MEMP’IS
BOOK
FIVE – “YOGA IS, as YOGA DOES”
(Wednesday,
January 6, 2035)
Norlin seethes all through the
underground West Node Mall passage to the Mag, gets
on, then off and kicks the omnipresent trashpiles on
his way to the Trouble Factory, hurrying to the elevator bank under lethal
glares, but no actual violence. A forest
of glastic buckets has sprouted across the breadth of
the atrium to catch tumbling water from hundreds, if not thousands of
leaks. An officer, unknown to Norlin, gives him an accidental-on-purpose shoulderblock at the door to the lift; other cops inside
stare; some make fanning motions as if he were a skunk, waddling through the
conservatory. When he enters C-Squad to
punch in, seven minutes late, an automated voice considerably less pleasant
than he remembers announces that sanctions for his fourth late clock in the pay
period will be eight and a quarter zeks. Eric Ice is
nowhere to be seen. Homer Sack,
processing papers, looks up and places a careful finger over his lip. Yawning, he stands up and formally offers a
hand.
"Corporal... good to see you back here. Plenty of work to be done. That strange little man, the one in the
yellow hat, he left a message that you should meet him at eleven hundred hours,
didn't say where. The van and driver
have been reserved in his name, to my authority... we sort of agreed that you
might stir up a little resistance if, you know.
Oh... and Germany stopped by, wants to see you at ten hundred hours..."
"Thanks,
Homes... gotta go through the motions, now... Norlin, present. Sack..."
"Present."
"Ice? Absent, th'
keb! Cattigan? Rimpaul Ranzany Lugosi... who the keb are
we foolin'?" he says, glaring up into one of the
surveillance cameras.
He
yanks open the door to the Frank-less refrigerator, hoping Ray's Wire boys
haven't thought to install another camera therein, and, by the light that
shines over the JatesBars and sandwiches and glastic bottles of Integral, uncrumples
the paper pressed into his hand and reads Sack's message: "Eric is going
to testify against you." Coughing,
he removes a bottle of 38 and returns to his desk, then removing that piece of
paper on which have been written the five names of his contribution to the
upcoming seminar at Stimwood.
Peg Reilly
Terushka
Batter
Philip Said
Lola
from Angola
Liz Sapoi
After
drawing a line through the name of his last informant, Norlin
adds that of Vona Rae Sletcher. Dialing from memory... and what a memory, so
degraded as to have these numbers
embedded in his psyche!... he activates the speaker
and, when a hesitant, elderly voice gives a tentative "hello", turns
on the charm...
"Peg? This is Norlin... Officer Norlin, from C-Squad? I've got good news. You will be picked up and chauffeured to Stimwood at around twelve hundred thirty hours. How's all the gang across the street..."
"Cold,"
Peg replies.
"McCoy?
Victor Iowa?"
"I'm
cold," Peg repeats.
"Well, I'll be sure the heater on that hydro's turned up...
way up," Norlin assures her. He calls the rest of his team again... their
memories are not so good, and accidents won't endear him to Henry Hat who, it
now seems, is just about his last hope.
He reads correspondence regarding larcenous truckdrivers
and pharmacists, WestAmerican spies and MexAmerican monkey-mutes planning violent revolution, sends
out the appropriate, Compliance-authorized replies to one and all, and leaves,
ten minutes early, for the morning's showdown with the Chief.
Germany
Smith's lair of Intelligence is a rustic simulation of a Bavarian lodge of some
previous century; ersatz logs ersatzly roasting in a
roaring, mock-Solar Furnace fireplace, flanked by a full library of volumes in
German and English (holographically simulated)... mountain
paintings of Alpenhorns, lederhosen and animal heads (some few even real)
blanket the wall. This fourth floor
corner office of the Trouble Factory has a partial view, through a rainy field
of downtown lozenges, of the Jatesaneum, which seems
to fascinate one of his guests... Captain Modesty's aide, Kruppe...
though not the other, a civilian.
"Norlin... this is Counselor
Bocke, from the Law Firm," Germany
introduces. "Bocke,
Corporal Norlin..."
"The
infamous Corporal Norlin,"
Bocke sneers.
"Give him a command and he sends out every Departmental LC to jack
off small boys..."
"What the keb..." Norlin starts.
"Bocke is referring to those two uniforms who failed Dr. Skark's test... oh..." the Chief of Intelligence's
face has become a mask of false astonishment, "...didn't you know? Bloodsugar far in
excess of permitted parameters, one... and the other, some sort of
painkiller... well, you've made the Law Firm happy, if nobody else, sending out
dopers to interact with the citizenry..."
"Not
merely countenancing, but abetting
lifestyle crime..." Bocke finishes.
"Quite so. But we are not here for recriminations over
the past... though that hour shall come, and soon..." Smith warns,
"...we are here to contemplate, plan and execute a bold stroke against the
criminal establishment that has so bloodied our noses, as of late..."
He
thumbs a clicker, and a PV emerges from a recess in the wall that, Norlin recognized long ago, is merely a sophisticated windowscreen composed of rows of illusory, leatherbound books on forensics, law and procedure instead
of a beach or desert.
"I
have had a chat with Henry Hat, you know.
Fascinating fellow... his experiences would make a fine peevee series... premium channel..." Germany Smith
distinguishes, "...but it's the fate of genius, sometimes, to have to go
round in this world, satisfied with making useful contributions while lesser
mortals reap the credit. Isn't that so, Norlin?"
"I've
nothing but respect for the Solar Commission," the Corporal replies.
"Good
man! Now... among the precepts Mr. Hat
advanced to me, and the reason for your being here is to verify such precepts,
or to dispute them... Mr. Hat has expressed to you, hasn't he, his convictions
of centrality - even to the extent of attributing many of our recent incidents
to a central intelligence? And while, for the record," and Germany
Smith rewards the lawyer with a significant nod, "we must disavow all of
Corporal Norlin's Said-derived intelligence, there are some diamonds in there, amongst the
filth. Isn't that so?"
"I'm
the last person you need seek value judgments from."
"Such
becoming... and deserved... modesty," the Chief laughs and winks at the
attorney. "Probably gleans it off
the Captain! Oh come on, Norlin... we're not being recorded for Compliance. Well, yes... we are... you did reiterate a
centrality inference in one of our dog-pimp's doctored editorials..."
"You're very confidence-inspiring..."
"I'll
take that as a compliment." Smith
yawns and stretches, contentedly, as if to give his visitor from the Law Firm
the illusion of great, dangerous cat, inspecting its own claws. "At any rate, based on transcripts you
have provided... howsoever inexpertly appended to yesterday's DR... and Henry
Hat's comments, we have arrived upon a course of action, Clive and I. With Clem Clarke's concurrence, Captain
Modesty has greenlighted an action that, I trust,
shall wrap up most... if not all... of these recent crimes, and net your fellow
Mondretto, too, if truly he does exist," the
Chief leers. "The Captain has even
authorized leasing of the Heisenberg Herd, the most especial detection swine in
all of the Americas. Not that we can
allow your presence after... well, I just felt I owed you an explanation. And, perhaps, once this matter is wrapped up,
tempers will subside and you might get out of here with some of your hide intact... that's all..." Germany Smith waves
a hand in dismissal, looking to the lawyer for some clue as to the sincerity of
the masque.
And,
there being nothing further to say, Norlin thanks his
Intelligence Chief with all due and proper obeisance,
and hastens away, satisfied that Henry Hat has revealed nothing to the brass,
concerning their extraordinary mission forthcoming.