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Atmospherics 07
ATMOSPHERICS 7
Winter 1996
_________________________________________________________________
Contents (in no particular order) :
Face on the sand
Ben Ohmart (findline@ix.netcom.com)
She (Vicky, a love poem)
Nathan Lindsay (student@gw.barstow.cc.ca.us -
name in subject line)
Lolita
Nostalgia
Gilligan's Island
Jonathan Chen (jchen@pwa.acusd.edu)
That night
J.G. Fabiano (marine@star.net)
Beauty
Jessica Fabiano (marine@star.net)
Bosnia Peaceful
Utah Bice Jr. (student@gw.barstow.cc.ca.us -
name in subject line)
Tribalware: an exploded view
David Dowker (djd@io.org)
and
Allegra Sloman (argella@dunciad.dorval.qc.ca)
Down a darkening alley
Dead end friend
Richard Fein (bardbyte@chelsea.los.com)
We're all going down
Another poem written on company time
Robert W. Howington (Robert_W._Howington@hud.com)
Farmers in the hood
Carolyn Suma (suma@library.utoronto.ca)
Moonhare excerpt
Kirk Hampton (mackay@mail.utexas.edu)
_________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________
This text may be freely shared amongst individuals, but it
may not be republished in any medium without express written
consent from the authors and advance notification of the
editor. Rights to stories remain with the authors. Copyright
1996, the authors.
_________________________________________________________________
Editorial:
Welcome to Atmospherics 7. This is the winter issue. Am I
the only one out there pining for spring? Am I the only
one beginning to hate having to put on layers and layers
of clothes just to step out back for a smoke? Anyway, I
hope this issue will help you cope with the winter blues.
And remember, spring officially arrives in less than 2 weeks.
I'm thinking of a slogan for Atmospherics: "It's not George but
at least we don't make you dress up in a silly powdered wig!"
What do you think?
I've received some e-mail about other journals and events
of interest to authors. One such thing of interest is a
fiction writers workshop on the WWW. You can find this on
the Book Stacks page at: "http://www.books.com/scripts.exe?"
Also, there is a new journal out which I haven't been able
to check out as I can't seem to get the page to load. The
name of the journal is "It's a Bunny" and it can be found
at: "http://www.iti.qc.ca/iti/bunny" If you get to see it,
please let me know what you think of it. I have to say the
name intrigues me.
In this issue are quite a few poems, of different styles.
"Farmers in the hood" is a satire on rap music and "Bosnia
peaceful" is self explanatory. I thank all the people who
submitted to Atmospherics this time. This issue contains an
excerpt from an upcoming science fiction novel, "Moonhare", by
Kirk Hampton. Sounds like a book I'd like to read. David
Dowker and Allegra Sloman have sent me another excerpt from
"Tribalware". Ben Ohmart has sent a few submissions to
Atmospherics and once again appears in the journal, for the
third time if I am correct. Please send me more. That goes for
everyone, I am always happy to receive your submissions. I may
not be able to publish them all but I do want the chance to.
As always, submissions can be sent to Susan Keeping at
billie@inforamp.net or keeping@library.utoronto.ca. I
prefer them in ascii text in the body of a letter. Also,
please hit the return at the end of each line so I don't
have to do too much fiddling with the line feeds.
Atmospherics is available through anonymous FTP at:
etext.archive. umich.edu; it is available on WWW at:
http://www.inforamp.net/~billie/atmos; it is available
through Gopher at: etext.archive.umich.edu.
Susan Keeping
_________________________________________________________________
Bosnia Peaceful
War is despicable and obsolete.
Create life true salvage swift justice right face.
So stand those wanting Peace cry out complete.
When comes to naught vanities beat.
Loves special Agape speaks our ace.
War is despicable and obsolete.
Try to be what stars should sing so sweet.
Saw God's Pure Soul Spirit From Earth His Grace.
So stand those wanting Peace cry out complete.
Visage content sound passion rings greet.
Please heed answering thoughts of truth in place.
War is despicable and obsolete.
O'ercome wraths haste unbalanced cheat.
Honorablility our hearts embrace.
So stand those wanting Peace cry out complete.
Beautifully shining Angel fleet.
American Liberty sets world pace.
War is despicable and obsolete.
So stand those wanting Peace cry out complete.
Utah Bice Jr.
_________________________________________________________________
LOLITA
While in bed
he seems discombobulated
that she keeps repeating an unfamiliar name
He considers the option of self-denial
and ponder
with the thought of cold-blooded murder
He feels like a second-rated magician
trapped in an authentic straight-jacket
Opaque smoke and odorless stench fill the air
in the light of total despair
Luckily,
he discovers his Buddha nature
NOSTALGIA
Sometimes I stare,
at the dusty trophies
The innocent times,
are of distant memory
Worries were no more than
an occasional pimple
and catching the bus on time
I try to think,
but Freud, Shopenhaur, and NIetsche
argue constantly
in a cacophany
tick tick tick tick tick tick,
Hi, I'm Ed Bradly
and I'm Andy Rooney
Tonight,
we expose the real truth of penile implants.
Jonathan Chen
_________________________________________________________________
That Night
I slept on the beach one night.
But before losing myself
In some unknown dream;
I looked onto the enormity of the sea,
Stared into the deepness of space,
And then back at the infinite crystals of sand.
As the winds chilled my body
And moon filled my eyes,
I thanked God their was a God;
And then fell fast to sleep.
J.G. Fabiano
_________________________________________________________________
Face on the Sand
(#31 in a series of Grown-Ups' Fairy Tales)
His third day just walking along the border of the land.
