Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (17 page)

Junior didn't say a word, choosing instead to contemplate the lit end of his cigarette. This was where tht Jean-Luc Godard scene would have been titled 1/
regardait le feu de son
tabac
. My luck that Godard films were no longer fashionable. When the tip of Junior's cigarette had transformed into a goodly increment of ash, he gave it a measured tap, and the ash fell on the table. For him, an ashtray was extraneous,

"About the door," began Junior, in a high, piercing voice. "It was necessary to break it. That's why we broke it. We could have opened it more gentleman-like if we wanted to. But it wasn't necessary. I hope you don't think bad of us."

"There's nothing in the apartment," I said. "Search it, you'll see."

"Search?" pipped the little man. "Search?" Cigarette at his lips, he scratched his palm.

"And what might we be searching for?"

"Well, I don't know, but you must've come here looking for something. Breaking the door down and all."

"Can't say I
capisce
," he spoke, measuredly. "Surely you must be mistaken. We don't want nothing. We just came for a little chat. That's all. Not looking and not taking. However, if you would care to offer me a Coca-Cola, I'd be happy to oblige."

I fished two cans of Coke from the refrigerator, which I set out on the table along with a couple of glasses.

"I don't suppose he'd drink something, too?" I said, pointing to the hulk behind me.

Junior curled his index finger and Big Boy tiptoed forward to claim a can of Coke. He was amazingly agile for his frame.

"After you're finished drinking, give him your free demonstration," Junior said to Big Boy. "It's a little side show," he said to me.

I turned around to watch the hulk chug the entire can in one go. Then, after upending it to show that it was empty, he pressed the can between his palms. Not the slightest change came over his face as the familiar red can was crushed into a pathetic scrap of metal.

"A little trick, anybody could do," said Junior.

Next, Big Boy held the flattened aluminum toy up with his fingertips. Effortlessly, though a faint shadow now twitched on his lip, he tore the metal into shreds. Some trick.

"He can bend hundred-yen coins, too. Not so many humans alive can do that," said Junior with authority.

I nodded in agreement.

"Ears, he rips 'em right off."

I nodded in agreement.

"Up until three years ago, he was a pro wrestler," Junior explained. "Wasn't a bad wrestler. He was young and fast. Championship material. But you know what he did? He went and injured his knee. And in pro wrestling, you gotta be able to move fast."

I nodded a third agreement.

"Since his untimely injury, I've been looking after him. He's my cousin, you know."

"Average body types don't run in your family?" I queried.

"Care to say that again?" said Junior, glaring at me.

"Just chatting," I said.

Junior collected his thoughts for the next few moments. Then he flicked his cigarette to the floor and ground it out under his shoe. I decided no comment.

"You really oughta relax more. Open up, take things easy. If you don't relax, how're we have gonna have our nice heart-to-heart?" said Junior. "You're still too tense."

"May I get a beer?"

"Certainly. Of course. It's your beer—in your refrigerator—in your apartment. Isn't it?"

"It was my door, too," I added.

"Forget about the door. You keep thinking so much, no wonder you're tense. It was a tacky cheapo door anyway. You make good money, you oughta move someplace with classier doors."

I got my beer.

Junior poured Coke in his glass and waited for the foam to go down before drinking.

Then he spoke. "Forgive the complications. But I wanna explain some things first. We've come to help you."

"By breaking down my door?"

The little man's face turned instantly red. His nostrils flared.

"There you go with that door again. Didn't I tell you to drop it?" he bit his words. Then he turned to Big Boy and repeated the question. "Didn't I?"

The hulk nodded his agreement.

"We're here on a goodwill mission," Junior went on. "You're lost, so we came to give you moral guidance. Well, perhaps lost is not such a nice thing to say. How about confused? Is that better?"

"Lost? Confused?" I said. "I don't have a clue. No idea, no door."

Junior grabbed his gold lighter and threw it hard against the refrigerator, making a dent.

Big Boy picked the lighter off the floor and returned it to its owner. Everything was back to where we were before, except for the dent. Junior drank the rest of his Coke to calm down.

