My son—whatever you do, do it well. If you can help it, don’t die in a submarine in the middle of the ocean.
Love,
Your Papa
Fillono went on to explain that Lars was with his grandparents in Innsbruck, Austria when he received the news. He was ten years old and those were the last words he would receive from his dad. The resort was left to him, but he didn’t want it. On his eighteenth birthday, he sold his half to Fillono’s uncle and used the funds to eventually go on deep-sea explorations in the south Pacific, to find his dad and his submarine at the bottom of the ocean. He continues his search to this day.
THE GONDOLA descended down the mountain and hovered over the main street of the town, which was alive with activity. People sat at cafes and chitchatted or read novels; some folks strolled about the streets or lounged on the grass, enjoying the crisp air and mountain breeze.
It reminded me of a college campus in late spring, where the mood is light and the excitement of the coming summer break looms.
Me and my thoughts floated like the clouds in the sky—just passing through, no mal intent.
A steady electric buzzing began to permeate the gondola cabin. At first, I dismissed it as a fly that might’ve breezed in, but as the intensity swelled, the buzzing—along with a white-noise accompaniment—droned from within my own skull. I flashed back to the last night I saw Fillono at the camp in the park years ago. It was the same sound.
Fillono didn’t hear it, or he pretended not to, for he was smiling and whistling “o sole mio” and gazing down upon his wondrous utopian town.
I cleared my throat. “Fred, do you happen to recall the last night we saw one another? That night Moroni’s company was disbanded?”
Fillono stopped whistling and scratched his chin. “Like a dream I remember. It was all-a- … surreal. I have tried to organize and edit together my-a-thoughts of that time…. I can remember fog, smoke, chaos, and destruction, and then—nothing. Like-a-the dentist when he knocks you out…. Then waking up…. So strange, so strange.”
“Yeah, strange is right. Then waking up where?”
“I cannot explain it Eddie. Like I was-a-taken by aliens and dropped off somewhere far away.”
“Oh yeah? Where?”
“Eddie, you won’t-a-believe me…. I woke up in an Air Force base in the state of Nevada.”
“And you have no clue how you got there?”
“None that I can remember. But the nice man—he was called Colonel Parley West and he told me all about it.”
Here is the story Col. West told Fillono:
The Los Angeles Fire Department was called to respond to a fire in Griffith Park, where a bunch of vagrants, riffraff and general outcasts were having a rally of sorts. L.A.P.D. got called in because most of the bums were drunk and delirious and had no idea what was going on—and they were uncooperative with the Fire Department’s commands to get the hell out of there so they could fight the damn fire.
Some of the emergency personnel noted heavy pupil dilation with all of the vagrants, and suspected psychotropic drugs. The police officers went in and used any means necessary to get everyone out of the danger area, which was burning harder by the minute. Many of the vagrants passed out due to smoke inhalation, heat exhaustion, intoxication and general fatigue.
Fillono was taken to one of the general hospitals, and he was recognized by one of the ER doctors on duty that night. He had remembered Fillono from when he was a kid: he and his family would ski at the Fillono resort. The young Fred Fillono would shoot home movies of the family and give them Italian sodas. His name was Dr. Percy West and his older brother was in the military and had trained at the same resort—this was Col. Parley West. The good Doctor noted the transient state Fillono was in, and placed a call to his brother. The fine Colonel personally had Fillono airlifted to the base in Nevada.
The next day, that is where Fillono woke up.
Outlandish, I thought.
Fillono thought so also. “But the Colonel, he-a-insisted that he owed a debt that can never fully be-a-repaid to my uncle Gaetano. He never tell me what it was. So Eddie—it is unbelievable, but that is the case. He cleaned and sobered me up, put-a-money into my bank account, and told me that he had a business proposition….”
I guessed that the business proposition was the experimental town and Academy that I was hovering above.
“Yes, Eddie—he is also a very philosophical man, very scientific man, a visionary man…. He had-a-ideas for ‘operational rational cultivation centers’—places that would act as academy, community and recreation townships as well as a military base. Like-a-the city-states of old. Of course, the perfect-a-test-ground would be this old ski resort I had inherited. So he met with big-shot money investor people from around the world and here we are!”
