ROOM 2A THE PONTIBUS JOURNAL 2

(CONTINUED FROM ROOM 2 THE PONTIBUS JOURNAL)

VARIOLA’S REVENGE

by Larry Lee Slot

Chapter Twenty Two

They left the airport after surviving the usual bureaucratic assaults. The two scientists checked into Hotel Paris in La Ceiba. The pilot went to a hospedaje in the Barrio. Nightlife in the small port town didn’t have much to interest them. Mostly bars and cabarets, it focused on the coconut oil-pineapple-banana industry (United Fruit-Dole) and international sailors.
Movie house entertainment was Spanish-subtitled American films. Mr. Frye and Mr. Aloirav took in a movie, but thought it bad. They left the theater soon after entering. While walking around the city, Lester stopped at a sidewalk vendor. He bought a small sack of hard green mango pieces.
Mr. Frye found them quite tasty, after he added the vendor’s sea-salt. The two could not obtain a good selection of native fruits and vegetables, as La Ceiba’s market closed early. Its counterparts in the larger towns of Tegucigalpa, Comayaguela, or San Pedro Sula stayed open longer, but that fact did the two men little good. Lester got an ice cream cone from another vendor’s cart.
He couldn’t help but notice the poverty all around him. Many people slept on the street, inside cardboard boxes. The poorest didn’t even have that. They curled up on a piece of paper. The evening was warm and damp after the afternoon rain.
The two arrived at the United Fruit muelle and looked at the huge transport-ships. The “boss” explained the different sights, as they passed them. In Spanish, to one of the Morenos (brown people), he shouted. “Hey Big-Belly.”
“Si, mon.”
“You meb’be see some combustible up the Platano for me?”
“O si, mista’ Ravo,” the much tattooed Moreno shouted back. “I go tell a Capitan’ now, mon.”
“Bueno, hombre,” the hotelier replied. Pointing to a large filthy gray-brick building, abutting the muelle, he said to Mr. Frye. “See that building next to the little pigsty.”
“Yes.”
“That hell-hole is where they warehouse local criminals,” Mr. Aloirav said. “They don’t feed or water ‘em in there. If you don’t have friends, family, business, or criminal contracts from the outside, you’ll starve.”
“No?!”
“Oh yes.”
“Did I misunderstand you? Did you say contracts or contacts?”
“You heard, correctly.” He replied. “If you need a crime committed, there’s the store. If you don’t want to get involved, “contract” with an expert. The carcel (prison) will release ‘em for the job. No questions asked, or answered, as long as you pay and your perpetrator returns.”
“No kidding?”
“No kidding,” the “boss” continued. “And pity you, should you land in there and have but a pretty relative to bring you stuff. Your wife, mother, daughter, sister, or some such will be most welcome to the guards. If you know what I mean?”
“No.”
“No sexo, no cena,” he spelled it out for him.
“That’s horrible!” Lester exclaimed.
“That’s life in a Third-World US Slave-State,” the hotelier said, smiling. “See that man?”
“What man?” He asked.
“The one over there with the red bandana on his hat.” Mr. Aloirav replied, indicating with his chin (not an ill-mannered finger). “You need a law broken, Les?”
“Of course not.”
“I didn’t think so,” he replied. “But any crime you want committed, he’ll get done for a nominal fee. Petty crime is like any other business in Central America. Anything at all for the good ol’ Yankee Dolla’.”
“You’re not serious?” Mr. Frye asked.
“Oh, yes,” the “boss” replied, unhesitatingly. “Perfectly.”
“Big-Belly”, scratching a large purple scar across his chest, said in pigeon English. “Him says okay, Meesta Ravo, two tambor (drums). I take up Platano in pippante fo’ yo’.”
“Cuanto?”
In an island accent, the Moreno gave some exorbitant price. Turning around, the hotelier grabbed Lester’s arm, saying. “Come on Les, we’re not gonna’ let this garivna (slave) rob us.”
They were about a half-block down the street, when a child came running toward them. Mr. Aloirav smiled, when he saw the red-haired black kid approach. Looking over at the urchin, the “boss” made as if to acknowledge the intended interruption. Then, winking at Mr. Frye, he turned away, ignoring everyone.
The hotelier said. “I have to go through this little ritual every time, but it’s worth it. Sending a barrel or two of av-gas up the Rio Platano is tough. “Big-Belly” forgets he always tries to cheat me before agreeing on a price. The guy’s tops, though. He’ll load it on the coastal vessel, guard, unload, and deliver it upriver. Three or four days along the coast and unloading are trying ordeals. “
“Why?”
“Diesel fumes, body odor, dead fish, bone-chilling nights and rolling seas can make the strongest person ill.” He answered. “At the river’s mouth, he’ll pile it onto a mahogany bark. Negotiating a round-bottomed dugout in five to six foot waves is a glorious thing to see. Then the fellow still needs to take it up the alligator and malaria-infested Rio Platano. It’s a three-day journey to Walpulpantari from there by pippante.”
“How much do you pay him?” He asked.
“More’n it’s worth. But I know it’ll get there, paying the extra.” Mr. Aloirav answered. “It depends on who pays the oxcart-driver getting it from airport to muelle. If I buy the av-gas and arrange for the cart, I save about fifty bucks.”
“How come?” Lester asked.
“He always hires his sister’s boyfriend, and they split what they rip off me,” he answered. “I’m buying the fuel tomorrow, though. The entire operation will cost me a hundred bucks, not including the combustible. The money, I save is bullshit. It’s lettin’ “Big Belly” think he’s pulled one over on me that I can’t permit. You can never show weakness here. It’s even more necessary to flaunt nonexistent or excess strength here in Central America than it is in the States. These people know they’re slaves.”
The “boss” peeled off 80 Lempira ($40). He gave it to the youth. The boy turned and ran back to “Big-Belly”.
Mr. Frye began perspiring and flashed back to Viet Nam. His legs weakened, and his face contorted with vertigo. Memories got so vivid and intrusive, the changes were noticeable.
After a minute, the hotelier asked. “You okay, Les? You don’t look so good.”
“I’m fine,” said Lester. “Just a little dizzy.”
“You haven’t been here long enough to have either culture shock or Montezuma’s curse.” He said with a grin.
“I know. That kid just started me seeing things. Little upsetting.”
“Interesting. He didn’t seem all that bright to me.”
Mr. Frye snapped out of the hallucination and laughed. It’s difficult to laugh and be terrified at the same time. The “boss” knew combat veterans with PTSD got intrusive thoughts. Feeling most of his own residuals were past; he was relieved to see rapid recovery in his friend. Mr. Aloirav wouldn’t have enjoyed any public display of mental weakness here in his own bailiwick.
Wiping the moisture off his face, Lester explained the traumatic scene he just relived. “I was behind some wire, doing ammo watch, on Highway 1, near An Than, ya’ know? This zip kid shouts across the ditch, asking for some “chop-chop” (food). I had a tin of peanut butter, I didn’t want; so I threw it to him. The tyke cuts it open with his own C-ration can-opener. No doubt acquired from some other Jarhead. As luck would have it, another kid comes along and sees the food. I see him ask for some but get no response. The first kid finishes opening the tin. He licks off the peanut butter sticking to the top and throws it away. You know how we were always cuttin’ ourselves on those damn things. Next, I see him turn his shoulders away from the other one and refuse to share. Neither one could’a been more’n ten-years-old, Rav, jist fuckin’ kids! The deprived one grabs the sharp top. Not ten feet from the concertina, he slits the first little fucker’s throat. He grabs the tin away and sits down to eat the shit in complete peace. The one I threw it to jumps up and runs a little ways. He holds his cut little throat, cryin’ real soft. I’ll never be able to forget the look in his eyes or that cryin’, Rav, never! Pretty soon, the kid starts to coughin’. Those intermittent gurgling sounds, ya’ know? When yer’ drownin’ in yer’ own blood? Then, he just lies down on the weeds next to the road and bleeds to death…real fuckin’ quiet. God, was I traumatized! I never dreamed you could get that hungry! I learned what starvation meant that day. That kid, running back to your “Big-Belly” just now. He sort’a snapped me back there.”
“Memories.”
“You too?”
“Hell, yes,” the “boss” replied. “The invasiveness bothered me. For a long time, they wouldn’t attenuate. The bad ones made me lose control of the moment. There’s one particular time keeps comin’ back, now.”
“What’s that?”
“Tet,” Mr. Aloirav said, “Hue.”
“The Imperial City.”
“Yah. Entering the Citadel’s as clear to me now as it was in February of 1968. When…I saw the chained dead gooks on the walls, all those bodies in the caves. Dead babies alongside the road. Those little pagodas. Ain’t life grand, Les?”
“Well…”
“For weeks, the smells. The experiences were too powerful to absorb completely. I can’t remember them enough to forget. Old urine does it. I smell rotten piss… it comes back.”
“It was bad.”
“Les,” the hotelier said. “Combat is the penultimate of life’s experiences. Given the ultimate is death itself. I knew the dark heart of war. I knew it well. I wasn’t twenty-years-old, not even a legal adult. Couldn’t vote, drink… Those miniature piles of dirt everywhere? Covering the bodies of the children? They were no bigger’n my baby sister.”
“I didn’t know you had a sister, Rav.”
“I did,” he replied but didn’t elaborate.
“Go on with your recollection.” Lester said, realizing his comment stopped the narrative. “I’m interested. I got to the Citadel after you did.”
Mr. Aloirav continued. “The small ditches around the little graves looked like pagodas. It made them look so neat and ordered. Death is neat. Don’t you think, Les? It’s so simple and precise. So mathematical & certain. I asked myself questions like, “Why does this have to be? Why am I a part of it? For whom am I killing? How can I go on? Oh God, how? How? I’m a credit to my redcoat English forbears, I am. Killing starving little Vietnamese people. I could just as well, with equal risk, have killed political fat asses in Washington, D.C. that deserved to die. But, did I?! No!”
“How many times I’ve had those same thoughts. I landed in Viet Nam, Rav, and my preconceptions took a major blow. I still have many, but I’ve learned that if you’ve never been scared, hurt, embarrassed, or just plain dead wrong you’ve been mostly dead anyway. Mistakes are steps on the enlightenment path.”
“I asked myself: How’m I gonna’ take it anymore? I answered: I can’t. It has to be over now, for me, until another time, another war, and another life. The killing, the death, the horror, it’s just too much.”
The emotion elicited choked him. He stopped speaking and didn’t resume doing so for a considerable amount of time. The recollection was strong, seeming almost vivid enough to be a description of the present. Continuing to walk together, they came to the river. Lester respected the other man’s need for a respite and said nothing. Then, once again, the hotelier began reflecting.
Leaning over the bridge, looking into the water, he said. “I fell into the deepest pit you can imagine after that. An abyss of eternal horror covered me. Somehow got out. How I could ever again accept Disneyland, I didn’t know. For a long time I ranted and raved to myself about all the institutionalized horror. Then I knew. To look out at the uppermost heights to which mankind might aspire, one must not fear peering into the abyss.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The extremes of thought and experience, Les,” the “boss” explained. “Their limits, as known, must be breached, if we’re to grow beyond genetics and nurture. It’s the one way we can become more than what Nature destined us to be.”
“Do you think it’s possible?”
“Yes, I do.” Mr. Aloirav answered. “Nature too is capricious. Her mathematics disguises the fact. She uses a different dimension-time scale than we do, and it cheats our weak minds. I remember thinking. I can’t go back to the US. There’s no way possible. There’s too much nobility in my breast. Disneylanders can never aspire to it or understand. The jokers’ll try ‘n destroy me. They must. I’ll not survive. I dare not survive. I’ll leave myself here. I’ll take someone else back. Another person, one who’s not been to the abyss and back will appear in my form. He‘ll go “home”. I’ll fit in and be just like everyone else in Wahkee. I’ll pretend to like money, the drive for status, and a big house. I’ll sleep between clean sheets on a soft bed, have a well-scrubbed body, and spout platitudes. In short, I’ll accept all the nonsense pseudo-civilized people love more than their freedom. Yes, I told myself, I’ll survive Disneyland too.”
“And you have,” Lester interjected.
“Maybe. To date.”
“But you still need to return to the jungle for rejuvenating.”
“I did survive, so well, I went even further.” He said, ignoring the comment. “Once the anti-vet mentality subsided, I began looking toward a more optimistic future. I feel now that the people of the World, US in particular, need my wisdom and spirit. They need my capacity for risk-taking & self-sacrifice, cultivated in the firefights of Viet Nam.”
The two men made revelations to each other. Many veterans do so, when in just their own company. Nevertheless, the evening was no longer pleasant. The hotelier suggested they go back to the hotel for the night. Mr. Frye was happy to oblige. The last few days tired him. He then spent a fitful night. It wasn’t roaches or triatomes, which cause most Central American hotel sleeplessness, bothering him. Nightmares and elicited sentiments kept him tossing.
Morning comes early in La Ceiba. Lester was glad of it. He knocked on his friend’s door but got no response. Mr. Frye assumed him a late sleeper and went wandering around the low-roofed marketplace alone. The tantalizing display of fruits and vegetables seized his attention. The many different foods, hawked in the stalls, intrigued him. Sampling started in moderation. One of the items tasted was queso blanco (white cheese). He thought it tasted similar to granulated salty cardboard. The hard dry sand-contaminated dairy product made him look for something to drink. Lester settled for a pre-peeled orange with a touch of salt. Fresh mangoes and pineapple slices were out of his price range in the US. He now consumed so many of them his stomach hurt. Nevertheless, a bowl of frijoles y arroz also stayed down.
Well into his second sapote, Mr. Frye thought he heard someone call to him. No one around appeared recognizable. Someone pulled at his sleeve. Lester followed where their pursed mouth & nose pointed. It directed him to an ox-cart on the street, a few yards away. The rig’s bed held two fifty-five gallon gasoline drums. The “boss” sat next to the cart-driver, waving.
Seeing a return gesture, he hollered, smiling. “Where ya’ been? I’ve been lookin’ all over for ya’. We missed breakfast at the hotel, you know.”
“I thought you were sleeping, so I went for a walk.” Mr. Frye shouted, walking toward the cart.
Noticing the sapote, the hotelier said. “I guess you found nourishment.”
Closer to the rig now, he replied. “Sure did. Been makin’ a pig‘a myself. This stuff is tasty.”
“I hope you didn’t eat any beans & rice in the comedors (restaurants)?”
“Why?”
“Hepatitis.”
“Now you tell me,” Lester said, climbing up on the cart.
Mr. Aloirav helped him onto the vehicle. Ox and driver waited. Big-Belly’s sullen expression greeted them at the muelle. He knew it would be a long sober week ahead. The Moreno was not looking forward to the task. Except for needing to support his ron (rum) habit, maintaining his sobriquet, he wouldn’t do it.
The cart-driver and Big-Belly unloaded the barrels. Mr. Frye watched them roll the fuel along the muelle. Relief shone in both brown faces, when the “boss” turned to the cart-driver and paid him. The drums then waited in the hot sun for other cargo to be loaded first. When they lashed the fuel down in the steamer, the “boss” shook “Big-Belly’s” hand.
Looking at his friend, the hotelier said. “Until these barrels arrive at my camp on Rio Platano, we’re free.”
They stopped at a street vendor to buy pineapple slices, and wandered back toward the commercial district. Viewing offered wares, they saw imports as well as indigenous products. Red Delicious apples in Styrofoam packaging were ubiquitous. Mr. Frye wondered how these people would react to tasting a normal apple. He could never stomach the too-sweet, over-ripe, mealy, imported fruit.
Inside the market building, sacks of beans and corn flour softened every bend in the path. Large bags of wheat flour made the corridors as dusty as a frontier town in summer. Butchers hung raw meat in the fly-infested hallways. One now dragged some to a bloody sectioning table to chop into smaller pieces. An old woman sold eggs wrapped in cornhusks. She piled them next to a number of immobilized emaciated-looking hens. Chicken legs, tied together to prevent escapes, made for easy transporting after sale. Lester thought. “Total exploitation. So human. As nebulous, confusing, and precious as our existence is to us, we still must take another’s, to conserve our own.”
The “boss” bought a kilo of quesillo (Venezuelan desserts of the same name are unrelated.) The soft white fibrous cheese was similar to mozzarella or Venezuelan palmazullia. He then obtained some corn tortillas & jalapeno peppers from another vendor. Making crude sandwiches with the three ingredients, the men ate a delicious lunch.
Perambulating some more, they headed south of town to Palmeras. Before the country built Goloson, Palmeras was La Ceiba’s International Airport. The old runway now looked as unassuming as a deserted U.S. country dirt road. United Fruit (Dole) Company’s low-profile terminal was located here. The hotelier always wondered why an organization owning so many US Government politicians needed such real estate. Entering a hangar, he talked to a large Dole employee, El Major.
Handing him some money, Mr. Aloirav said. “We leave in one hour for Palacios. Let’s go back to the hotel and get ready, Les.”
Returning to Palmeras, they saw El Major waiting with another man, a pilot. The pair led the two scientists over to a Cessna 172. Taking their bags, the pilot opened the plane’s door for them.
Alone together in the plane, the “boss” said. “We couldn’t take my plane. I didn’t have time to get the necessary permit. Unless I have one, the pols won’t let us land where we want. They’ll impound the aircraft on our return. My pilot is getting the Permiso de Circulacion. While we’re in Palacios, he’ll come and get us with the larger plane. You’ll soon meet Morris and see my jungle camp in La Mosquitia. We’ll head up the Rio Platano, to my old lodgings in the mountains, later.”
Mr. Frye waved to natives standing past a fence separating the airport from the local cemetery. They taxied onto the runway approach.
“Very encouraging.” He thought. “A cemetery at the end of the runway. Convenient.”
The Cessna rose over the cemetery and La Ceiba. It wound through the mountain passes between the Cordillera Nombre De Dios and the Cerros De Cangreioi. Passing over Nueva Armenia, the men went ever eastward. Over the savanna, they looked down at the beautiful ocean to the left.
Lester asked. “What’s happening in the Platano Mountains?”
“Someone I want to see,” the hotelier replied. “A guy I did a favor for once. Works for me on occasion. Haven’t heard from ‘im in a while. Wanna’ make sure he’s all right.”
“A medical flight?” He pried.
“No,” Mr. Aloirav answered. “Not so mundane. Knew the dude in Viet Nam. Gold prospector now. Helped him free his son.”
“Really?”
“Yah.” It’s going on twenty years. The boy was, sort of, one of Los Ninos (The Boys). The ones fighting the Somoza forces in the mountains?”
“You mean the Sandinistas.
“Yah.”
“They’re running Nicaragua now?”
“I’m not sure who’s running it now.” The “boss” quipped. “Even then, there was lot’sa bandidos (thieves) bandying that name about. The revolutionaries at the time called themselves Sandinistas after their hero, Sandino. I respected Commandante Zero – Eden Pastora – and his dreams, even if the means were sick. I was close, when the US blew him up. After he took the Palacio in Managua in 1978, they got powerful. I happened to be in Managua then. Somoza was drafting boys and shooting those who resisted. They caught the prospector’s boy. Remember when they were doing that to the gook kids in Viet Nam?”
“Yah. You became a communist because of him?”
“Hell, no! What makes you say that?!”
“Just some of the things you say. You’re not a very patriotic guy. I’m sure you know what I mean.”
“I’d sooner be a damn spineless Christian than a commie!”
“They seem pretty much the same to me.”
“They do, don’t they? But, political Communism allied to religion makes having freedom a criminal offense. Government and religion are con games…bullshit. None are legit. Protection rackets before and after the grave. I didn’t think ten was a good age to die for the state. Not that I’m more predisposed to think forty’s any better. Somoza was a US puppet and a pig.”
“I didn’t know him.” Mr. Frye condescended.
The hotelier continued, unoffended. “He was. Take my word for it. Anyway, when the placer miner asked me to help him, I did.”
“What did the help consist of?”
“I flew into a riparian clearing east of the Rio Coco. Samoza’s boys chased the kid there. Never knew for sure who got him there. I just waited, engine running, for him to come to me. Don’t ask me how he got shet of’im, but I spirited him away.”
“Sounds dangerous?”
“Somewhat, I suppose. It wasn’t tranquilo. There was some shooting. The plane was full a’ holes when we got back. But everything turned out okay.”
“Then what happened? Did he pay well?”
“Didn’t charge him. I just went back to the US.”
“You risked your life and plane for nothing?” Lester asked, impressed with the apparent generosity. “That was a noble deed.”
“Yes, I know,” he replied. “Not the deed per se, but that it was I that did it. And, it wasn’t for nothing. I get a kick out of living on the edge. Don’t you?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Well then, defense rests.” The hotelier replied, smiling. He looked out the porthole and said. “We’re passing Trujillo now. Way over there on your left, you can see Cabo Castilla. On the other side of that mountain ahead are the Rio Sico Tinto Negro and La Mosquitia. The end of civilization as you know it.”
“What’s that mountain ahead of us called?
“Sierra La Esperanza,” the “boss” replied. As they passed it, he said. “This is La Mosquitia, Gracias a Dios province of Honduras, my 2nd home.”
They soon crossed the winding Rio Sico Tinto Negro. Mr. Aloirav pointed out the various small villages in the vicinity with which he was familiar. They passed Limon, Iriona, and Tocamacho before Laguna de Bacalar stretched out in front of them. The plane flew low over Batalla and Pueblo Nuevo, local Moreno peninsular villages. Laguna de Bacalar was on their right and the Caribbean Sea on their left. Centered in a little lagoon ahead of them was a small hut.
The aircraft banked to the right, and the “boss” said. “Jungle obscures it, but that tall coconut-palm marks the leading edge of my lagoon. In the middle there is mi casa. The local natives helped me build it. I wanted it constructed in the water, rope-bridge to shore, for romantic reasons. It would have been much more sensible and less expensive just to build it on land. The water does protect it from the termites, though.”
The pilot’s right bank steepened, as he turned toward the landing strip. Mr. Frye could look down and ahead at the thatched-roof cabin. The bamboo manaca-palm dwelling made an unimposing structure for sure. It was, nevertheless, very picturesque. No other humans appeared to be in the vicinity. Perhaps that was due to the thick jungle canopy surrounding the lagoon.
“What a beautiful spot! What are all those cactus bushes on the seaward-side of the house?”
“Pineapple.”
The plane’s fuselage obscured the little farm and plants. The pilot straightened to level flight over the water and turned into the downwind pattern-leg. Over Laguna de Bacalar, he readied to bank left for a south shore landing. The grass strip terminated beside the community of Palacios. They would disembark there.
The hotelier pointed across the lagoon to the mainland hut-cluster and said. “There’s no landing strip on my farm. We have to land on terra firma (mainland).”
“How do we get to your place from there?”
“One of the Morenos is using my cayuco at Batalla. Seeing the plane dip low over mi casa will tell him to come to the campo de aterrizaje (landing strip). His job is to fetch and bring us to my lagoon.”
“I see.”
“In the meantime. We’ll wait at the headman’s hut. As I said, before we left. Beware of Morris. He’s not what he appears to be. The cognoscenti around here refer to him as “wearing two hats”.
“Two hats. I can imagine what that means.”
“In English, we’d say two-faced. It implies the same thing. Whichever way you hear it, the message is clear. The man’s a pol. Treachery is close. Be wary. Don’t make any deals or ask for anything. I’ll do all the talking.”
The pilot made a low-pass to get the animals off the runway. Then he circled around and made a short approach onto the windless field. The plane flared and settled down to a fast roll. After numerous jolts and bumps, it slowed to taxi speed. At the end of the runway, it came to a full stop. They prepared to disembark under a large matzapan (breadfruit) tree.
Lester saw through the porthole what appeared to be an invasion. Every person in each hut in the cluster was coming out to meet them. They converged on the plane, as the travelers disembarked. The crowd pressed close.
“Is this the welcoming committee or are they attacking us?”
The “boss” laughed, replying. “It’s always so. The whole village turns out to see what the new arrivals look like or brought with them. Privacy is a convention they do not understand.”
Mr. Frye stared at the mass of humanity milling around him. Outside the aircraft, he stood rigid, saying nothing. His bag started down a cow path in one of the native children’s hands. Others stopped gawking and followed the self-appointed porter over a small creek toward the largest hut. The child was as familiar with the ritual as the rest of the village.
Lester traipsed along with Mr. Aloirav, the pilot, and the rest of the day. Morris, entire face protruding from the bottom half of his head, like a squished grape, confronted them. Near the entrance to his hut, he greeted the hotelier as an old friend. The short swarthy pernicious headman, knowing beforehand, nevertheless asked what their business was in Palacios.
The “boss” answered that they were waiting for the Moreno Bernardino to come with the cayuco. Mr. Aloirav introduced Morris & family to Mr. Frye. Lester responded to the introductions, as the gentleman he was. His companion wasn’t as buoyant. Although treating the family with respect, the “boss” exhibited unmistakable coolness.
Mr. Frye smiled at the women, until Mr. Aloirav noticed. He cautioned. “Don’t think you can get too friendly with ‘em. The polyester does not mean civilized. Underneath those colorful prints beat naked savage hearts. Get too cozy and you may have to choose between staying here married or just plain staying.”
Perhaps Lester was a bit too optimistic, but he didn’t believe it. Thinking to take the natives at face value, Mr. Frye wanted to be sure not to prejudge the family. He wanted to prove Rav wrong, chafing at the hotelier’s tendency to seem so aware. The demeanor of being prepared for anything, he also found irritating. Walking over to one of the women, Lester tried to start a conversation.
She started giggling, making faces, and looking at the other young women standing around the hut. After an uncomfortable silence, the India replied in a patronizing tone. He didn’t understand Spanish well. However, by the body language, Mr. Frye could tell it wasn’t flattering. It caught him by surprise.
The glance askance, she gave the others, said. “Oh, lookee here. See me. The gringo picked me out of all the rest of you for his favor. How wonderful I must be. How grand I am. How foolish I shall now make him look. How much will he abase himself for me?”
Subdued and mortified by her self-consciousness or savage cruelty, Lester thought. “Perhaps Rav was right. I better cool it. Damn! It’s irritating. He always seems to know what, or what not, to do or say.”
It got close to three o’clock. With no other fares, flying into Goloson at night illegal, the pilot left. He wanted to get off the ground before the diurnal afternoon rains. Minutes later, people began getting wet. Many entered the headman’s hut. The majority of the villagers went to their own huts and left the newcomers in peace. As the various groups departed, Lester noticed someone unusual. A young blond India, among the dark-haired ones, remained. He asked the “boss” what his thoughts were regarding the reason for such an anomaly.
He replied. “I told you about her. White people notice the difference right away. Some hypothesize she’s a genetic throwback from Anglo-Saxon pirates. Morgan and others inhabited these bayous and shores for many years.”
“But you don’t think so?”
“No.”
“Why not?” Mr. Frye inquired. “Seems a reasonable explanation.”
“I know. Too reasonable. She’s pretty enough, and beauty’s a trait of commoners. Maybe it’s the romantic in me. Yet, look at that brow and those cheekbones. The girl’s not just beautiful; she has noble features too. Noble is not to be some ill-bred English pirate’s progeny. Those Caucasian genes swamp out the genes of her Paya father and Maya mother. She has neither the red skin of her father nor the distinctive Indian nose of her mother. That’s not normal.”
“Well, what else can it be?”
“I think she’s descended from one of the “lost people”. Maybe a white guariba.”
“A white what?”
“White ape. Inca – Goth. Descendants of Atahualpa’s vestal virgins & Pizarro’s group rape of same in 1532. The natives here are always talking about them.” Mr. Aloirav said. “Seems to me too much rumor for just imagination. They speak of otro mundo (other world) people. I know it sounds silly, but I told you about being to the piedra blanca (white rock) at Walpulpantari. I’ve seen the ancient writing.”
“What’s this legend about, once more?” Lester asked, remembering some of the story.
“Well,” the “boss” said, happy to relay again what he knew. “This comes from the people further south. Pure blood Indians living in the Cerro Pan de Azucar and Montanas de Colon near Rio Patuca.”
“I’m listening.”
“A band of blond-haired blue-eyed savages lives in the deep bush there. Just noticing these white monkeys causes the whites to run away en masse. No one meets them again for a long time.”
“How do you know the natives aren’t just pulling your leg?”
“Oh, I don’t. All the villages around have the same story, though. Like ancient flood stories, when there seem to be no discrepancies or fantastic embellishments, I begin to take them seriously. Wouldn’t you?”
Mr. Frye responded. “I don’t know. It sounds interesting. Exciting too. But if shy and retiring, why would their genes be in this girl?”
“There’s always the chance for rape or promiscuity.” The hotelier replied. “Most US rapes are said to go unreported and unpublished.”
“That’s true. She sure is a beauty.”
“You know.” Mr. Aloirav said in a “don’t hold your breath” tone. “We’re going up the Rio Platano tomorrow. Maybe we’ll see them.”
Bow-legged diminutive Bernardino arrived as the rain subsided. He took them across the lagoon to the cabin. The sanguijue (mosquito) hour struck, upon arrival, and the party went indoors. The barefooted Moreno left for Batalla, promising to return at dawn. Once dusk ended and evening fell, as usual, the majority of insect pests left. The two men spent a pleasant evening talking on the deck over the lagoon. Soft music, a light breeze, cognac, and some green tea kept them company.
Dawn was around 3 AM, and Bernardino arrived. He waited for the gringos. Soon the men were foraging in the jungle around the camp amid numerous interesting sights and sounds. The “boss” seemed just as comfortable as the Moreno in the wild milieu. Although none carried guns, all three wore machetes.
The terrain brought reminiscences of Viet Nam. Negative aspects, however, didn’t detract from the greater enjoyment of the jungle. Mr. Frye looked harder for blond-haired blue-eyed maidens than for an old prospector. He saw neither. Along toward dusk, the “Group’s” plane appeared, carrying the necessary papers for in-country flying.
The men left for Rio Platano. The camp was east of the river, between Ciudad Paya and Las Marias. A long sandy bank served as an acceptable landing strip if the rains weren’t too heavy. It appeared to the pilot, an experienced bush operator, to be dry enough to land. He said getting in was no problem. Getting out was also doable if they left before the afternoon rains.
The hotelier told him to land. Minutes after he did so, it got dark; the men spent the night on the bank. They saw no reason to push on to the camp yet that evening. The next morning, at the compound, Lester met two more of the “Group”, Bacon and Carl. They arrived the previous day, having come to Honduras on a commercial flight from the US. The pilot brought them to the enclave from La Ceiba before Lester & Mr. Aloirav embarked in Palacios.
Day three of their search ended. The “boss” said he wanted to leave the next morning for Barra Platano on the northern coast. The sand bar was near the mouth of the river. He wanted Lester to see “Big Belly” load the fuel barrels into cayucos and then pippantes. After a ten-minute flight, the plane landed at the Barra Platano.
The three men watched from shore, as six-foot waves crashed into the Moreno’s pippante. He transferred the drums to his vessel, as fast as the coastal boat unloaded them. Once seeing that accomplished, the hotelier felt he could leave the area. “Big-Belly” got it to the mouth of the river. The “boss” knew he would take it the rest of the way up the Platano. The cayuco was a lagoon craft, not a riverboat like the pippante. He could have unloaded into the cayuco first but didn’t.
Except for exotic fruit, jungle environments have few vegetables. Ants, iguanas, land turtles, and other hungry animals get to them first. The two vegetarians missed them. Mr. Aloirav dispatched the aircraft to La Ceiba to get some along with other essentials. He instructed the pilot to bring the two to Palacios first and return the following morning. They would go back to the Platano camp upon the plane’s return. The “boss” wanted assurance before leaving the country that the fuel arrived.

The evening meal in Palacios was fresh pineapples, mangoes, avocados, coconuts, beans, rice, and sopa de platano (plantain soup). Daylight ended soon after the meal did. The shack grew alive with the sounds of hunting and death, and the hotelier asked.
“Ever think about what you want done with your remains after you croak, Les?”
“Cremated, I guess. Cheaper for my survivors.”
“Me, I don’t want to be buried like some superstitious sicko. I want to get back into life as soon as possible. Rot in the jungle somewhere, ants and other creatures consuming me. With luck, nobody will find me until even my bones are gone.”
“Some would call that a poor man’s funeral.”
“Or a beast’s.”
The hotelier still hoped to find the prospector. In the morning, while eating some fresh fruit before leaving for the jungle, the “boss” said. “To eat a fresh pineapple, sun-ripened from virgin-jungle soil, and hold the fruit of your own loins in your arms is to be able to say that you have truly lived. We have truly lived, Les.”
“Yes, we have.”
Mr. Frye found streams to be fuller in the morning with draining dew & waning moon. He also discovered, while reclining in the midday heat, perspiration only developed on his evaporative side. Animals have difficulty noticing other creatures without seeing prior movement. A large anteater walked right in front of a motionless Lester without ever appearing to see him.
The next day, returning to the Rio Platano enclave, they found Bacon waiting for the fuel. From the air, they’d seen “Big Belly” and a Misquito just past Ciudad Paya. It was obvious the natives would be there within two more days. The last night there, an insect or rodent began chewing on something near Mr. Frye’s hammock. The strange sound awakened him.
Annoyed, he got up and grabbed a flashlight to search for the culprit. Thus engaged, Lester noticed, what appeared to be, writing on the hammock itself. At first it appeared to be but soot stains. Upon closer inspection, it read “PLEAFE BOFF NOT MY KIDF”. Meaningless to him, Mr. Frye made a note to mention it to his host in the morning, which he did.
The “boss” looked at it. Shrugging his shoulders, indicating it was a mystery to him, he left the room. “Big Belly” arrived, and the fuel was unloaded. Everyone but the natives then boarded the Cessna to leave the high bush country for La Ceiba. At the last minute, Bacon delayed their leaving by burning something.
Absent for well over a week, Lester was anxious to get home. Tired, disappointed in not seeing any lost people, he missed his family. The man was more than ready to leave. He didn’t want to be a poor guest and complain. Mr. Aloirav was in no hurry, so Mr. Frye forced himself to wander around La Ceiba. After a time, his efforts to enjoy himself brought some limited success.
The hotelier announced they would leave the country the next day. He put all their papers in order himself and got everyone ready to go. Leaving Inmigracion’s Exit-Visa building, they ran into Jose’. The very person the “boss” wanted to see. Not having made contact in La Mosquitia, the men now conducted their necessary business on the street.
He explained hearing earlier that week of Mr. Aloirav’s desire to see him. The Indio left his “diggings” (washing the river’s bank with a sluice-box). He arrived in La Ceiba, looking for his son’s savior, that same day. Their talk concluded. Lester watched the wet-eyed Indio touch the hotelier with affection.
Mr. Frye later mentioned his observations, and the “boss” argued. “I saw nothing emotional at all. Jose’s not that old, Lester. Barely fifty. He’s not getting soft. Men look old fast in the bush. It’s just business between us. Nothing more. Don’t convey sentiments where none exist.”
That evening, the “boss” left the hotel to radio the US. With nothing to do during the interim, Mr. Frye took one last stroll in La Ceiba. Passing the closed market, he saw Jose’ standing on the corner drinking a coco (coconut). Lester went over and greeted him.
The prospector brightened like a sunrise, saying. “You are a freend of Meesta’ Ravo, no?”
“Si.”
“You are fortunate to have such a man for your freend. I too am a freend of thee great man.”
Jose’ reiterated the rescue story, perhaps embellishing it from an earlier version. He recounted seeing his son walk from behind the crashed plane, unhurt. Mr. Frye saw definite tears. The Indio felt risking one’s own life for another man’s son was rare. He said dying for that man after what he did wouldn’t be giving too much.
“Meesta’ Ravo ees a great man. He geeve me my life back. What ees a man weethout a sohn?”
Nodding in agreement, Lester smiled, excused himself, and went back to his hotel room wondering. “What is it in Aloirav that inspires such behavior? He’s gained a precious loyalty he doesn’t seem to realize or value. How can he be so generous and kind yet appear so insensitive and apathetic?”
Falling asleep, the man postponed finding the solution to his enigmatic friend. He dreamed of blond-haired blue-eyed maidens lost in the jungle. Awakening with energy the next morning, Mr. Frye jumped out of bed and was down in the lobby before anyone. The thought of soon going home made him very happy. Missing his wife and kids much more than expected, he would soon see them.
Mr. Aloirav awakened in a short temper. It lasted until after leaving the airport. Impatient, wanting to get back faster, he fumed. “What’s keeping that pilot, damn him! I told him to be here at seven. Here it is, 7:05 AM!”
The man showed up at 7:10 AM. He was ten minutes late through no fault of his own. Inmigracion detained him. The stamp-verification official was late. Customs went smooth, and they went through it within the hour.
Airborne, the “boss’s” mood improved, and he apologized. The plane climbed up over Utila Island en route to Mexico. Far to the front and left, the men could see the Belize archipelago. Lester settled back into his seat and dozed until landing in Chetumal. Off again to Veracruz, he awakened there from a nap begun over the Yucatan.
Not yet dark, the pilot began talking to Matamoros’ controller. Mr. Frye didn’t even remember passing Tampico. They touched down at Kent County International Airport in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and it was snowing.

