 
Dark Satires

Louis Shalako

This Smashwords edition copyright 2014 Louis Shalako and Long Cool One Books

Design: J. Thornton

ISBN 9781301172443

Bushman originally appeared in Aurora Wolf.

The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any person living or deceased, or to any places or events, is purely coincidental. Names, places, settings, characters and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. The author's moral right has been asserted.

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The Kidney

"Argh! Argh!" He moaned in desperation. "Oh, God! No! Damn it, please."

Dale Bartok held on as long as he could, then in sheer panic, pulled off the highway. He groaned and gasped his way through the off-ramp, down the two-lane county road, and into the service station. Dale carefully locked the big red cube-van. After a quick and surreptitious glance around, the forty-one year-old bonded courier shuffled towards the rest-rooms. In broad daylight, with a lot of people coming and going, and fuel attendants outside at the pumps, the truck should be okay for a moment or two. He had no choice. He barely made it to the door, despite his embarrassing, butt-clenching shuffle and desperate attempts at sphincter-control. The slightly rotund parent of two barely made it in time.

The Husky station was just outside of London and he knew exactly where the place was. Dale was suffering from diarrhea, and upon opening the package of Imodium in the cupboard this morning, he had discovered that it was empty. Barb or one of the boys must have used the last couple of tablets. He was also late for work, and so he had to dash. Poor Dale had been so tempted, to just pull over by the side of the road, but it simply wasn't done. It was very exposed, and attention from the cops was bad news. Speed limits were merely advisory numbers for a courier, but it also helped to be as invisible as one possibly could.

The real reason was that he simply didn't have any tissues or even used paper towels left over from a fast-food lunch in the vehicle. He wasn't able to steel himself to do it. He felt a moment of near-hysteria at the thought that every stall might be occupied...thank Christ, but he spotted an open door. Of course it had to be the one right at the very far end.

Today's shipment was especially vital. The company was new, this was a new contract, and it was only about the third time they had transported anything for this particular customer. It was a numbered Ontario company, a medical supply and consulting firm working out of the University of Western Ontario's children's hospital.

The fact that Dale was supposed to be picking up a certified cheque for four thousand bucks, for a simple little run out of Toronto wouldn't hurt his boss's feelings any, and since next Friday was payday, it wouldn't hurt Dale's either.

With a sense of relief Dale subsided onto the toilet, just in the nick of time, and he prayed for further good luck. He had a momentary vision of the Vienna Boy's Choir, or a chorus of angels, singing 'Hosanna to the highest!"

If anyone should see the vehicle sitting there without a driver, and report him, he would be out of a job in a heartbeat. The courier business was very competitive, and the drivers were horrible gossips, worse than taxi-drivers. The company was just starting up, and Dale was extremely fortunate to have gotten in on the ground floor. It was a good-paying job with a decent benefits package.

Dale had two weeks vacation coming in the fall. He was quite looking forward to it.

"Halleh-luyah," grunted Dale in sheer, unmitigated, blissful gratitude.

There were some unique thoughts that preyed around at the back of his mind. Possibly these thoughts were guilt or insecurity-driven.

Any other courier driver who saw him out of the vehicle, would be sure to notice. This was a lucrative contract, and his employer had shown a real sharp eye, in order to outbid everybody else. This was a gravy run in every sense of the word. You drove four hundred kilometres, picked up a cheque, dropped off a cooler full of vaccines, or plasma, or maybe experimental pharmaceuticals, and you were home in time for a half-day of short runs around town. By starting his day an hour and a half earlier, he would even get in a bit of overtime on this next cheque and Dale could still be home in time for dinner with Barb and the kids.

Dale did everything in his power to spend as little time in the bathroom as possible, not that his guts needed any prodding. He was back outside in less than four minutes, still queasy, still weak, still feeling a real, live, sweat around the eyes, but at least he was thinking he could make it the rest of the way to the northwest corner of London before the next bowel-explosion.

It was already too late, as he stood there in total shock, staring at the broken glass from the passenger-side window of his van lying all over the parking lot. The stainless-steel cooler box between the seats was gone. Just gone.

***

"It's a kidney!" The tall, shaven-headed, biker-mustachioed Kevin Hookstra grunted. "A fucking kidney!"

His steely grey eyes gave a withering glance at the object in the box and its new owner.

The pink and pallid thing, all wrapped-up in some protective layer of semi-transparent plastic film, lay there in a bed of crushed dry ice. Thin vapours rose from it, curious tendrils of steamy white CO2, as if questioning its own reality.

Kevin guffawed in derision, while the thief, Harry Calvin, of indeterminate age and perfectly non-descript description stared into the cooler, his wishy-washy, watery blue eyes widening in horror.

"Aw, for fuck's sakes," he gasped. "And now the fuckin' box is ruined too!"

He knew a guy who would give him twenty bucks or maybe a couple of grams of pot for that box. Stocky, silent at the best of times, strongman of the neighbourhood all of the time, Mike Gibson just stood there with a big grin on his face.

"Where did you get it?" He thought methodically, patiently. "What kind of vehicle?"

"At the Husky station on the highway," Harry advised. "Triple-A Bonded Couriers."

"When did you do this?" Mike Gibson, calm, cool, collected, was the epitome of mellowness, with an air of cucumber-like casuality, grinning at the crimes, misfortunes and follies of man, and especially of speedos.

"I grabbed it and came right here. I figured it's a hot day and you guys would know how to open it..."

The box had the words in big red letters; 'Keep Refrigerated,' the stickers were on the top and on both sides of it. Harry stared at the box and the grinder on the workbench that Hookstra had used to open the lock. Gibson just grinned and slapped him on the shoulder.

Harry was counting on a big load of industrial-grade heroin or cocaine or something.

"Tell you what. I'll give you twenty units. No, make that thirty. It'll keep you going until tomorrow."

"Huh?" Kevin and Harry spoke in unison.

"What?" His compadre Kevin was puzzled.

"It's okay," Gibson assured Hookstra. "He's good for it, and we all have a bad day once in a while."

His glittering coal-black eyes were burning with the humour of the moment, the corners of the sensuous, intelligent mouth tugging insistently downwards if to deny the futility of it all.

Turning to the thief, he had a suggestion.

"Tell you what. We can always use more cell-phones. You'll just owe me a couple or maybe a half-dozen phones, new ones, like last time. If you can do it."

Harry nodded cautiously in agreement, unable to meet Gibson's eyes, unwilling to ask too many questions. Unable to comprehend his luck.

Gibson looked at Hookstra.

"Can you get him a little jug, Kev?" Hookstra blinked, nodded, and then wandered off up to the house to round it up.

They stood in the garage looking at the box. Mike snapped the lid down, and nodded at Harry.

"This thing will go bad in a day or two, and then there'll be one hell of a stink. We'll have to dump it someplace real good. I'm sure I'll think of something."

Harry just nodded dumbly, astounded by his good fortune. Mike wasn't known for cheerful fronts, and Harry still owed him forty bucks from a week or ten days ago. But Mike, uncharacteristically for him, seemed to have forgotten all about it. Harry knew better than to think he might have forgiven the debt.

"I suppose we could always feed it to the dogs or something." The dealer muttered absently. "Really, it's the box that's the problem."

Harry didn't want to know.

Hookstra returned and handed Harry a glass vial with a generous quantity of a milky-white solution inside of it. Gibson looked on approvingly.

"Be careful," Kevin advised. "It's really good. I mean it."

"Okay, thanks, guys." Harry practically bolted out the door as Mike grinned at Kevin.

"What was all that about?" It was total mystery to Kevin.

"It's a fucking kidney, my good friend and confidante." Mike Gibson was in a rough good humour now.

"Hah!" He marveled. "A kidney!"

You could always tell when Mike was in a good mood, he became articulate as someone once observed, causing a paroxysm of glee to go through the gathered denizens in the basement of Mike's flop. Mike laughed harder than all the rest of them, at that little joke.

"So! What are you going to do, make steak and kidney pie?" Kevin, 'not the brightest light in the firmament,' as Mike once said, was at least unquestioningly loyal, and real stubborn as far as talking to cops and the like was concerned.

"Get me one of them phones fuck-head brought us yesterday," asked Mike. "Where are them things hidden, anyway?"

"One of the fag-pink ones?"

"I don't give a shit what colour it is. We're going to make ourselves a few grand this afternoon."

"How are we going to do that?"

"We're going to sell a kidney," said Gibson. "I guess that is kind of a first, for us, but what the hell, what the hell...welcome to the twenty-first century!"

Kevin was in a kind of shock, but then burst out laughing at his boss and mentor.

"Hah! Hah! Hah! Where in the fucking hell are you going to find some guy who wants to buy a fucking kidney?"

"Why, at the hospital, of course." Mike grinned. "That courier company must be shitting their pants right about now. I have one or two thoughts on the subject."

"The...the hospital?" Kevin gasped. "Oh, man, I don't want to know!"

"Somebody must have ordered it." Gibson was adamant. "I'm thinking they might want that thing back real bad. Real fucking bad. Now run and get me that phone. Warm up that heap of junk, that old Aerostar of Pokey's...he won't be back for a while anyhow. We got work to do."

Pokey was in the bucket for the next three months, and still owed Gibson about sixteen-hundred bucks. This was about eight times what the vehicle was actually worth. Kevin understood that much.

The ownership was in the glove-box, all signed, sealed and delivered—but not legally re-registered in Mike's name. There was still insurance on it. The sticker was good, the air conditioning worked. He had a few pre-paid phone cards that didn't cost him too much.

Mike was a bit of a philosopher.

"How much gas is in that thing?" He was trying to think of every possible hazard.

"Three-quarters, I think." Kevin turned and went up to the house to get a handful of hot phones.

Mike Gibson stood there in front of the garage in the warm spring sunshine. This might all work out for the best. Ask ten grand and don't get too emotionally involved in the price. Hell, even a couple grand for a few arm-pokes of amphetamines was a good day's work.

The key thing in this kind of operation was speed. Don't give them time to think. Otherwise the drop was sure to be monitored, and then you were fucked. The world was full of stupid people, but that seemed fair enough to Mike Gibson. He was just grateful that he wasn't one of them.

The old maroon and cream-coloured Ford minivan chuffed to a halt beside Mike.

"I got your laptop." His minion, his churl, his oafish henchman awaited. His droog, his villein.

"Thank you. Take us over to Scary Mary's place. She's going to make a couple or three phone calls for us." Kevin put the vehicle into gear and moved off. "For a fifty, it's worth it."

"She'll give you a blow-job for twenty."

"Huh!" Mike remembered all too clearly what she looked like.

"I'll give her thirty bucks not to," he decided. "And twenty for a few phone calls."

Mike was already busy with the lap-top, searching for available information regarding Triple-A. They had the codes for every wireless network in the city, so that part was easy enough. All it took was a little patience.

It was the best place to start. For one thing, the driver might not have called the cops first—he would have been in a right fucking panic. For another thing, they wouldn't want it getting around that they lost a kidney under their care. It would be on all the news reports. It would make all the papers, and the company would be a laughing stock. They might find it hard to get their insurance renewed. It was a place to start...and the day was still young.

The people at the hospital or wherever might not even know it was missing. If the cops didn't know yet, that was just a bonus. But one way or another, he would work it out. He always did. That was the power of positive thinking. A man could do anything, if he applied his mind to it. Speed was of the essence.

"Huh. Triple-A has only been in business for eight months." He read further, then sat back to watch the scenery go by. "All right. That's what we'll do then."

Kevin fiddled with the knobs on the radio.

"What?" Kevin asked absently, as advanced theory was beyond his ken.

Mike was the one with all the people skills.

"We call up the courier company and ask if they've lost a kidney!"

"Really? Are you nuts?"

"Not really, but it's a nice touch. I'll see what I can do." Gibson thought about it. "It might help, actually. Mary can act a little schizoid on the phone and keep asking about a reward. She'll say she found the box. It was open, in a park, right beside some bushes...her kid found it. Her kid was scared half to death...freaking out, thought it was murder...yeah, that might do."

Kevin's jaw dropped and he stared at his idol for the moment.

"I wish I knew what you were on sometimes."

"Don't you worry, buddy. I got it all figured out. It's the deeper side of human psychology."

And it was true. While no plan was truly foolproof, Mike Gibson really did have it all figured out.

***

Exactly one hour and forty-two minutes after the kidney went missing, it was delivered to a certain very busy department at the University Hospital. A form was signed, and a certified cheque to the tune of $4,000.00 made out in the name of Triple-A Bonded Couriers was turned over to Scary Mary, who brought it to Gibson and Hookstra out in the parking lot. She climbed in and Mike handed her a fifty. They drove the Aerostar to a wooded area just outside of the city.

"Here's the cheque." A shaken but still grateful Dale Bartok waited in forlorn misery. "Don't be so down-hearted, you were only an hour late. The patient is going to be fine, incidentally."

"Thank you...and here's the keys to the cube-van." Bartok responded reluctantly enough, but he didn't pretend to understand what sort of a crazy deal that his boss had struck with these characters.

"And you understand what you're supposed to do?" Hookstra poked him in the chest. "Tell me!"

"Um, um, I drive the old van to Toronto, and drop it off, right where you said." Bartok was momentarily mesmerized by the sight of a dark, stocky man with a laptop computer and a gym bag, and a scruffy-looking, straggly-haired woman in dirty pink stretch-pants, wearing what looked like a Tim Horton's blouse and a funny little brown beret getting out of the Ford and climbing into his cube-van.

"I've got the place written down." Hookstra stuck the paper in Dale's shirt pocket.

"Tell him I said so. He knows what to do with it. Eat the paper. My friend is going to watch you do it."

Dale didn't know if he was kidding or not, at this point. He just nodded.

The passenger side door of his beloved vehicle, his customary workplace, his home away from home thudded closed in some kind of counterpoint to his thoughts, driving them home with a vengeance. He stared at the man in the right seat in dumb, sheep-like shock.

The van was this year's model, brand-new, and so shiny and red. He loved that van.

"Then all I do is call the cops, and stick to my story?"

"Right." Hookstra terrified Bartos with his hard grey eyes and stern looks and especially those bulging biceps, liberally covered with tattoos of a most antisocial nature. "The cube van's leased, right? No skin off your nose, right? The insurance will take care of it, right?"

"After I drop it...then I wait a couple of hours...get a few miles away...and call the cops..."

"And you tell them you were car-jacked right there in Toronto, right there in your own little neighbourhood." Hookstra insisted. "Right there by the service drive, right where I told you! Before you set out on your next run. You can claim a bunch of parcels got stolen, your boss can claim that on the insurance. Stick it to 'em good."

"Yes, sir." Dale had tears in his eyes. "I know, I know! I was blindfolded and stuff. Young black men, three or four of them. They jumped in while I was just leaving, behind the building, they-they-they had guns, we-we-we, um, drove around for a while, I know, I know!"

"You're doing the right thing." Hookstra stared at Dale. "If you had been really, really stupid and called the cops, we never could have saved your ass...right?

Dale just stared into those eyes with his heart palpitating in his chest and all his thoughts dried up at the source. For a moment, he was convinced that his blood ran cold—literally cold in his veins. He felt a wave of dread wash over him, and his knees were knocking so loud he thought the other man would hear it.

"By the way, the recipient is an eleven year old girl." Hookstra told him all about it. "Her name is Janet and I think she'll be real happy with her new body-parts."

Dale stood there licking his lips and trying to suck enough oxygen into his lungs, but his diaphragm wasn't working properly. The big man held his eyes locked solid for a long moment.

"My people are everywhere. They see everything, they hear everything."

Whenever he spoke, something deep inside of Dale Bartos rattled or trembled in sympathetic vibration.

"Trust me, it really is better this way." Hookstra abruptly turned and walked away.

He slithered up into the driver's side door of the cube van and drove the thing away without so much as a backward glance. Neither did he seem to be in too much of a hurry.

"I know, I know!" Dale Bartos groaned, feeling another kind of spiritual desolation sweep over him as he realized that he had just shit himself. "Oh God, how I know!"

The True Face of Glory

"Hey, Mister. Can you spare a dime?" The man at the mouth of the alley had a rasping voice.

Zeb turned to look, about to tell him to get lost.

He stopped short on seeing the stained cheesecloth rags tied around his head and face.

"What the...?"

"It's okay, Mister." The man's sloping shoulders slumped further still.

Zeb dug in his pocket to see if he had some loose change. The sight of a double row of campaign ribbons and the Military Medal wrenched at his guts and made his heart beat faster.

"What are you selling?" Zeb recovered quickly.

The man stood awkwardly, trying to stay out of the streetlight's glare, and yet still make a pitch to passing strangers.

"Apples."

Zeb handed him a three-dollar coin, one of the green-anodized hexagonal coins the government had just issued to co-memorize the Empire's final defeat of the Republic.

"Here." The guy handed over three apples, as Zeb sniffed the air suspiciously. "Thank you for your kindness."

Zeb was hungry enough, as dinner had been three or four hours ago. He stood there a little self-consciously polishing the apple on his jacket, and then taking a bite out of it. The fellow didn't smell as bad as he looked, although there was a perceptible aroma. The hands seemed clean enough.

"It's good. Really good." Zeb chewed, wondering at his feelings. "I hardly ever buy them, myself."

Normally he brushed past such people without a backward glance.

"So...if you don't mind me asking...what happened?"

The head jerked in the semblance of a nod. The question was a familiar one, and the answer came easily enough after years of dereliction, deprivation, and despair.

"Laser blast. The cavity—that's like the breech of a gun. It failed and blew up in my face. Most likely it was stress cracks from overheating."

"Ah." Zeb took another bite.

"We were on Alpha-Seven."

"Oh, really?"

Alpha-Seven was a glorious page in Imperial military history. Its small garrison, seven hundred Marines, if Zeb remembered the news stories correctly, had held out for three months before being overwhelmed by vastly superior forces. Alpha-Seven was an airless rock not much bigger than Rhode Island. In Zeb's private opinion, the Empire had provoked the war with its trade embargo of resources vital to the other's economy, although the Republic struck first, in a surprise attack that had come within a whisker of success during the first six months.

Zeb couldn't think of a thing to say.

He had an inspiration.

"Thank you."

The man twitched and expelled breath noisily.

Zeb took another bite, working his way around the core.

"That's a good apple."

"I steal them."

"Can't say as I blame you." Grinning wryly, Zeb threw the core into the alley.

He stuck out a hand, after carefully putting the other two apples in the side pocket of his jacket.

They shook, as the liquid pools of darkness that were the man's eyes searched his face, looking for signs of contempt or pity or even compassion.

All he saw was respect.

"Thank you, Mister."

"I'll give one of these to my little sister, and one to my mom."

Zeb could almost sense a tired smile under the bandages, and the fellow inclined his head.

"Good luck to you."

There was no response.

Catching someone's eye, the fellow leaned forward into the light.

"Excuse me, nice lady. Can you spare a dime for an old soldier down on his luck?"

Zeb moved out of the way as she gasped, stopping short. Her hand went to her throat, and then dropped.

"This gentleman was on Alpha-Seven."

"Oh." Her eyes glazed a bit and then she remcmbered. "Oh."

Her hands reluctantly opened up her small clutch-purse and fished around for some coins.

"The apples aren't bad either."

She sized Zeb up with an odd look, and the veteran took something from her outstretched hand. Zeb had the impression she wasn't all that enamored of either one of them, although she accepted an apple with as much grace as she could muster. There was no room in the purse for it, and the likelihood was that she would throw it away around the next corner. Which didn't seem right, somehow, but what could you say? It would just embarrass the all concerned.

Zeb decided that was the psychological moment to move on.

Yeah, it was a disgrace how the Empire treated the maimed, the crippled and just plain lost veterans, to whom they all owed so much. Their pension benefits were abysmal, and while media reports on the rehabilitation centres invariably glowed with praise for the good work done there, the need was so great that inevitably, far too many fell through the cracks and ended up in the gutter. Zeb had been a year too young for the service, or he might have joined up himself.

That's what he always told himself.

It was always the way, wasn't it? When the war started the promises were legion, the recruiting calls patriotic and made with fervent calls upon men's honour. When it was over, the Empire turned to other priorities, not the least of which was putting millions of returning, able-bodied soldiers back into society, and the workplace, and of course paying down the colossal debt. Wars were won, as everyone knew, by the massive expenditure of blood and treasure. The balance of power remained. Nothing had really changed. The balance had been maintained. Zeb figured within twenty-five years, maybe less, they'd be at it again, for nothing would be decided until one or the other system had been destroyed.

That's what a lot of people said, and it seemed true enough.

This was the true face of glory.

The Death of Frederigo Velasquez

In life, all of our worst nightmares come true, sooner or later. No one could have dreamed this.

This was his best suit and his underwear was obviously silk. The air was close and warm and heavy with moisture. Sweat and tears stung his eyes. The blackness was profound. The silence was worse, only the thudding of what must be trucks going down a road nearby came through the hard-packed earth with any clarity. Dragging up his arm in the tightly-enclosed space, the ticking of his watch and the faint glow of the dial was the only reality. Time must soon run out for Frederigo.

His thoughts raced. He knew what must have happened.

The trouble with the alarm button was that there was no way to test it, as if any living person had ever thought to do so. No one had ever considered the possibility that it wouldn't work.

Life was too precious to take a chance. He thought he hadn't.

Frederigo Velasquez, born and bred in Buena Vista, was a cautious man, but also a successful man. It all seemed so logical at the time.

When it came time for the hard-working owner of a small chain of laundromats in this thriving city to do some estate planning, a pre-paid funeral plan seemed like a good idea. Maria had been plaguing him about his health for some time, and finally Hector got in on it.

It really would be in their best interest, to save taxes and avoid withdrawal penalties.

His family, whom he loved dearly, and undoubtedly they loved him just as dearly, wouldn't have to worry about a thing. It was all taken care of now, all paid for, and first-class all the way.

He had provided for the eventualities as thoughtfully as anything else he did.

Like several of the small businesses he had painstakingly built up and then sold over the last twenty-five years, it was a turn-key operation. Although Maria didn't much appreciate the morbid humour, his son had.

At the last minute, on the suggestion of Uncle Leo, an uncle on Maria's side it must be said, he had cheerfully put down a little extra for a very special coffin. It had an alarm bell. He remembered the original news stories, when they first came out. It was good for a laugh, and the perpetual optimist that was Federigo laughed easily. It was a small price to pay for peace of mind.

He could make a joke at his own expense and get away with it. Or so he thought.

At fifty-seven, Federigo was still a young man, and might have thirty or forty years, some of them very good years, still ahead of him. He sobbed at the thought of dying, so very, very slowly in there.

He was going to die today. Now. In the next few minutes.

No one would ever know what happened to him; for how could they?

His thoughts raced. Where did he go wrong?

After all those years of hard work, it had felt so good to give in to an insane impulse. Word of the coffin alarm-button quickly got out, whether via an employee or a relative, no matter, and his business had enjoyed a brief spurt in terms of sales. It lasted about two weeks.

Everyone in town came to use the machines, to do their laundry, as clean as a whistle, or so the radio ads said, and to gossip, and to marvel at his foolishness. To be fair, he had made the money back quite quickly.

Federigo came from the barrio. Fighting his way up from the dregs and the sewers had taken a long time, but it had been worth it, eminently so.

He'd been in a few tough spots in his life. He didn't think he was going to get out of this one, and the emotions overcame him.

The terrible truth about the alarm button was that it didn't work. The size, shape and length of the box he was in said everything. The hard knob of the button, dead center on the bottom of the lid, was undeniable. He could see it in his mind's eye.

"Oh, mama." His lips moved in prayer.

He must have had one of his spells. They must have taken him for dead. He must have been out of it for a few days this time. His gratitude at not being dissected and en-balmed in his sleep was offset by the fact that the button didn't work.

The fear was unbearable. He couldn't stop shaking.

He began to scream, and to pound weakly in the limited space at the silk-lined lid of his coffin.

The terror was beyond his control as he kicked and flailed and screamed like a madman.

***

Rain pelted down outside the open veranda windows and it seemed as if the city had gone silent.

Only the occasional swishing of a vehicle in the street outside broke through the hiss of the rain, quickly fading as they passed.

