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InterText - Volume 2, Number 2
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IIIII N N TTTTT EEEEE RRRR TTTTT EEEEE X X TTTTT
I NN N T E R R T E X XX T
I N N N T EEE RRRR T EEE XX T
I N NN T E R R T E XX X T
IIIII N N T EEEEE R R T EEEEE X X T
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Volume 2, Number 2 March-April 1992
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INSIDE THIS ISSUE
FirstText / JASON SNELL & GEOFF DUNCAN
Frog Boy / ROBERT HURVITZ
Cannibals Shrink Elvis' Head / PHIL NOLTE
The Naming Game / TARL ROGER KUDRICK
Boy / N. RIDLEY MCINTYRE
The Unified Murder Theorem (2 of 4) / JEFF ZIAS
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Editor: Jason Snell ([email protected])
Assistant Editor: Geoff Duncan ([email protected])
Assistant Editor: Phil Nolte ([email protected])
--------------------------------------------------------------------
InterText Vol. 2, No. 2. InterText is published electronically on a
bi-monthly basis, and distributed via electronic mail over the
Internet, BITNET, and UUCP. Reproduction of this magazine is
permitted as long as the magazine is not sold and the content of the
magazine is not changed in any way. Copyright (C) 1992, Jason Snell.
All stories (C) 1992 by their respective authors. All further rights
to stories belong to the authors. The ASCII InterText is exported
from PageMaker 4.01 files into Microsoft Word 5.0 for text
preparation. Worldwide subscribers: 1100. Our next issue is scheduled
for May 1, 1992. A PostScript version of this magazine is available
from the same sources, and looks a lot nicer, if you have access to
laser printers.
For subscription requests, e-mail: [email protected]
->Back issues available via FTP at: network.ucsd.edu<-
--------------------------------------------------------------------
FirstText / JASON SNELL
It's hard to believe that it's been a year.
I remember when I first discovered that Jim McCabe's _Athene_
would be ceasing publication, and I remember thinking to myself: hey,
there's something I wouldn't mind doing. An electronic magazine. Why
not?
And here we are, one year and six issues later.
The magazine has grown and changed over the past year, with the
amount of text per issue growing by leaps and bounds. We've got more
subscribers now, though the official number has been hovering
slightly over 1,000 for quite some time now.
One of the stories in this issue, "Cannibals Shrink Elvis' Head"
by Phil Nolte, has quite a history behind it. It is one of the "lost"
stories of _Athene_, a story slated for appearance in the final issue
of that magazine (my own "Peoplesurfing" was another) that never
appeared. I've had the story sitting around for quite some time. The
catch is, I didn't know who wrote it.
Now -- this may seem unrelated, but trust me -- about a month
ago I participated in a strange meeting that has only really become
possible with the advent of computer communications: I met, face-to-
face, one of my assistant editors and contributors, a man whose
stories I've been reading for four years. His name is Phil Nolte, and
he works at the University of Idaho. As you may or may not know,
Idaho is famous for its potatoes, so much so that their license
plates have the phrase "Famous Potatoes" stamped right on them.
Here's the catch: the University of Idaho has a special potato
testing farm (or something like that -- all I know about potatoes is
that you're supposed to poke holes in them before you stick them in
the microwave oven) in Oceanside, a town just a few miles north of
San Diego. And Phil Nolte was going there for an 'Open House.'
I met him at a restaurant about a 10 minute walk from the UCSD
campus, and we talked for a few hours over lunch before he headed for
the airport and, eventually, back home.
I've done things like this before: my first girlfriend was
someone I met on a computer bulletin board I ran in high school (see
my story "Sharp and Silver Beings," in the Dec. 1990 issue of
_Quanta_, for details), and since then I've met a few other bulletin
board or computer network folk face-to-face. It's even a strange
experience to talk to them on the phone, as I did with Dan Appelquist
a few months back.
I digress. At any rate, it was fun actually >talking< to Phil,
about writing, computer communication, and all sorts of other stuff.
And at one point, as we were discussing Jim McCabe and _Athene_, I
mentioned a story I had called something like "Aliens Stole Elvis'
Brain."
"Why, that's 'Cannibals Shrink Elvis' Head!'," he told me. "I
wrote that!"
So it was. I had never bothered to ask Phil in e-mail, but over
lunch we finally overcame a year-long communication barrier.
The moral of this story? Maybe that while computer communication
is an incredible thing, it also can foster a lot of
misunderstandings. (So, of course, can live human communication --
it's just that the misunderstandings fostered by computer
communication are of a different type.)
In addition to Phil Nolte's store, this issue brings us a few
other fine short stories and the continuation of Jeff Zias' "Unified
Murder Theorem." Jeff informs me that a few readers have mailed him,
asking to be sent the rest of the story so they can know what happens
before the conclusion (which should appear in mid-June... we're only
halfway through now.)
I encouraged Jeff to make the readers wait. First off, waiting
will make the cliffhangers much more interesting, and we are
providing synopses to refresh your memory of the previous
installment. In addition, the version of the story that appears in
InterText will be somewhat different than the version Mr. Zias has at
home. Geoff Duncan and I have been jointly handling the editing of
"Unified Murder Theorem," and if we haven't been completely lax in
our duties, what you see here will be the "preferred form" of
"Unified Murder Theorem."
Before I go, I'd like to thank Mel Marcelo for providing us with
the special "First Anniversary" cover art (sorry to those ASCII
subscribers who can't see it).
I'd also like to mention that ASCII subscribers should hopefully
have an easier time reading the stories with this issue -- italicized
words in the PostScript version are indicated by >these< in the ASCII
version.
Finally, I'd like to thank Geoff Duncan -- an act which is
becoming a habit of mine -- for contributing a column of his own for
this special issue. It's well worth reading, I can assure you. (As a
sidelight, while I've met Phil Nolte and spoken with Dan Appelquist,
Geoff and I have never even spoken. His hometown of Reno, Nevada is
only a couple of hours from my hometown (Sonora, California), so I'm
hoping I'll get to meet him sometime in the future.)
Enough of me, already.
Until next time, I wish you all well.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
FirstText / GEOFF DUNCAN
Recently, I had the opportunity to have lunch with one of the
people who got me started in computing. I'd been the wide-eyed first-
year undergraduate who had barely touched a computer; he'd been the
intimidating electroculture veteran, mentor to everyone who was
anyone on the machines. He'd lived during a local "golden age" of
electronic fiction, when there had been a virtual writer's community
on the campus mainframes. Now he was a computing professional wearing
a suit and passing out business cards, while I still worked on campus
and hadn't cut my hair. Funny how times change and people change with
them.
Over cafeteria food we reminisced about computer gurus,
primitive graphics, and the old days of e-mail serials. It was time
well-spent, a validation of our pasts and the things that had been
important to us. I discovered his interests include avant-garde
gothic rock; he was amused to learn I was an assistant editor for a
network-based fiction magazine. "Don't you ever grow up?" he asked
between sips of coffee. "Electronic fiction is dead, if it ever lived
in the first place."
Mildly offended, I pressed him on the issue. It's not dead, I
explained. It's doing better now than ever before. "That's not the
point," he said. "Electronic fiction will probably continue to grow
for some time. But it's crippled by its medium. Computing is based on
information, and information is measured by volume, not by content.
You only offer content. You'll eventually run out of stories, then
writers, then readers." He sat back and crushed the paper cup. "It's
just a matter of time."
I laughed in his face. We'll see who's right in the end, bucko.
We spent a few minutes exchanging e-mail addresses and then parted
amicably. I went back to my office and my usual routine; he went back
to Brooklyn and a high-rise office tower. And that was the end of it.
Except what he'd said kept bothering me. Is electronic fiction
doomed from the start? Is its very media -- information technology --
going to be its demise?
It's obvious that electronic fiction wouldn't exist without
information technology. What's not so obvious is that information
technology supports the >amount< of information available without
regard to the meaning of that information. Technology lets us store,
organize, and retrieve more material than ever before. But what is it
that we're storing, organizing, and retrieving?
"Signal-to-noise ratio" is a term used to describe exactly this
dynamic. In a nutshell, "signal" is the content you want to receive
and "noise" is any other information that comes along with it. The
term actually predates computers: on a telephone system, noise was
literally "noise" -- hissing and crackling. But the idea still
applies: the lower the ratio of signal to noise becomes, the less
worthwhile it is for you to pay attention to the information as a
whole. It hurts your ears.
The signal-to-noise ratio of information technology today (and
of large computer networks in particular) is generally low. This has
a lot to do with the diversity of information available -- not
everyone is interested in a constant feed of Star Trek trivia. But it
also has to do with the way in which people >use< information
technology. From the point of view of any particular person, most
users don't generate much >signal<, but they do generate a fair bit
of noise. Most electronic information is addressed to a narrow
audience or is related to the use of the media itself. Very little of
the available material is intended for a wide audience.