Out of the night that covers me, black as the pit from pole to pole. I thank whatever gods may be, for my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance, I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance, my head is bloody but unbowed. I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul. Henley

Chapter Twenty Three

After returning from Honduras, Lester left Mr. Aloirav’s company. He went to the airport and paid the long week’s tie-down bill. While doing his preflight, prior to returning to Massachusetts, an airport bum materialized. Mr. Frye inspected, while listening to a run-down of his plane’s discrepancies at the same time. It was a minor annoyance.
Beyond a few instrument calibration errors, he knew there were not that many defects. Actual inadequacies, mechanical and airframe, were minor. The way home was VFR (visual flight rules – good weather) anyway. The tower gave Lester taxi permission to the runway and into position for takeoff. The eastern wind meant his red and white plane faced that direction at the runway’s approach end.
On permission to take off, he gave it full power and left Grand Rapids. Climbing to ten thousand feet, Mr. Frye was soon out of the headwind. He flew as fast as the 0-200 Continental engine would allow. Grabbing the most favorable tail kicker, the man sailed along at 90 knots. Off in the eastern distance, he saw another aircraft at the same altitude.
Lester wasn’t instrument-current (6 month validation), meaning he couldn’t fly IFR (instrument flight rules – fog). Under VFR conditions, maintaining safe separation-distance from the other ship was his responsibility. Under IFR conditions, the burden is on air traffic control. Mr. Frye didn’t mind keeping alert. He felt being a rubbernecker was a large part of the fun in flying your own plane.
Banking left, the scientist avoided a large cumulus cloud a few miles ahead. Reaching a straight and level VFR flight altitude, minutes later, he made a quick fuel-mixture check. Then, the man settled back for the long flight to Plymouth. Soon, the other plane passed, and Lester’s mind wandered back to his Honduran sabbatical. He looked forward to regaling his family with jungle, animal, water, people, food, and legend stories.
Lester drove into his row house parking spot quite late that evening. When the family reunion ended, he went right to sleep. The man was ready for a good night’s rest. The next day, he would build his Pontibus.
The following week saw him designing yet another Pontibus model. It got particular attention concerning different climate handling. Metal wasn’t going to behave, as biomolecules would. Calling various companies, Mr. Frye got quotes on aluminum and other necessary materials. For the first time in his memory, running out of funds wasn’t a concern. Mr. Aloirav sent a $20, 000 advance on royalties check to Boston along with Lester.
Expecting more checks from recording profits to relieve a great deal of pressure, Mr. Frye thought. “For my age and past efforts, I’m accomplishing what I should. Royalty checks will come in, and the sky houses will appear. I’ll make up for all my lost time and continue to grow. Sales will boom. I’ll buy everything we’ve ever wanted or needed. I may yet see the actual bridges in my lifetime.”
He was not oblivious to the fact that great deeds entail tremendous risks and sacrifices. The man felt prepared for any downside. He was forgetting, however, all those years of neglecting a normal life. Lester felt ready because he was not privy to the true cost in suffering incident upon following big dreams. How could he be? The agony he received to date was but a taste of what he deserved.
Chaos is God. Third Law. God equals chaos, the end of singularity. Life is order and unrest. Lester knew that.
Only Death can bring peace & happiness, because it increases entropy to maximum. Rigor mortis is the only perfect utopia, centralized control having moved into decentralized control, the perfect democracy. The man blamed his pain on his “God”. Doesn’t everyone? If schools taught all the ways dream size is proportional to the consequent torment, who would aspire?
If that monster Despair could but consume our painted, hollow-cheeked, sagging breasted harlot Hope; we would bask in the peace that comes with Suicide. But, oh no. Our masochistic souls demand we dream. The constitutive survival lesion in our intron DNA forces us to endure the torment that swims beside it.
Taking a chance as large as the Pontibus, Mr. Frye thought, meant believing in himself. That would make him a better person. His faith rationalized away its virtual impossibility. Lester believed the hazard was for a greater goal than anyone ever before even imagined was possible. How could any mind conceptualize the path of torment a man, who accepts pure super vaulting responsibility, must walk?
Many people hinted his idea was just a runaway fairy-tale. Kinder individuals told him it was a flat impossibility. Crueler hearts said. “Another Viet Nam veteran with an irrepressible desire to be effective. Sublimated rage and survivor guilt pitted against insurmountable odds.”
He felt positive those first few days. It got him thinking about other scientists involved in medical and agricultural research around the world. Mr. Frye saw them as children, building mounds of beach sand around their sandcastles. Each mothered provincial objectives hoping in vain to protect personal creations from the incoming tide. He felt politicians and grant scientists pretended confidence in their capacity to sustain institutions.
“They’re refusing to look at the situation in a serious way.” He told himself. “No one aware can have faith in the standard means at our disposal. I’ve read a great deal more than most. I have yet to encounter an author who had the courage to ask the necessary questions or postulate possible answers to them. I admire the doctor – lawyer desire to relieve suffering. I abhor their shortsightedness. Global population and ecological problems defy remedies. How can they hope to legislate, compromise, or drug away human copulation, insensitivity, greed, and cowardice? Attempting to protect a sandcastle against normal tides is always conjectural. Oblivious to the horizon’s approaching tsunami is true blindness!”
Then, he put off such vain pompous criticism. Delving deeper into design problems, Lester tried finding a way to produce aluminum-tubing tetrahedrons. In the calein structures envisioned, minuscule tetrahedrons would arrange in a grid like framework, automatically, as a characteristic of stochastic protein-folding constraints. Progressively larger triangles would result. Calein would serve analogous to microtubular protein.
Microtubules are the hollow protein filaments, found in all living organisms. They are responsible for structure, transport and communication. Skeletal networks, holding each organism together, use redundant proteinaceous frameworks of such filaments. However, calein was no longer an option. He wanted his aluminum tetrahedral constructs imitating enlarged microtubules. Substituting his lost calein’s function with metal would be tough.
Tubular conformation aluminum must emulate the protein. It could neither do so in real space nor fill the theoretical molecular position. Calein-producing organisms, envisioned, built, and lost could have done everything. They would have extruded inexpensive tubes and the adhesive to join them. The surrogate would be weaker & more expensive. Fusing problems were an immediate nightmare. Would he have to embed the pipes in concrete?
He did not want to leave calein buried in the past. He proved that stringent selection conditions could produce anything. Redeveloping it meant maximum risk, however, and he was a practical man. Duplicating his past phenomenal success was virtually impossible in a normal lifespan. Those former efforts were not just the result of diligence and pure genius. Assuming equipment, (comparable to MIT’s), and unlimited time were available, could he expect to repeat former good fortune? Many thought not.
The past years left him a few quarts low in his confidence crankcase. There was a small possibility he could reproduce the same effects with welded tubular aluminum. The fabrication scale was much larger, cumbersome and cruder in function, but Lester would try. He spent his first $20,000 royalty check creating a miniature metal sky house. The 2.5% aluminum scale-model was 5 feet in diameter and 4 feet high. It represented a full-scale prototype 192 feet wide by 156 feet tall. The scientist enclosed the entire structure in six sheets of acrylic plastic for protection. He wanted the archetype shielded, facilitating transportation to various world fairs, conventions, and displays.
The plastic case was also useful while the representation waited in various studios for publicity photographs. Due to the minute detail of the artistry involved, completing the entire scale-model took six months. Mr. Frye didn’t do all the work himself. A man named Mr. Otorp helped. The two men worked, side by side, in the row house workshop.
They became associated after the South Shore community ran the Fryes out of town. The scientist dropped into a Vietnam Veteran’s Outreach Center on Tremont Street in Boston one day. Such places allowed veterans to get together and talk about their experiences. Destructive guilt of involvement in the lost unpopular war needed terminating. Nothing seemed to palliate the onus. Reliving the causes all alone made it worse. Most combat veterans were already dead. Those surviving, chatting together, so the theory went, might help each other to bring their remaining lives under control.
When they met, Mr. Otorp was a mess. War guilt made him a drunk. New England’s toxic-acidic water, and his own lack of exercise, left the man sick with Crohn’s Disease. Chronic ulcerative colitis wouldn’t permit even two hours free from filling a toilet with his bloody diarrhea. When sober enough to take them, drugs didn’t help. Doctors warned that it must stop within eight to ten years. If not, he would end his days battling colon cancer.
Mr. Otorp was also a husband and a father. He and his lovely wife lived together with their three sweet children. How the man accomplished that feat was one of Nature’s consolation prizes. He was not one. Not being too fickle, it may have been one of Her bitter little jokes.
The family was the one part of his squalid existence worthy of affection. Following the child coming into the World in 1973 with a birth defect were two miscarriages. At three days old, another survivor required neonatal surgery to open a blocked jejunum. The situation was traumatic for Mr. Otorp. He could not make himself believe in the efficacy of prayer. The War made him an atheist.
He saw no reason to postulate a God. “God” is just a metaphor. Who needs an imaginary manosadistic dilettante and control-freak to blame for a sick & cruel world? He endured his fear for the boy’s life without any assumed supernatural assistance. Drinking helped Mr. Otorp through the crisis’ pain. The desire to turn to such negative support was habitual, as times seemed to demand it.
The occluded intestine was a genetic problem. Coming about through a deletion of a particular DNA segment, it passed from father to son. A similar mutation caused Mr. Otorp’s own birth to be defective. That malady, however, centered on a full six-inch shortening of his left leg. A noticeable limp resulted. He was also most apt to describe his skull, flattened on the right side, as “misshapen”.
Speculating on the truncated appendage affliction, a teratologist felt it was first generation. Mr. Otorp’s father was a US Marine Corps’ combatant during World War II. He passed near Nagasaki, shipboard, when the US dropped the bomb. Cosmic rays struck the spermatogonium, developing into Mr. Otorp. The deletion became part of the family’s hereditary genome, an heirloom.
It was not our sad gimp’s good fortune, however, to have just these defects. Born with a large birthmark on his rear torso, he required neonatal surgery to save his life. The cranial defect left him cortex-deficient resulting in a spatial-reasoning want. In his young life, baseballs invariably passed him by or hit him on the head. He never, even once, managed to hit a ball with a bat.
Early teachers diagnosed him as “retarded”. In another practical joke, Nature counterbalanced his shortages by adding to them a hypertrophied verbal-capacity. In classic idiot-savant style, he almost mimicked a Tourette. Our poor misfit appeared somewhat slow until opening his mouth. Then, he would chatter away in an almost never-ending train of the most embarrassing erudition.
His mother, bless her soul, was a “cleanliness next to godliness” Dutch matron. She believed in sparing neither soap nor water. Little Mr. Otorp and his summarized leg were forever falling down onto the unclean ground. He never seemed to find an end to requiring her services. The woman scrubbed hard and often in her celestial fervor.
She succeeded in rubbing off all the protective oils & primary defense globulins from the child’s skin. Anti-viral defenses absent; pre-Salk picornaviruses found fertile ground to wreak their havoc. At four tender years, he contracted infantile paralysis (poliomyelitis). Mr. Otorp grew up crippled and disfigured. Other children took great pains to knock him down at play.
It was always such fun watching him try to regain his feet while being pelted with stones. People remembered him and little David Lion. There they stood, back to back in the East Paris, Michigan schoolyard. Every recess time, the dynamic duo had the opportunity to fend off rocks with their handy white-pine crutches.
By seventeen, the physical deficiencies were no longer blatantly obvious. His biological drives for glory and blood lust were similar to most other adolescent males. In a 1965 feat of incredible intelligence, he deceived military induction physicals and joined the Marines.
We tend to accept as much misery in life as we can. After that, being frail, we start dumping it out onto others. Mr. Otorp was no different from anyone else in that area. With him, however, alcohol increased the interval between acceptance and dumping. By the time the unloading occurred, not much venom remained for causing any real pain to anyone else. People knew him as a generous and kind individual.
When he heard about Lester, Mr. Otorp was very much interested in becoming acquainted. Here was someone, like himself, upon whom life enjoyed defecating. He wanted to become aware of what the man’s research entailed. Assisting with the project was his goal. Mr. Otorp often visited the Dorchester row house.
Whenever familial duties allowed respite, Mr. Otorp returned to help. Mr. Frye resisted at first, but soon consented. Compensation was usual & unusable – verbal expressions of gratitude. Once adequate money became available though, Mr. Otorp’s efforts found more ample reward. Model finished, they applied themselves to the actual requirements of a working sky house.
Great quantities of aluminum tubing and different welding materials arrived. Tetrahedrons materialized. With larger structures came interconnection problems. Piers, platforms, etc. brought increasing frustration. Effective economical metal connections were elusive.
Many arduous hours working with the ersatz substitute for calein came to naught. Lester soon fell back into his old ways of blind devotion to the goal. Time flew by with very little to show for it. Days passed. Some weeks, even living in the same house, he never saw his family.
One day the police notified him they wanted his presence at the hospital. Paramedics brought his son there after failing to awaken him from a nap at a girlfriend’s house. The man rushed to the emergency room. He listened while medical personal told him they admitted the younger Frye for overdosing on a narcotic. It was very close, but he survived.
Police asked the scientist to come down to the stationhouse after leaving the hospital. He needed to hear about his son’s activities. The young man not only used drugs, they informed him, but also sold them to friends. Allowing such a situation to develop shamed Mr. Frye. He blamed his lax parenting and psychological distance.
For whatever reason, police would not divulge any names. They were careful not to mention the person thought to be the supplier. It was but a name Lester wanted, so he could make a visit. They would not give it. Perhaps they weren’t sure. Perhaps they wanted to protect their cut or Mr. Frye.
The family discussed the situation. Returning home, the miscreant assured his parents that no drugs would ever again enter his body. He swore not to return to the chemicals. Nor would activities involved in their acquisition occupy any of his time. It was a matter of weeks, and the hospital called again.
The situation wasn’t as benign. The lad did not recover consciousness. They pronounced him dead a few hours after notifying the family. Lester was in the room, holding his hand, when he slipped away. Mrs. Frye was in the Pembroke Sanitarium. Hearing the news from somewhere, she went into a catatonic state and stayed there. She never recovered, ending her days in the State Mental Hospital.
Lester blamed himself for the loss of his loved ones. He was not there when his family needed him. He knew what a wonderful creature Mrs. Frye was. Believing any woman, attempting to live with a veteran, must be an angel; his love for her was deep.
She couldn´t grow beyond the shock of the Queenstown losses. Other than to blame the attacks on her husband, she did not understand the subsequent media fabrications. Unable to appreciate the unrealistic goals he set, the poor woman became uncooperative. She was unwilling to give him any credibility beyond that she would give an unruly child. Even his smashing legal victory over corrupt lawyers, a crooked judge and venal politicians did not change her opinion.
His loyal spouse believed Mr. Frye’s eccentricity and lack of sufficient self-hatred responsible for her pain. Hatefulness destroyed her mental equilibrium. The bickering never ceased. Her mind collapsed under the constant strain. Now, the dual bereavement sapped Lester’s energy.
The great sadness in the two survivors permeated all the isolated parts of their lives. The pain was so intense; it constricted their insides. They could not remove the pressure. No detail or activity was immune from the pervasive quality of their agony. It became a part of them, as if a family member, with a life of its own. The necessary care and feeding of which, the pair dared not forget. It never left them.
The young woman, as the little mother, made life bearable in the row house. One day, she came home from school after Bible Study with news. Her dead brother’s former girlfriend was in a drug-rehab center. The addicted young woman’s guardians affiliated with one allowing visitors. Students were familiar with the place.
Miss Frye told Mr. Otorp, thinking her father might want to see the girl. Mr. Frye felt it would serve no purpose. His gimpy assistant thought otherwise, explaining his reasons. Lester thought about them and accepted the logic. A waste of time could not be an excuse. He wasn’t working at the Pontibus, anyway.
It was apparent something needed changing. His heart was no longer involved. Mr. Frye couldn’t educe the necessary concentration. It seemed pointless. For years, he told himself the hard work was for his children.
Now there was no son for whom to present it when completed. The dream was meaningless. He didn’t notice how such lassitude assaulted his daughter’s tender sentiments and self-esteem. She realized his great pain. Nevertheless, believing the Pontibus to be for her brother’s sake, not hers, disheartened.
Letting him know about the girlfriend was thoughtful. Perhaps, it was also somewhat self-serving. With no mother or big brother there, her sense of place and identity suffered. The girl was not developing feelings of personal security, retreating ever deeper into the morass of Christianity. She needed her father’s love even more now. After the past years’ experiences, the deficiency hurt. The little lady was trying to survive.
Lester got the address of the rehab center, where they incarcerated the young addict, and went to visit. Dressed in institutional clothing, the drab uniform did nothing to disguise her beauty. Dark brown eyes shown with a strange sadness. Institutionalization was not yet successful in clouding them.
Like a trapped little sparrow, she was not accepting her fate. It was obvious; the first opportunity that presented to escape, the young woman would take it. Following introduction, he explained in general terms what their meeting might accomplish. Awkwardness left some after return visits. Talk became more fluent. It focused most on her & incarceration.
She said. “This place sucks!”
“Because you can’t leave?”
“Yeah, but in other ways too.”
“In what other ways?” He asked, aware of the question’s prying nature.
“Shit! Can’t get high! Ever!” She said, wanting to shock his naiveté’.
“Why is that such a terrible thing?”
“Look Mr. Frye, let’s not shit each other. Maybe your life’s so great you don’t need anything else. Mine isn’t. An’ I don’t think yours is so hot either. Your son didn’t think much of it!”
Accomplishing her objective, wounding him, she got an answer without rancor. “You’re right. My life isn’t so great. Work’s kept me busy enough to not think about it.”
“I know.”
Still smarting from the first barb, Lester knew he wasn’t establishing rapport. The second slash of her knowledge laid his life bare.
“I’m sure.”
Mr. Frye needed to know what his dead son thought of him. Decreasing some unrequited love might distance his psyche from the pain. He wanted to hear derogatory remarks his son made while still alive. About to ask for more, Lester reconsidered. The caustic remarks helped no one, and it was too much for him to weather right then.
Allowing his eyes to water, he said nothing. As hard as she appeared, his perceptible vulnerability encouraged her feminine softness. The young addict said.
“I mean ya’ can’t eat as much as ya’ want, because ya’ get sick to yer’ stomach. Or, it makes ya’ fat’n ugly. Ya’ can’t drink as much as ya’ want because ya’ get drunk’n hung over n’ guys use ya’. Ya’ can’t fuck as much as ya’ want. Ya’ get diseases or pregnant or the guy ya’ want doesn’t want ‘r respect ya’. Ya’ can’t sleep all the time because ya’ get headaches. It just goes on and on.”
And the drugs help?”
“I can’t live without drugs.” She admitted, after first looking to discover any condescension or eavesdroppers. “They satisfy me. An’ it isn’t just that ice-cold feeling when it goes into your vein. Or, even the warm feeling that comes right afterwards. The pain just goes away. I feel exciting and worthwhile. I don’t have ta’ make any choices, and my life is filled with great experiences.”
“So what would it take to make you want to live without drugs?” He asked, wondering if those were his son’s reasons.
“Something better than drugs.” The answer came without hesitation.
“And what might that be?” Lester queried.
“Beats me.”
Whenever the conversation got close to him and his life, the topic changed. The conspiracy also extended to any talk about the deceased. Instead, they talked about generalities in life. The girl asked what he meant by looking beyond the clouds. The scientist admitted to closet idealism. He explained his leaning more toward artist-scientist than business-scientist. She expressed unawareness of any difference.
Mr. Frye explained. “It’s sort of like being a sculptor. Working with his chisel, the artist believes he’s bringing the stone’s spirit out into the open view. My sculpture is the future. I’m trying to bring its spirit into the present for everyone to see.”
“Now I really don’t understand. It sounds weird.”
He replied. “I want to benefit the human race and all creatures on Earth. I hope to do something that lasts for thousands of years. I can teach people how to walk on the clouds and ride the sunbeams.”
Lester thought he was making progress until the inmate destroyed him with a smile, saying. “You must be awful high. My dreams aren’t that far-out. What kind of drugs do you use?”
Mr. Frye did gain her confidence. It took hours of conversation. He even found a little peace doing it. His association with her acted as a kind of catharsis, assuaging some of his plaguing guilt. One day, she gave him her former supplier’s name, Mr. Francis Castle.
The girl even explained how to find him. The fellow might have been the younger Frye’s source of drugs too. She wasn’t sure. Lester’s peregrinations brought him where he wanted to go. The man, however, was reluctant to confront the dealer.
How should he behave toward a conceivable cause of his son’s demise?
The scientist didn’t know. Nevertheless, to put his mind at ease, some questions needed answering, understanding. He wanted to discover whether the pernicious guilt was assuageable. It was obvious his existence delivered less than what his son’s short life needed. How that happened wasn’t yet a concept ripe enough to assail. He would settle for guilt mitigation for the present.
Discovering reasons why dope pushers and certain others devote so much time to destruction might help. Understanding such a mind-set could, Mr. Frye thought, perchance set him free. Being able to discern their rationalization might assist in overcoming some of his problems. How it would all come about, he wasn’t sure. His personal difficulties, he was certain, were the opposite.
His own inadequacy, he felt, consisted of incapacity to insure planetary-life preservation. The scientist saw his duty as acting to further protoplasm. Prevailing over others’ reluctance to engage in such endeavors was a corollary. Steps to take, advancing such matters, were another puzzle.
He began a private quest to unearth Francis Castle’s secret motives. Lester would unveil the strange command over addicted souls similar to his son’s. Lester could not view mid-21st century USA, of course. If he could have, he would have seen the complete devastation of spirit resident there. One out of every two people addicted to either drugs or obesity. Narcotics’ use was an attempt to fill the growing hole where meaning used to be.
If Lester could have seen the future better, he would have noticed its utter vacuity of purpose. Trying so hard to assuage his guilt would not have enthralled him. As it was, he expected to discover why spiritual destruction wields more power than its opposite. Such knowledge, Mr. Frye felt, might regain him his lost peace of mind. He desired a return to Pontibus dreaming, to lead again a successful research project.
The dealer was where the girl suggested he might be, in Roxbury on Homestead Street. Here was the largest marketplace in Boston for illegal drugs. She gave Lester the information with a proviso he intended to honor. Under no circumstances was he to reveal the information’s provenance. She also advised him not to mention being the father of an OD (overdose) victim. If he wished to continue dreaming, the girl advised, Mr. Frye would heed her caution. Drug dealers, in her experience, were members of a nervous and impulsive group. Psychopathy was not a rare and wonderful quality in the milieu.
It took a great deal of self-control for Lester to speak with Mr. Castle. Giving in to murderous impulses was a constant worry. Insuring protection from just such an eventuality, Mr. Frye did not attempt to acquire a gun. Introducing himself, he explained what he hoped to accomplish. Mr. Frye learned in a hurry just how uninteresting the concept was to Mr. Castle. The dealer explained, without using many words, what he himself wanted. The good opinion of others it was not.
His exact words were. “Take a fucking hike!”
“Excuse me?”
“Beat it, turkey!”
“I will not! I need a few minutes of your time.”
“Oh, pardon me! Are you gonna’ fuck me?” The dealer queried.
“No!”
“Are you gonna’ bear my children?”
“Of course not!”
“Then why the hell should I give a damn about what you think of me? Fuck off! Asshole!” He replied, allowing just enough time to disclose his appearance before its disappearance. The cerebral turf battle’s rapid end effected a bum’s rush. Lester too left the area. He was determined, however, to return. On the way home, the man reflected on what he observed.
Francis Castle was tall, medium build, about 175 pounds. Of Mediterranean extraction, he wasn’t bad looking. No strong features lay under his olive-colored skin except for the cold steel-gray eyes. No hairless space existed between his eyebrows, but the forehead was of normal height. A set of full lips, yet patrician nose, gave him an overall wild but not vulgar look.
After many frustrating return trips, Mr. Frye caught the younger man’s attention long enough to ask. “Why won’t you help me?”
“I’m not in the information business, asshole! Get the fuck otta’ here!”
Aware of keeping potential customers away, as if unaffected by the rudeness, Lester mocked calm to say. “You’re busy. I’ll come back.”
“Can’t you get it through yer’ fuckin’ gourd, asshole, I don’ wanna’ talk to you?” Mr. Castle said, not trying very hard to be pleasant.
“Yes. I see that. You’re not interested. So you’ve said. How do I make you want to talk to me?”
“You don’t! Split blue head!”
Much embarrassed by such treatment, Lester was about to concede defeat. Then, despite the girl’s council to the contrary, an impulse grabbed him. Reaching into his briefcase, not so fast as to spook the dealer, he took out two photographs. Being recent, the pictures showed his son, as he was, less than a year before his death.
“See these?” He growled, shoving them under the man’s nose. “They should prove to you I am what I say I am. See the resemblance? I’m no cop. I am a grieving father looking for some answers.”
“I never saw that kid!” Francis shouted, assuming the worst.
“No?” Lester said, hiding his terror. “The police think otherwise.”
“Fuck you! Lyin’ bastards!”
Knowing he flirted with death, the scientist said. “In my personal effects, left with a friend, are copies of a letter addressed to the DA.”
“So fuckin’ what?! Flake off, old man!” He responded.
“The letter tells a story about my son.” Mr. Frye continued. “A few days before his drug overdose death, he told me some things.”
“Yeah. Like what?” Mr. Castle asked, feigning an unfelt nonchalance but hooked.
“Like enough to make your life pretty uncomfortable for a while.”
“Like I said, I never saw yer’ kid.” Mr. Castle retorted, hooked deeper. “If he said anything about me, it’s all bullshit!”
“We’ll see. You’ve got until ten o’clock this evening. Help me, or the letter goes in the box,” Lester threatened. Before turning to leave, he said. “In case you’re thinking about stopping the letter by stopping me, forget it. The DA’ll get it for sure, as will a few select reporters. It’ll make your situation untenable.”
Shouting an obscenity, the dealer was upset enough to lose concentration. Nobody needed to spell it out for him. Police & media thinking he supplied an OD victim, with a Dad in the picture…business could suffer. Reporters, shakedowns, higher bribes, and a miserable life for a while weren’t appealing. Whom the kid bought from wasn’t the issue. Other dealers might just seize the opportunity, decrease pressure, and move around…
With a father talking to the media, things could get well out of hand. The scofflaw didn’t relish the scenarios, but he didn’t know what to do. Thinking about killing to stifle his problem, Francis reconsidered. The other side seemed to control all the options, unless he called the possible bluff.
The dealer called his attorney instead, explaining the circumstances. The advice given was to talk to no one and remember the “other matter of concern”. By referring to the latest bust, he intended to insinuate that additional heat wouldn’t help. It was typical unusable legal counsel, fashioned by people who do not live in a real world. Advice intended for use by people who try not to live in a real world. Thinking it over, a few minutes before ten, Mr. Castle called Mr. Frye and said. “Whad’ya wanna’ know?”
“I told you,” he replied, heart leaping. “A few of your thoughts and feelings. Perhaps some ideas about the dope trade would help. I’m not looking for any personal details or confessions. I’m not out for revenge. I want to sort out what I need to sort out to get my own life back on track. I don’t even know if you can help me.”
He couldn’t tell if his answers dispelled any of the other’s anxiety. The scientist wanted to mention his own fear but restrained himself. Confrontation terror he dreaded less than his own feelings. Going on much longer, as such, they might just overwhelm him. The man worried about the consequences of drowning in a flood of his own tears. He still held back an ocean full from Viet Nam.
The photographs, threatened letter, and persistence he manifested all appeared genuine. Mr. Castle, a father too, felt stymied. Nevertheless, he reasoned, doubt might still lurk in a mind possibly hate-filled. Most people have an area deep inside, feeling some humanity, respecting uncertainty, be it ever so small. Even the hardest of men, with the deepest needs for revenge, can give pause, he hoped.
Francis was also impressed, as anyone would be, by someone taking a personal interest in him. It was slight, but it was hope. Confidence grew in his ability to allay Lester’s suspicions without involving cops.
“I ain’t no dope dealer. I’m a homeopathic physician, an’ I dunno’ what I can tell ya’, man. Mind you, I ain’t sayin’ nothin’ I’ll tell anyone else. If you think so, you’re way off base. You’ll get no kind of confession or snitch information outta’ me!”
The slight progress encouraged Mr. Frye, and he stooped to flatter after feeling the waning resistance, saying. “I told you I wanted no confessions. Just your wealth of experience with human nature might help me. If you could share it a little, I would be most appreciative.”
No recorders or wires!” The dealer asked, demanding.
“Of course not.”
After a comfortable pause, he said. “Aw’right, y’kin come over. I’ll talk to ya’.”
Homestead Street wasn’t far. Minutes later, Mr. Castle was looking inside Lester’s briefcase and frisking him for a wire. Finishing his inspection, he took him to a quasi-vacant building. Inside, they sat down at a table.
Expecting another flattering answer, but not getting it, the dealer said. “All the bullshit on TV about the chemical biz’, my hustle’s gotta’ make ya’ pregidic’d ‘ginst me.”
“I told you what I’m trying to do.”
“Yeah.” Francis replied. “Can’t say I understand why.”
“I lost my son to drugs. I need answers to get on with my life.”
“Ya’gotta’ think people in my business are monsters?” He queried, still fishing for an ulterior motive, another compliment, or some vindicating sentiment.
“Any prejudgment would defeat my purpose,” Mr. Frye cajoled.
For some reason, Mr. Castle wanted his recognition, continuing. “Well, no matter. Free-lancers are better than the niggers, anyway. The spooks’r the real bloodsuckers. Really vicious bastards.”
Surmising the quality of self-esteem, with which he dealt, Lester said. “Other than its destructiveness, I haven’t any thoughts on your profession. I don’t know you well, so I haven’t formed an opinion yet. The police told me my boy was selling drugs. He’s now deceased, and I’m interested in some information. Any you can give me, I would appreciate. I need to explain his behavior. There must be a way to deal with it without losing myself.”
“I talk to ya’, n’ya fergit the DA letter, right? N’ya quit buggin’ me?”
“Absolutely.”
“I gotta’ cohpla’ minutes. Whadya’ wanna’ know?”
Mr. Frye wasn’t prepared to ask any questions. He wanted to just sit and listen. To have the dealer talk about his outlook and “profession” was sufficient. Causing discomfort, similar to an interrogation, was not his intent.
Perhaps you could just tell me about yourself and your ideas?”
Softening his facial expression, Lester allowed a more benign demeanor. Suspicion continued. Francis was as vigilant as ever, but the brittle veneer cracked some. A shoulder relaxed. Getting up from the table, he drew his adversary into another room. Lights came on and the door shut. The space proved to be a sequestered apartment. The dealer led him into an inner-office. Feeling diminished necessity to impress with street-talk, he showed better diction. Mr. Castle now appeared to be semi-cultivated and educated.
Sitting down backwards on a chair, he said. “I don’t think I mind telling you about myself. Most people have in mind a fiend when picturing an unlicensed medicine provider. I’m not a grotesque being. I’m a Christian. I get some medicine for people occasionally, because I have the contacts. Not that I sell that much, you understand.”
“I understand.”
“The impressive bucks go to the nigger gangs and the big distributors. Between them and the pigs, I’m being squeezed right outta’ business.” Francis said. “I help the kids who’re afraid to deal with Dorchester and Roxbury’s skodes n’ spics. You know?”
“I think so. White kids.”
“Yeah. What I represent to the world, I guess, is a different kind of doctor.” Mr. Castle said after spending some time talking about how few chemicals passed through his own hands. “It’s what God wants me to do. It’s my “calling”. My kind of medicine goes to the world’s “poor in spirit”, like the Bible says, the sick and dying in soul.”
His last statement’s implication cut Lester to the quick. According to such thinking, his son’s drug addiction was an avenue of escape from pain. Continuing to listen to such opinions took strength. It appeared as increased interest. The more attention Lester paid, the more talk resulted. Francis may have enjoyed hurting Mr. Frye.”
“My job deals with Society’s gangrenous carcass,” he said. “It’s a selective garbage-disposal system…like maggots. They feed off rotten and dead animal parts.”
Realizing now Francis was trying to be unpleasant to sever the interview, Mr. Frye said. “Harming nothing sentient, the little bugs get along quite well in the world. Is that what you are doing, getting along quite well by being a maggot?”
“Er, well. Not exactly.”
“You were just using it as a metaphor?”
“Yeah. I was gonna’ say that their trouble with people happens after they graduate to flies, and they start “buggin’.”
Thinking that quite funny, the dealer induced some mutual laughter before continuing. “I do pretty much the same thing as a metaphorical maggot. I serve a useful function. God’s job for me is just as important as any other social institution. People come to me. I don’t solicit.”
“And you try not to get caught “buggin'” anyone?” Mr. Frye added, amazed at the man’s low level of self-esteem.
“Right.”
“I never thought of it that way.” Lester admitted, afraid to internalize the implications. “Did you know my son?”
Mr. Castle wasn’t sleeping. He knew, even if his interlocutor didn’t, the question was as taboo as the answer would be, and said. “You weren’t going to ask for any personal details or confessions.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I forgot.”
Francis assumed no father could accept the truth of such a situation without taking umbrage. Suspecting that the man, whose drugs killed your son, stood boasting of it before you would be upsetting. With certainty developing, something might snap.
“I knew your boy, Frye. Used to see ‘im on the street. Never sold to him. He went to another distributor. I never muscle in on another man’s hustle…”
“Go on, please,” Mr. Frye said, concerned at the defensiveness. Suspecting possible mendacity, he nevertheless acknowledged his statement sufficiently, yet refrained from asking the other dealer’s name.
Finding the dialogue largely innocuous, the dealer left the defensiveness. Assuming the scientist convinced, he continued. “I don’t muscle-in on the bankers either, like they’re doing to me. They and, their friends, attorneys and pigs. Bankers are warehouses for other people’s stored stolen labor. They’re just an obstacle to progress. Nobody finds fault with them or makes their profession illegal. Why? Because the bastards have the proper education and the right connections. Accidents of birth! Credentials! Lotsa’ tradition behind making money in that manner. You’ve no idea what it means, forced to learn fast, until you’ve become prey. God will punish them.”
“How?”
“Don’t know. But, trying to drive me out of business, putting me behind bars!? That’s muscling in! It’s not Christian. “Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you.”
“Oh.”
“I’m no slave, Frye. I’m a man. Men don’t submit or cooperate with their murderers. I’m no European Jew! Lawyers hustle other people’s labor under the pretense of a semblance of justice. They purport to be advocates with their licensed privilege to facilitate interpersonal dealings. The ones not just common thieves are but parasites, are they not?! Legal ethics! An oxymoron! Just a set of precautions necessary to misappropriate client funds with impunity, real racketeers. That’s more criminal’n what I do, isn’t it? They’re a hell of a lot more maggoty on society’s carcass than I am. It’s not Christian businessman, like me, who’re the enemy!”
The dealer paused, indicating a desire for some feedback, so Lester said. “What you’re saying has truth in it. I don’t think these people are as parasitic as you do, however. They serve a useful function in our society beyond pure exploitation. Where the line is drawn, I don’t know. Imagine a lawless world. Must be horrible. Please go on, though. Your perspective is fascinating.”
“I didn’t mean to imply they’re all useless. I’m trying to make you see I’m no worse. If they serve a purpose beyond mere exploitation, so do I. Western society appears to need narcotics. Someone must fill that need. Most existing professions have negative aspects along with the positive. If we weren’t all somehow necessary, we wouldn’t be here. Right?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Look. Take a thief. The one thing wrong with stealing is that it’s unwise.”
“Not to mention the cruelty to the victim.”
“Okay, right. There’s that. But, stealing enriches prison guards, attorneys, judges, the state, and the entire corrupt system. Economics. The thief stays poor and, as you say, the victim suffers. Why does society put up with it? To enrich the state’s sycophants! Society receives compensation for a crime at execution of sentence. Who compensates the sentencee for Society’s neglect during his childhood? A society that has a mania for raising diverse diseased & fatherless children. No one!”
“Welfare for the State!?”
“Your phony ethics! The whole moral idea is supposed to coerce the intractable and canonize survival skills. It’s an outdated and unimpressive tool. Ethics are just some of the ways the rich oppress the poor. Fools teach their kids to be honest and upright. By the time the kids realize it’s all bullshit, they’re ingrained poor and the rich are kicking sand in their struggling faces. We imprison the living to protect the dead – morals. Prisoners protect the dead. Presidents, perverts, prophets, or pariahs…all were innocent babes that changed according as Society’s potter molded them. Hitler & Heaven – a babe apart. Granted, your respectable society has a defense. It can’t be entirely wrong; it made Jesus Christ, Mahatma Gandhi, and Stalin.
Mr. Frye said. “Your thinking is interesting.”
“I can accept the truth.”
“Where have you pigeonholed scientists and medical doctors? I’m almost afraid to ask.”
“Mediocre toadies. Not quite as intense as the rest of the boot lickers. Merchants, but privileged. A credential system rigged with diplomas and licenses to sell drugs. I can’t get one. Medicine is an anathema. It kills as many as it cures. Its practitioners, like all professionals, are insecure with low self-respect. The longer they remain professionals, the worse and more unreasonable they become. Like lawyers, pomposity substitutes for dignity. I’ve never met a quack that wasn’t either a sleazy drug-company technician or a con artist. The best doctors are closet Christians, compassion vultures.”
“What about the police?”
Face darkening, he retorted. “Pigs! Establishment insurance that ordinary people never rise above mediocrity.”
His subdued reply contained ample hidden undercurrents of hate. Mr. Castle was not a friend of the Fraternal Order of Police. Reddening, he even shook, thinking about them. Glancing at Lester, the dealer stopped talking.
When he continued, the tone had changed. “We do have a deal, right?”
“You mean about the letter?”
“Yeah?
“Of course,” he answered. “You’re keeping your end of the bargain. Are you concerned that I’ll not do likewise?”
“Not really.” Francis replied. “Just wantta’ make sure what I’m tellin’ you isn’t gonna’ get back to the DA. If it does, along with whatever’s in that letter of yers’… They’d build a case against me for sure. In a heartbeat. A jury’d have a field day with me.”
“You’ll just have to trust me.” Mr. Frye said. “I have no other assurances to give you. You have nothing to fear, from me, when we’re finished here.”
“O.K.,” he said, relaxing some. “What else ya’ wanna’ know?”
“Please, just continue where you left off,” Lester said. “You were talking about the place police have in our society.”
“Don’t see ‘em as necessary.” Mr. Castle said. “They reinforce a deplorable status quo. Show me a cop or a lawyer not coming from a broken home or dysfunctional family. They grow up, craving order and structure in their lives. Diving into the “system”, they hope to find it there. By the time they realize otherwise, it’s too late. They disintegrate. They should come to God, confess, and be saved.”
“You believe that?”
“Yup. Maybe they also have a need to fight other people’s battles for them. Wishin’ someone had been there for them, when they were little. Feelin’ they alone can impose order from within themselves. They discover too late that the system is even more dysfunctional than was their childhood. Losing all life-directed motivation, they become jaded cynical parasites. The end result’s the same. Moral degeneration.”
“Maybe you’re just looking for the bad ones?”
“You’re saying I’ve got tunnel vision! In order to further my business, that’s all I can see?”
“Perhaps. It’s not so outrageous an assumption.”
“I don’t think so.” Francis shot back. “Ever met an honest cop? I haven’t. Licensed criminals with badges. Lawyers have licenses to cheat & steal. Cops have badges. Brutality is a badge. Tyranny over the human spirit wears a uniform. Conviction sticks, guns, mace, handcuffs… What kind’a paranoid carries that, wants to? They go to school, work hard, just to get the permission paper. Enforcing conformity, no matter the cost, is their rule. When they can’t, they take a cut.”
“You’re bitter.”
“US citizens, even system sycophants, are indentured servants, economically raped & subjected to continual plunder through strangling taxation.” He riposted. “The kleptocracy enforces their institutionalized psychopathic hegemony through violence, injustice, and ignorance. Just look at what your tax dollar buys. It’s a protection racket! Do you want: nuclear power or warheads crammed down your throat? I don’t. You want deadbeats supported from your sweat?”
“What about national defense?” Lester asked.
“Who needs to be defended?” Mr. Castle laughed. “US citizens are already imprisoned at 10X the rate of other countries. Slaves! What aggressor could be worse than the IRS? Tax-happy pols, funding rip-offs, mortgage fraud, invasion of privacy, exported terrorism, arms sales, pollution… Ever heard of asset forfeiture?”
“That’s not all the police’s fault.” Lester replied, not wanting to answer in depth for fear of offending.
“Financed by ripped off taxes! Groveling to the lawmakers and their vile products. Police enforce slave mentality, don’t they? Tax collection and the way they spend the bucks, right?! Are you satisfied with the safety in the streets? Do you concur with a legal system that threatens productivity at all angles? Labor laws, product liability…”
“You’re mixing civil and criminal.”
“When was the last time the police helped you instead of hurt you? Do you know anybody helped, more than hurt, by them? I’ll bet if you do, it’s a member of one of the privileged classes. Do you have any idea what it costs to bribe the bastards? Businessmen, like me, pay such supplemental taxes just to operate unbothered. Who do you think benefits most from my business?”
Speaking so fast, Mr. Frye could not get a word in edgewise, Francis said. “You say it’s my occupation making me bitter, so I’m critical. You think I see pigs as a monster element because they’re an occupational hazard. Frye, the next time you see one of our glorious uniformed “officers of the law”, remember this. You’re looking at a sick man or woman. A frustrated existence geared to victimizing the less fortunate, subjecting us to unbridled aggression. Riding around in one of those ubiquitous vehicles, terrorizing the city. Some a’ the vindictive police tricks I’ve seen would make you shudder. You’d never believe me, if I told you the stories.”
“I think I understand.” He said, squeezing in a few words. “Are you poor and less fortunate?”
“I have been.” Mr. Castle answered but wouldn’t change course, saying. “I know they put lids of marijuana and coke vials in glove compartments, pockets, and purses. Phony rape raps, easy to initiate, gain police shitloads of advantages. They satisfy personal vendettas, put innocent suspects behind bars, and keep quotas filled… The jerks work hand in glove with Bacon Hill. If storm troopers get your number, City Hall’s machine’ll crush you like a bug.”
Lester wanted to accept the system’s condensation. Run out of Queenstown by municipal authorities made it an attractive concept. After considering from what kind of mouth the venom leaked, however, he withheld judgment. The scientist was learning a great deal about a drug dealer’s outlook on life. Nothing was useful for his own problems, though. The hour was late. He was tiring. Mr. Frye still hoped to hear something helpful, so he continued listening.
“…They feel their occupation puts them above the law. Perjury goes unpunished, and they testi-lie with conviction.”
“You have no recourse?” Lester asked.
“Just try fighting the tyranny.” Francis responded. “Telephone poles and trees around the City will be your courtroom. Using them to tack up one-sheet protest papers is all the hearing you’ll ever get. Fighting back that way is a paltry excuse for redress! Who reads?! Once yer’ busted, yer’ fucked! The extensive and overwhelming ostentation of Society infers its legitimacy. Ever been in a Federal Courtroom?”
“Yes.”
“Then you know the engineered majesty there and how intimidating the oppressors are. Unchanging, the fraud distorts and disables normal criminal tendencies to test limits. Lacking sufficient courage, all remain its victims.”
Wanting to return another time, yet reluctant to complain of fatigue, Lester asked. “How can you be so sure there aren’t any honest cops? Sincere men and women, wanting to help people must join the force from time to time.”
“I’m sure. Like good pols, they join but don’t remain so.”
“There must be some who do?” Mr. Frye retorted.
“Maybe, I never met anybody who knew one.”
“I think you know there must be.” Lester said. “You can’t afford to take the risk, so you generalize.”
“Risk?”
“To your rationalization system.”
Calmed by the soft answer, Francis said. “Frye. You don’t understand the drug business.”
“True.”
“The bottom rung end user is a normal person, just very weak. Moving up the ladder, you come to the next rung, the dealer – pusher – traficante. The DEA, cops, and the pols pursue him for his “depravity” (their cut). Cops, pols, and the DEA will not countenance any infringement on their hegemony over depravity (cut). There’s the truth of it.”
“Nobody has any value?”
“I didn’t say that. But anyone’s value is only relative anyway.”
“How so?”
“Who can say, with even the least grain of certainty?”
“Who can say what?”
“A child making a mud pie has less importance to the ultimate fate of the human race than a man building a $B skyscraper?”
“Oh. I see what you’re saying now.”
“My occupation is no worse than anyone else’s, standing on my side of the persuasion.”
“Persuasion?”
“Doomed.”
Hearing something helpful, the scientist asked. “What do you mean by that?”
“Anusoptic disease perhaps.”
“What’s that?”
“Shitty outlook.” He paused, and then responded. “I watch people coming to see me on business. Sometimes, I even talk to ‘em. They all polarize.”
“Polarize?”
“On one side of life or the other.”
Intrigued by the observation’s implications, Lester encouraged clarification. “I don’t understand. What sides of life?”
Showing in his desire for recognition how far his illusion or prevarication could go, Mr. Castle elucidated. “Some who take the doomed persuasion don’t care who they hurt or what harm they cause. I’m not one of them.”
“Go on,” Mr. Frye said, when he paused. “That’s a very profound observation. Just the kind of commentary for which I came to you tonight, hoping to discover. Perhaps it’s what I wanted someone to express. I’d like to hear more.”
“I guess they feel it’ll all be over soon, anyway, even if they don’t say so aloud.” Francis added. “Sometimes I almost agree with them. I too think it’s a matter of small time. Something’ll wipe us all out, or most of us, like the plague. The Bible promises something like that. The Mayans thought so too. Nuclear power will ultimately destroy us soon, no matter what we do.”
Checking himself in a sympathetic nod, Mr. Frye let the dealer continue. “Some behave as if the doomed philosophy has captivated them. It hasn’t. They’re just ignorant.”
“How do you mean that?” Lester asked.
“They act like they think they’re a special part of the system. The effete rich or the rapacious upper-middle classes run around oblivious to what’s happening. They throw a little money at whatever scares them. It makes them think they’ve solved the problem. You know what I mean?”
“What about the side who don’t feel doomed?” Mr. Frye asked.
“Fools, trying to do something about the world’s problems.” Francis laughed. “Sad. The do-gooders and bleeding hearts. They succeed just in not profiting as long as they can. The Albert Schweitzer types – sociologists, humanists, and false-religionists. Environmentalists like that Greenpeace bunch. I could go on but you get my drift. The entire crew who believe there’s some kind of meaning or hope in it all.”
“Or something positive that can be done.” He interjected, responding to the insult. “A measure of one’s love is the degree of hatred and torment one is willing to experience for it.”
“Yeah, you think differently, but it’s hopeless.” Mr. Castle said. “It’s all because you haven’t accepted Christ as your Savior. God’s gonna’ destroy it all, ya’ know? Either a nuclear fuckup or some virus like that AIDS thing’s gonna’ wipe out the planet. The entire human race, ka-boom. Nothin’ left but the tears…”
He slapped his hands to his hips, as the conversation became boring to him. Getting up from his chair, the man indicated imminent departure.
Wanting to end the scene, he felt a fictional appointment sounded good, saying. “Gotta’ date on the other side’a town. Ya’ got enough to get off my back?”
Lester was interested and hated to leave. He was tired, however, and would have welcomed a break otherwise. The two were soon walking down the steps of the building.
Mr. Frye asked. “I’m not gonna’ harass you, anymore. I’d like to come back sometime, though, and talk with you again. May I?”
“Call.”
“I will.”
The dealer didn’t seem altogether annoyed over a possible replay. He gave no indication of having such a sentiment. Leaving the place, Lester went home, remembering the children at the drug-rehab institution. In the last few weeks, he’d seen many addicts.
“We haven’t come very far.” He thought. “Those kids are running from the same hopelessness and futility about which that guy speaks. They just haven’t learned yet how to bury themselves in adult avariciousness and religious illusion.”

