Maureen Birnbaum, Barbarian Swordperson

by George Alec Effinger

  "Hey!" I go. "like what does that mean? It sounds like you're bailing out on me now."

  He shook his head. "No, I won't abandon you. There is but one more room, and one more monster to battle."

  "The Nightmare Critter. And the Treasure Beyond Counting."

  "Yes," he goes. "Few heroes make it even this far. Even fewer make it beyond that final confrontation. I believe you are well prepared, Maureen. You are brave, true, and strong. You are fearless, cunning, and steadfast. You are shrewd, bold, and vital. You are clever, daring, and generous. You are undaunted, tenacious, ana-—"

  All right, Bitsy, all right! That's what he said, can I help it? He also told me that I was the Platonic ideal of all womanly virtues. Who am I to argue with a spiritual being? So he goes, "I have every expectation that you will triumph. Good luck, and may God bless."

  Then, believe it or not, he shook my hand. I took a deep breath, turned away, and went down the stairs into the Den of the Nightmare Critter. It was the biggest room I'd seen yet, so huge that even after I cast the Spell of light I couldn't see the far corners or the ceiling. And, wow, did it echo! It smelled awful, too, like all the abandoned tires in the world were stacked up in the shadows and they were burning.

  There were two things I didn't see. One was the Nightmare Critter, and the other was, you know, the Treasure Beyond Counting.

  I turned back toward Glorian. "Say, pal," I go, "where the hell is this—"

  It was the phenomenally deafening roar that gave me my first clue. I spun around again, and like at first I still didn't see the monster. Then I did. It was a dragon. It was blue and sparkly. And it was about the size of your average collie.

  "Huh?" I go. Okay, not me at my most eloquent, I'll admit. It seemed appropriate at the time. The dragon was sparkly because it appeared to be made out of cobalt blue glass. It would've been kind of cute if it weren't roaring and blasting fire and smoke at me. The fire was very real, and there was a lot more of it than you'd think a doggie-sized dragon could produce.

  I started at the top, with the Wand of Fireballs, which I emptied into the Nightmare Critter without so much as making it flinch. I tried absolutely everything else at my command, including the Spell of light in case it was, whatyoucall, nocturnal or something. I may as well have been reciting the Pledge of Allegiance for all the good it did. Finally, all I had left was Old Betsy, but that was good enough for me.

  I waded into that dragon with all my might. I hacked and hewed and slashed and chopped and cut for what seemed like hours, and I didn't make Dent One in the dragon's glass hide. In the meantime, it was crisping me up pretty good, even though I was wearing Fire-Resistant Armor. I had to dash back out of range now and then to slap at my smoldering boots and gloves.

  Glorian goes, "None of the spells you know can defeat this creature, Maureen, even in concert. In any event, you are out of Hex Points."

  "Now you tell me," I go.

  "And the dragon is completely impervious to your swordplay."

  "Now you tell me. Say, why don't you give me some help, for a change?"

  His voice gets kind of sad "Even if I were allowed, I am powerless against blue glass. And if the dragon kills you now, I won't be able to restore you."

  Suddenly, I felt just the least bit, you know, like doomed.

  Glorian goes, "You should've saved before you entered this room."

  "Now you tell me. Got any like useful hints, pal?"

  "Yes. Fortunately, you once had in your possession the single weapon that can destroy this monster, but you chose to drop it."

  I thought hard, even while the Nightmare Critter was moving up on me, shrieking and fuming and bellowing and blasting me with fire. I realized that I had been slowly retreating, and I was almost pinned against the wall. "That scroll! The Scroll of Glass Breaking, the one that appeared .when I killed the Invisible Gooey Thing."

  "You'll have to find it, Maureen."

  The goddamn scroll was all the way up on the first or second level. I started edging toward the door, and the blue glass dragon followed, shooting flames at me the whole time. I made it out of the chamber and started up the stairs. The dragon kept pace. I retraced my steps through all the rooms, up all the staircases, and one by one my Hit Points were dwindling. It was like omigod! am I going to make it in time, or will I die the Real Death down here? And then nobody, not even my best friend Bitsy Spiegelman will ever know what happened to poor old Maureen!