I realized that this is what my friend was trying to tell me
about electronic fiction. The people producing the signal are vastly
outweighed by all the people producing the noise. My friend doesn't
believe that projects such as _Quanta_ and InterText can be heard for
long above the din of the mob. And even if these projects survive,
how many people will try to distinguish them from the tumult? It's
easier to ignore it all.
Well, maybe my friend is right. There is evidence. To my
knowledge, none of the network magazines have much of a catalog on
hand, perhaps with the exception of _DargonZine_. I've seen most
network-magazines print outright pleas for submissions. Maybe there's
already a lack of >signal< in electronic fiction.
And perhaps I shouldn't say this, but editorial support is also
a problem. At most, a small group of people produces each
publication; the departure of one person can seriously affect a
magazine. _Athene_ shut down because of the time commitment involved.
Furthermore, network access is not guaranteed. A graduation or a
career change can stop a publication overnight. So coupled with a
weak signal, we may have a weak transmitter. Maybe we >are< a match
in the dark, merely putting off the inevitable.
But looking back, I still think my friend doesn't quite know
what he's talking about. Electronic fiction has come a long way since
its indeterminate inception. Beginning with Orny Liscomb's _FSFnet_,
we've seen a very long-running shared universe in _DargonZine_, the
on-line magazine _The Runic Robot_, the irrepressible "PULP", and a
new set of far-reaching magazines -- _Athene_, _Quanta_, and (of
course) InterText. And that doesn't take into account commercial
services and local electronic institutions: published novels have
made their first appearances on networks such as GEnie, and e-mail
serials continue like clockwork. New publications are emerging such
as Rita Rouvalis' _CORE_. I used to be able to count the editorship
of electronic fiction on one hand; now I scarcely know where to
start.
Cooperation between publications is astounding. InterText's page
of ads is one example; a more significant one is the comprehensive
access site recently created at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Looking through that site, I am impressed by what a few hyperactive,
impulsive editor-types have managed to coax out of the on-line
community. I'm a little bit proud to be part of it.
All this may add up to a little more >noise<, but it also
creates a much stronger >signal<. "Real" publications (and with them
"real" authors) are taking notice. Subscriptions aren't flagging.
There has to be fuel for the fire, and for now things are getting
brighter.
The funny part is that my friend sent me some e-mail the other
day. "That magazine thing you mentioned," he wrote. "Sign me up. And
it'd better be good, or I'll give you a swift kick in the disk
packs." Maybe my friend shouldn't try to be an electronic comedian,
but he only verified what I knew all along: >content< is what counts.
Or none of us would be involved.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Frog Boy / ROBERT HURVITZ
Johnny Feldspar woke up one February morning feeling slightly
different. He couldn't put his finger on exactly what it was, but it
bothered him nonetheless. He got out of bed, walked over to his
aquarium, and pulled out his pet frog, Jumper.
"And how are you feeling today?" Johnny asked his frog, gingerly
stroking the cool, damp skin.
"Ribbit," said Jumper noncommittally.
Johnny held the frog up to his face. "You look kinda hungry.
I'll stop by the pet store after school and get some food for you.
Okay?"
"Ribbit," Jumper repeated.
Johnny put his frog back in its little home, locked the lid, got
dressed, and went downstairs for breakfast. His mother was pouring
milk into a bowl of cereal when Johnny sat down at the kitchen table.
She placed the cereal bowl and a spoon in front of him.
"And how are we feeling today, Johnny?" she asked.
He took a mouthful of cereal and said between chews, "I feel
kinda funny, Mom--"
"Don't speak with your mouth full," his mother said. "It's
impolite." She reached over and tousled his hair. "How many times
have I told you that?"
Johnny grinned sheepishly and swallowed. "Sorry, Mom."
"That's okay. Now what were you going to say?"
"I feel kinda funny."
"Are you sick?" She sat down next to him and put her hand on his
forehead. "You're not running a temperature." She looked at her watch
and scowled. "Damn. I've got an important meeting at nine, so I don't
have time to take you to a doctor..." She drummed her fingers on the
formica table-top.
"I'm not sick, Mom. I just feel kinda funny." He frowned. "I'm
not sick."
Johnny's mother crossed her arms and looked at him. Then she
smiled. "I know what it is," she said. "You're just nervous because
it's Valentine's Day and you're afraid you won't get any valentines,
right?"
Johnny looked at his hands. >Valentine's Day.< The words came
crashing down on his ears like panes of glass, shattering. How could
he have forgotten? He'd spent the last three nights churning out
valentines for all the girls in his class, as per his mother's stern
instructions. If it had been up to him, in everybody's Valentine's
Day mailbox, which they had all made out of cardboard the previous
week as an art lesson, he would have put frogs.
>Frogs...<
Palm up, fingers stretching out to infinity, Johnny's right hand
had slowly gained his complete attention. He clenched his hand into a
fist, turned it over, and squinted.
"Johnny?" his mother asked, concerned.
He looked up, blinked. "Uh, yeah, Mom. That's probably it." He
smiled weakly. "I guess I just must be nervous."
"Hey, snot-face!"
Johnny stopped in mid-chew, turned his hand inward to protect
the peanut butter and jelly sandwich he held.
"That's right. I'm talking to you, snot-face. Or should I say
lover-boy?"
Johnny turned around and stared at Fat Matt.
"I saw you stuffing all those mushy love cards into the girls'
boxes." Fat Matt laughed, the small rolls of fat bunching up about
his face. His beady eyes glanced down at Johnny's lunch, in which
several pieces of heart-shaped candy bearing messages such as "Will U
B Mine?" and "I Luv U" were strewn. "I see you also got your own
share of valentines, didn't you, lover-boy? You know, I didn't get
any valentines, or valentine candy."
Johnny felt his face flush. He knew what was going to happen.
"It seems to me, lover-boy, that, since you got so many candies
and I didn't get any, that it would only be fair if you shared some
of yours with me." He moved forward and grabbed up the candies.
"Thanks, snot-face," Fat Matt said with a laugh. "Oh, that
doesn't leave you with any candy, does it?" He picked out a heart
from his sweaty grasp and licked it. "Well, here you go, snot-face,"
Fat Matt said, dropping it into Johnny's pint of milk.
At that moment, Rebecca Moyet, the prettiest girl in school, and
Quinn, her little brother, walked by. Quinn laughed, pointed at
Johnny, and said, "There you go, snot-face!" He laughed some more.
Rebecca frowned.
Fat Matt popped a few hearts into his mouth and looked once
again at Johnny's lunch. "Hey, snot-face, what else you got there?"
Quinn laughed once again, and Rebecca looked down at him
sternly.
Johnny looked around at the crowd that had suddenly gathered
around the four of them. Dozens of eager faces shifted left and
right, vying for a clear view of whatever further ridicule Johnny
might soon suffer. He felt nauseous, and his hand began to tingle...
A shout erupted from the crowd as Johnny's half-eaten peanut
butter and jelly sandwich fell, hit the pint of milk, knocked it off
the bench and onto the asphalt. The initial spray of milk spattered
the blacktop with white spots; the rest puddled around the fallen
carton.
Johnny's outstretched hand, raised toward Fat Matt, burned with
an increasingly painful pulsing. Sweat ran down, dripped off Johnny's
forehead, his nose, his chin. His lips twitched. "Frog," he said
gutturally, and slouched, exhaling, cooling, feeling spent.
Johnny hadn't expected there to be any noise; he hadn't expected
anything, really. He certainly hadn't expected, when he looked up, to
see Fat Matt screaming, to see his body spasm violently. He hadn't
expected his hair to shrivel acridly and to come out in tufts as his
hands clawed at his face, his head, his throat. He hadn't expected
his skin to turn green, to bubble, to drip off in clumps and sizzle
away on the asphalt into foul vapor.
The nausea that Johnny had felt only moments earlier gripped his
stomach fiercely. The shriek continued, stabbing progressively deeper
into Johnny's ears.
Fat Matt wobbled, what was left of his legs buckled, and he
collapsed to the ground with a crash of shattering bone. On impact, a
noxious cloud of green and red steam erupted from his body, obscuring
the view.
The vapors made Johnny's eyes water, and he grabbed the bench to
steady himself from vomiting.
The cloud dissipated, and all that remained of Fat Matt was a
pile of stained clothes and, sitting in the middle of them, a frog.
The crowd gasped, stared in disbelief.
Quinn's laughter sliced through the heavy aura of astonishment.
He pointed down at the newly created amphibian. "Frog!" he cried out,
and laughed harder.
Johnny felt ill. He wiped his forehead, his trembling upper lip.
His skin felt cold.
The frog tried to hop away, but slipped on the slick clothing
and landed on its side, making the rest of the children laugh loudly.
Johnny saw Rebecca try to hide the nervous smile on her face. The
frog stopped, then tried to bury itself under the clothes.
Quinn rushed forward and grabbed the frog. "Gotcha!" he said,
hefting it.
"Hey! Put it down!" Johnny said. "Can't you see it's scared?"