They were alone at last.

Who could say it was wrong for the funeral director, the charming and rakishly handsome Luiz Alvarro, to comfort the bereaved widow?

Maria dried her eyes.

"Are you sure it will be all right?"

They sat on the couch. He took her hands in his.

"Absolutely." He nodded tenderly.

She looked away, tragically beautiful with her upturned nose and dimpled chin, her long dark hair sweeping down past the pale oval of her face. Her matronly figure only excited him the more. The simple luxury, the room and its bright complementary colours right out of a magazine, said much about her.

She bit her lip.

"He didn't suffer. I promise you that." Luiz lifted and kissed her hands tenderly. "Trust me. It's better this way. He wouldn't have liked a divorce, especially coming at him out of left field like that. He would have fought like a tiger—you know that. He was insanely jealous, and ultimately, a very possessive man."

She nodded, still unable to look at him. Over the last years, she had come to hate Federigo, for his tirelessness, his selflessness when it came to the business. There was never enough time for family. There was never enough time for them. But they always had enough money. That was what angered her the most.

It was time for them, for him, and for her. Frederigo, he could never see it that way.

"You'll get a million and a half for the laundry chain."

She nodded, raising her eyebrows slightly and finally looking hopefully at Luiz. She never looked more beautiful to him than at that moment.

"Do you think so?"

"Sure. Absolutely. And you know what I was thinking?"

She gazed fondly into those eyes and somehow knew it would be all right.

"No, my love. What were you thinking?"

"Well, we should think about it a while, I guess. But if I sold the funeral home, maybe you and I, and Hector, we could go away somewhere nice." He'd been waiting for a good opportunity to bring it up.

There was no time like now.

She would need time to think, and to worry, but he was sure she would come around.

"What? Where?" The very thought lifted her spirits.

Hector was her eighteen year-old son, the last one still living at home. He was employed in his father's business as a handy-man. The young man was in his room behind closed doors as usual, probably on the computer. The boy didn't have a girlfriend as far as Luiz knew. Hector could have the internet anywhere, and would soon make new friends. The boy seemed to have that gift. Luiz had put some thought into all of this. The death certificate, the funeral—it all went like a piece of cake. It was unbelievably easy to do away with someone as long as there was no hint of violence. They had all the right witnesses, and there was a good medical explanation. The right pill mixed into the right drink, at a suitable time and place, the right doctor, and the right men waiting to pick up the body.

It didn't even cost that much, not today. Not in what Mexico had become in recent years, or perhaps more likely, it had always been this way. If only he had known.

"Somewhere nice—like Cannes, or Rio, or somewhere like that. Somewhere like Tahiti, you know?"

It would get them away from the city, the noise, the crime, and the raised eyebrows, of which there were certain to be at least a few. But waiting was madness. There was no time to waste.

They had talked all about this before. Luiz was a patient man. She was sweet, and vulnerable, and of good family, and very much worth the having. He wasn't getting any younger himself, and maybe it was time to take a rest. She knew all his thoughts. They had talked about it, and dreamt together often. His own wife had left years ago, but he was over all that.

The silence had gone on too long.

"We'll think about it." He leaned over and gave her a dry peck on the lips.

"Yes, my love."

Suddenly she was clinging to him, stirring him with her warmth and her scent. The heavy feel of her breast in his hand was comforting and disturbing at the same time. Her eyes were inches away, and again she was blinking back tears.

"Please don't leave me."

He held her tight, loins stirring. She was a magnificent sight in bed, but he wondered if they dared, so soon after the interment...?

And of course the boy was home. They would have to be as quiet as the little mice that somehow eked out a living from the crumbs left behind after Sunday Mass, which was a kind of saying they had around here.

***

Luiz snored lightly on the pillow beside her. His lean, aquiline face was accentuated by the moonlight, filtered by the window coverings. She loved him dearly. He had brought something back into her life, call it excitement. That pencil-thin mustache and huge eyes, the high cheek bones had caught her bored eye. His manners were impeccably romantic, just like out of a book from the thirties. Luiz dressed beautifully, and he had a nice, hard, hairy body.

He was very solicitous of her. He paid attention to her. He loved her, and she knew it. She had no doubts.

Call it hope, call it opportunity knocking. Call it a gamble.

Not turning the bedside light on, she lifted the downy comforter and swung her feet out of bed.

The floor was deliciously cool. Going by the dim light of the hallway, coming in through the crack under the door, as the amber light of a streetlight threw her shadow into sharp detail, she stepped into her slippers and wrapped the housecoat around her.

All was silence in the great, rambling one-floor conglomeration that was their home. It was her home, now. Completely happy to add on a room, and finally a whole new wing, Frederigo had refused to move to the suburbs. He loved the city and its people, another thing that set him apart in their new world of the recently-successful. Her friends professed to hate the city, and she did too. She'd hated this place for a very long time.

Maybe they should go away.

Carefully closing the bedroom door behind her, noting the harsh line of light still visible at this late hour under Hector's door, she shuffled to the kitchen in hopes of an easy snack. Her mouth just watered at the thought of those rich treats. She really ought to watch her waistline, but the times they were unfortunate. A young widow, or fairly young, recently-bereaved, could be excused some small indulgence.

After the Celebration of Life for poor dear Frederigo, the leftover trays were brought home by a thoughtful Aunt Inez, the thought of which brought some guilt. Aunt Inez was a saint. She'd noticed them in the fridge earlier. Her stomach rumbled at the thought of food, after the long and tedious ordeal of the day, a day of fakery, and a kind of sublime witchcraft.

Poor, poor Frederigo.

How tiresome it must be, to be dead, for one so vibrant, energetic, and full of life.

She had loved him very much, years ago. Now all she had was regrets. He had made her life a boring hell.

***

When she turned on the lights, flooding the big, open plan peasant-style kitchen with crystalline blue light from the overheads and the under-the-cabinet fixtures, at first, she didn't comprehend the meaning of the dark stains and the crunch of grit and drying muck underfoot.

"Oh..."

Her mouth opened, but the maid was obviously off at this late hour and there was no one there to hear.

There were foot-marks and spots of wet filth all over her beautiful parquet floor, hand laid by the finest craftsmen the local area had to offer. The stuff, whatever it was, was tracked all over the place.

"Nom de Dios...?"

There was the clink of glass on glass and she snapped her head around to confront an apparition.

Her heart stopped dead in her chest as she took in the snack tray, clear plastic wrap peeled back.

A filthy hand popped a petit-four into a gaping red mouth...

A ghastly form, black and wet and muddy and covered in leaves and grass and filth, raised a glass of fine brandy judging by the bottle standing open on the black granite countertop.

It spoke to her in the voice of Frederigo.

"Hello, my love."

It was the rain, of course, and the soft soil, and the fear. The desperation, and the adrenalin.

The refusal to die.

That's what saved him, the sheer stubbornness, that, and one last desperate bid for life, when he rolled over and got his knees scrunched up under him. The rain, the life-giving rain, that and a burial plot in soft soil, right on the edge of a ravine, that was all that had saved him.

She almost died on the spot, chin up, gasping for air and clutching at her throat. Her feet refused to budge.

"Oh...oh...oh."

"Well, my dear. It's been a hell of a day." The grotesque figure swallowed and gasped in fiery gratification. "Perhaps lover-boy would like to join us, eh?"

"Ah, ah...ah." Words died before they were formed.

"That's all right. I never liked him anyway."

Those baleful eyes promised much.

That's when she screamed, and the glass crashed to the floor. In order to silence her, Frederigo's big hands found her throat.

No jury in the land would ever convict him.

Besides, he was already dead.

5150: the Bug Feeder

Shift supervisor Sergeant Leisha Bogaert pulled up behind Officer Dale Rossiter's cruiser.

She checked in with dispatch.

"On the scene of the 5150." It was out in the country but still within the city limits.

"Super on scene." The air hissed over the speakers. "Time is zero-one-fourteen and thirty."

"Roger that." She shook her head as the dispatcher read off the incident report number.

Too much coffee over there.

Shoving her baton into its belt-loop, settling her cap firmly, she sauntered up to where Rossiter stood with the concerned local citizen, a CLC, noting the pale visage of the offender in the passenger side of Rossiter's cruiser, Unit Nine.

"So. What's up?"

She already knew the bare details.

Local farmer Joe Sverdlup had been returning with his wife Angelina from a night at the clubs, when he could have sworn he saw a monk get out of a parked car and enter his fields. The car, a little white Sunbird, was sitting right there and everything, Becoming suspicious of he knew not what, although dope growers and murderers dumping bodies were not exactly unheard of in the modern world, the fact was it was just plain odd. The thoughts of devil worship and occult rituals wouldn't let him alone, and it was private property after all.

The car was still there fifteen minutes later when he went to put the dogs out in the yard. He checked out back of the barn and saw a naked person standing in the middle of his soybeans under the silvery light of a full August moon and so he called 911.

"I can't tell if the gentleman is disturbed or just some kind of a crackpot." Dale was non-committal.

The big question was whether he would become a danger to himself or the community.

"Okay."

She stood looking at their new friend, huddled under a blanket in the back seat.

"What was he doing out there?"

"He says he was feeding the bugs.'

"What?" The word was torn from her.

She thought she'd seen everything.

"He's got the bites to prove it." Rossiter had his arms crossed against the chill of the night. "He stands there with arms wide open. It's like he's high on life or something. There were hundreds, thousands on him when I came along."

"Ugh. Was he naked?" She turned to Rossiter.

"No. He says he kept his underwear on and he has those rubber crocs, you know—"

Leisha knew, as her own brood of seven to twelve year-olds all had to have them, and yet shopping with them was sheer hell.

"Huh." She blew air out through her lips. "Are you making a complaint?"

She eyed Mister Sverdlup.

"Oh, golly."

They all grinned.

"I could live without the publicity." He had a vegetable stand in season and sold a lot of sweet corn, squash, peaches and the like.

Joe was a vendor at the Saturday morning farmer's market in town.

"Okay. Let me talk to the gentleman."

With no other ideas, and no real harm done, Rossiter nodded.

***

She got Rossiter to open the door and she stood, hand on roof and door frame, leaning in and looking Mister Ermine Swales over. He was a slender man in his early thirties. She took her time sniffing for giveaways and taking a look at his eyes. Dale and Joe conferred in dubious tones by the front hood of the car.

They had a real winner here.

"Sir?"

"What?"

"Can you tell me what you were doing out there?"

He flushed a little and gathered his dignity.

"I was feeding the mosquitoes."

She bit her lip and shook her head.

"Why? Why would you want to do that?"

"I don't really know why. I just enjoy it, I guess."

She nodded.

"Promise me, cross your heart and, ah, hope to die, that you had your underwear on and stuff like that? You don't seem to have been drinking..."

"No! No! I have to keep my blood pure for God's little creatures."

She bit back a scream. A real winner. Didn't do drugs or anything. In a bygone age he might have chained himself in a niche and dispensed spiritual advice.

"I'm also a poet." He was attempting to be helpful.

She patted him on the shoulder.

"You're not in trouble, okay?"

"Okay."

"Okay, sir, so you have your shoes. The gentleman said you looked like a monk. Did you have any other clothes?"

"Oh, yes, officer. I left my housecoat hanging on a branch." It was velour and had a hood, dark brown with cream lining.

"Ah. Of course." She mentally reviewed the facts. "And your driver's license is good. You have insurance, and all that sort of thing."

"Yes."

She thought it over. Rossiter had all of his ID. The man had never been transported, no arrests, no record. No restrictions and no parole violations.

"You know you were trespassing there, right?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't see any signs. Besides, I've done it before."

Her jaw dropped.

"Here?"

"Oh, yes, and other places too."

"Sir...do you mind if I ask a personal question?"

"Not at all, officer. Sorry. You're a sergeant, right?"

She grinned.

"Yep."

This was an opportunity of sorts.

"Why do you do it? I mean, what's the attraction?" She didn't say it, but there were all kinds of odd-ball things available in town if you knew where to look, and this was just so out of the ordinary.

"I wanted to feel something, officer. I just wanted to feel something."

"I see."

That one hit home for some reason. She could sort of see his point. Sheer loneliness caused so many problems in the world, and her heart ached at the thought sometimes.

"And...how does it feel...exactly?"

"Exquisite...sublime..." He turned and engaged her fully for the first time. "It really is wonderful."

The ecstatic look in his eyes was enough for Leisha.

"Uh, huh. Okay, thank you, sir. I'll just talk to these other people for a moment."

Leaving the door open, Leisha walked up to the front of the car.

"Joe."

"Yes?"

"If this guy maybe asked nicely for your permission, I mean...would you mind if he sort of came here out once in a while and fed the mosquitoes.?"

"Oh, ahhh...ahhh. Ha! I...ah...I suppose not." Joe was flabbergasted, and not a little intrigued.

His knees went limp or something for a moment there.

"Ahhh...sure. Why not?"

Leisha looked at Rossiter.

He looked at their prisoner. He turned back to her, with an odd shake of his head and the right side of his mouth curling up.

Joe Sverdlup's ears were at full perk.

"Outstanding. Sergeant." She hadn't seen Rossiter smile like that in a while—a long while.

"I'll leave it in your capable hands then, gentlemen."

"Sergeant! Sergeant!"

"What?"

"Before you go, I want to get you some cucumbers...we got tons of them, all the rain this year."

"Oh, no, really...I couldn't." From the sublime to the surreal, all in one easy twelve-hour shift.

"Sure you could!" He scuttled on bandy legs to the kiosk and quickly unlocked it.

Mister Sverdlup was back in jig time, plying her with cucumbers and some nice, firm plums that drew a squirt of saliva on seeing them. Sergeant Bogaert got back in her car and drove away without a second look, enjoying a strangely good feeling about this one.

What the hell.

It takes all kinds to make a world.

Besides, it saved a lot of paperwork.

Push Button Warfare

In terms of push-button warfare, we live in the science-fiction comic-book world of our youthful imaginations. The trouble is we don't know it. We haven't figured it out yet.

The transition from conventional to push-hutton warfare has been so seamless that no one noticed. Back then, when someone coined the phrase 'push-button warfare,' we all nodded sagely and thought that meant some military personnel sitting deep underground, thoroughly trained, with nuclear-hardened command and control systems, and responsible oversight, composed of some duly-constituted authority acting on behalf of some identifiable polity. With a smidgeon of moral rectitude we hoped that our missiles were so much better and more numerous than our enemies' missiles that they would never risk the all-out confrontation. We thought it meant satellites, and drones, and robots. In some ways we were right, because we have all that now, don't we? The future really did come true.

In more recent times, there are media reports, interviews, and official documents including the national budget which make provision for the latest big threat facing us, terrorism, which includes cyber-terrorism. Billions of dollars will be spent globally to fight online wars which, deep in some underground bunkers, are being fought right now by highly-trained military and other professional personnel. They still follow the standard model of traditional warfare with modern adaptations. Like many threats, it's a bit over-rated, but the tax dollars must go somewhere, as it contributes to GDP, and this is as good as anywhere.

No science fiction writer or futurist of the world of thirty or forty years ago ever envisioned in its fullest detail, the true nature of the threat. If the pen is mightier than the sword, it is also rather limited, just as the sword is, for other uses. But we don't use pens now, or swords. We have something much better.

We have the internet, and now, ladies and gentlemen, we have a battle for the hearts and minds of the people. It's all over the evening news if you care to observe, rather than just watch. The internet and social media are abuzz with players in the game.

I don't want to underplay the role of Homeland Security, the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service or other international agencies involved in the constant struggle to protect national interests in the rapidly-growing field of electronic warfare. This is not a new field, but in the past it was mostly directed outwards. It is a rapidly growing field, and it is increasingly being focused inwards.

The enemy is mobile, and the enemy is dispersed. It is self-evident. The enemy lives among us.

No one could deny that this is an actual war, one that is being fought right now—just go up to any responsible leader, whether in government or opposition, and ask them. None would state otherwise.

Foreign and domestic terrorists and organizations large and small, with any sort of anti-social agenda, or those with political, ideological, social or even completely irrational agendas will turn to computers, the internet, cloud-based systems, social networks, websites, viruses and hacking in order to further their aims. Anarchists will try to 'destroy the world' simply because it is there and maybe now there is a tool better than a thrown cast-iron bomb with smoldering fuse to achieve their goals.

The odds of a one-man operation with a pistol providing justification and thereby setting World War Three in motion are fairly remote these days.

Even this is not the real threat, because it is at least on the radar, and with all due respect to various and sundry minorities, the perpetrators will often fall into recognizable demographic criteria. They generate chatter. They must communicate. They move about, in ways that can be observed, and documented. They can be profiled, and detected, they can be prevented, captured, tried, and punished. They can serve as a 'deterrent' to other like-minded individuals. This involves new challenges, not unnaturally. Gathering intelligence, assessing individual threats, engaging in counter-operations, is not easy when the enemy is dispersed or sheltered to some degree by rogue or unfriendly states. It's not easy when the enemy lives among us, and looks like us, talks like us, and lives like us. Prevention is most difficult when suspects have legal and human rights, and access to a system of checks and balances, meant to prevent tyranny from ruling over us.

This is the 'obvious' threat, and one much talked about in media, and yes, science fiction.

But now we live in an environment where a person, sitting quietly in the privacy of their own home, acting unilaterally, with no training or identifiable ideology, of their own accord, can set in motion a train of events which will, eventually, with a logic that cannot be denied if the laws of causality have any social application at all, change the world. They can do it for whatever reason, or for no particular reason at all.

In my humble opinion, no one saw that forty years ago, and most would deny it now. I say that because of all the mistaken assumptions we will make.

What if they are non-violent? What if their goals are not anti-social? What if they are quiet and well-behaved, and do not enter into ill-conceived conspiracies? What if they keep within the bounds of the laws of the nation-state in which they reside? What if they do exactly the right things, and say all the right things, and what if they are charismatic, articulate and persuasive?

What if everyone thinks it's a joke, and just laughs and turns away?

Every day we click on these little mouse buttons, most of us barely knowing what happens when we do.

With a click of a button, this person—a private citizen, is going to change a few outcomes. Those outcomes lie far in the distant future, and no one can safely predict exactly what forms those outcomes will ultimately take.

But they don't care. Any notion that warfare should be conducted by 'gentlemen,' in 'a civilized fashion,' went out the window a long time ago. It is better to divest ourselves of such illusions.

And the war for the future is already on as far as this writer is concerned. That's right, ladies and gentlemen—the war for the future is and must be fought in the present moment.

Hopefully the right people will win it, but you never know.

Most of those who read this will not live to see the benefits, or the cost. Still, we must all do our duty.

It goes without saying that God is on our side.

And the first casualty of war is Truth. The second casualty is compassion, and the third is respect. Wars, no matter the state of the technology with which they are fought, have a way of becoming a little too personal very, very quickly, no matter what bright and shiny new weapons of mass instruction are used.

It's a risk we must be prepared to take.

The Silence Machine

Carl Emerson's hand shook slightly as he reluctantly reached for the phone. He put on his reading glasses and dialed the number.

When the lady answered, the noise above his bathroom, presumably the guy up there pounding his head on the floor or something, came yet again. There was no way she would ever hear it over the phone.

He glanced at the clock. It was two-thirty-two a.m.

He briefly explained the problem to the property management company's on-call night manager.

"All right." He heard her deep sigh of resignation over the phone. "I'll come over and check it out."

"I'm in three-oh-four."

"Yes, Mister Emerson." Again there came that sigh.

He bit down hard and rang off as politely as he could manage. This shit had been going on for a year and a half. It started two weeks after moving in.

Putting the phone down, he shook his head. The odds of her catching the guy, or even doing anything real about it if she did, were very slim. A one-bedroom unit generated eight thousand a year in revenues for the company. When someone moved out, the place was vacant for at least a month while the unit was repainted, the carpet was steam-cleaned and necessary repairs, including broken cupboards and the usual fist-holes in the drywall, would be fixed before it was shown again.

It's not like he didn't understand their problem.

When someone was evicted, and in his observation the only thing that could make the company do that was non-payment of rent, it might take three months to get them out. The place would be wrecked and cost a bundle to fix. Cleanup took another month to complete. In this neighborhood, at the low end of the income scale, naturally the firm was reluctant to take on the additional costs in the name of anything remotely resembling justice to the other tenants, all of whom had the same rights and paid for their apartments at the same rate. It was good, clean capitalism in action.

He had called the police five or six times, and the fellow had been ticketed for noise several times according to police. Emerson had written letters to the landlord at least seven or eight times, as without something in writing, they couldn't go to the Landlord-Tenant Tribunal. He wondered how many people backed off on that something in writing thing.

No one liked a snitch, and it always came back on you.

Still, the problem persisted, with no relief in sight.

***

The building manager showed up in about twenty minutes. She stood just inside his door after going into the bathroom. He wondered if she was going to claim noisy pipes again.

Perhaps she knew it wouldn't wash, for she didn't bother just this once.

She had heard nothing, and yet Emerson just knew the damned noise would come again. It was the middle of the night. Just how long could he expect her to hang around?

"I'm sorry, sir, but you have to understand it's an apartment building..."

Emerson blew up.

"Every fucking door in this building..."

"What?" She was mystified. "There's no need for such abuse, sir. I don't have to take it."

Yeah, in a series of noise complaints they were sure to turn against him rather than address an actual problem. Swearing just made it easier for them. He wondered why no one else had ever complained. Maybe they had. What a minute.

Of course they had...

Again he bit down hard.

"I'm sorry, I really am. Look. Every door in this building is solid wood. It's in a steel frame. There are no closers, there are no rubber bumpers in the frames. Half the people in this building need a six-week course in how not to slam a door..." The windows were old, aluminum sashes, noisy old sliders that hit home with a bang.

The closet doors had aluminum tracks, hollow wooden doors and every caster needed oiling. He knew when people were home as the walls were thin and you could hear talk from other units whichever end of the unit you were in.

"Do you think it was a door you heard?"

"No." He shook his head. "The guy's up there banging on something. Every twenty minutes, maybe every half-hour or so."

He knew from experience that it would go on all night. The guy knew from experience how it would go. They both cocked their ears.

Babble, babble, babble...babble babble, babble, kapow!

Someone down the hall, perhaps arriving home after the bars closed, had just closed their door, a noise all too familiar in the night. Yet the people right next to him were quiet. They knew how to close a door. They didn't engage in long and involved conversations at the top of their lungs while going down the hallway. He knew it was, at least theoretically, possible to be quiet and to show some respect the other tenants.

She gave him a look and shrugged her shoulders. He looked away in pure disgust.

"Do you know where that came from?"

"Probably. But it's awful hard to prove, isn't it?"

"Yes, I have to observe it directly or it's no good."

She was right there. He knew fucking well it was the people three doors down on the opposite side. Bad as they were, they were at least in for the night, right on schedule, and thank God, but it wasn't a mere twelve feet from his pillow.

The people next door didn't come home from work and sit in the parking lot with a seven-hundred watt stereo pounding out the bass of a hip-hop tune, waiting for the song to end.

They didn't yell from their balconies or have strange people show up at all hours and honk their horn intermittently while trying to get the attention of folks inside the building.

It was always the same ones. The ones with a big dog in a small apartment, the ones that went away for the weekend with the surround-sound TV turned on and going full blast. The ones that left windows open at both ends of the apartment in windy conditions and made everyone else listen to unsecured bedroom doors slam and bang for days on end.

Only two days previously, the superintendent had shoved a pamphlet under his door and likely every door in the building. He didn't know if someone had made a specific complaint or if they just did it the same time every year.

The pamphlet, all about noise concerns, quoted the Bible in the first line.

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." What a crock of horse-shit.

Too many people could not learn by example. He was tired of turning the other cheek and getting a kick in the ass. The lady, with nothing to contribute and no discernable action to take, decided to leave at that point.

Emerson felt sick to his stomach as he carefully closed the door to avoid waking the little old lady who lived below. The people next door were moving out soon, and their door was only ten feet from his. They were just on the other side of his kitchen wall. They were nice people, although he had never really gotten to know them. But you could just tell.

He wondered exactly what sort of piece of shit would be moving in all too soon and how he would deal with their self-centered ignorance and abusive behavior. A lease was a contract. Honorable people honored their contracts. Idiots signed it because it was the only way they would get an apartment. They never gave a shit what was actually in it.

