunfish. What do you know about fishin' anyways? All you
|
|
got up here in Star Junction is this reservoir and the one above it.
|
|
Both of em' full of bluegills. What you need is to come down to
|
|
Whittsett and fish in the river. You wanna catch some fish, that's
|
|
where they are," he boasted.
|
|
Mark knew Deavon was right. There really wasn't any "good
|
|
fishin'" in the reservoirs like before. On days like today, when the
|
|
water was clear, carp could be seen sitting on the bottom off the "tin
|
|
plate," but mostly, the two reservoirs, one overflowing into the
|
|
other, were populated with bluegills and sunfish. Occasionally, a
|
|
catfish or perch would swim through to break the monotony.
|
|
Local fishermen spoke of a bass population returning; every year
|
|
around bass season, "They're comin' back." This kind of talk and
|
|
stubborn locals returned to the small, rain and spring fed lakes; but
|
|
outsiders wouldn't fish there. Not for bass. They would go to the
|
|
Yough river or up to Virgin Run lake: both stocked by the state or a
|
|
local fish and game club.
|
|
"Why don't you come down to Whittsett and fish in the river? We
|
|
can go tomorrow," said Deavon.
|
|
"You gotta be crazy. My dad would kill me if he knew I went all
|
|
the way to Whittsett," said Mark.
|
|
"Shiiiiit, he don't have to know. You can leave in the morning,
|
|
fish all day, and be back by six o'clock. He'll think you was up here
|
|
all day."
|
|
"How would I get there?" asked Mark.
|
|
"Walk. How'd you think?"
|
|
"I couldn't walk there," said Mark.
|
|
"Why not?"
|
|
"You know how this town is. If people see me walking towards
|
|
Whittsett they'll call my mom and tell her."
|
|
"So what," said Deavon.
|
|
"If my mom finds out I went fishing in the river she'll get
|
|
pissed at me and say I could fall in and drown. Then she'd tell my dad
|
|
and I'd have to hear it from him too," said Mark.
|
|
"Man, your folks don't let you do nothin'," said Deavon.
|
|
"Does your mom know you fish up here?"
|
|
"Hell no, you gotta be crazy. I tell her I go way down the river
|
|
past the island to get catfish. The island's too far away for her to
|
|
check," said Deavon.
|
|
"Doesn't anybody call your mom and tell her they saw you coming
|
|
up to Junction?" asked Mark.
|
|
"They can try. We don't got a phone," he said, and turned to Mark
|
|
and smiled.
|
|
The boys laughed out loud then Mark plainly said, "Look Deavon, I
|
|
just can't go."
|
|
"Ok," said Deavon.
|
|
Deavon sure is lucky to live in Whittsett, thought Mark. The
|
|
river's down there, and all those different kinds of fish. Muskie,
|
|
bass, pike, and trout. And things always wash up on its banks. Rusty
|
|
tricycles, cables, and plastic parts of things that look like they
|
|
come from appliances or factory machinery. And he always has something
|
|
from the river. Hunks of blue glass or rusty railroad spikes.
|
|
Sometimes his pockets are full of iron ore pellets that fall out of
|
|
railroad cars.
|
|
Mrs. Adams almost went crazy the day he rolled a handful of them
|
|
to the front of the room while she was reading to the class.
|
|
"Who's balls are these?" she shouted holding them in her hand. "I
|
|
want to know right now."
|
|
Deavon puffed as he tried to restrain his laughter. Tears
|
|
streaked his face. Beside him, Mark buried his hysteria in a social
|
|
studies book. Under the desk, Deavon handed him some pellets.
|
|
"I know they're from the river. My son brought these home when he
|
|
was your age," she added.
|
|
"Then maybe they're your son's balls," shouted Scott Stanko from
|
|
the other side of the room. The class roared. Tammy Smith lowered her
|
|
flushed face.
|
|
With a crooked finger Mrs. Adams pointed toward Scott, but the
|
|
tip of the finger actually pointed right at Timmy Veletti.
|
|
"Listen, young man. I'm warning you. You're already in trouble
|
|
with me for your outburst this morning. I was a WAC in World War II,
|
|
you know," she said to Scott, pronouncing WAC as "wack."
|
|
"What are you pointing at me for? I didn't do anything this
|
|
morning," shouted Timmy. The class laughed even louder than before.
|
|
"No, but you did just now," she said and furiously rushed to him
|
|
in the middle of the room. The students moved their desks in big jerky
|
|
motions to exaggerate the width of her hips as she waddled past. In
|
|
the rush, she seemed to burst from her tight black skirt.
|
|
She grabbed the back of Timmy's shirt, put her face right up to
|
|
his and said, "I knew someone in the army like you."
|
|
Just then three more of the rust red pellets bounced off the
|
|
blackboard. The class roared and she stormed out shouting for the
|
|
principal and her old commanding officer. Mark brushed the rusty dust
|
|
from his hands.
|
|
Around the reservoirs, styrofoam bait cups are all you could
|
|
find, thought Mark. Fishermen from Virgin Run, who stop at the
|
|
reservoir to use up old bait, leave them lying around without even a
|
|
worm or two. Inside the cups, there's only perfect dirt; the kind that
|
|
comes with bought worms: no roots or coal or clay or bits of coke ash,
|
|
just perfect little moist chunks like black cottage cheese.
|
|
Mark looked at Deavon standing on the plate. He wore cut-off
|
|
shorts and his slight body bent backwards. His stomach stuck out a
|
|
little and appeared to have an inflated stretch, like a round balloon
|
|
pulled from both ends. His rich black skin seemed to absorb the sun,
|
|
soaking it into his body, never to release it.
|
|
He stands just like those African bushmen, the ones on TV
|
|
specials about Kenya or Botswana, out there on the Serengeti or
|
|
Kalahari. They always look so curious, so concentrated, he thought;
|
|
still, but in motion with small pieces of hide around their waists and
|
|
a stick at their side. What are they looking at? Maybe a lion or
|
|
rhino. No. It had to be something else. Something harder to discern. A
|
|
small deer maybe. Dad always said how hard it was to see deer when he
|
|
went hunting. Maybe it wasn't that different in the Serengeti than it
|
|
was here.
|
|
"So what are you gunna do?" asked Deavon.
|
|
"Huh?"
|
|
"What are you gunna do about tomorrow?"
|
|
"I don't know."
|
|
"Come on, Mark. You always think of something," said Deavon.
|
|
"Yeah, I... Shit! Here it goes!" Mark leaned on his haunches
|
|
toward the pole. The bobbin wiggled back and forth, raised half an
|
|
inch, then stopped.
|
|
"Gettin' a bite?" Deavon asked.
|
|
"Yeah."
|
|
"So what are you gunna do?"
|
|
"Wait for him to hit again, he's just playin' with it now," said
|
|
Mark.
|
|
"No. Not about that, about tomorrow. What are you gunna do?"
|
|
Mark waited silently for the bobbin to move. It remained still.
|
|
Satisfied that the fish wasn't going to strike he turned to Deavon.
|
|
"I can't walk down to Whittsett," said Mark.
|
|
"Why not? You got legs."
|
|
Mark looked sternly at him and tried to explain.
|
|
"Deavon, you know how these people are around here. Some of them
|
|
just like to make trouble. Maybe I'll ride my bike, I don't know. I
|
|
just can't walk down," he said with finality.
|
|
KEIRHH!
|
|
The bobbin smacked against the pole. Mark grabbed the pole and
|
|
pulled violently.
|
|
"Shit! I missed him," he shouted and began to rapidly reel in the
|
|
line.
|
|
Deavon walked to an edge of the plate and jumped. His leap was a
|
|
little short and his left foot landed in thick mud at the shoreline.
|
|
"Son-of-a-bitch!" he yelled, and pulled his foot from the mud.
|
|
Mark laughed as Deavon turned his foot to examine the dripping
|
|
sneaker. When he pulled off the shoe, it made the same sucking sound
|
|
coming off his foot as it had coming out of the mud. Deavon removed
|
|
his other shoe and tossed it on the ground. Barefoot, he stepped in
|
|
the water near the stringer and crouched to rinse the mud from his
|
|
shoe. The yellow paleness of his feet and palms was highlighted in the
|
|
water. They're not white or faded like people said, it's as if more of
|
|
the blackness is trying to come through, but can't, thought Mark.
|
|
"You should put it on the plate to let it dry when you're done,"
|
|
said Mark. "It's so hot it'll be dry by the time we go home."
|
|
"Yeah, I know. Hey look! There's a mussel out there." said
|
|
Deavon, pointing to a submerged rock.
|
|
"Yeah, I see it. Right by that rock. And there's another one
|
|
behind it." Mark finished reeling and laid the pole on the bank.
|
|
"Let's go out and get them."
|
|
"We can use them for bait," Deavon added.
|
|
At the rock, the water reached their chests. Deavon went under
|
|
for the first mussel then splashed to the surface with it. Stars of
|
|
water glistened on his tight jet hair. Mark went under and retrieved
|
|
the second. He pushed back his straight wet hair and took Deavon's
|
|
mussel. With one in each hand, he tapped them together. Deavon watched
|
|
closely, but the mussels remained sealed from them.
|
|
A loud engine rumbled on the other side of the reservoir. Wooden
|
|
planks bounced in tandem as a pick-up truck crossed the small, flat
|
|
bridge over by the swamp. The driver gunned the engine and raced up
|
|
the road along the reservoir. The boys turned and saw patches of red
|
|
streaking through the tree line. Past the trees and out in the open
|
|
the driver yelled, "Hey, you motherfuckers!!!" The truck, patched with
|
|
gray primer, continued up the road. Its engine strained as it reached
|
|
the top of the hill. Mark put his head down.
|
|
"Asshole," he muttered.
|
|
Deavon laughed and said, "He don't mean nothin' by it. He's just
|
|
playin' around."
|
|
"Maybe he is, but he doesn't have to play around with us.
|
|
Besides, who'd want to play around with anybody who has a piece of
|
|
shit truck like that?" said Mark walking to the shore.
|
|
"Yeah, I know what you mean," said Deavon. "But, I'll tell ya'
|
|
something. His truck might be a piece of shit, but he got a good
|
|
lookin' sister."
|
|
"You know that fuckhead?" asked Mark.
|
|
"No, but I know his sister. I see his truck at her house when I
|
|
walk to school. Sometimes I see him working on it. He's too young to
|
|
be her dad, so I figure he must be her brother."
|
|
"How do you know his sister?"
|
|
"From school. You know her," said Deavon.
|
|
"I do?" asked Mark.
|
|
"Yeah, she's a year ahead of us, sixth grader, got black hair,
|
|
kinda' tall.
|
|
"Whose class is she in?"
|
|
"Mr. Deiter's." Mark searched his mind as he waited in the knee
|
|
deep water. Impatiently Deavon said, "You know who I'm talkin' about.
|
|
Black haired girl with those big titties that are always bouncing up
|
|
and down the hall."
|
|
"That's Tricia Stueben's brother?" exclaimed Mark, pointing to
|
|
the road with one of the mussels.
|
|
"Yeah. That was Boobin' Stueben's older brother, Steve," said
|
|
Deavon.
|
|
"He looks kind of old to have a sister in sixth grade. Is he a
|
|
senior?"
|
|
"No. He's out. Just works on his truck and drives around
|
|
bothering people," said Deavon. In the distance, the engine rumbled
|
|
and became louder as it approached. The two boys looked at each other
|
|
and faced the road. Rumbling down, right on top of them, the truck
|
|
appeared from around a turn. A long haired, bearded man in the
|
|
passenger side leaned out of the window and shouted, "Fuckin' nigger!!
|
|
Go back to Whittsett where you fuckin' belong!"
|
|
Mark threw one of the mussels. It missed the truck and spun
|
|
across the road.
|
|
Stueben gunned the engine. The truck raced red and gray back
|
|
through the trees. The planks bounced in tandem. Loudly, Ba Boom!
|
|
Deavon got out of the water and found an old coffee can. He
|
|
filled it and spilled water on the plate two or three times. The water
|
|
dried quickly over the hot metal, but cooled it enough so he could
|
|
walk across. He stepped up onto the plate and sat in a puddle where
|
|
the water had collected near the edge. The metal banged against the
|
|
stone.
|
|
The boys fished silently for the rest of the day. Using the other
|
|
mussel as bait, Deavon caught two or three bluegill and a very small
|
|
perch. Mark caught another sunfish, but lost a catfish caught with one
|
|
of Deavon's nightcrawlers. In the warm water, their fish lay curled
|
|
and stiff. Only the tiny perch, the most recent catch, lived on the
|
|
stringer. Snapping violently, it made a gentle splash.
|
|
Mark leaned back on his elbows and looked up. Deavon sat stiff
|
|
armed; tilted back on his hands. His legs hung flaccidly over the edge
|
|
of the plate. He's still looking out, ahead; thought Mark.
|
|
"So Deavon, you wanna get out of here?" he said through a loud
|
|
yawn.
|
|
"Yeah. Let's go home." he said and silently stretched.
|
|
They brought in their lines and gathered up their gear. Mark
|
|
surveyed the ground for any hooks and bobbins that might have fallen
|
|
from his vest; then, he put it on. Its rough canvas stung his
|
|
sunburned shoulders.
|
|
Deavon wrapped his line around the base of the bamboo pole and
|
|
put the red and white bobbin in his pocket. The large ball bulged
|
|
tightly against the denim. Looks like old man Sweeney's goiter,
|
|
thought Mark. He jumped off the plate onto the cracked clay bank and
|
|
walked over to Mark.
|
|
"How are you gunna take your fish home?" asked Mark, holding the
|
|
stringer.
|
|
"With this." Deavon reached in his pocket and pulled out a length
|
|
of blue nylon cord.
|
|
"I'll run this through their mouth, out their gills, and carry
|
|
em' like this." Holding the ends of the rope, he showed Mark how they
|
|
would hang.
|
|
"That'll work; but you're not gunna keep that perch, are you?"
|
|
asked Mark.
|
|
"Hell yeah, I'm gunna keep it."
|
|
"Deavon, you can't be serious. It isn't more than three inches
|
|
long," exclaimed Mark.
|
|
"So."
|
|
"So, how are you gunna eat it? You'll cut most of it away when
|
|
you clean it."
|
|
"No I won't. I'll give it to my grandmother. She grinds them up
|
|
and makes fried fish cakes."
|
|
"All of it? Won't she cut off the head and the tail?"
|
|
"I don't know. All I know is she tells me to bring home all the
|
|
fish I catch and them cakes is gooood," Deavon said smiling.
|
|
Up on the road, like cut-outs of half-moons made in grade school,
|
|
one black, one white, they moved in a common sky. One passed behind
|
|
the other, grabbed at the sagging limbs of a choke-cherry tree; the
|
|
other crossed over and tormented a garden spider webbed in a barbed
|
|
wire fence. At the plank bridge by the swamp Deavon turned to Mark and
|
|
asked, "So, what are you gunna do about tomorrow?"
|
|
"Go down to Whittsett," answered Mark.
|
|
"Are you gunna ride your bike?"
|
|
"No. I'll walk down in the morning."
|
|
As they crossed the bridge, the planks wobbled under their feet.
|
|
Softly, Ba Boom.
|
|
|
|
--
|
|
JOHN REOLI, JR. (jr48+@andrew.cmu.edu) is a senior English major at
|
|
Carnegie Mellon University.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
To Comprehend the Nectar / LOUIE CREW
|
|
|
|
1
|
|
|
|
I did not expect Robert Martin to die. I fled The Witherspoon
|
|
School soon thereafter. That's not the gamble I thought I took when it
|
|
began.
|
|
Dr. Geoffrey Smitherman sat straight in a chair embossed "W & N".
|
|
I sank in leather. The cotton of my new suit brushed a panel of the
|
|
empire secretary which separated us. I had to tilt my head slightly to
|
|
look him in the eye. We did not yet have air-conditioning. Early
|
|
August. Not even a breeze.
|
|
"Mr. Smith, can you also teach Senior Bible?" he asked.
|
|
"Well, sir, I suppose I could, but I would prefer to teach only
|
|
literature. I have finished my thesis on Shakes..."
|
|
"We will give you plenty of that, but we need someone to take the
|
|
Bible class. Mr. Foxworthy retired in May. I see that you double-
|
|
minored in religion and New Testament Greek at Evangel University.
|
|
Foxworthy lacked rapport. He talked about missionaries and heathens.
|
|
Quite candidly, our boys take the course mainly to impress the
|
|
colleges. Bible on their transcript distinguishes us as a 'private'
|
|
school. It also alerts admissions people that our graduates understand
|
|
allusions."
|
|
"I could do it. It won't be a crip course though. I'll teach it
|
|
as literature, not as Sunday School fare."
|
|
"Fine, Lee. I think you'll get along nicely here, especially
|
|
since you attended The O'Gorman School."
|
|
"But O'Gorman is Witherspoon's biggest rival."
|
|
"You know a fine Southern boarding school first-hand. New faculty
|
|
who went to public school often don't understand us. Our reverence.
|
|
Not the fanatic kind, but you know what I mean. I believe Dr. O'Gorman
|
|
wrote me that you won the Bonner Award 'For Unselfish Service' at
|
|
O'Gorman. Did you not?"
|
|
"Yes, sir."
|
|
"Good, can you attend faculty orientation the last week of
|
|
August?"
|
|
"You mean I get the job?!"
|
|
"The boys won't arrive until Tuesday after Labor Day, except for
|
|
the football team."
|
|
My new trousers peeled from the chair as I tried to rise.
|
|
"Thank you, sir. I am much obliged."
|
|
"But you haven't asked what salary we will give you," he smiled.
|
|
"Oh." I blushed. "That's not important. I'm sure you will treat
|
|
me justly. It's the teaching that interests me, not the money."
|
|
"Excellent attitude!" he said. "Welcome to the Witherspoon
|
|
family."
|
|
|
|
2
|
|
|
|
Later I learned how much Dr. Geoffrey Smitherman valued the word
|
|
family. Because I had not pushed, he began me at the rate he gave to
|
|
those without a master's.
|
|
But I had not exactly leveled with Dr. Smitherman either. I
|
|
doubted that he would hire me if he knew that I no longer believed in
|
|
God, or knew that at least I thought I didn't. Four years at Evangel,
|
|
the world's largest bigotry institution, unconvinced me. I dropped my
|
|
intention to preach and took up literature as a better venue for "a
|
|
living sacrifice."
|
|
O'Gorman, had delivered me from a bad public school into a
|
|
community of others who enjoyed homework. But teaching as a graduate
|
|
student at a large state university taught me that too few others
|
|
value their brains. I had found such people at O'Gorman; I might find
|
|
others at Witherspoon.
|
|
I tease fiercely, and teach best by what I call "creative
|
|
intimidation." Boys liked my classes. Since I began school early, at
|
|
age 5, I was only four years older than some of them. Many got close,
|
|
especially the brighter ones.
|
|
But my best student, Robert Martin, rarely said a word, except in
|
|
class, where he shined. At O'Gorman, I had groveled too often.
|
|
Robert's football teammates teased him about his early lead in my
|
|
class, and would importune me to tell how soon I would post the grades
|
|
for the latest Bible test. Robert himself never asked. Was it
|
|
arrogance? Robert seemed to presume that he would best his closest
|
|
rival, Edgar Bell; and on every test he did, by at least three points.
|
|
Robert was prefect to second-formers in the Field House, but he
|
|
came to see his classmates on Senior Hall often and could have dropped
|
|
by with them to my apartment, had he chosen to. His friend Philip
|
|
Smethurst, heir to a textile fortune, visited often enough, and even
|
|
brought others, especially when I bought one of the first stereo sets.
|
|
Sometimes second-formers, not even in my classes, came with him. But
|
|
Robert never once did. Even at the refectory, he seemed not to notice.
|
|
He didn't avoid me, just didn't notice and passed right by the faculty
|
|
tables without a nod.
|
|
The perpetual shadow of his black beard made Robert seem older
|
|
than the others, but not sensual. Even now, over twenty-five years
|
|
later, and on much maturer terms with myself, I cannot imagine myself
|
|
in darkness peeking out blinds to look at him, as night after night I
|
|
waited to see either of his classmates, the two prefects in the next
|
|
building, shirtless, scratch balls.
|
|
Robert triggered fantasies less sensual. They had something to do
|
|
with power, not his modest skills as a tackle, but his ability to stay
|
|
with a commitment until he won.
|
|
At O'Gorman, I had escaped playing sports by becoming the
|
|
athletic trainer. At games I was a glorified water boy, but after
|
|
hours, with tongue depressors I swabbed many a hero's jock itch with
|
|
slabs of what looked like peanut butter and smelled like axle grease.
|
|
I aimed deep heat at others' sore buns; ground analgesics into others'
|
|
shoulders.
|
|
Four years of bowl fanaticism at "Bigotry U." made me an apostate
|
|
to sports religion. I worried that The Witherspoon School might revive
|
|
that. Since new teachers often have to coach j-v teams, I made a point
|
|
during orientation to visit the varsity workouts, hoping to influence
|
|
my luck.
|
|
It paid off. At a break in football practice, I asked a coach,
|
|
"What inning is it?" I got to advise the staff of the student
|
|
newspaper.
|
|
But Rubbings no longer threatened me. By then I had learned to
|
|
live with my secrets, to channel most energy into books and music as
|
|
easily as tackles thrust it into another's gut. Besides, The Sound and
|
|
the Fury and enough other works I admired had committed me to suicide
|
|
before I would ever act on the passions that surged in the dark as I
|
|
peeked out the blinds.
|
|
Instead, I feared the way that sports sucked me into their
|
|
definition of courage as essentially physical, an endurance of pain
|
|
and risk according to clear rules. That's why I never liked Hemingway.
|
|
But so pervasive is the point of view, I knew I could easily fall back
|
|
into thinking that only good athletes can win courage, like a team
|
|
trophy at the annual steak banquet. In that world, waterboys like me
|
|
live, if at all, off-sides, out-of-bounds.
|
|
I preferred to read "A Certain Slant of Light" and blast Mahler's
|
|
Ninth down Senior Hall.
|
|
|
|
3
|
|
|
|
Robert Martin appeared to respect my terms. He never volunteered
|
|
to give a talk at chapel, though faculty often recommended such
|
|
speakers for the Ivy League. He never joined the glee club to sip
|
|
sherry in the director's bachelor apartment and sit in the bachelor's
|
|
chair monogrammed "V." Robert kept to himself his athleticism and any
|
|
other religion he might have had; studied rigorously; and never made
|
|
less than a 96 on any of my tests. He worked less hard for other
|
|
teachers.
|
|
The more I learned about The Witherspoon School, the more I
|
|
admired Robert Martin. Witherspoon's trustees had given Geoffrey
|
|
Smitherman his "Dr." easily, since they also served as trustees of a
|
|
nearby Baptist women's college. Dr. Smitherman's "publications" turned
|
|
out to be several editions of a workbook on sentence-diagramming,
|
|
taught in no other school and only in our own Form One. At his autumn
|
|
tea, I examined a dozen of the impressive leather classics in Dr.
|
|
Smitherman's living room and found not one with the pages cut.
|
|
Claiborne was easier to like, if not respect. Dr. Smitherman held
|
|
the title "President," but Mr. Claiborne, as "Headmaster" actually ran
|
|
The Witherspoon School. Claiborne did not even try to mask his
|
|
pretensions.
|
|
"What did you buy that buggy for, Smith? Do you drive it with a
|
|
rubber band?" he teased me publicly when he first spotted my new
|
|
Falcon, parked so all could see it, by the new Demster Dumpster.