Feeling the slip of the water reach his toes and scurry away
before the next footprint could be born. The sun was setting or
rising so slowly it didn't matter, but the spray of the wind made
Malm's shirt break open like the buttons on the loose, loud shirt
were there for a joke. He was sad at being made of money and
therefore quickly flammable. He had no problems but the sound of
his heartbeat, and even the thought that that wouldn't last
forever did not drive him to the pleasant feeling that problems
weren't so far away.
Phone calls. Putting up with men who worried their lives. An
hour a week. Tops. And then. Back at the beach. Back at it. Never
thinking the waves rolled without him. Trying to go deep into
himself so that he could find something. A problem even wasn't
necessary. A joy or a reason for it beyond mere cash was a sacred
quest. And Malm was not a component of a sacred quest.
The sun was full. Ready to be born or die. That was when the
face in the sand, the face on the sand stared up at him. Mouth
slightly apart. Eyes up in the wrinkles of a young forehead.
Something resembling James Dean. Something James Dean actually,
he noticed upon the kneeling position. The soft cheeks were
dotted with the grit of soluble land. The eyes were there, full
color, whatever it was. Then it blinked.
"Jesus," Malm said quickly, pulling back. Several steps
away.
"hh..hh...hhhh..." the face said, but didn't go on. Without
a good throat or any throat that much was enough. Too much.
Malm circled some sand. Chattered at himself. Cursed himself
and things. Always coming back to a look at the face on the sand.
And the water kept reaching its nose. Mouth. It had trouble
breathing, even if it had no lungs to worry about. And the sand
was hardly good for the eyes.
Without a thought of freak show royalties, the rich man
could hardly just leave the damn thing there. What it needed was
water. Water without salt, he thought, and then moved to try to
discover a way of lifting it without touching the horrible
thing...
The midget who ran the only hotel - the hotel that Malm
owned and kept only as a personal retreat for some third of the
year, renting out to others for the remainder - on the sand
caught between waters never questioned where Malm was getting the
import of native girls from. He never looked up at a helicopter.
Never heard a sound. So he wasn't about to concern himself with
asking a question when the owner entered the all but palace
carrying a wet saggy shirt.
It took a couple hours, but the face had its fill of water.
Being dry all around the edges and in every part but the mouth,
the face was feeling strength. A good deal of it.
"Hey. Can I have some food?"
Malm jumped. He'd been biting off excess fingernails, but
now he felt compelled to answer the request. Like he was under
some power.
That face could sure eat a mess of mess. Shrimp including
shells, candy wine (made from aged to rotting peppermint
candies), fish minus the eyes and skin, one-legged fried
chickens, two boxes of old puddings, a whole ham served in six
trips, and a goose found washed ashore one night, among other
things.
"Where do you put it all?" the host asked as the face still
worked on a last bite of pig. The question was laced with wonder.
The cheeks were puffy, but it could still smile. And when it
opened its mouth to make the sound of a burp, or something close,
Malm could see right into the bedspread the face was laying on.
"Oh, you know," was the answer.
"But who - uh, who are you? You look just like -"
"Yeah, I know," the face replied. "I get that a lot."
Malm thought he was seeing things. But it happened. It was
happening. The curves of the visage - its borders ended where a
full man's ears would begin - crept through the loud-pattern of
the bed and inched its way along like some slimy creature would.
For the face, it wasn't difficult, but still required enough
concentration so that it was never an unconscious act. It was
trying to sit up. To get to the pillow, and plant itself like a
weed. Which it did, after some intuitive maneuvering.
"God..."
"What are you?" Malm yelled.
Instead of a tale which would explain everything, he
inquired about playing cards.
"What?!"
The shock of the beach was slowing wearing off. "shwooo.....
Uh. Cards. You any good at playing cards?"
Three months went quickly in the hotel. The small man had to
content his life with working out the reservation book. Irate
customers had booked months in advance sometimes, but all the
dwarf needed to know was Malm's desire once for having the place
to himself just a little longer, and things were ultimately
settled.
He took the face to the inland waterfall, and civilization.
Civilization was the crowd of pelicans which fashioned a giant
nest between some trees that weren't quite palmy. They watched
movies coming in from the satellite dish almost every night, and
Malm felt himself growing quite attached to the thing/friend
which at alternate times gave certain insights into what it felt
like to have the ultimate out of body experience.
"It's like blowing bubbles most of the time," the face
explained.
"Blowing bubbles?"
"Yeah. You know how it's nice to blow bubbles?"
"Yeah?"
"Well. It doesn't feel like anything. But it's nice."
That snippet alone was worth hours of silence for Malm who
contemplated it like it was thousands of years old. He didn't
know what it meant, but it felt closer to meaning something.
The only other person he could share the info with was his
ex-wife who still lived in a part of NYC which wasn't called NYC
but still held a similar zip code. He wrote her the Christmas
card he'd been meaning to for a few years now, enclosing the bit
of wisdom the face had offered, and three weeks later there was a
reply via FAX which simply stated WHAT THE HELL DOES THIS MEAN?
Whether it was a feeling of enough unrestricted sunshine, or
the fact that he still held unknown feelings for the only woman
ever in his life, Malm felt she deserved an explanation of what
he meant. And to be fair, the only thing that could explain it wa
s the horse's mouth.
When he suggested the trip, to Malm's surprise the horse's
mouth was all for it. "Yeah! As long as we can go by airplane. I
want to go by airplane."
The helicopter was chartered - face said it was close enough
to a plane - and they sped to the nearest spot of land that
wasn't an island where they took a jumbo jet to NYC. Malm hated
traveling with or against people, so he held all the seats'
tickets, and this meant he could put the face next to him. Though
the face complained about only being able to see the air blower
above.
Malm wanted to give him a view, but the one thing that hadn't
changed between them was that he wasn't aBout to touch the face.