The gondola made its ascent up the next mountain as I chewed on this data, reckoning how I had fit into all this.
“YOU DIDN’T believe him, did you?”
I’m back on the Lay-Z-Boy, answering the Interrogator. “Not really.”
“Why not?”
“First, the story itself made no sense. An ER doctor in L.A. who recognizes a passed out transient, calls his visionary Colonel brother with a heart of gold who immediately jumps into action that same night and flies Fillono to Nevada, then goes into business with him? That’s some flimsy writing. No—it’s not that I don’t believe the story—I can’t believe Fillono believes it.”
“How do you mean?”
“The Fillono I remember trusted no one off-hand. I always got the impression he was avoiding people like Colonel West.”
“People change.”
“Yeah—but their past doesn’t.”
“What do you mean?”
I almost answer, but I refrain. I’ve received a flash of incite with the Interrogator’s questioning: he’s bantering more this round … he’s either attempting to get me to buy the Fillono story hook, line and sinker or he’s testing my own memory of the events to see if I remember more than I am letting on.
Or he’s trying to get the real story from me so he can write a more accurate Fillono history.
My paranoia level is high because I don’t know who this Interrogator is or what he wants and what is at stake. A gut-hunch says he’s tying up loose ends. Attempting to make this interrogation seem like a hypnosis session; that “we” are trying to psychoanalytically get to the core of my “issues.”
“Mr. Bikaver, are you still here?”
“Yes.”
“You said a person’s past does not change.”
“I mean that a person’s past stays the same.”
The Interrogator is attempting to make sense of why I would say something so obvious. Fillono had alluded to a different set of circumstances to his own history there on the gondola than ones that I was remembering, for a few details were coming back to me at that moment. I knew, and still know these recalled details and what Fillono was telling me were in contradiction to one another:
1. Fillono was never broke. He was never a bum—he was well heeled the entire time while gallivanting around with our vagrant art band. His was a pedigree of modest Italian wealth via interests in various wineries, Italian soda, and radio stations the Fillono family had owned since the early 1900s. In 1993 he read Kerouac’ s On the Road and was so inspired he decided to roam about the United States and make a “cinematic homage” to Mr. Kerouac. He tried to “rough it” as much as possible, but I recall he had bailed us all out financially on a few occasions when money for us had been really tight. As a matter of fact, he was the guy who sponsored Moroni’s “theatrical” system of lights, amps, P.A.s, etc.
2. Fillono was never a drunk. I never saw him drink more than 2 glasses of wine at any time, and it was rare to see him drink that. He was a disciplined and focused filmmaker. He never needed to “sober up” because he was always sober anyway.
“You feel skeptical that Fillono either intentionally or unintentionally misrepre
sented his past? For what purpose, Mr. Bikaver?”
The question of “for what purpose” had been nagging at my insides for a while now. Why would anyone think they could change or rewrite the past? It already happened. It’s finished.
But here we were, and I thought back to Agent W’s spiel to Art B. Well, the radio host, about an operation that was in fact trying to do just that. Do they really change the past or just our perception of it? Was this Interrogator asshole trying to get into my head to change my memories? To make void my past?
“I’m not sure,” I answer, both his question and mine.
THE GONDOLA pulled into the bay atop Marconi Peak and we disembarked. The late afternoon breeze whispered cool reminders of the night’s approach as the sun headed down. We walked over to a large three-story lodge where the few people lounging on the deck waved at Fillono.
“This is a more tranquil peak and lodge. Mostly-a-writers, painters or people who just want peace and quiet stay here. Also our library/rental shop is here. I thought you would-a-like it.”
“Looks nice.”
He pointed out the modest library along with a cafe and a mini ski-shop housing a cute young woman who read a book about cryptography. “This is Lisa. She is the caretaker and librarian of the Marconi Lodge and Library. Lisa, this is the writer Edward Bikaver, Jr. He will be-a-staying here for a bit.”
Lisa smiled a courteous one and nodded as we exchanged a polite handshake.