|
|
I had gone $2,100 into hock to buy it -- $2,800 after interest --
|
|
and I earned only $3,600 for the 9 months, plus my room and board.
|
|
"Seriously, Lee," he added when he invited me to join him and
|
|
Mrs. Claiborne at their table in the refectory, "you will never know
|
|
that you have arrived until you sit behind the wheel of a big car,
|
|
smoking a cigar, knowing that it belongs to you."
|
|
I added Babbitt to the reading list for Senior Bible. Students
|
|
could earn up to 10 extra points for their annual grade (at half a
|
|
point per book) for each work that they tested well on, in an oral
|
|
examination.
|
|
"God makes 100. I make 99. The highest you can make, 98," I
|
|
explained.
|
|
Robert put all 10 of his points into storage by the end of the
|
|
first semester, though he never needed them.
|
|
Amazingly, no boy ever let out that I had put Dr. King's Strides
|
|
Toward Freedom on the list; some even read it, and those who did not,
|
|
still seemed pleased to have a teacher that had heard of the outside
|
|
world.
|
|
On Saturdays when anyone went to town, he had to pass a
|
|
Hospitality Tent which the KKK had set up in a mill village.
|
|
Management had closed the mill and moved the work to Hong Kong and
|
|
Taiwan when local labor organized. News about sit-ins in the Carolinas
|
|
gave the white unemployed something different to get worked up about.
|
|
Dr. Smitherman addressed the new unrest the same way that he had
|
|
addressed the "Race Problem" every year for over thirty years. He
|
|
talked at chapel about "Old Joe," the barber to boys when a young
|
|
"Mr." Smitherman first came to The Witherspoon School.
|
|
"Joe is one of the finest human beings I ever met." Dr.
|
|
Smitherman modulated a slight tremolo. "Mayors and governors would do
|
|
well to imitate his honesty and his good humor. He loves Witherspoon
|
|
boys. He helps us turn them into Witherspoon men. You should respect
|
|
good Negroes. Don't stir up a fuss like unfortunate rednecks. If you
|
|
treat the Negro kindly, the Negro will serve you well.
|
|
"Of course Old Joe would be the first to say that God does not
|
|
intend for the races to mix socially. Right, Joe?"
|
|
Venerable Joe Thompson, now in his eighties, hauled out of
|
|
retirement for this paid annual production, smiled generously and
|
|
said, "Yes, sir. You are a good man, Dr. Smitherman!" He would smile
|
|
to the audience and say, "Dr. Smitherman is a good man, boys, a good,
|
|
good man."
|
|
"Boys," Dr. Smitherman would close, "Joe confirms what you learn
|
|
when you study 'Mending Wall,' the great poem by Robert Frost: 'Good
|
|
fences make good neighbors.' "
|
|
|
|
4
|
|
|
|
"He can't go behind his father's saying? What's 'behind' it?" I
|
|
would ask my fifth-formers in the next period, given Dr. Smitherman's
|
|
own prompt to teach the poem.
|
|
As far as I know, they never reported to Dr. Smitherman how I
|
|
used Frost's own words to mince his interpretation. Claiborne probably
|
|
would have enjoyed it if he could have understood it. I felt that he
|
|
didn't like Dr. Smitherman and impatiently waited for Dr. Smitherman
|
|
to retire so that he could replace him in the President's Mansion.
|
|
Perhaps I misjudged him.
|
|
I learned later that few boys or faculty approached Claiborne for
|
|
anything, except to listen. Isolated in my books and music, I did not
|
|
notice their reticence and had to learn the collective wisdom on my
|
|
own.
|
|
I had no discipline problems in class. Students respected my work
|
|
ethic. If a boy ever did sass, I would squelch him with invincible
|
|
sarcasm: "John, you are very perceptive and therefore will understand
|
|
how important it is that you meet me here for two hours after class to
|
|
analyze your perception."
|
|
But in the dark, after lights-out, I could not defend myself with
|
|
words. As the newest faculty member of three on Senior Hall, I had a
|
|
hard time when the boys tested me.
|
|
They usually started off playful enough. Birdcalls. Frog croaks.
|
|
But I too soon took bait and shouted, "Who made that noise!?" or
|
|
guessed wildly, "Poindexter, the next time you do that you'll sit in
|
|
study hall for a week!"
|
|
This licensed the circus as clearly as if I had walked to the
|
|
center ring. By three o'clock in the morning I might have nabbed three
|
|
culprits, but the hall would remain littered with water bombs and
|
|
other trash. Everyone, highly entertained, would wait for my next turn
|
|
on duty.
|
|
Next I decided to ignore them, not to take even the first bait.
|
|
Let the menagerie built to whatever crescendo their ears could bear, I
|
|
would wait fortressed in my room. They gave up after about an hour,
|
|
but resented me. My ploy might have worked if I used it when they
|
|
first played, but now I was a spoil-sport. They turned mean, to jew-
|
|
baiting.
|
|
Rabinowitz played right into their trap. The moment someone made
|
|
the wailing sounds used in the movie version of "The Diary of Anne
|
|
Frank," Rabinowitz would run out of his room and bang on my door. They
|
|
loved it better than water bombs.
|
|
I would stand in the dark hall for hours, but no one ever made
|
|
the noises from a range close enough for me to catch him.
|
|
During Thanksgiving, I searched for evidence. With a master key,
|
|
I crept through all 45 rooms on the hall. Lawrence's Lady Chatterly
|
|
and Miller's Tropics had only recently broken the censors' backs, but
|
|
the porn these rich boys sported would not be marketed publicly for
|
|
another decade.
|
|
I stared for a long time, especially when I discovered in the
|
|
drawer of a weightlifter the pictures of men having sex with men. If I
|
|
had known such pictures existed outside my mind, I might have
|
|
predicted Poindexter would have a stash. He often jerked off at the
|
|
late bed-check; sometimes he waved! Yet he hoarded only dirty letters
|
|
from his girl friend, no pictures at all.
|
|
Partly on instinct, partly because a box of my books had pushed
|
|
the back out of my own laundry bin, I decided to check the backs of
|
|
bins in several boys' rooms. I hit the jackpot on my first try. It
|
|
opened to a casino.
|
|
Yes, as in mine, the back of the laundry bin opened into a low,
|
|
narrow place under the roof, large enough to squeeze maybe two people.
|
|
But behind the boys' bin, unlike mine, the narrow space opened into a
|
|
much larger one that ran the full length of the shower room midway
|
|
down the hall. In this secret space boys had placed a rug, several
|
|
cases of whiskey, three slot machines, and enough other paraphernalia
|
|
to keep up to fifteen gambling at any one time.
|
|
Even though I routinely eavesdropped, I had not expected anything
|
|
like this. Once I had overheard a prefect on the hall say that the
|
|
governor's son, a Form Two boy who lived in the Field House, had lost
|
|
$1,000 in one card game, but I presumed that the prefect exaggerated,
|
|
or referred to something that had happened during the previous summer.
|
|
Knowing that this evidence could blow the top off Witherspoon's
|
|
reputation as one of the finest prep schools in the South, I went
|
|
cautiously to Claiborne's Office. Closed for the holiday. I spotted
|
|
his Ninety-Eight parked in front of the gym and trekked through the
|
|
rain to his apartment at the back. Mrs. Claiborne, sensing my urgency,
|
|
asked about my family, pointed to some fruitcake, and quickly left me
|
|
alone with her husband.
|
|
Claiborne did not interrupt once during the whole time I told him
|
|
what I had discovered. I omitted the parts about water bombs and jew-
|
|
baiting, even the part about my plot to check the boys' rooms. I
|
|
fibbed a bit; I said that a stranger had telephoned to tell me to look
|
|
under the eaves.
|
|
Claiborne didn't question me. He didn't take notes. He just
|
|
listened. For half an hour he listened.
|
|
After I had stopped, Claiborne said, "Now, Lee, have you told
|
|
anyone else?"
|
|
"No, sir."
|
|
"Don't."
|
|
"Yes, sir."
|
|
"You've done a good job. Now let me take care of it completely.
|
|
Do you understand?"
|
|
He already stood at the door.
|
|
"Well, yes, sir," I lied.
|
|
"Good."
|
|
He never mentioned it again.
|
|
|
|
5
|
|
|
|
I've told this story out loud at least a dozen times over the
|
|
past quarter of a century, usually to close friends, but sometimes
|
|
even to my classes. Since I don't know you, I'm pleased and a little
|
|
surprised you've gotten this far. I never thought that in print I
|
|
would risk sounding like Edith Bunker when she loses her main point to
|
|
give you ten interesting minor ones instead.
|
|
But I never have come to terms myself with the main point. I know
|
|
the minor ones add up to something big. Maybe you can tell.
|
|
I can easily conclude the part about the jew-baiting. By the time
|
|
the boys returned from Thanksgiving, for the two weeks of term
|
|
examinations, they had too much work even to think of late-night play.
|
|
Then after Christmas, that seemed like another dispensation.
|
|
Until April. Mistakenly I left my copy of Emily Dickinson in my
|
|
apartment. Only honor students could study in their rooms during the
|
|
day, and no one expected a teacher about. Philip Smethurst ambled past
|
|
the showers, his back to me, and as he passed Rabinowitz's room, he
|
|
let out the moan from "The Diary of Anne Frank." As much to my
|
|
surprise as his, I pounced on Smethurst before he ever saw me, lifted
|
|
him off the floor by his jacket, and held him against the wall, my
|
|
fist pressed into his stomach.
|
|
I don't remember any words. I just raged. I saw him only once
|
|
after that, when he gave the Valedictory.
|
|
I learned by the grapevine that after the summer break began, The
|
|
Witherspoon School notified the parents of several of underclassmen
|
|
that their sons could not return. Claiborne placed in The O'Gorman
|
|
School the one senior who flunked, and the governor's son.
|
|
Viewed from a quarter of a century, Claiborne's seems a much
|
|
cleverer way to handle the gambling than to panic as I had done with
|
|
the water bombs, even though I still do not respect him.
|
|
When Claiborne succeeded Dr. Smitherman, he too metamorphosed
|
|
into "Dr." and built a garage beside the President's Mansion for his
|
|
new Lincoln. I heard he inherited even the leather, uncut books.
|
|
I understand that it took a few more complete turnovers to rid
|
|
the place of all hints of scandal when marijuana hit in the early
|
|
seventies; but The Witherspoon School survives, its good reputation
|
|
intact. It has initiated even a few black students into reverence, not
|
|
just football.
|
|
"Old Joe" Thompson and Dr. Geoffrey Smitherman eventually died,
|
|
confirming my theologian friend's emendation, "So long as there's
|
|
death, there's hope."
|
|
When I fled, I taught first at an Episcopal school outside the
|
|
South. From there to London to teach poorer boys, in the slums. From
|
|
there to my Ph.D. and teaching adults in college.
|
|
Each year at its Commencement, The Witherspoon School bestows
|
|
several coveted awards, including the Bible Prize, given in perpetuity
|
|
by the family of an early alumnus who died of a cold his first month
|
|
as a missionary to Nigeria, to "that boy who in the view of the Senior
|
|
Bible Teacher best demonstrates a rigorous understanding of Holy
|
|
Scripture." I surprised no one when I posted the grades for the final
|
|
examination outside the classroom: everyone had guessed that Robert
|
|
Martin would win it.
|
|
Then Claiborne called me to the President's tiny office for my
|
|
second and final visit. Dr. Smitherman sat high in the "W & N" chair.
|
|
Claiborne leaned against the wall, stoking a cigar. I sank in leather.
|
|
"Mr. Smith, you have taught well for your first year," Dr.
|
|
Smitherman said.
|
|
"Thank you. Next year I expect to revise..."
|
|
"We hope that you will cooperate with us so that you can teach
|
|
here next year," Dr. Smitherman said.
|
|
"Cooperate?"
|
|
"It's about the Bible Prize, Lee," Claiborne blurted, ever
|
|
impatient with Dr. Smitherman's delicacy.
|
|
"That's easy," I said. "Everyone knows that Robert Martin has won
|
|
it. He has led all year, and I posted his final grade, a 99, which
|
|
normally I reserve...."
|
|
"Not easy," Dr. Smitherman said, softly.
|
|
"Sir?"
|
|
"We cannot tell you any details. You must trust us. But Robert
|
|
Martin has done something we prefer not to mention, ever. He cannot
|
|
win the Bible Prize or any other."
|
|
"But he already has. I have posted the grades...."
|
|
"Lee," Mr. Claiborne said as paternally as when he advised me
|
|
what kind of automobile to aspire to, "no one has ever said that the
|
|
Bible Prize has to go to the boy with the highest score. You may
|
|
freely consider other factors, like character. I believe that Edgar
|
|
Bell scored second highest. He plans to preach. Robert Martin will
|
|
study business at Shackville State."
|
|
"Mr. Smith, you have taught a good course. We hope that you will
|
|
cooperate." Dr. Smitherman urged, not looking me in the eye.
|
|
|
|
6
|
|
|
|
Every other time that I have told this story, I have used it as a
|
|
model for endurance not orchestrated, for risk without clear rules.
|
|
I have explained to all earlier audiences, as I told you at the
|
|
beginning, that I left The Witherspoon School soon thereafter.
|
|
Everyone charitably assumes that I walked away from Witherspoon with
|
|
this courage of a different kind.
|
|
But I didn't. Actually I stayed on for two more short years.
|
|
Edgar Bell won the prize and went to Evangel. Robert Martin never got
|
|
to Shackville. He drowned in a sailing accident two months later.
|
|
I remember driving my black Falcon to the muddy lot behind the
|
|
Field House. Boys and their families sloshed everywhere. I saw him
|
|
several cars away, loading his gear.
|
|
My face said: "They pressured me; they made me; I'm sorry."
|
|
Robert seemed to see. I can't be sure. He waved from the gate of
|
|
his family's station wagon, shrugged his shoulders, and winked.
|
|
|
|
--
|
|
LOUIE CREW (lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu) is an associate professor in
|
|
the Academic Foundations Department of Rutgers University. He is the
|
|
author of Lutibelle's Pew (Dragon Disks, 1990), Sunspots (Lotus Press,
|
|
1976), Midnight Lessons (Samisdat, 1987) and more than 865 other
|
|
publications. His work appears in several recent anthologies,
|
|
including Gay Nineties: Contemporary Gay Fiction (Crossing Press,
|
|
1991) and New Men, New Minds: Free Parking (The Spirit That Moves Us,
|
|
1990).
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
Multiplication and the Devil / DANIEL K. APPELQUIST
|
|
|
|
The rain poured steadily down on top of the one-room schoolhouse.
|
|
To David, it sounded like the world was crashing down around him, and
|
|
the normal routine of morning multiplication tables proved to be
|
|
little comfort. David was smallish for his age, with sandy hair that
|
|
didn't quite cover his gray eyes, eyes that were now closed tightly
|
|
shut.
|
|
"David?"
|
|
The eyes sprang suddenly open in an expression that was a mixture
|
|
of fear and surprise. "Yes, Mrs. Wadlemire?" The words came almost
|
|
unconsciously, as his head swiveled to survey his surroundings. He saw
|
|
only faces, turned towards him in amusement. There were only fifteen
|
|
other children in the morning session, but to David it seemed like the
|
|
entire population of some child-inhabited planet was staring him down,
|
|
taunting him, making fun of his stupidity, his ignorance.
|
|
"I asked you: Would you care to recite the second row from the
|
|
table?" She pointed a stiff, bony finger to the chart which hung on
|
|
the wall. Conical hat and flowing black robes only materialized
|
|
afterward in a brief flash.
|
|
"Uh..." Hat and robes were suddenly gone, as were the millions
|
|
upon millions of rapt watchers. All was replaced with the suddenly
|
|
confining space of the small classroom, rain still descending in a
|
|
cacophony above his head. Mrs. Wadlemire, now clothed in her
|
|
traditional blue dress, stared at him expectantly.
|
|
"Two times one is two," he began.
|
|
One by one, his classmates started to look back towards the front
|
|
of the room.
|
|
"Two times two is four," he continued in his well-practiced
|
|
monotone. The beating of the rain on the roof seemed to intensify.
|
|
Mrs. Wadlemire may have said something. Something to do with fish,
|
|
perhaps. Whatever it was, it was droned out by the incessant downpour.
|
|
"Two times three is six." At this point, the lights went out,
|
|
shrouding the room in a sort of gray darkness, the color of rainy
|
|
skies. Through the skylight, David could see a dark shape moving
|
|
above. David squinted to see what it might be through the continually
|
|
renewed layer of water, but its form remained indefinable.
|
|
"Two times four is eight." A face! For an instant, he could
|
|
definitely make out a face, staring down at him from the otherwise
|
|
featureless gray rectangle of the skylight. The face was full of
|
|
strange, mixed-up features, and yet had been strangely familiar to
|
|
him, as if it was one he was supposed to recognize.
|
|
"Two times five is ten." He looked around to see if anyone else
|
|
had seen it, but the other children were all gone, replaced with
|
|
cardboard cutouts, decorated with crayons. Only Mrs. Wadlemire seemed
|
|
untouched by this strange transformation, as if whoever had affected
|
|
it had let her be, out of disgust. Her face, now framed in harsh
|
|
shadows, seemed like an amalgamation of the worst traits of mankind.
|
|
In it he could see hatred, cruelty, as well as a host of other,
|
|
equally undesirable traits.
|
|
"Two times six is twelve," still he recited on, as if any
|
|
deviation from the norm might alert them to his presence; the monsters
|
|
that stole children and replaced them with cutouts. A chill started to
|
|
work its way up his spine. He could feel the presence of something
|
|
behind him. A dank, musty odor assaulted his nose, almost eliciting a
|
|
sneeze. He did not turn, for he knew that to do so would mean certain
|
|
death. The whatever-it-was that he had seen on the roof had definitely
|
|
made its way down here, somehow switching the other children in the
|
|
class while he wasn't looking.
|
|
"Two times seven is..." he faltered. The answer was on the tip of
|
|
his tongue. He had recited the same phrase over fifty times, but today
|
|
it stuck in his throat like chunky peanut butter. He felt the presence
|
|
behind him closing, closing on its target like some great snake, now
|
|
ready for the kill. If only he could remember!
|
|
"David..." The voice of Mrs. Wadlemire cut through his
|
|
concentration. Why didn't she do something? Was she blind? Didn't she
|
|
realize that her class now consisted of a host of badly drawn
|
|
replicas, one child and an unmentionable beast? Perhaps she had been
|
|
in on it from the beginning!
|
|
"Fourteen," the momentary distraction of these thoughts was
|
|
enough to dislodge the word from his throat and cough it up. In the
|
|
presence of the word, the creature behind him seemed to shrink back,
|
|
as if it couldn't bear to hear it. Mrs. Wadlemire, now blindfolded,
|
|
holding a calculator in one hand and a chalkboard eraser in the other,
|
|
smiled a faint smile and shifted inside the folds of her white robe.
|
|
"Two times eight is sixteen," he went on, causing the thing to
|
|
shrink back even further (had it emitted a gasp of terror, just then?)
|
|
One by one, the cardboard children were replaced with their flesh-and-
|
|
blood equivalents.
|
|
"Two times nine is eighteen." He definitely heard a stifled cry
|
|
from the creature (he dared not look back yet, lest he be turned into
|
|
cardboard and become unable to recite the last verse of the deadly
|
|
spell). Under the fluorescent lights, even Mrs. Wadlemire seemed to
|
|
radiate a goodness, a quality which David found to be quite at odds
|
|
with her Nazi armband and smart officer's cap.
|
|
"Two times ten is twenty."
|
|
With this last incantation, the beast shrieked in agony. In its
|
|
death-throes, it managed to overturn a table, and set a globe
|
|
careening down the aisle towards the blackboard with its immense
|
|
claws, now waving randomly in the air. When David finally looked back
|
|
at it, it had almost shrunk out of site, seeking to hide, in its
|
|
disgrace, behind the plastic jack o'lantern.
|
|
David sat back down behind his desk, his job completed, the
|
|
monster vanquished. Even Mrs. Wadlemire, now clothed in her
|
|
traditional blue dress, would have to thank him. He had, after all,
|
|
saved her class from a fate most probably worse than death. But she
|
|
only looked at him, with her not-disgusted expression and said, "Very
|
|
good, David."
|
|
Hmm. Some thanks that was.
|
|
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
A Handful of Dust / DANIEL K. APPELQUIST
|
|
|
|
Rembrandt looked out of his tenth floor window and crooned softly
|
|
to the parrot perched on his wrist. The city lay outside, a strange
|
|
mix of traditional, postmodern and futurist styles, now bathed in the
|
|
light of the noonday suns, but Rembrandt's thoughts were elsewhere.
|
|
His thoughts, specifically, were of Picasso. It had been ten days now
|
|
since Picasso had ventured out into that cityscape and they had heard
|
|
nothing. Not a peep.
|
|
Monet looked up from the table and spoke. "Anything?"
|
|
It took a few seconds for Rembrandt to respond, but his answer
|
|
was quick enough not to provoke a second asking. "No. Just the same."
|
|
He turned, and the parrot left his arm, flying off towards some
|
|
unknown perch. "Do you really care?"
|
|
Monet sat back in his sparkling chair and gave Rembrandt an icy
|
|
stare, but remained silent.
|
|
"What if he never comes back?" Rembrandt continued.
|
|
"He will."
|
|
"But what if he doesn't. You certainly wouldn't shed a tear."
|
|
Monet rolled his eyes. "Picasso and I have had our differences,
|
|
but that's no reason for me to want him out of the picture."
|
|
Rembrandt sat down, and as he did so, a chair came into existence
|
|
under him. His eyes were still locked on Monet's. Increasingly of
|
|
late, he was beginning to believe that Monet was a bit off-color. At
|
|
first, he had seemed simply withdrawn, but his arrogant attitude now
|
|
betrayed something Rembrandt detested, something that was only now
|
|
becoming apparent. "If he doesn't come back, what are you going to
|
|
do?"
|
|
Monet's collar, normally green, suddenly glowed bright red,
|
|
betraying his emotions to Rembrandt even if he would not openly
|
|
display them. "I will remain here. I'm perfectly content to stay
|
|
here."
|
|
"You're not curious about what lies outside the door?"
|
|
"I've seen it. You've seen it. You were just looking at it!"
|
|
"And that doesn't interest you?"
|
|
"Frankly, no."
|
|
Rembrandt looked away, disgusted. After a second or two, he
|
|
looked back, his eyes gleaming with purpose. "Well it interests me. If
|
|
Picasso doesn't come back by tomorrow, I'm going out after him."
|
|
"Very well."
|
|
"I'm tired of being cooped up in here like some sort of animal,"
|
|
Rembrandt continued, ignoring the other's response, still feeling the
|
|
need to justify his decision.
|
|
"Fine."
|
|
"Has it occurred to you that that's all we are: Animals,
|
|
performing for someone else's pleasure?"
|
|
Monet's tone grew brusque. "As a matter of fact, it has. I've
|
|
spent a great deal of time thinking about who we are and how we got in
|
|
this unlikely situation and, as I told Picasso, my conclusion is that
|
|
it is best not to think about it." With this he looked back at
|
|
Rembrandt, challenging him for some sort of rebuttal. Rembrandt
|
|
snorted defiantly, got up, and left.
|
|
The sparkling remains of the chair slowly disintegrated as Monet
|
|
looked back towards the table and his book.