They'd agreed on that early on. It was just something Malm would
Not do. But the complete man Was nice enough to order a team of
stewardesses to alternate holding a book up for the face to read
for 6 of the hours it took to get there; as long as they were
looking away. No one else had seen the face.
A quick limo to his ex-wife's business, Malm sat waiting in
the waiting room, with a spongy sack on his lap. The sack was
very breathable. The receptionist tried not to notice that the
sack was moving.
At the appointed time, he went in and placed the sack on her
desk. After a hug that told them both things they'd forgotten,
Malm quickly unwrapped the sack so that it fell to its most
revealing. He was proud of the face.
But she screamed. And though the face knew it would have to
happen, he winced and waited for the breath to run out of her.
It didn't take long. She was looking at it. Then she got
past what it was. It reminded her. It reminded her of....
"What the hell Is this?"
"This is my face," Malm said.
"Hello," the face cordially tried. But it really didn't seem
to care. All this was a favor.
The woman laughed, and it was a second before she realized
there was call waiting going on. She buzzed her secretary with an
order, then locked the door.
Malm said like a shy man, "He said it."
"He said what?" she asked.
"Ask it something."
What do you ask a face? She waited. She realized. "How do
you breath?"
The face laughed. The sound was pleasant, but too high in
the room. "You know, I don't even think about it."
It seemed simple. But more than that. She wasn't afraid.
It was working out the way he liked. The way he'd wanted it
to. And she was growing proud of the thing he had brought her,
Malm could tell. She even went so far as to request time alone
with the face. So many questions. Too many questions that she'd
never think of.
He agreed, and left for a poor man's lunch. Malm could never
get over hot dogs. But they had to be draped in chili. A harder
specialty to find. But he finally did. Blocks away. The cabs were
scarce, but he eventually got back to the place where she worked.
The receptionist wouldn't let him in. Malm couldn't accept
no's. He didn't have to.
He broke into the private office. Everything was there. But
it didn't feel like it should. Of course there were no bodies -
that was the surprising thing. But there was something.. odd.
Too..
Kicking out of the room, he looked at the receptionist who
was already cold with anxiety. She was shaking a little before
she even answered the question. "I don't Know where she is!"
It was true. The rich man could feel it, could sense it
after a lifetime of playing the game.
He dreamed all the way down the elevator of finding the face
chewing on her. Some part of her body. And they would both be
groaning. And somehow it would all fit. Would all work. He would
still be a part of that. But he hadn't anticipated this kind of
betrayal.
Hours in the park. Walking. Shrugging. Misunderstanding.
Kicking the birds to flight. Malm thought about detective
agencies. Then tried a few. Always thanking them for their wasted
time when he failed to give a description of his ex. Always
embarrassed in the halls, because. He could never remember her
face.
ben ohmart
_________________________________________________________________
Farmers in the Hood
Yo, this here's the story of what happened to my bitch
And how my life went to hell when I got unhitched
My wife had upped and left me for some Alabama trucker
She told me how she licked him like an all day sucker
I got so mad and sad and blue I started drinking whiskey
Thinkin' of the two of them actin' cute and frisky
I sat on the rusted washer out in our front yard
By the dryer and old sofa and I thought real hard
Okay my wife was gone but my heart would mend
I had my pigs and my chickens, I had man's best friend
See I got me a huntin' dog and she's my pride and joy
I've had this bitch forever - since I was a little boy
Yeah, I started feeling better as I polished off the beer
Thinking that her brand new trucker was probably a queer
I finished all the liquor as I called my wife a whore
And I knew to keep being happy I'd have to drink some more
My mind was kinda wooly and my tongue was feeling furry
And I slipped behind the wheel with my crossed eyes kinda blurry
When my lively little huntin' dog, my regular spitfire
Made a thumpin', bumpin' noise when she went under the tires
She was a pretty little puppy with lotsa big brown spots
'til I hit her with my truck and connected all the dots
Now I'm feelin' sore and sober and I'm cryin' to the hogs
Since I ran over my bitch my life has gone right to the dogs.
Carolyn Suma
_________________________________________________________________
Beauty
Like winds blowing across a fresh summer dream,
An old tree with fruit to share,
A swan gliding on top of a stream,
A dandelion floating in the air.
Like leaves wilting and falling from a tree,
A daisy and a honey bee.
Rain drops falling one by one,
The clouds saluting only the sun.
These are all things we tend to never enjoy,
Until it's too late.
Things we look past
And forget to appreciate.
So take time out
To stop and stare,
To remember the beauty
That is always there.
Jessica Fabiano
_________________________________________________________________
Tribalware: An Exploded View
He was in a room full of what seemed to be antique
scientific instruments, or obscure devices of sexual
gratification, perhaps. It was difficult to be sure.
They shifted form, outlines dissolved then coalesced
again, vertically and horizontally polarized.
The parrot upon his shoulder was searching through
a handbag while speaking through the mannequin posed
provocatively on the couch. The words mostly dadaist
nonsense (...elohir ombala sessli nadji...) approaching
tonal music droning soothe fusion of subject and object.
The murmuring (her) approached on soft phonemes
sneaking up along his thigh with whispers of imminent
sweetness and nothing but delight, but the warmth of
her endearments did not move him. She lost resolution,
sliding into silent mouthings, articulate nonetheless.
Nicad had a sense of furry dervishes whirling in the air
around his head. A feather tickled his ear.
The parrot pulled a scroll from the bag and holding
one end in claw, with beak unrolled. Strangely liquid
luminous letters. While reading they flowed away
and re-formed into later text. "Description (with
Illustration) of the Earth Return Posture."
Nicad felt the insides of his eyes beginning to melt
along with the text and the body of her ecstatic
merging with the true shape of his
...and came awake.
A kind of (s)warming over his skin, urgent thirst,
funny taste in the mouth, sweetly metallic.
