Tubular Android Superheroes

by Mel Gilden

  We walked across the sand, across the public walkway, across the small brick yard, and into the house. Everywhere Zamp looked was an eyeful of stuff he had never before seen.

  "Hey, bros!" I called out. The house was empty.

  "Is this normal?" Zamp said.

  I shook my head. Then I heard shouting at the front of the house. I took a moment to pull on a pair of walking shorts that I found in Whipper Will's room and went outside. Zamp and I walked into a riot.

  Chapter 1

  Sucking Sidewalk

  PEOPLE stood in tight knots on the postage stamp cement apron in front of Whipper Will's garage. They shouted at each other angrily and waved sheets of paper in each other's faces like revolutionary flags. Dress was the usual casual affair: bathing suits, sandals, T-shirts advertising brewski and surfboards. I recognized most of the people; they lived up and down Pacific Coast Highway

  —what passed for neighbors in Malibu. The surfers were out there too and more excited than I'd seen them since somebody had tickled their surf-bots with a sledgehammer.

  "What are they doing?" Zamp said. I had no idea. There was nothing like it on T'toom. I said, "Sports."

  "This can't be baseball, I doesn't sound like this on the radio. Maybe it has something to do with us."

  That was wishful thinking. Nobody was paying us any mind. I walked up to a blond woman who was wearing a bathing suit made from three tiny blue flags and asked her what all the hubbub was about.

  She glared at me for a moment as if deciding whether or not to bite off my head. "Just look," she said, and shoved a white sheet of paper into my face. I took it and saw a neatly typed letter from a guy named Max Toodemax. It said:

  Dear Renter,

  As you know, both property taxes and property values are soaring here in Malibu. Because of this, I find that it is no longer financially practical to rent single-family dwellings.

  These single-family dwellings will soon be replaced by high-density condominiums. You will be the first to be offered an opportunity to purchase one.

  Therefore, the Gramarcy and Mills Demolition Company will soon begin demolishing your house. The law requires that I inform you one month in advance. You may consider this your one and only notice.

  Best wishes,

  Max Toodemax,

  owner

  "What does it say?" Zamp said.

  "It says that any minute now you and me and all these nice people will be sucking sidewalk." I handed the paper back to the woman.

  Whipper Will climbed onto something and raised his arms over his head. He said, "Hey, dudes. This hip-hop really has me dissed, dogged, and drilled, just like you. I mean, this is one grotty fall."

  "Is that English?" Zamp whispered to me. "We gotta, like, organize," Whipper Will said. "Tell 'em, bro!" somebody shouted. I think it was Captain Hook, the surfer most likely to shout.

  "But we need a plan, man. We gotta get our stuff wired."

  "I nominate Whipper Will," a woman cried. Somebody else called out his name and soon it was a chant. Whipper Will just looked perplexed. He waved his hands at the crowd as if testing the softness of a bed. The lights on PCH changed twice before the crowd got quiet enough for Whipper Will to speak.

  "No way, dudes. Somebody had to throw down the rap about getting our stuff wired. I volunteered to rap, but I'm no kahuna. You'll need somebody more gnarly than me before you're done." Whipper Will stepped down and the crowd began to grumble to itself again.

  Whipper Will and Bingo walked to the door followed by the other surfers. When Whipper Will saw me, he smiled as if he were selling teeth and cried, "Cowabunga!" He grabbed me and danced me around while the other surfers pounded any part of me they could reach. I was conscious of Grampa Zamp standing nearby wondering if I was being attacked. "How they hanging, Zoot?" Thumper said. We were attracting attention, so instead of answering I said, "I'll tell you about it inside," and kind of backed away from Whipper Will, hoping he and the others would follow me.

  "What's this?" Captain Hook said. He hooked a thumb in Grampa Zamp's direction.

  "He's with me," I said, making Captain Hook laugh. I kept moving, and pretty soon I'd attracted all the surfers into the living room with the front door shut against the crowd still festering outside. Nobody sat down, but just looked at me and Zamp as if we were what we are—a little bit unusual, a little bit not-of-this-Earth.

  I said, "Tough times."