|
|
A person reading a story might expect certain elements. For one,
|
|
they might expect a setting which they could relate to. Certainly they
|
|
would not want to be thrust into a cold, surreal universe where the
|
|
characters are named after famous painters and chairs appear and
|
|
disappear, seemingly at will. Any reader expecting this sort of
|
|
textual trickery would be brutally disappointed by most modern
|
|
fiction. In fact, it was just such disappointment which caused Monet
|
|
to look away from his book after a short while and seek some other
|
|
form of entertainment. He stood and walked slowly over to the window.
|
|
As he turned his back, table, chair and book melted into nothingness.
|
|
The window presented him with the same shifting scene. Much of
|
|
the cityscape lay below him now but a few of the buildings jutted up
|
|
towards the sky. Many of the buildings lumbered along at a slow to
|
|
moderate pace, some stopping momentarily in their journey to allow
|
|
others to pass. As he watched, a massive stone cathedral slowly ground
|
|
to a halt to make way for a squat, round building which looked like it
|
|
might also serve some religious purpose. There were never any people
|
|
to be seen in the city.
|
|
Monet leaned out towards the window and looked down. Below, the
|
|
river was reasonably quiet. On some days, massive amounts of debris
|
|
could be seen floating down it. Today, it merely streamed past, brown
|
|
and silty, making oval patches of bubbly froth around the
|
|
streetlights. For the first time, Monet thought it bizarre that there
|
|
should be streetlights on a river, but this thought was dismissed from
|
|
his mind by a sharp noise.
|
|
"Let me in!"
|
|
It was Picasso. It was definitely the muffled voice of Picasso.
|
|
Rembrandt sat up in bed, his eyes springing open.
|
|
"Let me in!"
|
|
There was no mistaking the voice. He sprang up and walked to the
|
|
edge of the room, the wall parting as he passed through it. A story
|
|
which switches back and forth between two or more characters' points
|
|
of view can be very confusing indeed. The Parrot, being deaf, heard
|
|
nothing.
|
|
The main door was the only object in the building which actually
|
|
required some effort to affect. When Rembrandt arrived, Monet was
|
|
already there, eying the circular stone carefully.
|
|
"Why haven't you started?" Rembrandt asked accusingly.
|
|
"You know very well that I couldn't even make a start by myself.
|
|
It takes two."
|
|
Rembrandt knew this, but he needed some excuse to abuse Monet
|
|
nonetheless. He hated himself for this need but he made no outward
|
|
apologies. He moved towards the massive stone that covered the main
|
|
entry way and began to push. "Come on!"
|
|
Monet followed suit, muttering something under his breath. Soon
|
|
the slab of stone was rolling under their combined pressure. A small
|
|
crack of the doorway was uncovered. This crack slowly grew in size
|
|
until a small man stepped through, a canvas bag slung over one
|
|
shoulder. Outside, they could see his makeshift canoe tethered to the
|
|
railing of the stair. None talked until the stone was set securely
|
|
back into place. When the task was accomplished, Monet and Rembrandt
|
|
looked their colleague over in frank interest.
|
|
"Well, don't you have any questions?" Picasso's zealous voice
|
|
broke the silence.
|
|
"You're quite a sight," Monet commented with more than a hint of
|
|
cynicism in his voice.
|
|
"You two are quite a sight yourselves! A sight for sore eyes."
|
|
"Didn't you find anyone else?" Rembrandt asked cautiously.
|
|
"No one."
|
|
"No one?"
|
|
"Not a soul."
|
|
Rembrandt paled. "Then we are truly alone."
|
|
Picasso walked over to him, trailing mud and silt from his feet.
|
|
"Don't lose hope yet! I didn't cover even a fraction of the city. The
|
|
city is even more immense than it looks from the window. It will take
|
|
years to explore it all," but as soon as the words escaped Picasso's
|
|
lips he knew that they had been a mistake. Rembrandt was like a small
|
|
child. His urge for instant gratification overpowered his reason and
|
|
his logic. The thought that exploring the city might take years or
|
|
even weeks filled him only with grief.
|
|
"That long?" he sighed and hung his head.
|
|
"But now we are armed with a weapon." Picasso reached into his
|
|
back and pulled forth a paper scroll. Spreading it out on the floor of
|
|
the entryway, he declared "this, as far as I can tell, is a map. A map
|
|
of the city."
|
|
Monet scoffed. "But that's plainly ridiculous, Picasso. As we
|
|
have observed, the city is a moving landscape, it never remains
|
|
constant. How can one make a map of such a place?"
|
|
Picasso waved his hands in the air as Monet spoke, obviously
|
|
quite excited. "That's what I first thought, but I found this map
|
|
infinitely more useful than I first expected it to be."
|
|
"Do you mean that it changes with the city?" Rembrandt queried,
|
|
wide eyes turning to stare at the unfurled scroll.
|
|
"I've never actually seen it change, but it always seems to show
|
|
basically the correct configuration. While travelling back from here,"
|
|
he indicated a position on the map "I made it a point to stare at the
|
|
map continuously for a good while. I never caught it changing, but
|
|
somehow, the positions of the buildings, even though they were moving,
|
|
were always correct."
|
|
Rembrandt looked to Picasso in wonder and then stared back at the
|
|
map. Monet simply started on the long trek up the winding stairs to
|
|
their tenth floor apartment. Picasso rolled up the map, much to the
|
|
dismay of Rembrandt, and also started up.
|
|
|
|
# # #
|
|
|
|
"So what are we to do?"
|
|
"It's clear that if more than one of us leaves this place, they
|
|
won't be able to get back in. There's no way to move the door from the
|
|
outside."
|
|
Rembrandt rolled his eyes at what he considered to be Monet's
|
|
defeatist attitude. "But there's every possibility that we can find
|
|
just as good if not better accommodations elsewhere within the city."
|
|
"There's no proof of that."
|
|
Picasso, who had remained largely silent throughout the
|
|
conversation, saw fit to interrupt now. "I didn't find a way into any
|
|
of the buildings, you know. I did tell you that, didn't I?"
|
|
"There's no other way."
|
|
"There is."
|
|
"No."
|
|
"I will stay," Monet stated in an infuriatingly final manner.
|
|
"If we go, you have to go with us!" Rembrandt was furious. His
|
|
collar was bright green, and even seemed to grow brighter with each
|
|
pulse of aggression. Involuntarily, he reached out into the air and a
|
|
glass of ice-water appeared in his hand. He downed the water and his
|
|
collar began to grow dimmer.
|
|
Picasso detested the way the other two always fought, but somehow
|
|
he felt connected to both of them, if only by the fact that they had
|
|
lived together for so long (how long, he could not remember, but he
|
|
knew, or sensed that it had been a great deal of time.) He tentatively
|
|
spoke out. "It may help if we arm ourselves with a goal." He unfurled
|
|
the map, and Rembrandt could see that already there were some changes
|
|
from when he had looked on it last. The forms on the map remained
|
|
static, though. Picasso spread the map out on a table which came into
|
|
existence underneath it and indicated a position with an index finger.
|
|
"We are here." Rembrandt could see their building, marked by a red #.
|
|
"If we travel down the river this way," Picasso continued,
|
|
tracing a line with his finger, following the blue streak of the
|
|
river, until he reached a white +. Next to the + were the words 'the
|
|
edge.' "This can be our goal."
|
|
"The edge of what?" Monet spoke up.
|
|
"I don't know. On my journey, I travelled this way." He indicated
|
|
the opposite direction from the +. "It was here I found the map." He
|
|
indicated a V sitting on the side of the river. "It was lying on what
|
|
looked like an altar, outside a huge stone cathedral.
|
|
"I think I've seen that building," Rembrandt piped up.
|
|
"This," he again indicated the +, "is the only representation on
|
|
the map to be labeled. That must hold some significance."
|
|
"But we have no idea what," Monet cut in. "Your addition of the
|
|
'goal' to our journey is as meaningless as the journey would have been
|
|
in the first place!"
|
|
"Nonsense!" Rembrandt almost shouted. "Don't you see what this
|
|
means? 'The Edge' obviously indicates an escape route -- a passage to
|
|
somewhere else."
|
|
"But it occurs nowhere near the physical edge of the city," Monet
|
|
argued, gesturing violently towards the map.
|
|
Rembrandt's collar began to grow brighter again. "The city moves!
|
|
Picasso has confirmed this."
|
|
Monet nearly pounced on Rembrandt. "You're just worried you won't
|
|
find anything and then you won't be able to come back. If you go, it's
|
|
final. You can't stand the thought of being trapped out there with me
|
|
in here. Look at yourself!"
|
|
Rembrandt sighed as if the tension and energy of the day and of
|
|
the moment were released in that one moment. As his collar cooled back
|
|
to its normal azure shade, he plunked down into a form-fitting couch
|
|
which had not existed a moment before and looked away, toward the now-
|
|
darkened window. "Perhaps you're right."
|
|
Monet simply looked pleased with himself.
|
|
"But did it occur to you that you too would be trapped within
|
|
this apartment?" Rembrandt started again, this time more with a
|
|
pleading tone than with anger.
|
|
"He's got a point. I intend to go back out and to not return.
|
|
Rembrandt certainly intends to do the same."
|
|
"Picasso, I always figured you for such a level-headed fellow,"
|
|
Monet replied, more to himself than to any other speaker.
|
|
"That I am, Monet."
|
|
|
|
+ + +
|
|
|
|
They left two mornings after.
|
|
The huge portal rolled back into its frame with a chilling
|
|
finality. When it was done, and the three were left outside of the
|
|
door, looking back at their former abode, there was only silence.
|
|
Rembrandt felt a shudder down his spine and felt for a second that he
|
|
had left something very important in the house, but he knew that there
|
|
was nothing. The parrot could not be coaxed out and that had disturbed
|
|
him greatly, but other than that he was content to start his new life.
|
|
After the decision, Monet's attitude had changed from sullen apathy to
|
|
sullen acceptance. He kept up with the others as they walked down
|
|
towards the rushing river, but his expression was colored with jaded
|
|
overtones.
|
|
Picasso led the others down to the dock and pulled his makeshift
|
|
canoe by the tether he had so carefully fashioned. He, too was scared,
|
|
although he felt compelled to exude an air of detached superiority. He
|
|
was, after all, supposed to be the experienced one. It had been his
|
|
idea to brave the exterior city. But now he was committed. He knew
|
|
that he had let himself be prodded into it by Rembrandt's urgings, but
|
|
now there was no going back. One leg at a time, he stepped into the
|
|
canoe, and looked back at the other two expectantly.
|
|
After much fumbling, they were clear of the dock and paddling
|
|
swiftly down the river: Picasso steering with one oar, Monet providing
|
|
the grim motive power with the other and Rembrandt sitting in the prow
|
|
looking forward. As the city sped past them on all sides, Rembrandt
|
|
began to sing softly to himself.
|
|
Looking back on the building they had come from, they now saw how
|
|
much it towered over this section of the city. It was a giant,
|
|
standing amongst midgets; a massive stone monolith which tapered at
|
|
its top to a sharp point. As Rembrandt looked back, he counted up
|
|
floors until he reached the tenth, in some vain hope of finding a
|
|
toehold of familiarity, but his effort was fruitless. Every story was
|
|
the same. They had never been able to enter any of the other
|
|
apartments.
|
|
The terrain they were now passing through was fairly familiar to
|
|
Rembrandt already, but it took on a completely different aspect when
|
|
viewed from the ground. From ten stories up, all had seemed orderly
|
|
and neat but now the true nature of the city was becoming apparent to
|
|
him. Many of the buildings were only empty shells where residences and
|
|
markets may once have existed but were no more. It seemed to Rembrandt
|
|
that the material used in these shells must have somehow outlived the
|
|
interiors of the structures. Pieces of what he took to be building
|
|
material hung tattered from gaping holes. Some of these were so close
|
|
to the ground that the river had spilled into them. They had become
|
|
part of the river, and the river had carried away their contents, but
|
|
the shells remained, indestructible.
|
|
Once in a while, sitting among these rotting shells, there
|
|
appeared a larger, more grandiose structure. These were typically
|
|
haggard but seemed like they at least had some life left in them. They
|
|
varied in shape but all of them seemed like meeting halls of some
|
|
sort. Some, perhaps were large stores? Some were simply strange. About
|
|
half a mile from where they started, there loomed across their path a
|
|
huge sphere with no visible entrance or window.
|
|
"We're going to hit that," Rembrandt stated nervously.
|
|
Picasso did not seemed distressed. "It doesn't look like it now,
|
|
but there's space underneath it."
|
|
Still, it loomed up in front of them. Rembrandt strained to look
|
|
for Picasso's opening but he couldn't find it. What if the space
|
|
underneath had shrunk? What if the huge sphere were slowly sinking
|
|
into the river, eventually to cut it off and form a dam? "You're
|
|
sure."
|
|
Monet spoke: "Shut up."
|
|
"Well, I'd prefer not to be crushed to death today, ok?"
|
|
Rembrandt spat back, but by that time they were close enough that he
|
|
could see there was indeed a space underneath the huge structure.
|
|
Still, he was nervous until they had reached open air. When they
|
|
emerged from underneath, an entirely new scene awaited them.
|
|
For a moment, they all sat, mesmerized. There had been no
|
|
warning, no sign that such a violent change would take place. In
|
|
contrast to the drab, decimated landscape behind them, spires made
|
|
seemingly of cut glass or even diamond towered over the them.
|
|
Inexplicably, the river which was silty and muddy before had turned
|
|
crystal-clear. Rembrandt wasn't sure when the transition had taken
|
|
place but his mind didn't stay on this long for he immediately noticed
|
|
that the sky had changed color.
|
|
"It's a dome," someone said. Rembrandt was so awe-struck that it
|
|
took a few seconds for Rembrandt to register that it had been Monet
|
|
speaking. He could see now that Monet was right. Running across the
|
|
sky, intersecting in a triangular pattern were white lines which must
|
|
have been support beams. It was impossible for Rembrandt to judge how
|
|
far away those beams were.
|
|
Monet looked at Picasso accusingly. "You didn't tell us..."
|
|
"I didn't know," Picasso cut him off sharply, unrolling his map
|
|
and studying it. "The city constantly moves and changes. From studying
|
|
the map, I've found that individual buildings move but large sections
|
|
of the city also can move." He indicated a portion of his map, a
|
|
circular region marked in the center by a *. "This area must be what
|
|
we've entered now. The river we're on clearly intersects it now, where
|
|
it didn't before." At this point the reader might be getting slightly
|
|
annoyed by the ubiquitous presence of this map. The map is only
|
|
vaguely described, and seems to pop up only when convenient. Perhaps a
|
|
full description of the map would help to ground it a bit....
|
|
Picasso put away his map and began to steer again.
|
|
"This wasn't here when you...?"
|
|
"Absolutely not."
|
|
"It's beautiful," Rembrandt said dreamily.
|
|
Monet looked up. "Yes."
|
|
A change in the wind brought with it a strange howling sound
|
|
which sent a chill through the minds of the three travelers. If there
|
|
was any doubt now that they would never return then it was the product
|
|
of insanity, a derangement so grotesque as to be unthinkable. The
|
|
sound was like a voice and yet was discernibly inhuman. Soon a second
|
|
tone, higher and shriller than the first, started up as the lower and
|
|
more sombre one began to die down. Rembrandt stopped rowing and stood
|
|
transfixed as the tones rolled over him. As the first tone died away
|
|
completely, he began to regain some composure and turned to stare back
|
|
at the other two. Their eyes were glazed over, the whole of their
|
|
brains devoted to their ears. Rembrandt had heard great symphonies
|
|
during his time in the flat. His ears had been massaged by Beethoven,
|
|
Bach, Mozart all in turn. No sound could compare in beauty to the
|
|
simple tones he heard now.
|
|
"It's got to be some atmospheric phenomenon; a by-product of the
|
|
dome structure, perhaps..." Monet's words cut across Rembrandt's
|
|
dreamy mood like a hot knife. He looked back at the other to see a
|
|
face still transfixed. Monet's mind was more analytical, or at least a
|
|
portion of it was. Looking more closely, Rembrandt could see that his
|
|
expression was not that of a man overcome by beauty but of a man in
|
|
the throes of deep thought. Picasso, as always maintained his
|
|
composure. Even now, Rembrandt could see that the sound was beginning
|
|
to lose its effect on him. Picasso's eyes fell by the degree until
|
|
they again rested on the horizon. Rembrandt looked back there as well,
|
|
as another mesmerizing tone began to dominate their surroundings.
|
|
|
|
* * *
|
|
|
|
"Look!" The voice was Monet's. Their journey through the domed
|
|
country had lasted more than a day now. So far, the scenery had been
|
|
somewhat uniform, but as Picasso followed the line traced by Monet's
|
|
pointed finger he began to feel that their fortunes were about to
|
|
change. Just on the edge of the horizon in front of them there stood
|
|
an island. There, barely visible, there was a huge building, itself
|
|
the size of a small city, judging from the distance. Picasso tried a
|
|
quick mental calculation and dismissed his figures as outrageous.
|
|
It took an hour before he could begin to make out the details of
|
|
the structure, and even then, there seemed no sense to it. It was a
|
|
huge mass of twisted angles. It was in the rough shape of a mushroom,
|
|
but with no curves. It was entirely composed of rectangular,
|
|
triangular and rhomboid slabs, which jutted out unevenly around its
|
|
mass. Crowning the top was a spire which reached fully twice as high
|
|
as the building itself, and what appeared to be a cross.
|
|
In three more hours, it was looming up above them like a
|
|
surrealist's nightmare. Furthermore, what they had taken to be an
|
|
island had in fact been a peninsula. As they rounded the right hand
|
|
side of the base, they saw that the river ended there. The rushing
|
|
water fell into gratings some three miles from where the river had
|
|
forked.
|
|
Confused by this, Picasso again pulled his map out and began to
|
|
scrutinize it. "That's odd," he intoned. "If we're where I think we
|
|
are, roughly in the center of the circular region, here, the map shows
|
|
the river continuing beyond this point."
|
|
Rembrandt turned to him, just as they were coming up on the end
|
|
of the river. "Well either your map is wrong, or you're interpreting
|
|
it wrong. Here, let me have it." He reached past Monet and snatched it
|
|
out of Picasso's hands, just as their canoe grounded itself in the
|
|
shadow of the huge structure.
|
|
The instant they hit ground, Rembrandt and map were gone. A
|
|
shadowy image replaced the space he had inhabited only a moment
|
|
before, then nothing. Picasso and Monet could only stare. Monet, being
|
|
within hand's reach of Rembrandt's former volume, reached out
|
|
cautiously, as if still expecting to find something there. When he did
|
|
not, he waved his hand around tentatively, then furiously, anxious to
|
|
find some indication that Rembrandt was (or had ever been) there.
|
|
Picasso simply stared, open-eyed, silent, their collars glowing a
|
|
deep azure.
|
|
Rembrandt turned to Monet, who was not there. Frustrated at
|
|
Monet's absence, he turned inquisitively to Picasso to find him also
|
|
absent. It was only at this point that he began to re-evaluate his
|
|
situation. The surroundings had changed but there had been no jump, no
|
|
discontinuity. The grey walls that now surrounded him seemed always to
|
|
have been there. There was no other explanation. And yet, he
|
|
remembered the shoreline; the canoe; the map! He looked about him, and
|
|
found it also missing. He shook his head in an attempt to rid himself
|
|
of this confusion, but the confusion remained, undaunted.
|
|
He began to sit, but fell, instead. Suddenly annoyed at the non-
|
|
appearance of a chair, he scrambled to his feet, determined to do
|
|
something. But there was nothing to do. It was at this point that he
|
|
noticed the golden sphere. There was no way to know if the sphere had
|
|
been there when he had 'appeared,' for lack of a better word. It was
|
|
there now, however. It shimmered, suspended halfway between floor and
|
|
ceiling, awaiting instructions. Where had that thought come from,
|
|
Rembrandt wondered. Indeed, he had the distinct feeling that the
|
|
sphere was somehow awaiting direction, or instruction.
|
|
Shrugging his shoulders, he said "come here."
|
|
Dutifully, it approached, bobbing slowly through the air until it
|
|
hovered not a foot away from him. Well, at least something obeys me
|
|
around here, he thought.
|
|
Monet sat on the sandy bank of the river, staring out into the
|
|
darkness, while Picasso paced back and forth behind him, a gold globe
|
|
floating dutifully above his head.
|
|
"These idiotic globes don't seem to be any use," Monet remarked
|
|
sourly, belting the one which hovered next to him in an offhand
|
|
manner. "I mean -- what's the point of a metal globe that follows you
|
|
around -- can it do anything? Can it produce food?" He looked
|
|
pointedly at it. "Produce food." It remained silent. "Nothing." He
|
|
looked away, disgusted.
|
|
Picasso stopped and regarded his globe, which he had almost
|
|
forgotten about; he was contemplating the dimensions of the structure
|
|
towering over him. Even though the darkness hid its form, it still
|
|
seemed to loom over them, a tangible presence bearing down, making the
|
|
very air heavier with its unimaginable countenance. "They could be
|
|
monitors -- They could serve no purpose at all, other than to report
|
|
back to their masters what our doings are."
|
|
"Why, then, do they seem to obey our simple commands?"
|
|
"A ruse? Trickery?"
|
|
Monet's lips cracked into a wry smile. "You're beginning to think
|
|
like me, Picasso." His expression soured again as his thoughts
|
|
returned to Rembrandt. Monet was accustomed to thinking of Rembrandt
|
|
as a fool, and it did him no good at all to be worried for him, even,
|
|
perhaps, guilty that he did not.
|
|
"You know," Picasso interrupted. "The globes may simply seem
|
|
unable to obey commands about food and such because they are unable;
|
|
assuming they themselves can't transport us."
|
|
"A broad assumption, considering Rembrandt's case," Monet
|
|
retorted.
|
|
"Nevertheless, assuming that: Perhaps there is no food to be
|
|
found here. And no way into the structure above?" He turned to regard
|
|
the globe coldly. "Perhaps these globes once served some purpose, as
|
|
rudimentary guiding machines, but there is no longer anything to be
|
|
guided to."
|
|
"A cold thought, Picasso. A cold thought."
|
|
"Come morning, we have to move on. There is no other choice."
|
|
"Without your Map?" Monet raised his eyebrows.
|
|
"Indeed. Our goal is still the same. We must reach the region
|
|
marked as 'the edge'."
|
|
Monet cut in "Without a Map, how can we?"
|
|
"Dead reckoning."
|
|
Monet, silent to this, continued to stare out into the clear
|
|
water.
|
|
Rembrandt, accompanied by the small gold ball, climbed a metal
|
|
staircase with metal walls.
|
|
"Considering Rembrandt's case." Rembrandt spun around at the
|
|
sudden voice of Monet, but saw no-one.
|
|
"Come morning, we must move on." Now Picasso's voice hung in the
|
|
air.
|
|
"A cold thought, Picasso. A cold thought."
|
|
Rembrandt's eyes widened as he ascertained the source of the
|
|
conversation -- the metal sphere. And, within the sphere, the ghost of
|
|
an image -- Monet and Picasso, sitting on the sandy river-bed.
|
|
"There is no other choice," the image Picasso said, a smile
|
|
flickering across his face.
|
|
"You're beginning to think like me, Picasso," Monet replied, now
|
|
grinning. Then image, and sound abruptly faded.
|
|
Rembrandt tried to grab hold of the railing, but it did not
|
|
steady him, and he fell down across the heavy, metal stairs. He looked
|
|
around wildly, for the walls now seemed to contain menacing shapes. A
|
|
coldness gripped him and he shivered. "No," he mouthed.
|
|
The globe sat impassively over him, silent.