Night brings out stars, as sorrow shows us truths. Bailey

Chapter Twenty Four

Lester pondered over his conversations with Francis Castle and the addicted girl for weeks. He surmised the “doomed persuasion” to include those in the arms business, nuclear power generation, tobacco companies, and “other” drug dealers. Even his old Sloan-Kettering “friend” at Cold Spring Harbor fit the description. He supposed most of the professions filled Francis’ ignorant “wannabe” category. Lester wanted to speak with Mr. Aloirav about such ideas, but he was out of the Country.
Mr. Otorp wasn’t a philosopher. Mr. Frye found no kindred spirit with whom to talk. He wondered about extinction and its opposite. “Do all living things evolve by natural selection alone, as all but religionists & a few ignorant mavericks assume? Is it all random? Could life be developing through a Nature-directed channeling? What if Nature is God’s teleological tool and Chaos is the Devil? No, Nature is the great God Chaos and the Devil is a fictional construct of the voodoo religionists. Is my existence relevant to Nature’s ultimate design? Maybe I’m filling an entropy vacuum. Has some universal knowledge picked me for the Pontibus burden because of my idiosyncrasies? Could all or some of my peculiar qualities be factors in assigning the award? Is a recombinant DNA background plus proximity to the sea important somehow? Have I a special awareness of the globe’s smallness due to my flying and war experience?”
The worst depression of his son’s demise dissipated in time. Lester blamed himself, his psychic distance, and ecological preoccupation for the tragedy. Needing to go on, he was unable to do so. Wallowing in guilt, he rationalized.
“I’m only responsible for myself. I was doing my best for him. Time will tell how fate judges my spirit. What I think, feel, and do are consistent with a philosophy of lifefulness. My deeds alone count or don’t count. Whether history indicts or apotheoses me for pursuing my ideas makes no difference. Such memories have little effect on the planet.”
The man contemplated, while his daughter modeled clay at the kitchen table. “Value, real power, is the capacity to effect positive change in the world long after you’ve died. What determines that power? Who decides whether deeds are positive? My value will be judged either in my DNA, sitting there at that table, or through the Pontibus.”
Leaving her, he spent hours working on twelve-pointed inter-tetrahedron connections, hoping to perfect a 720-degree sphere.
“Am I mad or far too idealistic?” Mr. Frye wondered. “Could I, like my wife, be an asylum candidate? Is the Pontibus quest a Cervantes-like tragi-comedy? Will it amount to just another windmill, giving meaning to my life alone? Is Otorp my Sancho Panza? Have I conjured up the big dream to give my miserable life hope or focus? Is it necessary? Handling the ridicule and patronization I’ll encounter, before realization, will take strength. Do I have it?” Will I fail for want of an erg?”
The positive aspect of his personality replied to the other side, all along, saying. “One has to admit it is a bit unreal. But, all real things were unreal at one time, weren’t they? The science isn’t wrong. Nothing in all the published literature contradicts my hypothesis. Many references could substantiate my claim. I know it will happen. Why shouldn’t the Pontibus be possible? The sky house model is excellent. People will have a good description of it, should I depart this world.”
Wrestling on, until strength waned late in the evening, he asked himself. “Should I continue or not? Frustration, loneliness, and now guilt. Is the sacrifice worth it?” The scientist answered before going to bed for the night. “Of course, it is! The world will become more violent if starvation, cold, homelessness, and injustice increase. Life will disappear if the ozone layer continues to disintegrate, global warming grows or the insanity of nuclear energy is exploited. I will succeed! I know I will! I must!”
Receiving regular checks from the hotelier now, he tried not to squander the money. Lester assumed the tetrahedral-vertex-joint problem would disappear in time. Meanwhile, he needed to do some financial planning for the eventual Pontibus construction. Once again, the man put his entire laboratory into the basement. Ridding it of rats, the first floor went to assembly and fabrication.
Paying his outstanding bills, he bought more aluminum tubing. Compensating his assistant better, Mr. Frye could afford to spend without feeling uncomfortable. With the welcome affluence, he also gave the house a better appearance. Bare plaster lathe that survived the past winters cannibalization, he covered with sheetrock. His daughter no longer felt ashamed bringing by her religious friends. Lester hired a nanny for those rare instances when he and Mr. Otorp would both be absent.
Experimental work continued, as they tried making the aluminum tetrahedrons serve their intended purposes. The new laboratory-factory grew, and the second floor fell to use. Tetrahedrons and sky houses in various stages of completion occupied it. Chemical and biological experimentation with agricultural matters and waste products went to the third floor. The fruitless work on the vertex joint, however, made neither very happy. Mutual frustration caused a rift.
Mr. Otorp’s lack of assiduous attention to work demands was not the cause. He pursued diligent self-improvement efforts via recorded lectures. As his employer before him, uncontrolled drinking seemed to be in the past. The Gatling gun speech velocity never left, because he considered it a positive. He was never able to speak fast enough to satisfy himself.
He was, however, interested in ESP (Extra Sensory Perception) research and everything associated with it. His focused employer would not pay for such experimentation. They found each other to be mutual irritants. Mr. Otorp began spending more time at home.
Mr. Frye reflected on how it was quite some time since he last saw Mr. Aloirav. While he ruminated, Gloria & Mr. Aloirav celebrated the birthday of their second son, Jason. Dr. Cinza shared in the festivities. As others eschewing the social fold’s protection to become free, the two New Society criminals needed a Global Facilitator. True freedom fighters, (if not just thieves), GFs hawala transferred hidden funds for clients. They also got false passports and other documents, arranged phony legal identities, etc. The hawala economy, at that time, was 100 times as large as the legal economy, yet most international intriguers were just cheats.
Few delivered. If they did, they took so much for their share it verged on the same thing. The hotelier trusted but three of the thousands of clandestine GF fiduciaries available in the World. Dr. Cinza of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil was one of them.
Missing his boy, wife, and Michigan friend, Lester needed some air one day. Outside, in the spring afternoon’s bright sunshine, he walked around Boston in a desultory way. Finding himself heading down Homestead Street, he passed a familiar apartment building. Tempted to visit, Mr. Frye remembered the dealer’s counsel to call before arriving. He felt sure Francis wouldn’t repulse a drop-in call.
No negative consequences resulted from his first visit. Chancing a refusal, Lester walked up the stairs to the hidden flat. Mr. Castle met him at the door. He didn’t appear angry at the interruption. Though almost a year, the dealer remembered him.
Offering a chair, he said. “Come in, come in. Just thinking about you. Sit down. Can’t talk long. Got an appointment at the courthouse in an hour. I almost stopped by your house the last time I was on your street. It’s the last brownstone before the vacant lot, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is.”
“I wanted you to see something. Received it just the other day. Thought you might be interested. You did say you were an environmentalist or something, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did. You’ve got a good memory.”
“Thanks. I saved this for ya’.”
“What is it?” Mr. Frye asked, accepting a piece of paper from him.
“Remember those one-sheet protests, I was telling you about, tacked up on trees and telephone poles?”
“Yes.”
That one’s from somebody who thinks a lot like I do. Like you too.” Francis said, pointing to the tract, as if an answer to all problems. “A bit inflammatory, I guess. Wish he was a Christian, but the guy makes a lotta’ sense. Thought maybe it’d convince you’a some’a the things I was talking about. You’ll see. They aren’t so weird.”
Lester perused it, finding an odd mixture of environmental propaganda and revolutionary rhetoric there, like:
“We are wallowing, drowning, in our own excrement now. Even a dog disposes of its feces… When the rats eat your children … rats can more easily survive in the filth…Society presupposes the right to imprison. Is it a right? Let’s examine it. What is a penitentiary? A human institution conceived, designed, and dedicated to the enforced waste of human life & potential, concomitantly thrusting pain into the world, as much as humanly possible. Lawyers don’t file class action suits against the State for cruel & unusual punishment. It’s not constitutional, so why not? The answer is that lawyers’ “antisocial & inhumane” profession depends on Society’s naked aggression! That’s why! …They call it capital punishment. It’s state-supported suicide, as an alternative to state-supported misery in prison. Both are cheaper alternatives to rehabilitation and co-existence. They must cease! Every plea-bargain is simple extortion. Every prosecutor is a criminal. Every prison is cruel punishment and unconstitutional. Every society is a tyranny. Every voter is a stew candidate for anthropophagia. A childhood gone awry is Society’s fault. Why does Society blame the child? It’s easier to blame the victim than face the problem. We punish someone today for someone else’s crimes yesterday and call it justice! Is anyone, (infant, child, adolescent, adult, or octogenarian), abused by Society, duty bound to withhold vengeance? No. They should not restrain the desire to implement any means to accomplish that purpose. Once the prisons are empty, ex-prisoners can equalize real criminals.”
The tract was not to his liking. It made Lester uncomfortable. Handing it back to Francis, he noticed it was unsigned. He asked. “I wonder why it isn’t signed.”
“A lot of men and women, cons and ex-cons, would get hurt if it was.” Mr. Castle replied, not appearing to notice the indifference. “Many people are behind him. The pigs would, very much, like to know his name.” Pointing to a section, he said. “See where he talks about environmental matters, here…”
“He’s got to expose himself sooner or later. Can’t stay hidden forever.” Mr. Frye said, not looking at where Francis finger pointed. “I’d be surprised if the police weren’t on to him already.”
“He ferrets out and eliminates snitches, while they’re still behind bars.” Francis said with obvious admiration but darkening visage.
Lester was aware how his nonchalance might appear as envy or worse, so he said. “He says some very interesting things.”
“He sure does!” Mr. Castle agreed, visage reversing its earlier chiaroscuro.
Aware now of his correct assessment, Mr. Frye asked. “Why do you think people follow him?”
“They like what he says. Don’t know if they agree with it all. I don’t. Membership in the New Society might be an incentive.”
“What New Society?”
“It’s there in the tract.” Francis said, bending over to point out a line. “See? Right here. If cons want respect, even before release, the “Group” helps. No longer outcasts, they get an opportunity to be more. He uses their help, saving the planet, and offers leadership positions.”
“Not everyone can have a leadership position, Francis.” He cautioned, looking up from the line indicated.
“To govern the planet? I agree. It does sound kinda’ crazy, doesn’t it?”
“He could just mean it as a symbol or a prospective goal.”
“Yeah, maybe. Just making a world for themselves, a second chance, without stigma attached, is inducement enough. They’ll have hope; feel respected, valued, and needed. The New Society can arrange early outs too. If I get boxed in, I’m lookn’ ‘em up.”
“Are you expecting it?”
“Y’never know. Contemporary criminal justice does not consider extenuating circumstances. Computers are relentless oppressors. Using them against injustice is a farce.”
“Do you think he’ll accomplish much?”
“Already has. My friend, who got me the tract, said the “Group” doesn’t discriminate in traditional ways. Her contact is black, a captain in charge of seventy-five other past and present inmates. The broad’s one of their top people.”
“That’s an impressive number. I wonder how he keeps control with no one knowing his name.”
“I’m not sure. My friend knows another DeHoCo inmate, says the Society is serious with people. Years in the “box”, treated like animals, members appreciate it. He is an environmentalist, right?”
“He says he is…of a sort.”
“Of a sort!” Francis exploded. “Are you so elitist, you can’t acknowledge responsibility in ex-cons?”
“Of course not.”
“You’ve got “Society” written all over your face.”
“How can you be so sure he’s even an ex-con? Maybe he’s a stoolie, a fabrication?”
He got no answer, as a knock at the door took Mr. Castle away. No money or goods appeared to transfer, but a drug deal occurred. Lester kept to his seat, until it ended, then asked. “What do you intend doing with all the money you accumulate?”
Taken aback, waiting a second before answering, he replied. “If I ever do get rich, I intend banking it in Europe. There are still places where US tyranny doesn’t reach. I’m gonna’ buy a beautiful house and travel with a top quality wardrobe. My kid’ll go to the best schools. I’ll have a secure old age. When I die, I won’t give any of it away. My kid’ll enjoy it. He won’t have to sell his soul for every penny, as I did. Other people give it to their kids, why not me?”
“Why not, indeed?”
“You disapprove, I can tell, but it’s good enough for me.” The dealer replied, his ebullience not quite ringing true.
“You misunderstand.”
Dressing for court, he said. “Make you a deal, Frye. You don’t judge me, I’ll not judge you?”
“I wasn’t judging. I don’t approve or disapprove of your ultimate intentions. It’s the American Dream. I was wondering why it doesn’t seem to affect me. I don’t see much progress with the attitude, I guess. I may be wrong, but if you believe that way, I think you undersell yourself. It seems to me, the concept limits one’s vision. Vanity. Seems everyone worships vain goals. Consumption is all you see, so that’s all there is. Squirrels and rabbits are happy living with such a disposition. I can’t be. I’m a man. Life gave me more. I expect more from myself.”
“I don’t care. It’s my money. I have a right to it. My brains and guts acquired it. My kid’ll enjoy it. The rest of the world can worry about progress. I’m no barrier to it. I believe in letting well enough alone. I enjoy all the money I make, as will my son and grandkids. At least, until they drop the bomb we will. Now, with the Berlin wall down, Russia broke, there’s fat chance of that happening.”
“Through chance and because you just didn’t care, your child’ll live in a world less wonderful than it could have been. Last time I was here, you talked about a disaster.”
“I did?”
“The one the “doomed persuasion” felt would occur?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Seems a shame to do all that for your kid just to have him end a second later in a big whoosh. D’you believe there’s no hope education’ll change people in time to avert it?”
“Nah. Waste of time. I learned more from books and dead people than I ever did in school.”
“Then why d’ya’ want your kid in the best school?” He asked, repenting of his former self-righteousness. “Isn’t that why the wall went down? Triumph of knowledge over brute force?”
“It boils down to this, Frye.” Francis said, picking up an empty crack vial. Holding it up, he continued. “I’m doing my responsible entrepreneurial part. I’m supplying poison. Society is the real killer. It sentences. I’m just the executioner.”
“Isn’t that a little gutsy, admitting you sell dope?”
“What the hell? Trial’s over. You can’t hurt me now.”
“I see. You believe Society wants disaster and sanctions you to peddle your poison?”
“Don’t you?” Mr. Castle replied, unaffected by the insult. “Dope sales aren’t decreasing. One in three Americans is hooked on some kind of dope. One in 3 is obese. The World sanctions alcohol, nicotine, caffeine, etc. despite the medical costs. Social hypocrisy presents a formidable and expensive nemesis for the marijuana dealer. If tax revenues are all yer’ interested in, legalize the shit!”
“Right! Have everyone addicted. Great for your business.”
“Pot’s not narcotic, Mr. Frye.”
“Not physically.”
“You wanna’ protect big legal drug companies from competition too?”
“I’m just not sure legalization will work.”
“Strange?”
“What?”
“I never thought you were such an idiot, Frye.”
“Oh, that’s real polite.”
“You know why ya’ won’t decriminalize it?”
“Why?”
“Over half the Country works for Uncle Sam! A big percentage takes a lucrative cut of the banned business, cops, lawyers, judges, social workers, etc. The other lazy creeps don’t wanna’ hustle for a living. It’s still easier on the dole than working to collect a tax on “smack”. Squares give up so easy.”
“You believe it’s by design?”
“No idea. But not even 1% of all the coke & smack confiscated goes to supervised fires. It’s returned to the street and sold, abetting government agents’ salaries. The USA is in the dope business any way you want to look at it!”
“You condemn all Civil Servants then too?”
“Civil Serpents! This Country incarcerates more people, per capita and in total numbers, than any country in the World. More than Stalin at his worst. Why?” Not waiting for an answer, he answered himself. “It’s good business for feeding at the public trough. Yer’ prisons are perfect examples of barbaric, cruel, and brutal punishment. Considering recidivism, imprisonment is a most reprehensible activity, lacking in purpose. It’s positive just for those on the dole. Passive mindless human warehousing called “rehabilitation”! Inmates are as expendable to the pigs at the trough as were Roman arena slaves. Talk about waste and lack of progress!”
The tirade didn’t take Mr. Frye off guard. He expected the other’s sentiments would be anti-incarceration. Lester, as almost everyone else, knew such institutions represented one of Society’s failures. Penal institutions were unavoidable in most people’s minds. Nevertheless, the vehemence was moving.
He replied. “The prison situation is in chaos, true. Other countries’ penitentiary conditions are far worse. I’ve seen them. Incarceration is further proof you don’t have a social mandate to ply your craft.”
Perceiving diffidence, Francis continued. “On the contrary. I do have one! Society is defaulting! If Society wants criminals, it better start paying for them. Prison is not legal tender.”
“Now you’re really off base, Francis. Society doesn’t want criminals!”
“Like hell it doesn’t!” The dealer shouted. “Who’d legitimize their damn bureaucracy? The banker warehouses human labor dollars and blocks progress. The government buys arms while education is in marasmus. Prisons contain unfathomable wasted human potential. Contemporary criminal prosecution is just a diluted & glorified vestigial remain of the barbarian blood feud. No one’s got the courage to admit either neglect or absent treatment. If they did, inmates would prove respected members of Society.”
“They’re guilty of crimes against it! Why can’t you understand that?”
“Crimes against Society!” The dealer replied, still filled with emotion. “An oxymoron! You do talk a pretty line, Frye! Aren’t inmates parts of Society? Do you think they want to inflict damage on themselves? Are all criminals masochists then? Are your mass-murdering Presidents and industrialists masochists too? They say Washed Beaches polluted half the water in New England. 10% of us will be getting cancer because of it. Their CEO’s a big pol and a billionaire! No, Frye! Society creates its criminals and makes provisions for their use. Admit it! Admit it!”
“Don’t be ridiculous! Inadequate child rearing, poor education, and unhealthy social organization don’t show desire. Neglect is not volition. You’re stretching it.”
“I’m stretching it!” Mr. Castle yelled. “You poor deluded fool! Where would humankind be, if there were no moral reference point? The poor show us a point of reference for wealth. The criminal keeps the fools from someday becoming aware there is no good or evil. It’s all economics, varying shades of theft. Society decides which characteristics are acceptable, based on resources, and so labels them. It legitimizes some of its members and rejects others! It just happens, whoops, those imprisoned and treated like shit are not licensed! Fuck Society! Frye! Fuck it! Why shouldn’t I break laws and take my own path to achieve my goals? It’s my life and my risk.”
In his suit now, he headed for the door. Mr. Frye took the hint. He got up and waved the tract, saying. “Thanks for thinking about me with this.”
“No problem,” Francis replied. “Kept a copy myself. Need a lift? I’m on my way to the BMC (Boston Municipal Court). I can drop you.”
“Okay.” Lester replied, detecting “request” in the tone.
Exiting the “crack house”, they got into a late model Ford.
“About what I said earlier, Frye.” He cajoled. “Don’t take anything personal. The court’s been giving me a hard way to go. I’m a little more intense than usual.”
“Not at all. I don’t agree with the way you rationalize your activities. If my son was alive, still selling dope, I’d feel the same way… tell him the same thing.”
“These guys in the courts are revered by Society, aren’t they?”
“Yes, and for good reason. They appear very dignified. I’m sure some are upstanding moral individuals.”
“Christ said, “he among you who is without guilt, let him cast the first stone”.” Mr. Castle quoted, and then he asked. “How do you and your “polite” Society reconcile such contradictions?”
“They’re paradoxes.” Mr. Frye answered. “Lord Milton also said, “To understand is to forgive.” It’s easier said than done.”
“Call them paradoxes, if you will. I call them inconsistencies. They spell hypocrisy and exemplify what I’m trying to say. Lacking a social license or existing in some way different from the herd makes you suspect. They call it “politically incorrect”. Being either a criminal or a philosopher is dangerous. Both represent gifts and problems for Society. Nobody can make up their mind what to do about such members, and they won’t deal with their humane maintenance.”
“A problem,” Lester agreed, “to be sure.”
“A problem becoming ever more obvious to all,” Francis added, shaking his head. “And it’s not being handled. Period. The bastards wouldn’t take my fuckin’ money anymore. Decided to make an example of me, I guess.”
“I hope you don’t think…”
“No.” He interrupted. “I know it wasn’t you, Frye. If I thought that, I wouldn’t be kissin’ yer’ ass right now. That’s fer sure! I know why ya’ did, what ya’ did, what ya’ had ta do. I’d’a done the same.”
“What happened?” Mr. Frye asked, unaware of the treatment his bottom was receiving.
“Possession with Intent.” Mr. Castle said, laughing bitterly. “Coupla’ days before we met. You know or’v heard the charge, I’m sure.”
“Of course. How did it happen?”
They neared the Mass Ave row house. Francis, seeming almost a different person, said. “I’d like to tell you the whole story. Some other time. This is where you get off. I’ve gotta’ meet my attorney and get over to the McCormick building (Federal Courthouse).”
“O.K.” Lester said, getting out of the car. “Later.”
Preparing for bed that evening, he thought. “Who’s the wiser, I wonder; those like me or those of the “doomed persuasion”? Either way, humanity appears in serious jeopardy. If it weren’t for the great ones, the human race would be a sorry statement, indeed. Surviving treachery and risk … Believing in the validity of a final ephemeral ideal … Pursuing same tenaciously … This seems to constitute greatness. How secure or reasonable is that?”
The following day, there was a knock at the Frye’s front door. The dealer stood there, looking as if he’d slept very little the previous night. Mr. Frye couldn’t help but notice his dejected state.
“Boy! Do you ever look tough!”
“I know. I smell that way too.” Mr. Castle replied. “Got a minute?”
“Sure, come in.”
Francis explained about his previous afternoon’s attorney visit. The news was not good, and he found it hard to handle. Past transgressions caught up with him. Bribes were not sufficient. He said. “When you came by yesterday afternoon, I was thinking about the consequences of the news being bad.”
“And…?
“What will happen to my wife and kid, should I get sent up.”
“You think it might come to that?”
“Yeah. My lawyer says he’s got it all under control. They always say that, along with “no guarantees”. I didn’t feel good about the conversation.”
“If you get sent up, how long could it be?”
“Five to ten. The squares convicted me of growing herb, “manufacturing”. Possession rap’s just icing on the cake.”
“What will you do?”
“Donno’. I’ve been picturing the sentencing in my mind all night. Damn scary scenario. My old lady will be crying. My kid’s so young. He won’t know what’s happening or what to make of it all. My eyes keep traveling across the floor of that courtroom. They come to the oak benches – that majestic throne. Then I look at the walls – more majesty. Then I look at me. My whole world taken from me in a heartbeat. Freedom, house, wife, kid, car, dog, yard, dreams…all gone, poof! Couldn’t sleep, thinkin’ about it. Everything’s so quiet, dry, and lifeless in courtrooms, you know, Frye. They’re so imposing & magnificent. It’s overwhelming. They take a man’s life away there, as if stamping a form. With no scruples, whatsoever, judges remove people from their families. It’s just imprinting a damned file.”
“Is that why you saved that sheet?” Lester queried.
“Yeah. I guess so. After they busted me, my friend gave me some advice. She said if they send me away ask the other cons about the New Society. They might help. Otherwise, yer’ just a number, nothing’s personal. Everything that once had yer’ name on it washes away. You lose everything in the joint. Fear replaces hope. You know why they take your belt and shoestrings away?”
“Sure.” Mr. Frye answered, wondering why the dealer trusted him.
“Suicide’s paradise compared to imagining a life of incarceration. Maybe yer’ wife’s different, Frye, but in my experience, wives are great castigators for small faults. Never forget a single disagreement. They cry, revile your secrets, and have very poor memories of your successes. I know mine’ll soon forget me and find another man. I can picture my son, little Hernan, ashamed of me, heartbroken in front of his friends. He won’t even want to carry on my name.”
Lester listened, wondering if he’d learn the story behind the arrest. However, Mr. Castle continued disclosing his imagined horrors, unconcerned about what he was saying. The one-sided stream-of-consciousness conversation never waned. Since already convicted, he didn’t see what harm talk could do now.
“Ever been locked up, Frye?”
Mr. Frye mentioned Michigan drunk tanks, and he started to describe the horseshoe crab fiasco.
Preoccupied, the dealer interrupted. “Will my dog remember me, when I get out, if I get out?”
Lester reminded him of Ulysses’ dog in Homer’s Odyssey.
“My wife, I know, won’t be able to make the house payments. My house will go. How long will it be, before she curses the day we met? I’m a loser, Frye, a soon-to-be-sentenced dope dealer. How is the woman gonna’ tell her mother and girlfriends? I feel so sorry for her. She sat in the courtroom as quiet as a mouse. Didn’t want anyone to see her. She cares so much about what other people think. Her little ego was smashed when they convicted me.”
Agonizing, he began to tell his story. “You know, Frye, it all started out as a dream three years ago. Yup, a wonderful vision. The damn dream turned into a nightmare. It’s gonna’ take my family and entire world from me. What a wake-up! I fantasized owning acres and acres of marijuana trees, the finest pot plants in all creation. I grew, tested, and sampled the best marijuana seeds I could find. I became an expert in the art of Cannabis cultivation, sale, and distribution. I’m a collector, a connoisseur, and a fine horticulturist for the herb, like a fine vintner. But, what of it? What’s it all worth, now? I guess I’m just one among millions who dream of success in illegal businesses.”
Trying to sound compassionate, Lester replied. “”The road to hell…” you know. I’m sure prison is full of similar dreamers.”
“Yah. It’s a select and very lucky few who ever make a success of this business. They reap the fruits of others, like me, who desire and dream but don’t ever harvest.”
“Maybe it’s a myth?”
“No. It happens. I know. I’ve met dealers making well over $20,000 a week from their businesses. Tax-free profits go into Swiss accounts, fruit jars, foreign real estate, or other legitimate enterprises. Profit without end, money unlimited, dreams of dreams. All within the grasp.”
“Is there that much profit in it?”
“Oh, yes. It’s been financing the US Government for decades … The Queen of England for centuries … All the biggest banks … But, I am not among the select few who make it, I assure you. I’m one of the millions who have not made a success out of drugs. I realized, too late, what I was going to have to become in order to succeed. I couldn’t pay the price.”
“What was it?”
“Someone completely ruthless. I believe I lack the needed brains and callousness to be a successful and wealthy law breaker. I believe now that success in the drug business goes only to those who are truly psychotic.”
“Really?”
“Yup. It was a pathetic and deviant dream. Y’know why?”
“No.”
“It’s predicated on a false hope. Even if I’d a’been very successful at it, I’d a’lost.”
“Why?”
“The mirage is compelling, but ultimate disaster ends the trek. The black marketeer’s never free. Never his own man. Forever enslaved to the shadow at his back – his past. Old friends, old associates, or the law always come back to bite. The world devours the man who relaxes his vigilance. You snooze, you lose. Once a criminal, you can never rest. You imprison yourself. It’s the price of outlawry, I guess. I musta’ just got tired and let ‘em bust me.”

