Dead Lines

by John Skipp; Craig Spector

  It was staggering. A thousand future histories, meticulously logged and gift wrapped for posterity. My eyes rolled like minnows in a mudslide as I scanned the sprawling mass of information packing his studio apartment; twelve by twenty-five feet of living space, plus kitchenette and bath. Every square inch of which was crammed with tier upon tier, shelf upon shelf of books, periodicals, videocassettes, laserdiscs, photo albums, notebooks, and manuscripts. There was some stereo equipment that Japan hasn’t even dreamed of yet. A twenty-seven-inch color TV that was about as thick as the Weehauken yellow pages. A lot of framed certificates.

  But the centerpiece was, by far, the computer: a formidable-looking IBM equipped with the largest-capacity hard disks I’d ever born personal witness to, humming contentedly beside a four-foot-tall rack of floppy disks.

  In short, proof.

  I stood, starkly and suddenly sober in the face of Jack Fitzpatrick’s incontravertible evidence. Like I said: I was a working writer at that point, squeezing an average of 3,500 words a day out of my little Macintosh word processor. I could double that pace for the rest of my life and not produce one one-thousandth of what laid before me.

  “That’s all she wrote, pal,” he said softly. “It’s all here: a thousand possible futures, all cross-referenced and catalogued. It’s all mine,” he added. “And yours.”

  I stared at him blankly. “Whu … what do you mean, mine?”

  Again, that secret smile.

  “You’ll see…”

  * * *

  Last night, Jack Fitzpatrick committed suicide by attacking the President with a fully charged cream pie. It contained no hidden explosives, no poisonous chemicals, no flesh-devouring corrosives. Knowing Jack, it probably didn’t even have any preservatives. The President-elect had just accepted the reins of power, and was busy spoon-feeding the faithful the same dangerous mixture of pious platitudes and get-tough posturing that had carried the election. Everyone sounded hot and ready to march on down to Central America and kick some commie butt. The media was out in full regalia, transmuting the event from reality to electron-fodder for the benefit of the folks back home. Jack appeared virtually from out of nowhere, and splat! the new President flailed back into the Vice-President, who in turn bumped the First Lady and the Secretary of State into the Second Lady and the Chief Justice, who pitched three members of the Cabinet sprawling and knocked the ex-First Lady clear off the podium and down into the band shell, where her spindly anorexic legs stuck out of the cacophonous tangle of Marine Corps band members like a blue-veined victory symbol. The former President managed to grab hold of the draperies before being bowled over by the Head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who landed whoofing and wheezing squarely atop him, and the pull of their joint impetus managed to bring the lion’s share of bunting crashing down on the entire fiasco like the finale of a Spike Jones road show. Jack was clear of the melee and leaping from the stage when… POW!

  I’m sure you’ve seen the pictures.

  I was working when it happened. The last three weeks had brought us closer than we’d ever been, largely because he was busy showing me through his archives, sharing memories I haven’t even had yet. Then, about a week ago, he suddenly dropped out of sight. I was worried, but what could I do? The future’s great stuff, but I still had the present to deal with, and books don’t write themselves. I left about two dozen increasingly uneasy messages on his machine, and otherwise left it at that.

  Until last night.

  I sat at my desk, completely unable to work on chapter seven of a novel which is already five months behind schedule, shell-shocked in the dawning light of realization. The TV was blasting, hashing and rehashing the details of the attack. In my lap sat the box that came by messenger yesterday morning. Its contents: a photograph, a cryptic note, and a key. The photograph was something he hadn’t yet shown me, a shot of myself and some very beautiful girl, waving from a boat in some subtropical locale. The inscription on the back says, “Honeymoon is great. Don’t wish you were here at all ha-ha.” The date is two years hence. The handwriting is mine. The girl is gorgeous, the spitting image of that long-ago bronze beauty. I may just die.

  The note said simply:

  GET ON DATANET. RUN FITZ: 12788; PP87; ENTER.

  For those of you as yet uninitiated to the halls of the silicon gods, Datanet is one of the many national electronic mail storage and retrieval services. I dialed it up, logged on, typed in the code, and waited.

  The screen went blank.

