Jazza nodded when I said that about us being a team but his body language lacked conviction. Great. One more thing for me to have to worry about.
“Wait,” he said as I got up, and I sat back down. “I think Ava’s gunning for Minnie.”
“What the fuck? Minnie? The God Appointed Supreme World Leader? That Minnie?”
“That Minnie.”
This I had to hear.
5. AVA’S PLAN FOR WORLD DOMINATION
I FLASHED A COMM TO CELESTE.
Sorry hun, still at team mtg with Jazza. Get an InstaNanny if u need help. Sorry babes.
“Back up,” I said. “Minnie? I’m going to get us another round of drinks. “Attacking Minnie is like attacking God, only harder.”
“I think Ava’s going to start by trying to bring back nature.”
I burst out laughing. “How, exactly?” Talk about living in lala land. Ava didn’t have a hope in hell. Global warming had killed nature, and there was no bringing it back. Minnie had taken the food labs from the early twenty-first century a step further, and declared farming dead. It was time for humans to take control and stop being at the mercy of Mother Nature. Farmlands were transformed into football field labs, and the world was studded with giant condom-shaped pustules birthing perfect shiny red tomatoes, fire-orange flawless carrots, and every kind of fruit and vegetable imaginable, plus new combinations offering optimal nutrition and edible perfection. Here, have a bananacot, an ingenious blend of banana and apricot, with added protein. The result: a chubby orange fist-shaped fruit was one of the more popular inventions.
Meat was harvested in bioreactor labs using cloned animals that had long since ceased to exist. Minnie said we needed to discard the idea of the animal being the producer of food, and she worked with cellular scientists to make it happen. Meat proved easier to produce than eggs, which we soon forgot about altogether. Milk was replaced with an allergy-free formula that promoted growth, increased brain mass, and aided the fatty neurons that fired our intelligence.
As if we needed all that added intelligence. We weren’t exactly doing anything with it except sitting around streaming shows on our CPs or shopping. The civilized world saw their lands divided into two: shiny plastic cities on the one hand, and plastic bubble farms on the other. The farms were auto run by robots, with two human foremen per, just in case. In case of what? It was inconceivable that anything might go awry.
“We can’t go back to real nature,” I told Jazza. “That would mean hijacking the satellites. We killed nature. There’s nothing left. We’d all starve to death.”
“It would be a struggle, at first,” Jazza admitted. “But Ava said she’d make sure there were food reserves until the earth got back on its feet.”
“Imagine having real weather,” I mused. “I wonder what would happen?”
It was something I had thought about before. Major cities had been declared snow-free zones because studies had proven that most people didn’t like snow, and besides, sidewalk ice was a health and safety hazard. It was too dangerous for children to toboggan down hills or skate on outdoor ponds, a law I’d thought ridiculous until I had Bax and then I changed my mind. Avid skiers were initially enraged by the loss of snow, but they soon adapted to skiing on virtual slopes, agreeing it was way better than the real thing. A protest by the Yuletide Purists changed the laws enough to ensure that a light dusting of flakes arrived at Christmas time. Three inches of perfect powder was deemed just enough to be aesthetically pleasing.
And, for our further health, safety, and convenience, it only rained at night because people voted that the rain was “too wet.”
“Crazy,” I said. “Ava doesn’t have a hope in hell of getting to Minnie’s satellites. Remember Minnie’s armies after the riots?”
“Minnie’s not infallible,” Jazza said. “AI armies can be hacked and, anyway, remember the water catastrophe? Epic fail for Minnie.”
I nodded, running my tongue over my teeth as if to reaffirm they were still there. Due to a miscalculation during the Sacred Board’s first stab at creating ionized, enhanced, immune-building, disease-lessening water, we lost our teeth and ended up with implants, steel rods capped with white titanium. Orthodontic perfection, built to last for a thousand lifetimes. It was weird how we all had the same smile, except for people like Celeste who spent big bucks on a deluxe designer variation.