Too low they build who build below the skies. Young

Chapter Twenty-Five

The girl finished another miniature clay coffin and placed it next to the others. Leaving the kitchen table, she wandered off to bed. Like her father, obsessive creativity was a major part of the child’s life. It became intense these last few weeks. Without the imaginative release, the loneliness would have been much worse.
She tucked herself in. As hard as he worked, Daddy didn’t need to be bothered. He wouldn’t notice her “good night” anyway. Lester never noticed his daughter leaving, until she was already asleep. He was concentrating on his work.
The dog’s barking disturbed him. Leaving the fabrication room, Mr. Frye went to check on the commotion. Noticing his little girl was not about; he looked into her bedroom. Kissing her and adjusting the covers, Lester was just about to shut off the lights. He stopped, however, as she awakened.
Interested enough to awaken from sound sleep; his daughter wanted some questions answered. She wondered if her brother was in pain. The young woman asked her father if he thought it hurt much to be dead. Surprised at the question, her father assured her it did not. The next question explored the concept of heaven. The nanny maintained all dead people went there.
According to the Bible Study Group, however, “heaven” could accommodate just a select few. The contradiction stumped him. He got around it by admitting an incomplete knowledge of the terrain. The man excused his ignorance by associating himself with others. He didn’t know of anyone who knew for sure.
The child wondered whether dead people would be together again as when alive. She received a quasi-affirmative answer to that one. The responses seemed to satisfy her, because the questions ceased. Lester left the room and closed the door. Thinking of another one, the girl asked. “Will heaven be as cozy as my old room was, Daddy?”
The question unheard, it went unanswered. She fell asleep soon after.
Secure now in finances, Mr. Frye was independent. The planetary custodianship effort, his Holy Grail, however, was still incomplete. With wife and son lost, during the quest, his daughter alone remained to touch his humanity. She was very important in maintaining his species empathy. He knew how dependent he was on her.
Mr. Frye wished he told her that more, if ever. The child satisfied his interpersonal needs, and she meant most everything else human to him as well. Invested with perceived obligations, the scientist struggled in his duty to care for her. Loving the girl very much, he did his best.
Returning to the first floor, Lester resumed the interrupted fabrication work. He began thinking about Pontibus issues. The popular media agreed that going horizontal to increase available habitats would soon be impossible. Burrowing within the earth to supplement territory wasn’t feasible for many reasons in addition to inclement geothermal temperature. Outer-space stations were just thimblerigs to him, and propellant exhaust destroyed ozone.
In Mr. Frye’s opinion, the human race was tugging at the end of their tether. Actual battles occurred over near-worthless western rangeland. The man saw the need for Lebensraum. He believed all creatures, in humanity’s responsibility sphere, required it. The key word to him was RESPONSIBLE, a quality of the noble. Thinking, feeling, and acting longer and more than others constituted true nobility to him. He believed if life blesses you with such a curse, it also obligates you, noblesse oblige.
Welding another aluminum tube to the tetrahedron on the bench, Lester thought. “We have the capacity to keep our island in the sky luxurious and dazzling with life. A new Earth in the heavens. Yet we’re anticipating a solitary and stale existence of just our own species and pets. Soon our lives will be devoid of the variety of life forms making human existence worth the while. Biomass isn’t burgeoning on the planet. We’re creating for ourselves a prison, packing it full of us, increasingly more defective each minute. What happens when we’ve filled every spot? The law singled out Francis Castle to experience incarceration. Soon, all humanity will face it and, unlike him, without eventual possibility of parole!”
Global problems occupied his mind, and he reasoned. “Allowing greed to create an impoverished existence won’t end the danger. The question isn’t only how sustainable our present society is with the technology at hand. Our restless nature will demand further expansion. It’s not just our species; the nature of Life itself is to grow and thrust outward. We must reach up and increase our presence or we die. To deny such truth is to be ignorant of biology. We will always need to proliferate. We still have a planet sparkling with life. Why not act now, “finemque tenere” (keeping the end in view)?”
Looking out his bay window at the street below, Mr. Frye thought. “Man’s greatest shortcoming is his diminutive vision.”
He remembered Mr. Aloirav’s pure biology philosophy: “The individual matters little. The species as a whole matters much. Reluctance to squander an individual for the species is weakness manifested in squeamishness. If you haven’t got the balls to be selfish, you’re an obscenity and have no business living!”
“Maybe he’s right,” Lester questioned. “Nature’s way is brutal. She’s not just. But, that means defining oneself. When one begins to live biologically, instead of under someone else’s moral edicts, it’s a given. How does one go about it? I can’t imagine the courage required to accept such a fate. It involves one’s self and one’s loved ones, “hostages to fortune”. What kinds of experiences or genetic makeup cause a man to develop so hard a Weltanschauung?”
Leaving the fabrication room, he went downstairs to check on some microbes, pondering. “For Nature, all that matters is reproducing DNA. She says to hell with the individual when Her objective is finished or neglected. Ray exhorts our living by dicta from such a cruel taskmaster. One might as well be an insect or a bacterial colony here in this tube.”
Mr. Frye held the container to light before replacing it in the incubator. Struggling with the Pontibus dream for himself and his truncated family was selfishness enough, he felt. The planet and beyond was its custodial mandate. All life forms contributed to fullness of existence.
Noticing compassion for the disenfranchised inundating him at times, Lester wondered. “How much kindness does Nature allow one to expend, before it becomes an exercise in vain denial, a sick altruism? Is it like the money-security fulcrum? Shall I ever accomplish my task? Now that I’ve got funds, will I still fail? Am I to spend my years in a future full of challenge and achievement? Or, do I look forward to dying a tired beaten bitter old man?”
Resolving not to die embittered, he believed he wasn’t just writhing through a generation of the doomed. The Pontibus was feasible. The future would see it accomplished. He would live to prove it.
Mr. Frye felt bio-geographical factors determined Homo sapiens’ (humankind’s) history. Few specific individuals have affected the race’s ultimate survival or cultural preeminence. Yet, indeed, it has happened. One man can alter human destiny and that of those sharing his planet. He dreamed and ruminated.
“From everything I’ve learned, posterity should consider me a great man, someday. Unlike a destructive Napoleonic, I’ll be of the creative Tesla paradigm. As such, I’m very useful to the human race. People shouldn’t make me feel I’m a burden. Perhaps becoming a friend to the disenfranchised makes you an automatic enemy of the franchised. Must men always be two steps ahead of the hangman to stay one step behind immortality? Does life so position all persons attempting to make the world a better place? Do others always brand them as enemies? Is it inevitable? Does the human fold drive the seeker from the nest’s warmth, as siblings do a runt? Are others out there, like me, who know that for which the situation calls? The very beneficiaries of our kindness hound and ostracize us. Is it to be expected? Of necessity, solutions must be contrary to conventional wisdom and seem so. Is my confusion that quality of which greatness consists?”
The ringing phone interrupted his thoughts. It was Francis Castle. He wanted Lester to accompany him and his little family to the morrow’s sentencing. The thought conjured up nothing but unpleasantness for all. Mr. Frye tried to decline the invitation. The dealer was persistent.
“Didn’t I help you, when you needed it?”
“That wasn’t the same thing, Francis,” Mr. Frye reposted to the guilt bullet. “I forced you to help me. What good can come of my being there, watching you go to hell?”
“Look, Frye. I know my wife will take up with a “grinder” (substitute paramour). My son, Hernan, needs more than just support. He needs somebody decent to look to occasionally. They may supplement me. If I get max’ed, I don’t have sufficient assets to skip out on an appeal-bond. I’m not asking you for anything else. Just let me introduce you and tell‘em you’ll take them home when it’s over. Damn it, Frye! My bond expires at sentencing. I don’t have anybody else.”
Not knowing how to refuse any longer, he was afraid the man might start begging. That would be way over the top. They agreed to meet the following morning at Faneuil Hall prior to going to the courthouse. The next day, Francis introduced his “friend” to the family. Together, the two men, woman, and child walked up the hill to the courthouse. At the weapon’s checkpoint, his wife held their son back and away from the men. Once inside the main building, she hugged him to the hallway walls.
The scofflaw, appearing not to notice, said. “I’m supposed to meet my attorney on the third floor. He’s got a case going on at the BMC (Boston Municipal Court). When it’s over, we’ll hook up. Gotta’ confab a bit, prior to the big event. Wants to calm me down and make me behave. Caution my ass about making a scene if it goes agin’ us. I donno’ what courtroom it’ll happen in. We can talk till then.”
“Are you going to jail, for sure?”
“Nothing’s certain, I guess, but most likely, yeah. My guy moans a lot about doing what he can. Not a good sign. I just don’t know how much time they’ll hit me with.”
Walking up the stairwell, the woman and child continued to lag behind the men. Reaching the third floor, the separate parties picked different benches along the wall on which to sit. Each twosome could see the courtrooms across the hall. Waiting for the day’s events to begin, the men talked. Mr. Castle raised his eyes to the stairwell, whenever stepping sounds announced an arrival.
Releasing a torrent of self-righteous anger, he said. “It’s revolting how they talk about me paying my debt to Society. What of the debt Society owes me? What do they think Christ would say about their rehabilitation efforts?”
Sensing the man wanted to explain himself, Lester answered. “Francis. Who knows or cares what true Christianity means? It’s nothing more nowadays but a shibboleth to identify local capitalists. Christian-like just means too weak to excel. It’s an excuse to envy the wealthy or hide from the poor. The use of Christianity is a drug, an addiction. The poor half-believe it and the rich use it against them. Either way you use such parasitism makes it a disease. The prevailing opinion is that the criminal incurs a debt. An obligation to pay until the end of his or her life. A higher level of consciousness aside, rehabilitation also means a different perspective. It costs a great deal of money. Most people feel just like you told me you did that day. It’s not your problem. Working for progress is the responsibility of the rest of the world?”
“Yah, I remember saying that. You were talking as if it was my responsibility. It’s not just rehabilitation that lacks. Ya’ gotta’ get into the system in the first place even to need rehabilitation. I’m doin’ my part in those areas. At least, I was.”
“You mean a proper upbringing for your child?”
“Yeah. It’s somethin’. My kid’s not so bad.” The dealer answered, gesturing in that direction. The little boy was picking his nose with one hand and twisting his hair with another.
Glancing at the stairs, he pointed to a man coming up the last few steps and said. “That’s my lawyer with the beard and ponytail.”
“How come you got such a rebellious looking one?” Lester asked, as the attorney saw his client and began to approach.
“I didn’t think about it, when I hired him. He came well recommended. I oughta’ kill the turkey that suggested him. The SOB cost me ‘n arm’n a leg, and then lost the fuckin’ case. I still gotta’ pay! Kin ya’ beat that?”
“Nice work, if you can get it.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, you might have won, Francis. Would you still have been upset over the money?”
“Of course not. The system sends a message loud and clear though. Remunerative crime is sanctified crime?”
“How do you figure that? You paid what he wanted.”
“Bullshit! Just ask this asshole coming down the hallway. With more money in my account, he could’a got me off. Admitted as much. Power, violence, money. All have the same effect. Ya’ got one working in yer’ corner, ya’ got the others. Respectable Society and suckers act in concert, jumping to their command. My tank was low on all three. Crime is quasi-aberrant behavior produced & maintained by a society using inadequate social-engineering methods to insure conformity. Inconsistent punitive measures follow to maintain its absurdity, and the status quo continues. Society creates and disposes of each individual, misfit or square. Inmate numbers grow each passing year. Prisons are bursting with overcrowding. Society sanctions “might makes right”, “violence for violence”, and “an eye for an eye”.”
“It’s vestigial and inhumane, but it’s the best we’ve got. I live with it. Others do. You took a chance, Francis, and lost.”
The conversation ended, as the lawyer arrived. Complaining about the non-functional elevators, he shook Francis’ hand. Not waiting for an introduction, the attorney left to use the rest room. They would talk upon his return. Mr. Castle took his seat again.
“Pretty cut and dried for you, isn’t it Frye?”
“No, it isn’t. I think I can imagine your perspective. I’ve always believed in leaving fortune to chance, but dream about achieving the stars. You did that. I also see how you had an opportunity to play by the rules and didn’t. You risked, you lost. End of story. Now you and your family will pay. Complaining about how it’s somebody else’s fault just won’t cut it.”
“Maybe not,” Francis riposted. “But rejecting rehabilitation is good judgment?! A weak terrified craven Society will spend over $35,000/year punishing me in its institution of higher brutality. It costs $30,000/year to put someone through a legit university! Suppose I come out violent instead of just a paper criminal? What about redress for possible future recipients of my increased anti-social nature? People sympathize with “victims”. Yet, they won’t spend to insure more don’t come down the road. You discount me, but aren’t I a “victim” too? Funds for solutions to social problems always get misdirected. Finding their way into the gaping maw of punishment. The System sucked me in and damn sure’ll swallow me! What if I was fucking innocent? Happens, you know? One outta’ twenty convictions.”
“You had a chance. You were tried by a jury of your peers?”
“Yah! Big deal! A bunch of squares!” The miscreant said, shaking his head. “Simple retribution, nothing more. If they were my peers, they’d a’ been businessmen like me.”
“You feel you should’a been judged by a bunch of dope-dealers?!” Lester exploded at the apparent effrontery.
“They’re as close to my peers as I’ll find, aren’t they?”
Mr. Frye didn’t know what to say. He felt it was obvious the offender just wanted to cavil against the system’s inadequacies. Mr. Castle was leaving no room for self-analysis. Lester stopped trying to defend the system and just listened. He saw no purpose in making it worse by showing insensitivity to the man’s pain.
Going into his own form of repentance, Mr. Castle said. “I should’a stayed in used cars. There’s more profit in’em than dope anyway.” He looked up at the ceiling and said. “Life sure caught me in a “trick bag”.”
“How’d you get busted?” The scientist asked, changing the subject. He was tired of the negative conversation and a little curious.
“It’s a long, sad story. One very painful to recall.”
“If you’d rather not, we…”
“No. I’ll tell ya’. I don’t believe you’ll fuck up my appeal. If you were gonna’ hurt me, yudda’ done it long ago. Yer’ not the type, anyway. I guess it started when one of my retailers, former friend, thought I should get into the production end of the business. Manufacture, instead of always intermediary. He thought, as did I, it would lower costs and increase “legitimate” profits. Indoor cultivation was far too expensive, I discovered. Chemicals and modern horticultural methods produce a quality product but not in large quantities. At least I couldn’t make it happen. After an abortive and heart-rending attempt at it, I started growing it outside. A real farm seemed the one alternative. I figured with acres of land and proper soil-amendments, I couldn’t lose. It would produce both quality and quantity. I was almost certain of it.”
“How did you ever get all the seeds necessary for such an undertaking?” He asked, surprised at such dedication.
“That was a problem,” Mr. Castle answered, holding his hand up to indicate temporary forbearance. “Anyway, I found some good land and laid down the money. I made the necessary soil adjustments and plowed the field. Planting season was almost over. Everything was ready to go. Then I discovered I was seed-short. I had but two pounds and couldn’t get more. Nobody would either sell or front me any. They were all doing the same thing on a smaller scale. I painted myself such a beautiful picture of what I’d accomplish. Now, it would be a fart in a whirlwind, if I couldn’t lay more seed.”
“So what did you do?”
“After my indoor fiasco, I was clos’ta broke. I needed to convince some retailers to front me some seeds from their own stash. Not an easy maneuver. Everyone likes to beef up a weak lid with seeds. They’re cheaper by weight than good grass. Smoke harder. But they’re still grass, right?”
“I guess so,” Mr. Frye answered, only aware of the high quality thuoc fen (Vietnamese Cannabis).
“Well,” the reprobate explained. “A pound of seeds is worth, mixed in lids, just as much as a pound of “Colombian Gold”. As tapped as I was, I didn’t want to owe what they wanted to soak me. It stumped me. Unless I could find a believer in my scheme, I was beat. Then, poof, just in time, a retailer fronts me a kilo of seeds at my price. I sowed ’em along with about five hundred seedlings saved from my indoor abortion.”
“How long did it take?”
“Bout a week. But it was all a cruel joke.”
“Because you got busted?”
“Not yet. After all the trouble getting seeds, time & risk planting & transplanting, Nature shit on me. I should’a known right then n’ there.”
“What?”
“We got one four-hour stretch of rain for the next two months. Sprouted plants, plus transplanted ones, just dried up and died.” Pausing for effect, getting an anticipatory glance, Francis continued. “The rest of the seeds laid pretty-much dormant, until the season was half over. Then rain got plentiful.”
“They grew O.K. then?”
“Just hold on,” he answered, enjoying the interest. “Planting season is late April. My remaining seeds sprouted in July. They got sufficient rain, but I expected to harvest in September. 40% of a growing season. It looked like I was beat. God seemed to be pickin’ on me. He was blessing American hypocrisy at my expense. Nothing worked. My money was gone. The notes I’d signed at the bank weren’t gonna’ get paid. I was in the hole for two hundred and fifty grand, some of it with wholesalers. My wife wouldn’t talk to me except in epithets. I was fucked!”
“Really?”
“Without money in this business, certain things happen with inexorable regularity. Friends disappear and attorneys say nothing, very loud. Bankruptcy stares you in the face. Prison or a shot in the night stands right around the corner. Your dreams become “pipe-dreams”. You begin to feel very ashamed of yourself, stupid, and unfortunate. A real loser, you know? I was ready to eat a bullet.”
What stopped you?” Lester asked, knowing the feeling too well. He expected the answer would be belief in Jesus.
Smiling, the dealer turned away from the crowded hallway and said. “Something wonderful was happening. My pot was beginning to take hold. It was growing at a phenomenal rate.”
“Sure enough?”
“Yup. I was getting a two to three inch height increase, per day. The outside ventilation must have been what it lacked indoors.”
“You may be right. Ventilation could, indeed, have been the limiting factor. It would have brought about a much better exchange of gases.”
“I thought so!” Francis said, pausing while someone walked past their bench. “Anyway, the plants were about two inches high on July 5th. By July 15, they were over two feet. On October 1, I measured trunks four inches across and sixteen feet tall. Some of the leaves were as big around as basketballs.”
“No.”
“I shit you not, Frye. Those trees were as big as ten-year-old elms.”
“But I thought you said you were going to harvest in September?”
“I should have,” the villain answered. “But when yer’ gettin’ richer, two million bucks a week, your thinking changes. While the plants are picking up resins, it gets real difficult to cut ’em. Ya’ feel sorta’ like yer’ killin’ the golden goose.”
“I can imagine.”
“I was ecstatic. After yanking the male plants, I ended up with little more’n a thousand plants out of a hundred thousand seeds. But, I was still in biz’. I picked one of the scrawnier plants on September 15. The dried leaves and blossoms weighed over seven pounds. It was gettin’ better all the time. When I was ready to harvest, you couldn’t have dampened my spirits with the entire Atlantic Ocean.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Old Mrs. Castle’s little boy, Francis, was a success at last. Tons of top-quality grass.” The unfortunate scoundrel, unable to resist a little ego puffing, continued. “I was so proud of myself. You would say, Frye, I thought my feces no longer malodorous. (Both men chuckle). I was plannin’ on buyin’ old semi-trailers n’ fillin’ em up with cured grass. Desiccants, fans, and preservatives would retard the mold, and I’d just sit tight. Couldn’t help but think of all the ways to invest the money. I was gonna’ spend like mad on travel, entertainment, good living and more. My kid was gonna’ be President. My wife, the first lady of all the pot plantations in the world. I was gonna’ buy land, lakes, and lampposts. I looked into stocks, bonds, and real estate. I even imagined bigwigs comin’ and asking my advice on lucrative risks. In short, I was gonna’ be a very big…wheel. I felt, I had arrived.”
Francis shook his head, lowering his voice’s pitch. “”The best laid plans of mice and men…””
Waxing nostalgic, he took a piece of paper and a pencil out of his pocket. The dealer drew a rough square on it while explaining. The figure represented his plot of land with marijuana areas laid out. He continued adding details, showing where corn grew on the periphery and places around the interior, etc.
The sad-looking conventional crop, he described, camouflaged the view of cultivated weeds from curious neighbors. Onions further inside the field warded off small-animal pests. Tomato plants gave additional confusion to possible human trespassers. His crop made him look like a poor farmer with a drinking problem.
He said he planned to harvest between October 5 and October 10. Each plant then would weigh at least sixty wet-pounds. Processing out the stem and water, he calculated an average plant yield of 8 pounds. It meant tons of finished dried cured product to store.
Minutes passed without his story moving much. The man was mustering the courage necessary to relate the unpleasant part. He said nothing for a time. Leaving the bench, Mr. Castle walked across the hallway and opened a courtroom door. He listened to attorneys arguing their respective cases. Lester heard the low drone from where he sat.
“Still yappin’,” Francis said, closing the door.
While so occupied, his attorney re-appeared, and the two went into a separate room to confer. Except for the woman and little Hernan, the scientist now sat alone in the hallway. He watched as a couple of attorney types come out of the courtroom opposite him, talking. One raised his voice an octave, increasing the tempo.
As the two got closer, Mr. Frye overheard one say. “…covered with these little red spots. Said they were dreadful looking. So, my client wants to start a bunch of health spas down there. Cater just to these bankers and wealthy professionals. Says it’ll be a gold mine.”
The other one replied in a normal voice level. “Endocarditis, you say?”
“Yup. Supposed to be reaching epidemic proportions in parts of Central America. The focal points are Honduras and El Salvador. Can’t treat it, ‘cuz it’s resistant to antibiotics.”
“Just bankers and wealthy professionals?”
“Yah. Some multinational execs & ecclesiasticals too.”
“A bug with deep-seated resentment against the upper middle-class.”
“Strange isn’t it? My client figures it’s an occupational thing. They eat all that greasy shit’n don’t get enough exercise. Couple of poor doctors, he knows, run orphanages. They need’a walk miles every day just to see all the children in their care. One operates in Salvador and the other in Tegucigalpa. Haven’t been touched, healthy as horses. The way he explained it sounded reasonable to me. So, I’m in for a few grand. How ’bout it?”
“Sure. Count me in. I’ll throw some bucks at it.” The other one said, as they moved down the hall and out of earshot.
Returning to his own thoughts, Lester wondered if Mr. Aloirav was aware of such a disease. He would try to remember mentioning it the next time they were together. Mr. Frye turned his thoughts to Mr. Castle. It was obvious. The bad guy expected to do a great deal of hard time. So much marijuana involved, over 60 thousand pounds, it was hard to imagine otherwise. The Castle family was tragic. Large high-risk ventures could hurt innocent people…
Attorney and client were together in the private discussion room about fifteen minutes. When they came out Francis was ashen-faced. He went over to his wife and son. She began to cry at his words, pulling the boy closer. Sometime after her husband put his arms around them, the woman regained her composure. He then returned to his former seat. His lawyer was talking with another lawyer. The sentencing judge was still involved with another trial and wouldn’t be available for an hour yet. They were to continue waiting until he was ready.
“Sorry, ya’ gotta’ wait so long, Frye,” the scoundrel said.
“That’s all right, Francis. What are a few more hours?”
Grimacing, he stared at the floor, until Mr. Frye asked. “Did you ever get the field harvested?”
“Partially.” Mr. Castle replied, taking his mind off his unpleasant immediate future. “What was I talking about? Oh, yeah. I remember. I was gonna’ tell you about it. Well…I estimated my thousand plus plants to weigh about four tons, ready-to-sell. At four hundred dollars a pound, wholesale, I had a three-million-dollar crop in the field. Tell me I didn’t have reason to be happy?”
There was no happiness in his voice, as he nudged Lester, who then asked. “Tell me what happened, Francis.”
“Well,” he said, throwing his hands out, grimacing a grin and nodding his head. “My estimates weren’t inflated. There it was, right in front of me. Millions of dollars on the root. The Castles were on their way to riches. On September 30, I went to the field and harvested about four wet pounds. Enough to make a half-pound gift to a friend. Nature called, as I finished, so I went over to some low bushes near the field’s edge. I heard a sound like a tractor. I was pissed. Who the hell was driving on my land, I thought? Poking my head up out of the bushes, I pulled it right back down again. Right there in front of me, I saw the most terrible sight of my life. A helicopter was hovering not ten feet over my plants. Some joker inside was taking pictures of my beautiful progeny. Ten minutes later, it disappeared.”
“Did they see you?” Mr. Frye asked.
“Naw, don’t think so. As it turned out, wouldna’ mattered if they had. But, was I ever stunned. What was I gonna’ do now? What would they do? Were they rip-offs or pigs? If pigs, what kind? Treasury? DEA? I didn’t have a clue! Could I get it all picked that night? No! Should I lay low for a couple of days or rip it out as fast as I could? I bought the land under a false name. But, I wasn’t sure they couldn’t pin it on me anyway. If they busted the field without me there, would they charge me? Did they need my presence to convict? I didn’t know. A lotta’ ifs! A thousand thoughts ran through my mind. I didn’t want to lose the three million bucks. But, busted with so much grass, “possession with intent to deliver” and “manufacturing”, was major. It would mean maximum years in the joint. As it turned out, I should’ve harvested at the moment. Should’a worked all night at it. I’da’ had cash to fight the bust, when it came. But, I didn’t. Laid low for about a week, watch’n the field from a distance with binoc’s. I was hopin’, against hope; they couldn’t attach my name to the land. Coupla’ days after the chopper incident, a dark-blue sedan drives up to the field. Two guys get out and walk the property. They went right over to a plant of obvious parentage and looked at it. After feeling the leaves, they left.”
“What did that mean?”
“It meant to me, as soon as night presented itself, I had a job. I was gonna’ havta’ do a quick rip out or lose it all.” The dealer said, knowing making that choice doomed him. “I needed the cash, even if they only busted me as possible owner. That night, it was dark, no moon. I took a crosscut saw and cut down about a hundred plants. After dragging ’em to the side of the field, I waited and watched a bit. Then, I tied a good number of’em upside down in some trees. I cut some of the larger branches off the biggest trunks and hung them stem-up too. Being so big n’ bulky, takin’ the side branches off the full plant helped. It made for a more concise and compact drying arrangement. It was also less conspicuous from a distance. Stripped trunks, I left on the ground. I hoped any rain, falling during the next few days, wouldn’t wash away too much resin. Now that I think about it, all that hoping was just a distraction. Something to do so’s not to ponder the obvious danger I was in. At times, I noticed lights off in the distance. But, while I was cutting and dragging the plants, I thought little of it. I figured they were just car lights on another country road. I was wrong. Dead wrong. The next night made it clear.”
“You got caught the next night?”
“Yup, and how!” Mr. Castle riposted, shaking his head and rolling his eyes. “The next night was an endless nightmare! I think about it all the time.” Striking his left hand with his right fist, he said. “And I was so fuckin’ close, too!”
“What happened?”
“I went back the next night after sleeping all day. I’d cut about twenty plants, when floodlights came on all around me. Cameras started snapping, and I was captured green handed. You’ve seen the drill on TV. They did the usual shit, read me my rights. Then they threw me in the squad car and took me to the station. I got booked, mugged, and arraigned – the whole nine yards. A fifty grand bond got me released the next day. I hadda put my house up as collateral on a property bond. Went from king to pauper in one night. No more illusions, Frye. I’d lost almost all the battles and now the war.”
Unable to sit still on the bench any longer, Francis left. He returned with four cups of coffee. Although Mr. Frye didn’t ask for any, he got a cup anyway. His silence didn’t affect the dealer’s sixth sense. He had a knack for knowing when someone desired a stimulant. Giving one to each adult of his party, the man returned to the bench. He related, between sips, details of his last criminal failure.
When the judge signaled he was ready, the bohemian attorney appeared. He got the entire family prepared. Waiting for the “shoe to drop” on the dealer and his family, Lester thought about Mr. Aloirav.
The younger Frye’s demise and Mrs. Frye’s asylum commitment occurred since their last meeting. The Pontibus was no further along, and the scientist couldn’t think of any good excuses. The death and resulting guilt still haunted him and dissipated his concentration. He couldn’t keep his efforts focused on the aluminum constructs. The man was forever trying to regain his lost calein with quick futile experiments. Inability to use even his available energy didn’t help.
His inadequate laboratory couldn’t replace all the work done at MIT. Even to begin starting over required spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on new equipment. Steady supplies of radioactive Phosphorus and his notebook were also essential. Anything short of that, he knew was embarking on pure gamble with the rest of his life. Mr. Frye was about to feel sorry for himself, when Mr. Castle stood to face the judge.
They were all imagining themselves in his position, but he walked through it and took the blow. Just noticeable, the number TEN made him flinch nevertheless.

Another year passed. The hotelier continued sending money. Lester continued spending most of it on the Pontibus. Aluminum-tubing projects got less money than first intended. Calein gambles took more. Enduring many disappointments creating the tetrahedron vertex-joints, he became less interested in their pursuit.
After his son died, Mr. Frye became curious about religious beliefs. He felt organized religion to be a travesty. So his reading on the subject, to fall asleep, became eclectic. Lester learned that ancient religions resulted from mushroom cults. Those that did not do so resulted from those that did. The most intriguing of the Eumycota, Basidiomycotina is the Siberian species Amanita muscaria var. muscaria.
He obtained some of those mushrooms and sampled them. After sweating, vomiting, delirium, and a deep sleep, Mr. Frye experienced the purported visions. He was never able to talk with his dead son, but the experience was profitable. Lester did some research on the mushroom’s secondary metabolites. The book’s prologue relates what occurred.
About the time they sent Francis Castle to prison, Mr. Otorp found it difficult to make his own ends meet. He, once again, began making frequent visits to the lab. As Mr. Frye became more interested in pursuing calein, Mr. Otorp was there to help.
Exploiting the scientist’s laboratory facilities, our loquacious genius discovered his South Shore community enjoyed a toxic water supply. He learned that glacial moraine aquifers contained low limestone levels. Such a condition allowed acid rain to cause a heavy metal (copper & lead) leach into tap water. He soon extended his find into most of New England. Mr. Otorp demonstrated to the citizens of Queenstown the aggressive nature of drinking water coming from local aquifers.
He explained the deleterious effects of such water on their health. He then won a seat on the local Board of Health with a mandate to fix the situation. Mr. Otorp proposed treatment methods for the economical alleviation of the condition. That entailed stepping on some very political toes. The pols raised money to publicize various untrue charges against him.
He told Mr. Frye. “I arranged my words to form questions in people’s minds. Those questions constrained them to think. I committed thereby a terrible crime and one day shall pay for it.”
He was right. It resulted in his recall from office. Despondent and discouraged, he spent most of his time at the lab. The two men worked side by side on Pontibus matters, morning to night.

There is not a fiercer hell than the failure in a great object… Keats

Chapter Twenty-Six

Promising to teach Mr. Otorp some molecular biology techniques, Lester showed him many. In turn, Mr. Otorp agreed to postpone his ESP research aspirations. Before consenting, he said. “One day I shall do these studies, Lester. Lack of communication is a major human problem. Not until we connect to a much greater extent can we resolve our troubles. It’s the sure way to total equality under the law and an end to the curse of government.”
“You may be right.” Mr. Frye replied. “We will do it, someday.”
Supplemented by voracious reading, Mr. Otorp took in everything. His spatial reasoning deficit relegated him to no formal education beyond high school. Nevertheless, on-the-job-training made his education rival even the best of post-doctoral students. The lab grew to depend on him. He was no lackey, holding some very strong opinions.
One of his convictions concerned the type of protective plastic they should use on the eventual constructions. Conventional resins came from fossil hydrocarbons. Mr. Otorp wanted microbiologically produced polymers. He felt they should use PHB (polyhydroxybutyrate), a microbial storage macromolecule. At $2/lb., the bacterial product was much more expensive than the most common plastic monomer. More popular petro-resin polyethylene sold for $0.40/lb. in 1991 dollars. The prices would not remain disparate for long if the microbes could be grown more cheaply.
Azotobacter vinelandii, is a nitrogen-fixing bacterium. It could grow in high Pontibus altitudes. Producing fertile soil, it would create amino acids for a world in need of inexpensive protein sources. The microbe also yields ample PHB. Mr. Otorp collected the three Azotobacter vinelandii PHB genes. He then inserted them into a plant from the oil palm family.
The transgenic’s host tree was a Brazilian gift from Mr. Aloirav, delivered during one of his visits. Working on it night and day, the Boston men achieved a functional prototype. One of the PHB genes, reductase, also dwarfed the plant. That made it even more useful for the high-tropospheric structures planned. Now the Company’s biological asset repertoire included a major PHB-producing vegetable and its nitrogen-fixing counterpart.
“Other Pontibus flora and fauna will also benefit from the dwarf palm.” Mr. Frye told the hotelier. “The new tree will take the Pontibus’ spent biomass as nutrient to produce the PHB. The plastic mulching film will conserve valuable moisture during cold spells. At higher altitudes, the biodegradable-polymer will also aid in weed control. We won’t even have to gather it up at the year’s end. We’ll return it to the environment. The dead plant will act as a food source for Actinomycetes fungi in the active composting areas. All that, in addition to the growth promoted by nitrogen fixation.”
A UN report that year disclosed that it cost $100/year to keep a child alive. The planet couldn’t afford it. One died every 2 seconds, 40 thousand/day, 20 million before five years old. 100 million survivors lost permanent mental and physical capacity. 200 million never made it to school.
Lester agonized and dreamed about feeding these and the planet’s expected hundreds of billions more. The “boss” was pleased at what the lab produced. He appeared more interested in the actual sky house progress than the accessories, however. His overriding interest made sense. The patents and proprietary development predicated on the Pontibus’ realization. A Pontibus, Mr. Aloirav reminded, still needing creation.
Despite his desire to shine, Mr. Frye was not doing well. He couldn’t apply himself as he could when his family was intact. The man frittered away his time on meaningless piddling. He behaved similar to an emeritus university researcher or some such vapid personality. Mr. Otorp found the petty schemes to improve lab procedures exasperating.
Both Lester’s parents died within six months of each other. Unaware of his emotional state, he fought depression even harder. Mr. Frye distracted himself with meaningless fantasies and possibilities for future gain. He dreamed about exploiting his golden Amazonian apples of Hesperides. But it never got any further than a dream. The man lost too many moments in blank unwholesome staring into the walls. It was as if wonderfulness existed there just waiting for him to discover.
The man knew staring at walls was irresponsible. He couldn’t help himself. All his spare force went just to maintain the status quo. One can approach understanding Lester’s mental state by considering the magnitude of what he was attempting. Compound it by adding his pain. The degree of distress must have been enormous.
Undertaking to erect the largest structures in history was a daunting prospect under the best of circumstances. The scientist persevered amidst terrible personal tragedy. With insufficient material knowledge, he possessed neither human momentum nor precedent to accomplish the task. Carrying such an oppressive burden, with his existing spiritual handicap, was next to impossible. Bills paid, Mr. Frye’s creativity problems got little attention.
Publicity to enhance business, a non-factor, occupied his time. The mental stasis went undetected. Mr. Otorp behaved like a graduate student, busily making his incompetent professor look competent. Patent possibilities, due to him, came out of the lab.
These advances also made the employer feel useful. He stayed out of the way; knowing it was still his own vision propelling the project. Just the wherewithal to keep the dream alive took all Lester’s energy. One day he said. “We see the danger, Mr. Otorp. Recognizing the problem, we know the solution. We must find a way to portray a similar vision in other minds. Inculcating obvious opportunities, and those not yet apparent, is our responsibility. At present we’re but assisting in other’s neglected environmental educations. If people will but accept the possibility of planetary sustainability through biosphere enhancement, we’ll succeed. Attempting less will be irresponsible. I may never see my child plant her footsteps in the sky nor walk among the clouds. Nevertheless, the Earth will not enthrall my soul.”
“Why don’t we build another model for the popular press?” Mr. Otorp suggested.
“Don’t you think we’ve exhausted the benefits of models?”
“No. This time we’ll use clamshell. It’ll show superiority in cost, weight, strength, and durability to metal, concrete, plastic, or wood.”
“That presupposes calein’s use.” Mr. Frye said. “I’m confident we’ll be able to construct the matrices from aluminum.”
“So am I, but wouldn’t it be better, for high altitude work, to use calein? Solar and wind energy, tapped there, would accommodate mineral-impregnated proteinaceous-materials to greater advantage.”
“The major oil companies bought up all the cutting-edge solar technology long ago. It’s sequestered from application until they exhaust all their oil reserves.”
“We’ve got to plan for it anyway.”
“True.” Lester said, then added. “You know. Using either calein or aluminum is gonna’ take familiarizing. Living in the sky won’t be similar to anything preceding it.”
“Total acceptance will come after a generation or two. Children must be born and raised on the Second-Surface first. We also have to design sky-cars capable of negotiating the triangularized pier surfaces. Driving these vehicles around will help stimulate appreciation.”
“Saving the planet from ecological disaster is essential.” Mr. Frye added.
Mr. Otorp couldn’t see how the bridges would accomplish that, so Lester explained. “Related population pressures of desertification, inadequate waste disposal, resource exhaustion, and nuclear terrorism need addressing. That is not happening at present. The Pontibus promises increased nutrients, energy, living space, and freedom from pollution. The Corporation will construct platforms for non-biodegradable waste disposal many miles past all human habitation. These surfaces will allow frozen storage of otherwise non-disposable chemical toxins, such as radioactive wastes PU-239, I-131, Sr-90, etc. At lower, cloud-level altitudes vapor-condensers can operate. These appliances will supply clean fresh water for drinking, bathing, washing, growing food, and raising animals.”
Before returning to wall gazing, Lester added. “Increased biomass, heat, and oxygen can enable more extensive outward colonization of the troposphere. Added living space, like coral reefs, will make habitat for many types of life a reality. Each dodecahedral living-area will have a methane generator underneath it to contain animal waste. From there, we can transport it to central recycling facilities or treat it in situ (on site).”
Humankind needed to find a way to cut their population growth. They also needed to make more effective use of near space. Increasing the Earth’s surface area, without a concomitant addition to peripheral-crust density, would solve that problem.
Until collaborating on the first prototypical sky house, Mr. Otorp lacked full appreciation of what it meant. Mr. Frye related to him his feelings on the true measure of one’s personal impact while living. He felt it concerned one’s affect on Life over time. He was offering Mr. Otorp a unique Life-affirming opportunity. Mr. Otorp need but accept the value of adding these extra advantages to his Weltanschauung.
The chance to share in effecting changes, in the Milky Way’s eternal dust, lay with their work. Eons after the mind of man erased past famous deeds, life would still feel their past efforts. Their deeds would not be lost. Long after the last vestiges of name recognition ended, their voices would not be silent. The measure of their true influence would still resonate with that of the universe.
Mr. Frye heard a brief news media acknowledgement. A short piece, (without mentioning his name), vindicated Mr. Otorp for his correct analysis of New England’s tap water. There was no fanfare. There was no word of appreciation even. They never mentioned the courage he manifested during the entire ordeal.
The powers declared the water toxic. They confirmed, (once again failing to mention his name), Mr. Otorp’s prescription for its remediation and generated funds for implementation. Lester and he stopped for a moment to celebrate the unsung victory. They drank a glass of homemade cranberry wine and went back to work.
Except for weather, Mr. Frye felt Man’s greatest concerns were confronting his evolutionary competitors. They were Man himself, insects, and microbes. Excepting these threats, the new species, Homo sapiens var. sapiens var. sapiens, was sound. Its success menaced other older species’ very existence. Attainment brought temporary unequivocal mastery.
Co-existence with life on Earth was a greater challenge now than at any time since inception. There was little planetary space left into which to expand. Lester felt the callused exclusion of everything not licensed by Homo would soon leave no habitat at all. The trend of population growth needed to moderate. Even religious mothers aborted over 50 million of their babies a year. Terminating innocent new life in violence hadn’t changed for thousands of years. It was still acceptable, even if insufficient.
In 1991, Lester warned that human population numbers would be, by the year 2011 AD, over 7.5 billion souls. He said. “To avert an ecological disaster, resource depletion must stop. Consumption needs of a small percentage dictate unreasonable terms. They allow just chosen plants and animals to survive. Humankind’s wounded spirit needs licking. Non-consumable plants and animals can do that. Without them around to teach true morality, the naked ape will flounder. Facing the life-sentence of bleak existence, they’ll situate similar to Francis Castle’s roommates. No hope for self-actualization, crowded into islands of madness. Lives subjected every day to the taunts and jibes of what might have been.”
Lester knew he could wait no longer. Leaving bed or not, the man planted symbolic seeds, germinating & growing into his future. It was up to him to create from them mighty oaks or poisonous weeds. His vineyards would bring either heady wines of accomplishment or just strangling tendrils. He was responsible for either leafy shade from life’s heat or burns from shameful neglect.
The scientist painted attractive vignettes in other’s minds. He displayed a plan with a viable chance to succeed. An opportunity existed to forestall the unimaginable horror threatening the biosphere. The man felt Society must expedite a sustainable ecologically cognizant economic system or confrontations would occur. Many sentient beings knew human numbers approached planetary carrying capacity. The ecological bottom line read close to bankruptcy.
The two men worked to make the Company’s modular-habitats better and less expensive. Although copyrighted, the completed construction would require actual patents. As soon as the vertex-joint’s effectiveness was ready, the Patent Office would receive their descriptions. The venture conceptualized space buildings and storage facilities of a unique nature. The Corporation’s market share would be 100%.
Evening News shed doubt on their prospects. It reported some foreign corporations entertaining thoughts of constructing a trans-Atlantic bridge to collect solar energy. These concerns must have read a 1984 Home Cloning Kit manual. The text described such a venture and showed the photograph of a model.
Multinational companies purchased his products that mentioned modular space-domiciles. They even requested research summaries on materials and methods of Pontibus construction. Their management looked into the Corporation’s technology. Purchasing genetic-engineering equipment, containing rudimentary explanations of sky modules and platforms, ended that interest. Appeal never extended to financing. Lester was confident his proprietary patentable 15-year head start would hold the lead.
He worked and dreamed late into the night on tetrahedral problems. There was a secret to keeping distant bridge points in synchrony with initial points. The key was in the accuracy of the tubing connections at pier vertices. Sixty-degree angles made there by radiating legs of the 15 tetrahedrons needed extreme precision approaching convergence. That abstruse requirement caused all vertex-joint frustration. Entropy refused to cooperate.
Before grappling with that problem, however, the non-vertex tubing connections needed to be exact. The man tried explaining to aluminum suppliers how to fabricate tubing ends to facilitate that effect. He was unsuccessful. Rectification attempts failed. No matter how clear his phrasing, they couldn’t get it right. Frustration and anger were resident emotions.
As a result, azimuths of distant points were unpredictable. The disarray, in time, would require unsustainable amounts of the two available aluminum-welding processes. He needed to stop the waste. The two men designed a machine to reverse crimp straight tubing received from fabricators. The machine meant another patent and made the Company’s potential list quite long:

1.NOVEL PIERS & INCREASED SURFACE AREAS 2.SKYHOUSES 3.NOVEL GARDENS 4.NOVEL PONDS 5.NOVEL SEWER-WATER COLLECTION DEVICES 6.NOVEL SOLAR-WIND COLLECTORS 7.NOVEL METHANE GENERATORS 8.NOVEL SEPTAGE RECYCLERS 9.SKYWALKS 10.TETRAHEDRALIZED COMMUNITIES 11.NOVEL INSTALLATION METHODS FOR TETRAHEDRALIZED COMMUNITIES 12.NOVEL SHOES FOR INSTALLATION OF AERIAL COMMUNITIES 13.NOVEL DISPOSAL OF FROZEN TOXIC & RADIOACTIVE WASTE 14.NOVEL ELECTRIC VEHICLES 15.NOVEL HURRICANE PROTECTION DEVICE 16.NOVEL EARTHQUAKE PROTECTION DEVICE 17.NOVEL TETRAHEDRON CONNECTING METHOD 18.NOVEL CONNECTING METHOD USING LIVING VEGETATION 19.NOVEL BIOMASS GENERATION. 20. NOVEL PALM PLASTICS. Soon would come NOVEL BUILDING MATERIAL, INTERCONTINENTAL TETRAHEDRALIZED MATRICES OF SILICATE – CARBONATE IMPREGNATED PROTEINS, NOVEL MINING METHODS AND OZONE DEPLETION REVERSAL SYSTEM. Also about 30 other processes would result, over time, in patents.

149 million square kilometers of land existed on Earth in the late 1970’s, when Mr. Frye began his quest. That meant a 29.2:70.8 ratio of land to sea. Utilization of terra firma took half of what human habitats needed. He felt coming shortages of buildable arable land would make life, as known, untenable.
Such valuable property continued to decrease. Louder cries for preserving open space occurred. Lester believed the exclamations elicited were for humankind’s own peace of mind. Sympathetic concerns for slower-adapting life forms were secondary issues for most. Seven billion persons inhabited the globe, competing for scarce resources.
The great man, Jonas Salk, was responsible for the health of much of that number. He estimated the planetary carrying capacity for humans was 11 billion. That number would find little incentive to continue existing, alone in the universe, without other life forms. Habitats for all creatures within the next thirty years would become scarce. Pressure on “development” concerns intensified in an effort to prevent destruction of new territory.
Future energy generation demands inevitably include nuclear power stations. Nuclear power generation is a ticking time-bomb. All higher evolved creatures are vulnerable to free radiation escapes, and there is no way to make either such power generation or its waste safe. Homo’s evolutionary chances amount to zero in the face of it. Only the Pontibus could give respite from universal radionuclide land-contamination.
Nevertheless, Mr. Frye said. “Construction industries aren’t ready for both architectural and building material changes. People will follow a leader twenty feet ahead, but not twenty miles.”
Mr. Otorp agreed. “Conditions indicate but incremental changes in the industry. We must stay just one step ahead of the construction companies. Too far ahead would be fatal. Waiting longer for large quantities of calein to become available is foolish. Such behavior means useless waiting to get too far ahead of the market.”
Mr. Aloirav also advised against it. On one of their many Brazil trips together, to collect Hesperides apples, they discussed timing. He said. “Lester, you’ve brought the Pontibus from abstract concept to the rudiments of concrete fact. It’s time you got some high-caliber management involved. I think the Company’s ready for expert assistance.”
That required financing, as did patent development and intellectual property. Adequate funds and quality administration would move them forward. The monthly checks were insufficient. Corporation president, Mr. Lester Frye, was in most of the World’s WHO’S WHO publications. Nevertheless, his fame brought neither capital nor a full complement of directors for the Pontibus venture.
The Company needed people skilled in areas he was not. His work achieved publicity, but it was often negative or trivialized. The media aired the concept at low viewer periods. Lester’s global concerns undermined his credibility.
He planned to give investors proper information regarding his research, including previous development and marketing efforts. In return for negotiable equity, the entire venture would require additional cash investments. These sums would cover such things as patent processing, production, marketing, and management. They expected the profitable new industry to exist within six years. The Corporation would generate profits through a number of licensing opportunities.
Communications, transportation, commissions, utility installation, construction finishing-work, and service contracts headed the initial list. Water & energy generation, biomass & food production, weapons & waste disposal or storage, etc. would be additional later revenues. Lester anticipated the Company to be a serious force in the business world around 2001. Within the following ten years, management decision alone would limit net profits. He expected his cash-flow break-even point would be 2009.
They planned a public offering as soon as the probable patents were, “pending”. The Concern would retain the funds raised in that offering. These resources would expand habitat neighborhoods and storage facilities beyond the initial prototypical enclave. New facilities and additional staff would train technicians and growth-support people in novel aerial municipality idiosyncrasies.
The Corporation expected to recover the lost calein by 2015. Resulting matrices would replace resin-coated aluminum in all tetrahedralized building-trusses and connecting intersections. That operation would keep them in a leading building market position. Profits from ocean mining would result from calein’s calcium carbonate extraction. That resource would overcome the eventual costs of metal-tubing obsolescence and replacement.
Calein attaching and curing in situ would preclude the necessity for vertex-joint precision. Therefore, fibrous proteins would facilitate more rapid outward colonization. Mr. Frye and Mr. Otorp expected their expanding technology-base to bring many markets into their influence sphere. To explain Pontibus-associated concepts to investors, they produced a video of the project.
Lester said. “For environmentalism to succeed, it must be responsible and operate in an economical way. If not, its failure will carry our culture and way of life along with it.”
“I like “environmentalism” as a word, but “biological sustainability” is a better term.” Mr. Otorp replied. “The “environmentalism” expression impresses people as an altruistic life-style. Some see it as a new form of religious hypocrisy like Jesus-freaks. A small minority of these “Eco-freaks” even treats it as an exclusive radical philosophy. Very few of your Company’s associates consider low-expectation “environmentalist” coteries as anything other than impractical anti-business Luddites.”
“I’m aware of that. Biological-sustainability is a policy of general human survival. We must approach it not as altruism. We can’t underrate religious fervor, but to succeed in the real world, one must retain objectivity. Fear of periodic reality checks is counterproductive. Stringent analysis must include economic fact, even if pursuing basic goals with religious zeal. Throwing money at environmental problems, hoping they’ll disappear, (if you toss enough), is not cost-effective. It must be a practical program, yet not a subornable one.”
His statement then got somewhat mystical. “To survive, humanity must respect its spiritual facet. It’s as important as the “reality perceiving” mental and physical. Other planetary life forms maintain numinousness for Man. We have a duty and a need to safeguard them in turn. Failing that obligation will dissipate our spirituality. Gathering momentum, it will spiral down into horrifying loneliness.”
After the town’s 1987 attack, Mr. Frye changed the corporate focus. Notes, biologicals, and most equipment needed replacing. He attempted to do that, after a fashion, at the Boston location. Rebuilding his molecular biology laboratory, taking research gambles, and working with aluminum dissipated his energy focus. Lester worked on the original concept and invested resources in auxiliary areas, while re-orienting his life.
Ancillary areas involved quasi-closed systems of sewage-septage-waste treatment, water purification, and energy acquisition. Subjects subordinate to the same ultimate goal as the lost research materials. The “boss” was preoccupied over the vertex-joint. His concern was why it wasn’t ready, after all these years. When the hotelier first facilitated Pontibus’ prospects, they were supposed to be near completion.
He now implied nonessential areas were squandering resources. It never occurred to Mr. Frye there might be more than just a friendly interest involved. He explained, almost convincing himself in the process, about doing everything possible to expedite matters. Nevertheless, the “boss” liked to refer to the “Home Cloning Kit failure”. He made veiled comments about how the Pontibus might be a similar fiasco. Like Pope Julius II at the Sistine ceilings, he was forever asking his own Michelangelo.
“Why is it taking so long?”
There were many reasons. The truth, however, was elusive. Lester wasn’t Michelangelo. Yet, likewise, he couldn’t point to it. The quasi-depression, he endured, made that item hurt even more. Mr. Aloirav was right, but the slash of pain delivered cut deeper than he knew.
The Home Cloning Kits were not as successful as expected. The Kits lost no money and were a high visibility product. They came out at the most inopportune moment, however. It was an idea whose time had not yet come. The era was when biotechnology’s image looked attractive to the investment community.
Nevertheless, it stood at the highest misunderstood point with others. Ordinary people, the Home Cloning Kit’s main market, never could grasp them. Many sold, but the product couldn’t overcome the general population’s subliminal negative esoteric bias against genetic engineering. There was also a high cost to perceived benefit ratio. The public didn’t see how a $599 glorified chemistry set could enrich their lives.
Most feared it would do them no good. Indeed, many feared just the opposite effect. Notwithstanding, the Kits were now in many diverse places. Health clinics, German & Swiss government offices, the British Museum of Science, etc. held examples. The Company gained considerable assets and knowledge attempting to market them around the world.
Disappointing sales were also attributable, after negative product perception, to management’s inadequate manufacturing-expertise. The Corporation’s president made each one himself, using labor-intensive assembling practices. It added to their cost. A crude marketing campaign contributed to lackluster trading performance. The Concern, i.e. Mr. Frye, spent advertising dollars prior to a complete market analysis.
He targeted high school science teachers, wasting his funds. The capacity to purchase and use the Home Cloning Kits didn’t exist there. The campaign to “stupidize” Americans with permissive education methods was just getting started. All these mistakes, however, Lester could have remedied, even as late as 1994. He survived what happened to him. There was still no competition.
His interests lay elsewhere. The man’s tenacity and apparent invincibility illuminated a favorable positive posture. Despite recurring battles with depression, his indomitable persistence indicated he would move forward. Excepting shareholder liability, the Company was unencumbered with bills. It appeared poised to go in the direction of his original concept.
Enough auxiliary knowledge was there to move it into the next stage. The tetrahedral vertex-joint alone held up production. The Corporation felt it would soon overcome that technical hurdle. Management still needed to show some semblance of profitability, however. Even the hotelier would be impressed with such a situation.
They expected to achieve that solution after initial construction efforts started. Resources could then accumulate to develop calein. No stored quantities of the protein building-material existed. Nevertheless, their other technology was “state of the art”. The Company’s body of knowledge focused on the first few thousand feet of near space, the troposphere.
Management felt it represented the most reasonable region to exploit. The majority of the biosphere is located here. Mr. Frye intended Pontibus technology to push the biosphere envelope further into the troposphere.
Ample funds at his disposal produced a reputation for forward-looking cutting-edge thinking. New, not-unwarranted, credibility gave the idea stature. He was responsible for many firsts. His Corporation introduced the first Home Cloning Kits into the general population. It was a necessary and appropriate venture, even if the return was more succes’ d’estime than financial.
Through Mr. Otorp, the Company was first to show New England tap water toxic, postulated prognoses, and the remedy. The man built an inexpensive test paper for the heavy metals, copper and lead. He embarrassed authorities with proof the water contained high quantities of them. It caught the Massachusetts Environmental Protection Agency and Massachusetts Department of Public Health in flagrante delicto.
Mr. Otorp maintained chronic exposure to these chemicals might in part cause diseases of unknown etiology. He named 30 diseases tentatively caused by copper toxicity and gave 1105 references to prove it. His test showed levels at some taps of over 230,000X what was safe. One of those presumed diseases was an atypical schizophrenia involved in a local child-molesting murder. Such awareness, plus venal journalism, caused his electoral recall. After that experience, neither Lester nor Mr. Otorp ever again felt that any media or politician represented even the rudiments of reliability.
The Corporation sustained no competition in tropospheric exploitation. There was proprietary incubus to continue in that enviable position. Lester’s past successes were indicative of what was possible in his future. The ability of his Company to recognize and anticipate change was evident from the record. Other key management people, however, were critical to success. The venture was strong in technology. Just as evident was its weakness in marketing, manufacturing, and finance.
Mr. Otorp was mulling an idea over in his mind. He suggested merging with a metal-refining-fabrication corporation. The man said. “New metal-savvy management will bring in manufacturing personnel right along with marketing and finance.”
Buoyed with Lester’s entertaining his idea, the thought experienced a crushing blow. The “boss” arrived at the Boston lab that summer. He refused to give it his imprimatur. Mr. Aloirav made it clear to everyone. “The industrial world knows this venture requires financing. Another company sharing the helm will dilute your control percentage. Such a dilution will weaken chances for gaining financing.”
The heeded advice miffed Mr. Otorp. Disaffected, he left and wouldn’t come back to work until after the hotelier was gone. Mr. Otorp never forgave the “boss”.
Mr. Frye expected to find sufficient management people yet that year. He estimated the technology patents would fund them. Needs satisfied, the Corporation could get “price and availability” quotes from metal & resin suppliers. According to Lester’s projections, 2000 AD would bring an experimental prototypical model. The Concern could then begin the sky module-manufacturing process. He said. “2001 AD will see the first commercial prototypical neighborhoods going up on land. The Corporation will need sixty million dollars to get there.”
Hearing that figure, the “boss” became quiet, later asking. “When will accelerated marketing efforts initiate and orders start?” After getting an estimate, he queried. “Will favorable publicity at groundbreaking bring all the venture expansion funds necessary?”
“I hope so,” Mr. Frye replied, “but I’m not certain.”
The hotelier seemed strangely pleased at the response. If the situation developed as anticipated, the Company’s factories would soon be in full production. Once available and employed, they could accelerate. Rapid worldwide expansion of the sky modular neighborhoods could then occur. Until that time, they still had the vertex-joint and funding problems with which to deal. Everything else appeared ready.
Lester explained his vision. “After assembly and installation, aerial edifices will form bridges when connected. They’ll appear as scattered neighborhoods of triangular-faceted habitats. Different configurations of piers will fashion the entire structure. Internal component arrangement of many tubular triangles will touch each other at their endpoints. Manufacturing is modular. Limited assembly will be necessary at the ultimate construction site. In an hour, the Concern can explain how to do it, anywhere. We’ll use 0.016-inch sheet-extruded aluminum tubing. Connections will be according to the present state of metal-fusing art. Bearing piers will be 24 feet in length and volume (i.e. cubic feet). They’ll weigh about 2.5 pounds before application of resin coating. Assorted piers will be similar to the trusses of building cranes or scaffolding skeletons. The factory will shape pier ends to connect at azimuth-changing intersections through the vertex-joint. That component, likewise made of aluminum and resin, still needs a method of proprietary perfection. Ends envelop spurs on two separate crimped semi-spheres. These joint shrouds are hollow. When brought together, wide and open ends connect at the crimp.”
“The final connection or positioning will accept pier ends at installation by the contractor.” Mr. Otorp added. “Development allows multiple sets of six piers to terminate equidistant from each other. Points are in 12 different 60-degree separated symmetrical directions. Appearance simulates a burr or war-club. Once the joint tests effective, we’ll begin manufacturing in earnest. The Concern plans enclaves of one hundred sky modular living units. A sky house neighborhood with vehicles, plants, and animals will be self-sufficient. Large piers will interconnect associated gardens, walkways, septic-water-collection systems, wind-solar generators, platforms, etc.”
“Initially,” Mr. Frye explained, “we’ll construct one sky module domicile size. Limiting size selection allows the Company to concentrate on profitability and outward expansion. We plan to standardize by decreasing the number of factory customization options. That increases potential production and sales volume. Different customers might want larger or unique domiciles. If so, that further enhances revenue. Corporation-approved and licensed local finishing contractors will handle optionals. Such grants will also tend to ameliorate community opposition. Pre-approved plans will be available to convert basic installed sky modules into multi-tiered or distinctive dwellings. Separating the pre- and post- installation aspects of the business also assists in organizational planning.”
Mr. Otorp said. We will construct sky modular domiciles in a manner similar to that of the piers. Due to different stresses on these constructs, horizontal-supporting areas take more concentrated tetrahedralization. Surface hexagonalization will exist underneath floor areas. The stronger the platform required, the denser the bearing surface necessary. The hexagonalized layer also contains even more tetrahedralization closer to the actual burden. All horizontal bearing areas similar to floors, such as platforms, walkways, gardens, rivers, pools, etc. need the increased intensity. Manufacturing aspects with major redundant tetrahedralization intensity are the most labor-intensive facets of the operation.”
Lester liked to say. “It’s analogous to keratinizing a protein.”
(Here, production approximated the World Bank’s funding mission. The rediscovered charge refocused in 1994. That obligation was the directive to accentuate and provide for more labor-intensive funding projects. It was the Bank’s current plan to implement planetary sustainability.)
In areas expected to undergo less stress, reduced tetrahedralization could occur. A non-weight-bearing partition wall would be such an area. He planned to ship both area types as connectable prefabricated sheets from the factory. On-site existing framework would accept the ready-made layers to expedite construction.
The factory would install insulation between exterior and interior weather sheeting. A contractor would situate the solar-energy-collecting exterior walls and roofing on site. Aerial products would have a 20-year life expectancy. The Company would need to hire more maintenance personnel, in time. These people would replace aluminum whenever they discovered oxidation damage. The Concern expected to find such areas wherever resins wore off or seawater gained access.
“We must search our constructed jungle areas for heavy hardwood trees.” Mr. Frye said. “As in most rainforests, thin fragile soil layers barely cover roots. A large falling tree could damage many underlying piers and sky houses. The Corporation will train & employ all Pontibus maintenance people. Customers must hire these individuals exclusively. We do not want unlicensed clandestine repair contractors developing and accumulating.”
“Private-habitation maintenance-prices will be set at a Company rate. That rate will include a percentage to compensate the Concern for communal upkeep. Time spent on Pontibus construction & maintenance, as opposed to domiciles, is communal time. That includes framework, roads, paths, lakes, rivers, forests, etc.” Mr. Otorp said.
“I plan to monitor such work.” Lester added.
“Rates must never become oppressive.” Mr. Otorp continued. “Disconnected levies might become callused to the resident’s peculiar constraints and good will. It’s imperative the bureaucratic nature of such maintenance not become similar to taxation. We don’t want the Pontibus ever to become involved in such extortion. I think we should encourage sky house neighborhood groups and maintain periodic contact, cooperating with them.”
In addition to regular maintenance people, the Company would hire temporary personnel. These people would reinforce areas near hardwood jungles and buttress individual trees. Subsequent to major storms, the “temps” would inspect and repair damage. They would also report to Corporation insurance-licensees about customer’s property damages. The Concern would review customer policies, underwritten by these licensees, in light of weather norms. Company standard operating procedures could never allow obscene profits. They would permit a measured commensurate Corporation-approved return similar to a utility commission. Corporate rape of citizenry must never ever occur.
They contemplated a very large venture, requiring much money and time. The concept’s ultimate completion would need the devotion of a great deal of creativity and effort. How the logistics and interconnections were all going to come together was still a mystery.
Then in the late summer of 1999, Lester’s little girl died.