  So I get to the room—the right room, the Invisible Gooey Thing room—and I can tell you my heart just started thudding when I saw the scroll lying on the floor. I hurried toward it, but the dragon was just behind me. I could even hear it take a big breath. I-knew, I just knew, that it wasn't about to flambé me—it was going to incinerate that scroll, the only thing in this bargain-basement Wonderland that could hurt it.

  I took this wonderful flying leap, Bitsy. You should've seen me! It was great, kind of a 9.6 for difficulty, 2.0 for technique dive, and I landed right on top of the scroll just as the dragon ignited. I felt the fire sizzle the armor on my back. Then it got very quiet, and I knelt and opened the scroll. The dragon was looking right into my eyes, drawing in another breath.

  So I read the goddamn scroll, and the Nightmare Critter shattered all over the place into a billion little blue pieces, and from somewhere, maybe from hidden speakers up in the dim reaches above my head, I heard the "Ode to Joy." I go, "Give me a break, okay?"

  So then Glorian comes up to me. He's smiling his Brad Pitt smile, and he's just about to say something.

  I raised a hand and stopped him. I go, "I want to know one thing: Where the hell is this Treasure Beyond Counting I've been hearing about?"

  "Here it is, Maureen, and it's all yours." He held out another scroll.

  "It's a scroll," I go.

  "Yes, it's a scroll. It's a special Scroll of Summon Taxi. With it, you can go anywhere you like. Anywhere at all just tell the driver."

  "Anywhere?" I go, my tiny little mind already racing.

  "Yes, Maureen, anywhere in the Known Universe."

  "Like, say, Mars?" You know, Bits, that my glorious, beloved Prince Van is never long out of my thoughts.

  Glorian goes, "Certainly, Mars."

  "Cool!" I took the scroll, opened it, and read it. Just like that, a magic Yellow Cab appeared. I was impressed. I didn't even have to leap out into traffic and throw my body in front of it.

  Glorian opened the passenger door for me and loaded all my shopping bags filled with gold and jewels. I took off the armor—I didn't want to keep it, and it would look pretty dumb to Prince Van—and sheathed Old Betsy and slung her across my back.

  Glorian goes, "Farewell, Maureen."

  I go, "Farewell, Glorian. You have been a good and faithful guide. Thank you for all your help. Seeyabye." He was standing there, holding the door for me, so I took the dollar bill out of my brassiere and tipped him.

  Hey, Bitsy, I know I had a twenty in the other cup, but, jeez, like I'm so sure Glorian didn't have change!

  I got in the cab. The driver turned around and he goes, "Where to?"

  "Mars," I go.

  "You got it." And we were off.

  We started driving away through gray, misty, unreal scenery, and after a few minutes I realized that I was filthy, scorched, and completely covered with blood and ichor. "Feh," I go, and then I told the driver to stop first at your house so I could get cleaned up for my darling prince. And that, sweetie, is how my very last and forever final exploit came to an end.

  * * * * *

  I DON'T HAVE ANY IDEA how long it took the cab driver to deliver Muffy to my doorstep, but Lord! it wasn't long enough. When she arrived, she shoved her way into the house—my son, Malachi Bret, and I are staying, you know, temporarily with my mother. Then Maureen started begging and pleading for help to transform her from a tough-as-nails macha maiden into a fully to-die-for elegant yet phenomenally sexy faux princess. She wanted to be the kind of woman her dearly beloved, the Mart
ian Prince Van, would find like totally irresistible.

  "And you know I don't carry cosmetics with me on my exploits," she goes. "I suppose I'll just have to make do with what you've got." The way she said that, you'd think my makeup situation was only slightly less hopeless than death by lethal injection.

  I showed her what I had in my room and in the bathroom, and I told her she could borrow whatever she wanted. "Just don't touch my mother's things."

  "For sure. They're probably not my style anyway. Let's just see what you've got." From long experience I knew that absolutely nothing would be good enough for Maureen, even if I had brought Max Factor and Coco Chanel back from the dead to give her a hand. She rummaged around in several shoe boxes filled with my basic makeup arsenal, making these little disparaging non-word sounds.

  She looked at a plastic bottle of invigorating spruce elemental essence for the bath. "Aromatherapy, Bitsy? Like duh." That didn't stop her from dumping most of it into the tub as it was fitting.

