Kalifornia

by Marc Laidlaw

  Who knows what other influences might have rushed in to fill the gap we left? At least we were wholesome and traditional—we had the network censors to see to that. We were living therapy. Might they ever take us back? Would they trust us now—or what remains of us? Are they waiting for a sequel or have they lost interest?

  Do they need us as much as we need them?

  No. The healing I needed isn’t here, in isolation from the world. You have to be within the world, and let it into you. That’s the only fair way to involve yourself in change.

  “Mr. Figueroa,” said a voice, “your Seer is here.”

  He turned away from the glass. “Send her in, please.”

  His stomach fluttered as if he were a boy again. It felt like wire fright, although he wasn’t sending, and the building’s anti-wireshow field prevented him from receiving all but specially coded business signals. The Seer always made him nervous and excited. Anticipation of her presence often turned his thoughts to metaphysics and philosophy.

  She stepped silently into the room.

  “Seer,” he said, bowing a bit. He fought his nervousness with formality. He restrained himself from blurting all his doubts at once.

  She glided up to the desk and extended a hand from beneath a baggy gauze of multilayered and many-colored fabrics, all of them more or less transparent. She was slung with gold chains, rhinestones, amethyst pyramids, antique fuses, papier-mache and turquoise beads, leprechaun charms, Monopoly pieces, mouse skulls, sharks’ teeth, gold fillings, pierced tektites, horseshoe magnets, ginseng and St. John the Conqueror roots, knit mojo bags, greasewood yonis and wax lingams, tiny flickering neon mandalas, brass bells, antique soapstone TV sets. . . .

  He took her scented hand and kissed it. She turned the palm toward him and he leaped back with a startled sound.

  An eye winked out of her palm.

  She laughed at his surprise. “It’s only a hologram, Alfredo. Nothing to fear.”

  It winked farewell when she took her hand away.

  “It looks so real,” he said.

  “Ah, it’s supposed to. But it’s all illusion. Pierce the veil, remember? Don’t take anything for granted.”

  “I try to keep it in mind,” he said earnestly. “I’m always reminding myself that it’s . . . it’s all unreal. Is that it?”

  “Yes, unreal. A dream, a dance. Maya.”

  He wondered. And all his thoughts of the audience—were they illusory too? What did he really know of the world beyond the rarefied realm in which he’d traveled? Nothing! Only what he’d picked up from the wires. And his programming choices were tailored, however unintentionally, by his mood, to suit his expectations. What evidence did he have that his audience was composed of isolated individuals without families of their own? Mightn’t that “insight” simply reflect his own recent despair and the limited extent of his experience?

  Throwing her hands over her head, the Seer spun a few quick steps of tarantella to catch his attention.

  He froze, her captive prey.

  She dropped her arms and came around the desk. “Tell me what worries you, Alfredo. I see fear knit up in your brow. There’s a dark cloud over your crown chakra and clots in your solar plexus.” Her face darkened slightly when she looked down at his groin. “Ugh. And there’s something that looks like a hairball in your root chakra, bacon grease and steel wool—”

  He couldn’t keep from smiling when she said that.

  “This needs immediate expert attention, a kundalini snaking of your plumbing. How could you have let it go so long?”

  Her nimble fingers worked the snaps of his belt and trousers. She chanted under her breath. Bells rang as she lowered her head. The veils hid her activities from sight although he felt them well enough. He gasped, stumbled backward, and caught himself against the desk. The fog of mental chatter slowly parted. . . .

  Suddenly Sandy streaked past the window—no more than ten feet away—waving into the room, his mouth going slack as he saw his father and the Seer. He lost his balance, tumbled from the board, but the wave carried him on.

  “Good God,” Alfredo said.

  “So patriarchal,” said the Seer, raising her head to scowl at him. “No wonder you have such problems.”

  “No, not that. My son.”

  “He worries you? Well, rest your mind.” She straightened, pressed against him. A rodent tooth pricked him through his undershirt. “We need to activate the full kundalini. Spawning snakes.”