“I always found it weird that Minnie never lost her teeth,” I said. “She stuck with her crazy junk-yard smile. I always wanted to ask, hey Minnie, how come your teeth didn’t fall out and why don’t you want these shiny new ones?”
“Ava said the same thing,” Jazza said. “But she said she’s known too many people who asked questions and disappeared.”
“Which is why going up against Minnie makes no sense! Minnie controls the world!”
“She understands the pervasive power of consumer capitalism versus that of free-market capitalism,” Jazza said. I raised an eyebrow and he turned the colour of a ripe bruise.
“Okay, so Ava said that, not me. But it makes perfect sense. The religion of the dollar.”
“And yet, Minnie professes to be on a mission from God.”
“Her God. If you ask me, it’s not Minnie we need to get rid of, it’s her mother.”
I nodded. “Good old Mama.”
All this talking had made me hungry, and I waved the waitress over. I sensed Jazza had a lot more up his sleeve, and I wasn’t leaving until I had the full scoop.
“I’d kill Mama first,” Jazza said, returning to the topic. “I frickin’ hate that woman. Leader of the Righteous Reform, my ass. What kind of woman would invent the Sanctified Priesthood? Lose my balls just to get a job for life? No thank you! I’d start by strangling her with her sapphire and ruby rosary. You know how heavy that thing must be? Still, it was the Holy Water of God’s Light trucks that gave me the idea for our campaign, so thanks, Mama, for that.”
Men who wished to join the Sanctified Priesthood could do so with one small condition: they had to have gonadectomies, in other words, have their balls chopped off. No desire, ergo, no sin. And since unemployment was at an all-time high, record numbers of men signed up to join The Renewed Catechism of the Righteous, cutely called the NewCats. You got employment, a roof over your head, and benefits for life. The thought of being a NewCatCenobite made me shudder.
“Even the Pope called Mama the salt of the Earth, a miracle sent by Jesus Himself,” I said. “But you have to look at the positives. No suicide bombers. No racism. No more nuclear programs. And Celeste’s a NewCat. I love going to church.”
“You just like to sing. There’s karaoke for that, buddy.”
“You know where her power comes from?” I asked. “Minnie’s? From her voice. You know the way sound vibrations make patterns in sand and can even change the shape of plastic? She does that to our brains. She hypnotizes us. I mean, she’s an ugly little shit!”
“Yeppers. But hey, I’m not exactly an oil painting.”
I felt shamed. How could I comment on looks when I was born so blessed while Jazza had been birthed on the opposite side of the spectrum? I had reached a new level of low.
“Well,” I said, my voice an apology, “I still don’t get how Ava plans to infiltrate all of this. Minnie is not only the Supreme World Leader, she is the Honoured President and Commander-in-Chief of the Sacred Board of Global Nations. She controls everything.”
“Power comes and power goes,” Jazza said.
“Can I see the capchas of Ava’s poems?”
“No.”
“Aw, come on! I’m your pal!”
Jazza laughed. “When you want to be. Anyway, Ava trusts me. I won’t betray that.”
Three red dots flashed in the corner of my eye. A level-two urgent message. I waved it away. Celeste. She was getting annoyed with me for taking so long. I ignored her and turned bac
k to Jazza. “You won’t win,” I repeated. “And if you don’t know by now, you’ll never find out what’s Ava’s up to. She sounds beyond your level of code.
Jazza looked annoyed. “No one is beyond my level of code,” he said, and his craggy brow furrowed. “I just have to find a way in.”
And I have to find a way to survive all of this. How? All I wanted to do was crawl under the table and sleep for the rest of my life.
Sweetie!
Celeste finally used the emergency data pin to get me in a way I couldn’t ignore.
Come home! We’ve got great news! Come on, honey! Come home!
Great. I sighed. “I’ve got to get going. See you tomorrow, Jazza.”
He stood up, dwarfing me, and I could see the outline of a lacy bra peeking out under the sleeve of his T-shirt. Peach. “Sharps,” he said, “look. We’ve been together since the start. I know I didn’t tell you about Ava, but I was going to, I swear. I mean, I had no idea she wanted to have sex with me. After the first time, I felt embarrassed, like I’d been so stupid and I thought you’d laugh at me if I told you. And you would have, but then she came back and it was so great. It is so great.”