The fate of the architect is the strangest of all. How often he expends his whole soul, his whole heart and passion, to produce buildings into which he himself may never enter. Goethe

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Lester wasn’t able to adjust to his daughter’s suicide. She was his last raison d’ etre. The entire remaining obligation he felt, regarding life and the environment, was for her. His family was now all gone. His life appeared over. There was no more reason to continue, and Mr. Frye didn’t. With no one to live or die for, he gave up.
Mr. Otorp discovered the girl in the bloody-water-filled bathtub after arriving that day. He told Lester. Together, they went to the bathroom. There, Mr. Otorp watched as the already joyless man disintegrated. It didn’t appear that Lester understood, since he shed no tears, but work ceased. He couldn’t talk.
The lab stopped exuding the sense of urgency that vision and concept of duty inspired. Mr. Otorp’s drive floundered, and his efforts lapsed likewise. He hung around the lab, hoping Lester would recover. He didn’t. Mr. Otorp soon felt little more than a vague obligation to “check in” at times. In the absence of personal impetus (and pay), he seldom returned to Boston. Still hating Mr. Aloirav, the man refused to communicate concerning the situation. Accepting other time constraints, just before Thanksgiving Day, he left for good.
Life gives each of us three basic choices, mutually exclusive: to dream, to die, or to give ourselves up to vanity. Mr. Frye cheated. Except for minimal essentials to forestall dissolving into oblivion’s ether, his functioning mind disappeared. He was there just in body.
The world left the deranged man to his own company. Wandering around the row house, bumping into things, he fell into long periods of inactivity. Stumbling outside on occasion, half-naked and filthy, the authorities hospitalized him. Upon release, the scenario redeveloped, until police no longer bothered. Ignored, one of many homeless babblers, Mr. Frye became part of Boston’s “unwanted” population.

Clean scrubbed faces of innocence lay less than 4 feet from the squalor. A thin wall separated the children from the hobo. A jug of wine was snug under the latter’s arm. Sunken eyes stared out of his head, a manifestation of death undying. Depressed cheeks made facial bones stick out like boils on the pallid face.
An arm raised, a feeble whisper, another drink of sweet liquid strength. Too weak to eat, sustenance was the occasional jug brought by his last friend. Burlap sack and torn canvass on an abandoned tenement restaurant’s concrete floor was a hospice. A jug now was his final & sole companion. The moment came, the whisper went out, and he was no more.
Wine spilled on the floor, dampening the wall. That moisture alone, diffusing through the wall, betrayed the departure on the other side. Lester Frye arrived, saw his dead friend, and dropped to the floor. A few moments later, he noticed the jug still contained some liquid. Could it be wine? Oh, yes. It was!

The misdirected energy of Lester’s incoherent cerebration gave no indication of that secret for which he searched. Too late for him, it would have been pointless. Nature does not select for, indeed, proscribes such compassion. The impossibility of leading a Christian life, despite 2000 years of institutionalized hypocrisy to the contrary, lends such proof.
Nature allows no sense of obligation for familiar species to become so acute it consumes. Mr. Frye’s tragic flaw, a ravaging rampaging sense of duty in a purposeless world, invalidated his biological eternity. What end would it now serve to learn the narcotic of happiness?
Life doesn’t permit it to such as he. One who neither sought nor understood it for so long. A positive influence without a successful portfolio, he was a cast-out, a pariah, born to writhe. Condemned to Hell on Earth was his punishment from a sadistic and maniacal Deity. He must suffer for his heinous criminality.
Out of necessity, Entropy allows the eternal water molecule’s perverse existence despite its manifested order. Mr. Frye was likewise doomed to exist in a chaotic World. Embodying the constitutive survival-instinct lesion, with which most are possessed, he endured. As does the entire desperate living world, struggling for survival, enjoying the terrible loneliness a little longer.
Lester weathered the winter without heat or lights. Supplying concerns shut off all utilities except water. If Boston’s “Water” Department could have found a coherent City client ledger or even a working executive, not mob-connected, that might have understood it, there might have been some action there too. Once someone saw that the account was unpaid, they could have cut Mr. Frye’s water too. Perhaps, since they could find neither his account nor address they did nothing. The pipes froze in January, and the Frye residence became an ice sculpture that would have made Alexander Calder blush with shame. Fortunately, Washed Beaches (CH) so completely polluted the NE aquifers that the water had no positive value, serving but as a graft-absorbing accounting tool for the City.
There was nobody else left in Mr. Frye’s row house to pay the various accounts. Bills, royalty checks, etc. arrived and slipped through the front door’s mail slot. On the interior floor, a light coat of dust, sometimes snow, covered them. Mr. Frye saw nothing of significance attached. They simply grew in mass and blew around the tiny foyer in tune with every stray breeze.
One day, during the following winter, he sat in his row house’s upper floor. Old newspapers covered him in part. Devoid of their worn broken-backed shoe companions, remains of socks covered his feet. Unwashed for quite some time, distal extremities like ears, elongated nails, etc. exhibited telltale impacted dirt. Long tangled and matted gray hair covered Lester’s head and upper neck.
Uric acid and urine had long ago eaten away strategic trouser stitching. His genitals hung down for any interested observer to contemplate. A vandal-broken window let cold December wind and snow fall in on his emaciated body. He twitched on occasion but didn’t shiver. The continued mental agony’s intensity dissipated most other cerebral capacity.
The wracking pain from cold and ice on his frail body accounted for nothing compared to it. After supporting such suffering, Mr. Frye’s physiological protection required all the remaining energy just to preserve homeostasis. To survive, his body wasted no glucose on movement or unnecessary functions. He endured the strain; oblivious to the damage wrought in its wake.
A knock at the door disturbed him. Staring out the bay window onto the street below, Lester started. His reverie soon returned. Then, some emptiness leaked again, as a crash broke the chilling air. A few more skin jerks, and he forgot about it.
Then, standing before him was an apparition of the hotelier. The apparent hallucination appeared and disappeared, as Mr. Frye watched soundless lips moving. He felt his arms and hands in motion but didn’t understand how or why. His brain wouldn’t reflect on the strange fantasy around him. Lifted up, aware of distant shouting, the man screamed.
“Leave me alone!”
It was his standard reaction to Boston’s punk’s assaults on his wracked being. He felt himself carried down the four flights of stairs. Outside, insensate to how it all happened, Lester’s uncertain mind comprehended little. Ambulances and airplanes appeared and disappeared. Grand Rapids, Michigan interjected, and a new room materialized around him.
Soon, he stared down at a new street, South Division Avenue. It was all a mystery to his befuddled consciousness. Over the next six months, Mr. Frye encountered numerous applications of Amazon Hesperides apple juice, exotic drugs, and psychiatric manipulations. They opened very small windows in his exhausted cerebration. A year went by, and he experienced but a few momentary lucid intervals.
Another year, and the warm tender care began bearing some visible fruit. Coherent intervals increased in frequency and intensity. No longer dying in Boston, Lester continued a slow progression. Each week and each month, the man improved. With memory functioning better, he learned how the “boss” discovered him and remedied the condition. Moments later, it wouldn’t have made any difference.
Mr. Frye could not put it all together, but he discovered some related details. Uncashed checks were the hotelier’s first indication something was amiss. Phone calls and investigatory visits became futile exercises. “Nobody knows where the hobo goes. Only the hobo knows where the hobo goes.”
An isolated inquiry brought information about hospitalizations and why. Understanding his friend to be safe in an institution, Mr. Aloirav let time pass. An occasional phone call satisfied his concerns. The hotelier let more time pass, and too much passed. Now, not given to self-abuse, he wasted little time castigating himself over his neglectful behavior.
With what care Lester now received, there wasn’t much cause for unreasonable culpability sentiments. It was obvious to anyone entering the poor man’s presence. Well-attended, however, did not mean little remained unfinished. That too was apparent. Mr. Frye was still in a bad way. Whenever he thought about his son, his guilt was too great for him to manage. His pain overwhelmed him.
“My son, my son.” He moaned. “How could I have done you so much wrong… so wrong?” Remembering his little girl, he sobbed through inconsolable tears. “The love and trust a little girl has for her father… Nothing in the whole world is as wonderful. I didn’t appreciate it. Now I don’t have it anymore… I used to… but not anymore… Never again… It’s gone… All gone… Gone.”
Lester would then slip into his painless “never-never land” again for a few more weeks. The tenuous grasp he held on his mental equilibrium did grow stronger with time. As 2004 AD ended, duration of rational intervals increased daily. The “boss” could leave him alone in the hotel room, and he did. Except for a brief relapse during the Christmas season, Mr. Frye healed.
During good periods, he wandered undisturbed around the hotel’s interior. Lester never got into any trouble; occasional misconduct was limited to uncontrolled lachrymose spells. During a particular peregrination around the hotel, he exposed a dangerous security hiatus in the organization. Like a curious child, poking around unsupervised; the man saw opportunity, an unlocked door, and he took it. It didn’t have anything to do with his need for alcohol. That dependency no longer existed.
The hotelier kept sensitive combustible trash interior to the lab door and both doorways locked. Something went wrong. Into a pile of old newspapers, outside the lower door, somebody dumped a bunch of misprinted propaganda tracts. Destined for the hotel incinerator, it caught Mr. Frye’s eye. Capable of rudimentary curiosity, he picked up a small pamphlet and read:

THE NEW SOCIETY
July 1994

Veteran, prisoner of a sick society, sage or scholar:
Have you suffered at Society’s hands long enough?
Is it time you took your revenge on those who’ve wronged you?
How much longer will you accept your shameful condition?
Poor ignorant superstitious parents, seldom employed, may have introduced you to life. Ill-housed and ill-fed, your childhood was a study in maltreatment. Nevertheless, surviving, you proved yourself the best that humankind can produce. If it were not so, Society would not fear you so much that it needed to gang up on you. The time has come to make your mark on the world.
Ever wonder why there are criminals? Nature gives some women the capacity to recognize good genes. For millennia, Nature selected the most disciplined, cruel, and savage as her first and best. Women wanted them: the qualities entered the gene pool. Now Society considers the opposite to be the first and best. Society designed jailer morality as a subterfuge to defeat you. They desire to make you feel guilt and shame for your very existence. Using such feelings, they gain control. Society does not give a damn about you. Do not be misled into believing so.
I’ve been a prisoner. I’ve tasted the bitterness that grows behind locked doors. Since my release, I’ve spent years on the banks of the Antilles searching for wisdom. My search wasn’t futile. I discovered it’s time to stop accepting discarded handouts and the miserable pittances these weaklings offer the slaves. I know the blessed joy that rushes to the heart after tasting the fruit of fresh revenge. I am offering you some of that sacred fruit. It grows with our organization, awaiting your harvest.
Those of you with children, heed these words. You can no longer sit by and watch sick weak cowards destroy what is healthy, strong, and noble. By ruling the entire world, you can insure your progeny will live on forever. The chemical is endless. Insure its survival, and you insure your eternity. Permit the weak to destroy or dilute it, and you die forever. Nature demands a reckoning! She confers no license on any creature for weakness: whether physical incapacity, ignorance, or lack of imagination.
Soon you’ll be too old to battle these fops. On that day, they could force you to destroy everything you love in one hysterical holocaust. The U.S. alone builds eight nuclear warheads/day. It’s prepared to kill more than you could in your wildest individual ravings. The country’s war-guilt, arms, narcotics trade and nuclear power generation dwarf any evil you can imagine yourself doing.
When they caught and punished you for violating their laws, did you feel guilt and remorse? Did you feel shame and disgust with yourself? Were you contrite in your heart?
Perhaps, but you also felt anger and humiliation. You may have sworn revenge against the mob that wronged and enslaved you. You were right to do so! Human depravity & law have turned Natural Law upside down. Brave, natural men need no written laws. Lawyers are pimps. Judges are whoremasters. Police are prostitutes, and squares are tricks.
Those who trust the system are fools. Taxed, as we are, how are we anything but slaves? Man’s law puts us, the Strong, behind bars. They want to see all the Free-Spirited in chains. Our purpose lies elsewhere.
Society demands obedience to deviant rules and adherence to silly artificial concepts like right and wrong. They would turn us all into perverted monkeys. The weak mob’s united forces and police-whores congregate, overwhelm, and inundate. They choose to lean on us instead of fighting their own frailty. Never accept the Christian guilt. Guilt is for deluded religious dupes. Your battle cry must be strong and noble, whatever you do, no matter what they do.
Great religion today is not Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam or some other soul-enslaving mumbo-jumbo. It is socialistic-democracy, dementocracy – the rule of madness.
Man, when was the last time you felt master in your own house?
Woman, do you want a helpmate or would you aid Society to enslave your man?
Is life what you want it to be for you and your children?
What presses you down and makes your life so insecure?
When was the last time any of you felt in control of your world?
Have you insured your children’s future on Earth?
Are you capable, alone, of working to avert world thirst, starvation & anoxia?
Veterans showed the necessary steel in their guts to dare a fight to the death. Just surviving prison, others prove possession of stronger wills than their captors. Together, we can crush Democracy, Fascism and Socialism. Making ourselves emperors and our women empresses, we will subjugate and rule the mob. The feeble must feed the strong. Instead of dictating to their betters, the weak must serve or they must die.
Behind our banner, destroy the cowards. Show no mercy! If you don’t, your line will perish. History demands we throw off our shackles. Break apart the bars! Our People will exist where prisons do not. Destroying the defectives, we will make a new race. The Strong have the sole right to reproduce. Nature has decreed who will own the planet. The World belongs to the Strong. Uniting behind one banner returns the Natural situation. Life must be the way it was before the perversion called democracy came into being. That way will be again, when we prevail. The enslaving jailers of the Strong & Noble fear us. That’s why we were imprisoned. Their greatest terror is that one-day we may all come under one beacon. They know it will mean their end. Alone and aloof, we cannot prevail. Together under one symbol, we will smash and subjugate them all.
Your nature may not be to join groups. Banding together with us, you can fight back in a manner calculated to win. Society’s insanity will destroy the human world. Prevent it! Act with us. Get your revenge. Channel your anger and hate behind our flag. Tear Society’s bowels open wide! Rip its flesh! Destroy it! Expose to the flies the entrails of its cowardice! Shine the light of day on its penuriousness. Maximum strength lies here. Let no one doubt it. Together, we can break the prison bars and mental chains.

XXX

Holding the piece of paper in his hand, as if germs covered it, Lester stood transfixed. The unsigned tract was similar to the one he saw years ago in Francis Castle’s crack house. How such a large quantity of them got here was bewildering. Engrossed in reading, Mr. Frye didn’t hear anyone come up behind him.
Just audible, he mumbled. “And in the meantime, the world can just go to hell, right?”
“I didn’t intend for you to read that, Lester.” A familiar voice said. “Forget you ever saw it and don’t worry about anything.”
Reaching for the pamphlet, he listened to the shocked and dismayed reply. “Not worry about it! How can you, my friend, keep bundles of such…stuff around?!
“Vanity, I suppose,” the “boss” answered. “I wrote it.”
“No! Impossible!”
“Is it?” He asked, smiling. “Why?”
“The person, writing this…is so…so…cruel.” Lester replied, waving the paper up and down.
“Cruelty? Cruelty, Lester!! Speak to me of cruelty! There is more senseless cruelty in one gram of wasted food than there is in any words I might utter.”
“You’re neither mad nor cruel, but this is both.”
“What makes you think it’s mad, Lester?”
“You’re a dedicated scientist and a kind person.”
“I see. You don’t think a dedicated kind person could, should, or would talk like a rabid revolutionary?” The hotelier queried, again smiling.
“Perhaps.” Mr. Frye responded, once again, waving the tract. “This is beyond mere talk, Rav. This is pure hatred; buried in venom! A kind man did not write this! If you wrote it, you’re a…a…monster!”
“A monster, Lester, is anything we fear and don’t understand.”
“A platitude! Rationalization!” Lester retorted, looking at the tract. “I do, indeed, fear and don’t understand. You court criminals!”
“I tried to appeal to every class of person, all types, because the most reprehensible characters can have the most divine qualities. The more heinous the individual – the more god-like in powers and talents. Every benefit Society ever received has been the result of individual criminal facets in our nature. You forget that! Wildness is good for the species. The World must learn to live with “our kind” until eschewing the need for asocial behavior. Rene’ Descartes said. “The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.””
“That attitude glorifies destructive competition. What about your own kids? Do you want them growing up in a world full of such attitudes?”
“Full of destructive competition?” Mr. Aloirav replied, leaning up against the wall. “Absolutely! You’d rather we raised children docile and tame? Little Leaguers? Sports sorts? A fate bred into beasts kept for carrion.”
“You don’t believe that?!”
“Yes. I do! It’s not a choice that we can elect to make, Lester. It’s a choice Nature made for us. One that we must accept to continue the perfectibility of protoplasm.”
“You justify criminal behavior!”
“Made by society to destroy society. Stopping crime by imprisonment is about as effective a cure as shooting dogs to stop hydrophobia, as ridiculous as dousing cold ashes with water to put out a distant fire. How can they imprison someone for their failure to nurture?”
“That’s not our problem.”
“Like hell it isn’t! If, by accident of birth, one is born male, Society begins deverbalizing you from day one. The community then teaches that quasi-mute boy all the virtues of self-destruction. They succeed. Can they expect him to be grateful?! Lester, Nature makes some of us different. Society expects us to volunteer our lives and individuality away, or it imprisons us. Driven to distraction, it’s too much for some to bear. An environment outside of civilization allows us to transcend our destiny.”
“We aren’t all imprisoned!”
“No, just those too poor in spirit to fight back.”
“Just evil men and women you mean.”
“I don’t believe in good or evil men and women. I do believe in the products of poverty, ignorance, and indifference.”
Mr. Frye felt his military service and arrest record might just buttress his interlocutor’s argument. Therefore, he remained silent. Mr. Aloirav continued. “One can’t know truth, living under capitalism. Everything’s for sale. Widgets, courage, dignity, integrity, truth, heroism, and love – all have a price tag. The US abuses the whole world with a false image as an eternal force for liberty. It’s all bullshit. We are as close to 1984 as any country… ever. With some of the new technologies we are ten times worse than George Orwell’s worst nightmare. I’m surprised I need to tell you that, after what you experienced. Americans work 9 months a year for the state, giving it the means to destroy national freedom and other people’s children. Desensitized by years of religious & political nonsense, the bomb, and government-owned spoon-fed media, the voters’ve become cattle. Well-fed, corralled, and milked, the carrion feed and empower the establishment’s cruel destruction of global life. Watching the US government murder millions of poor is but titillating now. Killing in the Middle East, Africa, Asia, or Central America has become boring, trivial. The ruminants consider it a poor second to other forms of bad entertainment. These non-entities enjoy televised sports, superstition, or inane sit-coms more. Americans know little of geography, history, literature, etc. Humane sentiment is but another cheap B-grade TV thrill, an inane celebrity, or a chick-flick. Even the evangelism nonsense, still watched by the ignorant and envious, has more effect. Everything serves the greater glory of the multinational elite. Whether hired Israeli brutes or U.S. arms, it matters little to beaten-to-death Arab children.”
“So you’re anti-Semitic too?!” Lester accused.
“Ha! The pinnacle of Semitism was anti-Semitic Christianity. It degenerated from there to Capitalism and then to our sick Humanism.” The hotelier stood up straight, moved away from the wall, and said. “I am Semitic, Lester. My great-grandmother was a pied noir Arabian princess, blacker than anthracite coal. My mother was a French Jew. I have nothing against the race. How could I? It’s in me.”
“You sure talk like a Nazi.”
“Because I said something unattractive to the religion, race, or the sacred cow, State of Israel? The truth hurts that much? Jews number among the worst anti-Semites in the world. Rothschild forced Hitler into putting Jews in the gas chambers just to populate his stolen desert in Palestine. Jews don’t even try to hide their bigotry. Look at their legendary psychotic progenitor, Abraham. Tries to justify his schizoid cannibalism by postulating that some “Jehovah” ordered it. Kicks his Semitic concubine and illegitimate son out when she becomes a bit much for the big bed. The broad turns out to be too perverse to die in the street. Poor Abe. She even has the audacity to keep her starving kid alive in the desert. That blatant murder attempt started it. Why should just Jews enjoy our eternal worship for butchering humans? The nose gang learned but one thing from Hitler. They too can have their innocents slaughtered. In everything else regarding genocide, the Nazis were their understudies. If you doubt it, read the Hebrew books, Torah, Talmud, and Bible. Beautiful literature glorifying mass-murder and baby killing. No child deserves a beating to death. Not even poor Arab or Indian babies.”
“Your compassion is touching in light of this!” He said, striking the pamphlet.
“Compassion. He wants to talk compassion!” The “boss” riposted. “Ever seen a child die of starvation, Les?”
“No.” Lester replied.
“Why not? The Ebo genocide in 1967 was available for viewing. How about the Ethiopian gangbang.”
“No.
“Ruanda?
“No.”
“Oh, I have. It’s not a very pretty picture. The Ebos were as educated and cultured as are you. I’ve seen their babies die from Western apathy. I held a dying child, so its mother could expire without seeing it fall into the dust before she did. For me it wasn’t just another cheap TV documentary, geared to titillate the masses. You don’t just take it back to your bleached white sheets, your garbage disposal, and your intensive care facility at Butterworth Hospital.”
“I’m sure you’ve seen some bad things.”
“Don’t patronize me, Lester! Their little arms shrivel down to about as big around as your index finger. Before they breathe their last their skin is as white as yours and mine.”
“You advocate wholesale murder here!”
“I advocate self-defense.”
“Premeditated self-defense?”
“Yes.” He answered, taking a second to cool his inflamed resentment for Society. Having a docile recipient for the heat helped. Swallowing a couple of times, the man continued. “Any individual, misinformed or weak enough to advocate capital punishment, will disagree, but… Admitting compassion for a fellow human being, they should be able to ferret out the truth. October 22, 1979, a grotesque life ended in a chamber full of cyanide gas. That life was Jesse Bishop’s, a convicted murderer. His death, like the earlier death of another murderer, Gary Gilman, was semi-suicide. They felt death was preferable to a life filled with continuing psychic horror in prison. Under the auspices of their states respective penal systems, the authorities administered the killing in collaboration. Considered easier and more economical than incarceration, the powers ushered in a renewal of capital punishment barbarism. Do you remember?”
“Vaguely.”
Willing to continue listening, Mr. Frye trembled at the antisocial attitude. Prior to the recent revelation, it was his credo that plebeians alone advocated or harbored such beliefs. Staring ahead, he felt uneasy. Mr. Aloirav was not low class. It was confusing.
Resuming justification of the pamphlet, Mr. Aloirav said. “Since first questioning the right to suffer existence, more respected thinkers have condemned capital punishment. Consummate cruelties of imprisonment and executions, administered to fellow human beings, are not enlightened deeds. They violate even the very law that makes this a Country. Organized gangs of semi-civilized brutes, the equal of lawyers and other subhumans, do such things. Persons condoning these activities are neither reasonable nor just. They are not as forgiving as purported.”
“I have no quarrel with you on that point,” Mr. Frye replied. “Like democracy, it’s bad, but it’s the best we’ve got. When you consider the alternative…”
“Bullshit!” The hotelier shouted. “Cop out! That argument is as weak as snake snot! Legitimate governments do not exist, Lester, never have. Enlightened people in democracies no longer believe that rubbish.”
“What rubbish?”
“If you vote for the weakest & most stupid pol, you can still get a harmless government.”
“Oh.”
“The truth is, only that type of pol will run for office.”
“Why?”
“Any man of integrity would never accept manipulation by the money interests that control the cattle “mind”; if you can call it a mind.”
“Voters are not cattle!”
“Sheep? No. Voters are more brutal than sheep. Pig mind might be more accurate. Slanderous to our squealing friends, perhaps. But, a country that sanctions collective brutality everywhere must expect a brutal citizenry.”
“The USA is not a brutal country!”
“Lester! How could it be otherwise? It’s the oldest surviving democracy of note!”
“So?!”
“Democracies stand on the basic premise that majority rules, majorities are brutal and base, but majority might makes right. OK?”
“I guess.”
“The USA runs the world through its violence. Soon, little brother emulations will make US style madnesses control every country.”
“And that’s bad?!”
“Ask, Lester. What are the majorities in every country? Women, sports nuts, religious, savage, poor, ignorant, and ignoble. White males of quality are in a minority on the planet. The voice of private property, freedom & excellence will ultimately be swamped out for everyone. We’ll be inundated by nigger consumerism, female consumerism, horrible noise called “music”, TV sports, god-mongers, superstitious madness, drunkenness, etc.”
“And you feel violence is the motivating factor in the movement?”
“Every human respects it. It’s the fuel behind human law. Every single form of communications media worships it. Everyone wants to beat up on their enemies.”
“Christians?”
“Never heard of hell?”
“Oh, right.”
“Why punish your best students?”
“Everyone else learns how violence can be art, when it’s necessary, and when it’s proscribed.” Mr. Frye mumbled. “Those who don’t can expect punishment.”
Punishment, as you well know, is neither a deterrent to crime nor does it reduce recidivism. Failing to insure proper childhood upbringing causes crime. Society’s guilt spits out after-the-fact-education or quasi-empathetic counseling instead of embracing preventative aspirations.”
“You know alternatives are expensive.”
“How cheap is cheap? Wasted lives cost humanity too. Society and its victims, “criminals”, must stop play-acting at justice and rehabilitation.”
“I’ve always believed our attempts were genuine.”
“Genuine as long as they cost Society pennies. The “criminal” and other “victims” pay the real price! Criminals foot the bill for neonatal units and subsidized genetic misfits. I’ll not sleep w/ your whore culture. It’s time to admit failure, forgive ourselves for collective criminal parsimoniousness, and change direction. I’ll never believe we’re desirous of solving the problem, until we do so.”
“Forgiveness! Proper upbringing, perhaps, but forgiveness? You make it sound like Society is the criminal.”
“Isn’t it? We’re neglecting our duty as human beings to other human beings. That’s criminal! Didn’t you just admit guilt and niggardliness have obfuscated it?”
“No! I didn’t! I…don’t think I did. I can’t accept that,” Lester said, shaking his head.
“It’s an attitude question, Lester, a matter of perspective. Perhaps there’s no need to apologize in words for having failed criminals. Neither should we continue to punish them. It’s our inadequacy, senselessness, and cruel excuses put them there.”
“What are our alternatives?”
“None are even being attempted. Remedial action after a crime’s been committed is both necessary and proper. It’s far more expensive in dollars and attitudes than prior corrective action. But, it’s a start. Detecting when a perpetrator first begins to show asocial feelings is crucial. By the time the crime’s been committed, emotions have already grown too large to deal with on the cheap. Too much for a simple apology, it’ll cost big.”
“Sounds like you feel dollars are the bottom line, misbehavior incidental. You propose throwing money at the problem?”
“It’ll go a long way. You admitted as much yourself.”
“How can you maintain that after what you say here?” Mr. Frye interrogated, holding the tract higher. “This is not just enlightened penology. It’s a tad bit more than an erudite exhortative criminology treatise, Rav. Your, wha’chu call it “New Society” isn’t a “Glee Club”. It’s an organization conceived right along with a call to arms. How can money remove such hatred? It sounds inconsistent to me.”
Mr. Aloirav laughed. “They’ll never understand that feeling of utter hopelessness. No one, unaccustomed to imprisonment, can know. They can’t feel the kind of hatred developing for Society, pigs, and all symbols of authority. A brief period behind those bars of failure and futility can make Society an enemy forever. Incarceration is the catalyst turning asocial into antisocial.”
“Speaking from experience?” He asked, probing for an explanation for that part of the tract.
“Never being, or seeing, a child imprisoned, one can’t feel the impact. A battered, burned, thrown down a stairwell, tortured, raped, ridiculed insane, or maimed child might spark it. If so, you deserve some pity. You’ll never again wash the guilt, personal or collective, from your hands. You’ll realize then, there can be a new course. A right start money can provide.”
“Against ingrained hatred too,” Lester queried, shaking his weak head, “like yours?”
“Even hatred responds to humanity.”
“Abused animals don’t ever forgive masters. What makes you believe humans are any different?”
“Not true, and even if it were, the psychic levels are nowhere near comparable. You know that.”
“Granted. But, are humans capable of standing more pain than animals before dying of the strain? Have there been any studies to compare…?”
“I don’t know, Lester.” He interrupted. “What difference does it make? We treat our machines better. I’ve never seen anyone treat animals as cruel as the system treats human beings in prisons. Then again, I’ve never worked in one of MIT’s laboratories either. I may be wrong.”
“There are some horrible things that go on there. I don’t know which is crueler. Their NSF scam nearly brought me to the brink. It was no picnic.”
Whatever. Lab animal & graduate student rights are not the issue here. Your quarrel with me is about my philosophy with regards to aberrant behavior.”
“More your actions than your thoughts.”
“What do you know of my actions?!” Mr. Aloirav questioned, alerted.
“Publishing these pamphlets is wrong! Very wrong. This isn’t the first one I’ve seen.”
“It isn’t?” He asked, surprised, yet relieved.
“No. I saw one in Boston, years ago. Now that I think about it, the guy showing it to me talked similarly. He must’ve acquired some attitude and material from your propaganda. The man saw himself victimized, too. In reality, he was just another law-breaker looking for a free ride on Society. That one paid dear for his crime.”
“Life’s a bizarre dream, Les. All of us are both victims and villains. We all share in life’s tragedy. Likewise, we all partake in the misfortune of both victims of crime. The criminal learned his behavior on this planet, right here. He didn’t go to some far-off world’s university, unfamiliar with our laws and mores. We shared in his creation: we share in his guilt.”
“Untrue! He…we have free will! We can decide which way to go. Nobody forces us into crime.”
“Only animals have free will.”
“Bullshit!”
“No one is totally depraved, Lester.” The “boss” said, referring to one of the “Canons of Dort”. (The dogma was a part of demented serial killer John Calvin’s sick doctrine. Grand Rapids contained a large number of adherents to the superstitious Puritan sect). “Does anyone do an “evil” deed without hoping for some good end to come from it?”
“I can’t believe it’s all random. You could forgive a vicious criminal if he victimized you?”
“Depending on the gravity of his crime, I suppose I could. Not that it would matter, if it were a fait accompli. The desire for revenge would be subliminal. Unless I relieved it right then, exacting a severe reprisal. Forgiveness comes with time. “To understand is to forgive”. “No man is hurt but by himself.” However, you’re missing the point. We must direct our efforts toward preventing or palliating the next crime. Society must change its outlook from institutionalized vengeance to institutionalized prevention, perhaps some charity.”
“Why?” Mr. Frye asked, sensitive to altruism with ulterior motives. “Because you say you can forgive? I’m supposed to believe that? I don’t think I’m missing any point. Now you’re giving me religion! I won’t buy it. Only atheism can liberate the soul.”
“Oh, come on. I’m not pushing religion.”
“Sure sounds like it.”
“To what end, man? I’m trying to make you understand by appealing to your reason, perhaps compassion. By adolescence, people are aware that religiosity and human charity are antithetical. Did you think just geniuses, like yourself, ferret that out?”
Mr. Frye knew the sarcasm was due to his own uncharitable repartee. He smiled at his friend’s cynicism and the corkscrew compliment, as Mr. Aloirav continued. “Donne said it well, “No man is an island”. We are “our brother’s keepers”, Les. We’re as much involved in his every misery as in his every joy. Our individual guilt may not be as poignant as Jesse Bishop’s or Gary Gilman’s. It’s still there.”
“Nonsense!” Lester shouted. “An unkind word, thoughtless act, misdirected intention, and we re-enact our own criminal involvement in mankind?”
“Don’t we? Our own fallibility, foibles, and crimes may be less by degree than the incarcerated, maybe more. Guilt depends on chance repercussions, the degree and slant of provenance and passion, nurture-nature.
“You make it sound like crime is but a special disease needing some kind of unique treatment.”
“Yes, just as religion is. That sums it up.”
“That doesn’t make their guilt or the suffering they cause any less reprehensible.”
“Your concern for suffering victims is noted. Legal drugs and their peddlers kill and maim more people than do their illegal counterparts. It isn’t guilty bastards going to jail. How many doctors, pols, or judges are in jail? Their heinous crimes are many times greater than those of petty miscreants. Guilt isn’t just a one-person thing. Saying it’s so, is a shallow cop-out for cowards. How many “victims” aren’t accomplices in their victimization? Many homicides deserve their killing. Far too many women beg to be raped or battered.”
“You won’t sell that to the women’s movement.”
“Look at all the Viet Nam vets going into bars, just wanting to get beat up. Whose fault is that? The bar-bully, the vet, or the entire country? Friends and neighbors victimized that boy, and now the ex-GI can’t shake the guilt monkey off his back. Talk about child-abuse! How far would the illegal drug trade get without cops, lawyers, judges, pols, doctors, nurses, social workers, etc.? Don’t we all benefit from it? Yet, who goes to jail?”
Mr. Frye was getting concerned. Such sophistry was too good for him to refute. He semi-understood the apologia for the criminal class. It was unsettling. Mr. Aloirav’s stand must be incorrect, but how or why?
“Crazy people sometimes do make sense. The very crazy aren’t in the asylums.” Lester told himself. “What Rav says to defend his position rings of sincerity and truth. I find that the most uncomfortable. He must be crazy.”
“Walk a mile in their shoes.” The hotelier said. “Consider the construction of a nuclear power plant. Within twenty years, radioactive carcinogens released will shorten the lives of 10,000 people. With accidents like that at Chernobyl the carnage is exponentially higher. Reflect upon the devastation to our environment from industrial wastes legally introduced into aquifers. Some guy in Massachusetts became a billionaire poisoning drinking water with toxic waste. The pols were all for it. His company, Washed Beaches, (CH) is now a public Corporation. Dwell on the executive decision to market a drug known to deform thousands of babies. How many chemical company-cum-government executives went to prison over Agent Orange & White? Imagine the number of children killed with the narcotics & arms from which Israel, England and the US profit? These are lesser crimes than a forgery?”
“”Bad folks make good laws; good folks make bad laws?””
“A platitude. It’s beyond clichés, Les. They’re outta’ line. Read a current newspaper. How much productivity is lost to Society by a dope-dealer’s business? Is it more damnable than hydrating and poisoning with flavor enhancers spoiled turkey meat? Such toxic food, made palatable, sells to innocent children in subsidized school lunch programs. Pols push it, get their cut. The richest man in the world is a glorified thief. Do you really believe the 2nd richest isn’t likewise? Are multi-million-dollar income-tax evasions by Fortune 500 companies but peccadilloes? Must be. No jail time. A $5,000 casino robbery will get you ten years to life. The casino owner robs a million times that in unpaid taxes and doesn’t do one second of time. Society is just organized hypocrisy. Is gravity of crime or gravity of criminal where the forgiveness license rests?”
“There is no license!” Mr. Frye replied, incensed at his impotence to combat and the nuances of truth he felt in the words.
“Oh yes, there is. Crime pays. Society makes that clear. It depends on the perpetrator. Corporate corrupting of public officials, environmental degradation, and financial or procurement fraud gives major pay-offs. What about workplace chemical-murder? Occupational homicide jails whom? Isn’t prison slave labor a crime? What about income taxes? Legally a slave, just because born a U.S. citizen. Isn’t putting a living being behind bars a criminal act?”
“It’s not as simple as you make it seem. Your atheism is almost Christian-like.”
“In its disdain for the altruistic revenge of a mano-sadistic God?”
“Quis qui quod.”
“Consider this. Slaughtering people in large numbers we consider just, neither wrong nor criminal. Witness Iraq, Lebanon, Central America, not to mention the Viet Nam genocide, etc. The US is nothing more than a murdering bully, yet…the World looks up to it. How befitting its President Clinton to have accepted the World’s most bloody scholarship. An endowment from a man, Cecil Rhodes, whose legacy is starving 20,000 Transvaal women & children to death, murdering countless others. Then, killing people in small numbers, we consider evil. Just the rich can escape paying for that with forfeiture of life or freedom. Religious leaders, ideologues, athletes, and executives of multinational corporations get increased glory, prestige, and remuneration after they murder. Their children can even become Presidents!”
“That was below the belt,” Mr. Frye replied, aware of the insinuation.
“The hell it was! In that vein, though, what’s a President anyway? An inflated politician. The worst examples of humanity that exist. All you can say for sure is they’re pretty panderers. Look at the Bush family crime syndicate. War crimes, drug dealing, accomplices in billion dollar S&L embezzlement, election fraud, etc. Genocide, war crimes. Look at Clinton… embezzler, murderer, war criminal, genocidal monster. Our democratic ruling class is weak, common, and richer than the rest of the pack. They comprise the best examples we have of our most poignant shame! None are leaders; leaders don’t go into politics. The saddest cases from the Viet Nam War come to mind. Those vets who lost all their manhood, (except its appearance), like McCain & Kerry, became pols. All are dirt. If it’s necessary to rearrange their molecules to make them appear more that way, so be it. The wonderful age of innocence, when I, like you, believed in my country. Conceived in drunkenness, whelped in hypocrisy, I knew, but I loved it so. I believed in freedom enough to fight for it. I helped allow the flower of capitalism to flourish. It bore fruit and rotted. Now, I can but hope these Merchants of Death, US, Israel, England drown in their blood money.
“You believe Kennedy was no better than some criminal?”
“It’s a matter of perspective. He was the whelp of a successful gangster, wasn’t he? He was the titular head of the greatest criminal conspiracy, excepting the Catholic Church, since the Roman Empire.”
“Now you’re off base.”
“I think not. The purpose for life is Life, Lester. Yet, in this twisted Society, financial success makes you an icon, the opposite of life. Being without it makes you a prisoner. Society fails in its responsibility to remove conditions responsible for creating aberrant antisocial personalities. It sanctions crime, imprisonment, and executions. The brutality and myriad deficiencies of the poor are a response. They’re reactions to mindless passive decadence and privileged parasitic debauchery. In “civilized” societies, one does not occur without the other. Civilization is a gilded lily.”
“You’re referring to people like me when you talk about privileged.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Yes, you are!”
“Suit yourself.”
“There’s no room for personal responsibility in your philosophy?”
Of course, but how you view yourself and others is the reality you have.” The hotelier replied, ultimately saying more than he desired. “What if you see yourself on a lower plane than others? The poor visualize themselves as more brutal, wasteful, unmotivated, and ignorant than the wealthy. Taking personal responsibility means to them, behaving in like manner. That’s why I’m successful at stopping the hopelessness of the criminal…”
Lester was silent. It wasn’t because of the verity he found in these words. They were specious to him. He could not, however, contradict them. The arguments seemed so convincing, they induced reticence. He was never more aware of the time he spent in mental vacuity. Awareness of past emotional problems contributed to feeling inadequate. Attributing confusion to these handicaps kept his rejoinders minimal.
Taking Lester’s silence as contemplation, not victory, the “boss” proceeded. “Socrates was asked, like Jesse and Gary, to aid the state in his own dissolution. It confronted him with a choice: banishment from his beloved Athens or collusion in his own homicide. Friends begged him to change his mind, avoid death, and accept banishment. They made numerous pleas. He refused. Opting for death, rather than years of semi-existence, Socrates took the cup of hemlock. It was an aid not only to his executioners. In choosing his own fate, he made his last willful act a suicide. How far we have come since 400 B.C.! Such is the mechanism, Society still employs, for criminal rehabilitation.”
Mumbling, reflecting on his own life, he said, “There are those who must suffer until the zest for life is gone. Semi-suicides with hemlock, alcohol, drugs, or gas chambers become the one recourse to dignity. It may seem like cowardice, but some will always need collaboration for their own demise.”
“Maybe so. Did you neglect to mention mental illness on purpose, Les.”
“Yes, I did,” Mr. Frye retorted in ill-disguised anger.
Pretending not to notice the indignation, the “boss” added. “Society creates and then disposes of its robbers, rapists, murderers, and philosophers, as it sees fit. Individuals elected for such a fate don’t even get a hero’s grave. From innocent baby to limp and burned carcass, strapped lifeless in an electric chair, they’re used. The punishment advocate goes his merry way, creating these human casualties, oblivious to their suffering. He manifests all the sensitivity of a Roman Emperor at the Games.”
“I understand some of your bitterness. I’ve been in jail,” Lester admitted. “We’ve got acquaintances, living in forests and drainage ditches, far away from civilization. They feel some of that same antipathy.”
“Viet Nam vets?”
“Yah, and others. I often wonder. How much love can a person have for his own life, willing its loss in another creature? Another human being, like oneself, having joys and sorrows, frightened in and for his own existence.”
“It’s a mystery to me too,” The hotelier volunteered, as if perplexed. He felt no hypocrisy, just relief, having calmed his friend.
Showing warmth and optimism, Mr. Frye said. “I can understand some of your sentiments. But, to me answers are in regaining lost strength necessary for survival on the planet. I agree that we should exert more resources, helping weaker and more unfortunate. Perhaps, by so doing, we’ll also learn the source of strength. Without enlightened self-interest, Life and outward growth will end. Caring less about our fellow planetary creatures, how can it be otherwise? One day we’ll feel nothing for even ourselves.”
“I’m not so sure I can agree with all that, but go on.”
“Your thinking is wrong, Rav. I can’t say why. I just know. But you made me see something.”
“What’s that?”
“Your desperation shows how large the apathy problem is on the planet. Greater than either of us was aware. Perhaps that and hopelessness are our biggest threats.”
“I didn’t know I did that. I never meant to, because I don’t feel that way. I believe greed and cowardice are bigger problems.”
“I can’t agree. I’ll never understand why you chose to organize criminals.” Mr. Frye retorted, unwilling to speculate personal aggrandizement as the motive.
“Perhaps, someday, you shall.” He said, bothered by the continued contumacy.
“I doubt it.”
The door from the hotel lobby now opened, and a yellow crepe dress appeared. Speaking to Mr. Aloirav from there, Gloria said. “Rav, I have to talk to you about business. It’s important.”
“Very well.”
No longer feeling welcome, Lester became uncomfortable. Without anyone telling him, he was able to ascertain the obvious hint. It was a good sign, regarding his mental recovery. The man knew when he was de trop. The hotelier nodded to him, and Mr. Frye walked out of the vicinity, leaving the paper, without hearing her say.
“We’ve got trouble, big time.”