The frog squirmed in Quinn's grip.
"Put it down?" Quinn smiled wickedly. "Okay. I'll put it down."
He lifted the frog above his head and then, with the help from a
little jump, he hurled it to the ground. It hit the asphalt with a
wet splat and lay there awkwardly, legs twitching slightly. Quinn
laughed. "Want me to scare it some more?"
"No!" Johnny cried, as Quinn swung his arms and launched himself
into the air, feet held together to ensure that his landing would
strike true. At the last moment, though, just before Johnny was about
to cover his eyes, Quinn jerked his feet apart and ended up barely
straddling the injured frog.
The crowd let out a sigh.
Glancing around, Quinn laughed, lifted up his right leg, and
forcefully brought it down on the frog.
The crowd let out a sound of disgust, and Johnny jumped to his
feet, enraged.
Quinn stepped away from the dead frog and looked down at his
blood-stained Reeboks. He frowned and poked his shoes into Fat Matt's
soiled clothes, in an attempt to wipe them clean.
Hatred coursed through Johnny's veins. "Quinn! You... You..."
The air seemed to thicken, grow hot and humid, as he struggled to
express his anger. "You..." Each breath he took became more difficult
than the one before. He strenuously dragged each mouthful of air down
into his lungs, only to have it slip through his throat and rush back
out into the world. And all the while he stared at the grinning
Quinn, who was now busy entertaining the crowd with theatrical
attempts at cleaning his shoes.
Johnny's vision blurred, the air coagulating into a sickly grey
soup, as if the day were hazardously smoggy or he were looking
through a grimy pane of glass. He squinted and saw Quinn kick the
dead frog toward the crowd, which immediately widened with shrieks of
amusement.
Johnny violently snapped his arm forward, his elbow joint
popping, and pointed at Quinn. One word, dripping acid, burned
through his lips: "Frog."
Quinn jerked his head around, a surprised look on his face, and
looked at Johnny before he screamed. His small body shuddered with
convulsions as the hideous transformation began.
The crowd, frightened and confused, screamed in macabre
accompaniment to Quinn.
"That's my brother!" Rebecca yelled, running up to Johnny. Her
face was flushed, violent. Tears were forming around her widened
eyes. "That's my brother!" She slapped him across the face. "That's
my brother!" She kicked him in the leg. "Make it stop! Make it stop!"
As she raised her hand to strike again, chorused with screams from
Quinn, the crowd, and herself, Johnny pointed at her and said meekly,
"Frog."
In horror, Johnny watched Rebecca's face contort monstrously as
she shrieked and as her hair, crackling, shrivelled and burst into
dark, acrid smoke.
Johnny reeled back, tripped over the bench, and tumbled to the
ground. He stared up at Rebecca, who was still screaming, though
Quinn had by then stopped, and saw her skin begin to dissolve.
The crowd swarmed into his view, rushing up from behind Rebecca
and from the sides, surrounding him. Every face was twisted with
desperate fear, every pair of eyes burned wildly, and every hand was
clenched into a fist.
The sudden closeness of the bodies of all his schoolmates made
the air so stifling that Johnny was not able to breathe. He raised
his hand in an attempt to defend himself, but could not utter a
single sound.
--
ROBERT HURVITZ ([email protected]) will finally be graduating
from UC Berkeley in May, despite all attempts on his part to avoid
the real world for as long as possible. He assume he'll have to get a
job or something.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Cannibals Shrink Elvis' Head / PHIL NOLTE
It started out as a joke. I mean, we were just going to have a
little fun. You know, do something weird. That, and we thought we had
them cold this time.
"Them" is the folks that publish those idiotic tabloid
newspapers. Every now and then someone will bring one of them in to
work. You know the ones, they're right beside the checkout counter in
the grocery store. That's right, the ones with headlines like
"Vampire Mummies Repel Space Alien Invasion" or "Tammy Faye's New
Miracle Diet." The stories are always about odd things that were
supposed to've happened. Trouble is, they always happen in foreign
countries or in little towns that you never heard of like Slapshot,
Wyoming or something. Not this time. This time they'd made a mistake;
they'd picked a real town.
It was Raymond who pointed it out. "Hey guys, look at this!
There's two brothers in Absaraka, North Dakota who have a space alien
ship in their barn!"
I replied to that with something very intelligent; something
like: "Huh? Bullshit!"
"I'm not kidding," he said. "Here, read it yourself."
"Bachelor Brothers' Barn Houses Space Alien Ship," I read aloud.
"Trygve and Einar Carstenson found the strange craft in an abandoned
field near their farm. 'We could barely lift it on to our trailer
with the endloader,' says Einar. Well-known Yugoslavian experts say
it probably came from Rigel." I could barely keep from laughing as I
read it. "Shit!" I said. "Absaraka? That's only 30 miles from here."
It was Neil who had the next thought. "Let's drive out there and
see if that farm even exists. What the hell, we could grab a twelve-
pack to make the trip go a little faster. It won't take an hour both
ways. Come on guys, what d'ya say?" Neil could be very persuasive.
"Yeah, let's do it!" We might have been a chorus. It was kind of
a slow day anyway. We left Knutsen to mind the store. He didn't like
it much, but it was his turn.
Fifteen minutes later we were in Neil's Caravan out on
Interstate 94 and we were all on our second beers. ZZ Top was blaring
on the stereo. Draper had brought the newspaper and was reading it
out loud to a very appreciative audience: "Milkman Bites Dog. Ninety-
year-old Woman Gives Birth to Twins. Love Boat Attacked by 150-Foot
Shark." We were all in high spirits when we took the Wheatland exit.
"Absaraka, five miles," announced Neil.
We went to the post office-grocery store to get directions to
the fictitious farm. We were surprised to find out that there were
two Carstenson brothers who had a farm about four miles out of town.
The guy at the post office said they were a couple of bachelors and
that they were kind of weird. I didn't say anything but I thought the
whole town was kind of strange.
Five minutes later we pulled up to the mailbox at the end of a
long winding farm road. "Trygve & Einar Carstenson," it read. You
couldn't see the buildings from the road, there were too many trees
and too much brush.
"Well, we've come this far," said Neil. "Let's go."
The road was nearly half a mile long. When we got to the farm,
we found a ramshackle three-room house and some dilapidated farm
buildings. In one corner of the yard was a rust-red Studebaker pickup
truck. It was a nineteen forty-something, I wasn't sure. It looked
like junk, with a cracked windshield and one staring headlamp.
Draper was the youngest so we made him go to the door. He
knocked a couple of times but there was no answer. We were about to
call it a day when the old geezers surprised us all by coming up on
us from behind the machine shed.
"What the hell do you sumbitches want?" said one of them. I
guessed it was Einar.
Old, grizzled, and Norwegian they were, and not in the least bit
friendly.
"We came to see the spaceship," I managed to squeak out.
Trygve was holding a double-barreled shotgun!
"Yew ain't from some Gad-damned lib-ral newspaper are ye?" said
Trygve.
"No, we're from Fargo!" said Raymond. Brilliant, Raymond,
brilliant!
"There ain't no Gad-damned spaceship here and git to hell off
our property!"
So much for country hospitality! We took his advice and "got to
hell out of there!"
We had finished our twelve-pack and were in need of another. We
were also getting hungry, so we stopped in Casselton for a bite. Half
an hour later, we were leaving the restaurant. It was Draper who
noticed them first.
"Well I'll be go-to-hell!" he said. "Look at this, you guys."
Rattling and smoking down the main street of the little town
came an apparition. An honest-to-god, rust-colored, forty-something
Studebaker pickup truck. In it were two other apparitions. Or
fossils, if you prefer. Sure enough it was old Trygve and Einar
(which was which?), come to town. The ever-devious Neil was the first
to grasp the significance of the event.
"Wonder who's at the farm?" he mused.
"Shit, probably nobody!" said Raymond.
"What say we go back and have a look around?" said Neil.
I don't know if any one of us really wanted to but no one wanted
to be accused of not having any nerve either. I guess I was the most
cautious. "Christ!" I said. "That old son-of-a-bitch had a shotgun!"
"Well he can't hardy hit you from Casselton, can he?" Neil
replied. That ended the argument. Neil's good at saying the right
thing to end an argument. He's brave, too. When we got back to the
Carstenson farm he showed his courage by offering to stay in the car
with the motor running while the rest of us did the snooping. It was
Raymond and I who found the ship! No shit! Believe it or not, Ripley!
It was in one of the old buildings that had a big door on one end.
"Jesus, would you look at that!" said Raymond, his voice rising
with excitement. "That thing is gorgeous!"
No doubt about it, it was beautiful. Long and slender and
smooth, it was sleekly aerodynamic and obviously intended for use in
atmosphere. It was much smaller than I would have expected -- it must
have been some kind of scout ship. It simply couldn't have come all
the way from Rigel. It was only about forty feet long and made of
some kind of totally unfamiliar metal or plastic. It was sky-blue and
shiny. Raymond and I looked at fun-house reflections of ourselves in
the side of it.