  When it blinked back on it asked me a very specific question, to which it wanted a very specific answer. A password

  Q: If you could do anything, but no one thing is ever going to do it, what would you do?

  I racked my brain, searching for the answer. I searched all night, no doubt while a platoon of police, Secret Service, and federal investigators were simultaneously kicking down the door of Jack’s apartment. I finally found the answer around 4:30 this morning. Right there, staring me in the face, on page 87 of RENEGADE SAINT—the chapter titled “Conundrum.” Sly bastard.

  Bleary-eyed, I logged on Datanet. Typed in the code. And when those little green letters lit the screen, gave the reply:

  A: I’d do it all.

  The screen blanked momentarily. When it lit up again, it was Jack. I cried as I read it. It said:

  Scott—

  You made it, which means I did it. I decided to go all the way this time. I think that’s what might be holding us back: until I go on to the next step, and blow this whole thing wide open, we’ll keep going kaboomskie.

  Am I some kind of kosmic keystone? Or is this just a little kick in the pants from God? I don’t know. Forty-five hundred years of cumulative experience later, and I’m still not qualified to say. I only know it’s time to move on.

  And that’s where you come in: when you punched in the code, it signaled Datanet to send precoded letters to every major wire service, newspaper, and periodical in the country. TV stations, too. The delivery times are all staggered, as well, so they can compete with each other for primacy. All-sides-against-the-middle time. I won’t be easily explained away. .

  The key is to a safety deposit box at your bank. In it are papers appointing you legal executor of my estate, and a diskette containing the locations of other safety deposit boxes across the city. In them are directions to storage facilities containing duplicates of every work in my apartment. There’s also some stock in companies that are soon going to make you a very rich man. It’s all yours, buddy. Use it as you will.

  It’s funny; after everything is said and done, I still think one of the best times I ever had was that first night with Jamie Morganstern. Remember her? I even went back and married her, once. Love conquers all, I guess. Life is so strange: we can never find enough time, and yet we spend so much of it all caught up in the bullshit. Politics and war, in particular; science and religion can get pretty loopy in extremus, but the first two are by far the worst. Sometimes I think that laughing those two particular practices right off the face of the earth might must be Humanity’s highest possible achievement.

  Oh, well. Gotta go, pal. Good luck.

  You’ll need it. And thanks. .......................Jack

  Was he right? Is the world going to fry in fifty years? How should I know? Not much reason to expect that it won’t, of course; but then, Jack never did this before. He may have changed everything with that one final act. And who knows? He may even be right about Humanity’s highest possible achievement. You’ve got to admit, after all…

  … the President looked awfully damned silly picking pie off of his face.

  I’VE BEEN WAITING ALL

  MY LIFE TO MEET YOU

  I wander the streets of this fucking city for the umpteenth millionth time; and though I know it to be pointless and worse, I do it. I do it I do it I do it out of habit, out of hatred for the patterns that have emerged to torment and enslave me: moist and meaningless shadow-things, liaisons with waste and nothingness in an e
ndless cold cold night…

  Let’s face it, kiddo. The thrill is gone. The thrill of the chase, of poking my nose at scented tails and letting my tongue go wagga-wagga… it’s gone. Too many nights going yeah and really, bumpity-bump did you cum? and I’ll see ya later. Too many nights senselessly pumping sperm into women who didn’t want it to grow and probably didn’t deserve its growth anyway, would treat it to more of human stupidity’s boundless milk in the hopes of spawning a lawyer or some other luckless creepy-crawler. No, man. It’s too goddam easy to climb in bed with the wrong person and let the fluids fly, your promise to tomorrow just a yucky inconvenience that there’s some pill to take care of.

  No, man. Fuck it. Beyond the habit and the hate and the slavery, beyond the hitherto-sacred-cow-enshrined sexplay; beyond all that, there is something that is screaming to be found

  And. I will. Find. It.

  Oh, whafs this? A can. Hey doggies. I’ll kick it. THWUNK clitta clitta clitta and nothing. Who am I kidding? This whole deal is a kick-the-can across infinity, and I’m infinitely weary. I’m going home.