  "Grotty for sure," Bingo said.

  "What will you do?"

  "Pray for surf!" Flopsie (or was it Mopsie?) cried. They were redheaded twins. Each surfer answered her with a mighty "Ahh-rooooha." Whipper Will shrugged.

  Thumper, who had been looking between me and Zamp as if he were reading subtitles, said, "You mean there's two of you guys?"

  "At least." Which could grow up to be a lie if I let it. "Bay City's a big place."

  "How is Bay City?" Whipper Will said.

  "They must be losing their grip. I still have the same head I left with."

  Mustard, who was never entirely straight, cried, "Ahh-roooh!" and the other surfers helped him. Flopsie and Mopsie hugged me. Hanger went so far as to brush the tip of my nose with her lips. It was official. I was home.

  "So," said Captain Hook, when the shouting had not quite died down, "who's the new bro?"

  Whipper Will and Bingo watched me. Everybody watched me. Even Zamp watched me, but with a smile that was a little ashamed at having been caught playing in this neighborhood. He was enjoying seeing what the boy could do. I was on my own.

  I said, "This is my Grampa Zamp."

  "He have a problem with toxic waste and nose drops too?" Captain Hook flicked his own nose meaningfully.

  I had pushed that explanation pretty hard the last time I'd come to Earth. I hoped a few more good miles were in it. I said, "Some of that environmental stuff made quite an impact."

  Mustard made his victory noise again, but everybody else just looked confused. Hanger grumbled about pollution. Zamp's nose quivered; I only hoped he'd keep his mouth shut for a while. One lie that size was about all that would fit in the room.

  "He speak English?" Captain Hook said, none too kindly.

  "When there's any call for it," Zamp said, causing the surfers to stare at him as if he'd suddenly gone all normal. Whipper Will laughed and shook his head. "Another Chandler fan," he said.

  Mopsie (or was it Flopsie?) astonished Zamp by putting an arm through his. She said, "Ever tried yoyogurt?"

  "Get those short Johns off him," Thumper said. "He needs some rad rags."

  "O-o-o-o," said Hanger as if somebody had just tickled her fancy.

  Zamp, hoping for guidance, looked at me as he was dragged toward the second bedroom. I called after him, "Relax and enjoy it." I remembered my first night in Whipper Will's house. They'd gotten me drunk on yoyogurt and brewski and we'd done the limbo till dawn. I didn't actually remember that particular dawn, of course. If Grampa Zamp had come to Earth for anything, it was this.

  Only Bingo and Whipper Will and I were left in the living room. Bingo said, "Is he really your grandfather?"

  "Yeah," I said. "I hope his hearts can stand the excitement."

  "He's a gnarly old dude. He'll be cool."

  I nodded and said, "Maybe it's not Grampa Zamp I should be worrying about."

  Chapter 2

  Stormy Weather

  THE surfers decked him in baggies and a Hawaiian shirt. Captain Hook said something nasty about how groovy it was that not everybody from Bay City thought a brown suit and hat was the freshest fashion. I don't suppose Zamp looked any sillier in his outfit than I looked in mine.

  A little light was left, a white luminous string at the horizon, so they half-carried Zamp out to the surf line and showed him how to use a surf-hot. From the kitchen window, I watched him whoop and carry on. Earth was his oyster. Whatever an oyster was. I only hoped that oysters didn't bite.

  When it was too dark to see, the surfers sat Zamp down with a Gino and
Darlene movie and a bowl of oat-bran yoyogurt. After that they put on music not much louder than the wild cry of a slaberingeo and taught him dances for which I did not have names. Or they might just have been nervous conditions. I went to bed long before any of them were done. The last I saw of Grampa Zamp, he had a fishnet draped over his head and he was shaking his hips as if trying to dislodge a couple of flies.

  The next morning I got my brown suit—the detective uniform—out of the closet. Bill stood behind it, right where I'd left him. I wasn't on a case. I wasn't going anywhere. Bill would just be in the way. But we'd been through a lot together and I had gotten used to him being in the way. Maybe I even liked it. The flypaper hissed when I pulled it off the top of his head. The lights behind his eyes came on and he said, "Hello, Boss."