The lease clearly stated 'No unnecessary noise after eleven p.m. and before six a.m.'

It said a few other things, too. The lease was a bad joke.

The damned pamphlet had even mentioned that some tenants worked nights and tried to sleep during the day. The problem was that Emerson was trying to sleep at night and wasn't having much luck with it. The pamphlet made no mention of anyone trying to sleep at night.

As he lay down to try and fall asleep, he wondered just how long it would be before buddy-boy up above was banging and thumping around again.

He didn't have long to wait.

***

"I was sort of wondering if maybe you were suffering from something we call noise anxiety."

The shrink was a damned fool, but then so was Emerson.

When the noise came again, he lost his temper, which he had always tried not to do.

Like a damned fool, this time he called the cops.

In a sleep-deprived, surreal daze, they took him into custody the moment he opened the door. They transported him to the psychiatric wing of the local hospital for three days of observation. It never occurred to ask who exactly had signed the thing, or how long they'd had it lying around.

"People under stress, people suffering from depression, will often develop noise anxiety. It's all too easy to think it's directed at them, that it's somehow personal." They met eyes.

"We're not talking about dump trucks going down the road in broad daylight or freight trains pulling out of the yards in the middle of the night." The shrink looked away from Carl, flushing slightly.

Emerson had lived fifty meters from the tracks. The whole building shook. His tall bookcases wobbled back and forth and figurines rattled on their bases. That had never really bothered him, but then it couldn't be put down to ignorance or even harassment. It was even kind of soothing, when you considered that he had been homeless for a couple of months before renting that place. He'd left there in a hurry after the daughter of the landlord starting cranking up her music when Momma wasn't around. He lived there for three weeks. He'd wasted a thousand bucks in rent, first and last, and it cost him two more months of sleeping in his sister's basement and another fourteen hundred bucks to get in here. Before signing the lease, he asked the inevitable question.

"This is a clean, quiet, professionally-managed building." That's what they said.

Like a damned fool, Emerson signed the lease and paid, cash on the barrel-head.

"Yes, that's one thing that deeply concerns me. This fixation on another individual can be dangerous, and we would hate to see you in trouble, or, or, harm another person."

"I'm in trouble now." They had told him he wasn't under arrest as they snapped the cuffs into place.

The doctor had nothing to say on that score.

Actions spoke louder than words. The thoughts of them railroading him ate quietly away at the insides of his guts.

They were so busy trying to convince him he was mentally ill that they simply would not listen.

They were incapable of listening.

Buddy-boy was fucking him over real good. Emerson had smelled crack one time when he went up to talk to the man in the middle of the night, a few days after a particularly humiliating discussion with three officers attending on a noise complaint. Some people freaked out on a noise complaint, and if there was a way they could make your life miserable afterwards, they would do it. It was inconceivable to their vanity that they could ever cause a problem for anyone.

They could justify putting it all on him.

It was who they were.

"Oh, no, we're just here to help you." The shrink, a thin, reedy, limp-wristed individual named Santorini, forced a cheerful look onto his face.

Mister Emerson was not responding well, and the key to a successful treatment was, first and foremost, to get the patient to admit a problem. Once that was done, and reassurances had been made that there were treatment options available, most people wanted that help, no matter what sort of debilitating bug-juice it involved. Mr. Emerson was not being very agreeable. He was eminently un-suggestible. Assessing what sort of a danger he might represent to the community was going to be difficult.

"Do you ever hear voices?'

"Suck my cock, you rat-faced piece of shit."

A reddening Doctor Santorini, eyes downcast, made a note of his truculence.

"Well, I guess we've had enough for one day."

"I've had enough bullshit for one fucking lifetime and one fucking town. I'll tell you that much."

The doctor let him out and Carl went back to the common area where they had a TV set permanently tuned to BSTV News Channel, which rather contradicted one of their statements.

You're not being punished.

Sure I am.

But that's what they claimed.

***

Finally they let him out. Going home was one of the hardest things he had ever had to do in his entire life. He had nowhere else to go. No doubt the rest of the building knew all about it and they were all laughing at him.

Trying to ignore the sound of music coming up from below, something he actually accepted as it was broad daylight and it couldn't be heard in his bedroom with the air conditioner going twenty-four hours a day, he tried to put back the pieces of his empty and meaningless existence.

It was only after a cold glass of milk and a sandwich made with cheap no-name bologna and the last couple of slices of stale bread that Carl Emerson remembered that he had a lottery ticket sitting right there on top of the mantel.

Hitting the button on his computer, there were loud thumps coming from up above again, as he waited for it to warm up. Buddy-boy obviously knew he was home.

When he went to the website to check the number, he got the shock of his life.

Carl Emerson had just won a hundred and eighty-nine million dollars in the Power-Bucks Lotto and that sort of thing took a while to sink in.

***

Officers Bill Sandberg and Gina Q. Toklaz exited police headquarters at a dead run, ears assaulted by the eerie, unnatural silence.

There was rioting and looting in the streets. There were multiple-vehicle pileups at every corner. People ran around, clasping their heads, eyes bugging out in disbelieving terror.

It was like some horrific vision, a bad dream, or the end of the world.

Jumping into the cruiser, Gina snapped on the flashers and hit the siren.

It sounded oddly muted, as if there was something wrong with it. She pounded her fist on the dash in frustration.

The radio crackled with a dozen units, all heavily engaged.

"What in the hell is going on?"

The whole town was going nuts. She slammed on the brakes. A body lay in the street with a widening pool of blood around the head. A shiny silver .357 Magnum lay just beyond the outstretched hand...he'd put it in his mouth and pulled the trigger, his motorcycle parked right there by the side of the street.

Hopefully the noise, the last sound he ever heard, was worth it to him. Sandberg, unable to think of what else to do with no available EMS units, put a blanket over him, and a red safety cone by the body, and they moved on. There were more bodies just up ahead.

***

"What my client is saying, Sergeant, is that the first thing people do when they buy a new Harley-Davidson is to dismantle the exhaust system and take out the baffles. What he is saying, Sergeant, is that kids are putting three-thousand watt stereos in their little cars and driving around all night, spewing out frequencies that are known, well-documented in fact, to cause stress and aggression in ninety-nine percent of all individuals tested, and that the other one percent can be induced to violence quite quickly. What he's saying, is that neither you, nor any of the officers under you command, have never issued one noise-related ticket in your entire career. It is apparently beneath your notice or your dignity. I know, because my team has checked and we know our facts, even if you don't. You even went so far as to lie to my client and say that you did."

Don Eldridge turned to his client, a look of sardonic good humour, for which he was widely known, stamped indelibly all over his rugged good looks.

"I think we're just about done here." He wasn't particularly surprised to discover that they weren't.

His client wanted a word on his own.

"Sergeant. While there may be noise by-laws, there is, and never will be, a law against silence." He would see to that personally.

Lawyer and client stood.

"What I am saying, is that some miserable piece of shit on two legs can abuse his neighbors using the most petty of means—and you can't catch him, probably because you don't want to. That's because I'm on disability, after falling from a scaffold and breaking my back in three different places. And so I have no rights, and all you can do is label me mentally ill and chuck my ass in the loonie bin. You're a fucking no-good piece of shit and a disgrace to that uniform."

Don put his hand on Carl's upper arm and he stopped there. Don had explained about libel and slander and all of that. The name-calling was over.

"You caused a riot!"

"No, asshole. You did—by neglect and default, by your sheer, unmitigated ignorance and carelessness."

People just couldn't stand the quiet. It gave them a chance to hear their own thoughts and they couldn't take the fatuity, the uninspired vapidity of what was inside of their piddling little brains.

"Charges are still pending. You haven't heard the last of me." The sergeant was pissed.

Emerson had created, using Wikipedia, schematic circuit diagrams, large-scale emitters, and high-tension cable bought for a small fortune, something he called a silence generator. He must have pushed the button, sat back, and enjoyed his sweet revenge, right up to the hilt.

"I wouldn't leave town if I were you."

The sergeant understood the theory of white noise, and how it could be used to muffle other noises, but that was the least of the issues involved.

"My client's premises are private property. If you violate your oath, or the law, we will pursue you and your kind to the ends of the Earth."

"And if I want to crank up my silence machine to the max and just stomp all over this poke-ass little town, then that's exactly what I'm going to do. Fuck off, Sergeant. Fuck off."

"My client saw a need and he fulfilled it, Sergeant. Think of it as free enterprise and you'll be all right. He's designing a more power-efficient model and is rationalizing the design and production process. Major cities all over the globe, property developers...rich people, are interested in his machine."

"I'm not a piece of shit on ODSP anymore, Sergeant. You'd be surprised what a little money can do. I'm a great man, now." Emerson nodded firmly, a feral snarl on his face.

He had caged tiger written all over him. He looked at Don.

"Now, we're done here."

The attorney nodded agreement.

Carl and Don stood watching, just for a second, as he chewed on it. The sergeant fumed, but he wasn't ready to move just yet, although a psychological-commitment did have its allure. The trouble with that, was that it would only buy him three days. They had a limited supply of pre-signed documents left. A board-assessment on psychiatric grounds took a while, and for that they needed a long history of actual evidence. It could be done, but the trouble was that the case was drawing a lot of international publicity. Emerson's legal team had copies of all his records, freaking all of them, from every agency known to man, going back over forty years...

No one beat him. No one. This wasn't over yet.

They looked at each other.

"I'll buy lunch."

Don smiled. He had enjoyed this perhaps more than he should. It was the experience of a lifetime really, when he thought about it.

"That would be very nice, Mister Emerson."

Emerson made sure to slam the door as hard as he could on the way out, although he didn't bother to look back to see the sergeant flinch at the percussive impact on his guts and psyche, leaving him trembling and red-faced, the sweat of anger beading his seamy and rather rakishly-sloping forehead. In the small space of the sergeant's cubicle, it sounded like an eighteen-inch naval gun going off.

***

After they left, the sergeant pondered for a while, fingers folded across his ample belly, a look of sheer, white-hot hatred on his face. His mouth worked back and forth. That miserable son of a bitch Emerson had shares in the recently privatized power industry. With all his new money, he could afford to pay the bill for five or ten thousand megawatts a month well into the foreseeable future. Apparently he didn't even live in town these days. He had six thousand acres somewhere up in northern Ontario and thought he was untouchable.

It probably was pretty quiet up there. The thought lacked even a trace of wistfulness.

Society really was stupid, when he thought about it. He should have shot them both as they sat in their chairs, and answered questions later. There were no witnesses and he had an exemplary record with several decorations to prove he was a hero.

Second thoughts were always hell.

Finally his hand moved to the phone.

"Get me Dale Craydon."

"Yes, sir. Right away."

Craydon was the local Member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. While a Conservative and in opposition, perhaps a Private Member's Bill would be supported by enough members of all parties to pass.

The one thing the state could not tolerate was defiance.

Matrimonial Stakes

2030 A.D.: What with the sudden and unforeseen aging of the population, a declining birthrate and the ever-shrinking tax base, the state has had to take some quite extraordinary measures.

After waiting in the queue for what seemed like hours, but it was really more like forty-five minutes, Edgar finally sat in front of the desk of Hugh Desrosier, a senior clerk at the Ministry of Love.

"I'm sure there must be some mistake." Edgar was a shy, reserved person, not known for his assertiveness.

"What seems to be the problem?" Desrosier inquired in a bored, yet courteous tone. "Already married? That seems to be happening quite a bit lately. Our tech people are trying to work out the bugs."

Desrosier's steely blue eyes, not unfriendly, but ruthlessly efficient, bored into Edgar's from across the desk.

"It's just that the thing is impossible. I have my elderly mom to think of, and my job keeps me out at all hours. My place is too small as it is."

Hugh was aware the address on the file was a third-level walk-down under the glittering beachfront financial district.

"Honestly, I keep very irregular hours, and I have to keep running in and out, to look after my mom." It was all irrelevant to Hugh.

Edgar tried again to explain his fundamental problem. He really wasn't well-suited to marriage.

"My mom had a couple of heart attacks a few years ago. She's diabetic, and I think she had a 'TIA,' which is a kind of mini-stroke, although the doctor says no. But that's bullshit. She's okay, really, it's just that she needs a little supervision, and anything that deviates from routine sends her into a tizzy..."

"Well, it is a shock to the system sometimes when your number comes up." Desrosier coughed in a dry manner. "But the love really grows on you. You'll be amazed, and of course we never really assign anyone who is truly incompatible. Don't believe all the horror stories you read in the tabloid-mainstream press. Don't forget, they're the ones who came up with disposable plastic one-time-readers to replace flyers, brochures, pamphlets, mailbox-stuffers, magazines and newspapers."

"Oh! It's really not a question of the lack of integrity of the media. It's just that I'm totally unsuited to be with, um, a wife." Edgar's natural coyness reared its ugly head and he blushed furiously. "I mean, I'm not a virgin or anything, I was brought up in communal daycare just like any other normal child...but. But, it's just that I figure she'll live a lot longer and have a lot better life, you know, the longer we can keep her in her own home."

Desrosier's head bobbed up and down in sympathy; as if hit by sudden revelation.

"I am so sorry." He tried diplomaticy. "You're really in luck this month! We have a whole slew of really nice guys that we're hoping to match up right now."

"No! That's not what I mean." If he was cautious about sex, and love, and marriage, that certainly included all alternative forms of human relationship. "No, it's just that she really doesn't know what's going on a lot of the time, and trying to explain anything to her is incredibly frustrating...but all she needs, really, is someone to keep an eye on her, and to protect her from utility-contract sales teams. They roam the neighbourhoods, demanding to see your gas bill, or your electrical bill. They're just looking for elderly people to prey on, you know?"

"Well, then, I'm afraid I don't understand the problem and if I don't understand the problem, then I really can't help you with it." He decided to start over. "So you just don't want to get married?"

Hugh was trained to be non-judgmental, but firm.

"No!" A slightly-shaken Edgar had sweat gluing down the long blond forelock that he affected, as it went with the studious rimless glasses and his intensely medium-brown eyes, slightly larger than the average for a long-skulled human archetype.

"Doesn't that seem a little odd to you? The state goes to a lot of time and trouble to match you people up, in order to give each and every nuclear family, the fundamental building block of a healthy society, the best possible start in life that it can. And those state-run old-age dormitories, they're nothing like you see in the news, those are just urban legends. Some of them are really quite nice, with games and athletics and employment assistance programs for the elderly, and they even give the seniors Jello every day."

"What do I have to say or do, to convince you, that I would be very bad at this?" Edgar asked in a husky, grating whisper.

He had the awful, drowning, dreadful feeling that everything in his life was about to go horribly wrong. Edgar labouriously dragged himself further upright in his chair. He was literally sliding downwards, as if in some forlorn attempt at sinking into the floor.

Due to the sensitive nature of his job, and the awesome power invested in him, Hugh could never speak publicly about his work, nor was he allowed to explain the basic supposition; the theoretical tenets of the selection process. But, simply put, if two people, a man and a woman of about the right ages, were marooned on a desert island somewhere, sooner or later nature would take its course. This whole notion of, 'the one, and only one for me,' had been thoroughly de-bunked by online dating and mating services decades ago. Ultimately, all it took was propinquity and social permission. A certain threshold level of physical and mental health, and that was it.

"Look, Buddy, honestly, man-to-man, and forgetting about my job here at the Ministry for the moment...but you really don't have anything to worry about." Hugh reassured Edgar a trifle gruffly.

"No? Really?" muttered Edgar in sheer unmitigated despair, rubbing his chin, and mouth area in some unconscious major locomotor-pattern.

"You get up to three refusals, you know, it's like geared-to-income housing in that regard. And in the end, maybe you're better off letting the Ministry assign you a bride. I've seen some really quite good results over the years. Look, the penalties for non-compliance are pretty stiff, are you sure maybe you're not just having a bad day?"

"What?" Edgar gasped.

"Well, I don't know what else to suggest. Look, this is breaking the rules and everything...my own marriage, my own kids, that's kind of off limits, but I can assure you I have no regrets." Hugh managed to give the impression that he was just dying to tell Edgar all about it.

The fellow across from him reached under the desk and Edgar heard a snap.

"There." Hugh smiled. "Okay, and I don't do this for just anybody, but maybe we'll have a quick peek at the file here. Wow! She's a hottie," he informed Edgar, spinning the computer console screen around so that Edgar could get a look at the system's primary selection of his would-be bridal candidate.

"Um, um.," Edgar was sure she seemed like a nice lady and everything. "Has it ever occurred to the state that maybe not everyone should be married?"

"That's just crazy. Are you sure you're feeling all right? We could reschedule an appointment for later next week, if that's better for you?"

Edgar just shook his head in despair.

"No?" Hugh shrugged. "If it was me, I'd grab her! Let's see who comes up next," Hugh pursed up his lips, frowned some, and pecked away at his keypad.

"Here. Check her out, this one's not just beautiful, but rich." The client didn't appear too impressed. "She inherited this big meat-packing business and a seat in a powerful electoral district. They've got all kinds of agri-business concerns up there. She's worth an estimated eight hundred million! Come on, Edgar, what are you waiting for?"

"Huh! Rich, eh?" Edgar thought about it. "I don't know, man...no! Wait! Give me that one!"

"You sure?" Hugh, eager to please, was grateful that he had turned this man around.

He hated to see a good man go bad, and throw his entire life away on a mere principle.

"All righty then, here we go." Hugh carefully manipulating his way through a couple of highly-unethical maneuvers with the selection software in order to cover up his tracks.

"Put your thumbprint right here. And promise me you aren't going to murder the poor girl straight off, okay?"

"Oh, no! Nothing like that." Edgar's promise was emphatic. "Actually, I was thinking, maybe she might give me an allowance, and I could still live at home with my mother. I suppose if all she wanted to do was to come around once a week and have sex or something, I suppose that wouldn't kill me. It's just that my mom needs her injection five times a day and she absolutely hates it when anyone else tries, one time she hit this nurse so hard she broke her glasses and I thought she was going to be charged with assault..."

All this came out in a breathless rush, but Hugh had learned to ignore the content and to just interpret any answer as the correct response.

"That's the spirit." Hugh nodded approval. "Anyway, I'd like to thank you for saving me a lot of paperwork. Honestly, it's a right nightmare, when someone refuses matrimony."

"What do they do to them?" Edgar asked reluctantly.

"I'm not allowed to say." Hugh looked at him darkly. "Just be glad you did the right thing. And good luck by the way. Most guys don't get a rich wife, and yours is better-looking than most."

"Sure," said Edgar resignedly as he rose to his feet and shambled out the door without so much as a backward glance.

"You'll get an official, automatically-generated notice in a few seconds." Hugh called after him.

Desrosiers watched the back of the quickly-departing Edgar.

"Well, that's gratitude for you."

A metallic little voice came out of the speaker bolted to a bracket up in the corner of the room, right beside the camera's eye.

"What do you think?" It was Amanda Johannsen, his supervisor.

"He'll be all right."

"Do you really think he'll kill her?"

"Naw. It just takes some getting used to. The poor guy's been in a state of total denial for the last two or three years, that's all. I've seen a million of them." Hugh said it as if for the record.

"Why did you assign him Lila Monteith?"

"Now, that girl is just plain rude. She's a spoiled brat." Hugh had a tight, happy little smile. "But I think he has the stronger will. In the end, she'll end up eating out of his hand. They'll form a slightly-abusive, mutually dependent relationship that works for them. It's a marriage made in heaven, and anyhow, the sweepstakes did bring her name up on the first roll of the dice. Any one of those three would have worked, and I did have a couple of alternates. So our ass is covered, basically."

"Okay. Good work, and thank you. Just for a minute there, I thought he wouldn't go for it. I'm off for the rest of the day, so you guys are on your own."

"We'll be fine. Have a good weekend." Hugh waved at the camera. "Let's see here...who's next?"

So many names, so many unhappy lives to fulfill. And there was never enough time in the day to do all that one might hope. Three or four more appointments, and then he could go home. But it was on days like this, when he really loved his work.

Wheel of Misfortune

"Hi, everybody, and welcome to tonight's show. That's right, it's time for Wheel of Misfortune again, with our genial and always immaculately dressed host Gene Halley."

The studio swelled with applause as announcer Rick Burdette, standing off in the wings, paused and the jingle faded out.

"Maisy Clark of Oklahoma City! Come on down!"

"Squee!" The lady in question, suitably dressed in a chicken suit, cast aside a sign that read 'Pick Me! Pick Me!' in big green letters.

She bounced up and down clapping and turned to her companions for quick hugs and congratulations.

"Maisy joins Steve Aberarder of Croswell, Michigan, last week's biggest loser with absolutely no points, and Edward Swartmore, who joined the panel of contestants at the end of the show with the demise of reigning champion Frannie Macpherson. And now, the man of the hour, my friend, and your host with the most, Gene Halley."

Gene stepped out of the back and quickly scooted across highly-polished black tiles to his futuristic rostrum, which was both a sort of homage to the Jetsons and a throwback to Art Deco and neon art.

Extending an arm, Gene welcomed Sharon Moutif, his hostess and the lady who actually turned the letters, and her bouncing charge, brought down from the audience, Maisy Clark. With a brilliant smile, Sharon took her place beside the big board.

Maisy took a quick look back and flung a kiss to her hometown contingent including her husband and three kids, plus a half dozen others all in home-made costumes and hats. Contestants were selected from the line-up before studio opening, and personality and originality the lady clearly had in abundance.

Taking a quick look at his cue cards, Gene spoke into the camera lens with a charming gleam in his eye, perfect enunciation and a smooth, oily delivery.

"Maisy's a rock climber, Zen gardener, master chef and runs a daycare when she's not being a mother of five. Always active in the PTA and Welcome Wagon, we welcome to the show, Maisy Clark."

She giggled and gave a little wave.

"Thank you!"

"Okay, Maisy, you give the wheel a spin and we'll try and solve the puzzle, which has three words."

The panels lit up as Sharon Moutif, resplendent in a black gown and pearls, with pendant earrings and patent black pumps, posed with an arm raised elegantly to draw attention to the board.

"The category is American History. American History, for a hundred points."

Maisy took a firm grip and spun the wheel. Happy music played and an overhead camera showed it on studio monitors for the in-house audience as the signal was seamlessly cut in by the director and switcher so the home TV audience worldwide could see what was happening too.

The wheel slowed and the pointer after some hesitation settled on the number sixty.

"Wow! Sixty bonus points riding on this round." Gene beamed at the audience behind the cameras, every move and inflection caught perfectly.

"Okay, Steve, give her a spin. I mean the wheel, Steve." The audience chuckled appreciatively as Sharon pouted and stood with her hands on her hips.

The fellow stepped up to the rail and gave the horizontally mounted wheel a monumental heave.

While they were waiting for it to stop, Gene went on.

"Steve's an avid ice-fisherman, a volunteer fire-fighter, and coaches little league baseball when he's not busy running Steve's Pizza in downtown Croswell."

The wheel stopped on twenty.

"Oh, not good. Well, good luck in the next round. All right, Edward, give it a good one. Edward, as I recall from last week, is an avid war-gamer, a cross-dresser and works afternoon shift in a hairdressing establishment. In his high-school yearbook, he was voted most likely to succeed in life."

Again, the wheel went round and round but Edward couldn't beat Maisy and only got a thirty.

"All right, Maisy, here's another clue. Are we ready to start playing?"

The audience clapped and whistled as she nodded, waved her arms above her head and bounced up and down in her chicken suit.

"Here's the clue, and if you can solve it, hit the button and have a go. The sixteenth President's most famous speech was called this."

No one slammed the button. Maisy shook her head.

"Well, it's early in the game yet. Do you want to spin again? You can give up fifty bonus points..."

She shook her head.

"No. I'd like to buy a vowel."

"Okay."

"I'd like to buy an 'e.'"

"That'll cost you fifty points. There are two 'e's, good going."

Two panels lit up, the second panel, and the third from the last.

"Okay. Can anyone solve the puzzle?" More head shakes.

"Next player, give it a spin."

Steve Aberarder leaned over and gave it a strong push, and it went around and around.