He who would do great deeds must expect great suffering. Plutarch

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“Why?” Mr. Aloirav asked.
“Security.” Gloria replied.
“What?”
“During training yesterday on the Baja. The cell leader overheard number 20103 telling number 20112 he knew who the “big “boss”” was.”
“Really?” The hotelier said, concerned about his anonymity.
“Yah. It turned out the man thinks it’s Bacon. That’s still way too many echelons up. I thought you’d want to know.”
“Absolutely! You’re right, Gloria. Too close. 20103 is the “second story” man, Bosely, right?”
“Yah. With us for just two weeks.”
“Who brought him in?”
“Heinz.”
“Heinz.”
The two people both mentioned the same name simultaneously. The blond man’s quality control was so poor it was becoming common knowledge. He brought in way too many problem members.
“Does he know about it?” The hotelier queried.
“Not that I’m aware.”
“Did the cell leader hear the whole conversation?”
“Enough to determine number 20103 didn’t start it.” Gloria answered.
“Damn! 20112 might be a plant.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“Who brought him in?”
“Same.”
Unable to hide a concerned glance in her direction, Mr. Aloirav replied. “It’s getting worse all the time, querida. Any good news?”
“Larry’s over the flu. He’s back in school.” She said smiling. Her voice carried a higher frequency tone at the end, indicating a request for agreement.
Recognizing it, and the way the yellow dress contrasted with her dusky cleavage, he said. “That is good news.”
Reaching into the refrigerator, the hotelier took out a couple of small vials. Walking over to a filing cabinet, he wrote on two different sections of two different files. One was Bacon’s file. The other belonged to Heinz. The “boss” handed her the vials one at a time.
With the last one, he said. “Find out everything you can, first. If it continues to look bad, transfer them with their closest associates to another cell. Make it a unit based in another country. Call Cinza. Get short-term documents, just good enough for a few days. Isolate both men. If you decide to terminate, use the vial marked “Ricin”. Get the usual data: new acquaintances, to whom they talked, etc. You know the drill. We’ll talk about it when we settle the matter. I want Bacon to prepare for possible contingencies.”
“Is this enough?” She asked, turning the small vials over in her hand.
“Not for all. When the two are dead, have Bacon take out their associates with the krait vial.”
“Some special reason for using separate ones?”
“Yes.”
“I thought so. You had me use the krait clone on those families we took out a few years ago. We haven’t used it since. I thought it was because it had problems. Guess I was wrong.”
He sensed her desire for more information. Trusting a discreet use of the information, the hotelier said. “Governments are too arrogant and unimaginative to believe we even exist. Unless we give them good reason to change, things should continue to go our way. Establishing patterns, we’re unable to transmogrify, will give them just that good reason. Using the same bug for every termination will flag us. I want the krait clone used just for the most special occasions. We’re also dealing with the enemy’s bureaucratic politics.”
“I understand. But doesn’t using the krait just on our own kind establish a pattern too?”
“It does,” he answered. “I believe a few hundred out of 7 billion will go unnoticed. There are beaucoup (many) sources of variegated DNA to accompany this music. Soon I’ll have a larger selection just for intra-organizational discipline.”
She nodded, and the “boss” continued. “For now, we’re safe enough. The krait doesn’t cluster into any particular niche of society. It kills faster but mimics other common infections and illnesses. It doesn’t infect with aerosols. They’ll never find the index case’s exposure. Postmortem pathology resembles typhoid. Destroying the whole family one way, our main target another, offshore, further obfuscates.”
“Dust clouds.”
“Exactly,” Mr. Aloirav agreed. “How many physicians could identify a new disease? Even allowing them rational thought beyond pharmaceutical propaganda and the golf course’s location, most aren’t prepared for it. What’s more, as bad as disease surveillance is here, it’s less offshore. No foreign epidemiologist will ever raise a clamor. Sao Paulo, Brazil 1971 proved that.”
“How?”
“A beta-lactamase-producing, meningococcus – Type C killed a few hundred. Children mainly, if I remember correctly. It stopped with a common classic terminator. No accident. No questions. No reparations. Brazil just let it slide.”
“That was before my time. One of yours?”
“No.” The hotelier answered. “I don’t know who built it. My guess is Japan – vintage China occupation, Togo Unit 731, Ishii & Yamada. It couldn’t have been Fort Dietrich. They’re copiers – can’t create. Too backward. Still haven’t figured out our “homo hunter”. They use it but don’t understand it.”
“Who would want to kill children?”
“You need to ask?!” He almost shouted.
“The US?”
“It sure looked like a CIA experiment to me. Until showing Saddam Hussein how to solve his Kurdish problem, it was always the same method. No imagination.”
“What about that Rio thing in 2000?”
“That was a very interesting case. A wealthy molecular biologist wrote a book on biological weapons’ creation. It never saw the bookshelves. A CIA agent with a pre-published copy got involved. . Some “terrorists” in Rio tried to get the biologist to build them one to decimate the US. The author refused, was blackmailed, and disappeared. Some feel it was the CIA or NSA trying to update their arsenals.”
“What do you think?”
“No idea. At any rate, Gloria, should the unexpected arise, we’ll take it one step further.”
“O.K. Anything else?”
“Yah. That’s a very pretty dress.”
“Thanks, Rav.”
“Have the hotel staff keep an extra-close eye on Lester Frye. I wanna’ know immediately, if he leaves the building or asks for an outside line.”
“Something wrong?”
“Not yet.”
“Something I should know?”
“Like beauty, loyalty, and intelligence in you, Gloria.”
“Yes?”
“The man’s got class where most don’t even have places.”
“Thanks. So what’s the problem?”
“He’s not one of us yet.”

When Gloria and the “boss” started discussing their security problem, Mr. Frye left the hotel. He walked up Division Avenue thinking. “Even without his knowing it, Rav makes me see I’m right. I’ve got to continue working to show the importance personal responsibility has for the future World. It’s impossible, though, when I can’t hang onto reality. It slips away when I least expect it. Somehow, I must regain my mental equilibrium. I can feel when it’s there and when it’s not, but grasping the interface is so tenuous. Returning to normal reasoning is so hard. It’s terrifying.”
For a few moments, he felt hopelessness and apathy competing for central position in his mind. They threw themselves against the man’s efforts to re-kindle his dream of building the beloved Pontibus. He saw these negative attitudes as root causes of most major problems. Lester knew the effectiveness of their powerful influence. Regaining soon his degenerated reservoirs of spirit was essential.
Walking along, he tried to remember his past successes. Just looking back at some gave him a small burst of pleasure. Moments after leaving the hotel, pondering on his old lab, Mr. Frye thought of returning to Boston. The benign pensiveness ended when he recollected his lost family. The thought of never seeing them again was too much. Forgetting where he was, chest heaving in agony, his eyes overflowed.
Mr. Aloirav and Ms. Gold came up the stairs together. In the lobby, the hotel staff informed them Lester left the building a few minutes earlier. Rushing out, the hotelier looked up and down the Avenue but saw no familiar form. Shifting his glance uptown, he caught a glimpse of the spare stooped figure near a busy intersection. Sprinting, the “boss” caught the disturbed weeping man just stepping into the street.
Traffic in front of the old Herpolsheimer’s department store, was heavy. Caught moments later, he would have walked to his death in the busy street. The recent heated conversation over the pamphlet must have extracted too much energy. In his weak mental condition, there were too few reserves of strength left to sustain equilibrium. Back in his room, the next few weeks found lucidity in Lester a scarce commodity. He remained unresponsive until a few days after Mr. Aloirav returned from a Rio de Janeiro trip.
One day, during a good spell, Mr. Frye left his room. In the lobby, he waited until someone left the lab. Catching the door, Lester walked down the stairwell. Knocking on the lab door, he waited. Once in the inner sanctum, Mr. Frye wandered. The hotelier, noticing his agitation, uninterested in purposeless waiting, asked what was on his mind.
“How long before I can return to Boston and my work, Rav?”
Raising his eyebrows, having long expected the arrival of just such a moment, the “boss” answered. “Think you’re ready for it, Les?”
“I feel ready. I haven’t been non compos mentis for weeks, Rav. I can remember my family without losing everything.”
Saying the latter, tears began welling up in his eyes. He listened, nevertheless, as the “boss” asked. “What do you want to do there? There’s nothing to go back to but an empty house.”
“My work is there,” Mr. Frye answered, holding himself together as best he could, tears running down his cheeks. He wasn’t aware yet of all Company equipment and materials being in Grand Rapids. Mr. Aloirav relocated everything to an abandoned furniture warehouse in a low rent section of the City. Not a bad location, it was inexpensive enough to allow substantial profitless time to pass. He wanted to allow Lester all of that he needed before resuming Pontibus work.
Thinking about his response now, before countering him, the hotelier said. “No, it’s not, Les.”
“What do you mean? Of course, it is.”
“No. It’s not. It’s here,” the “boss” replied.
“Don’t be funny,” Mr. Frye said, irritated. “You know it’s not.”
“Yes it is,” he replied, preparing for the storm of protest to come. “I took the liberty of bringing it all here for safekeeping, while you were recovering. All your equipment, laboratory apparatus, reagents, papers, and aluminum tubing is here, waiting for you.”
“Safekeeping from what? What do you mean?”
“I brought it here to prevent pilfering and your reliving bad memories.”
“But my good memories were there too.”
“I know that. But you can’t go bananas here without me being aware of it.”
“Go b-bananas!” Mr. Frye spluttered. “That’s pretty cold!”
“Yes. I suppose it is. However, my investment in your work is too great to let it all go down the chute. If you go psychotic again, without my ken, it very well could.”
Your investment?! You’ve got some nerve! I invested all the money I got from my record sales. What did you invest in my Company? All you ever did was complain about my not accomplishing anything! I never could understand where you got the gall to be so demanding. It wasn’t even your Company.”
“No? Got a copy of that contract with me you signed?”
“No. You know I don’t!”
“I do. I’ll get it.” The “boss” said, returning moments later with some papers. He pointed to a spot near the bottom of the last page and asked. “Whose signature is that?”
“It’s mine. So what?”
“So what? Read paragraph four above it.”
Lester read aloud. “Undersigned also agrees to the following apportionment of monies paid him by Distributor…Monies to Undersigned in excess of recording sales proceeds will apply as equity in said Company. Application shall be at the rate of…until Distributor purchases a fifty-one percent maximum.”
He was shocked, unaware of signing such a concession. The effective paragraph wasn’t even in smaller print. Back then, Mr. Frye was thinking of record sales and the $20,000 distribution allotment. So euphoric, his reading was not as careful as it might have been. He indeed signed over majority rights in his Company to Mr. Aloirav. Perhaps, the deal was a bit shady, but there was no fraud. It was not a pleasant moment for him.
“You took advantage of me, when I was without friends or money.”
“Yes, I did. The American Way, Les. But, let’s keep the facts clear. At the time, don’t forget, no one but me believed in you. Even today, other than the stuff I brought here, our Company is a fantasy, your fantasy. I informed you, by letter, when you were spending beyond what the record sales warranted.”
“I guess I didn’t read all my correspondence the way I should have.”
“I guess you didn’t, and we still don’t have the vertex-joint you’ve been working on forever. But, it’s all right. My investment is, and always has been, in you.”
“So how much of my Company do you own?”
“It’s, how much of my Company do you own.”
“You mean you own the full 51%?”
“That’s right. I have controlling interest.”
“You stole my Company from me!”
“Like Hell, I did! I legally bought the Company, according to that agreement you signed. In fact, I bought its book value 100 times over. I’ll bet you don’t even know how much I sent you over the years, do you?”
“Not exactly.”
“You signed the checks! Almost one and a half million bucks!”
“No! It can’t be.”
“I’ve kept the canceled checks, and the letters I sent. Like to see them?”
“What about my record sales? There must have been near that amount in royalties.”
“Islands in the Sky was a nice song, and it sold a few thousand copies. You made a few thousand dollars on it. I never took a penny of it for my distribution costs. If you’d like, I can show you the books on it.”
Convinced, Lester was nevertheless downcast. He didn’t need any more negative conditions influencing his depressed will to survive. With low-held shoulders and hanging head, he turned to leave. Each weighty step to the lab door seemed miles long.
Mr. Aloirav stopped him, just as he was about to exit the doorway, saying. “You still have 49%, Les. Are you gonna’ stick around and make it happen?”
“I don’t know, Rav,” Mr. Frye answered, turning back.
“You gonna’ let it all go to someone else?”
“My kids gone, wife catatonic, I don’t have anyone, anyone at all. There’s no one to work for.”
“You have yourself, your heart & soul. What about those dreams and goals?”
“My dreams were for my kids. Goals I envisioned have always twisted into bizarre reality, somehow, far from the way I pictured them anyway. I don’t want to sound like I’m crying, Rav, but the loneliness is quite a burden. I’m not complaining. I have no one to blame but myself. Given the same conditions, I’d do it all the same way again. Just the same, I can’t sleep. Sometimes the sadness is so intense; I have to literally fight for air. Life is so perverse. Like a hot knife twisting in my stomach, the pain’s almost unbearable. It takes a lot out of me just to keep my…equilibrium. My life seems pretty much over. I…I…feel I’ve died and gone to hell. I don’t see any point in it now.”
Mr. Frye found himself experiencing one of the most dismal situations a human being can endure. All purpose seemed gone, nowhere to turn for consolation. His former strength appeared to spit in the face of its creator. He sensed great sorrow in existence, seeing it greater in absolute terms than its transitory counterpart, joy. Believing both to be but ephemeral and vain, his misery was just that much greater. Perhaps, Entropy made a great mistake, allowing life to originate. If there were an eternity, to Lester…it would be sadness. Sadness was eternal. Death too would curse the human in him, he felt.
Long ago, the “boss” contemplated his friend’s vulnerability to harming himself. Even before Lester lost any of his family, there were concerns. People living on the periphery of the herd are always at risk. Aware of his friend’s former motivations, Mr. Aloirav focused on them to counter the dejection. Excluding the Pontibus, Lester’s inclinations were to sow seeds of hope and to give more than he received, until there was nothing left. Like some damn fool Christian, he got his wish. All used up, as he intended, just the shell of a man. Devoted to a strong sense of duty, the man knew no other mode of behavior. On the far negative side, he was prey to culpability weaknesses.
Mr. Aloirav knew how much these factors counted, and he now hit below the belt, appealing to memories of those pleasant former addictions asking. “What about all those defenseless creatures out there? Was all your talk about helping the disenfranchised just selfishness for your children’s benefit? Was there never any selfless overriding concern on your part to contribute?”
Anticipating another assault, he prepared himself. However, bridled by the guilt thrown at him, Mr. Frye felt stinging truths eating through his skin. He stopped to think about whether his dream was, indeed, just a selfish desire. Could it be true? Was his wish to better the world but self-seeking for his own children? Resentment elicited from losing his Company prevented him from saying anything polite. Lester felt his inability to field a civil immediate response gave him no alternative. Without saying anything, he left the lab.
Alone now, to ponder the situation, the hotelier looked on in silence. He found the behavior unsettling. Assuming the man upset and confused, the “boss” let him go. He would send someone to watch his friend. Doing nothing else seemed the wisest course of action. Mr. Frye would concede his error, after giving it a reasoned look, the “boss” hoped.
Then he would return, and they could get down to business. All the detailed plans, models, equipment, materials, work, etc., required to build the Pontibus, meant nothing without Lester. It was his brainchild. He bartered his happiness and eternity for it. Mr. Aloirav felt it should be his glory to choose.
The bridge idea needed Mr. Frye’s continued involvement. The hotelier didn’t want the enormous responsibility of building the Pontibus alone. Having more than purchased everything produced by the man’s fertile imagination, he felt entitled to his support. Who believed in the guy, when no one else did? Lester would have to come around.
More than anyone, other than Mr. Frye himself, the “boss” furthered the Pontibus vision. Nevertheless, it was Lester’s spirit that initiated the idea and brought it to its present state. Now, except for the vertex-joint, just labor and administration needed delivering. Mr. Aloirav didn’t contest where the credit was due. He intended keeping controlling interest just to insure its becoming a reality.
The hotelier would not trust the other’s resolve. He did want Lester to feel that enough personal equity remained to justify continued involvement. Equity the man deserved. Other than that, and Lester’s arcane ethical constraints, the “boss” was out of motivating ideas. Time would have to produce the necessary leverage. In that fact, Mr. Aloirav needed to believe. The thought that Mr. Frye might commit suicide was not an option.
Once out of the lab, feeling raped and super-stupid, Lester raced up the stairs. After tremendous sacrifice, not even to enjoy the full reward of his dream’s realization was devastating. The old man rushed out of the hotel. His footsteps picked up speed, until he was running down Division Avenue.
Coming to a side street, without slowing down, Lester collided into another person, who shouted. “What the fuck!”
Stunned, about to apologize, Mr. Frye recognized an old acquaintance. “Francis! What are you doing in Grand Rapids?”
“I might ask you the same, Mr. Frye?” The disentangled dealer said.
“I grew up in Lansing. This is almost my home town.”
“Really?” Francis replied. “I forgot.”
“Do you work or live nearby?”
“Both. We work for the same outfit, the New Society.”
“Oh, I don…” Mr. Frye started to counter the assumption, then just said. “…didn’t know that.”
Mr. Castle continued. “Yep. Been with ‘em since before my parole… years ago. Owe ’em big time. Sure do. I see you at the hotel, lots, talking with the “boss”. Don’t butt in where it’s not my business. Figured one of these days we’d meet and you’d recognize me, and we did.”
“You went right to prison that day?”
“Sure did, Mr. Frye,” the dealer admitted, embarrassed.
“Did you get out earlier than you should have…I mean…?”
“Ts’all right, Mr. Frye. I know what’cha mean.” Mr. Castle assisted. “Yeah, yer’ right. I did at that. Lots earlier.”
“How’d you manage to do less time? Was it the Society?”
The dealer looked around the area before answering. “Yah. This guy comes to see me. Says he’s with the “New Society” and can get me out, if I wanna’ work with them. Other inmates told me about him. Said he was straight. I say, yes! Next thing I know, I’m here.”
“You didn’t search them out yourself, like you were thinking of doing when we last talked?”
“I did. Hearing som’a the talk later, though, I wasn’t too keen on joining. Seemed kind’a heavy. By the second time I got around to it, I was in a different position. It didn’t matter to the squares, locking me up, whether I was guilty or not. Just being found guilty was enough to send me away forever. I wanted revenge.”
“Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.”
“I know, Mr. Frye.” Francis said, with sheepish downcast eyes. “I deserve an “I told you so”.”
“That’s why you joined?”
“Partly,” Mr. Castle replied. “I trust God will forgive me. The guy also talked my language. Gave me some hope. A ticket to self-respect. Because of them, I could do my time. The Society promised a second chance, a new dream. They delivered. As soon as I was outta’ the “big house”, I came here. Promised I would, and I did. Been working for ’em ever since.”
“And have you received your self-respect and revenge?” He asked.
Smiling, the dealer didn’t answer. Not affirmative, he didn’t make it negative either. There was enough positive nuance to send chills up the spine. Lester didn’t want to know the details. He could imagine.
The silence never became too uncomfortable, because Francis asked. “How’d you hook up with them?”
“I met Rav at a meeting in New York in 1983.”
“Whew! Over 20 years! You’re one of the oldest. So that´s how you got the balls to confront me after your son died. Are you still doing what you were doing in Boston? Or are you with the “Group” full-time.”
“Still the same thing.” Lester lied, protecting his meager self-esteem.
Why he shaded the truth, not disabusing Francis of believing a lie was a mystery. Almost as soon as the missed opportunity passed, Mr. Frye regretted it. He also felt relief. A strange desire to appear connected with the New Society took root. The sense of being safe grew within him. Lester couldn’t remember ever being there. He found the desire surprising & uncomfortable, having someone thinking him part of something.
It puzzled Mr. Castle too. “You’re not even close to my idea of an ex-con, Mr. Frye. Why are you associated with the “Group”?”
Without elaborating, the scientist replied. “I’m thinking of doing my research here instead of in Boston.”
“Really?” He replied, oblivious to receiving no real answer. So anxious to impress, the requested information denied, it passed unnoticed. “That’s what I do too, research.”
“You do?” Mr. Frye exclaimed. “Impressive! Did you get a degree while you were in prison?”
“I’m not a scientist, Mr. Frye. I research names for the “Group”.”
“Names? What names?”
Without prudent hesitation, Francis answered. “None very exciting. Just squares that guys say are guilty of things.
“Like what kind of things?” Lester asked, curiosity piqued.
“Various offenses, not even crimes, far’s I know, in the everyday sense. I get kudos for ’em, not to mention good pay.”
“Where do these names originate?”
“Inside and outside the penitentiary.’ He replied. “First time I saw you talking with the “boss”, I thot’cha’ were bringin’ a name.”
“Not me,” Mr. Frye replied. “Wha’da’ya research them for?”
“Ta find out if the gripe’s legit. The “Group” takes it from there.”
“Wha’da think they do with the information?”
“Beats me.” The rapscallion replied. “Guess they use ’em for the paper. I check ‘em out. They’re happy with my work. T’s all I know.”
It was cold, standing on the Avenue, with no protection. Being winter, the space between the buildings created a wind-tunnel effect. Both men were uncomfortable. Wanting to continue their conversation, renew their acquaintanceship, they persisted.
“Hey.” Francis said. “It’s colder’n a banker’s heart out here. Wanna’ go to the Greek joint ‘n have a bowl a’ bean?”
“Sure. Sounds great.” He replied, turning around to walk in that direction with Francis.
“That Greek makes the best bean soup I’ve ever tasted. Better’n Boston’s by a long shot.”
“You think so?”
“Yep. Two things I’ve found are richer here in the Midwest than in the East. The bean soup and the hypocrisy.”
“I don’t know.
“You don’t?!” The ex-con said in mock surprise. “I’m shocked! Both are much thicker here.”
At the Greek restaurant, they ordered coffee and soup. Warming up, eating the soup, they drank their coffees “New England Regular” (cream & sugar). The talk covered what went on in the country since that day at the courthouse. Mr. Castle explained some details of how the New Society picked him in prison.
Explaining the latter stages of recruitment, he said. “Released inmates get in touch with their contact or he contacts them. Parole is so welcome; ya’ wanna’ show yer’ gratitude. Collecting the big bucks helps too.”
“It pays well?” Lester queried.
“Damn sight better’n sellin’ dope.”
“Really?”
“Hell, yes! Double.”
The conversation got back to “names”, and Mr. Frye asked. “What “offenses” get you put on that list of names?”
“I don’t know’m all. I just check out the allegations, ta see if they’re true. Anyone having anything ta do with the nuclear power biz’, lawyers, socialists, or violates New Society ideas is a candidate. Expect to be checked out, if yer’ on life-support systems for over a year, junkies, etc… A donated or artificial organ in yer’ body is a sure call. Judges…”
“Judges? Why judges?”
“Why not?”
“Well, the nature of the job puts most above scrutiny, doesn’t it?”
“Mr. Frye, sometimes you can be pretty naïve, ya’ know that?”
“How?”
“Judges get their jobs through politics, don’t they?”
“Yah.”
“So they’re all corruptible! Guns to the head or dollars to the wallet are both assaults exploiting human weaknesses. Very few retain sufficient decency to interpret situations untwisted by Law, majority sentiment or political cronies. Yet, the squares allow’em to interpret the laws. Most are ignorant, corrupt, or just plain stupid. They’re lawyers, fer pete’s sake! Sheisters! Many are addicts of one type or another.”
“I disagree.”
“You would.”
“What’s that supposed to mean!?”
“Mr. Frye. You’re out to lunch, most of the time.”
“I am not! How dare you…!?”
“I mean…You don’t move with the rest of the world.”
“Oh.”
“90% of prison inmates are males with slight inborn brain chemical differences from the norm. The law punishes them for it. Without the humanity to do what’s right, judges in their glorious ignorance pander to their constituency. Their victims, behind bars, pay the bill.”
“Jurists’ inadequacies are those of their fellows. It’s what makes democracy work. It humanizes the law.”
“It also dehumanizes, because it’s cowardice! Anyone can be ignorant, scared, weak, or venal, you mean. That gives ‘em the right to judge? Horseshit! Those that sentence people to long prison terms for minor offenses get one a’ my allegation visits.”
“Who else?” He asked, changing the subject.
“Lots.” Preventing prisoners from possibility of parole or rehabilitative psychiatric help can be an invite. Tons of screws, wardens, parole board members. Politicians here and abroad, presidents from other countries. I travel a lot.”
“What will your investigations accomplish?”
“Guess, one of these days, they’ll expose ’em.”
“Expose them? How could that hurt? They’re not illegal or even immoral behaviors, as far as I know.”
“Can’t disagree, but the work’s good. So who cares?”
“You have no clue as to what’s behind it?”
“Naw, beats me. Maybe the organization just wants to use the information as a way to control our own people. There’s a lotta’ members behind bars, you know. I suppose it’s a way to manipulate.”
“How’s that manipulative?”
“Revenge, for one thing, potential pay-back,” the bad guy replied, with a self-conscious shrug. “Isn’t revenge a basic human need, Mr. Frye?”
“It appears that way sometimes. I don’t know what psychiatrists would say about it, though.”
“Well, we’ve broken no laws, or we’d all be in jail. There’s nothing wrong with saying people should be strong. Or they should care more for the poor and forgotten around the world.”
“No, that part’s O.K.” Lester agreed. “What about the violent things in those pamphlets, though? They’re not advertising for priests!”
“No, that’s true. Who knows? Maybe it’s just ta scare people inta’do’n the right thing without any violence, like the Bible. The papers are no more barbarous than arms sales, abortion, or capital punishment. Collecting names and writing one-sheet protest papers seems tame to me. Nobody except the “Group’s” bigwigs know what’s gonna’ happen with them.”
“Suppose you’re wrong, and the propaganda turns real. The sheets, I saw, were very explicit. If the law doesn’t stop the organization, something must & will. Those tracts are terrifying pieces of literature.”
“What’re you with us for, if you feel that way?”
“Just concerned about some of the rhetoric.”
“Some of it might be a little hard to swallow.” Mr. Castle responded, still concerned at Lester’s vehement repugnance. Reaching for common ground, he continued. “We’re entitled to freedom of press too, aren’t we?”
“Suppose, Francis,” Mr. Frye said, “more is going on than theoretical writing about violent change. What if the “Group” is preparing to commit crimes, big ones, right under the authorities’ noses.”
“They’ll inform us. We’ll have a chance to leave the organization, if we want to, I’m sure. The New Society isn’t the Mafia, Mr. Frye. I agree with them about the weakness of social institutions and the need for sentencing reform. Don’t forget, I was sucked into that system for being a poor farmer.”
“I know that. Maybe our institutions do need reforming, but that costs money.”
“Hospitals keeping sick half-human creatures alive costs too. Hundreds of millions of dollars go to support biologically unfit. That same money could be better used in rehabilitation or giving a poor kid half-a-break.”
“You sound like a second rendition of the propaganda. People who love those “sick half-human creatures”, you speak about, would disagree. I’m not sure throwing money at the problem will solve everything either.”
“I am. Real crime could disappear in a generation. Spending money on healthy people, who happen to be born into sub-optimal surroundings, would do it.”
“Spend more on child charity and rehabilitation. Stop spending on punishment. Neglect the hopelessly ill. Crime will disappear,” Lester mimicked. “You’ve really bought the party line.”
“And what’s wrong with that!? Sounds good to me.”
“The means! That’s what’s wrong, Francis! What if the “Group” is serious? What if it does what the pamphlet says it will?”
“Too harsh? Perhaps. Maybe it takes angry rhetoric to wake people up to see what they need to see. Shake them outta’ their apathy and greed. If so, I’m all for it.”
“Even if you have to deal with ex-cons who aren’t mere dope-dealers?”
“I feel safe as long as there are some criminal elements in the world.”
“Well I don’t.”
“Without us, everyone’d be slaves of the effete and useless rich.”
“I wouldn’t want to live in a world filled with criminals.”
Francis laughed and said with a sarcastic grin. “You are a babe in the woods, aren’t you?”
“Why?”
“You already do, Mr. Frye. Everyone is a criminal!”
“That’s absurd.”
“It’s convicts you don’t like, Frye. Convicts aren’t easy for people like you to deal with. Unsavory characters. Too real. What about your pols? How many of them are pure? None! They’re all white-collar criminals. Most are perverted, child molesters, sons of bigger criminals, murderers, dope-peddlers, liars, cheats, cutthroats, and brigands. Just got a better start than non-pols, so they can keep clear of the box.”
“I don’t know. I suppose there are a few bad ones.”
“A few!?” Mr. Castle shouted. “Not even a few good ones. Look at our State, Massachusetts. In recent years, we’ve been privileged to have representatives from every category, I just mentioned.”
“No, that’s not true…is it?”
“Isn’t it! Read your newspapers.” He demanded, very sure of himself. “Starting with Presidents, it goes downhill from there. Ed Kennedy, Tip O’Neal, Jerry Studds, Bob Crane, etc. If it weren’t for indigent criminals, like myself, the wealthy ones would devour us all. George Bush – dope dealer, son Neil – embezzler. Need more proof!?”
“Suppose you’re right, and I’m not saying you are. There aren’t that many politicians.”
“Oh, that makes a difference!”
“It does.”
“OK. I’ll play along. Say there’s 250 million Americans, how many pols do you think?”
“A million, maybe.”
“At least. But, take that number. There’s just as many convicts. Well over a million people are behind bars in this country.”
“I can’t believe that. I think you’re making it up.”
“I heard a CBS Evening News report say it on December 4, 1995. That was before I went to the “joint”. They also said the USA imprisons a greater percentage of its people than any other country.”
“Impressive. I had no idea you could remember dates so well.”
“Cheap shot, Mr. Frye!”
“Sorry.”
“The prison population is comprised of the same kinds of people as the outside is. There’s just as many scofflaws out as in. The majority of those on the inside got there because of poverty or substance abuse problems. The ones on the outside just didn’t have to contend with the disadvantages of those weaknesses.
“You’re not sure of that. It’s wild conjecture. You’re generalizing from what you’ve seen inside the penitentiary.”
“No I’m not. It’s true. You know what my occupation used to be, so ya’ think I’m prejudiced. I know what I’m talking about. People are in prison here just because they are poor! Equally guilty rich never see bars.
Shaking his head, Lester defended himself. “I’m not disputing your belief. It’s just your method of drawing conclusions. Your evidence is anecdotal. Imagine freeing all the convicts, making them equals.”
“I guess I don’t see anything wrong with either.”
“The cruelty that paper advocates, you agree with that too?”
“That’s the second time you placed yourself against us. If you’re so opposed to the “Group”, why do you work with us?”
“I…I don’t know.”
“You don’t have a very high opinion of me or my past.”
“Not true.”
“I know you don’t, or you wouldn’t have said we don’t deserve to be treated equal.”
“I didn’t say that,” Mr. Frye lied, getting used to it.
“It’s not important. You implied it. Six years of institutionalized torment by your fucking Society. I still fail to see justification for it in my past conduct. My behavior was no worse than sanctioned dope-peddling. If you could get off yer’ high horse, you might learn something. All the pills, liquids, powders, and other medicaments available out there include those altering mental states. Legal potions cause no less productivity or human-life loss than my stuff did. Yet, the system’s hypocrisy made my business alone the criminal enterprise. Your arguments are all so damned phony!”
“You still believe you were just an unlicensed pharmacist?”
“Absolutely not! I took a much bigger risk. I should’ve reaped a much bigger profit for my trouble than some petty pharmacist. Your Society owes me!”
“Oh, now we’re really in line! Society owes you? Next you’ll be saying the world owes you a living, like some damn commie!”
Bothered yet by his unpleasant discussions with Mr. Aloirav on similar subjects, Lester asked. “You feel the New Society is on the right track?”
“Yes I do.” He replied, unhappy his interlocutor couldn’t share his feelings. “At least to some degree, you must too. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be working with us. I don’t know as I’d have chosen the identical methods we’re using. But, I do think we’re doing right. Even if we do scare a few people to gain the ex-cons’ trust.”
“You think they’re just saying those things to impress ex-cons?”
“Don’t you?”
“No. I think the apathy and ignorance of the public has brought us to a precarious state. The country’s drug problem and socioeconomic irresponsibility rampage unrestrained. Some will welcome any action by whosoever has the courage to take it.”
Saying nothing to either affirm or disagree, Mr. Castle just became aware of Gloria Gold’s presence. Seated two seats away, she was listening to everything. He began feeling very sick, thinking of how long the eavesdropping occurred. Getting up from the table, Francis paid the check. Nodding to her, he left the restaurant’s premises with no further conversation.
Without any disposable income, Lester was happy for the lunch treat. He turned in surprise at Gloria’s sudden address. Accepting his return greeting, she smiled and walked over to the telephone. The dealer (in deep concentration) crossed Division Avenue, as the woman punched in numbers. She tailed Mr. Frye, when he left to wend his way back to the hotel.
Dismayed by the newsletter’s apparent support, Lester thought. “If decent law-abiding people knew what was happening, they would want to stop it. He’s making up death lists! I know it! Just like the gooks did, before the 1968 Tet Offensive. Many innocent people will get hurt. Rav must know the authorities will be on to him soon. What’ll he do then? I should do something.”
Entering the hotel, he climbed the stairs to his room thinking. “What can I do? Whom should I warn? How can I warn anyone? No one will listen to me. My mental illness of the last few years discredits me. There are still people around who think I’m crazy for trying to sell my Pontibus idea. Those who won’t think me loony will believe I’m just carrying a vendetta. Angry, trying to get even, with Rav for stealing my Company.”
What made matters so very much worse to Lester was the intangible loss. Despite the shrewd treatment over the Company, the hotelier was still his one friend. Unlike so many past colleagues and associates, the “boss” wasn’t preoccupied with profits and glory. Fame and accumulating money didn’t seem to matter much. Righting wrongs and saving biomass did.
These were the qualities drawing Mr. Frye to him, long ago. They even agreed on some ends. Means were another matter. Lester turned the key in his door, wondering.
“Rav Aloirav has seen war. He knows to what it degenerates. How can he countenance such warmongering writing? Maybe it is, indeed, all bravado. Francis thinks so. Could it be just an attempt to control criminal employees, or am I being naive? Who needs criminal help? Francis Castle is a likable guy. They’re both nice guys. They would have to be, as open as they are with me. Then again, they wouldn’t have many followers without being somewhat vocal or charismatic. But why does he need criminal friends & employees? Is he a dope dealer?”
“Perhaps my judgment is too harsh,” he mused, sitting down on his bed. “I’ve no followers or admirers. Rav has many. Maybe I’m too critical. My reasoning could be incorrect again, like before. Someday soon, I’ll probably be aware of my error and feel embarrassed. Maybe my outlook is all wrong, and I should be more like them. I may be ungrateful. Am I just lucky to be in their midst? They’re reasonable men, most of the time. So am I, some of the time. All three of us seem to be struggling with a basic philosophical question. Everybody has problems with freedom versus individual responsibility. Which one of us is right? I think I am. They think they are. Yet, we’re of disparate opinions. I don’t know what to do.”