|
|
|
|
* * *
|
|
|
|
Dawn broke softly over the steeples of the fortress (Picasso had
|
|
begun to think of it as a fortress sometime during his fitful sleep
|
|
under its oppressive shadow.) Picasso's eyes sprang open to behold
|
|
Monet sitting dutifully on the bank, legs collapsed between his arms,
|
|
muttering to himself.
|
|
"You hate me, don't you?" Picasso said.
|
|
Monet looked up, surprised by the other's sudden utterance. "Why
|
|
do you say that? I don't, by the way."
|
|
"You hate me because I forced this situation on you," Picasso
|
|
responded deliberately, his arms extending above him in an expressive
|
|
yawn. "I understand perfectly."
|
|
"Don't be an idiot. It was the only way."
|
|
Picasso sat up, then stood. "It wasn't though. Everything's gone
|
|
terribly wrong. We should have stayed in the apartment -- safe."
|
|
"Perhaps..."
|
|
Monet remained silent, morosely contemplating the shoreline and
|
|
the clear blue water of the river.
|
|
"One thing is clear," Picasso stated. "We must either devise a
|
|
plan to find Rembrandt, or move on. One of the two. Sitting here,
|
|
morosely contemplating the shoreline isn't getting us anywhere."
|
|
Monet turned and stared pointedly at Picasso. "I don't think
|
|
you're seeing the big picture..."
|
|
Picasso was taken aback. "How do you mean?"
|
|
"I mean that we have to take careful stock of our situation,
|
|
Picasso. It is my opinion that we are being deliberately manipulated."
|
|
Rembrandt broke from his slumber fitfully, grasping out for a
|
|
lightswitch which did not exist, and steadfastly refused to become
|
|
existent. The thick black air coalesced around him, encasing him in a
|
|
veil of darkness.
|
|
"Consider our situation," continued Monet. "We have been placed
|
|
here, by some unknown force. We don't remember how we got here, don't
|
|
really remember any of our backgrounds at all. And now we find
|
|
ourselves in this unlikely situation; run aground beneath a huge
|
|
tower, in the middle of some forgotten land."
|
|
Picasso stared dumbly at him. "I don't see what you're getting
|
|
at, Monet."
|
|
"If this were a piece of fiction, it would be grossly
|
|
unsatisfying. There's nothing for the reader to latch on to, no hook,
|
|
no familiarity..." He turned and stared again out across the calm
|
|
water. "...no meaning."
|
|
Picasso frowned as he regarded his comrade. "You seem depressed."
|
|
"We must find him. We cannot continue, in tacit acceptance of the
|
|
events that enfold around us." So saying, Monet straightened up and
|
|
began to walk calmly toward the base of the fortress. The metal globe
|
|
hovering above his shoulder. After a moment, Picasso followed, drawn
|
|
by the other's strength of purpose.
|
|
"Let us assume," Monet continued, "that we are pawns, playing for
|
|
some unknown being's (or beings') pleasure. The question then becomes,
|
|
'Can we affect our own destinies?' "
|
|
"But how could we know if we were pawns? What if every action we
|
|
took were pre-determined?" Picasso chimed in. He was beginning to
|
|
catch up to Monet's thought process.
|
|
Monet continued, "Unfortunately, we can't know."
|
|
"You seem to be painting yourself into a corner..." Picasso
|
|
remarked under his breath.
|
|
By the time they reached the base of the fortress, they were both
|
|
panting from lack of breath. The base of the fortress was smooth, a
|
|
huge obsidian wall that rose up before them beyond all reason. Monet
|
|
moved his hand closest to the wall.
|
|
Rembrandt continued to crawl through darkness, following brief
|
|
and faint flashes of color which played over his retinas. Perhaps they
|
|
were products of his imagination, but the overwhelming darkness forced
|
|
him to make a goal, any goal, and follow that goal ruthlessly. As he
|
|
crawled, too scared to walk, lest he fall off some ledge or walk into
|
|
a wall, he began to mutter furtively to himself.
|
|
"Damn Picasso for leading me out here. Damn Monet -- the smug
|
|
bastard. A plot, that's what this has been. 'Let's get rid of that
|
|
annoying Rembrandt fellow, Picasso.' 'Ok, Monet old boy, how do you
|
|
suggest we do it?' 'Well...' "
|
|
There was a hollow knocking sound. Rembrandt strained his eyes to
|
|
look towards the source of the sound, but it deliberately refused to
|
|
come into view, hiding guiltily in the pitch-blackness of this place.
|
|
He was on the verge of beginning his crawl again, when another loud,
|
|
reverberating knock was issued from above.
|
|
"Who's there?" he yelled out, half in panic.
|
|
Several smaller knocks followed, modulating into a creaking, as
|
|
of an ancient hinge, only now being opened after years of neglect. And
|
|
with the noise came light, blinding tempests of light, pouring down
|
|
from above. Rembrandt, temporarily blinded, could only desperately
|
|
cover his eyes, waiting for the pain to subside.
|
|
As Monet was about to touch the wall, a tremendous thunderclap
|
|
sounded, sending both Picasso and him to the ground, clasping their
|
|
hands over their ears in agony. Another thunderclap sounded, followed
|
|
by a series of smaller ones which seemed to quicken until they were a
|
|
shrill whine, eating up the air, blotting out the natural, beautiful
|
|
noises of this place, which they had begun to take for granted.
|
|
Picasso was the first to notice that the sky was falling. He
|
|
pointed wildly in the direction of the river, his eyes becoming
|
|
insanely dilated with fear. Monet turned to see the huge dome of the
|
|
sky apparently collapsing into the horizon. Looking up, they beheld
|
|
the entire sky moving, and looking away from the river, they beheld an
|
|
arc of darkness, opening slowly over their heads.
|
|
When Rembrandt could finally see, he beheld a miniature landscape
|
|
in front of him, revealed by a slowly opening domed lid. Above, two
|
|
harsh globes hovered in the darkness, radiating a fierce light down on
|
|
the landscape. The landscape itself consisted of a network of
|
|
miniature glass spires, interconnected by a series of streams. In the
|
|
center of the landscape, stood an enormous black tower, dwarfing the
|
|
crystal spires. At the base of that tower, two figures were clasping
|
|
their hands over their ears, trying to shut out the sound of the
|
|
enormous dome, looking off, away from Rembrandt, at their horizon,
|
|
where even now the final edge of the dome was disappearing into the
|
|
ground.
|
|
For a moment, Rembrandt stood in awe, amazed by the beauty of
|
|
what lay before him. Then he began to understand what he must do. They
|
|
had given him a chance for revenge now, and he intended to make use of
|
|
it. He reached a tentative hand out towards the cowering duo.
|
|
Out of the corner of his eye, Picasso caught movement. He turned,
|
|
his eyes registered the image, but his mind refused to grasp its
|
|
import. Slowly, he stood, watching the enormous hand, fingers
|
|
outstretched, come closer and closer to a similarly transfixed Monet.
|
|
As they touched, Rembrandt and Monet, a surge of light, stronger than
|
|
any he had ever seen, overpowered him, followed by a surge of
|
|
darkness.
|
|
|
|
O
|
|
|
|
When Picasso awoke, he was lying face down on a beach, the heat
|
|
of the suns beating down on his body. When he stood, he could see the
|
|
familiar landscape of the city surrounding him, although he appeared
|
|
to be on a small island, separated from the city on all sides by a
|
|
vast expanse of water.
|
|
For hours, he walked up and down the beach, trying to find some
|
|
inkling of what had brought him here, what had happened after, or
|
|
before, or during. His memory of the event was spotty, but he vaguely
|
|
remembered the giant hand, the blinding light. He found no trace, no
|
|
indication that any of what he remembered had actually happened. No
|
|
tower, no domed sky, no metal globe hanging dutifully above his
|
|
shoulder.
|
|
He sat on the sandy shoreline and watched the waves wash up and
|
|
down the beach. For a brief moment, they were one with the City,
|
|
endlessly rippling through variation after variation. He was sitting
|
|
at the window. He was hanging high from a tree-branch. He was flying
|
|
alongside the parrot, hearing what it could never hear. A tremor came
|
|
up through the desert island, shaking a few of the rocks loose further
|
|
up the beach where the sand turned into a desolate moonscape. In the
|
|
sky, the suns raged furiously. Picasso often wondered what they talked
|
|
about, the suns. He imagined debates on philosophical issues and moral
|
|
principles which he, as a mere human, could not possibly comprehend.
|
|
He was one of them. Even as he was the earth, the stars and the sky.
|
|
He wondered, only for a moment, where the others were. Not
|
|
Rembrandt and Monet, but the others. The background characters that
|
|
make any story complete. There were none. What was he doing? What was
|
|
he thinking of when he had signed up for this meaningless existence?
|
|
Had he even signed? How could one sign away one's soul, one's future,
|
|
to a fool world with multiple suns that didn't even make sense most of
|
|
the time. He slowly bent forward until his head lay in front of him in
|
|
the wet sand. After a while, the tide came in and he ceased to
|
|
breathe, but death did not come for him.
|
|
Like the buildings, shifting endlessly through their circular
|
|
journeys, washing up and down on the shoreline of the forgotten
|
|
island, his story was not, could never be, over.
|
|
This one, however, is.
|
|
|
|
--
|
|
DANIEL K. APPELQUIST (da1n+@andrew.cmu.edu) will, by the time you read
|
|
this, have graduated with a degree in Cognitive Science from Carnegie
|
|
Mellon University. In his spare time, he raises killer cats,
|
|
accumulates huge debts and enjoys crash-testing rental cars without
|
|
insurance. Currently he's either engaged in a desperate search for
|
|
employment or hitchhiking his way to Peru.
|
|
(Editor's note: After the writing of this bio blurb, Dan -- who also
|
|
serves as editor of QUANTA -- managed to locate a job as a computing
|
|
consultant at Carnegie Mellon University. We assume this means the
|
|
Peru trip is on hold.)
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
Gravity / JASON SNELL
|
|
|
|
It started when Frank's CD player tried to kill me on my way to
|
|
work.
|
|
I had just come down the stairs from my second-floor apartment,
|
|
and was already sweating. I could tell that the day would be hot and
|
|
humid. There wasn't a cloud in the sky.
|
|
There was, however, a large compact disc player eclipsing the
|
|
sun. For a second, my half-open eyes marveled at the sight of its
|
|
descent. Then I jumped.
|
|
It landed about a foot behind me, and skidded across the
|
|
sidewalk. Plastic shards were scattered everywhere.
|
|
"Frank!" I yelled up at the open third-floor window. "You
|
|
could've killed me with your goddamned CD player!"
|
|
A shape slowly inched out his window.
|
|
"Fucking digital clarity!" he screamed from inside.
|
|
Frank's window was giving birth to a large stereo speaker.
|
|
"Too clear! Too loud!" he shouted. The speaker picked up speed,
|
|
slid all the way out the window, and began to fall end-over-end toward
|
|
the CD player that had almost done me in.
|
|
"Too fucking loud!" Frank shouted as it smashed into the
|
|
sidewalk.
|
|
As I rounded the corner on my way to work, I heard another crash
|
|
come from behind me. Frank's second speaker had joined its brethren in
|
|
death, the third victim of some bizarre stereo component suicide pact.
|
|
My dear upstairs neighbor seems to be on some sort of quest. He's
|
|
searching for the ultimate home entertainment device, and he's very
|
|
temperamental.
|
|
When I moved into the apartment in March, everything seemed
|
|
wonderful. Living on my own was great, especially after twenty years
|
|
with my parents -- now I could have people over at all hours of the
|
|
night, could listen to my music any time I wanted to, and I didn't
|
|
have to worry about my parents walking in on me while a female guest
|
|
and I were buck-naked on the couch.
|
|
Then I met Frank.
|
|
About three weeks after I had moved in, there was a knock at the
|
|
door. It was Frank Cole, a 30-year-old man with an Electronics
|
|
Emporium name-tag pinned to his plaid shirt.
|
|
"Hi," he said to me. "My name's Frank."
|
|
"I noticed," I said. "It's nice to meet you, Frank. My name's
|
|
Jim."
|
|
"Hi, Jim. I live upstairs." Frank gave me a wide smile.
|
|
"I see."
|
|
"I'm going to throw out my TV," he told me.
|
|
"Really."
|
|
"Would you like to come and see?"
|
|
I was going to turn him down, but didn't really want to alienate
|
|
the person who was living above me. If I made him angry, he could
|
|
retaliate by jumping up and down on my ceiling any time he felt like
|
|
it.
|
|
"Sure," I told him. "Why not?"
|
|
Frank led me upstairs to his apartment, stopped outside the door,
|
|
and pointed into the dark room.
|
|
"You first," he said.
|
|
At first, I thought that I couldn't see any of Frank's furniture
|
|
because it was so dark. Then I realized that Frank didn't really have
|
|
much in the way of furniture. In the center of the room was an
|
|
overstuffed chair. The chair faced a home entertainment system,
|
|
including a wide-screen TV, that stood in the far corner. There was
|
|
nothing else in the room except for me. And Frank.
|
|
"Nice TV," I told him. "Where'd you get it?"
|
|
"I got it at Electronics Emporium. And it's not a nice TV."
|
|
"It sure looks nice. Mine's a ten-inch black-and-white. This has
|
|
got to be three times that size."
|
|
"Four times. It's a 41-inch diagonal rear projection TV with
|
|
Digital Stereo Hi-Fi Surround Sound."
|
|
"Nice TV."
|
|
"It's not a nice TV. I'm going to throw it out."
|
|
"What's wrong with it, Frank?"
|
|
He pointed at the big chair. "Sit, and you'll see."
|
|
I have no idea where Frank got the thing, but it even had feet,
|
|
like those old-fashioned claw-foot bathtubs. As I sank into it, Frank
|
|
ran over and turned on the TV.
|
|
"You'll see. You'll see."
|
|
The TV warmed up. One of those awful game shows that tries to
|
|
match up couples and send them on dream dates was on. I had auditioned
|
|
for two of them, but they said I wasn't their type. I guess I wasn't
|
|
dreamy enough.
|
|
"Stupid show," I said.
|
|
"Yes. Television is a waste of time -- the shows are terrible,
|
|
the sound -- even if you've got a Wide-Screen Rear Projection TV
|
|
with Digital Stereo Hi-Fi Surround Sound -- is incomprehensible,
|
|
and..."
|
|
"And?"
|
|
He raised his finger to his mouth. "Shh."
|
|
"I'm telling you, Chuck, I didn't want to spill the salad
|
|
dressing all over Marcie's new dress..."
|
|
"Listen to that," Frank said. "Terrible. The sound's terrible.
|
|
Even with Digital Stereo Hi-Fi Surround Sound. Even then."
|
|
"Is that all?"
|
|
"Of course not! You're in the chair. You can see. It's too
|
|
bright!"
|
|
"Why not just use the brightness knob?"
|
|
Frank looked angry, as if I was insulting his intelligence --
|
|
which I was.
|
|
"Because then it would be too dark."
|
|
Ah.
|
|
"Well, if you'll excuse me, Frank... I've got to get back to what
|
|
I was doing before." I pulled myself out of the chair and walked
|
|
toward the door.
|
|
The muscles at the corners of his mouth tightened. "Oh, sure," he
|
|
said. "See you again sometime. Nice meeting you."
|
|
"Nice meeting you, too. Thanks for inviting me up."
|
|
Frank began to close the door, paused, and stared at me. His dark
|
|
brown eyes were shining.
|
|
"I'm going to throw it out," he said again.
|
|
"Well, good luck," I said, and turned away.
|
|
I went downstairs, turned my stereo back on, sat down on my
|
|
couch, and idly stared out the window. I was enjoying my freedom --
|
|
even if I did have do deal with quirky neighbors.
|
|
There was a scraping noise from upstairs. I could hear it over
|
|
the sound of my stereo. Then there were two loud thumps, and silence
|
|
for several minutes.
|
|
I sat staring out the window, entranced by the music. The wind
|
|
blew. The trees moved. A Zenith dropped past my window.
|
|
I blinked. It must've been a dream, a fantasy, perhaps even a
|
|
really big bat or bird or something.
|
|
Then I heard a loud crash echo up from the sidewalk.
|
|
During my dash to the window to see what had happened, two other
|
|
objects dropped past. Later I'd discover that they were Frank's VCR
|
|
and Hi-Fi Stereo Surround Sound Decoder.
|
|
As I opened the window, I heard Frank laughing and screaming.
|
|
"I threw it out!" he howled. "No more fucking static! No more
|
|
fucking test patterns!"
|
|
I made a mental note to buy a deadbolt for my door and called it
|
|
a night.
|
|
|
|
A week after Frank had tossed his CD player and speakers out his
|
|
window, he knocked on my door.
|
|
"What is it, Frank?" I asked.
|
|
"I've got a new Living Room Thing," he told me. "You've got to
|
|
see it!"
|
|
"It's better than the TV?"
|
|
"A lot better. No flicker, no reception problems."
|
|
"Better than the stereo?"
|
|
"Not as loud."
|
|
I opened the door, stepped out quickly, and shut it behind me.
|
|
"Okay, Frank," I told him. "Let's go see."
|
|
The big chair was still there, but now it faced a large, well-lit
|
|
fish tank that sat in the corner. There were about 20 fish swimming in
|
|
it, chasing each other and annoying the tiny lobsters, or crayfish, or
|
|
whatever they're called, that were crawling along the bottom.
|
|
"Is this it?" I asked, pointing toward the tank.
|
|
"Yeah. No reception problems, no static. Quiet. Soothing. Fish."
|
|
"Where'd you get them? They don't sell fish at Electronics
|
|
Emporium, do they?"
|
|
"Nope. But there's a pet store next door."
|
|
"What made you want to buy fish?"
|
|
"I have dreams," he said. "Fish are in them."
|
|
"What kind of dreams?"
|
|
"Fish dreams," he said. "In my dreams, the fish are always
|
|
swimming. People are dying, but the fish keep swimming."
|
|
"What's killing the people?"
|
|
"It depends on the dream. Sometimes they're being tortured to
|
|
death, other times they just get shot in the head. But no matter what
|
|
the dream is, the fish keep swimming. That, and..."
|
|
Something caught in his throat.
|
|
"And?"
|
|
"'Copacabana.'"
|
|
"Excuse me?"
|
|
"I can't hear any real sound in the dreams. People are dying, but
|
|
I can't hear their screams. All I can hear is the muzak version of
|
|
'Copacabana'."
|
|
"You mean Barry Manilow's 'Copacabana'?"
|
|
"That's the one."
|
|
I had to admit, Frank had stumped me on this one. I had
|
|
absolutely no idea what to say.
|
|
"Could I take a look at the fish?"
|
|
"Sure," he said, and led me to the side of his tank. Frank began
|
|
pointing at fish, though they moved so fast that I couldn't tell which
|
|
ones he actually meant to single out.
|
|
"That one's Barry," he said. "And there's Rico, and Lola, and
|
|
that one in the back is Mandy -- "
|
|
I stepped away from Frank and took a look around the room. It was
|
|
almost completely barren, except for a couple posters, the chair, and
|
|
the tank.
|
|
"You know, this place would be nicer if you moved the tank out of
|
|
the corner," I told him.
|
|
"Yeah?"
|
|
"Yeah. Why not put it closer to the center of the room? Maybe by
|
|
the -- "
|
|
He squinted at me when I stopped in the middle of my sentence.
|
|
"What?"
|
|
Maybe by the window.
|
|
Frank's window looked exactly like mine. But I couldn't help but
|
|
think of everything he had tossed out that window. Putting the fish
|
|
near the window wouldn't help matters any -- especially if, on the day
|
|
that Frank gets tired of hearing "Copacabana," you're one of the fish
|
|
in the tank or you're taking a walk on the sidewalk under his window.
|
|
"Don't worry about it," I told him. "Look, Frank, thanks for the
|
|
tour. I've got to go."
|
|
"Sure," he said. "Come back sometime, and say 'Hi' to the fish."
|
|
"Sure."
|
|
I turned and left as quickly as politeness would allow. I never
|
|
wanted to come back to Frank's apartment, especially not to make
|
|
friends with his fish. The poor devils would be meeting Mr. Concrete
|
|
pretty soon anyway.
|
|
|
|
I was sitting on my window ledge, looking out at the sky and
|
|
peeling an orange -- my breakfast -- when I heard the argument. It was
|
|
a couple of days after I had met Frank's fish.
|
|
At first, all I heard was thumping -- it seemed like Frank was
|
|
stomping through his apartment. Then I realized that I was hearing two
|
|
separate sets of footsteps. There were two people up there, running
|
|
around.
|
|
Then, as I sat there stripping the skin from my orange, I started
|
|
to hear the voices.
|
|
"What do you mean mrrm don't like mfff," was what I heard a deep
|
|
voice, presumably Frank's, shout at the top of his lungs. I tore a
|
|
round piece of peel from the orange and rubbed it between my fingers.
|
|
"I don't mrmff them there at all. They're weird. I ummmf mumm
|
|
move them, Frank." It was a woman's voice. Frank had a woman in his
|
|
apartment. And they were arguing.
|
|
"It's my Living Room Thing!" he screamed. I held my hand out the
|
|
window and let go of the round piece of peel. It landed right on the
|
|
edge of the sidewalk.
|
|
"I don't cmf. Either umffo um I go." Then I heard a door slam. I
|
|
could hear the woman stomping down the stairs. A few seconds later,
|
|
she stepped onto the sidewalk below and looked up at me. Her hair
|
|
looked like it had been cut with a bowl, and she squinted behind what
|
|
seemed to be extremely thick glasses.
|
|
"You hear me, Frank?" she said. "Them or me!"
|
|
"Don't do this to me, Emily!" Frank must've been standing at his
|
|
window, right above mine.
|
|
"Do what to you?" I pulled off a strip of orange peel, and held
|
|
it against my nose. It smelled more like orange than the actual fruit
|
|
tasted like it.
|
|
"Make me get rid of my fish. My Copacabana."
|
|
"Them or me," she said. "Barry Manilow or me. Think about it,
|
|
Frank."
|
|
She started walking away, down the street. I threw my orange peel
|
|
at her, but it missed and landed in the gutter instead.
|
|
Frank slammed his window shut. When I went to work an hour later,
|
|
I still hadn't heard anything else from upstairs.
|
|
When I returned from work, Frank was screaming.
|
|
"Fuck you, Barry Manilow!"
|
|
Maybe I should've been more wary about approaching my apartment
|
|
building after the CD player tried to kill me. But I was concentrating
|
|
on licking the ice cream cone I had bought along the way home, and so
|
|
I didn't get to see the fish tank's championship-caliber dive.
|
|
But Frank's scream certainly got my attention. I looked up and
|
|
saw the tank impact with the concrete sidewalk as fish and water
|
|
rained down. Glass shattered and flew everywhere. I was lucky not to
|
|
be lacerated by a flying glass shard.
|
|
"No more fucking air pumps! No more food flakes! No more Barry
|
|
Manilow!"
|
|
The smell of fish mixed with the taste of Buttered Apple Pecan
|
|
ice cream in my mouth as I leaped over large chunks of glass and two
|
|
very annoyed mini-lobsters on my way to the safety of the stairwell.
|
|
|
|
Two weeks after he dropped the fish tank out the window, I went
|
|
upstairs to say goodbye to Frank. My summer job was over and it was
|
|
time to go off to college.
|
|
Frank smiled when he saw me at the door. In fact, I had never
|
|
seen him seem so downright cheery.
|
|
"Come in, Jim! Come in!"
|
|
The big chair was gone from the center of his room. In its place
|
|
was a large mat with polka-dotted sheets and pillows on it.
|
|
"Where's the chair?"