  No, I’m not. There’s nothing there. Nothing I haven’t sucked all the life from, anyway. Not even my art, clamoring (not as hard as I clamor) to be finished, waiting for me in the huge and empty darkness of my room. Not even my fabulous, breathtakingly beautiful art, which is displayed on all the right walls and between all the right covers, all over this great slobbering nation of ours and beyond! Oh yeah, it’s waiting for me; but not like I’m waiting for you, honey. Not like I’m aching for you.

  So where the hell are ya, anyway? I’m out on a main drag now, the cars are racing by with typical brainless fervor, this scene is obviously happenin’, man, happenin’, so… where the hell are ya? Huh? Please?

  I don’t know. There are so many people out here, doing their dingy public dances, stacking veneers like layers of paint on an old old structure. Well hey, people! I got news for y’all! Sucker doesn’t need a new paint-job; it needs to be torn the fuck DOWN, babies! It needs DEMOLISHED! It needs…

  One may well wonder, I suppose, how this foaming maniac hopes to find any kind of woman at all in this state of mind … much less the one. (Oh, how that phrase rings in my ears. And what sweet promises it holds.) But it’s not true. Already the woman-eyes are locking on me like rivets, doing the slow turn as I do the slow burn past them. They sense my hunger. They don’t know what it is, mind you; wouldn’t know how to sate it, even if they did. But they feel it.

  How could they not? It is the brightred red of lust and lifeblood, the penetrating yellow of keenest wisdom, the permeating green of calm and reconciliation, the soul-sucking blackness of utter despair and whitewhite light of utter clarity. It is a rainbow and more of energy, pouring out of me, eating and replenishing me so I can continue on my goddam brainless quest. Quest of the Ultimate. Ultimate that I just gotta have.

  I cringe inwardly now, thinking. Thinking: people, don’t think that I think that I’m better than you. Don’t think that I’m thinking, “I’m looking for someone much better than you’ll ever be. Sorry, babe… nice tits, but no go.” Because I’m as little and creeping and pathetic as any of you, out here blowing my brains out for something I’ll never have. Just like you. And none of us will ever find it. Not a…

  OOPS! What’s this? “Oh, I’m sorry, hon. Bumped right into ya,” I say without even thinking about it. I catch myself with a consoling hand on her shoulder, and wish that I would think once in a while before I do shit.

  Because I recognize the light in her eyes; know that she won’t be articulate enough to come up with anything witty and table-turning; know also that there’s nothing in this world she’d rather do right now. She has felt the energy: it has touched her there, there, and (oh yes!) there. I can see her thoughts, like two Championship Wrestlers having at it, one edging toward the ropes for a bit of tag-teamwork. It’s so sad, and so innocent, and I wish like crazy that it wasn’t happening.

  PROCTOR’S FIRST LAW OF SEXUAL DYNAMICS: don’t touch unless you really mean it. One little touch is all it takes. Once done, you either gotta follow through or do the Wormlike Wriggle. Both are more trouble than they’re worth. Honest.

  It’s the Wormlike Wriggle for me, doll. The indicator lights in her irises tell me that she’s coming up with something. Just as her lips part to let me have it, I withdraw my hand and kick in the deflector shields, saying, “Uh… sorry again,” with averted eyes and a doleful brush past her. Utterly uncharming, I’d think…but no.

  “It’s alright!” she assures me hurriedly, pitter-pattering up from behind. It’s all I can do to keep from smacking my forehead with a flat palm, invoking the clownface gods. I don’t stop walking. I cut a swath through the social intercourse of two happily chirruping couples, leaving them as a roadblock for Ms. Cutesiepie Hotpants. It slows her only a little.

  “Hey!” she calls, sidestepping the parrots and doing (I just know) the silly little hands-up running bit. It is cruel and thoughtless to let her chase me halfway across town for nothing. Sighing ponderously, I decide to kick in…

  PROCTOR’S COROLLARY TO HIS OWN FIRST LAW: the Wormlike Wriggle can sometimes be disguised as the Sabertoothed Snickass. This is to be done only in cases where corrective surgery is absolutely necessary.

  “Hey,” she says, laying her hand on my shoulder. I stop, and steel myself. I start to turn, and she’s met me halfway.