“A Farewell Letter from a Sentient Artificial Intelligence System to the Human Race—I liked that story. It had heart,” she quipped.
I was impressed that she had heard of me, and was more impressed that she was unimpressed by me: that meant she knew good writing, or at least didn’t care to know bad writing—which was most of my writing.
I stood there—a complete schmuck. “Oh. Thanks. Yeah….”
“Nice meeting you. See you around.” She resumed reading her cryptography book.
“Yeah—you too.”
We walked over to a staircase and climbed up.
Fillono unlocked the door and we entered my quarters: a cottage-style suite on the third story of this large log-cabin ski lodge. Cozy and comfortable, big but not preposterous and outside rested a patio-deck with a Jacuzzi overlooking the mountains. Fillono gave me the brief tour: kitchenette, bathroom, lounge area with a TV and fireplace, and the bedroom. Wooden, simple and classy.
The afternoon’s light was quickly turning into evening’s darkness, and an orange-purple hue commandeered the sky with a golden overlay: the quality was quite hallucinatory. Fillono made a few cups of cappuccino with a loud machine in the kitchen, and we went and sat out on the deck and sipped.
I kicked back. “So that’s it. You woke up and found yourself Dean and Mayor of Utopia in the Colorado Rockies.”
“Yes, Eddie. You know, the Designer he works in-a-crazy ways….” He breathed and sipped his cup. “Eh, so what happened to you?
“I don’t know. I think I woke up in some sort of hospital or something. Everything was foggy. They pilled me up on some strong meds for a while. Nothing made sense.”
Fillono sipped and listened. “Ah, yes Eddie—many things they-a-don’t make sense. We edit it together and make it the story so it will have-a-some kind of sense to us, even if it is all nonsense.”
I thought about the word “nonsense,” which prompted me to think about Froward Moroni—the madcap ringleader of the company of the carefree willing rogues, also known as the Free-Thought-and-Will Champions. “What about Moroni, whatever happened to him?”
Fillono sighed and pondered.
A little blue jay landed on the railing and scoped for potential crumbs.
Fillono tore off a tiny piece of his croissant and waited for the bird to approach. “The franchiser of the disenfranchised … the giver of-a-voice to the voiceless … the great re-treader. I was going to call my film about our artistic adventures ‘On the Road with Retreads,’ but the fire destroyed all my-a-film. Sad. He was a nice man … many of the people in the group were-a-wildflowers, with no past they wanted, no place society would embrace them, and nothing to-a-look forward to. Moroni pointed them to-a-something, and gave them—us—a place to belong. I am glad for-a-the man to have been in my life.” The bird nipped a bit of the bread from Fillono’s fingers and flew off.
“I had the same take, but I recall having a sense of unease about him that last night … as though we had all gotten taken by a con-man or cult leader,” I said.
Fillono nodded as he mulled over my statement. “Yes Eddie, maybe he was-a-tricking us. But for what? For money, from a bunch of artists and-a-bums? He took nothing from me, I never signed anything with him, and we were free to leave if we-a-wanted. I think the reason you-a-think that is because he did not produce any tangible work that you could-a-touch, or read or view like a play or poem or music. He was a composer of people, of us—we were his notes, his actors, his paintings. He-a-produced us and the whole thing was like a living, continuous piece of art that itself produced life and art. He-a-manipulated us maybe like I manipulate an actress to show a certain emotion for a scene in a movie I make. He conducted us to show our potential. For that, I am-a-glad. Now Eddie, I am not a complete idiot: what were his motivations, his-a-large-scale intentions? Those I cannot know because I have not-a-seen him or-a-heard from him since that night. Imagination can go anywhere about what he was-a-doing, because one thing is certain: he was a mastermind.”
The blue jay returned for a second helping. Fillono held out another piece. This time the bird approached with confidence and bravado.
I concurred with Fillono’s assessment: nothing could be proven about Moroni’s intentions. I went off gut-hunches all my life and that got me rot-gut drunk and nowhere most of the time.