  "I have a chamomile after-bath gel for improving the skin," I go. "I don't know how well spruce and chamomile fragrances mix."

  "Don't worry about it, Bits." She lowered herself slowly and carefully into the steamy hot water. "My skin's just fine, thank you very much."

  "How I envy you," I go, in like my flattest voice.

  "Loofah," she goes. I handed her the loofah. "Pumice stone." I gave her the pumice stone. It was like being on the set of General Hospital.

  I'll skip the rest of the ritual, except to say that Muffy spent half an hour soaking in the tub, then another ten minutes washing her hair under the shower, and the better part of another hour doing a wax-on wax-off routine on every visible hair between her nostrils and the floor.

  Then she started in on the actual paint job. She goes, "Bitsy, what is all this stuff? Don't you remember anything I taught you? Let me just say a few magic words: Givenchy, Lancôme, Princess Marcella Borghese. You've just got to stop buying your makeup from door-to-door ladies."

  I shut my eyes tighty-tight as I struggled to keep from ripping her lungs out. I even helped her do her nails. After all the coats of base, polish—Flame Scarlet, one of my own favorite shades—and clear varnish had dried, I slued a small gold-foil Olde English "M" on the nail of her left ring finger and a little rhinestone on the right ring finger. If you ask me, I thought that was just too much, but Muffy never asked my opinion and I didn't volunteer it.

  There was lots more, but the only real crisis came while she shuffled through my perfume collection. She picked up one bottle, sniffed it, and grimaced. "This is just so drugstore," she goes. "Who in their right mind would—" She stopped abruptly, and her expression-changed. "It's just that no matter how long you hang on to this cute novelty bottle, sweetie, it's never going to be a collectible." She settled for Paloma Picasso's Satin de Parfum. Mums had given it to me and I'd forgotten I even had it.

  By the time she was dressed and ready to rush into Prince Van's brawny yet tender embrace, she'd spent more than three hours getting made up. To tell the truth, though, she did look almost spectacular. "In a hurry," she goes. "Gotta run. Say hi to your mother for me. Thanks for everything, Bitsy. This may be the last time we ever see each other, but please don't grieve. Be happy for me instead, okay? I'll leave the shopping bags of gold and jewels with you—I can always come back from Mars if I need them. In the meantime, they're yours. Kiss kiss!"

  I opened the front door for her. I heard birds singing, and the breeze smelled of freshly-cut grass. Three neighborhood boys were playing Pickle-In-The-Middle on the sidewalk. It was a gorgeous day, except that the cab was gone. Maureen just stared at the empty driveway for a long time.

  "The driver said he'd take you anywhere you wanted," I go. "You should've gone straight to Mars and not stopped here. That used up your one magic-taxi wish."

  "Oh hell." If I didn't know her so well, I could've sworn she was on the verge of tears. She let out a deep breath, shrugged, and turned to me. "Know any good restaurants that accept rubies?" she goes.

  Grace under pressure. That's my pal, Muffy.

  Maureen Birnbaum

  Pokes an Eye Out

  by E. Taylor Spiegelman

  (as told to George Alec Effinger)

  WHEN I GOT HOME FROM WORK, there was a big glass of milk and a plate of oatmeal raisin cookies waiting for me, along with a note from Mums. To the day I die, I'm like totally sure she'll always think I'm, you know, eleven years old. Her message told me where I could find a second note, the important one, the one that my six-year-old son, Malachi Bret Fein, had worn home from school pinned to his shirt.

  Now, see, if I had been Mums, I would've left the second note right next to the first one. Or under it. Or maybe instead of it. I mean, like the note from school was pretty self-explanatory.

  Instead, she wrote me another note telling me that she'd put the teacher's note in a place where I couldn't miss seeing it, except of course I had missed it, or I wouldn't have needed Mums' other note to find it. I suppose if I asked for a show of hands to see how many people, in Mums' place, would've just put the school note on the refrigerator door with a magnet, I'd get a pretty decent response. That's where I would've put it.

  Not Mums, though. She stuck it on the mirror of the medicine cabinet with a piece of Scotch tape. Okay, you're probably saying, that's another place I couldn't help noticing it. Sure, except Mums fooled out and put it on the medicine cabinet in her and Daddy's bathroom, not on the medicine cabinet in my bathroom. Duh, huh?