  “Not—not now,” he said, peering out the window. Sandy swam away, one arm over his board. Alfredo hitched up his trousers and cleared his throat. He couldn’t get his suspenders snug again; with a curse he ripped them off and hurled them into a document shredder.

  The Seer sat down in his chair, lifted a tiny mirror on a chain around her neck, and checked her mouth. “Well,” she said, “perhaps a little business is what you need. I’ve been looking where I can, you know, but I haven’t seen a thing.”

  Alfredo came around to the conversation slowly. “Looking for the baby?”

  “Of course the baby, who do you think? You see what happens when you only disturb the slumbering serpents without waking them fully? Your head is full of condensed seed. You need to circulate the chi, draw it down again to the bronze vessel. Or else give up alchemy.”

  Alfredo sighed and sat on a corner of the desk. “So, then. No news.”

  “I told you not to expect too much. Even if the kidnappers were to trumpet their plans on the wireways, the chances of hearing it . . . you of all people should know how much info passes through us every day. We’re bathed in it. Trying to fish out one tiny bit of truth about your granddaughter is like . . . like trying to get a one-eyed turtle to slip into a dog collar in an ocean the size of the universe.”

  Alfredo stared at her. “I’m sorry?”

  She dismissed his confusion with a brisk gesture. “Old Buddhist proverb meaning great difficulty! Finding a needle in a haystack is nothing compared to this. I’m bombarded with misleading information; the wires buzz with speculation, rumors. Overload! No one knows a thing, Alfredo. If they did, I’d know it too. And right away you would know.”

  He clasped her hand. “Thank you, Seer.”

  “I don’t need your thanks, Alfredo. You’re an old friend. Just cross my palms with credit.”

  He nodded. “I’ll make the usual transfer. And you won’t give up?”

  “Not till that turtle’s on a leash.” She rose. “You know you can call on me anytime. And be sure to tune in to the show some afternoon. It would be nice to have a gentleman in the audience for a change.”

  “You know I can’t pick it up from in here,” he said. “But . . . I’ll take an afternoon off especially for you.”

  “You’re a dear.” She kissed him on the cheek and started out, but turned back before she reached the door. “Oh, Alfredo. I almost forgot. There’s a rumor spreading . . . about this building.”

  “What kind of rumor?”

  “Hard to say. I tapped a coded line, I think. But you may have inherited the corporation’s karma.”

  “Great.” He shook his head. “I’ve been thinking I should get out of here. Go back to Hollywood.”

  “Look into your heart, Alfredo. If you can’t find an answer there, I’ll ask around the networks and see if there’s an opening.”

  “Thank you, Seer.”

  “Ciao. And have a nice day.”

  The door closed behind her. Alfredo turned to look back at the sea, and saw Sandy surfing at a more discreet distance. Alfredo watched him for a while, letting his mind clear. He was about to return to his work, trying to remember what he’d been up to, when he saw movement out on the water, something approaching from the shore.

  He touched the magnifier on the window and felt a moment’s terror when he saw what was coming. The fear passed quickly, and in its place was only resignation.

  Signs and omens besieged him. He didn’t have to look into his heart to interpret them.


  It was time to sell the seascraper. Get out of business. Now.

  ***

  The water was choppy, drab, and freezing, but Sandy hardly felt it in his insulated suit. A pretty good break swept off the northwest corner of the seascraper. He sat astride his bright green turbo-hyperflex board, counting the swells, working out the pattern of decent waves, reentering the necessary trance.

  It wasn’t any of his business what Dad did. He was only human. Was he supposed to stay celibate for the rest of his life because an accident had taken his mate?

  I am here not to judge, but to surf.

  He put down his head, knelt close to the board, and shoved his hands underwater. Tiny, powerful wrist-propellers kicked in, pulling him into the slurping hollow of a wave. He’d found the prop-gloves in a supply room; the underwater maintenance crew used them when they went down to scrape windows.

  The wave grabbed him. He gripped the sides of the board, jerked his knees up under him, and got cleanly to his feet.

  Yeah!