Raymond made a funny face. I slapped his shoulder.
"Cut that out!" I said. "This is an alien spacecraft! It should
be treated with dignity! Jesus, can't you ever be serious?"
The little craft was beautiful, but it showed the after-effects
of one hellacious impact. One of the "wings" was bent and torn and
the nose and bottom were covered with dirt, like it had landed in a
swamp or something. There was an obvious hatch on one side. From the
way the mud was caked on the seams of it, it had not been opened. The
way the little ship was damaged we had to assume that its occupant(s)
were dead. We were just about to get a closer look when we heard the
horn of the Caravan honk and Draper screaming at the top of his
lungs. We high-tailed it for the van.
Trygve and Einar had come back from town. Hell hath no fury like
a pissed-off Norwegian farmer! Fortunately, all they had was that old
Studebaker truck and we had a head start. Neil has a couple of dents
and one broken window on the back of his Caravan from the shotgun
blast, but it could have been worse.
Within a day there was an Air Force barrier thrown up a mile
around the house. No one goes in or out. We don't know what to make
of it. Trygve and Einar must have gone into town to call them.
One thing that really irks me is that no one thought to bring a
camera. One lousy picture and we all could have been rich and famous!
Well, we won't be caught napping this time. We're on our way to
Clear Lake, Iowa to visit a Miss Nellie Rawlings, RR 2. It seems that
the large oval rock she was using as a doorstop on her hen house
turned out to be a Tyrannosaurus Rex egg. Hatched into a hungry
little needle-toothed monster. She says it ate a bunch of chickens
and her cat. By God, we're gonna get this one on film!
--
PHIl NOLTE ([email protected]) is an extension professor at the
University of Idaho, in addition to being an assistant editor of
InterText.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
The Naming Game / TARL ROGER KUDRICK
His mother's name was Sherry.
His father's name was Nathaniel.
His best friend's name was Warren Denaublin. His worst enemy's
name was Emily Pirthrull. Some of his classmates were Susan Fench,
Gordon Quellan, and Irving P. Rinehauser the third.
>His< name was John Smith, and he was >not< happy.
He wouldn't have cared so much if his name was at least
>spelled< differently. Jon Smyth, Jonn Smithe, or something like
that. But it wasn't. It was J as in Joshua, O as in Orville, H as in
Harvey, N as in Norman, S as in Samuelson, M as in Mitchell, I as in
Idall, T as in Terniard, H as in Hutchington -- John Smith. His older
sister (Josephine) had an English teacher (Mrs. Starnell) who talked
about the Everyman. John thought that John Smith was the perfect name
for an Everyman, but he was only eleven, so he couldn't even qualify
for that.
There had to be at least a >million< John Smiths in the world.
Didn't his parents >realize< that? What was wrong with them? What
could they have been thinking when they'd named him?
His mother would have talked first. She always did. "Oh
Nathaniel dear, look, it's our new baby. What'll we name him?"
"Oh Sherry darling, how about 'John Smith?' "
"Why 'John Smith?' "
"It's the most boring name I can think of."
That just about summed it up, John figured. Then his dad
would've gone on about something else, probably football. John hated
football. All the players had their names proudly displayed across
their backs, so everyone could see how great they were. Once, he
>had< seen a player with the last name Smith, and felt some hope.
Then it turned out the man's first name was Ebineezer and John lost
all faith in the world.
If only there was a famous president, or rock star, or something
named John Smith. Or a movie star. Anything. Of course, those people
would never >call< themselves John Smith, even if that was their real
name. Those people never used their real names. They made something
up. And that's what gave him the idea:
He would get his name changed. Officially. Right now, right on
this bright Sunday morning, before he even got dressed. Why put it
off? He felt better already.
The hard part, of course, would be convincing his parents.
Nathaniel Smith was sitting in his armchair in the living room,
reading the newspaper, completely ignorant of the storm of self-
confidence and assurance that was about to come flying out of its
room, demanding to have its name changed. Thus, he regarded the
request with considerable surprise.
"You want to what?"
"Dad," John repeated, "I want to change my name." It had far
less effect than he'd hoped for, especially the second time.
"You want," John's already washed, shaved, combed, groomed, and
perfectly dressed father slowly said while staring blankly over the
rims of his shiny glasses, "to change your name."
John, unwashed, uncombed, and still in his pajamas, said "Um...
yeah."
John felt the moment slipping away from him.
Seeing no real response from his father, he used what he'd been
saving as a last resort.
"Movie stars do it!"
"You aren't a movie star."
Leave it to parents to be logical when their only son in going
through the ultimate crisis of his life, John thought. "You don't
understand. I >have< to."
"Why? Are you hiding from the police?"
"No!" Why did parents have to >say< stupid things like that? "I
just have to, that's all."
"Oh," said his father, turning and looking at the wall. John
looked there too, but didn't see anything. And apparently, neither
did his father. After a couple moments he turned back to John and
asked "Why?"
"It's >boring<," he answered. He spread his arms out in a
gesture of emphasis that was completely lost on his father. "There
are millions of people called John Smith."
"Name one."
John stopped for a minute, thought, then realized he'd been
tricked. "Daaad! You aren't taking me >seriously<!"
His father chuckled. "Okay. Look, have you talked to your mom
about this?"
John reluctantly admitted that he hadn't. But, he added, she was
next.
"Well, why don't you see what she thinks, and then talk to me."
"But she's at >church<! She won't be home for a long time!"
"She's always back by lunch time. You can make it that long." He
ruffled John's hair. John slumped his shoulders and went back to his
room.
"And stand up straight," his father called after him.
John got caught up in other things and forgot about the whole
problem until after dinner. Then, his mother was shopping. She always
shopped after dinner. It never made sense to John, but then, nothing
his parents did made sense. He >had< to talk to her as soon as she
got back! School started tomorrow, and there was no way he was going
to start fifth grade as John Smith.
When he heard the sound of his mother's car coming into the
driveway, he ran out of his room to let her into the house. He threw
open the door just as his mother was about to unlock it.
"Hi Mom!" he shouted, scaring the unprepared Sherry Smith almost
to the point of dropping her groceries.
"Hi John! Hey, you scared me there." She wondered why he was
opening the door for her. She figured he wanted something, and tested
this by asking him to bring in the rest of the groceries.
"Sure, Mom!" He ran out and made four trips from the house to
the car and back without a complaint.
Even when that was finished, though, John still hadn't asked for
anything, and Sherry began wondering instead what John had done.
Finally, she came out and asked him if he wanted anything.
John beamed, then became ultra-serious. "I'd like to change my
name," he said.
Inwardly, Sherry Smith groaned. Josephine had gone through
several different stages of "but Mom, I just >have< to (fill in the
blank)," and was working on another one. She'd hoped John wouldn't
fall prey to it too. But, the best way to handle these fads, she'd
long ago decided, was to just play along.
So she asked him what he wanted to be called.
John opened his mouth, then closed it again. He had no idea what
he wanted to be called.
"Larry," he finally said, proudly.
"Larry," she repeated, as if trying on a new hat. "Sounds like
my name! Why Larry?"
John didn't know, so he said, "It sounds good."
"Larry," she mused. "Larry Smith."
John almost had a heart attack. "No! Not Larry >Smith<! Larry...
Quartz! Larry Quartz."
His mother looked dubious, but John loved it. "Yeah. Larry
Quartz. It's great. It's >exactly< right." Seeing no complaint from
his mother, he went back to his room, smiling. He could hardly wait
until tomorrow.
The next morning, after washing and dressing, John came out to
eat breakfast. His mother was making pancakes. No one else was in the
room yet.
His mother greeted him with a smile. "Good morning, John."
He almost responded, but then remembered and said "Who?"
His mother sighed. "Right. Who are you again?"
"Larry," he said slowly. "Larry Quartz." He sat down at the
table.
His father came in from the living room. "Hi John." Both wife
and son quickly corrected him. He looked at them, confused, but then
just shrugged.
His older sister was next. She bounded into the room, her silky
and wet black hair flopping behind her like a confused flag. She sat
down at the table and, much to John's dismay, ignored him completely.
He wanted to get her to call him John too.
So, he started humming quietly underneath his breath, and
playing with his fork, hoping Josephine would tell him to stop. She
did give him an odd look, and he paused and returned a false smile,
but nothing else happened. He went back to his humming.
Pouring some pancake batter into a pan, John's mother said "Jo,
we have a new member of the family this morning."
John stopped humming. What was she doing?
Josephine studied her mother. She looked around the table. "I
don't get it," she said finally.
Sherry put the batter down and waved an arm at John. "Meet Larry
Quartz."
Josephine stared at John, who paled slightly. "Whaaattt?" Her
voice rose in disbelief.
John sat still, wondering how to turn this to his advantage.
