MEMP’IS

BOOK TWO – “SUSPICIOUS MINDS”

(Wednesday, January 3, 2035)

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN – “STRANGER IN MY OWN HOME TOWN”

Norlin plods to the window, kills the screen and watches traffic until the pain in his head has subsided to a tolerable hum, then prepares and transmits a com to the Trouble Factory. He thumbs through a battered, black notebook - glancing at an address and number for Francine, the tour guide - shakes his head, dons his coat and takes the lozenge lift down to the sub-basement promenade leading to the West Node Mag, disembarking at South Node. Opposite the sinister, vacant Telecom lots, there... crawling with more small shadows than seemed usual... the Sunland Rest looms over a plain of uniformly spherical lozenges; institutions for the mad, the venially criminal, unwanted pets, the unwanted young and superfluous old. Norlin blows past Sunland's security station with his Trouble Factory ID, taking the elevator up to Tom Norlin's bed on Ward Eight. Taped to the front of the bed is a placard - "Sanctioned - Inappropriate Language. No Amenities until 13 Jan.!"

An old man, brown and yellow-spotted, wisps of white hair blowing across his forehead from the crosswind of floor and ceiling fans... despite the economical (if uncomfortable) setting on the HRI-licensed thermostat: seventeen degrees Celsius.

"Who... who are you?" Tom Norlin struggles to remember, rubbing a papery fist over three days' stubble. "Did you bring my juice?"

"It's me..."

"Oh..."

"I'm in a hurry. Workin'," his son grimaces. "Just wanted to tell you, I got my request into EABI, just before the thirty-first... they’ll have to send me your papers, I think..."

"My papers?"

"About that plot. You remember... with the fex, and foreigners?" Norlin prompts.

"I remember. Somethin' I... I don't remember..."

"It's late. We'll look over your papers when they come..."

"How's Reason?" the old man rallied. "How's my Jody..."

"Fine, Dad... just doin' fine, now. Gotta go! See you soon..."

Behind Tom Norlin's eyes, two troubled lamps sputter out. "Did you bring my juice?"

At the security desk, Norlin hands a Jean to the rent-a-cop.

"Get Tom Norlin his kebbin' juice when he asks for it. That too hard to accomplish?"

"He's sanctioned," the plump, officious young man replies. "Chart says that he called Herman West a cotton-pickin' poker cheat. We have zero tolerance for racial slurs..."

"I say - get him his juice." Norlin holds another Jean between his fingers, letting his jacket swing open to show his heater. "Don't... and it's your cotton I'll be pokin'..."

After the young man has taken his money, Norlin waits until he's gone to the machine, put a coin in, removed the HRI-approved JatesJuice box and started down the hall. Then he walks to the mag station and catches a hydrobus to the Hamorite Strip. He wades through the long ellipse of Abraham Northwest between Eighth and Ninth, a rutsome block of gamerooms, dirty bookstores, neon-sigiled "Soup Kitchens" and Integral 99 herbal bars towards the Prancing Pony, until intercepted by a quartet of mocksilk-jacketed, pigeon-claw necklaced Zeutrons... hair and ears cropped to an unnatural, mangled squareness.

"Spare a cigarette, Mister..." hisses the one with the cratered face - acne or, more likely, a remnant of one of the terrible poxes that had killed or mutilated so many infants in the decade after the K'ball.

"Against the law, citizen..." Norlin replies. Zeuts can be unpredictable. Some of them were simply out to beat up Nades, Jatesists or Hamorite perverts, sometimes... others feel an obligation to enforce that stricter version of the LC statutes nearer the purity as had decayed since the ascension of Triple-J. Sometimes, they swing either way, depending opportunity (and the presence, or absence, of witnesses).

"Law-abiding people don't belong on this street," swaggers the healthiest of the quartet, blond and freckled and nodding at the Pony, "...not in front of these joints."

"Spare a dime, spare a quarter?" reiterates the pockmarked moron, unsnapping a gravity knife that he almost drops in his fumbling, drooling haste. His three embarrassed companions edge slightly away. "Spare a quarter, spare yer water?"

Reaching into his jacket as if to produce a wallet, Norlin flashes his Trouble Factory ID, heater visible and within easy reach, in case the situation escalates.