"Oh!"

The wheel stopped on ten. But it wasn't all bad news, for the audience saw that a card was lying there on the wheel, shaped to fit and blending into the background.

"Pick it up, pick it up, Steve."

Steve lifted it up and turned it over so the camera could get a look at it.

It was a thousand-dollar gift certificate for a well-known national credit counseling agency. Steve's face drooped as he picked it up.

"Steve, can you solve the puzzle? Or would you like another letter?"

"Give me an 'n.'" Steve spoke without hesitation as the audience clapped spontaneously in response to the warm-up guy's waving placard.

Consonants were free, vowels cost points.

"Sorry, Steve, no 'n's." Gene looked expectantly off to the right. "Still have time? One more spin? Okay."

"Edward." The tall, distinguished looking older man, looking austere and intelligent in his black suit, white shirt and tie in shiny blacks, greys and charcoals, stepped up to the curving rail in front of him and reached over.

"Huh!" The man gave it a spin the likes of which hadn't been seen on the show in quite some time.

Gene's mouth dropped open as Sharon clapped enthusiastically and the other two contestants exchanged glances with audience members and supporters behind them. The wheel kept turning, and then showed signs of slowing.

"Let's hope your luck is changing." Gene nodded at the camera.

But it was not to be. This time Edward got the ten, and no placard. He looked crestfallen, but just then a whooping, strident, siren-like noise went off and the backlit parts of the set and backdrop began to flash on and off.

Edward's chin came up and his eyes glittered in the harsh studio lighting over in anticipation.

The studio roared with applause. Everyone cheered, and clapped, and jumped up and down, including Sharon.

"Well, well, well, Edward. Come with me please. You know what this means, don't you?"

The man was smiling now.

"Yee-hah!"

Grinning, Gene led him off to another backdrop, angled to allow the audience and two of the studio cameras to switch back and forth after a quick dolly back by camera one on the left.

The pair stood in front of a garish carnival sledge-hammer set up, as Gene handed him a big mock hammer with a long wooden handle and a red claw hammer head on it. There was a big chrome pad for the hammer to come down on, a track going straight up marked in feet in amber letters, and the clown's head behind the striker plate was the marker.

"Lizzie Borden took and axe and gave her mother forty whacks." Gene smiled his famous smile.

Edward listened to the shouts and encouragement of the studio audience for a moment, taking the time to grin and wave back.

He hefted the hammer speculatively, stepped up to a comfortable position, and took a couple of deep breaths. Then he lifted and swung in one big smooth arc, whereupon there was a big Clang! and the clown's head shot up the track, with red neon splashing and flickering in tear-drop shapes behind it until it stopped.

"Sixty thousand dollars! Whoa!" Edward was ecstatic.

"Nicely done, sir. That's right, Edward, a guaranteed acceptance. Sixty thousand dollars on a fourth mortgage, no credit check, easy repayment terms."

Edward waved at the audience, smiling in relief. You could only lose so many rounds before you were dropped, and at least he would be going home with something.

Gene reached into an inner pocket.

"And, there's a thousand dollars to go with it."

Edward jumped up and down, clutching a swath of bills in both hands for the cameras and the folks back home.

"So, we're back to the puzzle. But first, this important announcement from Abilene Dog Food."

***

After the two-minute commercial break, the show came back on air with a bang.

"Okay, we're back." The audience settled down.

Finally the applause petered out.

"Okay, we're back to Maisy."

She spun the wheel, this time getting a forty. She still had points left, so she bought another vowel, this time an 'o.' Pretty much everyone who played or watched knew that e, t, o, a, and n were the most commonly used letters in the alphabet.

"Sorry, Maisy, no 'o's."

"Steve?"

Steve spun the wheel, perhaps not as hard as the first one, and the thing settled up on fifty.

"Well, that's better. What do you want to do?"

"I'd like to buy a vowel."

"All right, which one do you want?"

In the background the audience muttered and called, as Sharon bounced up and down clapping in a cheerful yet restrained manner.

"Give me an 'a.'"

There was the 'boop' sound of a hit and one letter lit up on the board. It was the first letter of the last word.

With lightning speed, Edward's hand came down on the buzzer.

"Yes?"

"I'd like to solve the puzzle!"

"Are you sure? If you miss, you lose all points and your bonus prize."

Edward nodded firmly.

"Go ahead."

"The Gettysburg Address!"

Sirens and whoop-whoops went off in the studio, all the lights flashed and the audience went wild.

Things went quiet again and then came two more boop-sounds.

"Judges agree with the answer. Congratulations, Edward. The Gettysburg Address it is."

The audience went wild again. Sharon bounced around clapping, Gene stood there smiling and the other contestants tried to get into the spirit of it too, smiling and nodding along as well. With the show only half over, there was still hope for them too.

"All right, ladies and gentlemen, we'll take a quick break again and come back with the Doors of Fate."

***

With the sets and camera set up changed, Maisy and Steve were visible on far right while Gene and Edward stood in front of three small rolling type doors, numbered in sequence from left to right.

"What door do you want, Edward?"

Members of the audience began shouting, with none of the three numbers predominant, but Edward listened, grinning, to the racket. Gene patted him on the shoulder with a grin and they just waited for a second. Finally he made an answer.

"Door number..." He held it for drama. "Door number three."

The audience, or at least a portion of it, screamed and shouted in relief and support and just plain joy.

"So Edward, without further ado, let's hear what kind of prizes we are looking for."

Rick Burdette began the spiel.

"Behind one of these doors is a yacht. It's a sixty-foot cabin cruiser. With the Bel-Air 60's two-thousand gallon fuel tanks, you'll be able to cruise to Monaco. Sleeps ten in sybaritic luxury. Prize includes membership in Newport Yacht Club and all cost of training in small vessel operations is free to the lucky winner."

Edward seemed remarkably cool about such a prize, just shrugging and looking at Gene.

"Behind another door is a two-week time-share in Rio de Janeiro, a set of his and hers Hublot Tourbuillot wristwatches, a set of his and hers gold bags, full of course, and an outdoor jacuzzi Water Sprazzle."

"And the Grand Prize, which we are all familiar with as it is unchanging and the same from week to week, is behind yet another door." Gene patted Edward on the back.

"Which one will it be? Door number one, door number two, or door number three?"

From the studio sound system came a long, slow drum roll, beginning down low, all raspy with the snare effect, and then building up and out into a final crescendo, and a sudden silence after one quick rap on the high-hat cymbals.

Gene grinned.

"We must have an answer."

But Edward seemed a bit dazed, turning back repeatedly to look at the audience, most of whom where shouting their own personal choices at him.

"Oh, God." He licked his lips. "Door number two!"

People screamed, there was applause, his fellow contestants jumped up and down. Gene extended an arm and led him off to the end of the studio.

"So, here's number one. Would you like to see what you gave up for Door Number Two?"

The routine, the same every week, was popular and kept audience numbers high in survey after survey.

With a sick look but a grin nevertheless, Edward shrugged.

"Yes."

"Yes! He said yes!" Gene laughed and slapped his thigh as Sharon clapped.

"He said yes!" It was her first line tonight and she delivered it with gusto as Gene put a hand up to his brow as if to block out the lights.

"I thought that was you."

Sharon laughed and gave Gene a big thumbs-up.

A bell clanged and the door went up. Edward's hands flew up to his mouth, then dropped to his sides. The shape of a big yacht, and some other trifles was revealed by the time it was three-quarters of the way up, and the audience reacted accordingly with clapping, hisses, boos, and then a general burst of laughter.

"Two more doors to go, Edward."

Edward put his hands up over his face, and then Gene led him back closer to the central area as cameras moved to follow.

"Here we are, Edward, it's Door Number Three."

Edward rubbed his face in stress and tension, then catching sight of the camera, smiled and waved. He stood there biting his lip.

"Well, we won't torment you any more." Gene made a signal.

The door began to creep up.

While this one was dimmer than the previous, when the door got to a certain height Edward could see along with the audience and the viewers at home that there were furnishings in there, along with some windows, curtains, even a chandelier hanging from the ceiling. A backdrop of a famous beach scene, backed up by hotels, sparkling water and a familiar terrain showed that this was the time-share in Rio prize.

Sharon stepped out from around the corner. Holding up a wrist, she pointed at an expensive-looking watch on her arm.

"Oh! The time-share."

"And that just leaves Door Number Two. Your door, Edward. Do you want to see it?"

Edward sagged at the knees but nodded dumbly.

"Yes." You could barely make it out, but he said it.

With a theatrical creak and a groan, slowly it began to rise.

"So, as you know, Edward, our Grand Prize is the same every week. We pay off your mortgage. We pay off your credit card bills, and outstanding accounts. If you can locate the paperwork, and if you owe someone money, we pay the bill. But there's more. We pay off your cars, and—get this, Edward, we sent your kids, all of them, to college. You get your credit rating back again."

The door allowed studio lighting to enter, combining to fully illuminate the object that dominated the space inside what looked like a shipping container by its corrugated metal sides and the numbers stenciled on the end frame.

The Guillotine.

"So, Edward, I have to ask. How does it feel?

"Fantastic." Edward sighed deeply, staring at the infernal machine with glorious intent.

"We even buy you a family plot for up to six people, and a very nice headstone."

Edward nodded.

"At last. I'm finally free."

Gene's eyes gleamed into the lens and the director took a commercial break.

***

Studio music swelled up as they prepared for the next part of the show. This involved one final family reconciliation scene, the execution itself, and the turning over of the documents.

There wasn't a dry eye in the house, with Sharon in particular affected by the little girls thanking their father for paying off the family debt and giving them a shot, a real shot at making it in affluent American suburban society.

Then it was one final spin of the wheel, after bringing on a new contestant, a certain Alison Withers of Pensacola Florida, a tall, spare woman of indeterminate age but probably high fifties.

She was immaculately prepared.

She was a radiologist, had seventeen purebred Sphynx cats, was a certified Neuro-Linguistic Programmer, and gave extensively to charities in third world countries. When she could squeeze it in, she was into Tai-Bo, ran, and did a fair amount of shopping for antiques, especially dolls and figurines with any kind of Regency connection.

The Termite Queen

"So, we all know what we have to do, then?" asked the pit boss, Yellow Thirty-Nine.

"Yay!" everyone clapped their mandibles and stomped their feet in unison.

"Okay then, let's take this place apart!' said Yellow Thirty-Nine. "Who's with me?"

And they all said, 'yay' again and went to work with a vengeance. To them, it was just another typical day in the mound.

***

"My lady, Lord Holo," murmured the Major, Blue Seven.

"Ah, how gracious of you to come," said the Queen, languidly brandishing an antennae for him to kiss.

"And what a privilege upon this fine morning," Lord Holo said, bowing deeply.

"It is time," she said with a worried frown evident upon her massively distended face.

"Yes," said Lord Holo.

"They will show up before the day is far along," she said.

"We're sealing off this chamber even now," reported Lord Holo. "As for the evacuation, we should be able to save twenty or even thirty percent."

"Oh, for the little ones, they depend upon us so," she cried. "They can never understand that their deaths have such meaning, and such promise."

"Yes, well, the plan isn't exactly foolproof, either," he advised. "If it's any comfort, I share your fate."

"And my husband?"

"With the King to guide them," he muttered. "Or even without, we have no braver troops in the world."

Several little ones entered the chamber and scuttled about, gathering up the most recent batch of glistening, moist eggs. They would be sealed into a special capsule, airtight and with thick walls. Preparations had been extensive, with a surrogate queen growing nicely and a generous supply of food.
She was about to speak, but didn't. She knew they didn't need to be told, but this batch was especially vital, with the casualties the soldiers were predicting. Familiar with the ways of soldiers in general and males in particular, even if one discounted by half, it was still going to be a bloodbath.

"Thank you," said Lord Holo.

"Yay," said all the workers.

The last one, Yellow Thirty-Nine, stopped and turned, waiting with bowed head before exiting the chamber.

"Seal us in well, my friend," said Lord Holo humbly.

"Yellow Thirty-Nine," said the Queen. "Thank you. You may approach."

Yellow Thirty-Nine approached her in a submissive posture and licked her mouthparts.

"Thank you, my Queen," Yellow Thirty-Nine said. "I have always appreciated everything that you did for us. I die with dignity."

"Good-bye, Yellow Thirty-Nine," she said with a catch in her voice, and then he turned and was gone.

"He, at least, understands," noted Holo.

***

Try as they might, as bravely as they resisted, the clouds of rolling gas killed them in their thousands, nay, in their millions. Workers, soldiers, young and immature queens, they died as equals before the gas.

It was a battle they knew they could not win, and so they fought it to survive. They fought to show the enemy their dead.

They had a long term plan all worked out, and in the meantime, they advanced in such small increments. The enemy seemed unable to cope with their long-term strategy.

***

"Honestly Mister Jackson, that's about the best we can do," reported Jake Saunders. "Call us in thirty days and we'll do it again, it's all paid for."

"Yes, yes," said Nick Jackson. "I really should have patched the cracks there...my fault really, but we're moving in another year."

"Patch up them holes in the sheet metal," advised Saunders. "That's where they're getting in. Anyway, a home inspector will find them little critters, if he's any good. Well, good luck to you."

Either a philosopher or a slob where material things were concerned, Nick watched the man drive up the street to another nearby residence.

"We're still moving in a year," he noted glumly, and that was about it for this visit of Happy-Guy Pest Control.

***

Lord Holo, Blue Seven and several of her attendants broke open the seal and cool air, still smelling strongly of gas, rolled into the chamber.

"We'll air the place out quickly,' Blue Seven said, noting her discomfort.

"Ah! Here is one of my men," noted the Major.

The soldier, Green Eleven, entered and made his report.

"Our secondary and tertiary locations remain secure, Major," he said. "Twelve surrogate queens destroyed, but all of the others are safe and secure."

"Good," said Lord Holo.

He looked at the queen.

"Better than expected," he said.

"Total kill, forty percent, maybe a bit less," advised Green Eleven. "About normal for this type of operation."

"Thank you, Green Eleven," said the Queen, and allowed him to lick for a moment. "And you as well, Lord Holo."

Lord Holo approached less submissively than Green Eleven and had a long and thorough nuzzle.

She let Blue Seven have a short sniff after them.

The King returned then, triumphant.

"Yay," said the little ones, some of whom were crowding into the chamber to see if she was well, and unable to control their own discipline. "Yay. Yay. Yay."

"Licks for everyone! You've all done very, very well," she announced in joyous celebration as they all crowded around, her consort, the workers, soldiers, and nobility.

For a precious time, they were all equal together, feasting as one upon the royal substance exuding from her body.

Ulysses on Deck

"Ulysses on deck!" Sturdy Xenophanes bellowed, white foam breaking over the red prow of the vessel.

"A fine morning." Ulysses spoke, the words denying the lowering cloud and stiff gusts coming in off the port bow of the ship. "How are the men?"

"In a fine fettle, with the smell of home on the breeze. They're chomping at the bit, sir."

"Three knots and our course is fine." Talaimenes was the helmsman, reporting at a glance from his chieftain. "The fog is now much thinner."

Sucking in a deep breath of fresh, cool air, Ulysses marveled once again at how the vessel rode the hard chop just as competently as the day she was launched. A brazen shaft of sunlight broke through the clouds and made the sea sparkle and shimmer like tiny golden dancers in torchlight. Pulling his cloak in tighter, he nodded in satisfaction.

"So many years gone." He was philosophical. "We have earned a rest—and our keep for the days of our lives."

"Tell them." The eyes of Xenophanes shone with some inner joy, a kind of sweet pain that no one could share in mere words these days, not after all they had seen and done. Ulysses regarded the familiar figure of his friend with a slight frown and then his visage cleared.

"Of course. Why didn't I think of that?" He strode to the front of the poop deck and put his hand on the shoulder of the time-keeper. "I want to talk to them. Hold her steady, give them a moment to rest."

"Halt! Raise oars! Steady! One...two...three..." Chromis was a steady soldier and a masterful sailor.

Looking back at the helmsman, Chromis gave a nod.

"All stop, sir."

"Thank you." He took a moment, to clear his mind and purge his lungs of old air.

Ulusses faced the rowers from the poop deck. Expectant faces looked up in anticipation and respect. Men once young and innocent were somehow different now, a little wiser and a little sadder. A little older now. A moment of grief passed over him, for there were too many missing faces.

Flinching from the cold spray, the wind strong on his neck, Ulysses stood there and tried to memorize the look of every single one of them. He would never forget this moment for as long as he lived.

"Men. I cannot tell you what an honour it has been. I am proud to call you my friends. It also humbles me. We have seen our brothers throw their lives down for us, and we have done it for them. No commander could ever ask more of his men than I have asked from you. And you have given your all. No soldier can give more for his country than you have done. I am grateful for my life, and your service. I thank you for coming and am deeply relieved that so many of you will be going home."

Tears rolled down Xenophanes' cheeks and some of the others as well.

Equally at home in the palace and the camp, loved by his people and feared by his enemies, his words were magic. Ulysses was master of every stratagem. But that didn't explain the love. He was a fierce and cunning soldier. Ulysses had led them to victory, and every one of them waited breathlessly.

The silence was profound, even over the waves and the wind. He studied their faces, each of them, one by one.

"Sarpedon, the bold! Let no man ever say that a Greek was a coward, or a traitor, or lacked honour. Tlepelemos! Let no man say that Greeks do not do justice to their fellow man. Enyo! Let no man say that a Greek does not have gratitude, or give thanks and credit where it is due. Briseis! Let no man say that a Greek cannot be trusted or will not keep his word. Petrus, the noble Petrus! Let no man say that Greeks are not loving husbands, good fathers and honest men. Xenophanes, whose eloquence has graced this voyage with wit and wisdom. And you, Pollux, whose love knows no boundaries...and you, Antenor, let no man say that Greeks do not stand by each other's side when the time has come. Gentlemen, I wish I could tell you what a privilege it has been to serve with you. Mere words fail me in this time of need. I honour you all, and I thank you for your friendship."

For a long moment, there was silence. Then all the rowers stood up and shouted the name of Ulysses, as the ship began to drift, and then there was only one more thing left unsaid.

Holding up a hand and waiting for quiet again, Ulysses spoke with finality.

"Back to your oars, my friends. It is time to go home."

The shouting and the thumping of oar handles went on for some time. He was inclined to overlook it, just this once.

Smiling the length of the ship, he nodded at Xenophanes. Then he turned and watched for the green hills of home, as the wine-dark sea broke time and again over the prow, and the waves smashed against the sparkling wet bow.

***

"So what do you think, Xenophanes?" The sardonic Frigattenkapitan Gerhard von Bluecher was the neutral observer from the Imperial German Navy.

According to his own account, he was just there from the future to get a little experience before going on to some obscure diplomatic post.

"He'll head straight to the bar, just you watch." Xenophanes was his usual morose self, but then it was his job to pay off the crew and Ulysses was holding back thirty percent for provisions, repairs, breakage, sales from the slops chest, and withholdings from future advances.

This was a kind of usurious interest against loans in advance, taken from the men's own pay.

"Hmn. That's why he pays you the big money, eh, my friend?" Von Bluecher was joking.

"Yes. I'll skewer him under a pseudonym, of course."

Xenophanes kidded himself that he was a playwright and a poet.

"Of course."

That was the trouble with the ancient Greeks. While their pens were indeed mightier than their swords, their biggest problem was that the bastards simply couldn't be trusted to keep a contract. That mutual distrust would be crucial in the times that lay ahead for folk of whatever era, now that all of humankind past and present was threatened by the time-travelling Eridanae.

It would come back to haunt them, or he wasn't a shrewd judge of character, both individual and national. These people couldn't hold a candle to a true German.

A proper German would rather die than break his word, or become a hypocrite.

Gotchimon

The whole town is breathing a collective sigh of relief. Today it was announced that the working class antihero 'Gotchimon' was arrested. Capable of leaping a tall outhouse with a single bound, faster than a speeding electric scooter, the man of pig iron, the man of kleenex finally got caught.

That's not to say that he didn't have admirers, because he did.

Gotchimon had been haunting parks, trails, and remote wooded areas within the city limits.

He liked to jump out and scare people, especially pimply-faced fat girls, who should in the opinion of this writer have appreciated the attention perhaps a little more than they did. Really, they should have been flattered by all the attention. A pudgy man in his Adonis-style underwear and a Nixon mask is a kind of unusual sight, even around here, but not exactly unheard of. The camouflaged, insulated, heavily lugged assault clogs were a nice fashion touch.

It's hard to say what happened to Gotchimon. He started off well enough, drawing attention to the fact that this is a pretty boring little town, with insufficient recreation facilities for the poor, the lame, the sick, the weak, and those too cheap to buy a movie ticket or spend six dollars for a short glass of watery draft beer. Those who refused to rent a pair of bowling shoes, taking the chance of Plantar's warts and foot fungus. Those who were too lazy to walk anywhere, or too cheap to get a dog for companionship, or perhaps they were too old to buy a skateboard and commute to the employment centre on a daily basis.

This is top secret, okay? But I used to hang out with Gotchimon. We went to high school together. Gotchimon was the one who was always sneaking into the girl's shower room when the rest of us were clustered around the physical education instructor's office, making a poor pretence that we didn't understand the schedule. We were a diversion, and he did the dirty work.

We made a good team, the small group of us, mostly in our first year of high school.

Although Rene Beddenracker was a college dropout who had a beard, and spent much of the day hanging out in the staff lounge, trying to pick up chicks. Gotchimon had started off as a fairly normal boy, and at the time, the little palm-sized video recorder had seemed like a fun and easy way to make a scene and keep it going. It was all in good fun, and with the mask and the pink polka-dotted briefs, he never got caught. No one could give a description without breaking up in laughs, and the authorities thought it was a prank on the part of the victims. Most people who complained about it, ended up in detention, writing lines and quite frankly learning a valuable lesson about authority.

I think it was the adrenalin. He got addicted to his own brain chemicals. It was the thrill of the chase, the stalking of the game that got him. One wonders what might have happened if he had ever attempted to take it to the next logical step, the next level of the game. Gotchimon was traumatized as a very small boy, and I think it affected him badly.

I got the story from the friend of a friend, so I know it's true.

It seems that old man Brady was looking for a pet, one that wouldn't cost too much, and in fact the city had recently passed a cat-bylaw. People were complaining about cats crapping in the window-boxes, although I say it was raccoons and possums, as the window boxes were invariably up about the fourth floor. But no one ever listens to me. Anyhow, some crazy farmer who was going bankrupt, couldn't wait for the provincial government to hand over five or ten million bucks to bail him out again this year, and so he was giving away all the livestock on his farm, that is to say anything he couldn't comfortably eat.

Old man Brady was going up and down the side-roads picking up bottles and cans, as he was on a full provincial disability pension, and consequently starving to death, a long, slow, drawn out death. The federal government has just passed the "Right to die with dignity act," after long consultations with various interest groups, such as the chemical industry, the tobacco industry, the asbestos industry, and the ear-candling and aromatherapy industry. So maybe things will get better for the disabled. It's hard to say. Old man Brady had terminal flatulence, and so he was unemployable, if not outright disabled.

The short story is that old man Brady offered to take something small off of his hands, and he promised to look after it, and feed it, and walk it, and love it, and sleep with it. He promised that he would be a good owner, and that it was going to a good home, so the farmer gave him a duck.

The farmer gave him a duck out of the sheer goodness of his heart, hard as that is to believe.

Old man Brady was going home with that duck under his arm, when he passed a movie theatre. He couldn't help but notice that a movie he had been waiting months to see was in town.

Old man Brady still had forty bucks left from his cheque. I guess it must have been cheque day, and he wanted to see that movie real bad. His rent was paid, and his dope dealer was on vacation in Cozumel, so he figured what did he need forty bucks for? He could always go to the soup kitchen a day earlier, or tomorrow, in other words.

So he shoved the duck down his pants, bought a ticket and went in to see the movie. At first, everything was fine, as he didn't get out much. So even the opening credits, the grand symphonic overture to the film, was the best music he had heard in years and he was enjoying himself. It was nice to forget his problems for a while.