"He changed his name?" Josephine drawled. Then she started
laughing. "He changed his >name<?"
She turned to John. "What's wrong with the name they gave you?"
"Now Josephine," John's father began.
"It's Jo, Dad, not Josephine," she reminded him.
"What's wrong with the name they gave you?" John mimicked.
She glared at him. "John!"
"Who?"
"All right!" John's mother announced. "The first pancake is
ready."
"Well, why don't we let John have it?" suggested Josephine
sweetly.
"Who?" John replied innocently.
"Well, if >he's< not around, I guess I'd better have it!" She
took the pancake.
Not taking any chances, John quickly added that he wanted the
next one.
All in all, breakfast turned out pretty good for John. His
mother called him John once, his father accidentally called him
Harry, and his sister, for sake of argument, called him John every
time. It was great. He just >knew< that he was going to have a
wonderful day.
He didn't, of course, know about the new girl in his class.
Her name, and the month she was born in, was June. She had the
nicest hair and the sweetest smile, and she had just the right
mixture of shyness and audacity to get anything she wanted from
anyone. She was a knockout, or as much of a knockout as a fifth-
grader could be, and this was certainly the impression held by the
male population of the class.
In fact, no one dared sit near her. The boys didn't, because
they didn't want to do something stupid. And the other girls didn't
quite trust her. June, and the seat next to her, were left alone.
So when John walked in, just barely before the bell as always,
the only available seat was the one next to her, and all eyes were on
him as he sat in it.
With no formal training at all, John performed a perfect double-
take, and the result was a spontaneous burst of giggles as John found
himself trying not to stare at June as rudely as he was.
Then the bell rang and the teacher walked in, and everyone
turned to the blackboard.
The teacher was new. He walked in front of his desk and said
"Hello, class!" His voice was deep and clear. "As you may have
noticed, I'm new here. But I've taught fifth grade before, so I'm
very good at it. I hope that you will all think the same after you
get to know me. But first," he said, placing a pile of notebooks he'd
been carrying onto his desk, "I would like to get to know >you<. My
name is Mr. Carniss." He wrote it on the chalkboard with precise
handwriting and opened up one of his notebooks. "Now I have here a
list of names, but I don't know whom each one belongs to. So I'm just
going to read off each name and if that's you, just raise your hand.
How does that sound?"
Sounds terrible, thought John. This name-changing business was
going to be harder than he'd figured.
What were his friends going to say? He glanced around. Sure
enough, they were all there. About two-thirds of the room knew him,
or at least his name. He vaguely remembered being laughed at only a
couple of minutes ago and he didn't want to go through that again.
Then he thought of June. He didn't know her name was June, of
course, but whoever she was, she didn't look like she'd think much of
a John Smith. He found himself staring at her again, and looked away.
Why did he even care what some dumb girl thought, anyway? He wasn't
sure, but he did.
Mr. Carniss began.
"Sue-Ann Aldring?"
A girl in the last row raised her hand as if it were going to
explode if moved too quickly. Mr. Carniss looked up, smiled a smile
that melted Sue-Ann, and made a mark in his book.
"Michael Bern?"
And so it went. Name after name was called. Denaublin, Ewing,
Garth...
"June Golden?"
June raised her hand as far as it would go. John felt sick. June
Golden, he marvelled. What a name. She'd >never< have to change it.
If I had a name like that, thought John, I wouldn't change it for a
million dollars. Not for ten million. I wouldn't even change it if my
parents threatened to kill me. I wouldn't...
John stopped thinking and sank into his chair. He felt like he'd
just been hit with a sledgehammer. That was it. The answer. That was
how he could get away with this and not be the laughingstock of the
fifth grade.
Excited, he smiled, and could barely restrain himself until,
eleven names later, Mr. Carniss said
"John Smith?"
John raised his hand, slowly, faking uncertainty. He hoped he
looked like he wasn't sure he was doing the right thing.
Mr. Carniss looked up at John and made a mark in his notebook.
Then he looked back at John. "Is something wrong, John?" he asked.
John couldn't tell if it was real concern, or just the usual
kind teachers had for their kids. "Um...yeah," he said finally. "Kind
of. That's...that's not my name anymore."
Mr. Carniss looked surprised. So did the other kids. John kept a
perfectly straight face, but mentally crossed his fingers as he said,
"My parents changed it."
Next to him, June Golden's eyes went wide with pity. On the
other side of him, his best friend Warren almost fell off his chair.
Mr. Carniss was disoriented. For the first time, he seemed
unprepared. But he quickly regained his composure and said, "I see.
And what is your name now?"
Here we go, John thought.
"Larry Quartz."
Warren gave him a look which translated as "You've got to be
kidding." Some of the other students were looking at each other in
awkward disbelief. June seemed slightly bothered at the idea, and
turned away from John just as he looked over to see her reaction. But
none of this fazed Mr. Carniss, who had once again taken control.
"Well," he replied cheerfully, "what would you like me to call
you? John or Larry?"
John looked at him, sinking. Why did he have to be so nice? But
it was too late to back out now.
"I guess you'd better call me Larry, Mr. Carniss. I should get
used to it."
"You should get new parents," whispered Warren, but Mr. Carniss
simply nodded and made some more marks in his book. He finished off
his list of names and then class started.
The day went badly for John. Things hadn't gone at all like he'd
hoped. When he thought about it, he wasn't even sure what kind of
reaction he'd been looking for, but he did know he hadn't gotten it.
As it turned out, Mr. Carniss was only his homeroom teacher.
That meant he had to repeat his story and his act for five more
teachers throughout the day. By the afternoon he no longer wanted to,
but he kept having people he knew in some of his classes, and the
story had spread through the entire fifth grade by lunch hour. John
heard people talking about him from time to time, but he could never
quite hear what they were saying.
By the end of the day, the misery he'd feigned for his first
class was real. No one wanted to talk to him. No one knew what to
say. A brand new student would have been treated better. John had
forgotten how many friends he'd really had, until none of them seemed
comfortable around him anymore. It was like he'd died and some new
kid had come along, trying to take his place. It isn't fair, John
wanted to shout. I'm still the same person! I'm just called something
different!
After his last class, he collected his books and went to the
bike rack where he traditionally waited for Warren. He unhitched his
bike and, after a couple minutes, Warren arrived.
Warren smiled, started to say "Hi John," and then remembered and
mumbled "oh yeah."
"It isn't >that< bad, is it?" John asked.
Warren stared at him. "You mean you >like< it?"
"Don't you?"
Warren started to say something, but stopped. "It's okay," he
said. "But I like John better."
John looked at his bicycle. "Maybe I can get them to change it
back, or something," he said. He didn't like the idea.
Warren did. His spirits lifted immediately. "You think you
could?"
John was slightly taken back at the force of Warren's question.
"Well, I don't know. They haven't actually made the change yet, but
they said..."
"Well don't >let< them!" Warren shouted. "Shit! Tell them not
to! I'll help! Want me to come over? I'll stand up for you!"
"No! No--that's okay." John wanted to change the subject. "I'll
tell them. I won't let them. I...I like being John Smith." But he
wondered who he was trying to convince, Warren or himself.
He rode Warren home, and then went on to his house, deep in
thought. He still thought John Smith was a boring name, but nobody
seemed to mind. Maybe the name actually helped somehow. "John Smith?
Yeah, his name's boring, but >he's< cool..."
He got back home and put his bike away. When he walked inside,
his mother smiled at him. "Hi Larry! How'd school go?"
"Who?" John asked.
--
TARL ROGER KUDRICK ([email protected]) has been making up
stories since he could talk and writing them since he was twelve.
He's written numerous short stories and first drafts of two novels,
one of which is on-line at Oberlin College
([email protected]). His major goal in life is to earn a
Ph.D. in psychology. He stays sane through both being weird and
running AD&D sessions.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Boy / N. RIDLEY MCINTYRE
1. Start Switch
Shitamachi. The Manhattan Outzone. The Year of the Rat.
Darkness and rain pervade the quiet streets of the Outzone.
Here, the Federal Government in its infinite wisdom has cut off all
electricity, and left the running of the place to its inhabitants. In
Shitamachi, the Asahi Tag Team run everything.
The DJ in Snakestrike is a tiger-haired poserboy with his brain
connected to the turbo sound system at the end of a large dance
floor, two thin blue wires dangling from the tiny electrodes stuck to
his forehead. He is engrossed in the world of the music, every
digitized blip and beep and thump pulsing through his nerves like the
very blood in his veins. Electrical signals interfacing the sound
system to his nervous system to allow him complete control over the
mix. The ersatz sensory stimulation that runs through the 'trodes
overrides his own natural senses. Every three minutes he switches to
life to take a request.
The dance floor swarms with a thousand Shitamachi teenagers,
sticking their heads into the blue lasers and flashing fluorescent
gloves under the ultra-violet strobes. Every wall of the club writhes
with holographic snake scales, a reptilian world that's constantly
moving.