"Hey... man... we're just tryin' to clean up," the Zeut with tight, dark Roman curls backs off - the one Norlin has paid most attention to, coiled like a spring, with something deadlier than a knife up his black, mocksilk sleeve. "This Strip you know..."

"Nuttin' but LCs," scoffs Blondie, "...needin' a little rectangulation, yannow?"

"Our job. You're cuttin' into our territory," Norlin reminds them, "...Chief John Crum wouldn't like it, you probably know John..."

"Dig..." agrees Curly, whose conversion to negotiator for the group confirms Norlin's suspicions that he's their leader, such as any could be. "We support the police. We'd join up if you'd take us, keep the Strip clean. Well, except for Wiggo..."

"Shaddup..." the cratered Zeut gripes but, after Norlin glares at him, he somehow puts the knife back in his pocket without sticking himself.

"Go down to the Government Center, fill out an application. Now get the keb outta my way, I got business," Norlin pushes past them, suddenly impatient, "... police business..."

The Zeuts melt away into the night, and Norlin weaves to his right, then left to avoid a wild-eyed street pamphleteer who bleats, after the retreating policeman: "The beauty of art-in-life must be replaced by the beauty of life!" and stalks up to the Prancing Pony, whose busty proprietress, Molly Tandem, kisses him at the door...

"My policeman!" Molly squeals.

"The lady on duty, tonight?" Norlin pushes her away,

"Go right in!"

Norlin knifes through the crowd, passing killgame stations, the PV and pool tables... an untouched complimentary herbal juice in his fist. He leans against a wall until canned music... old Elvis movie soundtrack songs... starts up and Smyrna Williams, wearing a white halter and spattered cotton panties... a tribute to topicality?... dances the Twist, the Monkey and the Clam before a sea of drooling, whistling males. Norlin closes his eyes and journeys to a better time and place.

At the door, Molly winks at her enormous tattooed bouncer, Oom Hijk...

"Comes in twice, three times a week, that keb..." shrugs the bouncer, "...never makes a move on Smyrna. Never kebbin' talked to her even, not that I seen..."

"Cops are funny..." Molly agrees.

"Don't like cops..."

It's a few minutes after 2300 hours when Norlin returns home to a blinking light on his autocom. He plays back his messages while removing his coat, then prepares and munches a sandwich from the leftover krajjit in his Frank-less fridge.

"Norlin, it's Rottwahl," says the first voice on the autocom. "You there? Pick up, kebbit! Alright... it's Cattigan, you can have me however you want, I'm at the Trouble Factory, doin' kebbin' overtime, thank you kindly. Call me."

There's a buzz, then another message. "Cattigan here, call me, it's k'ballin' important, kebbit! [BUZZ!] Norlin! Jezk'ball... call me, kebbit! We got 'im. Call me! An' what's this intel about mass murder in the City tomorrow... who's your kebbin' informant? What murders? Call me! [BUZZ!] Keb you, Norlin! You don't want to talk, turn on the PV and see for yourself! We're all pullin' overtime... Cap'n Modesty don't know whether to kiss you or fire your kebbin' ass. Oh... and Eric called, says he'll pay you to get him those panties back from Blue City..."

Then there are no more messages. Rather than calling Cattigan, Norlin clicks on the PV to the Nite News with smirking Mr. Simple...

"Back again Jatesland, Simple here and... at the bottom of the hour... we wrap up the Nite News with a dramatic and violent conclusion to events in Blue City, as reported on our Evening News, only hours ago. With a preview of the Paul Parchette Show, Mr. Night's nite advice, sports and weather... but, first, Honey Markell with an Action Preview in Blue City..."

Norlin settles back on his couch while, on the PV, a mixed bag of Jatesland and Blue City cops surround a handcuffed Pearson on his front porch while, in the background, Chief John Crum and Clem Clarke, Detective are shown, locked in an apparently heated discussion...

"In a stunning conclusion to the fex burglary at the home of Professor Grover Pearson, as reported on the Evening News," Honey reminds her audience, "the burglar apparently returned to the scene of his crime here in Blue City to steal a pair of panties with bloodstains believed to be in the image of the King and, during commission of this crime, lost his life. Let's talk to the police!"