He felt quickened, preternaturally alert.
Heat pulse in the forehead. Was he feverish? His thoughts
clambered over each other in their hurry to get (him) out
of bed. Why the urgency and what was the agency of this
awakening?
Pockets slept on, the pale mask of her face relaxed into
radiance, mischievous angelic half-smile smoothed over
the nagging edges of his thought.
The walls seemed to have returned to their programmed ambient
state. Didn't he turn them off, though? Nicad stumbled into
the bathroom, the faint shimmer around his body following him
in clumsy imitation.
Returning, he discovered Pockets awake and sitting up in bed
with the strangest expression on her face. "You're glowing,"
she softly whispered. "So are you," he replied as he realized
that rather amazing fact. The almost invisible light, as if
simply a distortion of the air or glitch in vision, seemed to
flow slowly over her body. He touched her arm and the flows
merged immediately a charge up his spine wriggled touching off
tiny explosions of giggling giddy images feeling their way
into the labyrinth of another mind <hello> <<hello>> echoed
as lips traced each other's semantically sensitive skin,
sweetly singing of tender buttons
<no not the restaurant>
<<o don't worry i didn't think so>>
fingers frame an elegant argument (a philosophic glide
along the smooth) and then decide (tickling the inside of
a thigh) to linger over the parameters of the slim possibilium
that this was actually happening
<it seems the most natural thing in the world>
<<naturally>>
*
Global Reality Management is a company whose expertise
has colonized the invisible domain of information supply
and control. Originally, it concentrated on the traditional
areas of advertising, media 'relations' (read: manipulation)
and 'spin doctoring' as well as the more esoteric aspects
of political lobbying and intelligence gathering (including
people 'gathering'), but has become increasingly concerned
(in this oh-so-modern age) with virtual reality design
and maintenance (and the obvious connections to
the aforementioned).
*
"they must be televised to be decrypted...evolution will not
be felt...i can see time pulse...it is only a question of money
...interesting subtlety in the obsession department."
*
_foldaway_ like REALLY portable computer and screen.
Some of them turn into scrolls.
*
Geomancer started life as a program to assess temblors.
Now it is much more sophisticated and looks at erosion,
delta formation, clear cutting, and certain aspects of
the biosphere. Aethyr is weather, winds, temperatures,
variations. Heavy Water looks at the oceans below sea level,
up to the intertidal but not beyond. Wisefire looks at heat;
waste heat from humans, heat from the sun, heat released
and absorbed by the oceans. Each program releases data
to each, in a shifting protocol of priorities. A different
picture emerges as to trends depending on which program
is dominant.
*
"Only some warrior-priest-hacker would name an idea generator
after a piece of insect anatomy."
*
Nicad remembered the room where he was tested. It was a vague
memory, more of a feeling, gray walls gray day archaic computer
and light-pen. He knew then, watching the reaction of that
abstract representation of a man as the screen unscrolled
matrices of data, that something strange was going on.
"That was more of a high-security military installation
than a school," Pockets went on. "It was corporate, though.
_New Initiatives_ for the new millenium - what a crock of
shit! How did you get away, anyway?"
Nicad smiled.
"I disappeared myself...and certain irrefutable proofs of
various _events_ appeared in my place. After a while I
reappeared, digitally new and improved - Nicad version 2.0.
I never left town since I figured if they wanted me badly
enough they'd find me. So here I am."
*
Picture the confusion caused by data transfers being rerouted
into enormous information caverns, altered marginally and
popping back out into a competitor's chunk of cyberspace;
a series of increasingly bizarre perturbations in the world
stock market which feed into hitherto overlooked assumptions
in standard programmed buying structures; the entire arsenal
of the free world attempting to prevent their media signals
from being knocked out of the sky by computer errors,
homemade rockets with scavenged telemetry; the whole thing
being controlled by a sophisticated, distributed expert system
which assigns value to world events and then calculates where
there is an opportunity for the most confusion with effectively
zero loss of life. Picture a program which can assist you in
figuring out which series of pranks and disinformation will
influence world opinion and alter (manipulate) the behaviour
of target segments of the population and can find you
the technicians, translators and trading advice you need
within hours or days, all of which is hiding inside a program
which is ostensibly one of those elaborate role model games
that take years to play out.
*
A crazed foray into the Toronto Stock Exchange whisper line
with rumours of (as the hoaxed press release put it):
"Alchemists' Dream Finally Realized - _Immaterial Expertise_
announces the first ounce of gold produced from lead. The process
involves the use of a unique tool, developed at the IE Research
Lab, called _Nanoput_."
The idea of synthetic gold sent a brief shiver through the market
and then, saner heads prevailed. The problem was, as Moby had
flashed to Pockets, it was true. He had merely jumped their gun
for them and was off to glittering pastures elsewhere, presumably
short-selling his way around the world.
*
FORWARDED MAIL -------
From: aery@bottom.com
Date: 23 Sep 22
Originally To: elytra@enode.ca
hey lytra!
yous gotta lotta nirv to whyne <ohh poor moi> uh? yous
omni-po-tent & gnot even gno it...whatta bagga combustibles!
aint ya got any self-specs or thred of inhooman deesensy?
eyes a-shamed of yer nameless dithering...shif/klik & get
wit it, noman, you sheer aint ferreal yeti by a goner
& who am i? why i'm your faery godmother
aery (datz Aeriel too yoo)
*
The Game was a way to hide in plain sight. Part academic
exercise,
part venture capital driven, legally precarious, it provided a
MUD
for malcontents with a broad range of talents and interests.
The academic who started the flow of funds, a devout technopagan
in Baton Rouge named S. Miles found a wealthy patron and sold her
on the idea of a think tank focussing on successful and
unsuccessful
social transformations.