  I have no idea why, and I don't have time now to delve into Mums' unique thought processes. I'll just say that there was a pretty good chance another note or two were posted around the house, telling me about the school note in case I never found her first note by the milk and cookies, and those notes along with other forgotten missives from years gone by will come to light only after, God forbid, Mums passes away and Daddy and I have to sort through everything of hers. That job will take decades. The cataloguing alone will be like when that English guy stumbled onto King Tut's tomb.

  It seems that Malachi Bret's first grade teacher, Mrs. Glick, decided it was necessary for me to meet with her and the principal of P. S. 154, Mr. Martinez.

  I felt this terrible cold thing stab right through me. It was like I was on trial for something and I didn't have any idea what. Like in Kafka, you know, where faceless authorities put you through these bogus and totally harsh proceedings, and then one morning you wake up to find that somehow during the night you've acquired a thorax and an exoskeleton. I knew that I hadn't done anything wrong, but in an uncaring universe that's no guarantee at all.

  Not that anybody should get the idea that I really truly believe that we live in an uncaring universe. I'm not that depressed, and the universe isn't that bad, I suppose. It's just certain neighborhoods between my parents' house in Queens and Malachi Bret's school—uncaring is the kindest thing you can say about them.

  So, anyway, Mrs. Glick requested my presence at a meeting the next afternoon at three o'clock. Neither Mrs. Glick nor Mr. Martinez thought to ask if three o'clock was convenient for me. No doubt they figured that if I was a decent mother I'd walk through fire to attend that meeting, even if it meant having my paycheck docked or even worse. If I flaked on them or even just phoned the school to reschedule, then obviously I wasn't a fit mother and the Van Man would come to take Malachi Bret off to some unspeakable hellhole orphanage or something.

  I mean, these are the things that run through your mind at a time like this. Well, they ran through my mind, anyway; I guess I get a little of that from Mums. I don't want to start discussing how I might be growing up to be just like her. That isn't happening, I don't care what you've heard, and besides I have more important things to talk about right now. Like how even though I planned to leave work way early to get to that meeting on time, I had my schedule completely shagged by the untimely-as-usual arrival of Macha Maiden magazine's favorite centerfold, Maureen "Back Off, Buddy" Birnbaum.


  "S'up, Bits?" she goes. "Glad to see me?" How odd that she would say that. How odd that she believed I'd always drop whatever crummy, trivial, merely real-life thing I was doing to be her Number One Fan.

  She was grinning, and it didn't seem to bother her that everybody else in the subway car was staring at us. She was worth staring at, too, because she was in her usual Mistress of the Multiverse costume. I go, "Jeez, Maureen! You like scared me half to death, you do that all the time!"

  "Say hey, sweetie!" she goes brightly.

  I was like totally not in the mood for this. Not ready for Muffy, or her pendulous alabaster globes spilling out of her Frederick's of Flatbush solid gold bra, and like absolutely not in the mood for the next exciting installment of "Maureen Birnbaum and the Non-Denominational Church of Doom."

  I go, "Muffy, people are like, you know, staring."

  She goes, "Let 'em stare! I could care less, I'm like wild and free." She looks at me and she goes, "And Bitsy, I've told you a million times, never call me Muffy! I'm not a little girl anymore, okay?"

  "And I've told you not to call me Bitsy, but do you listen? Call me Bitsy once more, Maureen, and start calling you Mo. See if you can deal with that"

  She gave me this little look to see if maybe I was serious, and I guess she saw that I was, because she just grinned again and changed the subject. "Guess where I've been!" she goes.

  You should know that I didn't even bother to try.

  * * * * *

  I'M WHAT YOU CALL, you know, a survivor. No, really, Bitsy. Like I've had some pretty beat disappointments lately. Not getting back to Mars was way bunk, sweetie. We all know that I'm meant to fulfill my destiny as Co-Monarch of the Angry Red Planet, beside my one true love, Prince Van. Fortunately, I don't let a little adversity get me all raspy. I mean, if you let every teeny tiny thing bother you, then whoa! you're like next to useless. Say the world needs saving again or something, and you're like camped out in your bedroom listening to your old ABBA tapes and weeping. That is just so bald.