|
|
"Emily didn't like it. So she took it away. Now we sleep on the
|
|
futon together."
|
|
"I see. Congratulations, Frank."
|
|
"Thanks."
|
|
"But I don't see a Living Room Thing anywhere, Frank."
|
|
His eyes twitched for a second, as if he were scanning the room
|
|
for a Living Room Thing that he couldn't find.
|
|
"No more of those things. Emily didn't like me spending time
|
|
watching anything but her."
|
|
"She didn't like the fish?"
|
|
"No. She said I thought about them too much. And she said I
|
|
dreamed about Barry Manilow too much. She wants to be the only person
|
|
in my dreams."
|
|
"Well, that's good, isn't it?"
|
|
He hesitated for a second.
|
|
"Yeah, I guess."
|
|
Frank walked over to his open window, the one he had used to send
|
|
thousands of dollars worth of electronic equipment -- not to mention
|
|
several fish -- to their deaths.
|
|
"Emily's my Living Room Thing now," he said.
|
|
I could deal with Frank's own special brand of insanity to a
|
|
point, idly watching the precipitation of electronic equipment (and
|
|
marine life) that fell from his third-floor window. But the prospect
|
|
that a human being might become the next object for Frank to drop
|
|
filled me with fear.
|
|
|
|
"Emily? I need to talk to you about Frank."
|
|
I had caught her in the stairwell, on her way up to Frank's
|
|
apartment.
|
|
"What do you mean?"
|
|
"Frank's not what you think he is," I told her.
|
|
"Of course he's not. Frank scares me sometimes, you know?"
|
|
"You know about him?"
|
|
"Sure I do. I'm surprised you know how scary Frank is. I mean,
|
|
I'm his girlfriend. It scares me a lot more than you, I can tell you."
|
|
"I'm sure it does."
|
|
"He's always so distant," she said. "He never came over when I
|
|
wanted him to. He said he was always too busy... you know."
|
|
"Too busy?"
|
|
"Too busy watching the new big-screen TV, too busy listening to
|
|
the stereo, too fucking busy with his little fish! God, I hated those
|
|
fish! He should've been spending time with me. I'm his fucking
|
|
girlfriend."
|
|
"You were jealous of his fish?"
|
|
"No, silly! But I was afraid that he'd lose himself in them, like
|
|
he did with the TV and the stereo. It isn't right for a man to spend
|
|
so much time away from his girlfriend, sitting alone in that terrible
|
|
chair. I should be his only diversion!"
|
|
My voice grew louder as I tried to make her understand what Frank
|
|
undoubtedly had in store for her.
|
|
"Now he doesn't have any of those things, Emily! You're the
|
|
center of his living room now."
|
|
"Center of his life, that's what I should be. It's my rightful
|
|
place."
|
|
"You don't understand, do you? Remember what Frank did to all
|
|
those other things when he got tired of them? He threw them out the
|
|
window! And you're next!"
|
|
She paused for a second, as if she had finally understood what
|
|
I'd been trying to explain to her.
|
|
Then she began to laugh.
|
|
"Oh, don't worry," she told me, and began rummaging around in her
|
|
purse. "Frank would never think of doing anything to hurt me. And even
|
|
if he thought of it, I'd never let him try anything."
|
|
Her hand emerged from the purse holding a small handgun.
|
|
"So don't be afraid for my sake. Frank and I will be fine, as
|
|
long as he makes sure I'm the only one he thinks about." She slipped
|
|
the gun back into her purse, and began walking up the stairs.
|
|
"Thanks for your help," she said.
|
|
I swallowed hard and silently watched her ascend, until even her
|
|
ugly wooden clogs disappeared from sight.
|
|
"Don't mention it," I whispered to myself.
|
|
|
|
The next day was supposed to be my last day in the apartment. But
|
|
instead of packing, I spent most of the morning staring out my window
|
|
at the sidewalk, waiting for Emily and finishing my supply of oranges.
|
|
I wasn't sure if I'd be seeing her as she walked down the street after
|
|
leaving Frank's by way of the stairs, or seeing her fall to her death
|
|
after leaving by way of the window.
|
|
After a few hours -- and long after the last piece of orange peel
|
|
had fallen onto that sidewalk, Emily appeared down below. Because I
|
|
knew she had a gun, I was careful not to move until she was around the
|
|
corner, out of sight. Then I bolted for the door and ran upstairs.
|
|
"Frank!" I yelled as I pounded on his door. "Let me in, Frank!"
|
|
Frank opened the door after a few seconds, and smiled at me in a
|
|
good-natured sort of way. Several clumps of his hair were standing on
|
|
end, and he was wearing a plain white T-shirt and boxer shorts.
|
|
"Hi, Jim," he said. "What's wrong?"
|
|
"It's Emily."
|
|
He opened his eyes all the way, as if he were finally waking up.
|
|
"What? Did something happen to her?"
|
|
"No, nothing like that. But Frank, I talked with her yesterday,
|
|
and I've got to tell you, something's really wrong."
|
|
He turned around and began walking toward the window.
|
|
"I knew it!" he said. "I knew this would happen. I've screwed up
|
|
again, haven't I?"
|
|
"No, nothing like that, Frank. But I've got to tell you, she's
|
|
not the woman you think she is. She's no good for you, Frank. She's
|
|
crazy."
|
|
"What do you mean? She's just as sane as I am."
|
|
"Not quite. Look, Emily wants you to be her slave. She can't
|
|
stand to think that there's any point to your life except to please
|
|
her and think about her."
|
|
"She's my girlfriend. I'm supposed to think about her all the
|
|
time."
|
|
"Frank, being someone's boyfriend isn't supposed to mean that
|
|
you're her slave."
|
|
"She took away my chair."
|
|
I blinked.
|
|
"I loved that chair," he said. "She wanted me to throw it out the
|
|
window, like I did with everything else. I told her that I only throw
|
|
things I didn't like out the window."
|
|
"And you liked the chair."
|
|
"It was a good chair. It wasn't too hard or too small or
|
|
anything. It was perfect."
|
|
"What happened when you told her you liked the chair?"
|
|
"She told me that I should only like her, and nothing else. And
|
|
then she took it away."
|
|
His voice was raised. Here was more emotion in it than I'd ever
|
|
heard before. I idly noticed that only one of his eyes was brown, and
|
|
the other one was hazel.
|
|
"Frank, she's got a gun."
|
|
"A gun?"
|
|
"A gun. I think she's afraid you're going to throw her out the
|
|
window."
|
|
He opened his mouth, sputtered a few times, and shut his mouth
|
|
again. I'd never really seen anyone totally dumbfounded before. Frank
|
|
turned and stared out the window for a while, and finally managed to
|
|
say something.
|
|
"Why would I throw her out the window?"
|
|
Gosh, Frank, could it be because you've thrown every damned thing
|
|
you've ever owned out that fucking window? Might it be possible that
|
|
all the little fragments of glass that glitter when I walk along the
|
|
sidewalk are there because of your penchant for demolishing CD
|
|
players? At least Newton gave it up after the apple -- if you had been
|
|
there, Isaac would've probably been killed by a rogue soup kettle.
|
|
"Well, it's not like you've never tossed things out before," was
|
|
all I said.
|
|
"But I wouldn't throw her out. I love her!" He hit the wall with
|
|
his open palm. "She doesn't trust me. I can't believe it. She doesn't
|
|
trust me. She doesn't trust me."
|
|
He whirled around and glared at me. Both his eyes were open wide,
|
|
but the eyelid over the hazel eye was twitching a little.
|
|
"Thanks, Jim," he told me. "I appreciate your help. I'd like to
|
|
be alone now."
|
|
"Are you sure?"
|
|
"Yes."
|
|
|
|
I closed my apartment door for the final time and began to
|
|
descend the steps with my last box of stuff. I figured I wasn't going
|
|
to do any more about my upstairs neighbor's personal life -- if I made
|
|
him angry, he might toss me out a window, and if I made his girlfriend
|
|
angry, she could just shoot me on the spot. Or they could act in
|
|
tandem, with her shooting me and then him disposing of my body out the
|
|
window.
|
|
But I wouldn't have to deal with them ever again. I was going to
|
|
be out of the building for good. Whatever happened, I would have
|
|
nothing to do with it.
|
|
When I was halfway down the steps, Emily passed me, heading up.
|
|
She smiled as she went past. I managed to swallow and blink.
|
|
I concentrated on keeping my feet moving as a slowly paced out to
|
|
my car. I opened the trunk and dropped the box in. As I slammed the
|
|
trunk door closed, I began to hear the shouting coming from upstairs.
|
|
I fingered my key, thinking that I should just get in the car and
|
|
drive away. It wasn't my problem. I didn't know these people very
|
|
well. If they ended up killing each other, it would have no effect.
|
|
But instead of driving away, I stood there and tried to make out
|
|
the yelling. My car was parked a few spaces down from the Frank Cole
|
|
target zone, so I figured I was safe from any falling bodies that
|
|
might be heading down.
|
|
The yelling intensified for a second, and then cut off. I
|
|
swallowed again, and began moving toward my car as soon as I saw a
|
|
shadow in Frank's window. The window slowly slid open, as I hid behind
|
|
my car and watched. If Frank had managed to open the window, I figured
|
|
that Emily'd probably be taking part in Frank's first human-powered
|
|
flight experiment.
|
|
But what came out of the window was far too small to be Emily. It
|
|
was smaller than anything else I'd seen come out of that window.
|
|
I dropped to the pavement when I realized that it was Emily's
|
|
gun.
|
|
On impact, the gun fired off a shot. Great. I just knew I was
|
|
going to be hit by a random bullet, like in the movies.
|
|
I realized I was fine when I heard the sound of shattering glass.
|
|
I peeked my head past the edge of my car in time to see the last
|
|
pieces of my old second-floor window raining onto the pavement, where
|
|
so many objects had landed before. Somebody should paint a bull's eye
|
|
there.
|
|
"Frank! Emily!" I yelled. "You could have killed me with that
|
|
fucking gun! And you broke my goddamned window! Jesus, I just moved
|
|
out! I'm not paying for this!"
|
|
"Sorry," came a soft reply from above.
|
|
They paid for the window.
|
|
|
|
--
|
|
JASON SNELL (intertxt@network.ucsd.edu) is a senior at the University
|
|
of California, San Diego, where he serves as the Editor in Chief of
|
|
the UCSD Guardian newspaper, in addition to editing InterText. He will
|
|
graduate from UCSD in March of 1992 with a degree in communication and
|
|
a minor in Literature Writing, and hopes to enter a graduate
|
|
journalism program in the fall.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
The Unified Murder Theorem (part 1 of 4) / JEFF ZIAS
|
|
|
|
Prologue
|
|
|
|
They killed him that night and somehow he felt it coming. In all
|
|
other respects it was a typical Thursday night gig. Getting killed was
|
|
something he was prepared for, so it was no big deal.
|
|
The dark bar he was killed in was filled with noisy patrons
|
|
drinking beer, hard liquor, wine, or expensive mineral waters in clear
|
|
glass bottles. In the center of the smoky hovel was an elevated stage.
|
|
Merely four feet by six feet, the stage gave him plenty of room for
|
|
his Thursday night solo guitar gig, but fitting a whole band up there
|
|
was like putting a dolphin in your goldfish bowl.
|
|
The guitarist was medium height, brown haired, slightly slovenly,
|
|
and unremarkable in remarkably many ways. He could, however, play the
|
|
hell out of his instrument. The Thursday regulars attentively listened
|
|
to his cascades of chords and flurries of arpeggios. Not only did his
|
|
playing hold their attention: the guitarist's instrument itself was a
|
|
special custom job, a focal point.
|
|
Yes, all guitars have a fretboard, strings, and body; but this
|
|
guitar always projected a strangely luminous blue light which emanated
|
|
from its hollow body; it was simply a modified instrument, some people
|
|
in the audience thought. Most people didn't pay much attention to the
|
|
light, preferring to assume it was nothing special, or assume that
|
|
they really knew what the light was, when they really did not. Like
|
|
so many other mysteries in life, the audiences usually chose to ignore
|
|
the phenomenon rather than explore it. Only a few people -- maybe one
|
|
out of every dozen -- would ask about the blue light. How could he get
|
|
that light to pour out of the hole -- in synchronization with his
|
|
notes? The guitarist would never fully answer such questions. It is
|
|
just a light, he would say, a very ordinary light.
|
|
That Thursday night two guys who had been standing in the back,
|
|
against the wall, made their way up to the stage as the guitarist was
|
|
finishing his first set. He didn't get a good look at them because as
|
|
he lifted his head up from staring down at the fretboard the taller of
|
|
the two guys pulled out his thirty-eight and fired two shots through
|
|
the guitarists head while mumbling, inaudibly, the words "goodbye from
|
|
Nattasi."
|
|
|
|
Chapter One
|
|
|
|
The advancement of science is not comparable to the
|
|
changes of a city, where old edifices are pitilessly
|
|
torn down to give place to new, but to the continuous
|
|
evolution of zoologic types which develop ceaselessly...
|
|
-- Jules Henri Poincare
|
|
|
|
The sun was too hot, the shady grass too cool; the breeze was too
|
|
brisk and the baked sidewalks too dormant; but, taken as a whole, the
|
|
day was perfect.
|
|
At three o'clock in the afternoon of a sunny, mid-November
|
|
California day, an accordion instructor named Jack Cruger looked
|
|
through the windows of his stuffy first-floor practice room into the
|
|
parking lot of Del's Music World. High School kids floated through the
|
|
parking lot like twigs down a river. Some moved fast, some slow, and
|
|
some clumped in a living, breathing circle of conversation that
|
|
resembled a whirlpool.
|
|
Jack Cruger sat in the practice room waiting for his next
|
|
accordion student, a new kid. He hoped the kid had some ability; any
|
|
amount of ability would be greatly appreciated. Most of the kids he
|
|
got were forcibly sent by their parents in order to satisfy some
|
|
twisted ethnic family tradition. He could hear the parents now: "we
|
|
want Johnny to be able to play polkas at the family reunion," or
|
|
"teach him to play the Beer Barrel Polka for Oktoberfest."
|
|
That's why these miserable little students Cruger got were so
|
|
pathetic: almost none of them were acting of their own volition.
|
|
Forced to play the accordion, nature's most hated instrument. What
|
|
could be worse?
|
|
Up in San Francisco, forty miles away, a law was on the San
|
|
Francisco ballet, proposition P for Polka, known as the "use an
|
|
accordion and go to jail" proposition. Times were tough for
|
|
accordionists.
|
|
This accordion law (even though it was a joke) surprised Cruger -
|
|
- San Franciscans should know better, and some of them did.
|
|
Concurrently San Francisco, the city supervisors were ready to appoint
|
|
the piano accordion as the official instrument of the city, since the
|
|
piano accordion was invented in San Francisco, in 1907 by Colombo
|
|
Piatenesi and Pietro Dieiro.
|
|
In fact one of San Francisco's leading literary icons, Mark
|
|
Twain, had been an accordionist. Not for long, though. Jack Cruger --
|
|
being a fan of Mark Twain's -- recalled Twain's acerbic notes on the
|
|
subject of playing the accordion. Cruger's nearly photographic memory
|
|
(which he called his "pornographic memory") for enjoyable quotes and
|
|
images pulled in the choice memorable quotes like a fisherman hauling
|
|
in his nets. Twain had said "After a long immunity from the dreadful
|
|
insanity that moves a man to become a musician in defiance of the will
|
|
of God that he should confine himself to sawing wood, I finally fell
|
|
victim to the instrument they call the accordion." Even Twain maligned
|
|
the instrument; the accordion, always good for a laugh. And what else
|
|
had Twain said: "At this day, I hate that contrivance as fervently as
|
|
any man can, but at the time I speak of I suddenly acquired a
|
|
disgusting and idolatrous affection for it. I got one of powerful
|
|
capacity and learned to play 'Auld Lang Syne' on it."
|
|
As the story went, after being thrown out of various residences,
|
|
Twain was eventually pressured to give up the instrument. He even
|
|
wrote a rude statement of defection. "When the fever was upon me, I
|
|
was a living, breathing calamity... desolation and despair followed in
|
|
my wake. I bred discord in families, I crushed the spirit of the
|
|
lighthearted, I drove the melancholy to despair, I hurried the
|
|
invalids to dissolution and I fear me that I disturbed the very dead
|
|
in their graves... with my execrable music."
|
|
Cruel was the capricious twist of public sentiment. Back when
|
|
Cruger was a teenager, playing the damn thing was almost hip. Of
|
|
course, these misguided people, much as Mark Twain obviously had
|
|
become, were forced into a reactionary hatred of the instrument that
|
|
only spoke of some underlying passion, some real human emotion, that
|
|
surrounded their feelings for the instrument. Cruger could see this --
|
|
seen through the facade of ridicule, hatred, and name-calling. Deep
|
|
down, he knew they must actually like the accordion.
|
|
The real problem was half of Cruger's students didn't have any
|
|
talent. Little Billy Weymuts, the student that had just left, was an
|
|
exceedingly bad student who hated the accordion. Billy either never
|
|
practiced or had an almost disconcertingly powerful lack of talent.
|
|
This day, after three minutes, it had become clear that Billy
|
|
couldn't play his lesson assignment, a C major scale.
|
|
"OK, try again Billy, starting on the low C."
|
|
"The one here, this key?" Billy asked, as if he were searching
|
|
for the optimum spot to split a 80-carat diamond.
|
|
"No, two keys to the left, there."
|
|
"Oh yeah."
|
|
Billy plodded through a few notes, then hit a clinker.
|
|
"You know," Billy said, "This isn't so important. I want to get
|
|
into sports. Chicks dig a jock."
|
|
Cruger scratched his head. There was something about an eleven-
|
|
year-old saying chicks dig a jock.
|
|
"Who told you that?"
|
|
"Told me what?"
|
|
"About chicks digging a jock."
|
|
"My brother, Ronnie. Told me I should just be a jock, or at least
|
|
play guitar, ya know, like Beejee King."
|
|
"That's B.B. King. Do you even know what a jock is?"
|
|
Billy Weymuts brought his shoulders to his little elfin ears and
|
|
dropped his eyes. "I guess not."
|
|
They got back to the C major scale but didn't get far before time
|
|
was up; so much for Billy's lesson.
|
|
But it was a living. With twenty-one, no, make that twenty-two
|
|
students, plus gigs, plus a workaholic nurse for a wife, his was a
|
|
workable career.
|
|
That's what was holding him back, Cruger thought. This was all
|
|
too easy, much too easy. His students, clients, and wife were all very
|
|
willing to shell out enough money to make Cruger's life very
|
|
comfortable. No, he didn't drive a Porsche with personalized plates
|
|
saying "MONEYBAGS" -- these yuppie pursuits were of no interest to
|
|
Cruger. But still, he wanted more, just because it was all too easy.
|
|
Challenge, discord, friction. Friction; that's it. You couldn't
|
|
climb a mountain if it weren't for friction. In a world lacking
|
|
friction, you would slide back down into the saddle of your
|
|
equilibrium -- be it for better or for worse. Where is the friction in
|
|
my life? What are my battles, my defeats, my failures? If it weren't
|
|
for friction, no heroes would ever live.
|
|
Cruger glanced at the practice room wall clock -- the new
|
|
student's time slot was about to start. Cruger began to recall the
|
|
initial phone conversation with the boy. The student had said I would
|
|
like to hear about playing the accordion. A strange thing to say. Not
|
|
a simple I want to learn how to play or I would like lessons in . . .
|
|
not the usual.
|
|
Three minutes after the hour a young blond teenage boy knocked
|
|
softly on the studio door and then entered.
|
|
"Hi, I'm Tony Steffen, I talked to you the other day." The
|
|
youth's voice was low, slow, and punctuated.
|
|
Cruger reached over and shook Tony's hand. "Good to meet you,
|
|
Tony," he said, "have a seat."
|
|
Cruger was impressed with Tony's maturity. What is it about this
|
|
kid, he thought? Tony stood about six foot one, more than a few inches
|
|
taller than Cruger, and had a wiry, muscular build. But, Cruger
|
|
thought, it is more than his height - the kid has presence. The surfer
|
|
blond hair, long arms and legs, erect posture and resounding voice
|
|
combined to create a seamless package; the kid reeked of self-
|
|
confidence. What the hell is he doing here? Most of Cruger's students
|
|
were from Nerd Squad. Tony didn't fit the bill.
|
|
Cruger looked at the dusty brown case that Tony held by the
|
|
handle. "I see you already have an instrument."
|
|
"Yes," Tony said. "In fact, that's what I really wanted to talk
|
|
to you about most." Tony swung the case out in front of him. Quickly
|
|
popping the two aluminum latches on the front of case, he reached in
|
|
and pulled out a small and ornate accordion. Polished cherry wood.
|
|
Corrugated side panels and engraved trim gave the old instrument a
|
|
stately look.
|
|
"It's beautiful," Cruger said.
|
|
"Yeah. It's been, um, passed down to me. A really special
|
|
instrument, I've been told."
|
|
"I'm not knowledgeable as a collector, Tony, but I can tell you
|
|
that they don't make them like that any more."
|
|
Tony smiled a wide smile that radiated light and warmth. "I
|
|
wonder if you would play it a little for me?"
|
|
Cruger had been anxious to do just that; now he needed no excuse
|
|
to grasp the accordion and give it a try.
|
|
"I'll play it a little Tony, but, it's you who we need to get
|
|
playing it."
|
|
Tony nodded unconvincingly and watched as Cruger gently moved his
|
|
arms and pressed his fingers across the keys of the fine instrument.
|
|
The "Too Fat Polka" reverberated throughout the small practice room.
|
|
The instrument had a smaller, darker tone than Cruger was accustomed
|
|
to. He was into the second eight bars of the tune when he jolted
|
|
slightly at the sight of a strange luminescence rising from the belly
|
|
of the instrument. Blue streaks of light, entwined like yarn across a
|
|
cat tree, flickered their surprising veneer within the accordion's
|
|
belly. Cruger could see down into the cavity through a three-quarter
|
|
inch opening directly above the keyboard. Shock notwithstanding,
|
|
Cruger had continued to play down the solid Polka. When he stopped,
|
|
the strange light did likewise.
|
|
"What's that light?" asked Cruger in a coarse voice ringing with
|
|
disbelief.
|
|
"That light," Tony said, "is the reason that I had you play that
|
|
box." Tony seemed satisfied with that answer, but, Cruger clearly was
|
|
not.
|
|
"What do you mean?"
|
|
"The box will only do that, what we just saw, for you," Tony
|
|
said.
|
|
"Are you trying to con me or something -- you calling this
|
|
magic?" Cruger didn't know whether to laugh or let out his true
|
|
feelings. He gave Tony a hard, defensive stare.
|
|
"I know that this is all confusing for you, ah, Cruger. Is it all
|
|
right to call you Cruger?"
|
|
"Yeah."
|
|
"Anyway, I need to get this into your head, and I know it won't
|
|
be easy. All I want to do for now is tell you to please play this
|
|
instrument every night, for at least a little while."
|
|
"I still want to know what this is all about."
|
|
"Can you please just take it home and play it a little at night?
|
|
I will come back and explain everything to you in a day or two," Tony
|
|
said.
|
|
Cruger looked up at the ceiling of the small practice room. Small
|
|
styrofoam polygons covered the ceiling; Del, of Del's Music World,
|
|
certainly wasn't using the high-quality foam soundproofing material.
|
|
With accordions being played, you'd think he wouldn't skimp on it.