  "Hello, Bill. How they hanging?"

  "They?" he said. "Hanging?"

  "Forget it," I said. "Come on out of the closet."

  Bill watched me put on the suit, then followed me to the breakfast nook and swung his feet up and back over the edge of a kitchen counter. Meanwhile I read the paper and drank coffee. The world was still having affairs. I didn't understand all the comics, but then, some of them probably weren't funny. I figured that as long as the artists continued to draw aliens that looked like sacks with eyeballs on the tips of their antennae, I was safe.

  Zamp stumbled into the kitchen still wearing the Hawaiian shirt and baggies. They were a little wrinkled. He looked as if he'd had a wonderful time the night before and now regretted it. He collapsed into a nearby chair and held his head. I read the paper. He jumped every time I rattled a page.

  At last Zamp said, "So this is Earth."

  "Accept no substitutes."

  "Last night was amazing."

  "Don't try that stuff at home."

  "Those guys are professionals?"

  "No. Just Earth people."

  "Yeah." A moment later Zamp said, "Nice clothes."

  "The uniform. Trouble is my business.' "

  Zamp chuckled and was sorry. He said, "I knew you were crazy for that Philip Marlowe radio show, but I didn't know you were this crazy."

  I nodded and shrugged.

  Zamp said, "So, what's pizza?"

  Bill made a tiny mechanical guffaw. Zamp looked at him and said, "I don't believe we've met."

  "That's Bill, my robot. He likes to shake hands."

  Zamp shook hands with Bill for as long as he could stand it. "Pizza?" Zamp said.

  "Nobody here by that name," Bill said.

  While Zamp stared in surprise at Bill, I said, "I don't think you'd be very interested in it in your condition."

  "Pizza is food?"

  "More or less. It's good, but a little hard on the stomach."

  He contemplated that. It was difficult work. After a night of brewski and yoyogurt and dancing, just circulating your blood was difficult work.

  He went away and I finished my coffee and the comics. They did not become more comical. Flopsie, Mopsie, and Hanger came in and giggled as they poked through the refrigerator.

  The morning was busy. I dozed in the sun for a while, helped Hanger pot a plant, and traded quips with Captain Hook before he went out to surf with his bot. I had a nice chat with Whipper Will and Bingo about their chances of stopping Max Toodemax from bouncing them. Bill's chance of becoming a nuclear physicist was better. With all that excitement, I could barely catch my breath. I could have stayed on T'toom.

  Bingo and Whipper Will and I sat at the table thinking foggy gray thoughts about what kind of world it must be if a guy who has enough money can toss people out with the garbage. Suddenly Bingo cried, "Y-e-a-o-w!" and leapt to her feet. She scrambled to a drawer and pulled out a clutch of odd-sized paper—old envelopes, advertising, ticket stubs among them—and set them on the table before me as if serving a steak. "Messages," she said. "All from Knighten Daise."

  If I'd had eyebrows, they would have gone up then. Knighten Daise and his daughter Heavenly had given me a lot of grief on my first trip to Earth. Them and their Surfing Samurai Robots. I thought I had done with them. I turned over the messages one at a time and saw a tossed salad of scribbles, each one of which told me Knighten Daise's name and phone number and the word urgent, occasionally even spelled correctly.

  I selected one of the neater messages and went to dial the number. The phone was answered by a low mellow voice that sounded too perfect to be real, and it was. It belonged to Davenport, the Daise robotler. I told Davenport who I was and that I wanted to speak with Mr. Daise. '

  A moment later somebody else came on the line speaking with a thick, heavy, gelatinous voice. "Mr. Daise?" I said, feeling a little goofy talking to it. If that was him, he wasn't using the hissy whisper he had when he was a lobster.

  "Marlowe? Where have you been?"

  "Away. Is there some problem?"

  "I want you over here right now."

  "Is there some problem?" I said again.

  "Look out your window. Androids are everywhere."

  I nodded into the phone and it had the expected effect. I stopped myself and said, "You have android trouble, Mr. Daise?"

  "Must you always play hard to get, Marlowe? I'm offering you a job, and I want you to come over so we can discuss it."

