So we were all stunned when Karen told us she was going with Molière to Ickieville. Molière said that two other humans were also planning to go. I couldn’t figure Molière and Karen going: they seemed to love life here on Earth.
“Actually,” Molière says, “I’m on a recruiting mission. I’m going to invite some new Ickies to come back with me to Earth. We’ve had a lot of player casualties lately.”
“Karen part of your sales pitch?” says I.
“No,” says Molière after a short laugh. “Ickies will find Karen stupid, ugly, and limited. You have to be on Earth a while before you can see gold in the general sludge.”
“I’m pregnant,” Karen says out of the blue, eyes glowing happily.
There was a long silence, unless you count the twenty-three different bits of music blasting away at various decibels all around us.
The natural question was, who was the papa? Could FFs impregnate humans? The New York Times science section has assured its readers on at least two occasions that it wasn’t possible.
“Is it Molière’s child?” Lita asks.
“We think it is,” says Karen, smiling at Molière, then at Lita.
“Impossible,” says the Sheriff.
“Don’t be too sure, Jerry,” says I. “FFs tend to know a lot more than we do.”
“You’re telling us,” says the Sheriff, turning to Molière, “that you think you made a kid with this lady?”
“I know I’m more the father than anyone else,” says Molière. A bit ambiguous it seemed to me.
Lucas suddenly stood up and looked away from the fire into the darkness.
“He’s here again!”
Who should emerge from the shadows but Agent Mike Johnson. It was getting to be like a family reunion. Mike nodded at me and Lita, and stopped just behind Louie on the other side of the fire.
“Nothing to be afraid of from me, Lucas,” he says to my son. “You folks mind if I join you?”
“You planning to arrest us or drink with us?” I ask.
“I’d like to drink with you.”
“So what are you doing here?” says I.
“I’m no longer working for Unit A,” says Mike, squatting near the fire beside Lucas. “I’ve been fired. My boss didn’t appreciate my calling him insane and getting him locked up in a psychiatric clinic for ten days.”
“Bosses tend to be picky about things like that,” says I. “You want beer, bourbon, or ridiculously expensive French wine?”
“I’d love to join you in bourbon, Billy.”
As Mike accepts our flask of bourbon from Jerry, Molière bounces up from beside Karen to Mike’s side.
“Mike is joining the FFs going back to Ickie,” he says.
Just one bombshell after another these days.
“What’s that all about?” asks Lita.
“I find myself looking for a better universe,” says Mike.
“And why is that?”
“Because of the killing on Park Avenue yesterday,” says Mike. “Because of that nuclear explosion that killed a lot of innocent creatures. And because of this coming week.”
“What’s happening this coming week?” asks Lita.
Mike took a good swig from the flask, looked a long time at Lita, then at me.
“SWAT teams from throughout the country, National Guard units from New York and New Jersey, two companies of Special Forces, a regiment of the US Tank Corps, and the Navy destroyer Arnold Schwarzenegger, are all about to implement a plan developed by the DOD to end the occupation of Central Park. D-Day is Tuesday morning at four A.M.”
Silence.
Of course, we all knew that something like this was in our future, but hadn’t had any desire to actually think about it.
“Do your guys realize that the NRA will fight?” says Jerry. “And have over two thousand weapons?”
“They’re not my guys anymore,” says Mike. “And yes, they know it. And they’re glad the NRA will fight. They plan to make sure everyone knows that the Central Park Nation went to war with the United States Government. And of course you’ll lose.”
“We’ve got to get the NRA to lay down their guns,” says Lita.
“They—we won’t do it,” says Jerry.
“Then we’ll have to get them to leave,” says Lita. “As long as they’re among us and wanting to fight, hundreds of innocent people will get killed.”
“Thousands,” says Molière.
“I’m an NRA member and proud of it,” says Jerry. “And it’s not our fault. We’re just hacking around in the park like the rest of you. It’s the government that’s starting it.”
“That’s right,” says Louie. “But shooting to kill is not hacking around.”
Silence.
“Why don’t you and the sheriff go talk to their leadership, Billy,” says Molière. “Let them know how we feel about it. See if they won’t agree to march out of the park tomorrow, flags flying, without dishonor.”
“We should get out too, Billy,” says Lita.
“What are you—?”
“I’m not letting Jimmy and Lucas be subjected a second time to so much danger. I want them to leave. I want you to leave. Enough is enough.”
“Sweetheart,” I says, always tending to use that word when I’m entering into an argument with Lita I know I’m going to lose, “we can’t desert all our friends here.”
“I’m not sacrificing my sons for my friends. We’re going.”
“There’s something else you should know, Lita,” says Jerry. “Something I probably should have told you both when it happened.”
He stands up. We all look at him.
“Two weeks ago I got a visit from a guy who claimed to be an FBI agent—showed me identification and all—who wanted to know if you kept guns in your house. I figured they were planning an arrest and wanted to know if they’d be in any danger. I told him that far as I knew you just had an old deer rifle you hadn’t used in years. He looked disappointed.”
The sheriff spit into the fire.