John Crum swats away the KJAD microphone...

"No comment!"

"Jatesland police have been refusing comment all evening," pants the newslady, "...but we found Blue City officers willing, even eager, to talk. Officer Meza al-Shahiri... can you tell us what transpired here, this evening..."

"Honey," wheedles the local... something about him reminding Norlin of that leader of the Zeuts who'd expressed such interest in the law, "...at approximately nineteen hundred thirty hours, a routine search of the premises revealed the body of a well-nourished male, forty to fifty years of age, lying dead in the library of this house, shot through the throat with an arrow..." al-Shahiri points.

"Shafted! How horrible!"

"Yes," commiserates Meza al-Shahiri, "...yes - it is, Honey. Horrible! Thinking chronologically must be, evidently, not the same as thinking concentrically! The deceased has tentatively been identified as Igor Topple, a long-time loser with a lengthy criminal record..."

"No loss to Barataria, then." Honey wheezes. "Back to our studio..."

"No loss at all!" Mr. Simple gloats. "But Professor Pearson has been arrested, all the same, and he's been taken to the Courts of Flow for processing. We go, now, to on-the-scene-reporter Spitta Stennett who's with Tate Drummond, of the Law Firm. Spitta?"

"I'm here!" Spitta's a gasping, bug-eyed harpy in a light green shift and a litter of wooden bracelets - Drummond is an empty suit. "Counselor Drummond... as legal representative for Professor Grover Pearson, what do you make of this situation..."

"It's an open-and-shut case of self-defense," the lawyer primps. "My client defended his home and property to the best of his capacities, only to be set up by shadowy elements at the City Council, Trouble Factory and Jatesaneum... Martian fiends, whose sole objective is to persecute Professor Pearson for his views, not deeds, as manifested through the corpus of his labors..."

"Shocking! And what are these views of the persecuted Professor Pearson?

"Why, Spitta... his advocacy of the Venusian calendar, of course. And its implications for the Jatesish patriarchy which has, in two short decades, set the status of women back to its lowest ebb since the Middle Ages. Under Mars... not only a militaristic, but homoerotic and, dare I say, pedophiliac aspect," Tate Drummond confides, "...we've witnessed the disappearance of women from our culture, workplaces and government. Even their right to vote's been called into question. Under Venus, Spitta, someone like you would anchor at KJAD, not that simpleton Simple. Light is not mean!"

"Thoughts to think about," Spitta simpers. "Back to you!"

Mr. Simple winces from the safety of his studio.

"Ouch! A lawyer with a big mouth and universal truth, incumbent, in his corner. We'll see what the Courts of Flux and Flow have to say... on tomorrow's Evening News at 1800 and Nite News at 2300. And if you tune in to Spitta... or Honey... sitting in this chair, you'll know how low the Courts of Flow are blowing. Speaking of social and genetic inferiors catch Paul Parchette's show after these important messages..."

And, as the PV explodes in a fiesta of popups and crawling solicitations... all subliminal, none legible... Norlin pushes himself up, off the couch, and meanders into the head. He takes a whiz, flushes... an automatic voice replies...

"Evacuation and elimination recorded at 2328 hours, contents analyzed, composition to be forwarded to Jatesland Internal Security. Say "Yes" to print a copy for your own records."

"Jateshole!" Norlin curses his toilet.

"Reply not recognized. Document has been recorded, not printed. Thank you for your transaction...

"Kebbin' smart fexxer!"

Norlin returns to his couch, beholding the undeniably simian-spliced Paul Parchette in his blue ruffled shirt and white tux, already streaked with fallen hair and tiny, pale crawling things (like mobile grains of rice), grimacing for his audience...

"...so Pearson, the Green Arrow, has Venus in his pocket, Triple-J's faithful want out in a rocket docket to Martian time, I'm asking: Hey! Who's lookin' out for us on Earth? But hey... I'm just a monkey..."

And, to prove this, he plucks one of the grubs from his sleeve and pops it into his mouth - and that's when Norlin clicks off the PV and trudges off to the smartbed in abject and weary accord with Jatesland law.

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