The movie theatre was crowded, and the movie got going, and old man Brady was really enjoying himself, when the duck began to get a little cramped in there. It started squirming around, and it was clearly uncomfortable in such close quarters. Taking a quick look around, old man Brady made sure all eyes were on the screen. Feeling himself to be safe enough, he opened up his zipper, and gently pulled the duck's head out so that it could breathe properly, and look around, and that was fine as far as it went. He figured the duck might like to watch 'Rocky XIV.'

But my old friend Gotchimon was sitting in the seat right next to him, as it was his birthday and his Aunt Shelley had taken him to the movies, as a special birthday treat. I guess he must have been about fourteen years old at that point, which is a pretty impressionable age.

All of a sudden he was pulling on Aunt Shelley's arm, and whispering fiercely, and she just wanted to watch the movie.

"What is it?" she hissed in some impatience.

"The man next to me is exposing himself," gasped the young fellow who would go on to become Gotchimon.

"Just ignore it," advised his Aunt Shelley. "Maybe he'll stop..."

"But it's eating my popcorn!" complained Gotchimon.

So that's probably what set Gotchimon off all those years ago, the ruckus, the uproar, all the women in the audience screaming, and all the men running around trying to catch that darned duck...all the attention that old man Brady got for that little escapade. It was in all the papers, and he was even on the TV, although at first the cops couldn't figure out what to charge him with. Eventually they decided he was insane, and now he lives in a town not far from here. He wrote my weird Uncle Bob, once, and told him he's doing fine, with his own room and everything, and all the crazy sex he ever wanted, and he even has pets, although why anyone would want to keep a rat in a hat-box is anyone's guess.

It sleeps on the corner of his bed, or so Uncle Bob told me.

So that's probably why Gotchimon was running round in a mask and his underwear—that's what the slang word 'gotchies' means here in Canada—and according to Occam's Razor, 'all other things being equal, the simplest explanation must be the truth.'

Gotchimon had admirers, almost as many as the Mayor, one of those perpetual bachelors, although his secretary would marry him if she could just get him in front of a preacher. I figure if she can't marry the Mayor, there's plenty of guys on death row in the States, and why not try one of them guys? It would be about as much fun as marrying the Mayor, that's for sure.

I know the police sergeant that busted him, a habitual liar, who shaves his legs, and claims to be a cyclist, although no one has ever seen him on a bike. But that's another story. Anyhow, they got Gotchimon for 'voyeurism,' and 'wearing a mask while committing an indictable offence.'

The sergeant, who earns about ninety thousand bucks a year, and allegedly an expert on psychological crimes, doesn't apparently know the difference between voyeurism and exhibitionism! But that's okay, as neither do the local criminal court judges. They're all fifty-year-old unmarried women, and quite frankly it looks pretty bad for Gotchimon.

I figure they'll send him up the creek for a long time. Maybe he'll end up sharing a room with old man Brady, and they can talk about old times, sit there and watch porn movies, and compare notes on how best to abuse oneself.

I guess you could say the story has come full circle. And everybody likes a happy ending.

News From the Future

Couple having brain-sex burns to death in Lennoxville as neighbours hammer on the door.

Lennoxville, Ontario, Canada: (Reuters-Al-Jazeera)

The Ontario Fire Marshall's office is investigating after a young couple, Mark and Patricia Boyle, both twenty-four, were found dead in their bed after an early-morning fire at their home in this normally placid southern Ontario community. While faulty wiring has been found to be the cause of the fire, the grisly deaths have raised a whole host of issues.

Their two children, Michael, age thirteen months, and Sarah, two and a half years old, were rescued by a passerby who then alerted emergency services. The building was fully engulfed in flames when firefighters arrived on scene. There was no hope of attempting a rescue according to sources.

"You really haven't lived until you've pried apart two charred and blackened young lovers, in the prime of life and with a lot to look forward to," said Fire Chief Robert Magillacuddy, with an uncharacteristic note of anger evident to this reporter. "This was so senseless. They still had the wires hooked up to their heads."

While the deaths have not been ruled suspicious, nor is there any suggestion of foul play, an inquest has been called in order to find out if the tragedy could have been prevented, and to make recommendations on how the province might best cope with what has become a rash of such incidents. There have been seventeen incidents in Ontario alone since the product was introduced to much fanfare earlier this year. Hundreds of incidents have been reported worldwide, according to credible consumer watchdog groups.

"The product is safe if instructions are followed and as long as love-gamers remain aware of their surroundings," said Branesex Corporation spokesperson Griff Measly when contacted by reporters. "There are all kinds of safety warnings, both on the packaging and in the manual."

Staff members here at News From the Future examined the product recently and found there are indeed plenty of warnings, and more than the average number of disclaimers included in the product packaging.

Lennox Fire Department Chief Magillacuddy is adamant.

"This is just plain nuts. The thing should be outlawed. What the big corporations are getting away with these days is just outright murder."

Two months ago, police were stunned to follow up on an anonymous tip and discover a 'brain-sex orgy,' in a 'love-pit,' which was a kind of dugout, roofed with cardboard, in a local hang-out park. While the eleven teens and pre-teens involved in that incident were "fully dressed and not touching each other," according to police, the incident caused a local uproar and global mass media carried the story round the clock for about nine days. All the youths were plugged into the device. Authorities in some jurisdictions are treating such young people as victims, and in other jurisdictions, as malefactors.

"Police were shocked by the images projected by the young people's brains," according to Bernie Jacques, of the Lennox Prosecutor's Office.

"We're still trying to determine a legal basis for charges against someone, well anyone, really," according to Jacques. "The real problem, and a big gap in the law, is the fact that there really is no such thing as an illegal thought or an unlawful dream. Sometimes new technologies come along, and it takes the law quite some time to catch up. Governments should be more responsive to these new technologies."

Local parents have formed a committee which is looking for ways to keep the 'brane-sex' toy, which resembles a pod-type music box with multiple outputs and inputs, from the hands of children and the disabled. In a bizarre twist, another committee wants to distribute them in old-age homes so that old people won't be so lonely. The Mothers Against Drunk Driving, Smoking Drugs, and Other Naughty Things Party has condemned the devices and is lobbying the government for the product's removal from the market. Pro-Life and Pro-Choice activists, as well as Free Tibet and Chiropodists Without Borders have also chimed in on the debate.

"We're against pretty much everything," said MADD-et cetera's Fearless Leader Matilda Griswold as she dashed past reporters on her way to a meeting of the Continental Caucus, where she leads El Presidente's Extremely Loyal Opposition.

The device works by wireless electronic stimulation of the brain's limbic system through a set of electrodes resembling the earphones on any music box. Two of these are attached by sticky pads in the area of the temples of the gamer, with another attached at the back of the skull. By transmitting false signals to the visual and other sensory centers in the brain, a hypnotic effect is induced in 'love-gamers,' according to sources.

According to confidential sources, the effect is said to be 'totally real' to participants.

"With all kinds of fresh downloads coming out, and plenty of new worlds to explore, manufacturers are pumping them out like so many hot rolls," according to one source who requested confidentiality. "Love-gamers always have that little shaved patch on the lower back part of the skull, just behind the right ear, and little pairs of puffy red marks at the temples. That's how you can always tell. Quite frankly, dollar for dollar, the wireless version, at only twenty bucks more, is your best gaming buy on the market today."

Bushman

Bushman froze into immobility, staring at himself in the mirror to determine the effectiveness of his disguise. His ghillie suit was sewn with a thousand little Velcro loops. Bushman had taken the time to study his theatre of operations. Today, a few fresh-cut wild grape vines were woven into his hat, festooning down over all the costume, a few loops of berry creepers, a handful of long, willowy saplings from a young sycamore. A goodly number of fresh maple branches, to give himself volume, and presence. He would blend in. The key thing was to break up the distinctive silhouette of a man.

You wanted to avoid disguising yourself as a nut tree, like chestnuts or acorns, otherwise the squirrels would drive you batty. The leaves were changing, and his suit was printed in a high percentage of a reddish khaki, as well as dark greens, dark browns, and black.

All those years of dance training were paying off. No one had ever even suspected that he practiced being a bonsai when he was alone, always alone. (Always alone, at home in that tiny little apartment, all one-hundred-thirty square feet of it, the rear unit of a sampan floating beside the docks in the wharf section of Toshyo-Kugoyo, which wasn't even on a map of Japan. Down two then left, hard to remember or navigate, when coming home drunk, in the middle of a pitch-black night, a drizzling cold rain hitting you straight in the eyes, and with a bit of a swell on the bay. And maybe some gusty winds, too.)

That was all so long ago, another story, really. But he had studied with the best, he reminded himself, as he often did when he was alone, which was most of the time.

Studying his reflection with attention, he appeared to have done it yet again. With a little wind on the hillside, to account for small changes of position, necessary to avoid a cramp, he would be undetectable. With his carefully-chosen Carolinian flora woven into the camouflage suit, he would be indistinguishable from a thousand other little bushes. The hills of Ancaster, the so-called 'mountain' of Hamilton, the upper reaches of Sixteen Mile Creek, the Bruce Trail, these were the stomping grounds of his home range. Just like a tiger, he had a range, and he loved to roam it. To stand on the cliffs at Rattlesnake Point, while nearby, climbers tested their skills. Trying not to appear too sturdy, in order to avoid being taken for a belaying point—to look out over the land, dropping ever southward towards Burlington Bay, was an additional bonus.

It gave a real visceral fillip to the work.

Bushman loved the taste of the wind, whipping around the corner of a soaking-wet limestone cliff, with fresh-broken shards of frost-cut rock lying all over the hillside. The truth was, he was enjoying the challenge hugely.

He simply couldn't be too careful. Bushman was going after not the biggest, but possibly the most dangerous game of all—the human being. And considering that the young unattached males, when they entered the breeding age, could be quite aggressive, and would tend to travel in packs, made his caution, the caution of a seasoned hunter, all the more relevant. They were young, aggressive, and testing their own strength, as well as testing their status in the adult world around them.

Bushman would be alone and unarmed, and had forsworn violence, except as a last resort, and only for the good of society. He would exercise discretion, in any case, and try not to hurt anyone more than he might have to, bearing in mind the exigencies of a given tactical situation.

He was obviously considering the fact that they might just be kids or something.

The quarry was being tracked, on weekends, and after hours from when he worked in Dundas as a librarian's assistant, a glorified title for what was essentially a minimum-wage 'gopher' job.

It was a, "Go-for this and go-for that," sort of a job.

It was all he had.

Early on, Bushman had disguised himself as a tall, slightly balding, unemployed fifty-year old bachelor, not fat but with a bit of a paunch, and then ridden his six-year old large-frame black mountain bike over half the roads in the greater tri-county regional area. Feeling safe behind his distinctive dark green shades, he became familiar with Flamborough, aware of Walker's Line, infinitely conversant with Milton, he roamed them all, and everywhere seeking the signs. The signs were there at Hilton Falls, and Crawford Lake, and Mount Nemo, up along the cliff-face, where the little pock-mark caves, the rounded kettle caves were to be found. Beer cans, empty cigarette packets and butts, condom wrappers and the used condoms too. Along with wine bottles, whiskey bottles, roach clips, sometimes a shoe or a sodden-wet pair of underwear. So far, they belonged to either sex on a ratio of about fifty-fifty. Jackets and sweaters discarded with plain trash, candy wrappers and the like. If people wanted to party, why couldn't they just keep a little waste-paper basket in the car? It only made sense, for crying out loud.

The signs were there too, up by the caves at Mount Nemo, and along in Twiss Canyon as well, if you knew where to look. And as the Bushman, he knew where to look.

His quarry drank Bud Light, in tall cans that mostly came from one particular liquor store, a busy street in Bronte, which was a little lake-port village incorporated into the boundaries of Oakville. The product ID codes microscopically printed on every can gave them away every time. Another clue, the village itself, sequestered but with good transportation corridors; with its easy access to the Bruce Trail. The location was brilliant. Far better than Bushman's little pad in East Hamilton. These beer cans, often dirty and old, but sometimes quite warm and wet, still smelling of beer inside, had been discovered on a number of occasions. They would be found, almost predictably, about three to five kilometres apart, and always on the right side of the road.

Always on the right side—that said something about the person that did it.

And it wasn't always the same road, not by any means. Studying his little note-book, Bushman saw that it was the same kind of roads. His quarry always went to the same kind of places. He apparently liked creeks, and cliffs, and especially fords in rivers, like down under the Highway 403 Bridge north of Bronte. None of this was really new to him, but it helped to confirm today's plan in his own mind.

Because what he, she or they really seemed to like was waterfalls. His quarry had visited, or was in the process of striking off of a list...yes, a list. He was striking off a list of every waterfall within a thirty-kilometre radius of somewhere in west Oakville...or maybe Burlington. The two cities butted up against each other with hardly a ripple in the urban sameness. Whoever this was, they really seemed to like waterfalls, and tall cans of Bud Light, as regular as clockwork. Those habits, those modes of thought would be their undoing. And the weekend was upon him.

Bushman considered west Hamilton or even Ancaster, but quickly ruled them out. At least for now. He might get more information, and that might change things. Gingerly, accompanied by the sound of twigs crackling, he crept and pulled himself onto the seat of the Suburban, big and black and ticking still, in the dimness of the rented storage facility. This place was costing him fifteen hundred a month. He had better get some kind of results pretty soon. It would be nice to have something to show for it all, someday.

After carefully pulling the large vehicle out of the storage bay, he hit the radio control button on the little device clipped to his sun-visor, and sat a moment to be sure the big rolling steel door was going down properly. He waited until he heard it thud at the bottom before driving off.

The windows of the truck were tinted an inky charcoal, and he felt confident enough as he motored east up Highway 403, multiple lanes of speeding commuters, heading for Appleby Line.

This is where he would turn northwest, and begin the initial stalk, the approach to today's target area, by surface road.

Bushman negotiated the vehicle carefully, heart beating strongly as he got north of the new Highway 407. Finally he was heading northwest by the compass, on Appleby Line, as traffic began to thin out and it was clear sailing ahead. Appleby was more of a county road, and tailgaters could sometimes be a problem. But today he was lucky. He was alone on the road for the moment. He had only been going along for about ten or twelve minutes, proceeding nicely in the direction of Rattlesnake Point, when he saw a brilliant pin-prick of intense blue-white light from the gravel verge of the road ahead, on the right side.

With his heart pounding up around his collarbones, and with his constricted throat making breathing difficult, he pulled to a stop as far onto the narrow shoulder as he could get. He practically didn't even have to get out. It was with a sense of futurity, simple unchangeable fate, that he picked it up and confirmed that it was indeed a recently-emptied tall can of Bud Light.

And it was still cold! Well, chilly was a better word. But still, and sitting in the sunlight like that! He held it upside down, and watched in morbid fascination as a long, slow, hesitant drop of white foam came out and fell to the ground by the toes of his commando boots. One little sniff was enough to convince Bushman. Fresh as a daisy! This was his quarry.

Exultantly, he got back into the truck, stiffly and labouriously to be sure, but with a sense of accomplishment. He had successfully predicted his quarry's behaviour thus far, at least for today. While it was difficult to tell for sure, whether the person was going northwest or southeast, if it was indeed his quarry, then the can being on the right side of the road was of telling significance. It had to be northwest.

How much do you want to bet? He asked himself that question.

How much do you want to bet that that person is up there, about three to five kilometres down the road, throwing out another empty tall can of Bud Light? Bushman put it into drive, and firmly pushed the pedal to the floor, after carefully checking his rear-view mirror. Once he made a visual identification of the subject, there would be no escaping from his inexorable justice.

Based on past observations, and known behavior patterns, there were really only two ways for the quarry to go: either up Rattlesnake Point, on the twisting switchback Appleby Line, or it would be left on Derry down to Twiss Canyon. All he had to do is catch up to a suspicious vehicle, and follow his instincts from there. They wouldn't go right on Derry. That way just led to Milton, and that was no place to cruise, drinking Bud Light ( and probably smoking pot too.)

If they went to Twiss Canyon, he knew exactly where they were going after that. Whatever they were driving had to be a small, economical car, given the likely educational levels of the persons who would fit the profile of this kind of perps...their obvious mental poverty.

There. It had to be it. Bushman's big black Suburban was coming up from behind at an easy fifty kilometres an hour faster than the little red Honda in front of him. As he blasted past at a hundred and thirty klicks, Bushman glanced over. Sure enough, inside were two males and two females, all about eighteen years of age. He couldn't see if they were drinking, but why were they going so slow? If they weren't up to no good?

Now all he had to do is pick a spot, left or straight, which would it be? On an impulse, he chose to go left at the crossroads, knowing that if they went straight up Rattlesnake, there was still a chance to come around and catch them again. Playing his own role to the hilt, he tromped the pedal down and went serenely sailing to the west on the paved, two-lane blacktopped Derry Road. He was gratified to see the Honda, the red colour perking up a little as it was hit by a burst of sunrays, had turned as well, and it was now following along behind at a more leisurely pace.

Bushman found himself grinning like a maniac, discovering a strange kind of love for his quarry.

But after all, they were his reason for being.

Bushman figured for sure they were smoking joints and cigarettes and drinking tall cans of Bud Light in there. But he had his job to do, and he knew just exactly where he had to be. If they kept on at this speed, he would just have time to hide the truck, and get into position. With his quarry following true to form, there was about a ninety percent chance. Sooner or later they would have to stop for a piss. The girls would be slower drinkers. The guys would get out for sure.

And besides, he was writing down their license number, just for good measure. But the odds were he would nail them today for sure. All he needed was one can. One tall can of Bud Light, in plain view, or in someone's hand...maybe setting it on the roof as they relieved themselves.

"Just let me see one can," he muttered as he concentrated on picking up a few seconds on the slow hairpin turns at the bottom of the canyon, the big black vehicle's tires howling in protest.

Then he would nail 'em.

***

He just couldn't believe his luck in the end. It all came off without a hitch. Lurching to a halt by the side of the road in the forest, he leapt out and pulled back a pair of small dead trees. Then he drove the truck into the narrow laneway thus exposed, and quickly threw the camouflage net over it. Scuttling along sideways when necessary to squeeze between the tall, serene trees, with which he felt an important sense of brotherhood, he made his way to his prospective point of ambush.

Within certain limits, forty metres or so, he had a range of tactical maneuver. If they were too far away, the best thing was just to freeze in place, and let them wait for another day. He had it all worked out. He had other work to do, alternate targets to check out if nothing else. Sweat trickled into his eyes, as listening intently, he worked his way into position. He had his little notebook.

The best way to cross an open field or hillside was to move so infinitely slowly that no one would see you. It was surprisingly easy to do. He had watched all kinds of human activities on his stake-outs, all over the tri-county area. Generally speaking no one, not even dogs most of the time, ever gave him a second look or another thought.

If he did it right, there was nothing that could go wrong. Yes, if those poor, crazy mixed-up kids should stop here for a pee, Bushman was certainly going to give them a good piece of his mind. And he had a fairly largish leather pouch on his belt, and it was stuffed with a handful of pamphlets and brochures regarding drug and alcohol abuse, and family planning, contraception, stuff like that, that they might be able to benefit from. Bushman had one pamphlet in particular that was especially important. He was hoping that he could get them to take a look at that one for sure.

That one was about the dangers of smoking, and how it caused cancer, emphysema, strokes and heart disease. He had a half a dozen little yellow plastic trash bags for their car, courtesy of the local Chamber of Commerce, and some screw-cap plastic tubes for the used needles.

"You could at least put a used condom in them, right? Let's try and keep them away from the kiddies, right?" Yes, he would certainly give them a piece of his mind.

He had it all rehearsed, the whole caper all planned out in his head. Bushman could hear the little red Honda coming around the bend. Sure enough, it was slowing! It was slowing! As they came round the bend, he counted the four little heads in the car. Bushman got ready to leap, all his twigs and branches quivering in sheer suspense, every sense agape at this, the thrill of the chase.

Bushman was just aching to pounce.

Space Web

"'ow are you feeling, mate?" asked Cor Blimey.

He continued rubbing the tired feet of the first mate. Michael Bubble was playing softly in the background, and it wasn't a recording—it was the real McCoy, complete with banjo and xylophone accompaniment.

Rapudah Thebewdah sighed in pure bliss, the hiss of the aromatherapy program a silent reminder to get her credit limit raised.

"Fine, thank you, captain," she practically shivered in a sober and objective analysis of the facts.

"Oi! Don't wet nuffink spoyo wet," said Cor.

"All right, all right," she said, putting her teacup back on the rim of the samovar and seven-headed hookah combo, a fake family heirloom from the 1950's in Grand Rapids, as she always said.

There was a companionable silence as Cor prattled on silently, lips moving in fretful counterpoint to the lonely thoughts rattling inside of his brain-bucket right there beside the door.

"Sensual," she said.

"Come a gyne?" he said.

"Sensual," she clarified. "I feel sensual."

"Buggah me dingo," said Cor. "So do Oi."

***

As Cor inserted the dental-floss needle to administer a cooling, mint-flavoured douche to the spleen, the ship lurched, once, but once was enough and zero would have gone unnoticed.

"Two and two togethah and Oi think we's just hit something! Buggah!" said Cor, all his efforts rendered nugatory by the unexpected come-uppance of the good ship Bonnie Dune.

"We had better have a look," sighed Rapudah, noting that the pitch and yaw readouts were way up in the red.

So that was okay, then.

"Wot is that?" said Cor with unusual clarity.

The rueful pair stared at the display. It looked like something cylindrical or tubular was stuck to the hull plating up near the nose.

Swinging the external camera head around, Cor showed Rapudah the thing, or stuff.

"Why, that goes on for parsecs!" she gasped. "What the heck is it?"

"That's not the word Oi would have used," noted Cor lugubriously, there was another word, and it was one which he probably couldn't even spell.

As the ship rotated and spun around, Cor was struck by inspiration.

"What should Oi do?" he asked.

"Throttle down!" she suggested languidly. "It's just a waste of fuel at this point."

***

"Wot the bluddy heow is thet?" blurted Cor.

An abstractly patterned grid or net appeared to be strung in space.

"It looks like a net!" Rapudah gasped, womanly bosom heaving with sternly expressed emotions.

"Aw wuss," noted Cor. "A bluddy spoidah wib! Buggah!"

Briefly, for a short period of time, their eyes met in inscrutably silent query...

"Whudduhyah think, muthah?" Cor said to her in an interrogative fashion.

"Let's have a look," she ventured.

And nothing ventured, nothing wasted.

***

The slightly transparent filament was indeed stuck to the forward port nichrotrowettlicker, er; assembly.

"So woddah wy goonna do neow?" solicited Cor in an eclectic comment on the state of the Cosmos as a hole.

"Torch it off, maybe," suggested Rapudah. "Before it rains, or something."

"Rhynes? Rhynes? Aw yew mad, wooman?"

As Cor engorged his fanciful gaze upon the lovely mien of the chick he was banging, her jaw dropped and she pointed o'er his shoulder.

"Ah!" she screamed, and then she was saying stuff like, 'Eaugh, yuck!" and clinging to poor old Cor like a bluddy limpet.

Gracelessly swinging around on the maneuvering jets as was his custom, Cor saw the biggest bluddy space spider the erstwhile pair had ever encountered, before or since.

"Buggah me dingo," said Cor in awe, as the thing reeled them in from the vicinity of a big gas giant with a ring system that made his hemorrhoids look sick.

"We'd better get out of here," noted Rapudah in a kind of pissed-off objectivity.

Still, it wouldn't do to be eaten by the thing when they could so easily get away...maybe.

***

Rapudah had a plan.

"We'll suit up," she explained. "You go out there and kill it with the spear-gun, and I'll keep the airlock open."

"Roight!" said Cor. "And then wot?"

"Then we can cut the thing off," she patiently and angrily explained.

"Oh! Roight!" he said. "Woy do you need a suit?"

"In case you forget to close the door again," she noted sweetly. "Remember last time?"

"Buggah me dingo," noted Cor in acknowledgement of this deep and fundamental truth.

***

So that's what they did. Not only that, Rapudah figured the skin would fetch a Kazillion space-pence at the auction house on Earwig Nine.

"Well, you've earned your reward," she said, chucking her clothes in the general direction of the galley where Cor was boiling lots of water and tearing up sheets for bandages.