The real purpose of the Game was to assemble an expert system
which was, in essence, an engine of cultural transformation.
*
FORWARDED MAIL -------
From: aery@bottom.com
Date: 29 Sep 22
Originally To: elytra@enode.ca
an uneyedentified phlying objekchun in dis image-nayshun
similed as yous flipflop lyke abiat anorgee or wuzdat miss
interperturbayshun (in/akshun...glansed in find-syte,
transe enskonsed)
peeka boo icu
deez "abandoned carparts" remaind inflaygrant dis play
& may compro myze (the mazing yous ravel in)
sin seerlee,
aery
*
"What are we rushing for? One more meeting and I'll be vegetable,
or maybe mineral."
"Close your mind to distractions. You're going to another
country."
The door they were standing against had the same simple fish
glyph
as glinted from around her neck. Pockets saw him staring at it.
"It's a concession to the locals."
"I quite like it," Nicad said.
He did pause...and peered up and down the hallway, then checked
what was in the other function space on the floor and took notice
of the location of the stairwells and exits, all while Pockets
stood and watched him...to a monologue of varieties of criticism
and praise, quietly observing his frame gliding through space,
moving smoothly without hesitancy as if he was pouring himself
from one place to another.
And another country on the far side of the door.
There had been objections, in the beginning. Country has all
the wrong connotations and the response from some of the group
had been, not the country of intersecting lines and sectionals
and global positioning systems and tree-by-tree analyses of
corporate reforestation attempts. We are talking about
the para-country, the hyper-landscape, which is there already,
in which we wish to dwell.
"Nick, I'd like to go in," Pockets called softly.
They went in together.
They sat down and plugged in. There were perhaps a hundred
people in the room. Some of the enhancements dazzled: active
extensions and sheer shattering beauty. (Convulsive, yes,
and achingly acutely aware organism.) The screen was alive
with questions, and he started answering, trying to link to
the group where he could make the fittest contribution.
Most of the people were ignoring the technology and talking
in small groups. The costuming was deliberately outrageous.
An accentuation of other possibilities and acceptance of
the absurd and ultimately futile nature of the enterprise.
He felt underdressed all of a sudden, but (with the ease
of much practice) pushed the thought away.
Pockets had messaged him already - before they sat down,
surely - and simply said, "You just wait."
*
Audio barrage and rapidfire lightshow abruptly woke them.
The walls were alive, writhing, with variations of a single
pockmarked and emaciated face while multiple sound sources
poured forth the gospel according to Moby over a background
of industrial pain-cries. A synthetic silken voice - you could
feel the sheen of the oil, unguent ooze through and through.
<"You don't look happy to see me"> bounced around the room
as the unpaid apolitical sermon faded to a dull mumbling and
the lurid faces froze in particularly anguished pose.
"Why should I be? You left us minus one unfortunately rather
necessary hacker." Pockets roused and risen, clutching sheets
to her sleepwarm flesh, scanned the surroundings.
"I'm happy to see you." (Sheets slide to ankles and compile
themselves. Pockets finds her foldaway and fingers the finder.
Nicad mouths a question, "Can he?")
"You poor deluded thing you. Do you really expect us to fall
for such juvenile peepshow pretensions? If you could see us
you wouldn't be talking."
"I'd seen enough."
"Do you like my tattoos?"
"You don't have any."
"You don't say. Well, I think you'd better get an upgrade,
maybe boost your resolution, at least."
Static erupted then distant tinny "happy trails" and
<Be seeing you> seeming backward voiced.
"Some special effects!" Pockets false enthused.
*
In the next frame, we have Caithin, Pockets and Nicad sitting
in Pockets' apartment, while Nicad moans about Moby.
"Who isn't only, or necessarily, Moby, of course," Caithin says.
"Yeah, most likely it's two or three wireheads in a data hole
someplace." Pockets was looking much more irritated than usual.
In fact, her expression, which had never so far been directed
at him, thank the Parking Goddess, was bordering on the feral.
"People's Republic of Berkeley?" Nicad guessed. He kept
twitching, trying to divine the source of her irritation.
"These folks are clever. We literally have no idea where they
are...but all this shit's in the manifesto, didn't you read it?"
"I can faithfully swear that I read the entire thing and
nowhere in this appalling document - parts of which _are_
actually quite interesting - did I see the slightest mention
of Moby or any so-called data pirate making us a target."
/"that's wrong" & <<\"my feelings exactly" < came out
almost simultaneously. Then, again, this time in perfect
unison, "Moby erased it."
The women doubled over laughing. Pockets stopped first.
"He refuses to do a flesh-to-flesh, but I guess he's scared
I'll infect him."
"With what?" Nicad said innocently. The idea that he was
now irrevocably hosting a plasmate was still a little raw,
and he chose a relatively harmless way of whining about it.
The plasmate was affecting him. It was becoming harder
and harder to be irritated, although Pockets still seemed
perfectly capable of being angry. And Caithin. The angriest
person I know, he thought to himself. A beautiful container
for blistering rage, and still wondering why he had fled at
the earliest opportunity. Although he had to admit Caithin
was now calmer than he had ever seen her.
"Plasmate, or maybe something worse. Moby reads everything
that comes through."
"Impossible."
"He wrote the filter/parser himself. Moby claims it catches
all the prime stuff excepting about 5% and maintains itself
by monitoring shifts in how many of what kinds of words
are being used in what order between which participants.
I don't know whether to believe him, except he doesn't
have access to anything and gets in anyway. Who knows
how many more people he's watching."
"Me?" Nicad said doubtfully.
"Bet on it. You wrote the best advertising filter ever, so
he would either see you as a rival or a potential apprentice.
We don't want you going near him, lest he lure you over to
the darkside of the Force, so to speak," Caithin said.