“Are you in love with her?” I asked, and his face went the colour of a spoiled strawberry. “You are? Oh, shit.”
“I know it’s pointless,” he said and he hung his head. “Wouldn’t you be in love with her?”
“Ava? Shit, no way! She’s like a bubble scorpion.” Bubble scorpions were vicious furry bumblebees with balloon bubble limbs in a game Jazza and I played. “I can just see her big yellow stinger waiting to zap me. She hates me!”
“She isn’t fond of the way Mr. Williamson supports you.” Jazza was tactful.
“No, she hates me. And even if she didn’t, I wouldn’t fall in love with her. My dick would fall off like an icicle if it even tried to enter the arctic cave of her vagina. Oh my God, I can’t believe I’m discussing Ava’s vag with you! Ugh!”
Jazza had a dreamy look in his eye, and I snapped my fingers at him.
“Jazza! Just let me know if she’s going to stab me in the back, okay? At least give me warning.”
“Yeah,” he said mournfully and looking like a basset hound. I wanted to slap him into sensibility.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“She’s too good for me. She’s way out of my league. You’re right, Sharps, she must have wanted something from me. And I just have this feeling … like I’ve just lost something I should have taken better care of.” He rubbed his head. “My head hurts too. I wish I hadn’t told you any of this.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t mean to cut you off but I’ve got to go. I’ve been summoned by Celeste. Great news awaits at home, apparently.”
“I think I’ll just sit here for a while,” Jazza said, and I left him to it, messaging Celeste that I was on my way home and getting into my car. But then I just sat there. I just couldn’t put the car into drive. Too many memories flooded my mind. I needed a moment to myself. I set the seat to recline and tried to figure out how my life had become such a mess.
6. FINDING MY GLITTER BALL AND CHAIN
I WAS FORTY-FOUR WHEN I MET CELESTE. Over the hill. It was hard to believe, but Jazza and I had been a team for fifteen years. I’d taken my time getting to university, having suffered long bouts of depression in my teenage years, episodes that saw me bedridden, only getting up to smash the living daylights out of whatever was at hand and then crawling back into bed.
Years of nurturing by Mother, along with therapy, pills, and even electric shock therapy finally whipped me into good enough shape to get me through school and into university. I was quite content to remain a professional student for the rest of my life, eking out grants for as long as I could, but the government cracked down and booted a bunch of us out.
It wasn’t even fair, who got kicked out. It worked via a lottery system, and I later wondered if that was where Jazza got the idea for the 123BlikiWin, because he got kicked out too. He was a math and science guy. He had his Ph.D. by the time he was nineteen, which is when we met. I was twenty-nine.
I’d always harboured a secret fantasy. I wanted to be seated at the head of the dinner table, with my family quietly eating their food, my wife dressed like a twentieth-century fifties movie star. She’d be smiling at me, supportively and kindly, like she got how hard it all was, and she loved and admired me for my ability to navigate the daily grind of life. I think it came from me never having had that as a kid. All I had ever wanted was a normal, safe, suburban life—no shocks, just cruising along with everything nearly in order.
“Here’s to you, mister,” my wife would say, lifting her glass of soda water with a twist of lime. “Thank you for keeping us safe today in a world filled with peril. How was your day?”
And I got my wife and I got my kid, but I could never tell them how my day really was and the furthest thing I felt was safe.
There was so much I hadn’t known about Celeste when I married her. I didn’t know that she’d spend hundreds of dollars on trending toys, like those god-awful fake budgies. Thank god the IridescentFlyShiny craze ended, and there were no more birds. I didn’t know that she was so messy. Or that she’d be a bad mother. And a drunk. She was a frequent flyer on the AllGoodGetWell rehab program that was five-star all the way. She’d never worked a day in her life, and she’d lied about that.