|
|
But what should he do? Cruger was scared of his inaction. What
|
|
should he tell the kid? What the hell would friggin' Clint Eastwood do
|
|
in this situation? This is just plain bizarre. Is the kid a nut case,
|
|
on drugs? Thoughts sprayed through his mind like machine gun fire.
|
|
""Oh, by the way," Tony said, "Don't tell anyone about this,
|
|
please. "I know you won't," he said as if to assure himself.
|
|
"But..."
|
|
"Later," Tony said as he swung out of the cheap folding chair,
|
|
opened the door, and walked briskly down the musty, narrow hall.
|
|
Cruger had no response. He slumped forward and stared at the
|
|
strange small instrument that rested on his forearms. Shaking his head
|
|
from side to side he smiled as he rehearsed, in his head, telling his
|
|
wife for the very first time, "had a tough day at the office, dear."
|
|
|
|
Chapter Two
|
|
|
|
Cruger's wife, Corrina, was prone to the scientific approach.
|
|
Since Jack and she had decided to try to make a baby, their sex lives
|
|
had undergone a change.
|
|
For one thing, they now made love three times a day. Three times
|
|
a day had previously loomed as a mythical figure to Cruger. Not since
|
|
their brief and carnal Honeymoon had the prospect of such frequent
|
|
intercourse seemed plausible. Yet, now, it was three times a day
|
|
whether or not Jack liked it, just like the self-help fertility manual
|
|
said on page twenty-four.
|
|
They had been trying for four months. No periods had been missed
|
|
yet. Even so, Corrina continued to support the home pregnancy test-kit
|
|
industry with frequent testings. Rabbits dying were yesteryear's
|
|
method of test; vials of water needed to turn a rich blue color or
|
|
little tablets needed to spell plus or minus. Four months of pale
|
|
water and minuses -- the equivalent of live rabbits -- was not
|
|
considered a long time by most people.
|
|
Cruger thought it was a long time. His lower back thought it was
|
|
a long time.
|
|
When Cruger walked in his front door that evening, his own
|
|
accordion case in one hand and Tony Steffen's in the other, Corrina
|
|
was anxious to talk with him.
|
|
"I'm going to start monitoring my ovulation cycle," she said. She
|
|
was excited, her bright eyes on fire, lighting the room.
|
|
"Just as long as you don't make me count all my sperm every day."
|
|
"Listen silly. What I do is take my temperature every morning and
|
|
I can then chart when I start ovulating. Then we can make sure to make
|
|
love a lot just before and during my ovulation."
|
|
"Sounds wonderfully romantic. Out of curiosity, along with
|
|
Bolero, did Ravel ever write any music entitled Symphony to Ovulate
|
|
to, in G minor?"
|
|
"Did anyone ever not tell you that you're a smart ass?" she said.
|
|
"People who have never met me generally don't."
|
|
Corrina sighed. "Ah, the lucky ones."
|
|
"Listen, let me get this straight. When you're not ovulating I
|
|
take cold showers, keep to a low testosterone diet, and occupy my mind
|
|
with Baseball scores. Then for a week each month I eat oysters, beat
|
|
my chest like a gorilla, and jump your bones every time the wind
|
|
shifts?"
|
|
"You've got it, partner -- but you don't always have to wait till
|
|
I'm ovulating," she said. "We can just practice the rest of the
|
|
month."
|
|
"What, you think I'm a machine, a love-making machine; switch me
|
|
off, switch me on," Cruger said, "like clockwork?"
|
|
"You've done well in the past. And, if your batteries need
|
|
recharging, I've got a few tricks up my garter belt."
|
|
Cruger believed what she said. In her late twenties and athletic,
|
|
Corrina was still a head-turner, even a 'real fox' as one of his
|
|
buddies annoyingly called her. Trim, tan, with mid-length auburn hair,
|
|
she was extremely attractive. No tofu thighs or belly rolls like
|
|
Cruger saw on so many women at the beach and around the neighborhood.
|
|
Corrina didn't need help to get his libido into high gear.
|
|
"All I have to do is think of you in your string bikini. My
|
|
circulatory system does the rest," he said.
|
|
Corrina walked over to Jack and gave him a soft kiss on the lips.
|
|
She said, "All I have to do is think of you getting into my
|
|
string bikini."
|
|
Then they began to try to make a baby. No oysters necessary.
|
|
|
|
Later that evening Cruger accepted the inevitable: he would have
|
|
to play Tony's accordion. From good sex to accordions, isn't live full
|
|
of dichotomies, he mused. And why play the thing? First of all, the
|
|
kid asked him to. Second, the thing was exciting and strange and
|
|
unexplained. Lastly, it had a nice sound and a good feel. Why not?
|
|
He closed the study door so Corrina would not easily walk in on
|
|
the strange sight. The warm, softly illuminated study was lined on one
|
|
wall with bookshelves full of Cruger's favorite reading as well as a
|
|
few shelves dedicated to Corrina's anatomy, physiology, and nursing
|
|
textbooks. Cruger allowed his eyes to scan the shelves that were like
|
|
friends to him, holding up parts of his mind, parts of his past, books
|
|
that had become a part of his world view -- part of his most private
|
|
self. On the top shelf, a little Hemingway, some Fitzgerald,
|
|
everything by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The shelf below, invoking a more
|
|
philosophical mood, housed some Kafka: The Castle and The
|
|
Metamorphosis, Huxley, Plato, Koestler. The next shelf had the high-
|
|
speed fantasies of Heinlein, Bradbury, Asimov, Sturgeon, Clarke. Then
|
|
Cruger's eyes stuck to the next lowest shelf, full of the reading of
|
|
the college years: Joyce, Proust, Mann, Elliot, Beckett, Conrad; even
|
|
some sixties classics jumped out at him -- Mailer, Malamud, Pynchon,
|
|
Barth. Catch 22 was there, and others equally important.
|
|
Cruger wanted to reach around and pat himself on the back for his
|
|
literary achievements, at the same time saying: Yes, ladies and
|
|
gentlemen, I read all of these and more. But, please hold the
|
|
applause, save the awards, because I've done nothing with them but
|
|
file them away in my mind, my selfish head; they are now stashed deep
|
|
into the brains of an accordion instructor who is merely a consumer of
|
|
knowledge, not a provider, a processor, a manufacturer or a designer.
|
|
Unlatching the old case, he pulled out Tony's exotic instrument.
|
|
Caressingly, carefully, and tentatively, he began to play a few warm-
|
|
up scales.
|
|
Inexplicable blue light notwithstanding, the strangest thing was
|
|
this: Cruger began to play things he never played before. After a few
|
|
requisite Polkas, he launched into a snappy rendition of Malaguena, a
|
|
song he had heard but never played before. The instrument's
|
|
mysterious, resounding overtones echoed in Cruger's mind as its blue
|
|
sparks and beautiful notes rang out into the energized, tranquil air.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Three
|
|
|
|
As promised, Tony called Cruger at home the next evening. Tony
|
|
thanked Cruger for practicing the instrument as he had requested.
|
|
"How do you know that I actually played it?" Cruger asked.
|
|
"Oh, I know, it's obvious."
|
|
Cruger was only slightly disturbed by the fact that Tony seemed
|
|
to know this for certain, somehow. Other more disturbing questions
|
|
were still unanswered. As if a witness to Cruger's silent thoughts,
|
|
Tony said "I'd like to come over to fill you in on some facts."
|
|
"I think I would enjoy that."
|
|
"How about I come over after I'm out of school tomorrow, like
|
|
around four thirty?" Tony said.
|
|
"That's fine, I'll be back here by quarter after four. And you
|
|
better have some good explanations; this whole thing is really weird,"
|
|
Cruger said.
|
|
"Oh yeah, must be totally weird for you. Don't worry, see you
|
|
then."
|
|
Cruger hung up and thought about this High School "dude" who was
|
|
"totally" messing his mind. This kid was the strangest thing to ever
|
|
happened to Cruger. Being a true skeptic at heart, he still felt that
|
|
this was some kind of hoax, some strange setup. He expected the hidden
|
|
camera to pop out from behind the wall at any minute: "Surprise, it
|
|
was a joke, you're an idiot."
|
|
Cruger realized that, according to the apparent behavior of most
|
|
people, he should have been jumping out of his skin with curiosity.
|
|
Most people would have been more affected, Cruger thought. But he
|
|
evidently had a high tolerance for ambiguity.
|
|
He wondered if anyone really knew anything anyway, so why should
|
|
he worry about his silly predicament. He meant really knowing what was
|
|
going on, as in having positive, scientific proof of existence.
|
|
Besides, a little excitement was what he thought he wanted. A small
|
|
little challenge had presented itself, and he now accepted the
|
|
challenge, on its (or Tony's) terms.
|
|
So like people, he thought, to accept challenges that find them
|
|
while never choosing a challenge on their own. Playing the game is so
|
|
much easier for people than inventing it.
|
|
Cruger now waited for Tony to play his next move. What had
|
|
Kierkegaard said? Life can only be understood backwards; but it must
|
|
be lived forwards. Cruger now waited to live his soon-to-be-explicable
|
|
future.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Four
|
|
|
|
Cruger tried to put Tony out of his mind and found Corrina in the
|
|
living room doing aerobics. He asked his wife for a dinner date and
|
|
she kindly accepted. Corrina had the day off after working a week of
|
|
day shift, so she was rested and ready to go out to dinner. The new
|
|
Cajun place on El Camino Real, Louisiana Pot, was their choice.
|
|
The restaurant was located in a mini-mall that also had a dry
|
|
cleaner, record store, sandwich shop, crafts store, and Pizza place.
|
|
You could have your clothes cleaned, buy some overpriced CDs, stock up
|
|
on yarn, and eat anything from pizza to a tofu burger all without
|
|
reparking your car. Great.
|
|
The Louisiana Pot was New Orleans moved 2,000 miles west.
|
|
Dixieland music played, people drank like fish, and the Gumbo was
|
|
excellent. Corrina waited for her blackened prime rib and Cruger
|
|
waited for his blackened catfish.
|
|
Corrina told Jack about her patients, in particular a young girl
|
|
with MS who was a sweet kid with serious problems. In a way, the
|
|
toughest of patients.
|
|
A tape of a Dixie band played "Here Come the Saints." Cruger felt
|
|
himself floating in and back out of the conversation with his wife. He
|
|
wondered if the whole function of entertainment, evenings out for
|
|
tasty dinners and movies, where nothing more than a way of escaping
|
|
from the harsh reality we all see when we're alone. At the restaurant,
|
|
Cruger could see his pretty wife and well-dressed waiters and pretty
|
|
waitresses and laughing couples with nice clothes. He could hear
|
|
Dixieland music and the intoxicated laughs of young men and young
|
|
ladies who had just downed their "authentic" New Orleans Hurricanes.
|
|
If this were more real than playing his instrument or reading or
|
|
sitting around the house, then it only seemed more real because
|
|
restaurant scenes are what you see in the movies and on TV and what
|
|
you read about in the newspaper. Everyone, without exception, was at
|
|
least moderately young and moderately well-dressed. Bright colors and
|
|
patterns that seemed to say: I'm centered, I have money, do you too?
|
|
These people are all sheep, Cruger thought. They could be trained to
|
|
accept nearly anything as reality.
|
|
The waiter arrived with the prime rib and the catfish. Both the
|
|
fish and beef were spiced and burnt black in an iron pan. For all he
|
|
knew, the meal was highly carcinogenic. Cruger looked around as people
|
|
eagerly awaited their burnt-to-a-crisp twenty dollar entrees. Like
|
|
sheep.
|
|
"You think this blackened stuff causes cancer?" Corrina said.
|
|
Cruger was surprised. Either his thoughts were printed on his
|
|
sleeve or she was as cynical as he. She's a worrier like me, he
|
|
thought, that's why we're married.
|
|
"Un huh," he said. "But don't worry, what we did this afternoon
|
|
was an anti-carcinogen."
|
|
"And good exercise too," she said.
|
|
They ate their dangerous meal and Cruger tried to pay attention
|
|
to her discussion of patients and hospital politics.
|
|
"You really help these people -- I'm proud of you. At least one
|
|
of us is making a contribution for the better," Cruger said.
|
|
"Oh come on, you're making a contribution -- you're a teacher,"
|
|
Corrina said. She had her nose screwed up that way it got whenever she
|
|
became mildly annoyed.
|
|
Cruger realized that he was preoccupied and in a self-pitying
|
|
mood. At this rate, he would not be a very good date.
|
|
What she just said was true. Yes, he was a teacher and that was
|
|
generally considered a noble profession. Unless you teach accordion,
|
|
in which case, he thought, people thought of you like they thought of
|
|
the neighborhood crack dealer: forcing horrible habits on young,
|
|
impressionable kids.
|
|
Self-pity aside, honesty was sometimes the surprisingly best
|
|
policy: "It's just that I'm afraid I'm not doing enough with my life,"
|
|
he said. " I've been worried about not making a contribution, not
|
|
giving enough."
|
|
Corrina looking him straight in the eye, her pretty and open face
|
|
telling him as much as her words. "You're worrying too much. Just face
|
|
it, you're a good person, a great guy -- why else would I have married
|
|
you? Just accept that and quit punishing yourself."
|
|
And maybe he should let well enough alone. Did every action that
|
|
every person did on every day necessarily contribute to the course of
|
|
the future? Cruger thought that might be so; but, playing that weird
|
|
accordion with the blue light must be something important, a
|
|
substantial contribution, because there was something about it that
|
|
felt magical. He was somebody now, playing that weird accordion.
|
|
Whatever the flashy little thing really was.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Five
|
|
|
|
Our daughters and sons have burst
|
|
from the marionette show
|
|
leaving the tangle of strings
|
|
and gone into the unlit audience
|
|
-- Maxine Kumin
|
|
|
|
Tony showed up at Cruger's doorstep the next day, as planned.
|
|
Cruger was relieved and excited to see Tony, although he wanted to
|
|
appear nonchalant about the situation.
|
|
"Can I get you anything to drink? Cruger asked.
|
|
"A Coke or Pepsi, if you got it, thanks."
|
|
Cruger popped a can and poured two glasses full, on the rocks. He
|
|
motioned for Tony to sit at the kitchen table.
|
|
"So, you think the accordion I gave you is cool or what?"
|
|
"You only lent it to me, and, yes it's cool." Cruger's use of the
|
|
word cool came out as a mockery of Tony, and Cruger regretted it
|
|
immediately.
|
|
Tony said, "I have a lot of things that need to be said, and I'm
|
|
afraid you will need a really open mind to hear them."
|
|
"My friends tell me I'm open-minded," said Cruger. "And my
|
|
enemies tell me that my mind is so open that everything has leaked
|
|
out."
|
|
"Great, you'll need room in there for the stuff that I'm going to
|
|
lay on you." Tony flicked a wisp of his long blond hair out of his
|
|
eyes, as if the motion were a precursor to any serious discussion.
|
|
"Starting with an explanation of the blue light, I hope," Cruger
|
|
said.
|
|
"Yep. Did you look down into the belly of that box when you were
|
|
playing?"
|
|
"Uh-huh."
|
|
"And you saw those blue strands of light sort-of moving around,
|
|
creating different patterns and stuff."
|
|
Cruger nodded, wondering if they were going to play a guessing
|
|
game or if Tony would just tell him what was what.
|
|
"Well, what was happening in there was significant. Each one of
|
|
those blue lights -- or strings, I would call them -- each represents
|
|
a path, a possible outcome. As you saw, there are millions of those
|
|
things wiggling around when you play.
|
|
"I contacted you because you were chosen as someone who will do a
|
|
very good job of making, or, as I like to call it, spinning these
|
|
strings."
|
|
"What is the point of spinning these strings, and why are you
|
|
involved?" Cruger said, the questioning leaping out automatically
|
|
before he fully comprehended what Tony had just said.
|
|
Tony began to explain everything, or, at least, quite a bit.
|
|
Cruger was being offered a job. Tony belonged to an organization that
|
|
looked for people who had special talents and abilities: abilities
|
|
that were a match for the special needs of the company that Tony
|
|
worked for.
|
|
Cruger, mainly because of his musicianship, was one of the dozen
|
|
or so people in the world chosen for this job of "spinning" the
|
|
strange blue strings.
|
|
"So your company is an international company then?" Cruger asked.
|
|
"Oh yeah. In fact the company is a lot broader based than that."
|
|
Cruger frowned and Tony explained more.
|
|
"The Company, as we like to call it, has a bunch of
|
|
responsibilities. The primary responsibility is to create and support
|
|
all worlds, galaxies, and universes."
|
|
Cruger gave Tony a blank stare.
|
|
"It's a service industry, really," said Tony.
|
|
Tony laughed. Cruger pretended to laugh along with him. They
|
|
both continued to laugh -- Cruger felt like a cartoon character,
|
|
laughing, slapping his his knee; he would have even guffawed if he
|
|
knew what a guffaw was.
|
|
"You're joking," Cruger said.
|
|
"No, I'm totally serious. I can understand that you don't believe
|
|
me -- I didn't believe it at first either; but you'll believe it
|
|
soon."
|
|
Tony explained more. The spinners completed a necessary function
|
|
of determining the probable outcomes of all events on earth. Each
|
|
string could be thought of as a possible plane of reality across time.
|
|
The many parallel strings that intersected each other represented the
|
|
large number of possible outcomes for any given instant.
|
|
"Couldn't God just toss some dice? I had always thought that's
|
|
how it might work anyway."
|
|
"No," said Tony, "and we call him the Chairman, or the Big Guy,
|
|
by the way. Just Him rolling the dice would be a poor way of spinning
|
|
because it would be cold, mechanical, and lack the variation and
|
|
natural beauty that people like you provide."
|
|
"Well, how could it be that I do a better job than, um, the Big
|
|
Guy?"
|
|
"Originally everything was done by Him, like you say. But, then
|
|
it became clear that a more personal way would incorporate the proper
|
|
aspects of the human condition. I don't fully understand it, but maybe
|
|
you can think of it this way: it's like the difference between
|
|
computer-generated art and human-devised art -- an expert can tell the
|
|
difference."
|
|
Cruger was either satisfied with that explanation or so immersed
|
|
in thought that he failed to respond.
|
|
Tony continued to explain that the job of spinner would entitle
|
|
Cruger to a family health plan, enriched musical talent, and a sense
|
|
of accomplishment. Cruger just needed to play the special accordion
|
|
every evening for at least thirty minutes. Playing more would do
|
|
neither any good nor any harm. The job did not come without risks,
|
|
however. Not everyone was a friend of the company. In fact, the
|
|
company was in direct competition with what they referred to as the
|
|
"Other Company." Tony reminded Cruger that he was most likely at least
|
|
conceptually familiar with the "Other Company."
|
|
"If not for them, everything here would be perfect. Can you
|
|
imagine, no hunger, no disease, no murder or greed?"
|
|
"So the 'Other Company' is responsible for everything bad?" asked
|
|
Cruger.
|
|
"More or less. Death would always be with us along with the
|
|
natural occurrences that some people think are bad, but, the Other
|
|
Company pretty much has what we think of as the Devil's work as their
|
|
charter."
|
|
"Somehow this translates to a risk for me?" Cruger moved the
|
|
conversation back to what stuck in his mind.
|
|
"Yes. The Other Company has employees here just like we do. They
|
|
can get involved in messing us up -- they have in the past. But, we
|
|
keep a low profile. I am your only contact in the company. Just like
|
|
you, I have only one original contact, my boss, and now I guess you,
|
|
as an employee."
|
|
"Hah," said Cruger. "You come in here and tell me I can have a
|
|
job with the rulers of the universe and my boss will be a high school
|
|
kid who looks like a surf bum?"
|
|
"Yeah, that's pretty much what I'm telling you. I also know that
|
|
you are going to accept the job," Tony said.
|
|
Cruger rose his eyebrows and felt his chin jerk involuntarily,
|
|
demonstrating a small surprise reflex that he never knew he had. "How
|
|
the hell do you know that?"
|
|
"It came down to me in a memo. It's determined already by other
|
|
spinners. You're it."
|
|
"Then why did you even ask me?" Cruger said.
|
|
"Oh, we try to be polite in this business."
|
|
"And what about that family health plan you mentioned," Cruger
|
|
smiled at the incongruous use of such prosaic corporate terminology.
|
|
Tony nodded and answered. "That means that you and your family
|
|
will experience no illness or harm, except for what is beyond our
|
|
control, like intervention from the Other Company."
|
|
"Now that sounds like a pretty good benefit."
|
|
"Yeah, well, we're a very competitive employer. We don't even ask
|
|
for your immortal soul in return."
|
|
|
|
Chapter Six
|
|
|
|
Cold, cold, cold. The frost was fall's thickest yet; the dried
|
|
old leaves of Maples and Eucalyptus lined the streets. Most of all, it
|
|
was cold.
|
|
Leon Harris had just started his morning jog. His blood had yet
|
|
to flow to his extremities, which were as numbed from sleepiness as
|
|
they were aggravated by the chilling morning breeze.
|
|
Harris glanced quickly at his black plastic, multi-function
|
|
jogging watch, $3.95 from Service Merchandise. He had only been
|
|
running for three minutes, two seconds, and fifty-seven hundredths.
|
|
Usually the endorphin rush didn't kick in until fifteen minutes, at
|
|
least. Harris imagined the feeling he would have when the sweat poured
|
|
off his brow and the blood pulsed through his trunk and thighs.
|
|
Running, it feels so good when you stop, he told himself in a
|
|
clenched-teeth mantra. Morning runs are a lot nicer in the summer,
|
|
but, think of the poor suckers who live were it really gets cold, he
|
|
thought. The radio weather report that morning said currently forty-
|
|
three degrees, warming to a high of sixty. Not too bad.
|
|
Harris usually got his run done by 7:05, into the shower,
|
|
breakfasted, dressed and out the door by 8:00. He could be to work by
|
|
8:15, hit the weight room or Karate practice at lunch, leave work by
|
|
6:00 and get home around 6:30. Not that he lived by the clock.
|
|
At home, Harris would throw together microwaved leftovers or cook
|
|
a quick stir-fry type dish: lean meat, vegetables, and rice or
|
|
potatoes. He only drank alcohol when out with friends, keeping it to
|
|
one or two drinks, which didn't have too much of an effect on his lean
|
|
6-3, 210-pound body.
|
|
Once at work, he would make out a list that described his goals
|
|
for the day. A typical list looked like this:
|
|
|
|
8:30 Glass of Water, write list
|
|
8:45 Investigate File System bug
|
|
10:00 Staff Meeting
|
|
11:30 Lunch workout
|
|
12:30 Debug, design next lib interface
|
|
6:00 home
|
|
|
|
Then he would break the list down into sublists. Often the
|
|
sublists generated sublists of their own, but Harris knew where to
|
|
draw the line.
|
|
His performance reviews at work usually commended him on his
|
|
organizational, attention to detail, and ability to persevere on a
|
|
problem until closure.
|
|
The man had no vices. Well, almost none. When given the
|
|
opportunity, Harris could be an extremely inquisitive person, far past
|
|
the point of simply being nosy.
|
|
When Harris' next door neighbor, Jack Cruger, began playing his
|
|
accordion every single evening, Harris noticed.
|
|
Harris, a black man who grew up in the sixties and seventies,
|
|
liked to listen to Stevie Wonder, James Brown, John Coltrane, Miles
|
|
Davis, Hendrix, Muddy Waters, and some Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, but
|
|
not accordion music.
|
|
He would have been merely disgusted with Cruger and his
|
|
instrument, if not for the flickering pale blue light that shone
|
|
through the curtains when Cruger played every night.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Seven
|
|
|
|
Cruger was cooking dinner when he heard Corrina coming through
|
|
the garage door.