"He thinks he can control others without ever making physical
contact with them, and he doesn't understand that flesh-to-flesh
is the way to go, if you want to persuade. But now he's got
the perfect excuse not to do it. He knows about the plasmate
and he finds the idea revolting."
Nicad considered his future.
"Is he crazy enough to have us eliminated?" Nicad said.
"We don't know."
Pockets looked sly. "Wanna make like apes?"
Nicad sighed. "Of course....why else was I born?" he said.
*
They had escaped to this place in the near wilderness as
a kind of desperate gesture and discovered a net-free zone
of natural splendour with its waterfall and frogs, fungus
and ferns...and the stars, o the stars smeared across utter
void, swarming in his head even now as he contemplated
future ruins.
The constellations echoed certain patterns he had glimpsed
in their tribalware exchange...something remembered from
the initial configuration of ELYTRA. The flicker of blue
electricity across Pockets' pale body, eyes closed, back
arched in orgasm flashbulb image.
Nicad glanced down at her sleeping self now, eyes shut but
lashes quivering slightly with the soft outrush of her breath
or was that the same breeze which fluttered the flowered
curtains? He thought he could smell jasmine. A distinct
olfactory presence.
The sink was gurgling, words submerged in the noise...frothed
and bubbled, babbling spring-fed brook flowing into the plumbing,
syllables emerging. Nicad shuddered and heard the words,
"Gaia rules." He looked around quickly and over his shoulder,
shook his head, and crawled into bed.
David Dowker and Allegra Sloman
_________________________________________________________________
GILLIGAN'S ISLAND
People who refuse to believe their own senses
are particularly fond of
the curses of too much wisdom.
But your attention is drawn to the fact
that you have changed your name to boredom.
If they show the re-run one more time
I swear I am is going to die.
Jonathan Chen
_________________________________________________________________
WE'RE ALL GOING DOWN.
I just saw an
anti-smoking ad
on tv. It said,
"You smoke. You
die."
Excuse me, but
I think these
people should
go back to the
very beginning
where it says,
"You born. You
die."
ANOTHER POEM WRITTEN
ON COMPANY TIME.
Jesus, the philosopher (I don't
call him the Son of God, but
that's another poem), once told
his fans, "For the wages of sin
is death."
I sit here at my desk at work,
a career paper pusher for Uncle
Sam, thinking I'd much rather
plunder, rape, murder, pillage,
fuck, gamble and consume drugs
24-7-365 than work 8-to-5 for
40 years in a boring office,
plus be a goody two shoes the
whole time, and fucking die
anyway.
Robert W. Howington
_________________________________________________________________
DOWN A DARKENING ALLEY
Shh i don't want no trouble don't wanna hurt ya
just want money quick gimme purse look lady
don't scream don't worry want cash want cash
good that's real good see like i don't want
trouble
shh don't wanna hurt you fifty bucks shit that's
all you got
your ring is gold take it off don't want no trouble honest
shh lady don't scream or nuthin just the ring
i'll take it off hold still hold still stop cryin there
wasn't so
bad ya got nice fingers but there are red marks on them
now move back back more more now lie down i gotta get
away
hide your eyes count to hundred like hide and go seek and
you're it.
got nice hair lady lady don't scream just said you
got nice hair
shh i don't want no trouble don't call me animal i ain't no
animal just
you got nice skin lady don't scream lady don't
scream
i gotta put my hand over your mouth now calm down
shh don't wanna hurt ya or nothin you got nice tits ouch
hey bitch don't bite me bitch you just like the other
bitches
i thought when you smiled at me that maybe ah the hell
with you
ya ain't listenin bitch you bitches never listen to me
always they tell me whadda ya want or like those in the stores
who say
may i help you like i don't know they really sayin what the hell
ya doin
here they all got all that makeup on and shit they real ugly
without it
i see ya got makeup on also not that much but i bet ya as
ugly
if ya got makeup on then ya got no real face
ya want me to be quick i'll be quick but ya fightin me
i don't wanna hurt ya let me wipe off that makeup shit off ya
face
if ya keep fighin i gotta punch ya don't look at me that way
ain't no bug
just let me get these buttons nice flat belly stop
fightin
ya got nice pussy don't wanna hurt no hurt no hurt
bitch stop fightin bitch stop fighin i'll squeeze ya neck
stop
want ya wanna get in wanna get the stuff off ya face be
ugly
be ugly like the rest wanna realy touch ya real face
just a few seconds that's all a few seconds bitch shh
stop screamin
stop scratchin gotta have ya stop movin gotta squeeze
gotta squeeze hard wanna get to ya wanna wipe off that
bullshit
listen listen you betta listen bitch there that's
better
see just lie quiet lady like what you doin now lie quiet
that's good
now turn over and count to a hundred
lady turn over turn over turn over lady can ya hear me
do somethin stop playin ya can't be dead didn't squeeze that
hard
just want you to listen just want to touch your face
lady move count to a hundred start countin
lady lady lady
Richard Fein
_________________________________________________________________
Plot summary of THE MOONHARE (by Kirk Hampton):
The inhabitants of the planet Wemm have been deprived of all
technology by the highly advanced Hophond, who keep Wemm (and
other worlds) in a state of pure,pastoral beauty. The Hophond
accomplish this by an electronic field which dematerializes and
stores even the simplest technology--i.e., any machine or tool
--at its inception. This deprivation has certainly kept Wemm
pastoral, but it has embittered the inhabitants, who ache for
revenge against the Hophond. It has also led to the evolution
of intelligent plantlife on the planet, which--together with the
deadly storms caused by the Hophond field--makes life hazardous.