I met Celeste at a party at work. I hated parties, but I had to go. The irony was that Ava had told me to go, and she herself never showed up. Since she wasn’t what you’d call a people person, it was probably for the best.
The venue was typical of the time: a ballroom of mirrors with pale blue satin painted panels and carved curlicued sconces. Chandeliers dripped crystal and chrome, and everybody stood around fake smiling and wondering when they could get drunk or leave. I fell into the latter category.
I was leaning against the wall talking to a woman who had her coat buttoned to the collar and her backpack neatly in place, straps neatly parallel. I guessed she wasn’t planning on staying long either, but at least I tried to look like I was participating, beer in hand, casual smile, flashing my dimples and talking about a serial killer series on the HumerusNumerous channel that was all the rage. Jazza preferred the ParityParallelUniverse channel or EchoSerialFree, but they were too gory for me.
I was calculated; I watched trending series so I’d fit in and have something to talk about. That, plus sports, and I was okay. And, at that moment, talking to the woman who was clearly less socially at ease than I was, I felt as comfortable as a prime time talk show host. I wished Ava was there to see me. I hated her but I also felt a weird desire to please her and that made me hate her even more.
And it was then, at that very moment, just when I felt like I could fit in, that I saw Celeste. How could I miss her? She was a battleship of cleavage and glitter, and she flipped her blonde hair back and laughed, just like the fifties’ pinup I’d always dreamed about. A Marilyn Monroe smile, big white teeth and high cheekbones, so shiny and wholesome. I found out later that her avatar name was ShinyFangGlitterBaby, which really should have told me all I needed to know.
“Mr. Williamson’s baby girl,” backpack woman said. I knew the ill-at-ease woman was in pixel development or something, a part-timer in the Sheds, and I could never remember her name. I had a real job in the Tower, reporting to Ava who reported to Mr. Williamson, but I never knew he had a daughter.
“Oh god, here she comes,” backpack woman said, and she ducked around me and scuttled out the door. I looked around and saw the glitter battleship heading towards me. Me! Buoyed by confidence with my encounter with Shed woman, I straightened my shoulders and sucked in my gut, although I worked out a lot so really there was no worry there. But then the beauty queen, a bit past her prime if one was honest, sailed right by me, and I was left standing and grinning like an idiot, my hand held high, a fool
for all the world to see.
And they did see. My mirrored reflection told me that everyone had seen but were mostly just happy it hadn’t happened to them. There was the tiniest pause, like the screen froze, but then it went back to noise and chatter and fake tinkle this and fake tinkle that.
I’d had enough. I put my glass down and reached for my coat.
“Sharps!” It was Mr. Williamson. The very guy we were there for. “Have you met my daughter, Celeste?”
The glitter battleship was back, flipping her hair and smiling. I wondered if she was on Feel, the latest drug to keep you comfortably numb forever.
“Delighted,” I said, and I held out my hand. Celeste took it absently, but then her eyes focused and she leaned in closer. “
Great dimples,” she said, and her gaze actually held mine for two long seconds.
“He’s my boy!” Mr. Williamson bellowed. He’d been a big fan since I was an intern; he made scads of money off Jazza’s and my work. “Been with us forever,” he told his daughter. “Will be with us forever if I have any say in it.”
“Great to hear that, sir!” I beamed back at him.
“Say,” he whispered, “how’s Ava these days?”
A bitch as usual, I wanted to reply but I held my tongue. “Fine,” I said and forced a smile.
“Good man. Listen, look after Celeste here for me, will you? I’ve got to do the rounds, make a speech blah blah. Don’t know why they even had this thing. Forty-five years is a drop in the ocean. I’m not going anywhere for the next forty-five, har har! But drinks are good for morale and they’re tax-free, so there you go!”
He left me with Celeste, and there was an awkward silence. She played with her bracelets, and I wondered why she didn’t leave and schmooze with the rest of the room. I was sure anybody there was more interesting than me.
“You look like Jason Bateman,” she said. “He died, in what, 2025? I love his avatar! So gorgeous! He still models for Armani and Givenchy and Dior.”
The Rage Room Page 4
