The Almanac of the Dead: A Novel (121 page)

Zeta had never asked any questions, but sometimes the strange little yellowish man talked nonstop when she came to make inquiries about the work he was doing for her. Awa Gee had recommended Zeta demand all payment in gold. Gold, always gold, because anything else was only paper or a few electronic impulses encoded on bank systems vulnerable to tampering.

Awa Gee had carefully taped blackout cloth all over the windows of the little house. The only light had been from a huge fish tank and from a mute color TV in the center of the room near the zebra-hide sofa. Awa Gee had dumped pillows and bedding to the floor to make space on the sofa for Zeta to sit. Awa Gee perched himself on his work stool; his eyes, strangely magnified by his glasses, shifted from her eyes to the terminal screens and blinking red, yellow, and green lights that filled the room from floor to ceiling. Awa Gee did not show Zeta what was inside the trailer, but they had stepped over two bundles of heavy cable that seemed to connect the little house to the trailer. The cable had been carefully wrapped in plastic garbage bags and taped securely.

Awa Gee had been working night and day for weeks on an international
project. “All goodwill—no pay! By invitation only!” he told Zeta proudly. All the other participants had had billions of dollars of research facilities behind them. Awa Gee had been the only “little guy” to reach the last level for entry to the project. Split the atom? They had done that easily with sheer force. But to split a one-hundred-digit number into two primes! That had not been accomplished until last week, Awa Gee said, smiling.

Awa Gee had acted as if he had not seen another human being for weeks; the little man could not seem to stop talking. Zeta told Awa Gee he must feel very pleased with himself, but the little Asian shook his head and the bitterness had returned. No, he could feel no pleasure, not while there was injustice. Injustice allowed others with inferior brains, intellectual imbeciles, to receive all the millions in research grants, while he, Awa Gee, had to settle for what he could make from the junk he found in the dumpster behind the university’s computer-science center.

Awa Gee’s last outburst seemed to tire him, and he sat down muttering to himself in Korean. Zeta settled back on the zebra-skin couch to watch the huge lion-fish. Awa Gee reached into a Styrofoam ice chest on the floor by his feet for a cold can of beer. He offered it first to Zeta, who shook her head.

They sat in the dim light, and Awa Gee drank the beer while they watched the lion-fish beg for food. Awa Gee seemed to revive after the beer and was ready to talk some more. During the special prime-number project he had barely had time to call orders to the liquor store. He had paid cabdrivers to deliver cases of beer because his constant attention to the project had been indispensable. He had gone days without sleep. A brooding expression spread over Awa Gee’s face. “The others, they had all they needed—not like Awa Gee!” Awa Gee had been forced to string together an odd assemblage of old computers considered obsolete by others. Strands of computers had been Awa Gee’s secret of course, and his “strands” could match the best the universities might have, though not the government. Of course, the government researchers themselves had third-rate brains; without human intelligence computer power hardly mattered. Awa Gee’s face tensed when he talked about the “government.” The advantage the government and the universities had was
no lightning.
They could all afford the latest protective devices for their precious equipment. But not Awa Gee. One bolt of lightning, one great electrical surge, and the genius of all his endless months of circuitry intermeshing and wires would be vaporized. Zeta picked up a book with huge slashes and forks of lightning blazing across the book’s dustcover.
“Lightning,” Awa Gee said. “I am learning all I can about my—my worst enemy!” Zeta flipped through pages of lightning photographs; lightning leaped out of volcanic eruptions, lightning coiled inside tornado funnels, and zigzagged across the mushroom cloud of an atomic blast.

Awa Gee was sorry the special project had taken him away from his best customers, but the prime-number project had been absolutely essential. The governments of many nations had not wanted the hundred-digit prime-number project to continue because project results might jeopardize national security by facilitating hackers who broke through elaborate secret entry codes. Citing national security, the U.S. government had seized all Awa Gee’s project notes in Customs and had prohibited further work with codes by Awa Gee. “But they can never find me,” he had told Zeta proudly, “because to them, I am connected by way of Seattle and San Francisco. To them, I am a certain Professor Kew on sabbatical leave from Stanford University.”

One of Awa Gee’s specialities had been the creation of new identities complete with passports, driver’s licenses, social security numbers—everything obtainable through computer records. Awa Gee had created a great many identities for himself while he had lived on the West Coast, where Asian births and deaths were plentiful. “The dead are my friends,” Awa Gee had confided to Zeta. “I go to find birth dates on the gravestones or in the newspaper, then I write to the state capital for a new birth certificate.” Awa Gee had already created three new identities for Zeta, complete with U.S. passports. Awa Gee charged extra for Canadian or Mexican identities because it required him to travel.

AWA GEE FINISHED his beer and with a big smile brought out another. Zeta could see he was just getting warmed up. She thought about making up excuses to get out of there, but Awa Gee was easily insulted. Alcohol brought round red splotches to Awa Gee’s cheeks. He went to the corner where two speakers sat on the floor. “Hear this,” he said. Ocean waves crashed rhythmically and endlessly on the sound
track. Zeta saw the petals of the lion-fish’s gills undulate in rhythm with the ocean sound.

Awa Gee sat at a keyboard where his left hand worked a terminal while the right hand dialed phone numbers. Awa Gee’s fingers moved over keys with amazing speed. Awa Gee did not need the company of other human beings. He was most relaxed, most “at home,” with his own thoughts and the numbers. Numbers were alive for Awa Gee; some numbers “sang,” while others flashed complex patterns of iridescent colors as if they were exotic blossoms or jungle birds. Numbers were his companions, his roommates, and his allies. One morning the “big cheeses” would wake up to discover how the numbers had suddenly all added up to zero for them. The power of the numers would reside with the poor and the dispossessed.