Leaving Mr. Frye’s company, it became clear to Mr. Castle the terrible mistake he made. The look he got from Ms. Gold was downright threatening. It was nothing, however, compared to the words she delivered back at the hotel. Lester went out of sight up the stairs, and she attacked.
“What the fuck were you doing back there?!
“Talking with an old friend, Gloria,” Francis answered.
“”Group” business!? To a non-member?! In public?!” She screamed. “You broke rules!”
Head hanging, Francis mumbled. “I might’ve said a little too much.”
“Might’ve! You asshole! You got one big fucking mouth!” Ms. Gold swore. “Damn you, Francis! Heinz is gonna’ be all over me like stink on shit, recommending a goddam Jesus freak to the committee. Hav’ta listen to ‘im all over again about lettin’ a Jew-faggot lover into our “Group”.
They invited the dealer to the “Group” leader’s meeting that evening. He didn’t hear what went on, prior to arriving, but couldn’t believe the party sang his praises. The miscreant knocked on the door of the vacant West Side apartment. The leaders wore somber expressions on their faces, as he entered. Bacon ushered him in, and they motioned for him to sit down at the table.
The “boss” was the first to speak. “Francis, Gloria informs us you were talking “Group” business to a non-member today in public. These are serious accusations. Are they true?”
“Yes, they are.”
“Why? Weren’t you warned about such behavior?”
“Yes, I was…”
“Well? Speak man!” Mr. Aloirav ordered, as the offender demurred in his defense.
“I wasn’t aware Mr. Frye wasn’t a member, Sir. He said he was, and I often saw him talking with you. I just assumed…”
“You assumed very wrong.” The hotelier interrupted. “You were taught membership identification indications and procedures in prison, were you not?”
“Yes.”
“You then knew, or should have known, the man exhibited none of them.” The hotelier said. “You may have done us a great deal of damage. Even if he were a member, you still had no business talking “Group” business in public. Suppose there was a hidden mike near that booth. You’ve broken two of our main rules.”
“I know that, Sir.” The penitent replied. “I’ve got a big mouth, sometimes. I intended nothing malicious. God knows how much I want to do right by you ’n the “Group”. I meant no disloyalty. I’m terribly sorry. Whatever I can do to make it up, I will.”
“I’m not sure you can, as you say, “make up” something you can’t stop. How do we know your “big mouth” won’t happen again? As you say, yourself, even you don’t know how to control your chatter.”
“Yessir.”
“Many here have another real problem with you, because of your adherence to that crazy fag religion.” Heinz said.
“Very true, Heinz.” Rav responded. “Rational people are not religious. Ignorant irrational people are weak. Nature gives no license to incapacity.”
“Sympathy is a weakness too,” Gloria added, “and I fear us allowing it to enter our organization.”
“Fag pedophile zombie worshippers, like you, would be selected against, in a real world, Francis. It makes such weaknesses as yours, to us, just that much worse. That too works against you here.” The “boss” looked around the table, shaking his head. “Big mistake.”
“Yes, sir.” Francis replied.
“I want you to know how everyone here feels.” Mr. Aloirav said to a trembling body underneath the very white face. “We would be well within our code of principles to “off” you. It may mean taking Mr. Frye out too. He’s an old friend of mine. I feel very sad to have to kill an old friend. I’m sure you would too.”
“Yes, I would.” Mr. Castle replied, quivering in an ever-so-slight wave-like motion. “I…I have a son, “boss”. If you decide to put me down, will I be able to say goodbye?”
“Do you have anything else to say in your defense?” The hotelier asked without answering the question. Receiving a negative shaking of the head in response, the “boss” continued, soft but cold. “Anything making us believe you might have redeeming virtues or might serve as an epitaph?”
“You’ve always had my undying loyalty.” The screw-up replied, eyes desperate & beseeching. “I’ll tell you everything I can remember of the conversation. If you want me to, I’ll stick close to Frye or kill him, whichever…”
The “boss” looked around the room at his officers, before he replied. “Let’s discuss the entire conversation, right now.”

Political rights do not originate in parliaments; they are rather forced upon them from without. And even their enactment into law has for a long time been no guarantee of their security. They do not exist because they have been legally set down on a piece of paper, but only when they have become the ingrown habit of a people, and when any attempt to impair them will meet with the violent resistance of the populace. Rudolf Rocker

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Francis recounted everything he could remember two or three times. Upon his finishing, Gloria added what she overheard. Everyone agreed the conveyed versions were identical. They instructed him to wait outside in Mr. Aloirav’s Cordoba, accompanied by a new “Group” officer. The hotelier then asked for comments. He listened to each one. Heinz gave a thumb down, as did Bacon and Carl.
If general offenses in others rose to no more than simple mistakes, the “boss” forgave them. It was always remarkable how well he countenanced honest mistakes by his people. In Mr. Castle’s case, it was nothing short of miraculous. Maintaining how he was among their best operatives in research, Mr. Aloirav was very vocal. He reminded them how well the man did what the “Group” instructed him to do while in prison.
In one particular instance, those efforts got him sent to brain-dissolving Marion. Marion, where all the US government’s dirty little secrets disappear. Francis never talked. He just barely survived.
Nevertheless, the majority of the officers were adamant. They did not leave the apartment pleased. The hotelier’s largess meant all their fortunes were at risk. Ms. Gold was among those voting for death. When everyone except she was gone, the “boss” said. “I know you don’t like it, Gloria. Say it and be done with it.”
“Damn right, I don’t like it! He’s a fuckin’ liability!”
“I don’t think so. He fucked-up. No question about it. He knows it. It won’t happen again. He’s not a pathological blabbermouth, despite his own statement to the contrary. The man thought he was in safe territory.”
“Our lives are at stake too, Rav. You’re not pregnant here. He should be punished as an example.”
“Damn it, Gloria! You’re always so fucking quick to punish! Only children & retards can justify the luxury of believing in right or wrong or hurling guilt. You’re neither! I’m taking exclusive responsibility here. I know how you all feel. But, it’s my shortcoming. Don’t you see that? The whole thing wouldn’t have occurred if I, myself, hadn’t been so close to Lester in public. If anyone is culpable, it’s I. We’ll watch extra close for a while. We’ll ride him like a god dam pony. It’ll be all right.”
“I don’t think we should chance it. It goes against all our policies.”
The hotelier was slow to answer. “A long time ago, a person I know made a mistake. Against much good advice, because I believed in her yet untested loyalty, I gave that person another chance. Damn glad I did. I learned to care more for her than anyone in the world.”
Ms. Gold blushed but said nothing, and he continued. “The man is loyal. I can’t dismiss that. I will not sacrifice every human bond for my quest. I’m not like my lunatic friend. That kind of consistent attention to duty puts you in a box, where you can never be free.”
“Are you free, Rav?”
“As free as I need to be.”
“Really?”
“Only alone, stark naked, and wild in triple canopy rainforest can a man be completely free, Gloria. Listening at night to the sounds of reptilian jaws crunching chitinous exoskeletons. Wakening to gentle increasing crescendos of guaribas and dragonflies telling the world they’re glad to be alive. Hunger, fear, and loneliness won’t allow social bonds to gain a foothold there.”
“What keeps you chained here?”
“Survival, revenge, posterity.”
“Punishment.”
“Touché.”
“How much longer?”
“Until the job’s done.”
“When will that be?”
“Who knows? A lot depends on the opposition. I’m still working on basic self-preservation.”
“Survival. How do we differ from poor white trash, Rav? All they care about is survival too.”
“We’re on different levels, Gloria. It’s a question of degree. The malignant poor are that way because they are biologically deficient, wasteful and undisciplined. We are none of those. In addition, I’m also working on the survival of the species, planetary life.”
“How is that?”
“There are two kinds of selection processes at work on us today.”
“And you’re gonna’ tell me what they are.”
“Natural selection and US industrial “democracy”. Nature hasn’t changed much. It’s still “survival of the fittest”. The other is “survival of the richest”. I don’t believe it’s possible or desirable to change natural selection. I sure as hell am gonna’ try to destroy the other.”
“They’ll kill you, Rav.”
“Probably. Been leaning on death so long, I doubt whether I could even use another support system. It’s more than simple payback, Gloria. I wanna’ finish what I started and need more time.”
“What did you start?”
“I didn’t know, until much later, what Viet Nam was all about. I learned too late it wasn’t my war. Yet I participated in the U. S. Government’s organized conspiracy to kill all poor men’s kids. I was one of the local poor men’s kids sent off to do the job. Either way poor boys died, them or us. How could the bastard pols & caedere bankers lose? Survivors had themselves and their progeny damaged or destroyed by dibenzofurans (Agent Orange & White). The extra-tough ones, enduring everything else thrown at them, were at the mercy of Rothschild’s whorth-estate. Then the Government changed tactics. Instead of murdering the poor, they over-fed them into slavery-for-all. Bread and Circuses. Stalled oxen. Resulting welfare-state goals now reward under-achievement with the same vigor that before they rewarded achievement. That, supporting phony drug interdiction, and the cost of exporting terrorism, is ridding the country of the remaining achievers. They’re destroying the initiative of the best people through taxation, invasion of privacy, imprisonment, and outright colossal fraud.”
“Can’t we get vengeance, living in another country?”
“Sure, but why? You lookin’ to retire, Gloria?”
“We are getting older. We’ve got kids.”
“This country exports its terror to those other countries. Where would you go?”
“Somewhere?”
“Our fight isn’t provincial, my love. We are not intellectual sheeple, believing the Company line. It’s not Man’s inhumanity, but his humanity to Man & beast, crying out for redress. Until prison doors are open, and hunting of innocents is dead, I’ll never relax. All countries incarcerate. As long as prisons exist, we’re not a civilized society. As long as there are penitentiaries, I shall remain an implacable enemy of the entire human race. I’ll never be free of that, even in another country.”
“I guess not.”
Unlike my crazy friend, though, I’ll never become a fanatic.”

Lester awakened the next morning, as usual, to other hotel guest’s voices in the adjoining hallway. He remained in bed, pondering his life and that of immediate acquaintances. Part of the previous day’s conversation with Francis concerned money. What the man acquired through his “Group” affiliation boggled Mr. Frye’s mind, and he thought.
“Francis Castle is out for personal gain. An acceptable bourgeois value. A certain amount of wealth is necessary for happiness and the development of a decent ethical life. Money brings more freedom, joy, and peace than its opposite. Accumulating vast quantities of it, however, is cowardice and displays other biological weaknesses. Fate & Entropy keep most people’s acquisition of it in check.”
Watching a spider creep over his bedspread, Lester continued to think. “Francis is right, assuming whatever betters his family benefits his world some. Money will do that. He’s free to exercise far more charity than I am. I’ve no income. Rav and Francis both desire to do good. Their values don’t seem so incompatible with my own. Francis’ shortcoming is in not combining his desire for personal with the common good. Failing to do so, he becomes avaricious and unhappy, making religious resignation understandable. Aloirav’s shortcoming is the opposite. He has connected his individual desires so closely to collective well-being; he can’t distinguish between them. I could never become like Francis. Being near Rav, however, scares me. I can see what motivates him. I could become like him. Why didn’t I ever find a way to reach people in my own way?”
The spider reached the decision point of retreating, circumventing, or crossing over his hand, and Mr. Frye thought. “Aloirav conquers his fears enough to take action. He moves in the face of problems without yielding to religious superstition. His behavior appears effective and wise. The cruelty, resulting from his writing, isn’t any worse than the cruelty of world apathy and ignorance.”
The spider elected to cross the hand, and Lester watched it musing. “Is Rav the monster his writing indicates? Has a maelstrom of vengeful thoughts and dreams caught him? Is the man letting his runaway imagination obviate the discrimination of truth from fiction? I sure know how that is! I’ve seen nothing concrete indicating he’s either acting on his violent ideas or even presenting a plan. A very active fantasy-life could be the extent of it. Given my somewhat strange state of mind, perhaps it’s just a way to maintain friendship. Maybe Rav’s using his imagination in a bizarre way for my benefit. He might think being grotesque is the one way I’ll understand him. No. That’s not realistic. I’m too self-absorbed. His life doesn’t revolve around me. Where is the money coming from to pay Francis such a salary?”
Off the bed now, the spider scampered across the bare wooden floor. Lester rotated matters that are more important in his head. “Why did I tell Francis I was involved with Aloirav? Do I kid myself? Am I a closet joiner? It’s time to decide how far I’ll go, before having any further dealings with them.”
Staring at the 1940’s design floral-wallpaper, He put his thoughts together. A knock on his door startled him. Opening the thin oak portal, Mr. Frye faced Mr. Aloirav. Without an invitation, the “boss” entered the cramped little room. Staring at each other for a moment, the hotelier walked over to the small table next to the window.
Sitting down at the chair underneath the mirror, he grumbled about straightening out a few things. His recalcitrant tenant was too far out of step with the plans and goals of his New Society. The intended strategy of having Lester ruminate to a positive conclusion was a bust. Yesterday’s unexpected events dashed the “boss’s” previous faith in such a solution. It was necessary to push harder, before the deviance grew.
“Francis says you’re thinking of staying. Glad to hear it.”
“It was during a moment of weakness. I’ve had second thoughts.”
“Really?”
“That 1994 tract scares me too much to want any connection with you.”
“I see. I’m sorry to hear that. What’say we go down to the hotel restaurant and have a cup of coffee. We can talk about it?”
“No thanks. I’m all set.”
“All right, Les. Care if I order some? I’ll have them bring it up here. We can talk over a cup.”
“Not at all.” Lester answered, aware of the coming hard sell. “Suit yourself.”
Sensitized to the difference, he requested the coffee “black” instead of “regular”. It’s a precaution you don’t forget after visiting the East. New England custom adds cream and sugar to “regular”. One must ask for “black”. The hotelier acted out of habit and ordered for the two of them. Room service was superb. Mr. Frye’s expressed desire for none, notwithstanding, they soon each held a full cup. With the pot resting on the small desk, the “boss” chatted about molecular biology. He started a strained discussion on protein-engineering techniques.
It drew Lester in, and a real conversation ensued. His contumacy dissipated. He found himself animated & talking about the best electrophoresis techniques, sequencing gels, cell culture, etc. They were discussing DNA synthesis and gene replacement targeting, when Mr. Aloirav mentioned an unfamiliar operation. Very interested, Mr. Frye’s attention grew. He forgot his desire to remain aloof.
“I’ve never used that targeting method.” Lester said. “I don’t understand the mechanism or how you achieved the results.”
“Really? I use it frequently.”
“Where can I get the protocol?”
“I don’t think you can.”
“Why not? If you use it, you must have the reference.
“I don’t.”
“It must be published somewhere.”
“Oh, it is, but just in my lab…that I know of.”
Shaking his head in frustration, Lester said. “I don’t know why you don’t publish it, if you can repeat it.”
“Publish!? Repeat? Why, I’ve repeated it well over a hundred times.”
“Then why don’t you publish it?
“I’m reaching for the stars and you’re asking me to tie my shoelaces.”
“You’d be famous.”
“Now there’s an inducement. I sure need the admiration and envy of your colleagues.”
“It might help.”
“I don’t need to get funded, and I’m insufficiently vain to do it for grins.”
“Think how science could benefit, knowing such a technique…the advances it would bring.”
“To what purpose, Lester? So they could cure a few more exotic cases of cancer, remove a few more lymphomas. Maybe stop a few more heart attacks. What end, I ask you, would it serve?”
“You need to ask?”
“Yes. It’s appropriate. Life’s too short to study Latin. Why exacerbate the population problem or degrade further the species’ quality? Petty compassion. Useless waste of time and paper.”
“What about the suffering alleviated?”
“Suffering is a necessary part of struggle. Most is self-induced. Makes us stronger, wiser.”
“Maybe so.”
“The suffering I wish to stop is not the kind produced by one’s personal ignorance.”
“Well. I’d like to know the procedure. I wish you’d publish it for me to use.”
“I’ll write up & give you a protocol. But don’t get any ideas about sharing it.”
“It’s yours. I’d have no right to do so.”
“If you were not you, you might feel different.”
“Perhaps.” Mr. Frye replied, disinclined to find so much bad in other people. “There’s something strange in your reluctance to publish. Even way back, when we first met, I thought so.”
The revelation didn’t unnerve him. He did pause a long time, looking at his friend in a curious way. Both men were aware a Rubicon flowed before them. The “boss” urged his charger forward, saying. “You’re right, Les, there is.”
Less uncomfortable, encouraged by the other’s amiability, Lester asked. “What would happen, if the police saw those tracts? Suppose I took one down to the “cop shop”.”
“It’s nothing Monroe Avenue hasn’t seen before, I’m sure.”
“What if I told them I knew who was publishing it?”
“They would listen to you, and be polite, until discovering your history. I’d, no doubt, get a visit & some questions. They’d patronize you. Life would return to normal.”
Embarrassed, Mr. Frye assumed the same but said. “I’m not so sure.”
“Nor am I, Les. I hope you never try to do that. You’re my friend, and I’d hate to lose you. We think alike on many things. Therefore, I’m going to tell you something. I wasn’t gonna’ spring it on you yet. But, the conversation you had yesterday with Francis exposed my limited alternatives. Our relationship is about to change. It may never again return to the way it was. It makes me very sad to think about losing your friendship.”
Mr. Frye felt a cold chill creep up his spine, and he asked. “Why…”
“The truth is…I don’t publish, because I’d be crucified.”
“What on earth for?”
“People would not like what I do. So they can’t know.”
“Are you doing NIH-prohibited experiments?”
“I’m sure.”
“And you’re afraid of the shame of exposure?”
“Shame from your colleagues affects me as much as their admiration and envy might.”
“Then, why…?”
“I’ll give you more information.” The “boss” said, smiling. “But I must have your word you won’t let it go any further. You always appeared to me to be an honorable man. I’ll trust your word, if you give it. Your informing on me wouldn’t affect anything too adversely. But the negative publicity & scrutiny would be most unwelcome at this time.”
Attempting to appear convivial, Mr. Frye agreed to the condition. Never considering possible ramifications, he replied. “Of course I’ll keep mum. If that’s what you want.”
“I’ve wanted to tell you more for quite some time. I value your mind and perspective. Not being able to share aspects of my work with you has always been distressing.”
Agreeing to maintain silence, Lester never considered the New Society and taboo experiments connected. Unconcerned, he thought perhaps the work was NIH Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee prohibited. Certain classes of proscribed experiments everyone in the science knew to be voluntarily restricted. For years, however, many violated the rules. Most felt the forbidden activities only “politically” dangerous. If made public, such peccadilloes might cause a scientist to lose NIH or alternative federal funding. They were not violations of law.
Wanting his curiosity satisfied, seeing no reason to withhold his word, Mr. Frye boxed himself in, chuckling. “Scientists are so neurotic; always imagining little terrors and not giving major ones the time of day. He’s worried about some school of thought or committee somewhere disagreeing with him. Over insignificant aspects of his experiments or thinking, I’m sure. Even if not just an NIH prohibited procedure, what’s bad enough to think its exposure would crucify him?”
The pamphlets and his Company’s loss were fresh in his mind. His talk with Francis Castle was just yesterday. Those circumstances made his misreading of cues ever more shocking. His mind must have fallen asleep with inaccurate gating on purpose. Many years of companionship conditioned Lester to distort his perceptions vis a vis his friend. He assessed from his own perspective, seeing the “boss” as but a reflection of himself.
“I’ve been developing biological weapons.”
Not at all prepared for that statement, Lester spaced. Protecting his delicate residuum of copability, he didn’t trust his hearing and couldn’t internalize it all. Such research wasn’t respectable. Mainstream scientists did not do it. Just renegades, military-sellouts, did it.
Observing the discomfiture, Mr. Aloirav continued without waiting for a return comment. “So far I’ve completed a few dozen. About ten more will soon be ready. Once you get the hang of it, it’s very simple. In time, you can get more creative. It’s necessary to distort the human immune system’s sense of reality. Your transcripts must survive HLA (human leukocyte antigens) surveillance. All you have to do is isolate c-myb DNA or reverse transcriptase RNA transcripts into a cDNA. Build up a sufficient amount of DNA. Use malignant human cells or normal toxin genes and existing cloning techniques. Insert the gene part corresponding to the carboxyl-terminal region of your protein into an expression vector. Even pBR322 will do. Get enough protein for antiserum generation. You need to identify the product once you’ve completed everything else. Use c-myb in every agent you build in that particular plasmid. It’s basic Molecular Biology 101. Anyone with one of your kits could do it.”
Lester’s face still wore a horrified expression. Almost unable to speak, he managed to ask. “Agent…?”
“Your weapon, a new virus,” the hotelier explained. “The bug has to be traceable. Ya’ use the c-myb DNA or transcript in all introductory stages. It’s your probe for the DNA blots on any particular agent. The DNA’s necessary for homologous recombination with the human genome. It works rather well with xenotropic retroviruses but not with the pathogenic ecotropics. I usually put the c-myb DNA near an unused area in the 5′ portion of the env region. Once built, you test it in either tissue culture or on humans.” Looking forward, he added, laughing & slapping Lester’s knee. “As you’ve perhaps guessed. Hope yer’ not a purist. Access to abortion clinics for primary-cell cultures is necessary. ”
Mr. Frye’s bruised mind recovered. It was now racing. He saw it as obvious now, how the New Society’s goals and the Francis Castle conversation intermeshed. The “boss” was quite capable of entering a world of evasive and twisted epidemiology. He could, indeed, effect the violent goal described in the tract.
Lester thought. “Such nefarious activities, yet Rav doesn’t appear concerned I’ll inform on him. He’s making no indication of it. He’s either very confident of his position or knows something I don’t. Maybe both. Should I be alarmed for myself? Am I slated for execution, anyway, so he feels he can speak his mind?”
Fears for his own safety now surpassed fear for the human race. He harbored no doubts about Mr. Aloirav’s contemplated implementation of New Society objectives. Extricating himself from the situation at hand was his immediate concern. To avoid further endangerment, Mr. Frye tried remaining calm. Failing in that might elicit unwelcome responses. Thoughts of permanent escape could come later. He concentrated on bringing some presence of mind to bear on the situation.
Lester sidestepped his overt terror and revulsion by asking. “Where do you get the xenotropic viruses?”
He answered. “I got a CAEV (Caprine Arthritic Encephalitis Virus) from a goat, of course. I’ve taken others from monkeys and even some from chickens. Simian hemorrhagic fever makes a good chassis. Most of my proviruses came from wild rodents, though. Vehicles aren’t hard to find, once you know what you’re looking for.”
Still fighting for composure, unsure how to play along without being offensive, Mr. Frye gambled, asking. “I thought the majority were non-pathogenic. That makes them useless for organizing epidemics. You do want to produce epidemics don’t you?”
“Yes. Epi & pandemics will come in time with scale-up. Normal hemorrhagic viruses will do for that. Their problems for me reside more in self-protection than evading epidemiologists. But, you’re right; xenotropic viruses are not always immediately useful. I must intervene. Some endogenous proviruses and virogenes become as pathogenic as ecotropic viruses when manipulated. I do lose a lot. Even so, a great many become quite virulent.”
“How do you know they’ll do what you require of them?”
Smiling, unaware the terrified man spoke with an affected calmness not felt, the “boss” answered. “I don’t. I’ve sustained my share of failures. Some were much too uncontrollable for military purposes. Most do work to some extent. You must approach them all like they’re political wanna-be’s. With viruses, it’s essential to protect one part above all others.”
“What part is that?” Lester asked, curiosity getting the best of his fear.
“You cannot destroy the DNA program providing for antigenic “drift”. Any lasting degree of substance structure is unobtainable. They’ve got to remain recognizable by their devastating effects while forever changing. Not even the virus should be aware of its identity for very long. The immune system will lock-in on it. I invested too much energy trying to make them ultra-specific in the early days.”
“Too specific?”
“Yah. It’s useless. Results forced me to give up perfection. My best products wouldn’t stay focused on targeted individuals. I hoped to eradicate certain types of human hosts, but the realization slipped through my fingers. After a while the viruses always seemed to get out of hand.”
“In what way?” Lester queried, his fear controlled and very well disguised by now.
“For some inexplicable reason – vanity, anthropomorphism, whatever, I felt I could make my creations as teleological as I. I wasn’t sensitive enough to the quintessential drive for survival. I didn’t count on certain things.”
“What happened?”
“For one thing, as I mentioned, I didn’t allow sufficient programmed drift. My constructs, far too rigid, allowed immune systems to build antibodies too fast. My solution was to use malarial drift genes. That skewed them too far in the other direction. I created new diseases I either couldn’t manipulate or were excessively weak & slow. Then I read some papers by Barbara McClintock and got unique ideas.”
“That’s why you went to the Cold Spring Harbor Seminar?”
“Yeah. I wanted to meet the old broad. My first creation, using her concepts, was a mistake.”
“How’s that?”
“One of the lentiviruses, containing an antigen-inducible transposon, targeted hemophiliacs and fag drug-abusers. It worked great on some niggers in the Uganda-Tanzania area of Lake Victoria. Believing everything was going OK, and my experiment was successful, I thought I’d solved my problem. I learned otherwise.”
“How so?”
“My knowledge of the immune system was deficient.”
“How did you discover that?”
“Tested a strain on a few white faggot-druggies. Thinking it answered all my requirements; I noticed some unmet goals I set for it. In 1978 or 1979, I read about it in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. You know that little publication by the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) in Atlanta, Georgia?”
“I’m familiar with it.
“Well. They described cases quite similar to the disease I created. I continued to follow their periodic description of it. According to that source, the disease deviated from my plans for it. Time, I prognosticated, from point of introduction to ultimate mortality seemed to lengthen. It’s now altogether unsatisfactory. Way too slow for military purposes. It also appears to have left my targeted individuals and gone into humans.
“Humans?”
“Yah. It’s no longer just in queers, dope-fiends, and bleeders.”
“I see.”
Shaking his head, he confessed. “Conventional media sources maintain it can be transmitted to the general population through normal heterosexual copulation. Soon it’ll even be in insect vectors. Transmitters like flies, mosquitoes, and triatome beetles are notorious levelers. I blew it. Bad mistake.”
“But how could you have known it would do what it did?” Lester asked, now defending him. “As a virus, it would be wild and uncontrollable. How could you even expect to regulate it?”
“I could have! I built it! It was to circumvent the compassion vultures I did so, Lester. Yet, even without them, the weaklings escaped. I never wanted to stress quality individuals with that bug. Whatever. My methods have improved since then. No excuse though. My mistake was egregious! I failed to assess adequately both the fortitude of animal immune systems and microbial ecology. Also, I underestimated the agent’s biological need not to kill the host. I learned, but too slow. Unforgivable.”
“What ever made you go into this kind of research, Rav?”
“I told you, years ago, in those trips we used to make from Charlotte. Don’t you remember?”
“No. Of course, I remember the trips. I don’t remember you talking about being motivated to do military research, though. You seemed to want to help humankind. Such work is so opposed to that.”
“No, it isn’t. I already explained that all to you. The planet is a closed system. Nature is not altogether noncommittal on this point. We are having an affect….”
“I can’t buy that argument. It’s so…so criminal.”
“Criminal?! You’re a broken record, Lester! What difference does calling something criminal or non-criminal make? For that matter, what difference does even being a criminal make? The term is but an ugly metaphor, an oxymoron. It purports to represent someone on the receiving end of a decadent ochlocracy. An asinine word! Integrity is being loyal to one’s judgment. We’re all murderers & robbers. The difference but lies in our victims. What does it mean to be murdered? Being caught in an entropy pinch and leaving some biome. Is that really so bad? Not to me. Just the thought of death is comforting. Ten years ago, every day, Man destroyed at least two planetary species of life. Today, on ephemeral nepotistic whims, it’s a thousand! Now that’s wrong!”
“Assuredly!”
“But it’s not a crime. Unless you consider the inability to survive man’s bestiality a crime. What horrible offenses have these harmless creatures ever committed?”
“None, of course.”
“Even if so, could their iniquities be of so heinous a nature they must therefore be exterminated en masse?”
“Of course not. But, how much less execrable are they than innocent victims of your biological weapons? Have you no human values?”
“That’s what I’m pursuing. My values are in the survival of my race, in particular my DNA, and its continued evolution. But, not to the exclusion of other forms of life. To that end I strive, and may the carnage be bountiful.”
“The innocent life, Rav!”
“There are no innocent humans, Lester!” He shouted in response to the biting criticism. “You should know that, growing up near here with the Calvinistic hypocrisy. What about the Christian Reformed “Heaven”.”
“Not all people believe that nonsense or act on such silliness.”
“They’re all guilty!”
“I disagree.”
“No matter. Your head’s in the sand. They are, if just for the possession of provincial compassion alone. Just look at what the species is becoming because of it. Weaker and more bloated every day. Besides, I’d die if I couldn’t kill. Call me the “Revenge of the Planet”, if you will. Or, at least, the “Revenge of the Rain Forest”.”
“I’ll be satisfied with “arrogant”. Your megalomania seems only exceeded by your pomposity.”
“I prefer to look upon it as an accurate assessment of my capacity.”
“You’d die if you couldn’t kill?”
“Of course. But, I’m not alone there. You too kill without remorse on numerous occasions.”
“I do not.”
“Yes you do.” The “boss” said, smiling at the unjustified anger. “You can’t dwell on it, because there’s an ignoratio elenchi involved.’
‘What?”
‘Willful ignorance. Folks seeing you with a missing front tooth diminishes their respect for you. No matter how much you explain your condition or how much forgiveness you beseech – to no avail. Therefore, you won’t accept what you know to be true. If you use Black English, people accept your handicap, disrespecting you nonetheless. If you swish, people will accept your perversion but hate you just the same.”
‘I see.’
‘I don’t think so. You’re killing right now, perfectly aware of it. You just don’t consider it so; because it isn’t a human being you’re offing. Sanctioned, it’s legal.”
“OK. Technically, I suppose you’re right. But, you’re being ridiculous. The gravity of the concept….”
Mr. Aloirav interrupted. “Oh, calling it a technical point excuses it, hunh? Perhaps some Homo hubris has obscured your mental clarity, Lester. You kill, you must, billions of organisms every day just by living. Malignant and other foreign assaulting organisms phagocytized everyday by cellular immunity. All the oral bacteria swallowed and destroyed in stomach acid etc. It’s very clear. All of us are murderers; uncontrollably so.”
“True, very true, but that’s not even close to the issue, and you know it. Killing a microbe will never be the moral equivalent of killing a human being. It’s madness to think otherwise.”
“You’re right. It isn’t the same thing. It’s a relative issue. They’re unicellular. When you think of remorseless killing, you think multicellular. Correct?”
“Of course.”
“Bring it to a multicellular level then. A small mosquito can precipitate the destruction of a much larger body than itself. That insect vector could fill your body with malaria, dengue, encephalitis, or some other parasitism. Diseases that you, perhaps, couldn’t battle without a preempting assault. Wouldn’t you kill a mosquito that threatened to attack you?”
“I suppose so.”
“A common housefly. An insect whose only offense might be suspicion of contaminating your food with typhus or ptomaine. More than likely, though, a simple annoyance. Disturbing your peace of mind would get it murdered. Perhaps you would just destroy a wasp nest if you were stung; never gratuitously on sight.”
“You’ve made your point,” Mr. Frye replied unimpressed.
“I don’t think so. It’s not just a weight differential. Notwithstanding what I’ve already said, you also aid in the destruction of even higher forms of life. What’s more, your act is willful with malice aforethought.”
“I’ll concede that I kill mosquitoes, flies, and even a multicellular wasp or two. I most definitely do not ever harm or even aid in the harming of anything higher. You know I’m a vegetarian.”
“I see,” he said, amused at the naïve hypocrisy. “Then you do not use paper or wear leather shoes. You don’t fry your food with GMO oil. You never eat cheese on your pizza. Cheese made from milk. Stolen milk, relegating its lawful owner, a veal calf, to the slaughterhouse. The houses, you’ve lived in – no lumber involved? Your computer didn’t require magnetic diskettes. Manufacturing effluents from which destroy many acres of habitats, poison many water supplies. How many children have you caused to be born dead or deformed?”
“None.”
“You’ve escaped then, seeing the effects in Colombia of how your morning coffee is produced. Ever wonder what happens to banned US pesticides? The vegetables and fruit you so pompously tout as your diet. Aren’t they purchased at the price of countless pesticide-destroyed lives here and abroad?”
Former sanctimoniousness evident, it destroyed Mr. Frye’s argument, and he replied. “You need not say more. It’s true. I do use paper and lumber. I’m aware of my contribution to the tropical rainforest’s devastation. I have been cavalier in my use of plants, animals, and their products.”
“I’m not finished. You pay your taxes and vote, don’t you?”
“So?”
“Ever ask what such activities cost? What they buy?”
“Democracy, freedom, a standard of living.”
“Then you concur with exporting banned or useless toxic drugs, tobacco & sugar subsidies? You agree with sending billions of dollars in “aid” to that death merchant, Israel?” You support the controlled-substances pol welfare system. USA’s insane puppet presidents? The Rothschild whore pols that peddle multinational arms to destroy countless innocents in the Mideast, Balkans, Americas, Africa, Asia, etc.?”
“All right.”
“Slaughtering innocent people, most of them poor children, for “democracy” and your standard of living?” He asked, looking at his crushed friend and saying. “Shall I go on, Lester?”
“No. You’re right in asking what right have I to judge, when my own infractions are so bad. Nevertheless, I can. I do, and I will continue to do so. Your entire sophistry aside, what you’re doing is still wrong, very wrong, Rav. I don’t need to tell you that. You know it’s true. It’s also true I’ve aided and abetted the suffering and destruction of higher forms of life. I do, way too often, choose to forget my complicity in that. My pursuit of food and comfort is thoughtless and cruel. But, I can still live with it. I don’t know how you can live with yourself. You know you’re going to be, you…you…are, responsible for killing your fellow humans.”
“And you call me arrogant and pompous! Where did you ever obtain such a selective memory? You neglect to recognize or accept your supercilious morality.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You’re like other scientists, intellectuals, etc. Knowing what’s wrong, you’ve no balls to act. You’re all a bunch of weaklings!”
“How so?”
“Forget a moment about the murders your taxes and voting conduct buy. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people died because you didn’t have the guts to waste the Bushes! Ever ask yourself how many sound children died & still die just because of your cowardice & willful blindness?”
“How dare you?!”
“Oh! He’s miffed. How violated he is! You are the problem, not I. You sanctioned professionals! Doctors like your MIT cohorts! You never heard of neonatal units, intensive care for the over 70s, organ transplants, pharmaceutical scams? Except for arms’ sales and US government-supported narcotics prices, waste unequaled. Trillions of dollars of caedere conversions exhausted! For what?! Vanity! All because you have no balls.”
“I resent your condemnation.”
“Oh, you do? Asshole! I haven’t even started.”
“What can I do? Medicine is legal. Doctors need to police themselves.”
“You use the quacks. You pay their salaries. Your patronization buys the monsters status, puts untold millions of pounds of toxic drugs into the potable water supplies. Enough to squander more innocent lives than Nazi death camps. How can you feel so much more important to the Earth than other life? What about the plants, people, and other animals? How long do they have to wait before your benign neglect murders them all?”
“I’m doing what I can.”
“That’s just it! You’re not! You’re copping out, Les. You’re like the average Christian during the auto de fe & pogroms. You’d have sucked up to Torquemada, Stalin, and Hitler when they were eradicating Semites, and you know it.” Lester was silent, and the hotelier softened, saying. “Well…at least you recognize your position’s vulnerability, and the effect you have on the biosphere. That’s more than most. It also makes your commensurate culpability greater.”
“In what way?”
“Conforming…acting politically correct. It’s so warm & safe. All you intellectual bastards are the same! It’s so contrary to stepping out and trying to define yourselves.”
Lester’s silence at the insulting language made Mr. Aloirav question without mounting further defense. “How can the separate worlds of living things ever achieve mutual survival? Facing such devastating willful blindness, it seems impossible. Can such monumental greed and insensitivity ever be stopped without violent interference?”
“I don’t know. I can’t condone your way.”
“I’m trying to carve out an enclave of decency in a jungle of garbage worshippers. Flying in the soup, like everyone else, I’m not certain my methods are correct. With the possible exception of the Pontibus, yours sure aren’t.”
“Your prescription is so draconian, so inhuman…or rather …so cruel.”
“I’m glad you corrected yourself,” the hotelier replied, feigning humility. “Your caring about my feelings is sweet.”
“It was instinctive. Don’t take it personal.”
“Touching actually.”
“Fuck you!”
“Lester, don’t you see? Saving a few sick people now just means more will die later with greater suffering. When the trees and animals go, so will we. We’re all connected. Our destiny is their destiny and theirs ours. That’s why I want you to develop the Pontibus.”
“So you can find peace?” Lester replied with acerbity.
“Cheap shot, but yes,” the hotelier answered with softness. “The great questions I’m attempting to answer have no easy answers! My megalomania is but a tool. Small people can’t hope to solve such immense problems. Even without religion to drive you into ignorance, Les, you fail to understand the virtue in kindness. You too persist in looking for contentment. You short-circuit vast kindnesses by grabbing at the minuscule ones. You’re close to being a compassion vulture. You should have been an airhead medical doctor, a non-thinking memory.” Mr. Aloirav rose to leave, saying. “Once general introductions begin, I’ll insure you’ve got the preventative serums and vaccines required.”
“Why should I need them?”
“There may be errors.”
“I guess I should thank you. What makes you think I’ll cooperate?”
Turning back toward him, the hotelier said. “You and I are both out for the well-being of planetary life. I know that. Perhaps you do too. Given our differing means and actions, which of us is correct? Do you know? I know you believe you are. Except with respect to me, I hope you are, too. I don’t know. I’m just not willing to chance your self-doubt, delay, and neglect.”
“No? What would you say, if I said I was going to report you? Everything you just told me delivered to the authorities, today.”
“I’d say you were very foolish to harbor such a thought. You gave me your word, moments ago; you would keep mum about what I told you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You can’t seriously believe I gave my promise regarding anything as grave as this? Expecting me to hold to my word, when wholesale homicide is concerned, is idiocy.”
“I would suggest the inappropriateness of you considering me an idiot, or yourself.”
“No. I’ll rephrase my thought. It’s madness.”
“I wouldn’t presume to speculate on that either were I in your shoes. You’re far from being an expert on that subject.”
“Now who’s using the cheap shots?”
“I’ve eyes and ears in many places, Lester.” Mr. Aloirav said, ignoring the censure. “You’d never make it to Monroe Avenue. If even seen talking to a stranger on the street, you both die.”
“What!?” He bridled, making sure of the threat. “Maybe today, next week, or even next month, but could you watch me forever?”
“Yes. But, long before that day came, you’d have caught a cold. My enemies catch cold and die.”
“I see. Then I am to assume, I’m your enemy?”
“Absolutely. Until I know you’re safe.”
“Are you gonna’ lock me up?”
“Perhaps. I won’t stash you in one of my warehouses yet. I abhor incarceration. I’d rather kill you and be done with it.”
“That’s reassuring.”
“In a way, Lester.” The hotelier said, after a pause. “Your fantasy is real. You can stop me, but not in the manner you’re imagining.”
“How so?”
“Struggling my way, Les, I can never stop. I can’t even die, knowing the future will be unsafe for my children. You’re my last chance, and I’m your last hope. I want to stay human. You can… What do you think my methods will alter long term? Will they stop my pain, give me respite? Will they make me free? Will I be able to find relief from my burning thirst for self-definition? No. Only death or your Pontibus can do that. Don’t be so adamant. Put all ideas of informing on me out of your mind.”
That was the way he left it. Mr. Frye didn’t drink the coffee on the desk-table; it wasn’t the way he liked it. Even if it had been, the man repulsed the thought of having shared pleasant moments with the “boss”. Pacing the floor for a few minutes, he attempted to use the telephone. Lester knew no one to call, but he wanted to test his changed status. The switchboard informed him his calls couldn’t go through without management approval. Moments later, a woman came by and removed the phone.
The hotel was home to over a hundred aged roomers. It disgorged a large number of them into the lobby during the day and early evening. After attempting the call, Mr. Frye left his room and went downstairs past the front desk. Mingling with the lobby crowd, he tried leaving inconspicuously via the front door. Noting his intentions, the polite desk clerk ushered him back to his room.
Most of the guests were aware of Lester’s past mental inadequacies. They saw nothing unusual. Administration of such treatment didn’t come as a surprise to him either. Expecting it, Mr. Frye knew, until Mr. Aloirav considered him safe, they would curtail his freedom. A minute later, the “boss” knocked on his door.
Answering it, anger resonating in his voice, Lester said. “I see I’m to be kept prisoner.”
The hotelier, walking uninvited into the room, said. “You tried using the phone. You’ve no one, besides me. Other than a foolish test of my resolve, it could only have been a desire to inform on me.”
“How long do you intend to so treat me?”
“Until you and I decide whether we can reach an understanding.”
“And if we can’t?”
“You die.”
“I see.”
“As I said. I’m reluctant to imprison you, but we must make this fast. Continue trying my patience, and you will make your “deadline” come that much sooner.”
“How can I reach an agreement with you? You’re forcing me to take part in something I find reprehensible! Things I’ve been opposed to my entire life!”
Lester couldn’t even contemplate the details. Mr. Aloirav was using his imagination so negatively. Thinking up ever better ways to create and implement newer more-devastating biological weapons. Dedicating brief periods to finding more horrible methods for their employment. What else could he accomplish? There wouldn’t be time to spare. It was all so obvious. Thoughts of more harmful new scourges strained Lester’s fragile mental-constitution. Such scenarios were more than his gentle spirit could accept. It boggled his mind, thinking how wrong his judgment was. He felt used and betrayed.
“I’m asking you to think hard about which course you choose,” the hotelier warned.
“I don’t need to think about it!”
“Yes, you do.” Mr. Aloirav replied, waiting to continue. “I intended to beat around the bush. Thought I’d go slow, try to make things more palatable for you. Then, right now seemed the best time to grapple with it. I tried putting myself in your position.”
“Sure you did!”
“I did. I thought. If I were Lester, what would happen to me, should I try to inform? Simple answer. I could experience major ridicule prior to an ignominious death. However, if I didn’t inform? I would have a chance to affect certain events. Stop some; advance others, by either opposing or cooperating with their instigator. I would not inevitably die knowing things might have been different, were I not so unyielding. How different? Respected, a new life, extremely successful, without having lost an opportunity to influence history. I know which way I’d go.”
“I’m sure you do.”
“Come on, Lester. Build the Pontibus, together with my organization and me. If we’re successful and provide habitats, it may, very well, change my plans. You may obviate the necessity of reducing the planetary population.”
“What do you mean?” Mr. Frye asked, feeling the blood leave his face.
“I mean I shall decimate global human numbers. Repetitively. Until they’re at a sustainable level. When necessary, I shall continue doing so. Unless…”
“Unless what?”
“The Pontibus is in place to carry them!”
“You’re stark raving mad!”
“Oh, I don’t think so. Not as often or as profoundly as you, anyway.”
“You’re a real bastard!”
“Thank you. I try. Which is more than I can say for you.”
“I do what I can that’s positive.”
“Which is virtually nothing!”
“Bullshit!”
“You call going off your rocker positive? If I hadn’t stopped you, a moment ago, you’d be dying right now for attempting to snitch on me. That’s doing what you can?”
“In part, yes.”
“Now you’re acting a pure fool,” he said, turning his back in disgust.
“Why, Rav?” Lester asked when calmer. “How…”
“I suppose I can’t expect you to understand, but I did so want you to. Please don’t think it’ll be easy or pleasant for me to kill you. I don’t know when or if we’ll see each other again. So goodbye, my friend.”
“Wait, Rav,” the terrified man replied. “Just be a little more patient. I’m trying to understand. I just need a little more time.”
“Time, I got, Lester.” The “boss” said, not turning around, holding his hand on the doorknob. “Patience for snitches, I don’t. The ball’s in your court. Convince me you’re out of my sphere of concern, and you’re home free. Fail to do so and…”
Not finishing his sentence, Mr. Aloirav opened the door. He walked out of the room leaving Lester bereft of breath.
With heart pounding and knees weak, Mr. Frye crumpled onto the bed. He maintained but a semblance of sitting. Small quivering waves inundated his body and then subsided. Lester was in no doubt that the hotelier meant what he said. How could you not take as serious, someone building biological weapons?
Reducing human population, to isolated individuals, was not impossible. Since the recurrent rocket & mortar attacks in Viet Nam, he couldn’t remember feeling so frightened.