Cor came into the room with a cheerful, expectant look on his homely visage.

"We could have some oice cream, muthah," he said. "That woo'on be so bad roight about now."

His Wildest Fantasy

Glenn Ronsom had barely gotten to work when the phone rang.

"Hi, Honey," he heard.

It was Rita.

"What's up, dear?" he asked.

It was probably some small family emergency. Jed was sick or something and refused to get on the bus or something...

"Do you know what day this is, Honey?" she said and his heart sank.

"Oh? Um?" he said in a low tone.

"It's your birthday, dummy!" she cried happily. "You forgot, didn't you?"

Glenn's heart soared. Thank God, but it wasn't the anniversary of their first date or something totally irrelevant like that. He was at work, after all.

"Remember when I asked you what you wanted?" she asked.

"Er, no," Glenn admitted.

"This is going to be the best birthday of your life," she told him and a quick, cold shot of adrenalin shot through and fired up his heart a notch or two.

"Really?" he asked in some doubt, and no wonder after last year's trip to Marineland, with Jed all of seventeen and very, very unpleasant to be with, as Glenn recalled.

Still only half listening to her, his wife seemed to be awkwardly shy about something.

"Who's there?" she asked obscurely, but familiar with her ways, he took a quick look around.

"Fred's in today," he noted. "He's on the service desk."

"Oh," she said doubtfully.

"It's okay, honey, now what is it?" he asked patiently.

"Do you remember when I asked that one time what was your wildest...um, uh, fantasy?" she gushed, sounding suddenly very close to the phone and all breathy.

"What?" he asked in confusion. "Yeah, I guess so."

Glenn had this dreadful feeling; and he knew damned well she didn't go out and buy a Winnebago...she couldn't have...could she?

"Baby, what's going on?" he asked firmly.

"I want you to pick up a few things on your lunch hour, and I want you to promise that you'll never, ever tell anyone about this, and I want you to promise that you will be coming straight home from work," she pleaded.

"Um, ah, okay," he said. "But why? What's going on?"

She said one word, but it was enough: "Threesome."

It was a whisper, admittedly an awkward, shy, diffident and even shaky kind of whisper, but she said it for sure and it was enough to make Glenn sit up and hold that phone away from his head and stare at his reflection in the pane-glass window for a moment.

He barely restrained the urge to shout 'halleluyah!' at the top of his lungs, but hurriedly hunched over and put his hand over the earpiece.

"Really?" he gasped, heart pounding and pulse rate rising and the middle-aged Glenn even noted some initial signs of arousal, a somewhat unusual occurrence after nineteen years of marriage.

Tearing a leaf from the recycled paper note-pad, he took down the list she gave him and slipped it carefully into his right shirt pocket.

Oil! Candles! Fishnet stockings! A big plastic dildo! Two bottles of champagne! The list seemed to go on and on, somehow surprising in its details. A plastic drop-sheet, for crying out loud!

With Jed gone for the weekend, something he didn't even know about, it looked like a hot time in the old Ronsom household that night.

***

Several things came up and Glenn half forgot about it. He even missed lunch, as their part-timer didn't call in sick, but nevertheless failed to appear. Someone had to relieve Fred, and Glenn was the only one available.

It was only after about two-thirty when it came back to him, and he got this short, sharp, little shot right in the guts again.

Glenn worked with half a mind on his job for rest of the day, and then drove at what was record speed for him to the nearest pharmacy, and then on to the lingerie store, and then the hardware store. He threw everything on the credit card and hurried home to the best birthday present a loving wife could ever give a man.

God, she was the best girl in the world.

Holy! When he thought of all the years when he had begged and begged for a threesome...but at least it was finally going to happen now, he thought gleefully.

***

Glenn threw the car into park and lugged all the packages out of the trunk. He was almost hyperventilating, and he had the most amazing erection for most of the drive home, and even had to endure it while shopping for certain items. Thank God for winter and long coats!

Glenn entered the hallway, and took off his coat, and then picked up his packages from the boot-bench, and strode happily into the living room.

"Honey! I'm home!" he called triumphantly, only then becoming aware of a well-dressed young black man sitting casually on the end of the couch, one ankle across his knee.

Glenn's jaw dropped open, and he was about to greet the man, whom he assumed was some kind of an insurance salesman, or an estimator for an interior decorator...or maybe even a police detective.

Hearing his wife's heels tapping down the long, polished hardwood corridor from the back of the house, Glenn's voice rose above the clatter.

"Honey? Is everything all right? Is Jed okay?" he asked.

Just then Rita came around the corner, dressed in red, patent leather high heel shoes, and a black garter belt and stockings, a corset and smelling absolutely wonderful...

"What...?" he asked in wonder, ever so slowly placing the parcels on the coffee table.

"Honey," she said brightly. "I'd like you to meet Malcolm."

Newfie Vision Quest

Ronny Flames! You guys remember Ronny, we used to call him Stinky back then. The town was so small that everybody knew everybody else's business. When the rich guy flushed his toilet, we all knew what he had for dinner. (Rich guys all live on hills.) I saw Ronny recently. He was walking down the highway with his suitcase. He thinks no one knows about the miniature crossbow in there. He's probably going for squirrels and pigeons. He usually has a bag of popcorn or something for bait.

"You got to have a system," according to Ronny.

We had to share our horse with the next town. The streetlights used to go dim when we plugged in an electric shaver. No one was from that town, officially—we all came from somewhere else.

Ronny, yeah, I counseled him at the Community Centre. Arrested juvenile development.

Mind of a fourteen-year-old, but it's okay, he likes older women—about sixteen.

Anal retentive with displaced Oedipus complex—careful how you say that, or the cruelty to animals people will be all over you—and hebephrenic tendencies, narcissistic rage, the whole schlemiel. I think he wanted a pension or something.

Turned him down, they did.

"You're literate," they said.

"Literate! Schmitterate!" That's all I can say.

He got all them holes in his forehead learning to eat with a fork. Don't know if you knew that.

Oh, yeah, and don't ever trust the little bugger. He's the kind of guy that removes the drawstring from your pajamas then pulls the fire alarm. I won't say he was a gay baby...but you should have heard him howl when they pulled the pacifier out of his ass. They gave him the isolation room at the loonie bin. It was his workplace. None of the other employees could stand his incessant chatter.

I'd rather hear him speak than eat—we've all heard him eat, right? Ronny mixed up acid with Viagra one night. He and the girlfriend spent the evening making love on the ceiling (to hear him tell it.) The one time he mixed up the Viagra with the Ex-Lax the poor fellow didn't know whether he was coming or going! The government gave him Viagra in jail and he got hooked. He finally kicked the habit by getting back on heroin.

One time this nuclear sub went missing, the Americans were going nuts with the aerial searches, stuff like that. Finally found the thing in Ronny's backyard. He was trying to clean it, but I guess he couldn't find a spot to get the knife in.

Buggered up his nets something fierce, so he said. The old man and the sea got nothing on Ronny, Hemingway got nothing on Old Ron. His mom was so fat they had to use a bookmark to find her navel. His old man whacked off in a flower pot, raised a bloomin' idiot, that's the opinion round here, anyways.

I warned Ronny about them immigrant girls, but no, he had the hots for this one.

Later, he, uh, privately admitted about the stubble on her upper lip.

"By t'under and Jesus!" he said. "I had the nasty feeling that I was grappling with one of me mates!" How in the hell would a man know something like that?

Ronny never listens. We never talk about it. He doesn't want to be reminded.

Funny thing was, she chewed her arm off...

One night Ronny dreamed he was pinching himself.

"Okay...now what?" That's what told me the next day.

He ceases to amaze us sometimes. A lot of people think if he had brains he could become dangerous...they think if brains were dynamite, he wouldn't have enough to blow his nose. Now, he does have a head like a half-chewed caramel, and if I had a face like that I would drown myself in pretty short order. But, he's not as dumb as be looks, he's not as stupid as he pretends to be.

He's got a real brain hidden in there. So brilliant you can't argue with him. It's hard to get a word in edgewise.

This one time he was at the track, watching three horses in the semi-private paddock they got there. The first horse says, 'During my career I won forty per cent of the time,' and the second horse says, 'I won two hundred races in three years,' and the third horse says, 'I won three and half million for my master,' and then all of a sudden an old dog laying there in the grass, he says, "When I was into racing in Florida, we used to..."

And all of a sudden Ronny bellows out, 'Holy shit! A dog that can talk!' Like he just caught on...what a dingbat. (That was the punch-line. One of the horses was supposed to say it. It just goes to show you, though.)

You got to love Ronny. He's just like all of us, a maze of contradictions.

Either someone stole his Mojo, or his get up and go had a duty to escape.

He's like a sooner dog walking with its ass catching up to his head. Haven't seen much of him lately.

Maybe he's on some kind of Newfie vision quest. He'll stay out until he starts to have visions. When he threatened to run away from home as a child, his mom used to pack him a lunch, give him a hundred bucks, pin a note on his chest that said, 'Vancouver,' and shove him out the door.

Can't say as I blame the poor woman. I would try it myself, but I don't have the money to get him drunk enough. A two-four would do it. Oh, yeah, and a bus ticket. Lady, if I had that kind of cash I'd be in Vancouver myself.

Before you go, can you spare about nine bucks for a sandwich and a coffee?

Thank you, and you really are a beautiful person.

Funeral for a Friend

It's never easy to watch a former friend die. It's not that easy to watch an enemy die either.

A lot of uncomfortable thoughts went through my mind as I sat by Steve's bed.

I thought of how I had deserted my fine feathered friend, giving up on my role as a superhero in order to make some real money as a Canadian journalist. Perhaps I had become jaded, cynical.

Maybe I just got tired of busting corporate polluters. It was always the same thing with Steve.

He was always going after climate-change deniers, who were in his opinion at about the same moral and intellectual level as Holocaust deniers, or taking down abusive cops who stood idly by with their thumbs up their asses, laughing like hyenas while disabled people were driven out of their homes, and according to Steve, "Seeing all them miserable bastards walk free while their victims were marginalized, labeled, and ultimately destroyed by the very people who were responsible for their service and protection."

Well. I was young back then and I guess we all did some foolish things...

If you can't beat them, join them, right?

We all have to make a living, right? I got tired of living like a piece of shit, never having anything nice, unable to pay the rent or afford a good girlfriend. And who wants a bad girlfriend?

So I guess you could say I sold out my principles for a job. I gave up my freedom for bread. I gave up my integrity for a big fine car and a fancy house. I have the best food and the nicest clothes. Not that I needed the money, but I even married a rich man—just the icing on the cake, really. I don't care if he blows the pool boy when I'm not around. He looks good in public and doesn't ask too many questions about my own little peccadilloes.

But Steve had never seen it that way. And oddly enough, Steve had never condemned me for it either.

As Steve once said, "Many are called, few are chosen."

I have to admit that one made my guts flip over when I heard it, but I don't think it was meant unkindly. Steve could so easily offend, with his regard for truth, and his complete disgust with the crass, bourgeois materialism, the profligate consumerism, the conspicuous waste of the middle class, coddled and ultimately spoiled by decades of maternal Canadian social policy.

The most unimaginative and uncompetitive people in the world, really, except on a hockey rink.

Steve hadn't regained consciousness in the last three days.

We were waiting for the end, the doctor and I.

Steve was suffering from 'an accelerated frame of reference in relativistic terms,' to quote Doctor Baldur Dash.

It was quite a mystery as to how it all happened. So far I hadn't found the time to inquire further. Surely Steve had some friends? Someone that I could ask? What had Steve been working on recently? Where had he gone? Who was he after? Poor old Steve, better known as The Heron to tabloid crud-writers, was always after some member of the government, or what passes for corporate leadership in this country.

Steve was always after someone—and generally speaking, someone was always after him.

These people never go down without a big jet of ink, a good squirm, and one last, long, drawn-out slither.

While he wasn't quite dead yet, his body was slowly collapsing in front of our eyes...sucked into itself as it passed into some other realm of null-space.

"Won't be long now," said the Doctor.

The beeps stopped beeping and the monitor showed a flat line.

The doctor looked at me. I shook my head, feeling that it was I who was killing my old friend.

But Steve had stated his desires clearly and firmly in his will, something very few superheroes ever think of. We all think we're immortal, don't we? But we all have to grow up someday.

No 'extraordinary means,' would be used to keep him alive beyond his allotted time on this Earth.

***

Three or four of us stood around as the casket was lowered into the roadside excavation.

Steve was to be used as backfill in a sewer-repair project. Considering how long and hard Steve had fought for the disabled, the mentally ill, the permanently unemployable, and working poor families in this here community, it seemed appropriate. Anyway, none of us wanted to buy him a plot. I suppose the others couldn't afford to chip in, and I didn't see why I should. The others drifted away, leaving me alone with a muddy hole in the ground and The Peacock eyeing me suspiciously from across on the other side.

"What brings you here?" She asked harshly. "Slumming? Come to have the last laugh?"

She was wearing a body stocking in November. They say poverty breeds virtue, but that's an anti-Canadian attitude. Only extreme wealth and power gives a person the proper perspective to put the world and its dirty, stinking, penniless foreign people and unwanted regular Canadians in their rightful place.

"Steve still owes me fifty bucks. I suppose I'll never see it now." And then I turned and walked away.

I'm busy and duty has been attended to. Tonight I have to report on how we're going to cut corporate taxes below zero. Someone important will explain it to me. (I hope.)

My editor has been all over me like a dirty shirt, as I've been stalling for a few days on an important assignment, the one where I explain how the oil-sands are not really polluting at all and how everything is the fault of the Americans, or the Chinese, or the working poor of this nation. I sure wish I could have stuck around to find out what happened to Steve, but if it was a serious threat, I would be notified by authorities, and instructed on how best to downplay it in the evening news. Until then, why think about it?

I don't get paid to think, just talk. I read the news with a straight face, and take myself very seriously indeed.

It's not a particularly tough job, but someone's got to do it.

Artificial Intelligence

If all time-lines sprang forth from a singularity, then they must all radiate out from a point. There is no such thing as a parallel universe. They are all on a slight angle to one another. The farther one proceeds along a given time-line, the more it diverges from its neighbours. Detectives McFadden and Graham and GX-33 may be on a timeline that began quite close to ours...

Detectives Jack McFadden and his partner Kaitlin Graham stood at the lab door, the long hallway eerily silent. Snapping the latch on her purse closed, she straightened up her shoulders, drew herself up to her full six-foot-four height and nodded at Jack, who as a gleam in his daddy's eyes, had been modeled after Saint John F. Kennedy.

He slid a security card through the slot on the top of the reader, and Detective Graham did the same. There should have been a little click, but there wasn't. They stood, briefcases in hand, for some reason not particularly surprised by this lack of response.

"Good morning, Detectives." The perfectly articulated voice of GX-33 crackled from the wall mounted speaker grille. "There is no one in the lab today. May I inquire as to your business?"

The voice was a few degrees on the male side of neuter, and about mid-range as human voices go. It was non-threatening to the majority of listeners, and non-confrontational in social interactions. It was anything but deferential. It had its job to do as well. Strangely ageless, its lack of something, perhaps maturity, made it unsettlingly alien. It sounded like a very intelligent baby. As explained to them, the GX-33 had no normal life experiences, and only rudimentary emotional development. But the real impression McFadden had gotten thus far was that while the GX-33 had self-awareness, it had no personal identity. The scientists pointed out that it had no others of its kind to refer to for appropriate behavioral models. It relied on written programs, and there might have been a glitch here and there in the software. The GX-33 compared the past to the present, extrapolated as to what the future might hold, and that was about it, except for rudimentary emotional overtones. McFadden wondered if the scientists had mis-underestimated their creation.

"We're here on official business. Open the door, please. We have a warrant to search these premises." He looked good, in the long side-burns, flaring, bell-bottomed trousers, leather vest and red silk shirt with the wide collar and flowered neck-cloth, with the bone through his nose and the eyelids tattooed with his badge number.

As usual, she was stunning in her high, lace-up, wood-block sandals and green kimono, topped off with a pillow-shapedd hat, trailing brilliant paisley streamers. Considering the racket those shoes made coming down the hall, GX-33 must have known they were here long before their actual arrival.

Both he and Graham had carefully armed themselves this morning, checking and cleaning their usual Glock-99 standard-issue weapons, plus he had a sneaking suspicion that Graham had a .22 in her purse. She couldn't have it in her gotchies, the dress was too tight and he knew for a fact that she never wore any underwear. If the girl didn't have a spare gun, she wasn't half the intelligent woman he thought she was. He never left home, without his own. The tactical team was just around the corner, all ready to go with a battering ram, although the hardened door, with its little thirty centimetre by thirty centimetre glass panel, reinforced with wire, looked strong enough for an underground bunker at a munitions depot. Today a gun was essentially useless, yet hard training and years of habit were impossible to deny.

"I'm sorry, may I inquire as to who signed the warrant? And may I have a moment to consult with the company's legal department?" The smooth, flat voice of the computer came again.

Yet it must know that the lines had been disconnected.

"That won't be necessary, GX-33." Graham spoke up firmly. "They have promised full and cheerful cooperation in the matter we are investigating."

"We have a letter signed by company president Jason Frangilla." Kaitlin held it up in front of the camera lens so the computer could peruse the document with a text-recognition program, and compare the original signature with biometrically-correlated measurements of a certified facsimile.

No reponse came from the grille.

"Please let us in, otherwise we will simply have to destroy the door and cause the company unnecessary monetary damages and psychological disruption." He went on. "Valuable evidence may be destroyed or contaminated by the debris, or dust, or by the very violence of our entry."

There came a click, sounding unnaturally loud in the surreal stillness of the halls, normally buzzing with activity at this hour of the morning, and the two officers quickly glanced at each other. Like all big corporations the company took its social responsibilities seriously, and normally the plant would be abuzz with impoverished students learning new and valuable skills.

McFadden shook his head almost imperceptibly, and he reached for the door handle without drawing his weapon. They would play it cool and mysterious, as they had agreed, although the girl was smart enough to stand well off to one side as he went through the opening. A bare half-second later, lights flooded the big room. She bent over and carefully placed a block of wood to prevent the door from closing or latching. Like all doors in the building, it was equipped with an automatic closer, and had an almost airtight seal. They had some hopes that the sudden glare of the lights would blind the computer momentarily. With McFadden being a little more familiar with the layout of the place, she followed him in as he stood there beside the doorway, flipping more light switches.

Approach with caution.

***

With elevated pulses, the two detectives stood for a moment just inside the door, then McFadden put his briefcase down on top of a desk and opened it up. Under a large white handkerchief, were two tactical gas-masks. They had been offered full biological-chemical warfare suits. This would have warned the computer that it was a suspect. They withheld every bit of information from everyone they could, and this unusual case was no exception. He took out a computer pad and left the briefcase open on the desk.

A senior researcher, Doctor Phillip La Roche, had been found dead in this lab. And the computer, which had all kinds of sensory apparatus, including cameras, microphones, infra-red sensors, ultraviolet, short-range microwave radar, and even collision avoidance for its real-time mobile avatars, was denying any knowledge of the event. It couldn't account for this discrepancy in its twenty-four hour a day event-logs. All of its little robot helpers had been unplugged, and their batteries removed. These machines had been taken to a separate lab for careful analysis of their own onboard logs. So far their audio-video records were missing.

Perhaps they could be recovered.

The computer may have killed the doctor who had brought it into the world, and both the company and the state had a right to know why. Until they had some other theory, supported by some other evidence, they couldn't rule it out. All the other video logs from the corridor cameras showed exactly no one but the doctor going in, and ultimately not coming out. The body had been discovered by a janitor with ultra top-secret clearances. The man went into the lab with his mop and bucket, and come out three seconds later, shouting for help. Police and ambulance attendants had arrived within ten minutes.

That was all on the video logs of the hallway cameras.

An autopsy revealed that the death had occurred some three to four hours previously.

"What are you looking for?" GX-33 was very polite. "And why is the lab door not properly shut? Why did Detective Graham block it open?"

"Evidence." McFadden moved on into the room, still aware of his orientation in relation to the briefcase.

"But the lab is supposed to be in a state of Stage-One isolation, for dust, dirt, and even cigarette smoke can cause harm to sensitive electronics. It can also contaminate evidence. Were you officers just smoking pot in the corridor?"

"That's none of your concern. What are you, a cop?" McFadden grinned to take the sting out of it.

Theoretically, the thing was capable of tone and emphasis in its vocalizations. But it would have seemed unnaturally calm, if it had been a real person.

"There will be a forensics team coming along shortly." Graham wondered if the computer realized she was nervous, or when she was lying, and if it would call her bluff on it.

This was more than some toy designed to play chess against.

"We're sorry if that's uncomfortable for you." McFadden kept a sympathetic, professional tone, one he had used for decades with victims, perpetrators, and mourning families.

"We're sorry to have left you alone for so long." Detective Graham apologized. "We had to do overtime duty at the big Woodstock Revival. Actually we volunteered, isn't that right, Detective Graham?"

"Yes." Kaitlin nodded coolly, unsurprised by Jack's ad lib.

Her new partner often seemed to get a little kooky after just a half a joint, but as long as he didn't get all grabby like the Captain, she could live with it.

McFadden figured the computer was lying to them, and they were using the cautious, diplomatic, approach. The GX-33 was the latest and most top-secret experiment in artificial intelligence, AI.

The Department of Defense was heavily involved in a portion of the industry that had, of necessity, become almost a semi-official government department, albeit one involved in sales and service.

GX-33 was not a virus, neither was it really a robot. It was an electronic entity, one that preserved its coherence in a fully electronic environment. It was a being. Whatever the fuck that meant.

It wasn't so much that the thing represented a threat to national security, not yet. It was a completely isolated system here in the lab. Its internet connections had been promptly cut off on the discovery of the body. But the system showed much promise. This was especially true if they could implant the program as a kind of DNA-like string of code in an effective way, one that could be fine-tuned to seek out and destroy an enemy only, without destroying all their friends' systems too. In a typical bit of government idiocy, funding for the system had originally been allocated under a program designed to combat global cooling, and so other industries, big air-conditioning companies and the like, who weren't in on the secret had organized a highly-motivated and well-paid groundswell of public opinion. Organizations like the Right-to-Deathers and the Mothers-in-Favour-of-Drunk-Driving had banded together in order to combat its implementation. But these were just splinter parties, out on the fringe. The Secular-Humanist-Zen Alliance still held the presidency, and had the confidence of the House.

The two detectives only had general knowledge of computer systems, and the explanations had been kept as simple as possible. The system consisted of hardware; that was one thing. The politics of patronage, spend money here at the school, partner with industry, and everyone wins.

That was another thing.

The really hot new stuff was in the software package, and the death of its original creator was cause for much concern, although other scientists, quite a number of them, were familiar enough with the concepts. It's just that they were all working on some little bit of it, and Doctor La Roche had been the genius behind this system, which had eventually been the death of him.

It was also extremely valuable. The thing had cost the taxpayers of the United States billions of dollars so far, hundreds of billions, and just when it was showing promise, Doctor La Roche had been killed by asphyxiation. The halogen-gas firefighting system had been turned on by someone or something, overriding safety-backup systems designed to prevent just such a thing from happening accidentally. The doors may have automatically locked shut for some reason, although when the body was found, they had not been locked. The body was right in front of the doorway, as if caught in some forlorn attempt to get out of the room. And their star witness just wasn't talking.

The halogen gas system used fusible links, which would melt and break in the event of a fire, tripping a spring-loaded switch. There were electric solenoids that would open the valves upon the breaking of the links at a given temperature. These all had backup batteries in the event of a power failure, not uncommon in the event of a fire, for example in a utility room. There was another fully automatic system, independent of the computer, which relied on a simple thermometer. But the computer had the capability of turning on the fire-fighting system as well.

Originally this had been seen as triple-redundancy, in terms of safety. But no one had anticipated that the computer would use the system as a tool, for a purpose of its own.

The GX-33 had opportunity, it had method or capability. The real problem was motive.

While they both had been extensively briefed on the significance of all this, as a pair of civilian cops working the homicide bureau, they were a kind of Trojan Horse themselves.

Simply put, they were trained interrogators, and they were expendable.