"What's one, two lousy doors? Consider the gravity of the situation. We could service this apartment in no time flat. Let's not hear another word about that door."

My door. It didn't matter how cheap it was. That wasn't the issue. The door stood for something.

"All right, forget about the door," I said. "This commotion could get me thrown out of the building."

"If anyone says anything to you, just give me a call. We got an outreach program that'll make believers out of them. Relax."

I shut up and drank my beer.

"And a free piece of advice," Junior offered. "Anybody over thirty-five really oughta kick the beer habit. Beer's for college students or people doing physical labor. Gives you a paunch. No class at all."

Great advice. I drank my beer.

"But who am I to tell you what to do?" Junior went on. "Everybody has his weak points.

With me, it's smoking and sweets. Especially sweets. Bad for the teeth, leads to diabetes."

He lit another cigarette, and glanced at the dial of his Rolex.

"Well then," Junior cleared his throat. "There's not much time, so let's cut the socializing out. Relaxed a bit?"

"A bit," I said.

"Good. On to the subject at hand," said Junior. "Like I was saying, our purpose in coming here was to help you unravel your confusion. Anything you don't know? Go ahead and ask." Junior made a c'mon-anything-at-all gesture with his hand.

"Okay, just who are you guys?" I had to open my big mouth. "Why are you here? What do you know about what's going on?"

"Smart questions," Junior said, looking over to Big Boy for a show of agreement. "You're pretty sharp. You don't waste words, you get right to the point."

Junior tapped his cigarette into the ashtray. Kind of him.

"Think about it this way. We're here to help you. For the time being, what do you care which organization we belong to. We know lots. We know about the Professor, about the skull, about the shuffled data, about almost everything. We know things you don't know too. Next question?"

"Fine. Did you pay off a gas inspector to steal the skull?"

"Didn't I just tell you?" said the little man. "We don't want the skull, we don't want nothing."

"Well, who did? Who bought off the gas inspector?"

"That's one of the things we don't know," said Junior. "Why don't you tell us?"

"You think I know?" I said. "All I know is I don't need the grief."

"We figured that. You don't know nothing. You're being used."

"So why come here?"

"Like I said, a goodwill courtesy call," said Junior, banging his lighter on the table.

"Thought we'd introduce ourselves. Maybe get together, share a few ideas. Your turn now. What do
you
think's going on?"

"You want me to speculate?"

"Go right ahead. Let yourself go, free as a bird, vast as the sea. Nobody's gonna stop you."

"All right, I think you guys aren't from either the System or the Factory. You've got a different angle on things. I think you're independent operants, looking to expand your turf. Eyeing Factory territory."

"See?" Junior remarked to his giant cousin. "Didn't I tell you? The man's sharp."

Big Boy nodded.

"Amazingly sharp for someone living in a dump like this. Amazingly sharp for someone whose wife ran out on him."

It had been ages since anyone praised me so highly. I blushed.

"You speculate good," Junior said. "We're going to get our hands on the Professor's research and make a name for us. We got these infowars all figured out. We done our homework. We got the backing. We're ready to move in. We just need a few bits and pieces. That's the nice thing about infowars. Very democratic. Track record counts for nothing. It's survival of the sharpest. Survival in a big way. I mean, who's to say
we
can't cut the pie? Is Japan a total monopoly state or what? The System monopolizes everything under the info sun, the Factory monopolizes everything in the shadows. They don't know the meaning of competition. What ever happened to free enterprise? Is this unfair or what? All we need is the Professor's research, and you."

"Why me?" I said. "I'm just a terminal worker ant. I don't think about anything but my own work. So if you're thinking of enlisting me—"

"You don't seem to get the picture," said Junior, with a click of his tongue. "We don't wanna enlist you. We just wanna get our hands on you. Next question?"

"Oh, I see," I said. "How about telling me something about the INKlings then."