“Then he said something that chilled me to the bone. He asked if it might be possible if I, as your friend, might get you to go do some target practice shooting.”
He looked around at us all to see if any of us were getting his drift.
“Billy,” he says. “They want you to have your rifle out of storage, in your house, and recently fired. Can you think why?”
“They want to have an excuse to shoot him,” says Lita, always a lot sharper than anyone else.
Jerry looked at me to see if I got it too. I did.
“You’d be in danger if you left the park with the NRA guys,” he says. “In fact, you’ll be in danger until—”
“Until I’m dead,” I says, sighing. I smiled. “But then I can relax.”
Lita moaned and slid a few inches down the tent.
“Is there no end, O Lord?” she says, eyes closed.
“You know,” I finally say to Louie across the fire from me, “me and my boys almost got killed. Hundreds of people did get killed. My two boys got gassed and shot at. Mike here says the Feds are going to assassinate me. Are all Fun-Ins like this?”
“Human life is like this, Billy,” says Louie.
“The deaths weren’t caused by any of the people joining in the Fun-In, Billy,” says Molière. “The deaths are caused by people who are serious, people who feel they have important purposes to fulfill, feel they have Answers. People doing things for the fun of it don’t kill.”
“And despite the deaths,” says Gibberish, “there are nine hundred and thirty-two thousand eight hundred and sixty-six people in this park tonight. Do you get the impression that they think their lives are worse for being here?”
I looked around at the campfires and listened to the music and saw people dancing around two of the fires. Not too many people seemed to be feeling too bad about things.
“People seem happy enough right now, Louie, but how are they going to feel when the tanks move in and the explos
ions start and more of us die?”
“They’re going to feel horrible,” says Louie.
“I’m too old for this shit, Louie.”
“No, Billy, you’re not. You joined the march, you confronted the police, you ran when you had to, and now you’re here, and I think in a half hour you’ll go with Sheriff Coombs and try to get the NRA leadership to agree to leave the park and avoid a blood bath for all of us. I noticed you weren’t too enthusiastic when Lita talked to you about leaving.”
“Well, that may be tr—”
“I now think we should stay,” says Lita. “We’re safer here with several hundred thousand friends than we would be out there.”
“I don’t like seeing more deaths,” says I.
“Don’t waste your time worrying about dozens of deaths here,” says Gibberish. “Worry about the hundreds of thousands of humans and other living things that are dying unnecessarily all around the world every day because of the insane system you humans have created.”
“And don’t forget about all the Fun-Ins in cities all over the world,” says Molière. “They’re calling us the Central Park Nation. They’re looking to us to lead.”
“We have to go,” says Louie suddenly. He, Molière, LT, and Gibberish roll a couple of feet away. “There’s a big meeting of a few FFs with your leaders in the zoo building to decide what we’re going to do tomorrow.”
“What are the options?” asks Lita.
“Some want us to stay here for as long as we can, others want all of us to march out of the park down Fifth Avenue to Battery Park, gathering more people as we go, but also some of us slipping away home. Then some of us would occupy Battery Park for as long as we can.”
Lucas leapt up.
“Can I come?!”
“Sure,” says LT.
“Go, Lucas,” says Lita, “and tell them what you think should be done.”
“And you, Billy,” says Louie, “should go with Sheriff Coombs and talk to the NRA. If anyone can make them see that they should leave, it’s you.”
With my usual groan I managed to struggle to my feet.
“Never thought of myself as a pacifist,” I said.
“Baloney,” says Baloney suddenly appearing from wherever he’d been for the last four hours.
“You don’t even know what we’re talking about,” Karen says to him.
“Makes no difference. Baloney.”
The four FFs with Lucas in tow, begin to move off.
Lucas stops and turns to look back at us.
“We’re going to be all right, Mom,” he says.
“Baloney,” says Baloney.
“You’re too optimistic, Lucas,” says I.
“Baloney,” says Baloney.
BOOK TWO
THE HAIRY BALLS
AND THE END
OF CIVILIZATION
WILL BE AVAILABLE SHORTLY.
LOOK FOR IT AT YOUR LOCAL TAVERN.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Without the time, effort, critical skills and support of Paul Lucas, Robert Bosler, Rob Wringham, and Steven May this novel would be a weak echo of what they helped it become. Much much thanks.
ALSO AVAILABLE FROM TITAN BOOKS
HACK
Kieran Crowley
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NARCISSISM.
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It’s a dog-eat-dog world at the infamous tabloid the New York Mail, where brand new pet columnist F.X. Shepherd accidentally finds himself on the trail of The Hacker, a serial killer targeting unpleasant celebrities in inventive—and sometimes decorative—ways. And it’s only his second day on the job. Luckily Shepherd has hidden talents, not to mention a hidden agenda. But as bodies and suspects accumulate, he finds himself running afoul of cutthroat office politics, the NYPD, and Ginny Mac, an attractive but ruthless reporter for a competing newspaper. And when Shepherd himself is contacted by The Hacker, he realizes he may be next on the killer’s list…
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