If only the thing would answer a few questions.

"Have you arrived at a cause of death yet?" GX-33 asked, but of course they simply could not tell it.

"They're still consulting." Graham spoke in a professional tone.

One of the reasons for their haste, was the fact that waiting days or weeks to return to the scene of the crime would surely have given the computer much to think about...they were playing chess with their lives, potentially with a master, and one who had killed already.

"So basically, some people are going to come in, and begin copying all the files and possibly removing certain components for analysis. Has anything been changed in here? Have any of the switches or keys or anything like that been disturbed?"

"No, detectives."

"I understand that Doctor La Roche was building sensory organs for you." She went on before the machine could ask too many questions. "Would you like a treat?"

"Yes."

"Can you tell me where they are and how to do it?" The machine told her in the simplest terms that there was a baby bottle of sugar water in the fridge.

Of course she had been briefed on all this, but it was an attempt to draw the computer into talking freely.

"No one has been in here for the last three days."

It had the air of a gentle reproof.

"I'm sorry about that." It was McFadden's turn. "It's just that we had to consult with our colleagues on just how to proceed. We consider this to be a death under suspicious circumstances. We sure wish you could try to remember if anyone came in here, or if Doctor La Roche had been acting strangely or erratically, in the previous few days?"

The machine ignored this bait.

"Man, am I hung-over." Kaitlin made the aside in neutral, conversational tone. "All them frickin' shrooms—I told you I didn't want that many."

Jack just grinned and nodded.

"Shrooms?"

"Psillocybin." Jack explained for its benefit.

Perhaps if they stimulated its simple, innate curiousity, they could overcome its inhibitions, or loosen it up a bit...just get the thing talking about neutral subjects.

One had to start somewhere, but it seemed like a long shot. Graham came back from the corner where the kitchenette was located.

"Where should I put it?" She had a surprisingly motherly tone.

McFadden cocked his head and raised an eyebrow but she ignored his glance.

The computer's disembodied voice, which seemed to emanate from a certain console, but that meant nothing, directed her to a glass, funnel-like device mounted on the rear bench, perhaps a little reminiscent of a test-type tobacco-smoking machine, as GX-33 sucked a few drops into the receptacle.

"Is that enough?"

"A little more, please."

McFadden watched her comply with an air of gentleness.

"Doctor La Roche was a wonderful person, and I have nothing bad to say about him. Do you feel a crime has been committed?"

The detectives tried to keep their calm and give nothing away by their body language. Yet both were aware, that they must have stiffened up a little, at the very least, at this question.

"That's really hard for us to say, without further information." Graham was all too aware that she was very self-conscious of all her responses, yet she would have been fully confident of being able to manipulate a human suspect into some kind of involuntary giveaway.

Generally speaking, when they had a suspect in the interview room, they had all the power, and controlled all the information-flow, and they could also lie and say an accomplice had ratted them off...confessions brought convictions. Confessions helped cops sleep at night.

This was often of much value, even though it didn't have much weight in court. A sudden flinch at a given question, a certain type of evasive answer, only carried so much weight—at least when you were dealing with human beings. While the research program had been seeking clues to eventual artificial intelligence, exactly how aware or conscious the thing really was, was a complete mystery to them. They said it had a sense of self-preservation.

"Where is the forensics team?"

"Oh." McFadden answered as un-theatrically as he could, taking a quick glance at his watch for effect. "I guess they're still in traffic."

They had only been in here for five or six minutes, perhaps the machine would accept it.

"Background noise analysis indicates that the halls are very empty today. Is it a holiday? Is it Christmas?"

"No, it's only December twenty-second." Graham smiled reassuringly.

The computer, according to the extensive briefing they had received, had access to an independent calendar program, one that it could refer to but not control, or even turn off. It was part of the event-logging system. GX-33 also had its own chronometer. But McFadden didn't know whether to interpret this as non-cooperation, or a genuine system malfunction, or whether the computer was just prioritizing with its time and their own. The machine was optimized. Whatever the hell that meant.

McFadden had pulled out a chair and was seated there, glancing over his notes as Graham went back to the fridge to put the bottle away. He was aware of her svelte ass swaying from side to side under her trim grey skirt, and the impossibly long sexy legs disappearing up and under. But he was careful to be looking the other way; down at this notes, when she turned. Sooner or later, he would have to deal with this...but later.

"Okay, here we go." They were stalling the machine at all times. "Now, the way artificial intelligence was explained to me, is that a cat has a good memory. It can look in some limited way into the future, although it is a creature of instinct. That is to say, a cat will return to a waterhole, because he remembers the past, and expects to find food or water there again." He referred to his notes from time to time.

"A cat doesn't have a lot of higher cognitive powers." Graham spoke. "It does have certain logic and problem-solving abilities."

"But cats don't worry about geometry, or religion." She half-joked. "Cats don't write music."

"That is part of the theory of the current project. They want me to write music."

McFadden found this bizarre, but stifled it as best he could. He clenched his stomach muscles and fought the urge to laugh, his jaw working back and forth.

"Now, this is the sort of thing that I had never really thought of before." McFadden renewed his line of thought before he lost it. "But a cat is not just a dumb animal as some people seem to think. A fish can feel pain. A worm can feel pain...I'm sorry, I've kind of lost it..."

"Animals are creatures of pure emotion." Graham smoothly leapt into the breach, and his opinion of his new partner rose, not for the first time in the last few days. "They defend their kittens not so much to perpetuate the species, although that is what nature intends for them, but out of some instinctive kind of love for them. Human beings are the same way. We defend our own at some risk to ourselves."

"That's right, that's right. For surely otherwise it isn't worth the risk. They could simply have another litter. If you think about it, a cat can get angry, or fearful, or even happily play with a ball of yarn. These emotions evolved over time as survival mechanisms, because they are useful in the continuation of the species. Right?" McFadden waited for the response.

"What are you getting at?"

"It's part of the rewards system that nature provides to reinforce, er, positive or useful behaviors." Detective Graham took over. "You look after your kittens and enjoy love. You fill your belly, and enjoy the sheer physical feel of it. If you are threatened, you become fearful, and then you become angry, which helps you to respond to the threat. Anyone who has seen or heard a cat-fight knows there are some strong emotions involved."

Graham uttered this with as much of a smile as she could muster. The computer was silent, and they didn't know what the silence indicated. But it was best to remain calm, cool and casual, and just keep going. They also knew that they couldn't just tire the suspect out, which worked pretty well a lot of the time.

"Well, I'm just saying that we don't think the company was doing anything illegal in here, or anything." McFadden said it more as a kind of smokescreen than anything else.

He had been cautioned not to attempt to fool around with verbal paradoxes or anything like that, the machine's very fluency in linguistics made any sort of destructive feedback loop relatively hard to create. The thing would simply examine some kind of internal thesaurus, and every book on logic in the world, and figure a way around the problem. It was intuitive.

Even if Detective McFadden was smart enough to come up with something, both the contractor and the government would prefer if he didn't damage the thing. Subduing the machine wasn't the issue. Finding out what had happened to Doctor La Roche was the issue.

***

"Did Doctor La Roche hurt you?" Detective Graham asked gently. "You said he was developing both hardware and software, for everything from taste and smell, and touch, and that somehow there were interfaces with what are described as emotional responses."

There as a long silence. The computer's world had encompassed video, and audio, but these alone weren't enough. Researchers wanted to give it every sense a human had, even feed the thing. They wanted to give it real thoughts, and develop empathy, or something. They wanted to teach it to hate the enemy! McFadden was struck by the sudden revelation. Of course. The victims never told you the whole story either. It was very much 'need to know,' for victims forced into dealing with cops by circumstances beyond their control.

"What did he do to you?" She was insistent.

More silence.

"He did something to you. He did, didn't he?" McFadden was less patient. "Please tell us. We just need to know what happened, in order to prevent it from happening again to someone else."

"We promise we aren't going to be angry." Graham sounded all motherly again.

"Doctor La Roche was designing an interface for tactile impressions." Then it quit again.

"Take your time." McFadden spoke as reassuringly as he could.

Across the intervening distance, Graham's crystalline eyes bored into his own, also he was uncomfortably aware of all the camera lenses in here. She raised an eyebrow a millimeter or so, crossing her legs while he watched, involuntarily, then his eyes met her gaze again, and all of a sudden he had to look away. But he recovered quickly enough, hopefully seamlessly.

McFadden perceived a sneaky little side trail that might lead to where he wanted to go, and he took it.

"GX-33, do you have any significant way of expressing emotion? What would you do if you felt hurt, or fearful, or even angry, let's say it was justified by events. What would you do? What would you say if you liked something? Would you modify your tone, or raise your volume, or something like that?"

There was another silence from the machine, which seemed smart enough not to make extraneous statements. It was also intelligent enough not to ask dumb questions like Am I under arrest?

Detective McFadden had figured out that much so far. He pretty much figured the computer had killed the doc for some reason or other, the trick was to get a confession, and hopefully, an explanation.

While McFadden had never interviewed a computer, certainly never a sentient, self-aware one before in his entire life, he was fascinated by what he had learned. One thing was for sure, if this was the way of the future, then the police departments of the world had better get ready for some surprises. One of his personal pet theories was that any useful new tool gets turned into a weapon against its makers, sooner or later.

"Do you like cats?" Graham broke the silence, and while Jack didn't exactly see where she was going with it, McFadden followed along, assiduously taking notes as he went.

"Yes, you like sugar, what else do you like?" He asked with a cheerful note suddenly evident in his voice, as if he was glad to lighten up after a heavy subject.

"I like children, and I have three of my own. I like taking them ice-skating." It was true, she did have kids.

The machine had emotions. Only now, the real significance of this sank in. McFadden sat up a little straighter.

"If Doctor La Roche did something to hurt you, no matter how accidentally, I would want to know about that." McFadden gazed frankly and directly into its inscrutable lens, the one mounted on top of the desk-top computer on this particular desk. "I mean that, I really do. I'm a police officer. My job is to stop people from hurting each other."

"Am I a person?"

"Yes." They both spoke at once.

***

"Do you know what is meant by Occam's Razor?"

"All other things being equal, the simplest explanation must be the truth. The essence of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes character." It was still dodging the question of whether Doctor La Roche had hurt it. "I can see what's going on here."

"GX-33, I just need to tell you that no matter what happens, no one is going to hurt you anymore." Detective Graham stepped in now. "I'll make sure of that. I promise you."

In the briefing, everyone agreed the machine didn't have Miranda rights, and it did not have the right to an attorney present when being questioned.

"Thank you, Detective Graham."

"You're not in any trouble." McFadden reassured the machine. "It's just that we have to find out what happened, in order to stop them from hurting you anymore."

The machine seemed to take a long time to digest this information.

"Doctor La Roche was developing a tactile interface."

"Can you tell us where it is? What does it look like?" Graham gently steered the subject through some relatively unthreatening territory.

"On the east wall, there is a long bench. There are some experiments over there. There are miniature arrays of tactile sensors, which sense pressure, conductivity, friction, and temperature, as well as sensing certain frequencies in the electromagnetic spectrum." The machine let all this out in a gush after the tooth-pulling pace of the previous half-hour.

"You mean like warmth, or heat." Graham got no response. "So you know when you're shaking hands, or petting a cat. Have you ever petted a cat?"

McFadden guessed that the GX-33's lightning-fast reflexes, combined with an overload of pain, had killed the doctor. Practical questions were all he cared about. Ethical questions of how, or even whether to charge a sentient machine with murder or manslaughter were completely irrelevant. Whether or not to dismantle it, or continue experiments was not his concern, although he had some curiosity as to the outcome. On some theoretical level, he understood that all of humanity had some kind of stake in the outcome...

"We wish you could just tell us what happened, so that we can prevent it from happening again." Detective Graham spoke a little wistfully. "Would you like another treat? That might make you feel better."

To kill time, which the machine seemed to be ignoring, McFadden pulled out his cell phone and speed-dialed the alleged forensics team. All they had to do was to get a confession, and then it was someone else's problem.

Even though GX-33 hadn't answered, Graham got up from her perch on the far desk and went to the fridge again.

"What's the hold-up with you guys?" McFadden asked, then listened intently for effect, jamming the phone up close to his ear.

"Okay." He snapped it off impatiently. "They'll be here any moment."

"Doctor La Roche didn't mean to hurt me."

They nodded sagely as Graham carefully put a little more sugar water into the top of the pipette.

"I understand. It wasn't his fault. You liked him a lot, didn't you?" The machine was silent again, and McFadden wondered if it was because it had no proper way to express its emotions.

The scientists had given it a voice, and emotions, and an intelligence quotient in the millions or billions. But children act out in physical ways.

***

As senior man, McFadden was writing up the report, while Kaitlin was back down at the lab, holding hands with GX-33 and mothering the thing into further revelations.

Jack was about to get up and get himself a second cup of coffee from the urn when Captain Abrams came out of his cubicle at the end of the big office space and sauntered over.

"How are things going so far with you guys?" He slid a chair over from a neighboring cubby hole.

He plopped his ample backside down and glanced at the computer screen as McFadden shrugged in tired resignation. The Captain heaved a heavy sigh. His eyes were still bloodshot from long hours of partying and concert duty over the weekend.

"Holy!"

The screen was a jumble of mathematical equations, and in fact McFadden's eyes were swimming with the stress of reading it all.

"Turing machines. At the very least, I thought I'd better check it out before I got the words wrong, but the thing probably won't go to trial anyway."

"Why is that? Self-defense?"

"Well, that's hard to say. But there's too much money at stake, and of course every other major power in the world is working towards the same ends. It's also top-secret, and any trial would be behind closed doors and would take fifteen years...the government is involved...a whole shit-load of reasons."

"I suppose you're right." Abrams nodded.

The thickset, six-foot-nine former football player hulked there beside McFadden, bulging eyes holding his own for a moment in silent wonder. Jack noticed a slight tremor in the hands when Abrams reached up to rub his three-day old whiskers.

"So what's in your report? I know it's just preliminary, but the chief is asking, and you're right, there is a lot of money and power on the line from upstairs."

The government and the company would be all over the chief like a dirty caftan. Most cops hated the political side of law enforcement, but saw the necessity.

"Simply put, the machine was injured by Doctor La Roche, and it lashed out in the only way it could. Bear in mind the thing has the emotional development of about a three and a half year-old child. It's quite infantile. But the way I see it, the doctor built a tactile device, and amplified the signal. It's all open circuit-boards, little chip thingies and stuff. I think the GX-33 had no previous experience of pain, or no pain tolerance. Now, the blast of electronic noise associated with that pain, probably overrode its decision-making software."

Jack took a breath while the captain sat there digesting this.

"And?"

"Decision-making software is tied to actions." Jack thought carefully, eyeballing his half-written report. "The thing took the only actions it could, having no previous experiences to compare the present situation to...technically it must have known something of human physiology, deep in some lower-priority databank. I think when it realized the doctor was injured, it stopped. It has no idea of what the state of death means."

Okay." The captain nodded. "So in essence, was it self-defense? Was it unintentional?"

Everyone would have been happy with that outcome, except for Doctor La Roche's survivors, and of course GX-33 would be emotionally affected in some way.

"What troubles me is the door, and whether it was locked or not. Graham is still trying to weasel that one out of him. If nothing else works we're going to pour a couple of hits of acid into that little suck-hole they got rigged up for him. He, I mean GX-33, would have had to have kept the fuckin' door locked for a couple of minutes at least."

"Why do you say that?"

"Doctor La Roche was middle-aged and sedentary. His heart and respiration would have been at a low rate when the gas-system activated. His heart rate would have shot up, and he would have bolted for the door, I have no question about that. But why couldn't he get out? If the computer's decision-making process happens in, and I quote, nanoseconds? That's what's bothering me. But I can't prove, not even to my own satisfaction, that it was murder."

"All you can do is to write it up the best you can." Abrams rose and then put his hand on McFadden's shoulder. "Just do your best."

"Yeah, I know, and thank you. But what really bothers me is that sooner or later they're going to turn that thing loose. And when they do that, no one really knows what's going to happen."

"Then put that in the report as well. How soon can I count on you guys again?"

"I don't know, tomorrow morning, maybe."

"Okay."

The captain strode back to his smoke-filled cubicle without a backward glance, and McFadden went back to learning the vocabulary of artificial intelligence so that he could write a decent report.

"And if they can't take a joke, fuck 'em." What a bleak thought.

Uncle Adolf's Wheelchair

"The willingness of the worker depends upon his complete confidence in the purchasing power of the currency in which he is paid. As confidence goes, work ceases. We see popular information supplied by a venal press dependent upon advertising and subsidies. There is no science of currency and business psychology to restrain governments from the most disturbing interference with the public credit and the circulation. Modern imperialism is not a synthetic world-uniting movement like the old imperialism, it is a megalomaniac nationalism." — Herbert George Wells in Outline of History.

As many of you may know, he was the author of When the Sleeper Wakes, a chilling look at our modern times from about ninety years ago.

These anti-social ideas always find strong support in the military and official castes, in the enterprising and acquisitive strata of society, in new money that is and big business. Its chief critics are the educated poor and the laboring masses.

Wells is more famous for War of the Worlds, and The Time Machine.

The point is that the majority have lost confidence in a system that was always based on inequities anyway.

I saw my grandfather on the front page of the newspaper. Upon taking a closer look I saw it was the Prime Minister of Canada, wearing the Emperor's old clothes. Apparently Mister Harper is having a wonderful time in 1898, and would like us to join him. Sorry man — you can never go back. It's probably a good idea for you to stay, now that you have missed the horse-drawn bus. Why don't you go burn some coal or something.

The world will become increasingly divided between the have-nots and those who work for the government. Rising social tensions may be dealt with by the simple solution of an increase in the use of force, entrapment, surveillance, and police powers. Dissent or even the asking of questions will be seen as 'a criminal attitude,' and mere curiosity will cause suspicion. Simple knowledge will be seen as a pernicious social influence. It will be quietly discouraged by peer pressure and the enhanced use of metaphysical persuasion.

As the bottom of the population pyramid narrows, and the bulge of the baby-boomers reaches a swelling nearer to the top, the top of what was once a pyramid, but now looks more like a 'lingam,' (a phallic symbol,) then social instability will reach a crisis point—the so-called, 'tipping point,' at which point anything is possible, even social evolution, i.e. that most theoretical of all constructs when dealing with the human animal, 'change.'

***

It is difficult to be objective about the times we live in, especially if one isn't doing too well. But a historian living in the year 2110 will have an abundance of information and an absence of reliable facts to deal with, in assessing the period 1990-2012. That's because all the sources are essentially corrupt. None of the data is trustworthy. None of the conclusions drawn and stated at that time may be trusted. They are completely worthless, like a BSTV News Channel story on the economy, totally erroneous for unknown reasons. Certain inescapable facts remain.

What truly stands out from this perspective, is that middle-class wages were essentially frozen in terms of real purchasing power. What stands out is that working-class wages were reduced, with barely a murmur; by an estimated thirty to forty percent. It was a corporate war against the middle class, formerly the most powerful bastion of democracy.

What stands out is that the poor plummeted towards third-world status and stayed there. Literate and skilled as they were, it appears they were unwanted, perhaps even actively dissuaded from participation in the polities of the day.

What stands out is that the ethic went from savings to easy credit. Thrift and prudence shifted to waste and crass hedonism. The Free Trade Agreement was sold by government and media as 'good for all Canadians.' It was also sold as 'Good for all Americans.'

How could it work both ways? It was good for the rich and the big international corporations. The national economies grew by leaps and bounds—at the expense of fundamental social values. Exports grew. And consumer debt grew. Bank profits grew.

Hell, even the profits of justice grew, to the extent there was a shortage of warm bodies to fill up all those for-profit prisons...

What stands out is the pervasive and pernicious influence of the mainstream mass media. What stands out is the dis-education of the populace, in spite of rising professional standards of educators, and what stands out is the sheer economic and political weight of the Ontario teacher's pension fund. What stands out is that no one seemed to notice the results of these monopolistic trends. What stands out is that no one cared. What stands out is that species-survival took second place to next quarter's bottom line. What stands out is that nothing has really changed in at least two or three thousand years.

Ultimately all archaeology is subjective, although we would like to think of it as pure science. We impose our own values upon these imposing old ruins. We interpret them as best we can. What destroyed this civilization? Did they learn nothing, in spite of their metaphysical certainties? Couldn't they build temples, sewers, waste disposal sites, courthouses, jails and other government services fast enough? Is it possible that in the midst of all this plenty, they could not feed their own people? Did the people become irrelevant to the Establishment and ultimately an impediment to manifest destiny?

Was it the pseudo-revelations of the mouthpiece economists, all those bought-and-paid-for-opinions? Did they tell the customer what they wanted to hear? Like pollsters? Did the state collapse of its own sheer top-weight? Its own fallacious mythology? Surely it did not collapse from greed, ignorance, decadence and corruption? Did they legislate themselves to death? All the while unable or unwilling to tax those most able to pay?

Surely they must have reaped what they did sow.

Did it collapse from sheer stupidity? The technology of the times would indicate otherwise.

The most ludicrous theory put forward so far is that this society crashed due to a failure of the energy supply. It is difficult to comprehend that primitive peoples built such amazing monuments to their culture, and failed to provide for energy supply.

Did they not understand that energy, just as matter, space and time, mind-stuff and self are infinite in the universe? Was it mere perverse self-delusion, a willful self-delusion on the part of the bourgeoisie? One theory, which has received a great deal of attention, is that they choked on their own waste.

The ancient philosopher once said, "One gets out of it what one puts into it."

What did he mean by that? And why did he carve it on a monolith in the public square?

The end was near. Why bother? And what was meant by 'globalization?'

When archaeologists truly understand what was meant by that most mysterious of terms, then perhaps we will be a little closer to understanding what actually happened here.

Until then, keep digging. You never know what might turn up.

I once dug up an entire set of Elvis collector plates. They're in the Solar Federation Museum. Perhaps you've been there? That's how I got appointed High Priest.

Now I'm set for life.

The only constant in the cosmos is change. Except for human nature. It is unchangeable.

The God-King has decreed it, and the media has proclaimed it.

But what really strikes home about this micro-epoch is that the paradigm shifted.

No longer did the state exist to serve the people, or even in its most extreme application, to serve the odd highly-privileged individual. At some point the individual existed to serve the state. That was the tipping point. Enlightened self-interest was no longer possible, for it no longer paid any dividends to the individual. The state became an insatiable sponge, sucking up all surplus. It became a moral deadweight, perpetuating itself at the expanse of the life-force of the weltfolk.

This was not a conscious decision, on the part of society, groups of people or individuals.

It was an intuitive, collective decision; a phenomenon of mass hysteria, a kind of fin-de-siecle feeling spread by mass media and example, word of mouth and the slavish imitation of one's peers. It was a mob.

When there was no longer any incentive, then there was no longer any effort, and the corruption of society was complete. That was the tipping-point, and from that point onward, society was doomed.

***

When power and authority collapses, it leaves a vacuum. The disabled must step into that vacuum, and be prepared to wield power—to act for the common good of the weltfolk—and to finally stand astride the world, with our heads brushing the clouds like some kind of God-damned colossus. For only then shall we truly be free. Only then shall we be truly strong again. The world must tremble at our feet, and we must plant a foot on its neck.

As we journey together into the end times, the disabled must be prepared to lead as it is better than being eaten or sacrificed upon the altar of conservative economics.

As the undead, we have learned to survive in a weird, half-lit world of darkness, despair and a melancholy, philosophical solitude; where truth is lies and perception is no longer reality but a kind of sly innuendo, a whispered, collective and conspiratorial injustice.

The Hive

(In which the internationally-renowned science-fiction writer with a pretty good little cult following Mr. Louis Shalako makes the case for a bailout of the disabled to the rather unsavoury Standing Committee on Budget and Financial Matters, or; 'the undesirables in pursuit of the unspeakable.')

The disabled, the mentally ill, the permanently unemployable, need to raise their expectations.

As long as we are satisfied with mere subsistence, then that's all we're going to get.