There's a hole above the dance floor where people from the level
above can watch the dancers. Up here, on the left at the cocktail
bar, Snakestrike stinks of dancer sweat. It also reeks of business.
And for once, Dex has nothing to do with it.
Two women serve the cocktail bar. One dark-haired with natural
beauty, the other a made-up half-Japanese blonde doll who is well
known as an Asahi Tag Teamster. They call themselves sisters when a
drunken Japanese Sony slave plays being a suit to them, despite his
slave's company-grey jumpsuit. Dex watches them all with interest,
then calls the dark-haired girl over to order his third Vijayanta
tequila slammer.
Dex is here to see Laughing Simon, the Asahi Tag Team's best
technojack, but he's been stood up again. So, he sits by the bar with
his face cupped in his hand and a pocketful of stimulant wetware in
his black pilot's jacket. He is just thinking of leaving when he
feels a tap on his shoulder from the billy on the grey stool next to
him: a muscular Australian kid with sideburns, a blue denim jacket, a
quiff and a ginger moustache.
"So what do you do?" asks the billy.
"Why, are you collecting taxes?" Dex answers. His voice is
English. The dark-haired girl returning with a plastic tumbler
wonders if there are any Americans left in Manhattan. She turns the
glass three times and fizzes it with a bang on the bar and Dex calmly
downs it.
"You look like a ghost to me," says the Australian.
Dex shakes his head the way he's supposed to when they ask him
these questions. All the time thinking, does it show that much?
"Sorry, matey. Just your average ho-hum chipster."
The billy shuffles closer, his voice slipping gently into a
business tone. "Shame. I'm looking at some hot paydata and I really
need a ghost. One of the best. Someone like the Camden Town Boy.
Dexter Eastman."
"You've found Dexter Eastman, matey. But I gave up the ghost
over a year ago."
The billy makes a swift move from his jacket and Dex can feel a
cold plastic tube dig into his hip. The Australian raises his
eyebrows. "Looks like I've found my man, then." He motions to the
exit with his head. "We're walking."
"You're walking. I'm here for a drink."
The Australian squints in Dex's face. "You'd better move, cause
if you don't it's gonna be a Kodak moment."
Dex sits still. "Go ahead. Shoot me. You won't get out alive.
The decision, as they say, is yours." A flick of Dex's eyes motions
the Australian to look at the dark-haired bargirl. She holds the HK
assault shotgun usually kept under the bar. Casually, and with a
feisty smile, she rests the barrel on the bone of the Australian's
nose and crunches the first round into the chamber.
"If you're takin' anyone out at my bar, it won't be with a
plastic pistol, matey," she says curtly. "Give me the piece and deal
with the man friendly-like."
The Australian gives over the gun with a taut look from Dex to
the bargirl and back. He wipes sweat from his moustache.
Dex gives a thankful look to the bargirl. "Respect to you," he
says.
"S'okay," she replies, "If he didn't look so dumb, I'd shoot him
anyway." She puts the guns behind the counter, out of reach, and goes
back to the Japanese slave.
Dex turns to the Australian. "You've got two minutes. Deal or
step."
The billy talks through clenched teeth. Being challenged down in
a club full of strangers by a girl who looked about seventeen has
raised a storm inside his pride. It is a storm that has to subside
just this once.
"My name's Priest. I'm a dealer for Kreskin."
"Kreskin the rigger?"
"The very same. Kreskin says you two used to work together. You
used to do overnight laundry for him with the World Bank."
"That was a year ago."
"Yeah, well he's coming up against some tough opposition from
the Martial Government Air Force along the North Route and he needs
you to run the Ether for him. Hack into the MGAF shell and find out
the reconnaissance flight plans for next week. Rabies just broke out
again in the Seattle Metroplex and Kreskin has the contract to ship
vaccine over the line. He says you did it before for him. He says
you'll do it again."
Dex narrows his eyes. "Read my profile. Ex-hackerjack."
Priest smiles. "Kreskin said you'd be a little reluctant. I have
read your profile. Ex-hackerjack. Ex-MGAF pilot. Ex-joker. You've
done a lot in your time. Kreskin needs someone he can trust. Someone
he knows. And of course if you refuse..." Priest takes a cold gyuza
dumpling from a bowl on the bar and bites half of it.
"Kreskin publicly announces my whereabouts to the MGAF."
"I think he had something even worse in mind, but you're on the
right track. Strictly business, you understand, Dex. Nothing
personal.
Somehow Dex wishes it was personal. Then he'd have an excuse to
smash Priest's face in.
Kitty slips into Dex's room and hands him steaming ration coffee
in a polystyrene cup. She's like him, another smart young refugee
from the authorities. The Manhattan Outzone is an excellent place to
hide, but she wasn't born to this, and no one could hide forever.
She looks at Dex through superchromed Sony eyes as he drinks his
coffee, sitting on his black leather swivel chair and fidgeting, and
she realizes that she knows very little about him. He grew up in a
shanty town in the Thames Midland Metroplex and found a way out
through running the Ether; the Camden Town Boy. He was a hackerjack
legend by the age of fourteen, teaching others like Dagger and Man
Friday to run the Ether. At fifteen he was involved with a team
rivalry squabble and left for North Am District, where he joined the
Martial Government Air Force, flying missions against the nomad joker
clans who smuggled anything from weapons to computer parts from one
Metroplex to another, figuring that the MGAF's high security would
make him harder to track down.
She heard that he turned joker after he had to shoot down his
own wingman to save a busload of joker kids from being rocketed. So
he joined the nomads as a pilot running recon missions and every once
in a while he would launder joker clan money through the Ether.
Kreskin got him a new identity and he left the game for the
Manhattan Outzone, where he moved in with Kitty and the Asahi Tag
Team and became a chipster. Once, he told her that his main ambition
was to live a normal life. Buy himself a piece of Happyville. The
biggest problem he had was dropping his past.
Kitty only has to see the look on his face to know that the past
is on its way back.
Dex downs the coffee and crushes the cup inside a sinewy hand.
"You don't think I should do this, do you?"
Kitty stands with her back to the wall by the door to the
kitchen, her arms neatly folded over her _Omni_ T-shirt. She bites
her bottom lip.
"No," she says to him. She kicks herself off the wall and leaves
the room, closing the door behind her.
Dex is alone in a grimy-grey room with a swivel chair, a desk
and a foam mattress to sleep on. Something inside him claws his
stomach. An empty feeling.
A hunger.
He takes the machinery out of its bubble-plastic wrapping. It's
been in storage in a tea chest in Kitty's room for so long that the
wrapping sticks to the molded form of the Sony electronics, making
the job more difficult. The sense 'trodes, like sticky silver beads
with microthin wires, are wrapped around the Etherdeck. A procured
military item in cold matte black, designated Ares IV.
The Ares IV has a stream of wires that plug into the input port
of his stolen, unlicensed Fednet computer. Built in Poland, its
bright red plastic casing and molded keyboard with old chunky keys
seems tasteless to all but the billy tribe. Dex is no billy, he's too
dragon, but he likes things in strange colors. The whole setup that
has been updated for high-speed bias by Laughing Simon is plugged
into the socket that runs a tap into the groundline. He sticks the
trodes to his forehead and switches on all the equipment. "On"
telltales glisten in the darkness of his room. The screen on the
Fednet computer displays a prompt. Everything's ready except Dex.
He sits cross-legged in front of the setup and hesitates. The
hunger inside his guts claws him again, and he nearly buckles with
tension. With his left hand, he fingers the keyboard of the Fednet
computer, preparing himself for sensory takeover.
With the other poised over the Ares IV, he touches the Start
switch.
2. Ether
Just as Dex had taught the Dagger and Man Friday, so a girl
called Kayjay introduced him to the Ether on a cold London night in a
Sony-owned flat in the Camden Secure Zone. He was twelve years old
and Kayjay was a small, thin- boned, pretty little Bangladeshi girl
with nothing better to do than follow the latest fads.
She had spent most of the day playing with her father's
electronic toys. His Sony computer... black and sleek and totally
unlike the low-tech kit-boxes that Dex had seen in the shanty town.
His wallscreen color TV that was constantly tuned into Disney 7 (The
Children's Channel), showing the latest adventures of baby-faced
anthropomorphic soldiers in space jungles, fighting the evil
insectoids with their nuclear battlesuits, and Dex and Kayjay acted
them out in the living room, firing remote control units at each
other (Dex was always Mark and Kayjay was always Sukhi), and Kayjay
won. When they raided the wardrobe for fancy costumes, Kayjay came
across the thin non-descript box that she had seen her father use. It
was densely heavy and as big as a Federal Government daily ration
box.
He remembers her words now as she tried to explain the concepts
to this bright, but uneducated, boy, lying on the thick carpet floor
of her bedroom. She tapped the ridge on her black leather swivel
chair.