The hero, Dann Quuluur, who sees himself as Wemm's premier
detective, pursues his wayward daughter Batim onto the Hophond
ship, which orbits the planet, maintaining the machine-eating
field. The ship is so unimaginably advanced technologically
that it drives Batim mad.
The following excerpt begins as Dann and the Hoph robot PeV,
orbiting the Hophond planet, are questioned by the selfstyled
"galactic police."
From Chapter 12:
STOPTIME
Now the Captain of the Pan Galactic Guards began questioning
me. To to this unto-do thus, he had to lift his leg and put it
on a chair, which was hard, because the chairs gayly (ha ha ha!)
lofted emselves up higher in the air in play yay-yay, and this
would force the Coptaing--who was NOTHING if not bent on
dignity--to split his crotch and somewhup unseemily Show His
(Ass).
You see.
And "Where you from?" he'd say, both he and the chairs
grunting runting unting unk ng.
"From?" I'd say (and I'd say "I'd say (and I'd say 'I'd say
(and I'd say "I'd say")' because) because this happened many
times, e.g. & i.e., everthing from here * on in happened. Many
times). "Why, the planet Wemm, of course of course."
"Wemm?" Pancaptain said, looking from me to PeV so much that
me and PeV started doing it, and soon (as I saw, not then, but in
various ancient reproductions that indicate this happened eons
ago) the entire roomful of vacuuhlemed cops were doing it
too--triopling off and staring from one to another in a great
communative swaying of wasanig of aIes.
"You two are from Wemm?"
"It seemed no great crime..." I started to mutter like an
idiot, but stopped as the captain drew out his pistol and pointed
it at me.
It was the first pistol I'd seen. It shone huge and primal,
like the first pistol your father pulls out when he first gets
you down on your primal knees and threatens to blow your sweet
young brains out unless you commence to start to feel pain
IMMEDIATELY.
It seemed to point itself at me, and it seemed to sparkle with
dew, and it seemed to have just emerged from a refreshing dip to
the bottoms of the shaypool, and it seemed brimful of clever
ideas, and also it seemed to have wiped its broad happy mouth
with a glorious cuff, and it seemed to have some important ideas,
if not from Hought, at least from some less clever, parenthetic
thought, and it seemed very friendly and like happy in an
overwholmnong way.
In blue shadows Pancapt spoke: "I know what I'm agonna do,"
he sez, wiggling the big gun right in front of my mouf. "I'm
agonna kill ya--yessiree. I think Wemmsmum, I mean Gemmsmumm,
dang-it, I mean to say Wemm Scum deserves ta be tortured to
death, that right boys?"
No response from any quarter, but a hard light of pain
forming inside the gun and not-so-shyly exposing itself.
"Yup. That's it. I'm gonna kill this sonofabitch, and
butcher his robot, too..."
"I'm not a robot," protested PeV, and CHING! sounded a sound
a soun a so against his hide, and PeV fell silent. My head
really hurt, let me tell you, and I was really depressed. I was
profoundly in despair that my entire life had led up to this,
getting beaten to death, or wrapped up in the painfield I
gathered was coming from his gun.
"Now you're agonna like this, real good," the Captain was
saying, his houghtawful accent getting thicker and the filmframe
I was stuck in getting stupider and darker and totally in my
head.
It was totally in my head.
You are totally in my head.
Tumor head.
I blinked and looked up, for the Captain had stopped. I
figured for a moment he was discouraged from his little act by
the absence of response from the other cops--normally as
responsive as some dumb fantasy of a crowd of alien policemen in
some idiotic, precious, self-indulgent, scintillating yarn about
a crowd of other cops cleverly embedded in robotlike emotional
behavior in the context of a searlingly personal emotive fantasy
blarn.
But I notice, too, that the little light in the core of the
torture gun had gone dull red, and I noticed also in instant
playback--one of the many special talients the Chemuttee'd spond
into me that didn't seem to work on cue--that the Captain's last
words had been sliced away in a series of shrill staccatto
stutters--like "stutters tutter utte ut t! tchee! tchee! techee!
Techee! tchee! techee! hk! hk! hk! k? k? k? k? h- h- h- h-," if
I may represent it so.
Well, I may not be able to represent it so reprehensibly, so
I can just reprevent any retroverntuality of referent by spating
blumply that the Captain had shut up.
In fact, all was perfectly silent, and I felt a lot better,
except when I looked up there was a blue tint to the light and
the air seemed viscous and reluctant to move, and everyone was
stone still. Pancoptain stood there with his mouf open and his
gun cocked; PeV floated nearby, a gouge in his side; the other
cops were back there, no doubt waiting for their next stupid
pantiomime cue--except they seemed in a bit of a oilsmoke
glaze back there; and even more a smokey glaze was the frozen
image of the Hophond panulet overhead. It wasn't so much no it
wasn't so much that the palanept's ionization fires were
still--and they were almost still--as that as that that the
screen itself was having trouble, its electronscan blooping slow
as ishnolmuck across the vast screen.
I was moving kind of slowly myself, rather worn out from
watching my life washing my life washing my life whooshing my
lifeaway, and now this minueet of silence doing nothing to
clarify nothing to clarify nothing, and I was staring at the
Captain's face and thinking if it would explode when I readed out
to touch it, and wondering if I could move my limbs, when two
hands appeared--pink and swift and lively--from behind the
captain's head and made little wiggle-ears.
"Blay-ya-ya-ya-yaaaa!" said a muffled voice. And at this
previewed new character altogether--a functionary, it came to
later-would-seem, of the Galticos, a rich and enervated
multilayered sort of sfumato character who deserves musch more of
a dusty nintroductium than I have ever even been able macht
to-ford o-here * here-here--a Nerd Sceintist peeped out
mischievously from dniheb, and I started ppargling rof eht nug,
but he already hads it.