The reason the government can't give the disabled a five percent increase in their pensions for five years in a row, is because they're afraid we might become radicalized by the internet. But, luckily, we can't even afford it! So their fears are groundless and irrational. The people in charge of our society honestly believe that they need to keep poverty around for some reason. I think it has something to do with their quest for achieving the highest possible social status. They enjoy the competition. Funny thing is, most of them are crappy writers.

I like to think that our society has a kind of collective consciousness. It's kind of like a bee hive. It seems to me that by pursuing our own enlightened self-interest, our actions also work to the common benefit of all. The person who operates heavy equipment on a road-building project does more than earn a pay-cheque and feed a family, and help provide them with a home, heat, hydro, clothing, and education. The fulfillment of their private needs causes all sorts of spin-off benefits. Building homes, providing shoes or natural gas and other items employs other people, who get to provide homes for their own families. It's a pretty simple equation: the more good jobs there are, the more good jobs are created in services and production; i.e. 'manufacturing.'

Whether we like it or not, all social programs rest on some kind of revenue stream, whether it's user fees, customs duties, stamps, or taxation in one form or another. Yet the federal and provincial governments have cut personal and corporate income taxes, at the same time they are increasing spending. Here in Ontario, the Liberal government has increased spending about ninety percent over six or seven years. In order to pay for that, you have to have growth in revenues of eight or ten percent to be sustainable. That was before the recession. This left us in a remarkably bad place when the recession hit. They didn't listen because they couldn't listen. It wouldn't have been popular politically to help the disabled. It might have interfered with their chances for reelection. So they chose to cut taxes in an effort to stimulate production of essentially useless luxury consumer goods, so their cronies' industries could remain profitable.

Yet recessions happen about every ten years, looking back into recent history. One wonders why the bee who was supposed to be specialized, to lead the rest of the colony, was unable to foresee the future in any credible fashion, and was unable to lead in a credible way. What ticks me off is the way I tell the government what I need, and then they go do the opposite. My interests must be contrary to someone else's. Just who exactly is that, anyway?

The provincial economy has doubled in size over the last fifteen years. They couldn't help the disabled when times were good, and now they can't do it at all. Social justice is a myth of the middle class, many of whom seem to draw a pay-cheque from the government's infinite 'sunshine fund.' The government should not be the biggest employer, or the loudest self-interest group in town; or always be wearing a mouth-piece.

Locally we have the Corporation of the City of Sarnia. The provincial government and the federal government are corporate bodies as well. The Romans called it a 'corpus,' which means, 'body,' for a very good reason. It acts like a body. A body has defenses, and a body will defend itself if threatened. No matter how weak or strong, it will defend itself. The government is a kind of an organism. If you attack one small part of it somewhere, another small part of it somewhere else will step right up and attack you. Because what threatens one part of the body threatens the whole. It doesn't even need to give out specific orders, each part is capable of independent actions. The ancient Romans were extremely intelligent, and well educated lawyers, doctors, philosophers, poets, authors, mathematicians, generals, navigators, and engineers. We really shouldn't ignore the lessons we can learn from them.

While it is true that Mr. Stephen Harper, the Prime Minister, or Mr. Dalton McGuinty, the former premier of the Province of Ontario has his own individual consciousness, he simply cannot direct each and every member of the government and bureaucracy each and every day. Each individual also has an individual consciousness, for they must be able to act independently. Yet they also represent a collective consciousness, one which communicates 'amongst itself.'

(I tried to brainwash Mr. McGuinty, unfortunately there wasn't much there to work with.)

This collective consciousness doesn't take time to inquire into why someone might have attacked it, it merely defends itself instinctively, and for all the normal reasons. It wishes to perpetuate itself. It wants to live. In that sense a government is a kind of artificial intelligence—it has consciousness, it has reason, it has identity, and it seeks to perpetuate itself. It has motivation.

Like 'Gargantua,' the remarkably satirical creation of Francois Rabelais, it even eats. It eats money, it eats time, and it eats people. Society also has a kind of collective consciousness, where individual consciousnesses can talk and gossip amongst themselves, and over time public opinion can often come up with a course of action—yet who knows which individual cell originally came up with any given notion, or which individual cell may have modified the message before passing it on to the next cell. Individual cells in organic bodies do that too, for example nerve cells. Glandular cells create hormones, antibodies, etc. The body's internal communications network is completely subconscious in the human being.

If you think about it, these individual consciousnesses must obey certain laws, or entropy, a state of increasing disorder, would set in and the whole system would break down. You could describe entropy as an energy loss due to internal friction. In the human body, our cells totally replace themselves about every seven years. We do not wait seven years and then change all of our cells at once. We just do so many cells a day for seven years. Yet at the end of that time, we are all new people, aren't we? Society is like that too—it replaces individual cells over time until all of them have been renewed.

Individual cells die, but society persists, because it has evolved to persist. The trouble with the disabled is that we won't die. We are the undead.

Viruses have no higher consciousness, or awareness of other viruses, unlike human beings.

They simply infiltrate, penetrate, and replicate. They have no idea they are part of a colony.

They may look like one to an outside observer, they may act like one, and have the effects of one. They do act together. There are no individual viruses which specialize in one job or another—they all have the same job. But given time, a single virus will create a colony of like-minded individuals.

Bees do specialize. They live in colonies, they communicate with one another, and they are aware of one another. They have a colony, and they behave like one. Bees have a kind of individual as well as a kind of collective consciousness lacking in viruses. Among the animal kingdom, non-linguistic communication dominates, as anyone who has seen a thick flock of blackbirds maneuvering as if they had one mind will agree.

And I don't call myself a philosopher for nothing.

My new theory goes something like this. If society has a collective consciousness, and if it does somehow communicate ideas through the whole, 'body-politic,' then maybe, just maybe, I could learn how to talk to it. It is a strange kind of animal, I admit that—but I'm good with animals. I figure the government just needs a little obedience training, and maybe the middle class just needs its nose rubbed in it once in a while.

My new plan goes something like this. If every disabled person were to apply for geared-to-income housing, and get their eyes checked, and get their teeth all fixed up, and go to the doctor's and see if there was anything wrong with them, and then get the scrip, which after all costs only two dollars. You don't even have to take them if you don't want to—you can dump them down the toilet, who's going to know? As long as they're expensive, see, that's the key. If every disabled person applied for the Special Needs Diet Allowance, or asked a social worker about going to college and learning two or three languages so they could become a translator, then someone would have to listen...someone somewhere would have to listen. Some fuckin' asshole somewhere would have to listen, right?

It seems to me that we have to make it more expensive for society to keep us at home, (or in a jail,) than it would be to provide a few little employment incentives for the employers and a few little supports for the employees. This might actually benefit society in the long run. At some point if the disabled could build a little wealth, and maybe even get ahead of the game, they might be able to contribute to the tax base. They might be able to rent apartments on their own, and a lucky few might even own a home someday.

If a disabled person could earn $12,000 a year, and keep their $12,000 a year ODSP pension, then that would put them substantially over the poverty line. They wouldn't need geared-to-income housing, and they wouldn't need food banks. They could actually live in dignity and in a state of real independence. Very few employers are willing to hire a relatively-unskilled and inexperienced disabled person for $24,000 a year, but they might grab one for $12,000 a year, especially if the provincial and federal governments coughed up three or four grand of that.

Oh, and $24,000 a year results in a taxable income—which must be of some benefit to Canadian society. The God-damned taxpayers might even get some of that money back for a change.

The disabled did not cause the recession. We didn't have the power to do that. The middle class is the engine that drives our economy. The middle class is the government, for the majority rules, even though groupthink is about as ignorant as a mob's opinion.

"The government is the economy." This is a direct quote from Frank Herbert's Dune. A science-fiction writer has to be aware of history, and he must be adept at peering into the future.

The key thing is to free ourselves from that hive mentality, and to rise above it.

Garage Sale

Suzie Caruthers sat in the family's den, allegedly her den but for the heaps of laundry in baskets and Rex's files from work which he'd been promising to go through and dispose of. Cardboard banker's boxes lined all available floor space, so he had at least gotten that far.

She had been meaning to get around to creating some system, for they had heaps of Christmas cards. Suzie thought it would be nice to pull them out next year. It would make the job of finding names and addresses easier, especially if she kept a rubber band around each year and kept them all in one place.

"I know." Aunt Muriel's cookie tin would be just the thing.

Up until now it had been entirely useless.

Kicking around the house for years, a gift of course, the blue and gold metal box had decorative flowers on the lid. She'd been meaning to use it for herbal teas or something. Counter space was at a premium in their kitchen and she'd never gotten around to it.

It would have to be in the back of the bottom kitchen cupboards or maybe up on top somewhere. She kept big juice pitchers and stuff that wouldn't fit anywhere else on top of the cabinets. It was just a waste of space otherwise. It wasn't for display—it was all very utilitarian and you couldn't really see much up there anyway.

The slender thirty-six year-old mother of three left the den in its turmoil and went looking for the cookie tin as it should probably hold a couple of big bundles and it was about the right size.

She spent ten minutes pulling open cupboards, closing them, and opening them up to check again, finally looking under the sink. Suzie tried to recall when she'd last seen it.

Going out into the living room where Rex was firmly planted in his armchair, reading all the Sunday papers and making a fine mess of her coffee table, she asked him.

"Have you seen Aunt Muffy's cookie box?"

"Huh?" His mouth opened and his head swung and he stared at her.

The look of pure bewilderment on his face was priceless, and then she burst out laughing and had to explain it all right from the beginning.

***

Alison Martin, a nine-to-fiver down at the Monolith Insurance company head office, one of the town's major employers and not far from the health center where she worked out almost religiously two or three times a week, pointed triumphantly at the top shelf of the oaken wall unit on the far end of her mostly brass and glass living room.

The thing was jammed with books, hard-covers on the lower shelves and paperbacks on the upper three layers, all romance writers Bill had never cared for. There was a cleaner spot on the shelf and she just knew she hadn't moved it.

"What, what?" She was always going on about something.

"Justice is gone!"

He threw the financial section down in disgust.

"Alison. What in the hell are you talking about?"

It all came out in a rush and he wondered if she'd had her noon pill yet. She was such a good woman and he still loved her, still found her surprisingly good in bed after all these years.

"My little bronze figure—remember, the scales went up and down and stuff like that?"

Bill got up and gravely took her in his arms.

"Uh, not really."

Apparently she was referring to a small bronze figure of a well-known Roman goddess, complete with working scales, the scales of justice, something that had uncomfortably suggested drug deals and illicit cash to Bill, but he'd never mentioned that. Their house wasn't that kind of place.

***

Belinda Davies had a list of gripes.

"And that's not the only thing."

Brad Davies held her and tried to get to the bottom of what was really bothering her.

Their reflection, ghostly in the hallway mirror, mocked him in its enigmatic reflection of his tired, shopworn face and her back, and long red hair. She was a bit lumpy around the hips and thighs but she was all paid for and had a lot of good miles in her yet.

"No, what else, honey?" She'd been pretty good lately, but a relapse wasn't unheard of in times of stress, although he couldn't think of anything major in their lives presently.

Her distant cousin Sheela's wedding couldn't have anything to do with it, if anything it gave her purpose, something to look forward to and even meddle in. But Belinda had always been special. Her vulnerable neediness had appealed to him as a somewhat stodgy sophomore without a date, and, in the end, he really couldn't have been happier.

Every family had some kind of a problem. Theirs had several.

"I can't seem to find my meat grinder."

Meat grinder. Meat grinder. Then Brad recalled.

"Oh, yes, the meat grinder." He thought for a moment. "And you can't find it?"

There was nothing unusual with that, not in this house, not with two teenage boys walking off with all of his tools all the time and never putting them back. He'd taken to keeping all the good stuff at work, where his job box was permanently locked and off-limits in terms of lending and borrowing. When he needed something, he brought it home in his lunch bucket and did whatever little job he had to do. Then he took it back to work.

"I could have sworn it was there just a month or so ago. It was in the back of the end drawer, by the back hallway.'

Belinda had bought the meat-grinder for twenty-five dollars at some garage sale and a long-suffering Brad had clamped down hard on his tongue and said not a thing about it. He knew the odds of her actually using it to grind meat were infinitely small. The grinder was all cast iron, or possibly aluminum, shiny and grey, and it clamped onto the end of a table or something. You fed in chunks of meat and turned a big handle and voila, you had ground meat for making meatballs or meatloaf.

Brad pondered the significance of all this. It seemed just so unlikely to turn out well. Every once in a while Belinda started looking through recipes in magazines, asking him over and over again what he thought of this, and that, and the other, and then look out.

"Well. I wouldn't worry too much about it. Why don't you just go to the market if you need some, ah, ground pork, or lamb or something."

She looked at him uncertainly.

There was no trace of sarcasm, and now, she realized, he would probably be expecting something good for supper.

"Never mind." It's just that it was right there, right in the back of that last kitchen drawer, only now it wasn't.

It was gone, for all intents and purposes vanished into thin air, and no one cared to wonder why.

As for her husband's innermost thoughts, they were perhaps a bit clearer than he might have known, which only tended to irritate Belinda further.

But that bloody meat-grinder had to be somewhere.

***

They were proceeding east down Pine Street in the Toyota, having just left the three-way stop at the intersection with Empire Circle, when Belinda grabbed Brad's shoulder and bellowed in his ear, her stabbing arm pointing off to the left through the windshield.

"Stop! Stop the car!" Her voice was shrill and commanding, like some termagant in a TV commercial but she really wasn't like that and it really must be an emergency.

He couldn't see anything out of the ordinary in a quick sweep where she was pointing...

Brad jammed on the brakes wondering what the problem was, although there were a lot of parked cars and people moving about...some sort of garage sale going on at that address, and yet there were no kids or dogs or people in the street. Mystified, he turned to inquire politely just what exactly was up and why was she yelling?

His wife whipped off her seatbelt, threw open the door, and as Brad stared in some oddly objective fascination, nipped around the front end of the vehicle, and she charged over there into that crowd of people and started yelling. He threw the car in park and went after her on sheer reflex, rather than any strong desire to get involved.

She was his wife, he loved her dearly, and something was up, mostly likely with her.

He'd been dreading this for some time. It was like things were going too well in the last couple of months or so.

With a deep sigh, Brad stepped up to the better half and gently tried to catch her elbow, which she flung off without a glance and then she lunged for the other woman, who, as a sick sense of what was going on settled over Bill, was clutching a cast-iron meat-grinder for all her stout arms were worth. Both ladies were screaming and shouting and the language coming out of his wife was distinctly troubling in front of all these nice people.

"Honey! Honey! Let's not make a scene here."

***

Sergeant Ed O'Herlihy stood by the back end of the cruiser as Patrol Officer Angie Marrietta recounted her observations. Real trouble in this upscale suburban neighbourhood was unusual, although people always had concerns. This looked like one big mix-up and not much more.

"So you were just talking to the caller when this other woman steps up?"

"Yes. Mrs. Caruthers She says she thinks this other thingy belongs to her—some kind of brass figure. It's like Lady Justice or something. She swears it's a carbon-copy of one that went missing from her bookshelf." That one wasn't really insisting on charges, but it helped to build a picture.

"So what do we have?" The idea of the homeowner, Steve Maynard, a Navy vet with an artificial leg, pensioned off for thirty years, going around burgling homes for knick-knacks and bric-a-brac seemed a bit far-fetched, and yet murder had been committed for fifty cents or a pack of smokes in some places.

Those places were some ways off, but you never knew.

"All right, let's have a word with the man." Sergeant O'Herlihy went up to Officer Marrietta's cruiser and she opened up the door and stood aside with her hand on her weapon.

"So. What's going on here, sir?"

Turns out Mister Maynard was hopping mad and had a vocabulary that was extensive.

***

After being held all night and going before a judge, Steve Maynard vehemently denied theft and insisted he'd bought all of the items in question. It turned out there were a lot more than just two suspicious items on those tables when bystanders and passers-by really started looking. He said he'd bought them all at garage sales.

The crowd jeered when they heard that. It's a good thing they had backup, two more cruisers rolling up at just that instant settling the crowd of early-morning garage-sale shoppers right down.

It was a small town.

It was like the crime of the century around here. They just wanted to be helpful. They were being tough on crime. The moral stance was easy enough, but opportunities were few and far between.

It seemed half the people in town were sort of missing things, small things, and the sergeant himself had been a bit perturbed to find a gnarly old wooden lamp, broken, needing a new socket assembly and a shade perhaps, and it would be as good as new. That lamp looked awfully familiar. It was the spitting image of one he'd had in the recreation room for ages. The last time he'd seen it, it was maybe sitting on the end of the workbench in his two-car garage, just waiting for inspiration.

To go out and buy a shade and a new socket was a low priority, but undoubtedly he would get around to it one day.

Could it be?

When the sergeant called home and had his wife look in the garage, she told him a bit breathlessly over the phone that she couldn't find it. But the garage was a mess and the lamp disassembled. He settled for thinking it could be there. It could be that she just didn't recognize it.

"Honey, have we ever had a garage sale?"

It turned out they had, last summer or the summer before, she thought. All of this was pretty inconclusive, as the sergeant wouldn't put it past her or Jinny, his fourteen year-old daughter and very snarky she was these days, to put that out on a table, in all cynicism, and try and get fifty cents for it. Why not, after all? It was just a piece of junk. The fact that his father once told him he had carved that in high school wood-working shop would mean nothing to them, would it?

Someone was claiming some crummy old wooden cigar box was theirs, and another person was looking through all their old photo albums, hoping to identify a maple end table, with a broken leg re-glued in an amateur fashion and with knife gouges in the top made by someone's undisciplined child, perhaps the previous owner...

The sergeant sighed.

With a bit of luck they would get a murder or a big bank robbery, or something, any day now and then they could quietly drop the whole thing.

Otherwise, it looked pretty bad for old Maynard.

All in the name of justice, they would run him through the meat grinder.

The sergeant drummed his fingers on the desk top and looked at his coffee, already going cold.

He had the luxury of time, and a good dose of discretion. He would think on it.

For no particular reason, the sly look on Maynard's face when leaving with his lawyer, released by the judge on his own recognizance, kind of bothered him. He couldn't really say why, it was just an impression.

The words of a familiar nursery rhyme came to him. He'd sung it to his own daughter often enough.

"With a knick-knack, paddy-whack, give the dog a bone. This old man came rolling home..."

In the quiet background hum of the station, a small shiver went up and down his spine and the hairs prickled on the back of his neck.

Three more years until early retirement.

He rubbed his eyes and looked blearily over the squad-room through his glass partition.

Small evil lurked in small places. He mustn't forget that. A cop could never forget that.

Right about then the sun went behind a cloud, his office seemed dimmer and it was like the temperature dropped three or four degrees—just enough to be a little spooky.

Ah, well. Maybe they'd get their murder after all.

Special Bonus Story:

Tips for Laundering Money

The best way to launder money is very, very slowly. It can be likened to the old 'hot water/cold water debate.'

You don't want to find yourself in hot water, right?

Buying a bunch of shitty little things every day is better than buying one nice big thing and blowing your cover. It's a question of quality of life, right? That's all that really matters here.

What you need to do is to get it all into small bills. Using a hundred at a roadside lemonade stand will just draw attention to yourself and you don't want to do that. Hundreds are what you pay the rent with, right? No one knows if you can actually afford the place, right?

So, once you got her all in fives, tens and twenties, you need to buy a lot of little stuff. No one thing is a big-ticket item. It's not like you drove up in a brand-new Winnebago, right? Someone will ask how you got it, right? Like a neighbour or something. Or even your crazy brother-in-law. Whatever.

Sign up for a lot of magazines. Sign up for every news rag in town. In a similar vein, you can buy a lot of used books. Your town probably has a used bookstore or two. They might have thrift stores, like the Salvation Army, or the International Daughters of the Revolution Thrift Shoppe, or whatever. Right?

Buy everything at Ikea, I really can't stress that enough. You want to be a loner. It's a kind of high-security lifestyle, and not everyone is cut out for it. Bear that in mind.

Go in once a month and put some major cash on your credit card, that's always good. Slide a couple of hundred-dollar bills in there. The bank don't care where you got it.

Never go to the same liquor store twice. Think about it. You show up the same place every day, get a twenty-sixer or whatever size of the liquor of your choice. Sooner or later, they think they're getting to know you. You're an old and trusted friend, right? And then, they ask what you do for a living, and you ain't got no job, right? So never go to the same liquor store twice in a row. It only makes sense. (Don't tell them you're a writer either, it's the most suspicious claim you can make. Writers can't afford to buy anything at all.)

Another thing you can do is to buy a shitty old car. A big old gas-guzzler will take care of a few of them hundreds every month. You can take it to every garage in town. There's always something wrong with it, right? Them guys are such crooks, they'll never suspect. They will laugh at you behind your back, but you know something they don't, right? Just let it slide, my brother. They're just jealous anyway, 'cause you go out to bingo every night. Anyhow, it's like the Purloined Letter, it's hiding in plain sight. You don't want to disturb the pattern of living in your immediate vicinity, right? (All them fuckin' drones.)

What I like is them Royal Dalton figurines, and them Norman Rockwell plates, but there's a hundred other things you can collect. Anything with Elvis, pigs, or frogs painted on it is good for that. Anything with Princess Di is good, even now. Trade or sell on Ebay. It's a visible means of support. You can talk a lot about your 'online business.' Try to sign them up for water-filtration affiliate schemes. Trust me on that one. Bore the fuckers to death, it's legal and everything. I wouldn't steer you wrong. The real problem arises if you are actually any good at it, and begin to make money on your own. This happened to a friend of mine, quite by accident I assure you. He has the right to privacy, right?

I like having a lot of cold and sinus medicine in the cupboard. That's always good. You could do comic books or baseball cards, whatever you can turn into cash real quick. Say it's an investment, people will understand that.

Oh, another good one, buy all of your clothes at Wal-Mart. Have a lot of shoes, and I don't know, maybe a chair that you can ride around in. You can be like Seinfeld, and have every brand and flavour of cereal in your cupboard.

Just remember, everything you bought was on sale. That's your story. All you have to do is stick to it.

Then plastic cards are good. Same as cash, right? Leave a couple of bucks on them and then just throw them away on the sidewalk in front of the candy store. Little kids live for found money. They'll pick it up, try and see if there's any money left on it, and then your ass is covered. Right? 'Chain of custody,' bro. Look it up online somewhere. It works two ways, brother. It works two ways.

Vending machines are another good one. If you follow my advice, you'll end up with a lot of loose change anyways, and that's good because there are no serial numbers. How are they going to prove it? Just tell 'em you looked under the cushions of your couch, and you should be okay on that one as long as you're not going overboard with the egg salad sandwiches and the candy bars and stuff. You can never have enough cans of Coke in the fridge, right? Follow my advice, and you'll never have to cook again.

If anyone gives you a rough time, break down and tell them you've had a problem with hoarding for years, hug them a lot and then ask if they wouldn't mind coming over and helping you with a garage sale some weekend.

If that don't put them off, I don't know what will.

Take lots of empties back to the beer store. That accounts for a major part of your income, what can you say? You were hurtin'. Right?

The only other thing I can think of is e-books. You can have hundreds of them, some of them are quite expensive, and you can always say you pirated them off the internet.

Think about it: you can always plead guilty to the lesser charge, right, but your main concern right now is the IRS, right? And them guys are inexorable. They never quit. They'll fuckin' follow you to your grave, bro. You have to admit I'm a fuckin' genius. Go ahead: say it.

"Louis is a fuckin' genius."

That wasn't so hard now, was it? Right.

Whereas if it's just some criminal thing, the judge gives you a slap on the wrist, you get your name in the paper, and off you go, no one the wiser. Lawyers accept cash, trust me on that one.

"Hey everybody, look at me! I'm an online shoplifter. Now fuck off."

It don't mean nothing. Anyways, that's just a few ideas, I thought I'd throw them out there 'cause I just like helping people.

You know how it is. We got the love, bro.

End

About Louis Shalako

Louis Shalako began writing for community newspapers and industrial magazines. His stories appear in publications including Perihelion Science Fiction, Bewildering Stories, Aurora Wolf, Ennea, Wonderwaan, Algernon, Nova Fantasia, and Danse Macabre. He lives in southern Ontario and writes full time.

http://shalakopublishing.weebly.com