For Awa Gee it had become increasingly clear that the people were up against the giants. But the giants had been ruthless for too long; the giants had become deluded about their power. Because the giants were endlessly vulnerable, from their air traffic control systems to their interstate power-transmission lines. Turn out the lights and see what they’d do; turn out the lights on one of their state executions. Awa Gee had already infiltrated emergency switching programs. No interstate backup transfers, no emergency at all would register even after miles of high-voltage transmission line were gone. They’d never catch him. They’d blame the ecofreaks.

Awa Gee had no interest in personal power. Awa Gee had no delusions about building empires; Awa Gee did not plan to create or build anything at all. Awa Gee was interested in the purity of destruction. Awa Gee was interested in the perfection of complete disorder and disintegration. At first Awa Gee had experimented with disorder by unwinding spools of rope to snarl and tangle deliberately into mounds of thick knots; then he studied the patterns of the snarls and tangles as he worked to remove them. Empire builders were killers because to build they needed materials. Awa Gee wanted to build nothing; Awa Gee wanted nothing at all to happen except for the lights to go out; because then he would top them all with his “necklace” of wonder machines so efficient they operated off batteries and sunlight. Earth that was bare and empty, earth that had been seized and torn open, would be allowed to heal and to rest in the darkness after the lights were turned out. The giants of the world would fight of course, but their retaliation would serve Awa Gee at every turn. The greater their retaliation, the greater the destruction.

The University of Arizona was a giant that must die soon. The university had fired Awa Gee and sent him to hell at a photo-finishing lab. Awa Gee had written the computer programs for polishing the giant mirrors and lenses the university had developed for the government’s secret space-laser project. Awa Gee had planned to stay with the university for a few years longer to perfect his solar war machine, but one of the old white professors had caught Awa Gee polishing the war machine’s special components after hours, in the university’s optics plant. That had been the end of Awa Gee’s top-security clearance, but the end had also been the beginning for Awa Gee.

Although the lens of the solar war machine weighed at least forty pounds, Awa Gee had mounted the machine on the back of his bicycle, to show it was indeed a weapon for the poor masses, who had little or nothing in the way of transportation. The simplicity of the solar lens was also an important feature. A one-day demonstration and briefing was all it would take. No prototype could be expected to be perfect. The solar war machine had to be unpacked and assembled on a tripod that fit onto the bicycle frame. Awa Gee had many modifications to make, but the single most important element had been the glass lens he had salvaged from the university optics department.

Awa Gee watched Zeta relax with her eyes closed. He watched the rhythmic flutter of the gills of the lion-fish and regretted he could not tell Zeta about the success of the machine’s first test. But Awa Gee had made himself a few simple rules, and he intended to live by them. Complete secrecy had been the first rule. Awa Gee had loaded the machine and his video camera on his bicycle and pedaled down Stone Avenue to the corner of Speedway. Awa Gee had been planning and preparing for some time for the test target: a motel coffee shop where city cops drank coffee and ate lunch. Two or three Tucson police cars were usually parked outside.

Awa Gee had recorded all the tests of his weapon in order to make improvements.

First Awa Gee had set up the video camera on its tripod. The camera took attention away from the war machine on its short, stout tripod. The video camera was an old model, and its bulk was just what Awa Gee liked in case of gusty winds. Awa Gee set the video camera on auto and zoomed in first on a police motorcycle, then a squad car.

Awa Gee had kept his breathing slow and deep like the lion-fish sleeping in his tank. He had taken a leisurely look at the sky. No clouds
for a hundred miles. Perfect weather for the solar war machine. Awa Gee squinted up at the sun and began to adjust the legs of the war machine’s tripod. The glass face of the lens remained hooded in black velvet. Awa Gee had sewed the cover himself. The lens had been a prototype—one of a kind—and Awa Gee wanted no scratches or dust to mar the surface of the powerful lens.

Awa Gee had not worried about passing motorists or people on the sidewalk in Tucson. Because people in Arizona were generally ignorant and assumed that all Asians with video cameras were wealthy tourists. Awa Gee knew he was practically invisible to almost everyone driving by or sitting inside the coffee shop. He removed the velvet hood from the solar war machine and adjusted the angle of the tilt of the war machine’s lens until a tiny point of blinding white light light was focused on the windshield of the police car. Awa Gee had watched through the telephoto lens of the video camera and counted the seconds. Suddenly the point of blinding white light had been surrounded by a flash of red as the interior of the car burst into flames. Awa Gee had walked casually to the war machine and turned the lens away from the sun. He had kept the video camera recording as he carefully repacked the war machine on the back of his bicycle. The police eating lunch in the coffee shop did not emerge until a fire engine pulled up to the flaming patrol car. Awa Gee watched the motorcycle cops scramble to move their machines and wished he could have aimed for their gas tanks while he was at it. But that might have caused suspicion, and Awa Gee was no fool.

English words that he had once studied and memorized to impress a lovely English teacher suddenly came to mind:
Euphoria. Euphoric.
Awa Gee had never felt anything so powerful sweep over his entire being. The fire had made roaring, popping sounds loud enough to be heard over the sirens’ noise and the shouts of firemen spraying water over the cop car. Awa Gee had visited the fat brown whores walking Sixth Avenue, but he had never confused trivial amusement with profound pleasure. He was the mighty author of the comedy scene that had played in the motel coffee shop parking lot. He was the sole author of the comedy’s opening lines: a series of small pops and explosions. The best part had been that the police and firemen had no idea what had happened. Awa Gee had zoomed the camera onto the faces of the cops just as the car’s gas tank had exploded. The brown whores were delicious, yet one visit didn’t last Awa Gee long; but the thrill of the burning police car did not diminish.