But the itch wouldn’t go away: Moroni was a mastermind and did have some intention and I knew it was big. My own notes pertaining to the man featured words such as “subversion,” “funny business,” “rebellion,” deception,” “revolution,” “the galactic hornswoggle” and “the system” used in association with him. His intent was clear to me and that was this: to subvert THE SYSTEM.
Which system I didn’t know.
“And he vanished like a phantom,” I said.
Fillono nodded and gazed into his cup. “I tried to locate him a few times. Theories abounded: he was a communist operative from-a-the former Soviet Union, he was a CIA ‘change agent’, he was a Vatican assassin, he was-a-from the future, an alien, or he didn’t exist—that he was a ‘shared memory’ implant. That is what the poor souls in the asylums and skid rows told me when I asked about him. Sad.”
The blue jay took off and I closed my eyes and relaxed. A gentle wind brushed through me and I shivered.
We sat and sipped our drinks in silence for a bit as the sun set.
“Eddie, you-a-relax. I must go and teach a class. Later maybe we-a-get dinner. We catch up more, yes?” Fillono finished his cappuccino.
“Of course, yeah Fred. Thanks. This is a great place.”
We stood up and shook hands.
“Moroni as an alien. That’s a good one,” I said.
Fillono winked. “Ciao. I will-a-call you in a few hours.”
With that, he walked back into my room and then exited from the place. I sat back down and marveled how fast it had gotten dark.
“SPEAKING OF aliens, I recently learned that the pronunciation of ‘inalienable’ is not ‘in’-‘alien’-‘able’, it is ‘in’-‘a’-‘lien’-‘able’.” A voice with the confidence of a game show host cut through the lean air.
From the shadows appeared a large-grinned, glint-eyed sturdy man in dark military fatigues, rappelling down from the sky onto the deck. His name-patch read: Col. P. West. The very man Fillono had gone into business with. I could’ve sworn I had seen and met this man before, but when and where?
He landed and stood before me as casually as though he didn’t just come from the sky. He unclipped his harness and se
ated himself at the table and continued his spiel: “…the term has to do with ‘liens’, not aliens, so when we say we have ‘inalienable’ rights it means no one can put a lien on anyone else’s inherent rights. In-alien-able would work, though, for I see it as we all have rights that cannot be made ‘alienable’, or alienated from us. So this would be like a heteronym—same spelling, different meanings, different pronunciations—but could still connote a loosely similar concept. Fascinating, eh…? Are you cold? Should I turn the AC down?”
My eyes transfixed on what was just moments prior the dark outline of the top of the mountain beneath the starry night sky but was now a painting of that same mountain beneath the same starry sky, a painting which hung on the wall behind where Col. West sat, which was behind a desk inside what was apparently his office….
I felt a million miles away from my prior location, as though I had been raptured from the Rocky Mountains to wherever this office was in the twinkling of an eye.
What the hell just happened?
Col. West stood and approached me. He snapped his fingers a few times in front of my face. “You with me, Bikaver? You zoning out on that painting or what?”
My reflection stared back at me in his mirrored sunglasses. “Where is Fillono? Where the hell am I?”
“Oh—you were there again. Must’ve been the painting. Buddy, you are in my facility, having another episode. Can I get you something?”
“Uh, yeah. I could use some water.”
West snapped his fingers and pointed them at me like a pair of six-shooters. “You got it.”
He walked to his mini wet-bar across from the couch, where he sat and whistled while pouring a glass of water. He poured himself a glass of ginger ale and high-shelf Scotch over a few ice cubes.
For reasons I cannot comprehend I wondered if the good Col. had ever snorted cocaine in the back of a cab on his way to a Tijuana whorehouse, taken peyote, or ever passed out in a gutter. I attempted to imagine him—this man with precise hair, pressed military get-up, shiny teeth and happy-go-lucky “awe-shucks” disposition—in any “compromising” situation. I couldn’t, so I filed it into one of those “blind spots” of the imagination, like fathoming your own parents screwing. I’m certain he could never envision me putting a knife into an enemy combatant’s chest or repelling from a helicopter into a hot war-zone.
Planet Fever Page 11