|
|
"Back here," he said. "Your chef is at work creating another
|
|
masterpiece."
|
|
He stirred the mushrooms sauteing in the butter sauce and
|
|
sprinkled the minced green onions from the cutting block.
|
|
Corrina walked into the kitchen and put her purse down on the
|
|
counter. She sniffed the air. She smelled Tarragon.
|
|
"Mmm, smells good."
|
|
"But of course," he said, mocking the accents of the French chefs
|
|
that worked at restaurants more expensive than any he had been to. He
|
|
sounded exactly like one of those temperamental little Cordon Bleu
|
|
jocks.
|
|
"Was that supposed to be a French accent?" she said. "Sounded
|
|
more like an Australian with lock jaw."
|
|
"You've got no ear, no ear. My accent is magnifique," he said,
|
|
again sounding like an Aussie with lockjaw.
|
|
"Whatever." And then she put her arms around him and pushed her
|
|
face into his neck. She whispered into his ear "we're pregnant."
|
|
Cruger forgot about his culinary masterpiece and bad accent. They
|
|
kissed and hugged and she cried. He did too, a little, but worked hard
|
|
to keep her from seeing it and himself from admitting it.
|
|
Cruger believed that whatever would happen, they were strong
|
|
enough for it. The journey would begin again, a journey that, as
|
|
opposed to some others, was not in itself the reward.
|
|
A baby, a baby, goddamn, I don't believe it. He hugged Corrina
|
|
tight and close, eyes shut hard, leaking only slightly.
|
|
He and Corrina knew the fragility of life. Corrina had been
|
|
pregnant a year ago. The baby -- not yet known as a 'he' or 'she' but
|
|
most certainly not an 'it' -- was of course destined for greatness.
|
|
Possibly a doctor, an astronaut, or maybe even President of the United
|
|
States, the baby would most certainly be a special person.
|
|
The winter months of December and January passed. Then, for
|
|
Corrina, she said it felt like a heavy period. Realization of the
|
|
dreaded fact was more horrid than anything they had ever faced before.
|
|
The robbery of a promised life was a malicious obscenity.
|
|
The Doctors gave Corrina a set of explanations. These thing can
|
|
happen for many reasons: failure of the fetus to attach properly to
|
|
the uterine wall, scar tissue, or hormonal imbalances. She had still
|
|
been in the danger period -- just barely. The first trimester had
|
|
nearly elapsed without incident. The integrity of the umbilical cord
|
|
had been questioned; the doctors thought that the cord became twisted
|
|
and then failed.
|
|
He and Corrina vowed to be brave and try again. Only a success
|
|
could erase the miserable failure of their first attempt.
|
|
Cruger wondered if he would ever believe that a real life had not
|
|
been lost. Sure, the first baby actually born to them would be the
|
|
first child, but, hadn't their been a different life, a thoroughly
|
|
different zygote based on different genetic material that had existed
|
|
and then suddenly not existed? In practical terms, it didn't matter to
|
|
him. In terms of the meaning of a life that has been thoroughly
|
|
erased, the meaning was very special. The poor damned little umbilical
|
|
cord.
|
|
He kissed Corrina again. Yes, we are brave enough for another
|
|
shot at it.
|
|
And what type of world would they be bringing their baby into.
|
|
Would they bring the baby into a world that he felt he had to
|
|
apologize for? No, his child, all the children deserved better.
|
|
He vowed to try hard to make it better. For his baby.
|
|
|
|
Later that night, Cruger retreated to the den to play Tony's
|
|
accordion. Cruger, admittedly, had never been an exceptionally good
|
|
accordionist. His repertoire consisted of a dozen Polkas, some folk
|
|
music, a few old swing standards, and "Lady of Spain." Anything else
|
|
and he had to read the music; and he was not one of those expert
|
|
sight-readers who could play anything perfectly the first time. Since
|
|
he had been spinning alone in this room for a few nights, he noticed a
|
|
change in his playing. The notes seemed to flow out more smoothly. The
|
|
instrument produced a rounder, more musical tone. Cruger could play
|
|
almost any tune he had ever heard before, his ear and instincts
|
|
accurately leading him across the keyboard.
|
|
This night was no exception. His paying felt strong and full of
|
|
life. He played Thad Jones's ballad, "A Child is Born." He had only
|
|
heard the song once before on one of Corrina's old Thad Jones & Mel
|
|
Lewis big band albums. But he knew the song now; he deeply felt the
|
|
song and every one of its nuances and alternate chord changes. Life
|
|
could be so good.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Eight
|
|
|
|
Leon Harris' beautifully landscaped front yard stood out as the
|
|
neighborhood's best. The lush green carpet of his front lawn was
|
|
thicker and greener than a billionaire's wallet. To the other side of
|
|
Harris' driveway was an elevated Japanese Rock garden. The Scotch
|
|
moss, red-tinged boulders, gravel, as well as the spherically-shaped
|
|
Pyrocantha and Juniper bushes formed a visual retreat from the
|
|
concrete and asphalt monotony of the maze of streets, sidewalks, and
|
|
driveways that entangled the tightly-housed neighborhood.
|
|
As Harris had improved his yard, his impression of the neighbors'
|
|
yards had diminished. At first his neighbors, both the Crugers and the
|
|
Youngs on the other side, had what appeared to be perfectly adequate
|
|
yards. By the time Harris had added the final fieldstone to his rock
|
|
garden, the neighbors' small intermittent weeds seemed bigger, the
|
|
rusted brownish grass more horrid.
|
|
The neighbor's yards had clearly become the landscapes from hell.
|
|
Harris didn't know any of his neighbors well. He said hello to
|
|
the ones he passed when he was out for a run, and had only spoken
|
|
briefly to the Crugers a couple of times. The Cruger guy was a pretty
|
|
lazy dude, Harris thought. A musician. Somehow he had a babe of a
|
|
wife. The guy must be twenty pounds overweight, a scarcely employed
|
|
accordionist (calling him a musician was probably a stretch), and he's
|
|
got a hot-looking wife who pretty much supports him.
|
|
He must not be as stupid as he looks, Harris realized.
|
|
But who knows what the hell this Cruger guy is up to now? Harris
|
|
poured some boiling water over an herbal, caffeine-free tea bag.
|
|
Ginseng root, good for sustained energy as well as sparking the immune
|
|
system.
|
|
Harris didn't have any plans for the evening. He sat at the
|
|
terminal in his home office and played with a few matrix solutions he
|
|
didn't get a chance to try at work.
|
|
Later he went into the family room, were there was room to move,
|
|
and practiced a few dozen low and high kicks, on left and right sides.
|
|
He finished the quick workout with sixty-five knuckle and fingertip
|
|
push-ups. Even this quick workout gave him a good healthy sheen of
|
|
sweat. He peeled his shirt off as he entered the bathroom and,
|
|
grabbing his toothbrush, began his fourth tooth brushing of the day.
|
|
He concentrated on his gums -- the plethora of television ads
|
|
concerning gingivitis had him worried.
|
|
From the bathroom, through the obscured view of the semi-opaque
|
|
privacy glass, he could see the Crugers' house. A soft blue light
|
|
radiated a sense of peace and contentedness from one of their bedroom
|
|
windows. When Harris stopped brushing, he could hear the sound of the
|
|
accordion. It was a faint sound; Harris thought it sounded like the
|
|
old standard tune "Autumn Leaves," but he couldn't tell for sure. It
|
|
definitely wasn't a polka, and Harris considered that much a great
|
|
improvement.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Nine
|
|
|
|
The doorbell rang at 4:15, right on time. Cruger opened the door.
|
|
Tony was wearing day-glow pink beach shorts, a black Megadeth tank
|
|
top, and unlaced high-tops. He stood with one arm holding his
|
|
skateboard and the other around the shoulder of a young lady friend
|
|
who held her own skateboard. Her skin was tanned to a smooth medium-
|
|
brown. A perfect match for Tony, Cruger thought. Her flaxen blond hair
|
|
hung down to her shoulders and across her eyebrows. Baby blue skin-
|
|
tight lycra pants, peach halter top and sandals completed the perfect
|
|
young-California ensemble. She was beautiful.
|
|
"Cruger, this is my friend Sky," Tony said.
|
|
"Sky? Nice to meet you."
|
|
"Hi, shall I call you Cruger?" Sky asked between bubble gum
|
|
snaps.
|
|
"Please. Are you and Tony in school together?" Cruger said.
|
|
"Yeah, Tony and I have three classes together." Sky smiled wide
|
|
and lifted her big blue eyes towards her namesake as if having three
|
|
classes with Tony was better than winning the lottery.
|
|
"I'll meet you later tonight, Sky. Cruger and I have some
|
|
business." At the word business, Tony's tone of voice dropped to a
|
|
deep growl.
|
|
"OK, later." Sky waved and slapped her board on the ground in a
|
|
single fluid motion.
|
|
Cruger watched her closely as she sailed, on the small plastic
|
|
board, down the driveway, swerving back and forth and then cutting a
|
|
turn onto the sidewalk. A second later he caught himself staring and
|
|
stopped.
|
|
"Very attractive young friend you have, Tony."
|
|
"I wouldn't have thought you of all people to be such a lech,"
|
|
Tony said.
|
|
"Lecher is too strong a word. Dirty old man will do just fine"
|
|
Cruger said. He rolled his eyes and smiled.
|
|
"OK," Tony said. "Let's get to business here. Last thing I need
|
|
is you giving me a hard time about Sky."
|
|
"Why is that? Is anyone else giving you a hard time about Sky?"
|
|
Cruger asked automatically, unable to imagine what conflicts Tony
|
|
would be having over a girl like Sky.
|
|
At that moment Tony instantly looked like a teenager again.
|
|
Tony's shoulders slumped forward almost imperceptibly, yet, the slight
|
|
lapse in posture illustrated a vulnerability that Cruger hadn't
|
|
noticed before.
|
|
Tony dropped his eyes to the floor and said "Sky is in what you
|
|
would have to call a 'sick' relationship. She's been going with this
|
|
guy for a year, and she's tired of him, but she can't get out of it."
|
|
"Why can't she get out of it? Has she tried to break up with
|
|
him?"
|
|
"Oh yeah. In fact she's told him that she wants out and she wants
|
|
to date me. That just makes him grab on tighter and follow her around
|
|
-- I think he's obsessive."
|
|
Cruger pondered Tony's situation, nearly breaking out into an
|
|
inappropriate grin, thinking of the fact that Tony was such an
|
|
extraordinary kid, plagued by ordinary problems.
|
|
"The thing is," Tony said, "she and I have a lot in common, and
|
|
he -- his name is Rick -- doesn't have anything in common with her.
|
|
The guy is a delinquent. Really, I'm not exaggerating."
|
|
Cruger wandered over to the family room couch and motioned Tony
|
|
to follow. The plush carpet and late afternoon sun blended to create a
|
|
calm atmosphere that clashed with Tony's mood.
|
|
Cruger said, "there must be something about this guy that's not
|
|
allowing her to get away. Is she afraid of him?"
|
|
"Well, she might be afraid of him. He's sort of wacko acting
|
|
sometimes, and that scares her."
|
|
Tony was truly a teenager; Cruger could see that now. Not only
|
|
that, but, he was a sensitive young man who must feel like an outsider
|
|
among his peers. Tony lived a secret life that he couldn't share with
|
|
his friends. In the status-hungry phase of late high school, that must
|
|
be a serious social burden.
|
|
"Well, enough of that," said Tony. "We need to get down to some
|
|
business.
|
|
"OK. But if you want to talk about this or anything else like it
|
|
again, feel free."
|
|
"Thanks, Cruger. I don't care what the Big Guy says, you're all
|
|
right."
|
|
Cruger almost jumped off the couch: "Don't scare me like that --
|
|
I went to Catholic School, you know."
|
|
"Sorry," Tony said. "Now that we're being serious, I need to
|
|
continue your orientation lecture. How's the spinning going so far?"
|
|
"Great, considering I don't know what I'm doing."
|
|
Tony paused for second, a look of concentration on his furrowed
|
|
brow. "If you've got time, I like to shoot over the hill to the beach
|
|
to think sometimes. We could talk there if you don't have to be back,"
|
|
Tony said.
|
|
"Actually, that would be fine. I don't have any plans this
|
|
afternoon -- my wife won't be home until seven-thirty." One of the
|
|
luxuries of being a musician who works few hours, Cruger thought.
|
|
Makes up for the magnitude of pay, or the lack thereof.
|
|
"Cool. Let's go." Tony was heading for the door like a rocket,
|
|
his surfer's body being pulled toward the beach by a nearly visible
|
|
magnetic attraction.
|
|
They got into Cruger's car. Tony rifled off instructions before
|
|
they had even left the driveway.
|
|
"Seventeen shouldn't have any traffic going towards Santa Cruz
|
|
this time of day. Take Route One North when we hit it, and then we can
|
|
go to Natural Bridges -- I like that beach a lot."
|
|
Cruger nodded and exhaled deeply, preparing himself for the fifty
|
|
minute drive. Shooting over to Santa Cruz was a young man's move, but
|
|
it felt good to be mobile, to live life to the fullest and get the
|
|
most out of every minute. His back was starting to hurt from the drive
|
|
already. He wondered where his bottle of aspirin was and hoped Tony
|
|
didn't want him to buy some beers -- probably some wispy thin domestic
|
|
beer that tasted like slightly used water but left you with a thick
|
|
headache the next day.
|
|
They started to ascend, having passed quaint Los Gatos nestled in
|
|
the foothills of the coastal mountains. The dense pine and Douglas fir
|
|
forests jutted skyward on each side of the two-lane road, resting atop
|
|
the smallish shoulders of the vertical clay-rock walls that encased
|
|
the highway.
|
|
"I'm going to be a Physics major next year in College, man, I'm
|
|
really into it," Tony said.
|
|
"I think I can understand your fascination with it," said Cruger,
|
|
"In fact, I guess you have access to, what would you call it, inside
|
|
information."
|
|
"Yeah. I mean, the way things work, the scientific method, that's
|
|
everything. The only hope we have is to fully document and describe
|
|
the physics of our environment and our lives, only then are we in
|
|
charge -- you know, the masters of our destiny. Hell, I can't talk to
|
|
people about this at school. If they knew that I skate home after
|
|
school to review Schroedinger's equations, they'd peg me a nerd."
|
|
"So, is that where the 'Tony the GQ surfer dude' act comes from?"
|
|
"Totally dude; like totally," Tony said as he blew his hair out
|
|
of his face.
|
|
"But what else is at stake here? How about this stuff with humans
|
|
being more in control because of the Unified Theorem?" Cruger said.
|
|
"That's the key. And when we get more control because of our
|
|
particular technological approach, I want to be one of those in the
|
|
know. The driver's seat will be for those of us who understand the
|
|
theory. The theory of operation."
|
|
"And where does that leave a dumb old spinner, accordionist, good
|
|
for nothin' like me?" said Cruger. "I hope not as corporate dead
|
|
wood."
|
|
"Oh no," Tony said. "Think job retraining, the wave of the
|
|
future."
|
|
The twisted smile on Tony's face was the kind of smile that
|
|
reflects a sarcasm that is entirely too representative of the truth.
|
|
Cruger tried to take no offense.
|
|
They arrived and Tony led them to the edge of the sand. Cruger
|
|
could only see one person, a quarter mile away, on the deserted beach.
|
|
Waves mercilessly pounded against the shore, slowly grinding the
|
|
fine sand particles into smaller and smoother pieces of sand. Natural
|
|
bridges was a limestone structure that formed a bridge across a small
|
|
ocean inlet. Through the center of the stone structure was large
|
|
circular hole that people would walk through when traveling from one
|
|
section of beach to another.
|
|
Cruger took off his shoes and socks and stepped into the cooling
|
|
sand. The smooth particles massaged the bottoms of his feet, rolling
|
|
across the top of his feet when he took larger steps. Cruger had
|
|
always liked the beach, the winds, the sand, even the fog that
|
|
accompanied most mornings on the shoreline. Now the cool afternoon
|
|
breeze moved through his hair like an invisible rake though grass, the
|
|
salty air massaging health and the robustness of the ocean into his
|
|
scalp.
|
|
Why don't I come here more often, he thought. The same thought he
|
|
had whenever he came, except for the times where he first had to
|
|
struggle through hours of traffic. If you knew when to leave and when
|
|
not to, that wouldn't happen.
|
|
Tony sprinted down to the shoreline, dipped his feet in the foamy
|
|
water, and ran back to Cruger, covering the thirty yards in what seems
|
|
like a couple of seconds.
|
|
"Need to get some exercise -- spent the whole day sitting on my
|
|
rear in class," he said.
|
|
"Right," Cruger said, "a little exercise like that for me and you
|
|
can call 911."
|
|
A gust of wind passed over them, kicking up sand, chips of water-
|
|
logged wood washed in by the tide, and scraps of leaves and seaweed.
|
|
"You need to know some more things about the Company," Tony said.
|
|
"The Company has a large, complex organization, but, I'll tell you
|
|
what you really need to know. As you probably already guessed, a good
|
|
percentage of the Company is composed of people right here from earth.
|
|
"Many of the executive positions are still held by Managers from
|
|
elsewhere. The vast majority of these -- well, I'll call them
|
|
foreigners, sounds better than 'aliens' -- most of them are from the
|
|
same planet: Tvonen. You won't find this planet on any of your
|
|
astronomy charts; I assure you, it's far away. Oh, by the way, the
|
|
Chairman himself is a Tvonen."
|
|
Cruger raised his eyebrows. Now he knew the top dog was an alien,
|
|
did that matter?
|
|
"These foreigners went through a process of evolution quite
|
|
similar to what the humans have endured. However, there are a few
|
|
major differences, and they're important differences."
|
|
Cruger noticed that Tony's ability to talk so matter-of-factly
|
|
about these matters was surprising and frightening -- it even grated
|
|
on him a little. How could God and the secrets of life that had
|
|
previously seemed magical and immortal now be so prosaic?
|
|
"First of all, the Tvonens have creationist mythology that rivals
|
|
the book of Genesis for entertainment value. The only irony is, their
|
|
mythology is not allegorical like ours but entirely factual.
|
|
"It seems that the Tvonens were originally created as a tribe of
|
|
androgynous beings; there were exactly twelve of them and they lived
|
|
in a setting that we would have called Eden. It seems that their
|
|
creator, and exactly who that was is something I will get to later,
|
|
had quite a sense of humor. They were twelve Tvonens living in a
|
|
perfect environment; all the food they needed grew in the ground and
|
|
on trees, the atmosphere and temperature was very mild, although too
|
|
high on the nitrogen side for humans, and there was no disease,
|
|
poverty, pestilence, or taxes to pay.
|
|
"Well what's the catch, you'd probably ask? Like I said, they
|
|
were androgynous; they had no way of reproducing. This did not turn
|
|
out to be such a disaster, though. The original twelve didn't age.
|
|
Their skins remained free of wrinkles and blemishes; their bodies
|
|
stayed young, flexible, and healthy. Before they knew it, centuries of
|
|
our equivalent time had passed and they were all still young and
|
|
healthy.
|
|
"But, now I get to the part about the maker's sense of humor. It
|
|
turns out that one day, one of the twelve who was called Remad, went a
|
|
bit loony. He pulled limbs off tankas, or trees, and ran around in a
|
|
wild circle of self-flagellation. When the others, who were entirely
|
|
horrified, tried to stop Remad, he hit them and then continued on
|
|
himself. The next morning, when Remad awoke, what do you think they
|
|
found?
|
|
Cruger just shrugged.
|
|
"He had grown a sexual organ between his legs -- a penis." Tony
|
|
laughed and shook his head.
|
|
Cruger scratched his head thinking that this, possibly the
|
|
strangest story he had ever heard, was maybe the most important story
|
|
he ever heard.
|
|
"This is a documented fact, dude. To this day a Tvonen can be
|
|
observed to undergo 'the change.'
|
|
"Maybe you can guess the rest. Two days later, another tribe
|
|
member misbehaved badly. The next day this Tvonen had become a she.
|
|
Only four days of groping and rubbing and kissing and general boot-
|
|
strapped sex education before she was pregnant by Remad. Actually it
|
|
wasn't that easy to figure out: the female Tvonen has almost a half
|
|
dozen sexual orifices. Only one is good for reproduction, and it
|
|
varies from individual to individual. Trial and error.
|
|
This conjured up some wild mental images for Cruger. Sounds like
|
|
a couple of sixteen-year-olds trying to do it in the back seat of a
|
|
Volkswagen have it easy compared to the Tvonens, he thought.
|
|
"For the longest time the rest of the original tribe remained as
|
|
they were -- looking younger and healthier every day, actually. Remad
|
|
and his wife, Tvena, had twelve children in as many years. Strange
|
|
thing is, Remad and Tvena were old, wrinkled and dead within sixty
|
|
years.
|
|
"Three centuries later they knew that a special enzyme in their
|
|
blood stream control the secretion of the hormone for sexuality. The
|
|
sex enzyme was activated by exposure to environmental or emotional
|
|
impurities. Centuries later a Tvonen could either have immortality, or
|
|
a life of booze, drugs, sex, and procreation. Isn't that cruel?
|
|
"An interesting footnote to the story of the Tvonens is that
|
|
their early history was characterized as something that roughly
|
|
translates to: "The Fouled Fountain of Youth." Their culture does
|
|
provide the sort of Fountain of Youth that humans have searched for in
|
|
vain. When the Tvonens live in harmony with their environment and
|
|
avoid violence, destruction, and pollutants, they live from that
|
|
fountain. Once converted sexually and environmentally, they can never
|
|
go back. What you see there currently, after millions of years of
|
|
civilization, is a healthy mix of reproductive and immortal Tvonens.
|
|
Of course they have preserved their environment, unlike earthlings, in
|
|
order to give their people a choice between immortality and
|
|
reproductivity."
|
|
Cruger had trouble believing what he just heard. The idea of
|
|
androgynous and immortal sentient beings was hard to swallow. But,
|
|
then again, the idea of technological and "logical" humans destroying
|
|
their own planet was also a tough cookie to crunch.
|
|
"What is their civilization like now?" Cruger asked.
|
|
"Now they are what we would call a very advanced society. They
|
|
have technology that seems amazing. But, keep in mind, they are a lot
|
|
different than humans. For example, they never devised any digital
|
|
electronics. Their entire technology is based on analog computing and
|
|
mineral crystals. What they also have is terrific projective holograms
|
|
that they can transmit with pinpoint accuracy. For clothing, they wear
|
|
trained microorganisms that are self-cleaning and form-fitting."
|
|
Cruger sat there, the salt air blowing across his cool face,
|
|
thinking about the Tvonens. Whereas the sand was beginning to stick to
|
|
every square inch of Cruger's body, those small, coarse annoyances
|
|
seemed to slide off Tony's tanned surfer skin, as if he were coated
|
|
with teflon. Maybe the sand knew who its friends were.
|
|
"Normally science progress with one smallish advancement after
|
|
the other. Each scientist stands on the shoulders of all his worthy
|
|
predecessors. One thing that was never done before is to stand on the
|
|
shoulders of alien scientists -- that is how we've skipped a few steps
|
|
here and advanced so quickly," Tony said.
|
|
"You mean the Tvonens, they've helped us?" Cruger asked.
|
|
"Yes, the ones that are running the company. They've pitched in a
|
|
few key ideas that have allowed us to tie together string theory with
|
|
the singularities -- black holes and the Big Bang phenomenon. Without
|
|
the little tidbits they provided, we would probably still be stuck for
|
|
a decade or even a century or two."