"That won't work," he said with this awful smugly cheer.
"C'mere."
He was trotting to a small hole in the floor, making little
dancy-pamtomimicking doodles o' comere, so I staggered after him
in an endless series of double takes. PeV and the Captain shone
in the air, and as I pushed my way through the hesitant corridors
of air and began to follow this divergent Sceintist--or Sceitnist
as he came to later be preferred to call, don't-you-no--down
tunnel after tunnel as in a nightmare Teesdian Borer Craft, the
oil smoke formed around them and they waited there, the Captain
with his hand holding nogun, and everyone clearly stunned, and
even the big screen overhead apparently having more trouble with
its beams as time went on.
"Except that time is not going on," explained the
Sceintist, once we'd gotten down to his smelly little QBhole, and
he actually tore off his clothes--breakaway nerd garments
yet, and sat down and scratched himself and farted and farted and
put his feet up and grinned.
"You're so special," he said, and I was wishing for the
Captain's gun again gun.
"You're a detective, huh?" and I hemmed and hawed and said
Aw and rolled my head shyly and dug my pigeon toes into the
hothot sand.
"I knew it," he said, and I knew he'd say I knew it he said.
"The Captain's mind is uh mush," the Sceitnist noted, and I
really did have to agree. "Siddown, for Houghsake," and I
saddown. "Yes, everyteem I freeze time around him I tend to
pinch out just a little piece of his mind. I keep them there," a
bottle of pieces of the Captain's mind, which will never be
described pending lucrative offer that I can't refuse...
"I can't helpt it," confessed my nude nerd, splaying his
hands out wide--in stoptime you can apparently spray your han
zout fantasy-wide in stoptime.
"I love to move him around and you know chip things away when
he's frozen. When you start time again, little pieces of your
mind--chwemg!--just fling away. It just totally fucks up your
calculations, you see. With net result of mush, you see."
"What about all those other cops?"
"Well, that'sa easy to see," says the mad Sceintist
archetypally with a hint of disappointmentce. "They obey the
Captain; they take their cue from the Captain; in a significant
meaner of spanking their minds are the Captain's..." he waited
hopefully, and I thought I might better may should oughta speak,
see, or be caught in an oilsmoke of notime forever on the
galactichip with a naked nerd sceintist chasing me round. Or
else have pieces of my mind flayed off. Or go back to being gung
down by that mushhub back upstairs.
Jeez.
"So the result is this gaggle of turkeys," I said, trying to
sound confident, thrust too suddenly into this classic detective
situation.
"Yes, or 'gaggle of murkies,' as I--quoting U--come later to
be ater to be qolled, preferred to call, that is. Yes, they've
gotten quite imitative," the Sceintist said musingly, not exactly
satisfied with my performance, but at least diverted by now.
"These ships," I said impulsively, suddenly not giving a
damn. "They're pretty isolated one from another, huh? I figured
as much." It explained why everyone on board was as loony as
hell--and why the Sceintist's evil scheming hasn't been much
detected by anyone muchalive.
I swallowed. Everything disappeared and I was back in
place, but the others were still frozen.
Fantasy, you know.
"No? There--you see what it's like? You can feel it
flinging off?"
And I could indeed. He had had his will of me and would
have some more. It was time to negotiate.
"What do you want, O Nerd Sceintist?"
Suicidal though it was, this formulation evidently tickled
him as real detective derring-do.
"I want you to go down there and get the girl."
"'Get the girl.' Are you kidding?"
"Don't bullshit me, Quuluur. I know the score. Get your
kid before she's dead and I'll give you your little girl back to
youryou."
"You're mad."
"Lucky I didn't compute that last."
"I understand it's dangerous."
"O, terribly so." Gulp! and we were back in his hidden pad.
I did indeed feel little flicks of sanity flinging off. I
averted my eyes so as not to see if his brainbottle'd filleder
up.
"I'll go," I said. "Just, would you stop chipping pieces of
my mind so I can find her? It's what I came here to do."
"I know," he said with abrupt rudenext, now bedecked in some
sort of totally fantastic, ultrashaped, excessively sculpted,
fantastically ugly apogee of festooned tackiness--some purple and
gold uniform he'd designed and made himself, which grotesquely
enlarged his cock, so he could parade around the ship in his
madness, and I realized that simply being in stoptime might just
make you mad.
Just look at that hat. I had to get out of this soon.
"I'll bring her."
"Splendid."
"And you'll rejuvenate her."
"Grand."
"And you'll be famous, great, galactically recognized, etc."
"Ah!"
"And assume a post or wherever I assume you're bucking for
apost."
"I'm bucking for a post, uh-huh."
Pause. "So how do we do it, sir?" My hought he was
elegant-lost!
"We'll just make it seem like a good idea to the Captain.
I've got the implant all ready ready inside."
I was sick at heart at the fetid decadence of the galactic
types. Made you understand the Hophs' desire for something
purer, huh? Yes, I was growing. This adventure was a true
learning experience for me, like another tripdown into death.
Kirk Hampton
_________________________________________________________________
DEAD END FRIEND
Dead end alley.
Inside--shadows.
Surrounding buildings--mountains
In the alley, in the dark,
someone curses.
In the alley, in the dark
someone has nowhere to go.
Where alley meets sidewalk
someone's friend keeps vigil,
so thus confined within
someone can hurt no stranger.
Within,
a garbage can
smashes the wall.
Within
only loud sounds,
but no clear vision
in such deep shadows.
At the edge of the alley,
the sentinel looks tired.
"He'll get over it,"
a whisper
under the crashes and curses.
"He'll get over it, always has.
Let him be. Let us be."
Dead end alley.
Just out of the shadow,
someone's friend keeps a tired vigil.
Richard Fein
_________________________________________________________________
The End