"INKlings? A sharp guy like you don't know about INKlings? A.k.a. Infra-Nocturnal Kappa. You thought
kappa
were folktales? They live underground. They hole up in the subways and sewers, eat the city's garbage, and drink gray-water. They don't bother with human beings. Except for a few subway workmen who disappear, that is, heh heh."

"Doesn't the government know about them?"

"Sure, the government knows. The state's not that dumb."

"Then why don't they warn people? Or else drive the INKlings away?"

"First of all," he said, "it'd upset too many people. Wouldn't want that to happen, would you? INKlings swarming right under their feet, people wouldn't like that. Second, forget about exterminating them. What are you gonna do? Send the whole Japanese Self-Defense Force down into the sewers of Tokyo? The swamp down there in the dark is their stomping grounds. It wouldn't be a pretty picture."

"Another thing, the INKlings have set up shop not too far from the Imperial Palace. It's a strategic move, you understand. Any trouble and they crawl up at night and drag people under. Japan would be upside-down, heh. Am I right? That's why the government doesn't mind INKlings and INKlings doesn't mind the government."

"But I thought the Semiotecs had made friends with the INKlings," I broke in.

"A rumor. And even if it was true, it'd only mean one group of INKlings got sweet on the Semiotecs. A temporary engagement, not a lasting marriage. Nothing to worry about."

"But haven't the INKlings kidnapped the Professor?"

"We heard that too. But we don't know for sure. Could be the Professor staged it."

"Why would the Professor do that?"

"The Professor answers to nobody," Junior said, sizing up his lighter from various angles.

"He's the best and he knows it. The Semiotecs know it, the Calcutecs know it. He just plays the in-betweens. That way he can push on, doing what he pleases with his research. One of these days he's gonna break through. That's where you fit in."

"Why would he need me? I don't have any special skills. I'm a perfectly ordinary guy."

"We're trying to figure that one out for ourselves," Junior) admitted, flipping the lighter around in his hands. "We got some ideas. Nothing definite. Anyway, he's been studymgall about you. He's been preparing something for a long time now."

"Oh yeah? So you're waiting for him to put the last piece in place, and then you'll have me and the research."

"On the money," said Junior. "We got some strange weather blowing up. The Factory has sniffed something in the wind and made a move. So we gotta make moves, too."

"What about the System?"

"No, they're slow on the take. But give 'em time. They know the Professor real well."

"What do you mean?"

"The Professor used to work for the System."

"The System?"

"Right, the Professor is an ex-colleague of yours. Of course, he wasn't doing your kind of work. He was in Central Research."

"Central Research?" This was getting too complicated to follow. I was standing in the middle of it all, only I couldn't see a thing.

"This System of yours is big, too big. The right hand never knows what the left hand is doing. Too much information, more than you can keep track of. And the Semiotecs are just as bad. That's why the Professor quit the organization and went out on his own. He's a brain man. He's into psychology and all kinds of other stuff about the head. He's what you call a Renaissance Man. What does he need the System for?"

And I had explained laundering and shuffling to this man? He'd invented the tech! What a joke I was.

"Most of the Calcutec compu-systems around are his design. That's no exaggeration. You're like a worker bee stuffed full of the old man's honey," pronounced the little man.

"Not a very nice metaphor, maybe."

"Don't mind me," I said.

"The minute the Professor quit, who should come knock-ing on his door but scouts from the Factory. But the Professor said no go. He said he had his own windows to wash, which lost him a lotta admirers. He knew too much for the Cal-cutecs, and the Semiotecs had him pegged for a round hole. Anyone who's not for you is against you, right? So when he built his laboratory underground next to the INKlings, it was the Professor against everybody. You been there, I believe?"

I nodded.

"Real nuts but brilliant. Nobody can get near that laboratory. The whole place is crawling with INKlings. The Professor comes and goes. He puts out sound waves to scare the INKlings. Perfect defense. That girl of his and you are the only people who's ever been inside. Goes to show how important you are. So we figure, the Professor's about to throw you in the box and tie things up."

I grunted. This was getting weird. Even if I believed him, I wouldn't believe it.

"Are you telling me that all the experiment data I processed for the Professor was just so he could lure me in?"