"See this chair?" she said. Twelve-year-old Dexter Eastman
nodded softly. "This chair doesn't really exist. It's just an
amassment of atomic particles. But the way the light reflects from
them, and the way our eyes see that light, leads our brains to come
to the conclusion that this pack of particles is a chair. Without a
way of translating the fact to us, it doesn't really exist. Without
sight it has no color. Without touch it has no texture. Without taste
it's not organic. Without sound it doesn't squeak when you turn it.
Without smell it isn't leather. A person without senses has no world.
It just doesn't exist, there's no way of translating it to them."
Kayjay moved around the room like some eccentric Disney 9
(Education Channel) science instructor and ended up grinning,
pointing to her red telephone.
"Ever listened to the sound a modem makes when you send it down
a phone line?" She made a weird screeching sound and an equally
appalling face and Dex gave a little giggle.
"Data. Raw data. A computer talking to another computer. Not to
us, because it doesn't speak our language, but that's by-the-by. The
fact is that data has a sound. And if it has a sound, it has a smell.
And a taste, and a texture and you must be able to see it. It exists.
Only normally, there's no way to translate it to us."
She edged over to Dex and kissed him softly, ran thin brown
fingers through his spiky black hair. "Somedays I go there... to this
other world. Father calls it the Ether. Like ethereal, I suppose. But
it's more like a checkboard than anything else. You want to go? I'll
get Father to bring home another set of trodes. After that, we'll do
it together..."
The processor is an empty blue cathedral. Code embodies him as
the virus runs its course. There is a soft dent in the defense shell
and Fednet's watchdog program lays in wait. Dex knows this, though,
and avoids the obvious weakness in favor of the silent meltdown.
Another key is tapped and a silver thread streams from the
melting roof where Dex has lived all this time toward the bounty. The
defenses have been breached, the virus has become part of the defense
program, shaping itself to the contours and Dex knows his trojan
software can work well enough without him, that he can switch off any
time and let a demon do the work for him. But it seems too easy, and
something must be wrong.
He stays with it, observing... watching the trojan open and
close files with lightning speed, knowing it's true target, but
running a trick that it really is a routine file check. As soon as it
finds the file, the thread snaps back, and Dex sends a program to
cover its tracks. It doesn't matter. The breaching virus is old and
faulty, and has caused a cancer in the defense shell that the
watchdog can't fail to notice. Dex waits just long enough for the
thread to return before he tries to rescue the virus which has gone
wild. Eventually, before he can tear the trodes from his forehead, he
feels the crushing smash of the MGAF trace program as it finds his
home shell. His senses are dazed, rocked back and forth and he is
pulled like spaghetti as he sees the trace's toothy smile.
He tears the trodes from his forehead and fights for breath.
Suddenly nauseated, he crawls so fast through the door but vomits
across the kitchen floor before he can reach the sink. Passing out,
he can sense the far off rank smell of stagnant water and the cruel
touch of a rough cloth. The stern tones of Kitty's voice echoing
through his head...
Snakestrike. The pretty, dark-haired girl brings his drink over
to him, loosely covered with a small cloth. She draws him closer to
her. Her voice is an urgent whisper. "Your name's Dex, isn't it?"
Dex nods.
"Man in that booth behind you was asking for you not two minutes
ago. He said he was an old friend. I told him you weren't here. He
said he'd wait. If you're in trouble, matey, call for another drink.
I'll bring the shotgun. Escort him out for you."
Dex sits back. She circles the tumbler three times and bangs it
on the bar, turning the drink into wet foam. Dex lets her take away
the cloth before downing it.
"What's your name?"
"Jess," she says.
"Enough respect to you, Jess." He taps the bar and takes a
breath before pushing himself off the stool and looking for this
Mister Dangerous. He spots him immediately, and knows his name is
Turk.
"What are you doing here, Turk?"
Turk has his arms spread along the back of the seat, a dumb,
superior grin on his Dixie City fat face. He wears a blue flight
suit, wing commanders tapes on the epaulettes. He even has his own
row of medals, including a purple heart that he must have got when
Dex shot down his own wingman.
"Thought ah'd find you heah, Eastman," he drawls drunkenly. "Ah
was gonna ask you that question mahself. How the hell can you live in
this dump, anyways? What do the Sammies call it? Shitter-what?"
"Shitamachi. It's Japanese for downtown. Look, cut the gomi,
Turk, just tell me what you want."
Turk laughs raucously and chews gum, bobbing his head. "Jeez,
Eastman. You been heah so long, you'se even spoutin' like a Sammie.
Bah the way, your friend Priest is dead. Ah did him mahself. But not
before I managed to spill your deal outta him. So gimme the file you
copied and we'll be friends again."
"We were never friends. What makes you think I've got it with
me?"
Turk leans forward and takes a sip from his beer, then returns
to his reclining position, absent-mindedly tapping his fingers
against the ultra-suede. "Ah told you, Eastman. Ah know the deal. So
gimme the data, 'cause I know you got it."
Dex takes on a wounded, irritated look. He runs his hands
through his spiky black hair and then takes out a black silicate cube
from his jacket pocket and tosses it over to him. Dex is angry as
hell now, but he knows he has to contain it if he wants to stay
alive.
"Sammie for downtown," Turk mutters. "Down is the operative
word, Eastman." He turns his head to the end of the booth, which
backs onto the hole above the dance floor. "CAN'T YOU PLAY SOME NEIL
YOUNG OR SOMETHIN'? ALL THIS SAMMIE NOISE SOUNDS THE SAME AND HALF OF
IT AIN'T GOT NO WORDS!" He comes back and laughs. "You got insurance,
Eastman? Ah'd take some out if Ah were you." He stands and finishes
his beer.
"And don't let those Sammies take you in. Remember Pearl Harbor.
Catch you 'round." Turk slips out of the booth and past the cocktail
bar, shaking his head and laughing to himself when Jess throws him a
dirty look.
Dex and Jess exchange a glance. Somehow the look on her face
tells him exactly what to do.
3. Rehash
"Nixon. How are you? It's the Camden Town Boy. No, not anymore,
I'm a free man now. In Shitamachi dealing software to the Asahi Tag
Team. Yeah I know... fifty-five points last night, you get a share?
Better luck tonight, eh? Anyway, I've got something you might like. I
did a run for Kreskin last week, MG Air Force flight plans along the
North Route. Yeah, well I asked for 750 marks, but Kreskin dropped
his price, said he couldn't go any higher than 500 marks. Yeah, I
know, I should have guessed he'd take me for a sucker. Anyway, the
MGAF are wise to it, so they've changed their flight plan. Yep. And
I've got the new one, too. I'll let you have it for 600 e-marks, what
do you say? Ace, it's a deal. Transfer the money into a World Bank
bin under the account name of Peter Townshend. Of course I know who
Pete Townshend was, but they're too stupid to figure it out. I'll fax
the details to you. Better send one of your jokers. Pickup point will
be on the fax. Anyway, time is money and you're eating my phone bill.
See you sometime."
Dex has an airbrushed wheel-dial telephone, the color of
turtleshells. Kitty says he has no taste whatsoever. When Dex
reiterates that he likes strange colours, she just shakes her head.
"Who was that?" asks Kitty. She stands half-in, half-out of the
doorway to the kitchen. There is still a trace of vomit smell in the
air in there after a week.
"Nixon's another Rigger. Officially him and Kreskin are rivals.
So he'll buy it just to have something Kreskin hasn't." He wipes
sleep from his eyes and pulls at itchy hair.
"Think it'll work?" Kitty sips on ration Vijayanta coffee and
makes a face as she burns her tongue.
Dex collapses onto his mattress and sighs, looking out through
his window at the condemned block across East 10th Street. Lines of
age wrinkling the building. The circular port-hole windows, like a
thousand eyes all crying at once.
"It bloody well better work," he finally replies, hoping that
soon, things could get back to normal.
Nixon has his package. Another group of mercenaries known as the
Harlequins are also interested in the information. Something to do
with a hit they have to make on the MGAF.
He meets them at dusk in Tompkins Square, when the day is
hottest, and the shadows are longest. The Harlequin Rigger's name is
Fly, and he is a frail twig of a man who needs a metal walking stick
to stand upright. He is known more for his abilities as a fence than
for running a good merc group.
The boys around him are typical San Angeles Ronin, they are all
six feet two inches and have deep tans, dressed in Twin Soul Tribe
garb (very baggy green jeans and hooded sweaters). Dex has seen a
million like these two muscleboys, and they don't impress him. Fly
informs him that their names are J.D. and Mavik.
"So what's business like now, Dex?" Fly speaks in a dreamy,
whispering tone, a voice much older than he is; looking at him with
eyes that are much wiser than the frail man could ever be.
"To tell the truth, the chipster business could be bottoming out
here. I might need to expand."
"Expansion's always a good thing, Dex. If you're going to think
at all, think big. A real famous businessman said that once... But
I'm damned if I can remember his name."