  He shot past a row of windows. This was the weirdest break he’d ever seen. Secretaries stopped typing; execs paused with coffee squibs at their lips. Sandy waved, feeling better than zoned now, feeling alive and in the moment. None of that squashy desk-sitting for him, oh no. Several of the employees waved back. He couldn’t hear them, but they seemed to be cheering as he surfed past desks, potted ferns, macrame hangers, monitor screens, job interviewees, janitors. All stared after him with admiration and green envy in their eyes. . . .

  Gun that board!

  He was getting too far ahead of the wave, losing power, falling into slop. There was a mean snarl to the breakers out here. If he didn’t get over the lip or pull out in time, he got nailed. Deep water wasn’t necessarily a cushion. He feared getting whacked against the seascraper.

  He wiggled his way back over the crest, just ahead of the flattening tube, and found himself riding a herd of white and green steeds, surveying his private sea. He seemed to be floating right up into the sky, arms extended for balance, Jessie Christ himself in a lime green wet suit. Maybe he’d do all right in a corp after all, if this was how he got to spend his days.

  Then a whole ‘nother weirdness intervened to drag him back to earth, or at least to ocean. Take a guess.

  Sandy slipped from the precarious safety of his board, came up sputtering with the taste of oil and iodine in his mouth. He dog-paddled, waiting for the board to home in, circle back, and pick him up. Then he clambered on quickly, got to his knees, and looked east to the coast.

  Boats.

  Not the usual commuter crowd of water taxis and ferrycraft. Too early in the day for that. These sped and bounced recklessly over the waves; something about them made him think, “Pirates.” Maybe it was the cannons they carried.

  Sandy dipped his arms in the water and aimed south, skizzing along the eastern face of the ‘scraper. The water was all dimples and bumps, rising and falling. He kept low, hidden from most of the boats. He couldn’t have seen more than a fraction of the flotilla. The whine of many motors, the shouts of passengers, carried out to him on the seaward wind.

  Ominous forebodings oppressed him. One lone surfer against a whole fleet of pirates? Another battle for the history shows.

  He pressed the intercom button in the nose of the board. “Corny? Hey, Corny, you there?”

  The speaker crackled; water buzzed and danced on it. “Yes, Sandy?”

  “Have you taken a look at the coast recently?”

  “I have.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me what’s going on?”

  “We’re not certain what is going on. I’m waiting for orders from your father.”

  “How about at least giving me a warning? I can’t see anything down here, Cornball. Bring the sling around and haul me up quick.”

  Schools of silver fish darted randomly beneath him, scattering like drops of mercury near the face of the building. Sandy looked east again, shading his eyes. Here came the boats, ripping up the water, maybe doing permanent damage. He gazed straight up and saw Cornelius working the crane, swinging the boom over the edge, lowering the sling. By the time it hit the water, Sandy was ready to give up the board and dive. The boats sounded like water hornets about to sting. He grabbed the sling, hooked it to the snag in his wet suit, and clicked the board on to a separate catch. Instantly he started to rise, twirling.

  From midair, in the eastward-facing arcs of his spin, he saw fifty or sixty small to medium boats, some with long silver cannons in the prows, all of them crammed with passengers. As they approached the seascraper, they split up like minnows surrounding a log.

  Cornelius pulled Sandy onto the roof. A crack team of sealmen—building security—poured up from the parking garage and stripped off their clothes, revealing oily, dark fur. Their lean, muscular torsos were crisscrossed by harnesses holding holsters and knife sheaths.

  He’d watched them performing calisthenics on the rooftop in the mornings, singing anthems, but he’d never seen them in action. For a moment he worried about the people in the boats.

  “You going in with ‘em, Corny?”

  Cornelius shuddered, eyeing the water with distaste. “I can’t swim.”

  Sandy shook his head. “And you call yourself a seal?”

  “An exile.”

  The leader of the sealmen barked an order and they all leaped over the side. Sandy jumped to the low wall and watched them dive. Graceful brown bodies sliced into the water, rippled along beneath the surface. The sight was breathtaking, despite the nautical menace.

  But what exactly were the boats threatening?

  As if in response to his thoughts, the boats settled down. After the engines quieted, the passengers began to unfurl huge sail-like banners. At first they were a mass of wrinkles, but then the wind caught them and snapped them open.