  Having faced me, she is again at a loss for words. I take a moment to appraise her. She’s a nice girl, it’s obvious. She’s cute, she’s ample, she’s warm all over and eager to please. A couple of years ago, we coulda had some fun hey! I quite thoroughly hate myself for what I’m about to do.

  “I…” she starts to say, shy smile creeping crossways, happy taffy-pullers at either end of her ripe red lips. I’m about to spazz them out when some fool bumps into me from behind, pushing me flush against her. It feels good. Damn you, God or whatever you are! for making us all so vulnerable.

  The stunned silence lasts too long. She inflates it to triple its actual worth. My eyes burn like hot pus behind the eyelids, and I feel an unwanted tear gathering substance there. My hands come up to her shoulders and push me gently away. Maybe, just maybe, I can play this one straight.

  “Darlin’,” I say with just the right blend of tough ‘n’ tenderness, “you’re a very sweet lady, and cute to boot, but I really gotta get going.” Then I give her the patented winkansmile, and turn to walk away.

  Winkansmile. Frankenstein. Here’s the evil Dr. Winkansmile, building monsters from the pieces of dead and moldering dreams! Where are the goddam torch-bearing villagers to put me out of my misery? Do I have to come back for yet another dreary sequel?

  Yup. I hooked her like a small fish: no matter how many times I throw her back, she just got to have that worm. “No, wait a minute!” she cries, stopping me. “Umm… couldn’t we, like, get together lat…”

  “See, I’ ve got this little problem,” I butt in quickly, working my best understated Bruce Dern imitation. “I’ve got to disassemble my piggy banks. By my estimation, I’m up to roughly two hundred and fifty thousand pennies. That’s a lot, don’t you think?”

  She nods, confused. We’re almost halfway there.

  “Well, tomorrow, I’m going up to the top of the Empire State Building during rush hour and flinging them all right over the side.”

  Her stare is blank. It’s working, God help me.

  “You’ve heard about how, if you toss a penny off the Empire State Building, they can go straight through a person? Faster than a speeding bullet?” I giggle in an unhinged manner. Go git ‘er, Sabertooth!

  “Well, I figure, it’s going to cost me, sure, but I’ll probably go down as the single most fiscally extravagant mass-murderer in American history, not to mention the biggest.” I allow myself to shift into full-tilt hysteria now. “Fuck Charles Whitman! Fuck Henry Lee Lucas! Nambee-pambee, penny-ante, piggly-wigglee diddlee-shitty …”

  I turn away th
en, making tracks, still singsong ranting far beyond her audible range, my last impression of her face embossed across my inner eye. I don’t wait to see the taffy-pullers yank her face downward, don’t wait to see the hurt and confusion. Can’t bear to see it. I walk off hurriedly, contemplating the underside of speeding cars as a final resting place…

  Yeah, I can see it now. THE JOSHUA PROCTOR STORY: closing reel. Our hero finally realizes what a loathsome, heartless monster he has become. Like all those who flip God the bird by pursuing the unreasonable, like all those who aspire to Godhood themselves, his heart’s been corrupted and his demons unleashed. The bitter irony of it, the sorrow and revulsion, brings the tears and laughter bubbling up in one last mad paradoxical burst.

  The city blurs, goes soft and runny. Close-up of his face, hideously transforming: yellow slit-eyes above the long-toothed snout, spilling watery slime down his cheek’s matted fur. He wipes his eyes with two monstrous claws, howling now, and tried to refocus.

  A thousand lights pierce the soft gray smudge, homing in on him like spotlights from heaven. They are calling him home. A repentant human voice echoes inside his mind, saying LORD JESUS, FORGIVE ME (who wrote this script?), while the outer beast flails and bellows its rage. No more commercials now, kiddies; this is the dumb old climax you’ve been waiting for.

  Full-body shot of the thing, rearing back as the multifold lights start to bathe and envelop it. Lashing out at nothing, now glowing from within, oblivious to the screams of the gathering crowd, it howls and is blind and in frenzy.

  A stupid cop runs up and clubs it from behind. Whirl. Slash. So fast that the body stands, teetering slightly, while the face wetly exits stage left. This time, the creature hears the screams all around it. With one last shriek of anguish, it takes five stumbling steps backward. Into the street.