Fly gives a hoarse laugh and Dex joins in. J.D. and Mavik look
calmly at the decrepit housing blocks that surround the concrete
plaza of Tompkin's Square. Thermographic Sony vision scanning the
windows for possible threats. They don't even have to show what
weapons they carry. They have rewired nerves for inhuman speed and
could probably take out a potential assassin before the hammer falls
on his gun. Stuff like that doesn't come cheap, though. Most of the
Asahi Tag Team who have rewired nerves had to go as far as the Tokyo
Metroplex to find a neurosurgeon good enough to do it. These boys
have it as standard with all the Martial Government trickery behind
it. They probably don't even know about the glitches in the
triggering software that runs the nervous system, something that Dex
had to pay a lot to get ironed out when he deserted the air force.
"Where's Man Friday? How's he doing these days? I haven't heard
from him in a long time."
Fly pulls a nicotine stick from his black denim jacket and bites
a piece off the end. "He's still trying to find out what happened in
Rio. Did he leave a girl behind there or something?"
Dex nods. "A wife, from what I remember."
"Oh. Well, we think the Feds caught up with her and she's gone
missing. He's organizing an expedition to find her, I think. We're
gonna go in with him. He wishes you were running Ether again. Says it
ain't so much fun with you not around."
"Well, I'm officially retired. Except for this stuff. Good luck,
anyway. If you need any chips for Portuguese, you know where to find
me."
Dex and Fly banter this way for only a few more minutes, as both
of them have other places to go to. Fly eventually gives him about
400 marks' worth of yen for the data cube.
Kitty watches Dex throughout these events. She can see his life
here burning out slowly. She can see from his blue-eyed, thousand-
yard stare that his feet are getting itchy again. Track record has
proven that he doesn't stay in one place for too long. Kitty needs
him here, or at least with her. The two of them aren't in love, not
exactly, but what they have is more than a friendship. Some kind of
closeness that she can't afford to live without.
He flicks the stop switch. Sweat pours from his face, stings his
eyes, leaves salt on his pink lips. His black hair is stuck to his
wet head. He gasps for air and finds the atmosphere is too thin for
him in this grimy little room. He pulls the trodes from his head,
rushes to the round port-hole window and wrenches it open.
Lukewarm air hits his face, cools him down. He sticks his head
out into the night's rain. It rains every night in Manhattan.
Something to do with the high humidity during the day condensing when
the hot sun goes down.
Across East 10th Street, three Asahi Tag Teamsters in their
canary yellow jackets and purple tiger-striped skintight jeans suck
on nicotine sticks and slap with each other about previous clashes.
One of them breaks into a spurt of superhuman martial arts to
demonstrate his actions. Just visible behind the kid's ear a mini
datacube shines from his neural software port. Chipped for Hapkune-
Do, reflexes rewired and boosted by 10 percent, zen flowing from
their new Sony eyes. Dex looks at these kids and sees the future of
the world. A future he doesn't much care for.
He slides back inside and closes the window. Walking over to the
middle of the floor, he looks at the green screen of the unlicensed
Fednet computer and sees the results of this day's work. Two tickets
to Heathrow waiting for him whenever he wants. One way. His life here
is falling to pieces, and it's getting near the time to skin out.
Tiny words glowing green in a dark room. He looks at that screen and
thinks he can see his future.
4. Times Square
"Kreskin says he'll met you outside the old Slammer Cyberena at
noon."
"Times Square."
That's where he is now. The north side, across from the entrance
to the Cyberena. He sits in the uncomfortable seat of a magnesium
alloy rickshaw that belongs to a young Irish-American kid called
Bobby, who wears a white BIG PIERROT SAYS WATCH YOUR BACK T-shirt and
a conical straw hat to keep the blazing sun off him. Kitty's next to
him, watching the windows behind the dead neon signs. She's not happy
about this choice of venue at all. It's out of Shitamachi. Out of the
protection of the Asahi Tag Team. It's the lower end of the Tangerine
Tag Team's kill zone and it's totally open.
Dex figures the poor security of the area will work to the
advantage of everyone, but he knows that Kitty doesn't get nervous
without good reason. So when Kreskin's red rickshaw arrives and Kitty
hands him a HK pistol, he doesn't give it back. Dex hates guns. He
snaps a magazine in and loads a round, letting the hammer down
softly. Before climbing out, he stuffs the thing down the back of his
baggy red jeans.
Kreskin climbs out wearing a cheap business suit, hiding his
eyes behind a pair of Mitsubishi anti-laser glare glasses. He keeps
two of his joker muscleboys close to him, watching the area while
toying playfully with their HK uzi copies. For a moment it almost
looks like Kreskin doesn't recognize Dex as he strides across the
street. But soon he's there and the smile creeps onto the Russian's
chubby face. The huge arms extend and the two old friends hug each
other with subtle reservation.
There's a swift conversation that seems to arrange another
meeting time, and Dex hands over the data cube. Dex is full of
himself as they talk. He's given Kreskin what he wanted, made enough
money for Kreskin to sort him and Kitty out with new ID's so they can
go to London when the heat is on. He has his future in his hands at
last. A chance to create his own destiny.
There's a stifled thump and a cry and a woman's urgent shout
behind him.
"DEX!"
He spins to see the scene, pulls the HK from his jeans.
Bobby lies in a growing pool of blood, his life evaporating
under the heat of the sun. Turk has Kitty by the throat, using her as
human body armor; the cliched hostage position, with a thick chrome
revolver pressed into her temple.
"Hi there, Eastman!" Turk breaks into his dumb grin showing
bright white teeth and a piece of strawberry gum. "Think ah'd leave
heah without takin' you wi' me? Ah think not."
Dex levels the automatic at Turk's head. Behind him, he can feel
the presence of Kreskin and his boys, the sights of HK uzi copies
sending shivers along his neck. Sweat tickles his chin before
dripping off him.
"Let her go, Turk. This is you and me here."
Turk whistles and makes a face. "You been watchin' too much Big
Pierrot, Eastman. Come up wi' an ole cliche like that. You put away
your piece an' maybe, jus' maybe, Ah might let your li'l lady go."
Dex shakes his head. His guts wrenched with the feeling of
betrayal, like nothing has happened but he's lost everything he has.
"Come on, man. I throw this away and I'm giving you the edge."
Turk flicks back the hammer on the revolver, Kitty sucks in a
breath. "What edge, fool. Don't try an' pull that mental shit on me,
Eastman. Ah know you ain't gonna shoot me."
"Did it once before, Turk, remember? Nothing can happen without
you dying at the end of it. You run and I'll shoot. You shoot me and
I'll shoot you. You point the gun at me and I'll shoot you. You kill
her and I'll shoot you. They shoot me and I'll shoot you. No win
situation."
Dex cocks an eyebrow at Turk's expression. The smile falling
from the fat Dixie City man's face, turning to a sneer.
"What's up, Turk? Run out of choices? Then call Kreskin's men
off."
Turk licks salt from his lips.
"Better do as he says, man. You won't be quite so good-looking
with a hole in your face." Kitty's mind is racing. She doesn't have
the advantage that these boys have. All of them are probably rewired.
Dex, she knows, definitely has been, she's seen how fast he can be.
Only a 5 percent reflex boost, but it's enough of an edge against an
unmodified man. No, she can't outrun them, so she has to outthink
them. Be faster by pre-empting them all.
"Shut up, bitch!"
"What's it going to be, Turk, eh?" Dex can feel his wired
nervous system, courtesy of the MGAF, speeding up. An effect like
pins and needles all over the body. A slight vertigo and then the
neural processor that runs it all from the base of his spine kicks in
and the world turns slow-mo.
Frame by frame, a second of violence.
Everyone is surprised because Kitty moves first. Her elbow lifts
up and back to push Turk's arm away and the revolver slips from his
grasp and Kitty is in the air, diving for the cover of the rickshaw.
Turk is a standing target, but Dex doesn't fire, instead, he jumps at
wired speed to the floor and shoots at the red rickshaw. He empty's
half a magazine into Kreskin.
Kreskin's boys are too slow, only now starting to speed up.
Their first bursts of fire are at the place where Dex was, and find
only Turk's fat body at the far side of the street, catching him in
the throat and upper torso. Bullets rip through his spine and out the
other side, pulling Turk with them like puppet strings.
The tall Dixie City man slaps against a metal shop front and
slides silent to the ground in a bloody, crumpled heap of flesh.
One of Kreskin's boys managed to follow Dex's trajectory, and
when Dex rolls up onto his knees to fire the other half of the
magazine, bullets smash into his right arm and sends him spinning
back to the floor.
Then the boy that shot him has an instant to realize that his
boss is dead before his own head shatters sending blood and brain
matter across the red rickshaw. The last Kreskin boy is stunned and
silent. Kitty stands there with Turk's revolver in her small hands,
trained at his head. The boy drops his HK uzi copy. Kitty walks over
and kicks it away, then kneecaps the boy to stop him from leaving.
Dex is screaming in agony. He's been shot before, but that was
just a flesh | |