  Sandy read the bold words aloud: “WIRES FOR WORKERS! BROADCASTS ARE BROADENING! IF YOU’RE NOT LIVE, YOU’RE DEAD!” He looked at Cornelius in bewilderment.

  “Now hear this!” came an amplified voice. A man stood up in the prow of the largest boat; there were speakers taped to his hips and a mike at his lips. “The time has come for workers to share in the wires. Eight hours of deadtime is a daily crime—worse than murder. It cuts you off from the world!”

  This was true in a way, though Sandy had doubts about its illegality. Office buildings were partially excluded from the net. Computer and communication links were allowed, but commercial broadcasts were jammed except in emergency tests, when shrill, bone-jangling alarms were allowed to paralyze everyone. It wasn’t effective to allow employees to space in on their favorite programs while they were supposed to be working. Who could concentrate on two or more worlds at once? The office receded from consciousness as more compelling subjects filled the mind. Work suffered, poor thing. Some companies had invested in a mild form of random sensory stimulation—a kind of full-body Muzak—but this had been linked to an increase in nervous disorders. Wire silence was safer.

  The man in the boat kept ranting: “We come to sanctify our challenge with a sacrifice! Together, we have the power to stop you corporate tyrants. Against us, you are nothing!”

  “Is he talking to me?” Sandy asked.

  In the next instant, a series of closely spaced blasts shook the air, frightening gulls from perches on the edge of the tower. Smoke streamers burst from the cannons, trailing fire and ashes. Sandy panicked, nearly leaping for the safety of the sealman-filled sea. But the smoke announced nothing more lethal than itself; it didn’t even stink. The air above the boats turned black, impenetrable, while the building itself remained untouched. He waited for the wind to wisp away the clouds, but it was dense stuff. As they waited to see what the demonstrators were up to, the silence grew.

  Finally, a few at a time, the boats bobbed out of the murk.

  Empty now. There was no sign of the protesters. The sealie shock-troops dog-paddled in place, in lieu of any more decisive action.

  “W
here’d they go?” Sandy screamed down at the head seal.

  “Down!” the sealman shouted back.

  Sandy bolted for the elevator. It dropped a few moments, then stopped to allow his father to board.

  “Did you see?” Alfredo asked.

  “Some of it,” Sandy said.

  The elevator continued to fall.

  Alfredo shook his head; actually, his whole body was shaking. “I never had enemies till now.”

  “They’re not your enemies,” Sandy said. “They’re your fans. You didn’t set the seascraper policies.”

  “I—I just want to be loved.”

  “We all do,” Sandy said.

  “My public . . .”

  “I know. That’s them out there.”

  The doors opened on a dark, hushed corridor. Down the hall, a crowd pressed up to a broad window, all staring out into the luminous green water. Space was made for Sandy and Alfredo.

  Outside, the demonstrators were sinking past in slow motion. Now Sandy saw what had been hidden from him on the surface. Each protestor was wrapped in chains, draped with heavy weights. Around his ankle a boy no older than Ferdi wore a manacle attached to a length of chain that was fastened to the sort of double-barbed anchor Sandy had seen only in tattoos and Popeye cartoons. Most of the drowners were Sandy’s age or younger. He marveled in a horrified way at their selfless dedication, their youthful devotion to such a foolish, fatal cause. With mouths and eyes wide open, they calmly and deliberately drowned for the right to bear wires. He wondered what programs they were experiencing in these last precious viewing moments; he hoped the shows were good ones.

  They could be watching me, he thought. In reruns, but me all the same. Maybe I should be out there with them, putting my life on the line for the wires. Hell, those same kids made me rich and famous. What did I ever do for them? Sure, we had a few laughs, shed a few tears. Big deal.

  Did I ever die for anybody?

  He had plenty of time to think such thoughts. The protestors sank so goddamned slowly.

  Sandy’s breath fogged the glass. How ironic that he should be wasting it on a windowpane, taunting the drowners with the nearness of so much oxygen. Not that they noticed. Their eyes were fixed on some other scene.