|
|
The wind blew Cruger's thin, curly hair down across his eyes. He
|
|
absently swept the hair away with his forearm.
|
|
Tony explained that the theoretical physicists had made some
|
|
breakthroughs that even the company's R&D department didn't
|
|
immediately understand. Einstein had proposed a theorem that the
|
|
company engineers, the planet builders, had to check on to see if it
|
|
was actually the equivalent of their method. The theoretical
|
|
physicists of the '70s through now had come incredibly close to
|
|
defining the time/space continuum, at least in human terms, in their
|
|
"string theory" as it relates to the formation of planets, galaxies,
|
|
and the universe. The work of Hawking and Penrose had brought the
|
|
theory closer to full proof.
|
|
"I don't know what happened to the original universe builders
|
|
because they are working on new projects. You know, the ones who
|
|
originally built the earth and all the galaxies. They're
|
|
entrepreneurial types. The maintenance engineers must check the
|
|
relativity and string theory to see if we really have done the
|
|
incredible: this planet itself has evolved a species to the point that
|
|
it has defined or even surpassed the knowledge of its creator." Tony
|
|
smiled proudly, his already bright eyes putting out a higher amperage
|
|
gleam. "An incredible notion. Think about it, we're the student
|
|
actually surpassing the teacher -- doesn't happen often."
|
|
"Yes, but if it's cliches you're looking for, 'those who can do,
|
|
and those who cannot teach'," Cruger said.
|
|
"Mmm. That would be saying the creator can't create? I think, as
|
|
a species, humans are self-taught. In a nutshell, that's what
|
|
evolution of an intelligent species is: the slow education of a
|
|
species over time. We could call it Intellivolution."
|
|
Tony grabbed a quick breath and then continued in a deep,
|
|
confident voice. "A better analogy is the notion that someone like you
|
|
could buy a fish tank, put in some fish, plants and food. You then
|
|
come back to check on the tank a 'while' later -- remember the
|
|
fragility of the notion of time -- and then the tank is full of smooth
|
|
skinned little "fish" with arms that are telling you how the pump and
|
|
filter work and what they want to be fed. That's the human condition,"
|
|
Tony said.
|
|
Cruger expected Tony to follow with the words 'Q.E.D' -- Tony had
|
|
sounded formal and overly confident in his statements. Cruger grimaced
|
|
during Tony's comparison of humans to fish but vowed not to take it
|
|
personally.
|
|
Tony noticed Cruger's displeasure. "Hey, I am as human as you
|
|
are, bud. I know it hurts. But admit it, we humans aren't God's gift,
|
|
so to speak."
|
|
Cruger chuckled. He thought about what Tony had said, wishing
|
|
that he had any kind of a background in science at all that would help
|
|
understand the concepts that Tony wrestled with.
|
|
"Can there really be a complete Unified Theory?" Cruger asked. "I
|
|
mean, everything seems so infinite, how can it all be explained or
|
|
managed?"
|
|
Tony nodded his head. "Right, it's all mind-boggling. Another
|
|
possibility that had been investigated was that there is actually no
|
|
theory of the universe that describes all of the actions and behaviors
|
|
in a scientific sense. It could be that an infinite series of
|
|
different explanations exist that apply to each situation. Just like
|
|
you wondered, it has been thought possible that there is really no
|
|
theory of life and the universe. Events cannot be predicted beyond a
|
|
certain extent; they occur in an random and arbitrary manner.
|
|
"Even if we were able to fully quantize the Unified Theory, for
|
|
example in a series of algorithms on a computer, the theory would
|
|
still remain undeniably separate from implementation. As an example,
|
|
even if we completely understood every detail of the functioning of
|
|
the human body, it would still take a long time to learn to actually
|
|
create or 'build' that body.
|
|
"In the same way, understanding the entire universe and creation
|
|
of universes would leave a lot of work to be done in implementing
|
|
tools that implement the theory."
|
|
"But, they have the tools -- they've provided that step?" Cruger
|
|
asked.
|
|
"Yes, I have converted their system into a human implementation
|
|
that actually uses computers. Digital electronics is our big addition
|
|
or contribution to this model," Tony said.
|
|
"That's hard to believe. What they originally used must work,
|
|
right? Why would they want to convert to our technology?" Cruger could
|
|
not imagine a computer running the show. Images of '50s science
|
|
fiction films and the overused term 'computer error' popped into his
|
|
mind.
|
|
"I can think of a few possible reasons. For one, in order for
|
|
earth to maintain itself, it may need to have a system developed in
|
|
its frame of reference, a human frame of reference. Another
|
|
possibility is that since we were getting so close ourselves to
|
|
cracking the code -- remember what I said about string theory -- that
|
|
they may have just expedited our own destiny."
|
|
"Great. It also sounds like this 'promoting from within' was a
|
|
factor. If you want humans to do the job, give them endemic, human-
|
|
oriented tools," Cruger said.
|
|
"Tools that are user-friendly," Tony said, following his
|
|
marketing jargon with a sardonic grin.
|
|
As the orange sun started to hide itself behind the lighthouse,
|
|
beach cliffs, and twisted Monterey Cyprus trees on the horizon, they
|
|
packed up, brushed off sand, and began the drive home.
|
|
"What about spinning?" Cruger asked while guiding the car over
|
|
the twisted road across the Santa Cruz mountains. "Is there anything
|
|
more that I should know or concentrate on when I do it?"
|
|
"No. I can't tell you exactly how to do your job, that would be
|
|
prejudicing the future's outcome. You must simply do it the way you
|
|
would naturally do it, without direction," Tony said.
|
|
A while later Cruger pulled car into his driveway. He and Tony
|
|
said goodbye and Tony grabbed his skateboard. Hips swerving and knees
|
|
rolling, he sped down Cruger's driveway, all the while whistling a
|
|
small, nearly silent song that played hauntingly in Cruger's mind as
|
|
his tired legs walked the front steps of his beckoning home.
|
|
Crouched along the fence, watering can in hand, was Cruger's
|
|
neighbor, Leon Harris.
|
|
Harris had been curious about the young visitor that Cruger had
|
|
entertained twice before. Explaining that he planned to work on
|
|
documentation at home that afternoon, Harris sat by his bay window
|
|
looking for anything out of the ordinary at Cruger's house. Luckily,
|
|
he found it. What's with the blond kid, Harris wondered. And the
|
|
accordion and the blue light at night?
|
|
Harris was cursed with the curiosity of a cat. He would not rest
|
|
until he understood what was going on.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Ten
|
|
|
|
Cruger sat crouched over his accordion as he played. The notes he
|
|
struck had a special warmth that night, a deep dark sound that
|
|
reminded Cruger of the pounding Pacific ocean surf. The room was
|
|
fairly dark, brightened only by a single lamp covered by its dark
|
|
brown shade. Earth-tone light reflected off the warm, egg-shell-
|
|
painted walls. He looked at his trusted, dusty old books in the large
|
|
teak bookshelf as he carelessly flipped his fingers across the piano
|
|
accordion's keyboard.
|
|
As he played, unbeknownst to him, babies were born, elderly and
|
|
sick people died, and innumerable twists of fate and fortune ensued.
|
|
Not all events were strings that were spun. Not all events that were
|
|
spun were done by Cruger. The complex interplay of strings was ever
|
|
changing, always evolving. Cruger would never know the exact results
|
|
of his actions.
|
|
Within the next three weeks, a 7.2 magnitude earthquake hit the
|
|
San Francisco Bay Area. Part of the Oakland/San Francisco Bay Bridge
|
|
collapsed. The Highway 880 Cypress structure collapsed. New lives
|
|
began. Medical breakthroughs were made.
|
|
A spinner in Iowa used his flour mill to do the special deed. One
|
|
evening, he got into a fight with his wife over the subject of
|
|
children. She wanted a large family of eight or ten children, he
|
|
wanted to stop with three boys. Enough children, enough children, he
|
|
thought.
|
|
He went in to the barn and began spinning. Blue threads of light
|
|
ricocheted off the millstone and across the pale, straw covered barn
|
|
floor.
|
|
That night, 700 miles away, a future President of the United
|
|
States was conceived. A big night, even for a spinner.
|
|
|
|
A solitary spinner in Moscow sat in front of the his large wooden
|
|
chessboard. Each exquisitely crafted onyx piece was an individual,
|
|
telling a sordid tale of battle and emotions through their small scars
|
|
resembling nicks and scratches found across their exteriors. The
|
|
spinner, a Grandmaster -- only playing against himself, with this
|
|
chess set, in the warm, dark room -- used the Karamoff defense; as he
|
|
moved the Knight blue streaks splattered the dull plaster walls.
|
|
"Checkmate," he told himself.
|
|
|
|
A man in California attached thirty-five large helium balloons to
|
|
his deck chair; he wanted to see what would happen. What happened was:
|
|
he floated into the sky. The air pistol that he brought along to pop
|
|
the balloons, one by one, in order to smoothly descend, fell down
|
|
between the chairs slats. He drifted up to 17,000 feet, waving to
|
|
passing birds and airplanes indiscriminately.
|
|
Spinners could not be held accountable for everything every idiot
|
|
did.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Eleven
|
|
|
|
"It's close to school actually, only take a minute to get there"
|
|
Tony said.
|
|
Tony wanted to show Cruger where he hung out when he was doing
|
|
"company work." They got into Cruger's Honda Accord, started it up.
|
|
The small engine purred like an overfed kitten.
|
|
The building was, as promised, a five minute drive from Cruger's
|
|
house. Tony's office was rented space in a small office building
|
|
shared by a Title Company, some Law offices, and Tony's facade
|
|
business. The placard outside his office entrance read "Universal
|
|
Properties, Inc."
|
|
Tony's office had a small desk sitting in the middle of the room.
|
|
On the small desk was a thick blue cable weaving a circuitous path to
|
|
a two-inch hole in the wall.
|
|
They sat at Tony's small, plain desk.
|
|
"We need to continue your training," Tony said. "You only got a
|
|
small dose of it so far."
|
|
Tony leaned back in his office chair and kicked his legs up on
|
|
the desk. "The other source of intelligent life that we know about is
|
|
the Chysa planet. They are actually a totally different story than the
|
|
Tvonens."
|
|
Cruger felt like a child listening to his father tell bedtime
|
|
stories. But, he was no child; Tony was no parent; these were no
|
|
bedtime stories.
|
|
Tony continued. "The Chysans are evidently really low-tech. If it
|
|
weren't for the Tvonens, they would not have any representation on
|
|
Earth or in the Company at all. No one has seen them in their real
|
|
form -- "
|
|
"But you said they were on Earth," Cruger said. He had been
|
|
trying to form a mental image of these people and their ways. If no
|
|
one knew what they looked like, how could he imagine them?
|
|
"Yes, but what I hadn't mentioned yet is that they evidently can
|
|
disguise themselves very well. I don't know for sure, but they seem to
|
|
easily take on new forms or at least wear very good disguises."
|
|
"Are we talking about adding something like makeup to their
|
|
faces, or are we talking about completely changing shape?"
|
|
"I don't know," Tony said.
|
|
Cruger wished he faced more absolutes, more certainties; all he
|
|
could get so far were maybes.
|
|
"Then how do we know that they exist and are here?" said Cruger.
|
|
"You just have to take it on faith, my man. We have intelligence
|
|
reports that say so."
|
|
Cruger wondered if these "low-tech" intergalactic hitchhikers
|
|
were really so low-tech. Seemed like they had kept a pretty low
|
|
profile so far. That takes a little intelligence, at least.
|
|
"Is there any sure-fire way to know which ones they are?"
|
|
"No," said Tony. "I consider that an important area for future
|
|
research. Especially since many of them may be involved with the Other
|
|
Company."
|
|
The words fell on Cruger like a sack of rocks. He had begun to
|
|
imagine these people, or whatevers, as playful, somewhat backwards
|
|
magicians. He had wanted to think of them like cute sea otters at the
|
|
zoo: swimming on their backs, doing flips, and generally mimicking
|
|
human behavior in a delightfully anthropomorphic way. It now seemed
|
|
that the Chysa were not so innocent and playful.
|
|
"Why the Other Company?"
|
|
"That may be how they were recruited by delinquent Tvonens. The
|
|
Chysa have a tendency towards deceit and magic. This, in a way,
|
|
parallels the philosophy of the Other Company. You know, they are
|
|
totally into deceit and trickery. In the Chysa culture, this is
|
|
considered to be exemplary behavior."
|
|
"The question is, do they really know what they are doing, or are
|
|
they pawns?" Cruger said.
|
|
The luminance of the color computer monitor reflected a bright
|
|
and diffused image off Tony's face. "We don't really know, but, it
|
|
would probably be a mistake to think that they are mindless and don't
|
|
really know what they're up to. Just because they are not more
|
|
technologically advanced than us doesn't mean that they are stupider
|
|
than us," Tony said. "In some ways, we are really stupid. We may be
|
|
destroying our planet beyond help. We have, throughout history,
|
|
committed genocide. We may be the most homicidal intelligent life form
|
|
that ever lived. Maybe the Chysa aren't so stupid."
|
|
Cruger couldn't disagree. In one breath, humans were aspiring to
|
|
godliness. In the next, humans were possibly the stupidest of the
|
|
"intelligent" life forms. Contemplating the possibilities of combining
|
|
stupidity and power frightened Cruger. Absolute power corrupts
|
|
absolutely. How could he, of all people -- Jack Cruger, the laid-back
|
|
musician -- be involved in what was starting to sound,
|
|
disappointingly, a hell of a lot like politics.
|
|
Tony gave him a computer overview; Tony had accomplished a great
|
|
deal on the computer so far. When Cruger's attention and energy level
|
|
began to fall off quickly, they agreed to get together again Saturday.
|
|
|
|
The next day Cruger gave his accordion lessons as usual, except
|
|
an extra sense of pride and meaning filled what must have been a void
|
|
in his life. He was proud of himself, proud of Corrina, happy with
|
|
what life had recently dealt him. Now he was giving something
|
|
important back, possibly making the world a better place. Heck, maybe
|
|
making the universe a better place.
|
|
The quote, we are spinning our own fates, good or evil, and never
|
|
to be undone popped into his head. How true -- who had said that?
|
|
James, or maybe Emerson. Little did they know just how right they
|
|
were.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Twelve
|
|
|
|
The engaging back-beat of the legato bass-line anchored the
|
|
solid, driving blues that Cruger coaxed from his accordion. He had
|
|
developed yet another new technique: he played the bass line with his
|
|
left hand while reaching over and playing the melody, higher on the
|
|
keyboard, with his right hand. The bellows were pumped with his elbows
|
|
while both hands worked out the dirty blues in synchronicity.
|
|
Next, he picked up the tempo and banged out a respectable
|
|
arrangement of Charlie Parker's "Donna Lee." Corrina would like this -
|
|
- too bad she isn't home yet. The other night she heard him playing
|
|
"Dolphin Dance" and "On Green Dolphin Street." Was he in a dolphin
|
|
mood that night, whatever the hell a dolphin mood may be? She was as
|
|
surprised as she had yet been in their three-year marriage -- wasn't
|
|
she the one with the stack of Miles, Bird, and Coltrane albums, while
|
|
he had the most unhip of old records ("The Schmucker brothers play the
|
|
Catskills") piled in their wall unit?
|
|
"Hey, you're playing some good stuff, I can't believe it," she
|
|
had said.
|
|
"Well, I'm just getting into some more jazz and classical to
|
|
broaden myself. Your bebop albums are pretty good after all, now that
|
|
I actually listen to them. I have to admit."
|
|
She continued listening from the kitchen, not yet seeing and
|
|
questioning his instrument's secret blue sparks. Next he played Bach's
|
|
Toccata in D minor. Very dramatic. He finished up with a rousing
|
|
version of Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze." Cruger clacked the keys for
|
|
percussive effect and even nursed a hypnotic distortion from the box,
|
|
blue streaks flying. Hendrix on accordion? Maybe this is pushing it a
|
|
little, he thought.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Thirteen
|
|
|
|
Bright and blue beyond belief, the Saturday morning sky hung like
|
|
a warm protective blanket across the wide sky. Tony walked to the
|
|
front door of Jack Cruger's house. Just as he heard the slightest
|
|
rustle of a sound, he turned to see something large, colorful, and
|
|
horrible. It was on him in an instant. Tony was thrown hard to the
|
|
concrete steps. As his clothes were ripped and torn, he felt immobile,
|
|
suffocated, entirely constrained and helpless.
|
|
He was punched, kicked, crushed, pinched and groped. Every square
|
|
inch of his body was touched, attacked, in some way. His clothes were
|
|
torn away from his body, leaving him naked, exposed, humiliated.
|
|
Tony's sense of time bogged-down to the slow-motion rate of
|
|
tragedy and disaster; the entire encounter really lasted only seconds.
|
|
He lay near death, only shock and the hallucinogenic aftertaste
|
|
of violence spared him from terrible pain.
|
|
He swallowed the salty and fast-flowing blood that filled his
|
|
mouth. A slow calm kept him from panic. He knew to conserve energy, to
|
|
hug himself tight and construct a spiritual cocoon around his
|
|
destroyed body.
|
|
Faint in the distance he heard the doorbell ring inside Cruger's
|
|
home. He felt himself slipping closer to that dark, cold cave that
|
|
filled his mind with images of pure fear. As if a brutal joke were
|
|
being played, Tony heard the thin beep-beep-beep of his digital watch
|
|
alarm -- telling him his time was up? Then, as if hitting an ice
|
|
slick, he slid quickly into the cold and gloomy abyss of his
|
|
nightmares. He was gone.
|
|
|
|
Chapter Fourteen
|
|
|
|
Friday had been a lousy looking day. The foggy and smoggy sky
|
|
pasted a dull gray tint across everything below it. Clouds, trees,
|
|
houses, birds, and cars absorbed the depressing dull radiation and
|
|
emitted a picture of impassive apathy.
|
|
A rotten day.
|
|
Saturday was different. In a climactic zone that rarely had
|
|
quickly-changing weather -- Cruger's friends on the East coast saw
|
|
wild weather swings like this all the time -- Saturday was a big
|
|
switch. The wind blew just strong enough to clear the skies to a
|
|
bright blue. The smog count was low, the conifer pollen count high.
|
|
Bright sunlight tunneled through Cruger's silky curtains, illuminating
|
|
small dust particles, the kind usually never seen unless the light
|
|
shines through them at a certain angle.
|
|
Cruger was home washing the dishes, Corrina just having left to
|
|
work. Cruger never taught lessons Saturday. Some Saturdays he would
|
|
play a birthday party, Bar Mitzvah, or wedding reception. Not today.
|
|
He wanted to sit and think. Pulling himself away from the regular
|
|
monotonous list of duties he usually attended to, he would figure out
|
|
what was happening in his life. Too much -- he knew that at least.
|
|
The doorbell rang. Cruger dried his hands and walked to the front
|
|
door.
|
|
Cruger's stomach compressed into a tight knot. The horrid
|
|
wake of catastrophe flooded Cruger from his toes to his fingertips.
|
|
Tony lay face down on the doorstep, a puddle of crimson liquid forming
|
|
around his limp blond hair.
|
|
Tony's innocent exuberance for life was gone, wasted, spilt like a
|
|
child's first glass of wine; spilled like Tony's blood across Cruger's
|
|
doorstep.
|
|
Cruger reached down to feel for a pulse, but, he knew the answer
|
|
before he even began to bend over. The realization of Tony's death hit
|
|
him; the emotional collision with an overly harsh reality demanded
|
|
some necessarily inadequate dissipation of unwanted energy.
|
|
Cruger exhaled loudly "No . . .my God," and then sunk to his knees,
|
|
not knowing what to do.
|
|
And that sound, what was that sound? Cruger then saw the black
|
|
digital sports watch on Tony's wrist, chirping its annoying
|
|
repetitious chirp over and over.
|
|
Leon Harris stuck his head out of his front door. He saw Cruger
|
|
doubled over in front of his young friend, who lay in an entirely
|
|
unnatural position, limp armed and limp legged. Harris ran across his
|
|
lawn to Cruger's front step.
|
|
"What happened?" Harris said.
|
|
Cruger's heart fluttered like a bird's; his skin was flushed from
|
|
the neck up.
|
|
"I don't know," Cruger said, "I think he's dead."
|
|
Harris bent down and checked both Tony's carotid and radials
|
|
arteries for a pulse.
|
|
"Yeah ... I'm afraid you're right."
|
|
Cruger reached down and unstrapped the noisy watch from Tony's
|
|
lifeless wrist. Using the heel of his shoe, Cruger stomped down on the
|
|
fancy blue plastic watch a few times before it was silenced. He wanted
|
|
to see a spray of springs and clamps and smoke pouting out like in the
|
|
cartoons, but the watch only lay there, in the stark sunlight, like
|
|
Tony: beaten, broken, and wasted.
|
|
|
|
To be continued...
|
|
|
|
--
|
|
JEFF ZIAS (ZIAS1@AppleLink.Apple.com) has written and managed software
|
|
at Apple Computer for ten years, and will soon begin a stint with a
|
|
new software company. He enjoys spending time with his wife and two
|
|
small children, playing jazz with Bay Area groups, writing software
|
|
and prose, and building toys for his children to trash. The Unified
|
|
Murder Theorem will continue next issue.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
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|
THE FOLLOWING ARE ADVERTISEMENTS. INTERTEXT IS NOT
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RESPONSIBLE FOR THE VERACITY OF THE ABOVE ADS.
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Quanta (ISSN 1053-8496) is the electronically distributed journal of
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Science Fiction and Fantasy. As such, each issue contains fiction by
|
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amateur authors as well as articles, reviews, etc...
|
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Quanta is published in two formats, ASCII and PostScript(TM) (for
|
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PostScript compatible laser-printers). Submissions should be sent to
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quanta@andrew.cmu.edu. Requests to be added to the distribution list
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should be sent to one of the following depending on which version of
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the magazine you'd like to receive.
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or
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Send mail only -- no interactive messages or files please. The main
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Directory: /pub/quanta
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--
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In addition to InterText and Quanta, there are several other network-
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distributed "publications."
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DARGONZINE is a text-only electronic magazine printing stories from
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written for the Dargon Project, a shared-world anthology with a
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CORE is a network journal edited by Rita Rouvalis, and is available in
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ASCII format only. For a subscription, mail Rita at: rita@eff.org
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Submit! You will submit to INTERTEXT! No, we're not trying to dominate
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we can't without submissions from people out there in the net! Write
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Basically, any genre is fine and length is rarely, if ever, a concern.
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We like it if you haven't posted the story to a network newsgroup, and
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Submissions can be in ASCII or, for those with the ability, RTF
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Spectre Publications, Inc. is a relatively young corporation
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publishing a biannual anthology of previously unpublished manuscripts.
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The books are titled FUSION, representing the amalgamation of three
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genres (Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror) beneath one cover.
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FUSION is largely composed of strong college manuscripts submitted by
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students from across the country. For more information on submission
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P.O. Box 159, Paramus, NJ 07653-0159
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Tel: 209-265-5541 Fax: 201-265-5542
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InterText Vol. 2, No. 1. InterText is published electronically on a
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Internet, BITNET, and UUCP. Reproduction of this magazine is permitted
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as long as the magazine is not sold and the content of the magazine is
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not changed in any way. Copyright (C) 1992, Jason Snell. All stories
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next issue is scheduled for March 15, 1992. A PostScript version of
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For subscription requests, email: intertxt@network.ucsd.edu
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--------------------------------------------------------------------
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Thanks for swingin' past the farm. Ma loves it when you bring the
|
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young folk to see us.
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--------------------------------------------------------------------
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