  Daise was right, of course. He didn't have to tell me what he wanted. I was ready to mow his front lawn if that was all he wanted. So far this trip had been as dull as a dirty window. Trouble was my business. Here was trouble. The fact that I didn't like Mr. Daise or his robots slowed me down a little. But I was bored enough to play his silly game, that was for sure.

  I was about to tell him I'd be right over when Grampa Zamp came back into the breakfast nook looking less like a sick seagull and announced he was hungry. "Pizza," he said. It was not merely a suggestion.

  Into the phone I said, "I'll be over tomorrow."

  "Today, Marlowe. I've waited long enough."

  "There are people ahead of you. You've taken a number. I'll be over tomorrow."

  He huffed at me, finally agreed, and hung up. I felt better already.

  "A case?" Whipper Will said.

  "Not yet. So far it's just a phone call." I turned to Zamp and said, "Pizza?"

  "That's what I'm told," Grampa Zamp said.

  Whipper Will and Bingo were game, and I sent Bill down to the beach to see if any of the surfers were interested. Silly me. A surfer who was not interested in pizza was probably dead. We all strolled up the public walkway pretending that if everything did not suit us just so, we'd turn it into a parking lot.

  Malibu was having another beautiful day; you can live there for a long time without seeing anything else. The ocean looked like a sheet of diamonds, but it still smelled like the ocean. The smell had to fight hot grease, thin chili, and tanning lotion, but it won. The ocean always does. The sky was so blue somebody might have trucked it in from Hollywood. It came complete with a hot white sun that might have been carved from a new kind of ice.

  People who had nothing better to do were out in force. Enough more than a few of them wore the same unusual jewelry that I wondered if it was more than a fad. I pointed them out to Whipper Will.

  "The blue plastic collars?" Whipper Will said as if I had insulted him. "Superhero Androids."

  "Meaning?"

  "Meaning vat-grown simulacrums of human beings. No springs, no gears, no electronics. Just android stuff. I understand that each of them has a particular superpower."

  "Leaping over tall buildings in a single bound?" Zamp said. "Stopping bullets with their chests?"

  Whipper Will almost smiled, but it died and curled up like a dead beetle and made a nasty snarl. Whipper Will was generally a cool dude. Snarling was not like him. He also seemed to have lost the surfer lilt to his voice. He had spoken an entire paragraph without using the words dude, cool, or gnarly. Bingo was looking at him worriedly, as if he were a stranger with frightening ideas.

  Whipper Will pointed to an android taking a photograph of a mom, a dad,
and two small kids. "See that? The picture that SA android is taking will be in focus, perfectly composed, and perfectly lit. That's one of their superpowers." He pointed to a couple of old folks approaching the public walkway. They were being led by an android who also carried two beach chairs, a small library of paperback novels, a cooler, and a big inflated duck. As they reached the walkway, one of the public trams came along and stopped right in front of them, allowing them to board. "Another superpower," Whipper Will said. "I don't know if they make public transportation come or if they just time everything perfectly. But somehow, if you're with an android and you want a bus or a taxi, you can always get one, and right now."

  I said, "You sound pretty dogged by the whole thing."

  "Dogged, yeah." He could not quite bring himself to spit. Instead he just curled his lip again.

  A little nervously, Bingo said, "The blue collars identify Superhero Androids the way the forehead cloths identify Surfing Samurai Robots. The ads say the blue collars complement their beauty. You all right, Whipper?"

  "Cool," he said. "Boss. Bitchen." His tone said he was none of those things. His thoughts did not make him happy but he continued to think them anyway.

  Even walking together, Zamp and I did not attract much attention. Malibu was that kind of town. If we weren't making the cliffs slide onto Pacific Coast Highway

  or polluting the ocean, we weren't important.

  Androids were everywhere. I saw more of them as we turned up a sidewalk toward PCH. Some people had robots following them, but not as many as I would have expected. Not as many as I'd seen the last time I'd been on Earth or even the day before. I wondered how Knighten Daise, the owner of Surfing Samurai Robots, was coping. Maybe I should have seen him today, after all.