He who longs to strengthen his spirit must go beyond obedience and respect. He will continue to honor some laws but he will mostly violate both law and custom. Cavafy

Chapter Thirty

Lester likened the human specie’s experience, taken in its entirety, to a horsehair rope. His analogy wove the braided fibers into a crescent shaped cord. Rope ends point in opposite directions. One terminus went upward towards collective aspirations, the mythical paradise. The other end pointed downward towards our origin, oblivion.
Straighter hairs tended to strengthen, curled ones thicken. Straights helped close the breach between paradise and oblivion. Curlies just supported the straight or took up space. Pointing toward paradise also, curlies first went in extraneous directions. He compared each individual to a hair.
Life’s mistakes caused the degree of curliness and off-course positioning. Kind beneficial lives tended to straighten and curlies did the opposite. Mr. Frye saw himself as a straight. Mr. Aloirav just now curled after admitting authorship of the New Society pamphlet. Until then they were soul mates, parallel straights.
Lester’s new feelings of ineptitude in judging character were indescribable. Personal fear now equaled dread for humanity. He never once doubted the hotelier’s ability to do that which he intended. The man’s prowess in both molecular biology and military strategy awed Mr. Frye. They’d known each other too long for mutual suspicions about technical capacity to surface.
Lester’s estimations of personal ineffectiveness exceeded his desire to cooperate in assaulting the criminal organization. He saw his shortcomings as precluding all possibilities of his alerting authorities. Nevertheless, he vacillated. The next moment his fears seemed but superfluous precautions, and Mr. Frye convinced himself to oppose them. How to go about undertaking such a responsibility, he wasn’t sure.
Lester hung around his tiny room for days, until the paralyzing fear dissipated somewhat. A week after the precipitating café conversation, he ventured into the lobby. Not being able to go right down and confront the enemy was bothersome. He felt humiliated, as does a child after a spanking by the father. The man found his ethical position embarrassing. In a quandary over what to do next, he saw Francis near the front desk. Aware the man might know everything about the situation, Mr. Frye walked over to him, anyway.
Summoning some courage, he said. “Hi, Francis. How’s it going?”
“Mr. Frye. Haven’t seen you for a while?”
“Staying pretty close to my room.”
“I see,” he responded with a knowing look, speaking volumes.
“I’m sure you do.”
“You got me in a lotta’ trouble, you know?”
“How?” Lester asked. “What did I do?”
“You bullshitted me about being in the “Group”,” the villain answered. “You knew you were doing it, too.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry.”
“So’m I. Teach me to take someone at face-value.”
Both men noticed the “boss” emerge from the laboratory stairwell door. He relieved the encounter’s awkwardness. Not at all wishing for a 2nd offense of talking, in flagrante delicto, Mr. Castle slipped away unnoticed.
Mr. Frye stood taller, as if ready to accept a blow. He waited for Mr. Aloirav to approach and said. “Good morning, Rav.”
“Good morning, Lester. Enjoying your day?”
“As much as can be expected, I suppose.”
“I’m glad,” the hotelier said, preparing to leave.
“Wait, Rav,” he pleaded. “We need to talk.”
“Yes, that’d be nice sometime,” the “boss” replied, leaving him without another word.
Rebuffed and further humiliated, Mr. Frye went back to his room. The next day, he determined to get an audience. Going down to the lobby, Lester discovered the laboratory stairwell door locked, as usual. Knocking twice, he was twice disappointed. Watching, he saw no one enter or leave, allowing him to slip past unnoticed. The following morning, the same thing happened. The afternoon found him reading, keeping a close watch on that door.
Mr. Aloirav appeared. Mr. Frye caught him and said. “Rav! Are you avoiding me or are we going to talk?”
“I’m busy, Lester. Maybe next month.”
“OK. I’ll be here.”
“Don’t bother me anymore.” The hotelier said, adding on the way out the door. “Until you’re asked, stay away.”
The message received was clear. Cajoling was over. Either Mr. Frye genuflected, or he died. No other alternatives or options were open. If Lester wanted to live, he would have a master.
The following month, his summons came. Bacon and Francis escorted the crestfallen gentleman down the stairs. They knocked and waited. Dismissing his minions outside the laboratory door, the “boss” ushered Mr. Frye into the inner sanctum. There, he motioned him to a chair.
Lester sat down, and Mr. Aloirav said. “I assume you’ve decided to join my organization?”
“Yes.” He responded, showing no surprise at the arrogance.
“Fine. When are you going to start work?”
“As soon as possible. If you’ll just show me where I’m to go, I’ll go there.”
“We’ll go there now together.”
Upon arrival at the warehouse, he showed Lester the comfortable apartment prepared, saying. “I trust it meets with your approval?”
“It does.” Mr. Frye said. “You were very sure I’d come around.”
“Yes, I was.”
Lester went to work. The “boss” came by at intervals, thereafter. He stayed a few minutes each time. Mr. Aloirav wasn’t so foolish as to believe coerced loyalty could ever match the true version. He knew gaining Lester’s heart was essential to calling him his own. Therefore, freedom would come with qualifications. Although the man wanted and needed to work alone, the solitude was draining. Mr. Frye’s remaining contact with humanity was just the “boss”. Reading fiction late into the evenings, Lester used his imagination to stave off the solitude.
Sitting at his warehouse workbench, he questioned himself one day. “Am I entering a crap game? Is it all so random? Is crazy God gambling with the Earth’s future? I’m supposed to sit aside and let His mindless humanity rule and ruin it? As either planetary life or a species, we’re doomed without intervention. Resource exhaustion, overpopulation, disease, nuclear technology…which one will slaughter planetary life is conjectural. It’s not hard to be a prophet-of-doom today. Failing to change things is even easier.”
After many months of isolation, Lester began resembling most long-term captives. He began identifying with his captors. Putting the final changes on another vertex-joint experiment, Mr. Frye rationalized.
“”Only an armed prophet will succeed”, according to Machiavelli. Accepting Rav and his New Society as my new family makes me so armed. Their money and resources, at my command, are powerful inducements. The means to achieve tremendous results are mine, if I stick with them. I’ll be prostituting myself in the process, selling my soul to the Devil. But, the end should justify sacrificing my misgivings. Who’s around now to feel any pain, because of me, if I fail? Nobody. There’s no one to care about me and my conscience but me.
Adjusting my morality now may achieve a great benefit for humankind and the planet. Through either sales or use of biological weapons, the “Group” will wreak havoc. I might obviate damage facilitated by them. Governments will create weapons anyway. There’s nothing I can do about those either. I’ll just be using the situation to create something beautiful while breaking down walls and borders. Rav did indeed save my life. He threatened me just to protect himself. There is a lot of good in his dream. We all live, feeling & causing pain. We all die and cease to feel. Suppose we come back? Shouldn’t we try to make the world a better place, while we’re here, to insure that if we do return, the world will be better for us? Is Rav behaving so much otherwise?”
He began looking forward to the hotelier’s short visits. The sentiment was not wasted, and the “boss’s” visit frequency increased. Mr. Frye’s renewed interest in life and conversation was noticeable. A few more months of sequestration went by. He longed for rapprochement.
Desirous of extending a visit, Lester asked. “Tell me, Rav. How’d you ever come to this point?”
“You mean, how did I ever get to be such a monster?”
“Please, Rav. You needn’t be so combative. I’m trying to understand you. You want me to become a real part of your organization, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’ve got to accept things within myself. Gaining your trust and my real freedom is my objective. You must know I can’t ever be trusted, unless the decision is mine. My integrity needs to embrace my behavior. If my actions dishonor me in my own eyes, how can you believe in my future loyalty?”
“You’re right, Lester. I’m sorry. I’ll tell you the story. Before doing so, however, I want to know if we can take another trip.”
“To where?”
“The Amazon River, near Macapa’.”
“Where I found the anti-aging apples?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s go. I’m sure I remember the spot.”
“I do if you don’t. I’ve made a number of them alone.”
They got a flight the same day. On planes and at times during the various subsequent voyages the hotelier told his strange tale. Swimming in the Amazon relaxed Lester in more ways than just the physical. After collecting a number of apples, the two men left the area. Numerous conversations occurred during the various voyages of which the following constitute a part:
“In 1967, Les, you and your friend, Mr. Otorp, were in Viet Nam, I believe. I was there too but also in Kenya, equatorial Africa.”
“Whatever were you doing there?”
“TAD (Temporarily Assigned Duty). Living with a Masai woman. My New Society story begins even earlier, though, in I Corps near Phu Bai.”
“That long ago?”
“Yes. One day, while reading a magazine, I got an idea for an educational organization.”
“A school?”
“Not exactly. I read these two articles. One was about deforestation and the other about the human immune system. My mind integrated the two. I thought it might be possible to aid the planet’s immune system, if it had one. Instruct it, analogous to a thymus gland or a spleen.”
“I don’t understand.”
“It seemed to me the human race was becoming a planetary disease. We were overwhelming the immune capacity of life on Earth. I felt a “calling” to help eradicate the plague.”
“Oh.”
“Ironic, isn’t it? Half the world starves to death. The other half spends its’ resources, wastes food, keeping people alive who should be dead.”
“And still we proliferate.”
“Yes. It’s even an unquestioned, unquestionable, part of our culture. Anyway. There was a shortage of combat-tested platoon sergeants in 1967. To induce us to extend our tours, the Marine Corps offered us an additional paid leave. You may remember. Those accepting the program got transportation paid to anywhere they wished in the “free” world. I visited Africa (TAD) in return for extending my stay in the combat zone for another 6 months.”
“I heard about it. Lots of guys went to Sweden.”
“Right. I chose Africa because of an ex-patriot French Foreign Legionnaire I knew. He and I were doing business in Hue’s black-market. The old guy told me the places to see there.”
“You were a criminal even way back then?”
Not believing the question deserved an answer; Mr. Aloirav just gave him an odd look and said. “In Kenya, when I wasn’t with a Masai woman, Elizabet’, near Arusha, I stayed at Hotel Pigalle, Nairobi. It was small but near the market. I liked the trading atmosphere, imagining Aladdin and Ali Baba nearby. The building was right around the corner from the city’s main thoroughfare, Government Road. I was having a good time fucking off, just like being on R & R (Rest & Recuperation). Same damned thing happened to me in Bangkok.”
“What?”
“My money ran out.”
“Mine too.”
They laughed and the hotelier continued. “I looked up a Pakistani friend of my French partner. The guy was right where he was supposed to be in Sofia Town. His gang had a neat thing going, smuggling Mercedes taxicabs. After stealing them from the Nairobi environs, they drove’em out the Leopoldville highway into Uganda. Hired “merc” (mercenary) escorts saw them into Congo diamond country. Once there, they traded the cars to local native chiefs for diamonds. Stones got smuggled out of Belgian mines in nigger anuses, wrapped in cigarette-pack cellophane.”
“How’d you discover all that?”
“I hired on as a merc.”
“You were a mercenary?”
“Yes. Is that so hard to believe? The world’s full of ‘em.”
“Not true.”
“You just don’t know how to call a turd a turd, Lester. There are two basic types of mercenaries. We pay one type for healing and one type for killing. There’s a lot of deception in both. The former takes his 30 pieces of silver for altruism and the latter for eschewing it. Both contemptible, hired healer and hired killer, I learned the error of my ways and quit. The world is still full of medical doctors.”
“Whatever.”
“Back then, Indian smugglers also needed mercs to man the 50-calibers on the way out of the bush. I got to know lot’sa native chiefs. In later years, I bought samples from them. While helping me advertise my subsequent antibiotic business, they assisted trial introductions unaware.”
Listening with rapt attention, Lester didn’t dare ask what the “samples” referred to were.
“One day, I was in an open-air café, next to my hotel. The house specialty was that Asian Indian dish, chapata. I was staring out at the park across the street. It was right after a short visit with the Kikuyu tribe. I needed recuperating from a bloody Congo run. Looking away from the park a second, I noticed a Pakistani eating chacula at a nearby table. What made me notice him was his half-assed attempt to attract my attention. He couldn’t have been a beggar. That particular café was much more expensive than other restaurants. He’d have to have money, eating there. I wanted to know what the guy wanted but didn’t need some fag bothering me. I asked the waiter, whose name was Rashid, to help.”
“Why ask the waiter? Why not ask him yourself?”
“I thought he’d speak Pakistani, and I couldn’t respond.” Mr. Aloirav explained. Mimicking the singsong English, he said. “Rashid says. “Oh no, Bwana Aloidav, he come in heah quite often. Not to woddy, he won’t ask you to bed him. He speak veddy good English.””
“What did he want?”
“Just to talk with me. So, we yakked awhile. The guy was boring. After a bit, I excused myself and went back up to my room at the Pigalle. Didn’t think much more about him until later that month. I was reclining on some skins with my Masai woman in her hut. She lived on Kenya’s Tanzania border in a tribal-village near Namanga River.
“What were you doing there?”
“Not a whole hell of a lot,” the “boss” answered, smiling in a dreamy nostalgic way. I lived in that particular kraal, off n’ on.”
“How old were you?”
Too young to care whether I got the “clap” or not. We were drinking pombe, a thirty-day-old fermented beverage. I noticed a fellow kept passing by our door. He was acting damn strange. I asked Elizabet’ what his problem was. She wasn’t real good at English personal pronouns.”
“What did she say?”
Mr. Aloirav mimicked the woman’s pigeon English-Swahili. “She said, “Her want talk wee you, Bwana Rav. Her come Arusha see you.””
“Did you talk with him?”
“Oh, yeah. The guy wanted me to talk with his master. I didn’t feel much like leaving Elizabet’ right then, but I did. Followed him to Arusha. Guess who his master was?”
“The guy you saw in Nairobi?”
“Damn straight.”
“What’d he want this time?”
“Me…to ding Jomo Kenyatta. Said an Asian group would pay me. They felt Kenyatta’s making Kenya safe for Kikuyu Mau Mau was sticking them with the bill. I agreed to do it for 20,000 pounds.”
“You did!?”
“Yeah. I was young and foolish in many ways. I wanted the excitement more’n the bucks.”
“On the edge.”
“You got it, Lester. I trust the force, giving me being, will protect my life as long as necessary.”
“But you didn’t do it.”
“Naw…never got the chance. Coupla’ nights later, back in Nairobi, Rashid comes to me. He says I gotta’ get outta’ the country PDQ. Kenyatta’s secret police were onto me.”
“That soon? Did you?”
“Hell yes. I was persona non-grata, and I didn’t know how far behind me they were. I swiped a Mercedes and high-tailed it otta’ there. In Kampala, I waited a few days to meet some Pakistanis. We went down to Entebbe. I met some more Asians, made some plans, and left. With my hot Mercedes, we all went into Katanga through Ruanda Burundi and Bukavu.”
“How’d you get back to the war?”
“Sold some of my diamonds and went to Dar es Salaam from Katanga through Bukavu. I stayed South of Lake Victoria, doing part by road and part by bush. Reached the coast, kept clear of Mombassa, and caught a Pan Am jet to the US. Returned to my unit. I was late – AWOL. They busted me. Never went back to Nairobi.”
“How’d you get to be a scientist?”
“I read some biochemistry books.”
“That’s it!?”
“Yah. Did a lotta’ reading, technical papers. Beyond being a Marine and “saving the world for democracy”, I felt unfulfilled. I wanted to do something to relieve suffering.”
Lester sympathized with the desire to relieve suffering. He could not understand what caused such latter distancing from these admirable former sentiments. His perplexity was understandable, and he wondered.
“Going from a person who could harbor kind feelings to one who is a mass-murderer is quite a jump. How does one, concealing in desire and deed the killing of countless people, change so? Maybe there was no transition and both sentiments reside in a schizoid personality. Perhaps the entity is a living paradox and sees something others don’t. It’s an enigma. Not just some pathetic miscreant, he never epitomized, to me, an amoral presence.”
Returning from the Amazon trip, Mr. Aloirav saw Lester settled in again at his warehouse laboratory. Until their next conversation, Lester mused on his situation and dispute with the “boss”, asking himself. “Is Natural “Love” congruent with the whole social concept of “Evil”? Is conflict Nature’s way of enforcing compliance with some heretofore-unknown principle? Does the principle bring differing-interfering DNA into ever closer-centered spheres of conforming-sympathetic DNA? Is growth of biomass then the one true “Law of God” or is diversity of paramount importance? Is man’s position to become penultimate as custodian?”
Re-convinced of custodianship’s desirability, he thought. “The planet will be a very dreary place indeed, if man alone exists. Who would choose to live, having but the barest minimum of species extant? Just a few animals, for personal needs, is so sterile sounding? Stability lies with stewardship of as much diversity as possible. If man’s efforts don’t aim there, Nature will destroy him. As scary as Rav is, perhaps he isn’t as far off base as I thought.”
The next conversation between the two men took place a few days after their return from the jungle. The apparent inconsistency in some of Mr. Aloirav’s recollections made Mr. Frye ask. “You said the human race was a blight on the planet. You felt a “calling” to diminish it. Yet you also want to relieve human suffering. Don’t you find that paradoxical, just a tad inconsistent?”
“I don’t remember ever saying that I wanted to relieve human suffering. I wanted to mitigate pain but not necessarily human pain. Besides, killing, done right, doesn’t cause much anguish.”
“It causes enough. Death causes incredible suffering in the minds and hearts of loved ones?”
“Ya’ got me there, Lester. But all people die, in time.”
“How’d you get started in business?” He asked, changing the subject to protect his self-respect.
“I wasn’t as poor after Viet Nam as were you or most ex-enlisted men. The black-market was good to me. In this country, I needed to prevent the appearance of having “no visible means of support”. It’s a flag. Cops like to bust. Until “finding” evidence, the public serpents charge their victims with that to make allegations stick. So, I worked here and there to gain biochemistry experience. Books & science papers were small change. My original plan was the entire apprenticing route to a Ph.D. As a graduate student, I would do the professors’ research but learn too. Things got in the way.”
“Like a family.”
“Yah, among others. Self-employment was just a matter of course. My war wounds didn’t permit me steady work.”
“What’d you do?”
“Came here. My parents moved to Grand Rapids when I was 12. It’s more r’ less my hometown. Figured I could best succeed in familiar surroundings. I put small down payments on run-down local real estate and fixed it up. Whenever possible, I acquired chemicals to accompany bits and pieces of pharmaceutical equipment I found. There’s lots’a both around, if you can link your eyes to good deals. University waste is phenomenal.”
“That’s true. I acquired a great deal of both as surplus too.”
“It seemed foolish to “borrow” chemicals and equipment from various locales. Incurring all the uncomfortable questions incidental to that scene wasn’t attractive. After a while I had no more time to watch for surplus stuff, and I started buying. After a while, my garage laboratory became equipped enough to do some rudimentary chemistry. I started manufacturing antibiotics.”
“How’d you do that without a degree?”
“It’s simple chemistry. Published stuff. Degrees are just status symbols, Les. They carry no de facto weight. Credentials for employment. I didn’t want to be somebody’s slave. I couldn’t sell my products here without other credentials, but I had contacts in Africa.”
“Pharmacists?”
“Oh, no. Native chiefs. They introduced me to others. Tribes and villages all over equatorial Africa used injectionists. There was quite a black-market for medical stuff. I sold them my bioproducts and acted as middleman for syringes, needles, etc.”
“You re-invested your profits in your lab?”
“Yah. What I received here and there kept me going. My real estate rents made my land-contract payments. Mortgaging the equity, I learned maintenance as I went along. Some creative deals with short-term financing, and I was soon secure.”
“When did you get into doing your own research?”
“Right away. I needed quite a bit of cash for travel and chemicals. My black-market savings were drying up. My white diamonds were long gone. So, my first efforts were to cut costs. I directed them into increasing various antibiotic yields. That meant collecting scientific papers to read up on mutagenesis. Acridine dyes, UV radiation, nitrosoguanidine and such methods monopolized my interests for months. The other research techniques I knew back then were electrophoresis and density-gradient centrifugation.”
“Did you have to build your own apparatus, like I did?”
“No, by then I was buying everything. Being weak in molecular biology theory, all my energy went into educating myself. I kept up with most of the new developments in the field. Still wanted to heed my “calling”. During one of my business trips to the Congo, I met a missionary quack. He showed me how to discriminate between Simian Hemorrhagic Fever (SHF) and malaria.”
“Quack?”
“Yeah. A doctor, physician, drug-technician, false-hope merchant.”
“Oh.”
“Once I could diagnose the difference, I knew what to do.”
“The difference?”
“Between diseases.”
“Oh.”
“I wanted to create an aerosol-transmitted SHF with a case: infection ratio of one.
“Really? Was that your first biological agent?”
“No. My first was plebian & serendipitous. A meningococcus Type C contaminant got into one of my beta-lactam bioreactors. After extracting the culprit, I had a powerful beta-lactamase producing Type C. It was the first one I was able to produce in large quantities. I introduced it later than my other creations, though. Didn’t do anything with it for a long time.”
“Why not?”
“Interesting question. In late 1971, I was thinking of doing business in South America. During a trip to Sao Paulo, Brazil, I discovered an identical bug. The effects were impressive. It caused a few hundred deaths. The bug never made a visible dent in the Brazilian population. In 1973, I found a beta-lactamase producing Type A there, but it reverted to antibiotic sensitive. The Type C’s were pretty much the same “bugs”. Slight sequence differences, but the serotypes were identical. No question it was human produced. Aware of maybe needing to live in Brazil someday, I held my bug back. That country didn’t have sequencing capacity then. I didn’t want to damage my possibilities in the eventuality something went bad here.”
“What was the first microbe you introduced?”
“A simian virus. I distributed it around Africa’s Lake Victoria via a few vials of penicillin.”
“Why?”
“I needed to know if it would work.”
“No one asked questions, when your medicine recipients got sick?”
“No. A black life in Equatorial Africa, back then, was worth about as much as a cigarette. That is, if the tobacco was roasted.”
“I’ll suspend judgment on the morality of what you did. How does one go about making a virus stronger than Nature does?”
“I don’t think you can,” the “boss” responded, ignoring the condescension. “To be accurate, Lester, the actual difficulty lies in making it weaker. In time, strong microbes adapt well to co-existence with their host, causing few ill effects. Killing the host is counter-productive. What’s necessary is to debilitate an organism. The ticket to high virulence is diminishing the bug’s selective advantage over time. To do that you need to protect it from its enemies.”
“Other microbes?”
“Yes. And the human immune system.”
“I never thought of it that way. It doesn’t seem like it should be so hard to do.”
“Well, it was, and it wasn’t. You must remember. Molecular biology wasn’t much of a science in the late ’60’s. Most of the sophisticated cloning techniques didn’t exist yet. They sure weren’t published, or I’d’a read about ‘em. My expertise grew right along with the science. The initial agents I found to begin my work were particles I couldn’t even identify. Using my own crude tissue-culture methods, I accumulated a few useful “bugs”. I learned later, after acquiring some manipulative techniques, how to characterize them. Some of my initial viral constructs were similar to the Human T-cell Lymphotrophic Viruses. I’ve played with them since then, adding and subtracting DNA. I put in some c-myb DNA here or substituted an LTR (Long Terminal Repeat) there. I now add transposons, site-specifically, or let other interesting inducible oligonucleotides pop in at random. But I was working almost blind back then.”
“I see. Why the need to “play” with them? Couldn’t you just find a system that worked and stick with that?”
“Gotta’ be creative, keep the epidemiologists chasing their tails. If the disease detectives ever get to the point source of one of my “little dudes”, they’ll bust me. It’d happen just as fast as it would for any other damn legal infraction. That’ll stop my disease flat. Without knowing the origin, CDC, WHO (World Health Organization), or GTF (Group de Travail Francais) are stumped. Even critics like Institut Pasteur or Fort Detrick can’t predict the “bug’s” future without that info. One way to obviate the eventuality of them discovering it is by not fucking with everything. Ya’ can’t mess with the ENV (antigenic moiety) too much or tinker with the LTR. Screwing up the “bug’s” ability to change its ponchos on the immune system is prohibido.”
“Why’d you have to experiment with real people? Couldn’t you just experiment on HeLa cells or fibroblasts?”
“I needed to test for safety and efficacy.” The hotelier answered, (as if preparing a new drug for market). “You must know that. The FDA (Food & Drug Administration) requires it. Should I be any less thorough than the damn government?”
“I guess not.”
“Never be weaker than your competition, Les. Just appear so.”
“I just can’t get over the fact that it’s murder.”
“So was Viet Nam.”
“That was different.”
“Was it!? You can climb down from Olympus any time now, Lester! How many hundreds of thousands of women and children didn’t your great republican President slaughter in Iraq? How many are your leaders starving to death right now? I don’t kill babies just to save a few oil pennies and keep my crooked kids names out of the papers. I’ve got a stronger sense of responsibility than that!”
“He was your President too, don’t forget, and it was War.”
“So what?! That sanctifies it? That makes all the difference? Because a mindless manipulated brute pol, bought by Khazar gold, elected by shorn sheep, says it’s necessary?”
“In part, yes.”
“It’s subjective, and you know it!”
“Perhaps. Nevertheless, I don’t want any part of it. If I work here, I work alone. There must be some way I can keep separate from the rest of your “Group”.”
“I don’t know yet. I’m breaking new ground with you.”
So why’d you go all the way to Africa to test?” He asked, changing the subject after failing to extract any concessions out of his new “sovereign”. “Couldn’t you do it closer to home?”
“Africa was better for many reasons. Like South America, it had no law. My commercial business was there. I could acquire raw materials for further experimentation. I brought back human blood, monkeys, and tissue samples, while transporting antibiotics and viruses. Half the time I didn’t even need to smuggle.”
“Wasn’t blood difficult to acquire?”
“Not at first. Missionaries conditioned sick Africans into seeing white men as benign. Pavlovian. Thinking I was trying to cure them, they gave me all the body fluids I wanted.”
“It didn’t bother you to kill people not harming you in any way?”
“I remember staying at a hotel once in Kenya near the Kiliguni. The management had taken pelts of near-extinct hyraxes and ordered them sewn them together as bedspreads. Obscene, isn’t it?”
“Yes. But you didn’t answer my question.”
“Yes, I did… Getting on with my story…After a few years of Jomo Kenyatta, black Africans became worth more. By the time I needed a lot of blood, it was no longer cheap. I had to catch and drain ’em on the qui vive. Viet Nam gave me the necessary experience to do it quite well.”
“You’re not making this easy.”
“Why should I?”
“Why didn’t you use dated Red Cross blood bank supplies?”
“I didn’t need the scrutiny, and I thought using blood from endemic areas would be more cost-effective.”
“What did you do with it?”
“I got the essential viral particles. At first, I grew different diseases in green-monkey primary-tissue-culture.”
Familiar with tissue culture from his Maloney Leukemia Virus work at MIT, Mr. Frye questioned. “That was a long time ago. Did they have commercial fetal-bovine-serum back then?”
“I don’t really know, Lester. I didn’t explore that avenue. When I didn’t have enough nigger blood, I went to abattoirs or killed goats myself, drained the blood, and let it coagulate. The filter-pressed serum worked fine.”
“Did you get human tissue for cell culture, too?”
“That’s another story. As I was telling you, African blood got expensive. Until ready to test my constructs, I didn’t have that much more use for it. Using human diseased tissue or viruses made me apprehensive. I wasn’t sure of my immune sufficiency. I started a crude, blanket-protection program for myself against all my viruses. Those the green monkeys were shedding were first on my list. I didn’t want to contract some fatal zoonosis. An easy risk to lose, injecting oneself with diseased cell-culture supernatants.”
“So what else did you do to protect yourself?” Lester queried, intrigued to learn about the man’s prophylactic procedures.
“For bacterial diseases, it was traditional formalin. Published stuff. For the viruses, it became an art. I injected myself with Freund’s adjuvant and serum to start. Kept adding greater concentrations of attenuated diseased cell-culture supernatants. Later, I started introducing primary African blood cells, abortion clinic gleanings, and even my own sperm into the dishes. That created zoonoses of my own choosing.”
“How did you manage that?”
“Come on, Lester,” the hotelier said in a mock seriousness. “Even you must know how to do that?”
“I don’t mean that!”
“I know what you meant,” the “boss” said, laughing. “Just yanking your chain. I co-cultivated monkey cells with African cells, fetal cells, or my sperm in goat serum in the presence of a mutagenic cocktail. Used an acridine dye. Upon rampant cell death, I collected the supernatant and transfected more cells. It was tough, insuring no bacterial or Mycoplasma contamination or even immune reactions against my own sperm. I collected enough dialysate to immunize myself after the fifth transfection and at every subsequent step. Then I grew up large quantities for field trials. Animals work better for that. I stored lyophilized supernatants away for future vaccine-production.”
“I didn’t know that would work. Did you ever get sick from it?”
“Did I!? Once I got so sick, thought I was gonna’ croak. Didn’t go home for days. After recovering, I changed my protocol for attenuating that particular immunogen. I didn’t want my “Group” getting that sick.”
“How often did you go to Africa?”
“Less and less. My real estate business kept me in Grand Rapids a great deal. When the powerful recombinant DNA techniques became available, I spent time learning them. I almost never went out into the field, myself, after 1975. I dispensed with personal African travels. I made a trip in 1976 to test a delivery method. I wanted to see how polyacrylamide-microencapsulation worked with one of my agents. I went to the Sudan in the spring and Zaire in the summer of that year. I haven’t been back to Africa since. I learned a lot on those trips.”
“How’s that?”
“The success of microencapsulating is indisputable. It protects agents and allows accurate scheduling of disease introduction. Aerial introduction contains definite opportunities as well as special hazards.”
“They are?”
“Point source exposure, for one. A technique where you’d think it would be the least of your worries. Turns out to be a nightmare. Minor exposure can be concentrated and accentuated, but it also focuses attention on the “little dudes”.”
“In what way?”
“Damn Bible-banger clinics. God mongers bring the diseased together instead of allowing the infected to die in their hooches. Kills more. Hospitals are nothing but dens of death.”
“Isn’t that what you want?”
“Ultimately, yes. Not right now. They attract attention to the epidemic’s epicenter.”
“And disease detectives?”
“You got it.”
“I see. So the other “Group” members do all the dirty work now?”
“Pretty much. I started acquiring technicians in the seventies. I screened ex-cons and embittered Viet Nam veterans. A small percentage are excellent sources of ideas and improvisation, they do my introductions now.”
“So you have plenty of time to do “research”.” Mr. Frye said with undetectable disdain.
“Right. Time to dabble in the intricate topology of DNA. I can experiment on developing advanced methods of tissue culture too. Some neat tricks come out.” Leaning forward, the “boss” said. “I found a way to hook toxin genes to resistance plasmids. These things are like cluster bombs. They bite hard. If not killing outright, they drive the immune system to misfire, until the host expires.”
“Do you think you could show me sometime how to do the connecting? I can use such a technique, when I work on calein again.”
“Sure.”
“Your work sounds like an overall success story.”
“Well, it wasn’t,” Mr. Aloirav disagreed, shaking his head. “I can’t begin to tell you about all the failures. I wasted weeks attempting to transfer viral (plasmid) DNA responsible for botulin, the botulism neurotoxin. I wanted Clostridium botulinum toxin expression in a retrovirus. Still haven’t succeeded in that. One day, I was working with rabies virus and stockpiling Bacillus anthracis spores. Made a big mistake. Cost myself a week’s work. Cleaning that up, I serendipitously discovered how to associate fragments of toxin DNA with bacterial episomal elements. It was by accident, but who cares? No, I failed a lot, Les. I didn’t need to publicize the instances or worry about someone scooping me, though. So, I never lost a beat. The turning point came when my experiments joining assorted vectors with Aspergillus flavus’ DNA paid off. When within-host expression occurs from these aflatoxin genes, it’s curtains. 10ugs/kgm of the toxin will destroy crucial human cells. Results are immediate. Death comes in 14-28 hours, without fail. The best part is, it appears to be just the result of a simple disease. It looks like a common cold, gone wild.”
“That’s a powerful toxin.”
“Sure is!” The hotelier agreed, buoyed by the admiration. “I’ve since been able to integrate other toxin cistrons (genes). I’ve got Death Angels Amanita phalloides, verna, virosa and Castor bean Ricinus communis in bacteria. Belladonna, poison hemlock Conium maculatum, some ferns, and a few Gonyaulaux dinoflagellates are in my viruses. Getting the bacteria associated with representatives of all the major antibiotic resistance groups was crucial. When accomplished, I had a very powerful arsenal at my disposal. Well on the way. These “bugs” won’t be surviving long in open competition with co-existing commensals, but so what? I didn’t design them for longevity but for rapid killing. What do I care if they survive or not afterwards? Better that they don’t. I added another supertoxic shellfish-toxin gene to my repertoire just last month. Oral doses of purified expressed toxin are lethal at around 1 microgram/kilogram of body weight. When my new “bug” expresses, its effects do not attenuate from that figure. Paralysis comes in 3 hours, death in 5. Pretty neat, hunh?”
“As I said. I’m suspending discussion of its morality. I trust you will never have me do any “introductions”?”
“No. I believe in people’s natural differing proclivities. The “Group” allows those with particular prowess in certain areas to demonstrate those specialties. Some would be inept at germ introductions. I use them in different positions.”
“Like research?”
“Yes. Like Francis, Les…”
“You’re making up death lists…”
“Some are couriers, transporting completed vectors to different storage areas.” He replied, ignoring him.
“How is that done?”
“I put clones of my bacteria and viruses in liquid Nitrogen. Unattended Revcos (ultra-cold freezers) in universities and corporations around the country become unwitting recipients.”
“There’s room?”
“They’re not packed as tight as bodies in a Valladolid cemetery. People seldom clean or take inventory of freezer contents. I do monitor them. So far, my “bugs” have been safe. Some have been stored unmolested for years. I have multiple reserve copies of everything in artic ice.”
“The problems and their solutions all seem to have been clear to you. Other than the moral aspects, I can even sympathize to a certain extent.”
“My morality is personal. I don´t understand how an intelligent person can buy into outdated values.”
Didn’t you have to overcome plateaus, though, to accomplish all you did? Or was it all just good days and bad days?”
“I did have plateaus. What can I say? My successful work didn’t become consistent until ’74. When the newer recombinant-DNA techniques appeared, I used them as fast as the authors published them. By then, it wasn’t just I. I had lab assistants. Once trained, I sent them to various labs around the world to steal information I needed. “Club” members began doing actual trial introductions.”
“Such as?”
“Some of the “Group” are homo & hetero-sexual. I believe they’re called bisexual. “Prison does it to people, so I accept them. (I don’t allow natural fags in the organization.) Anyway, they were familiar with acquiring live Haitian’s cheap. We tried anal introduction rather than staying fixed on A&A (aspiration and alimentation).”
“You make it sound as though you were buying guinea pigs!” Lester said in quasi-horror, fearing to hear the repulsive positive answer.
“Yes.” The hotelier said, prepared for the repugnance his answer generated. Leaving Mr. Frye no room to ensconce himself away from the gravity of complicity, he continued. “We infected a few and watched to see how long they took to die.”
“Cold-blooded murder!” Lester exclaimed with unconcealed revulsion.
“Of course,” the “boss” replied, exposing Mr. Frye’s mental blocking. “So what? I paid them to die. Don’t tell me you were thinking my native Africans weren’t likewise murdered? A serial killer should be enthralled by some bourgeoisie sense of morality?”
“I…I guess not.” He said, seeing the nightmare realm about to encompass him.
“You think it barbaric… procuring human beings for experimentation. Like Balb/c mice bought from Charles River Labs. It’s saved many families from a fate, they themselves considered, worse than death.”
“That sanctions your amorality?” Lester questioned with surprising candor to the other’s shrugged shoulders.
He felt strange. Native Africans were of similar racial stock to Haitians. Yet, their dying from the same causes didn’t elicit a commensurate shock within him. Mr. Frye grew up in a country, permitting slavery, but behind facades. The media was always there to smooth over rough spots. He wasn’t prepared to accept such a blatant state of affairs. Quasi-legitimization through the U.S. socialistic system made it more graphic. Failing to proscribe the Law of Supply and Demand, regarding Homo sapiens, was unthinkable to him. Human beings don’t look like widgets. Lester found the treatment incongruity an unacceptable premise.
“You bought human beings.” He mumbled, shaking his head. Appalled at his own acquiescence in such behavior, Mr. Frye squelched self-flagellation and asked unabashedly. “Was the anal introduction more successful?”
“No. Those agents apparently deteriorated into unbearable slowness as did the earlier African introductions.”
“Apparently?”
“From what I’ve read.”
“Did it take long to find out what was happening to retard it?”
“Yes and no. My original biological agent was powerful. The human trials were smashing successes. From what I’ve read, however, the immune system and virus must have accommodated each other. The understanding reached was very good, for both to survive so long. Sequential changes of HLA’s (human leukocyte antigens) are necessary. The original host’s sexual partners must acclimate the virus to make it ever less virulent.” The “boss” sat, shaking his head before continuing. “The knowledge was a great disappointment. Massive destruction occurred with the prototypes, as in my tissue culture. Cellular demise was rapid and thorough.” Mr. Aloirav looked him in the eye and said. “I heard about some cases in the 1980’s. They took as long as five or six years from exposure to final death throes. With such characteristics, it’s useless as a strategic biological weapon.”
“What did you do about it?”
“Worked on it!” He responded. “The mistake was in placement of the antigen-inducible transposon. By 1976, I had quicker and better ones to use on individuals or on whole populations. I built a rabies variant that gave 80% fatalities…I put my signature on that one.”
“You did?”
“Yah, I’m kind of a shepherd to the flock, don’t you think, Lester?”
Mr. Frye didn’t understand what the question meant but felt the inability to answer fortunate. He didn’t want to feed some perverse vanity that might be lurking there.
Instead, Lester asked. “How do you know it gives 80% fatalities?”
Disappointed with the response but replying with apparent nonchalance, the hotelier said. “Reports had it appearing as though the body experienced liquefaction. A “meltdown”. Clots and bleeding appeared with no apparent order to the process and at every conceivable orifice. Eyes, ears, mouth, even pores etc. looked sanguinolent. Starting with headaches, rashes, and high fever, it progressed fast to uncontrolled hemorrhage. Thrombi showed up at every opening. Black vomitus and death followed thereafter. Took less’n two weeks. A test in 1995 brought down hundreds with 10 initial particles. Spread like wildfire.”
A very pregnant silence followed the last description, until Mr. Frye broke it, asking. “I…don’t understand…how were you able to assess…the mortality?”
“You mean besides asking the African quacks?”
“Oh. That answers my question.” Lester said, and the “boss” nodded his acknowledgement. He continued. “The truth, Rav. What made you do all this?”
“Lester, Lester, Lester, there you go again. I don’t know why you persist in finding my dedication so hard to understand. I’m introducing a completely new generational concept in war, the creation and management of mega death. Haven’t I always accepted your devotion to the Pontibus, even when it bordered on fanaticism? Why should you treat me any different? The planet has AIDS, Les. Humans are HTLVIII! I’m a T-cell, creating a healthier immune system for life on Earth. I encourage and enable the living land, water, and sky to fight for their right to exist. You’re watching the completion of an epic poem, a Nibelungenlied. Enjoy it!”
Without taking the behest to join in the Schadenfreude, Mr. Frye changed the subject, replying. “I saw no Level 4 or 5 containment facilities in your lab, no negative pressure locks. How do you protect yourself along the way? Hemorrhagic viruses are too contagious and deadly to dispense with such precautions.”
“Bleach, UV and vaccines,” Mr. Aloirav answered, showing displeasure at his recalcitrance.
“Only that?!”
“At every step, each DNA manipulation, I re-immunized myself. If I did not do so, I could not have succeeded. Without such safety measures I’d have succumbed long ago.”
“I should think so!”
“It would have been too hard accepting such sophisticated equipment here without arousing suspicion. As it was, I brought in most equipment disguised as refrigerators and ovens.”
“You have vaccines for all your constructs?” Lester asked, manifesting some incredulity.
“For all the human agents, not for all the food-animal viruses.” He replied. “No military biological attack is complete without a concomitant assault on people’s flesh-eating characteristics. One must break the back of resistance. Since I don’t eat meat, I didn’t waste resources developing ruminant or poultry vaccines.”
“How did you ever build vaccines for the others so fast?”
“I can’t give you that information, Lester. It would take excessively long. Sorry.”
“Have you discovered everything you wanted to know, yet?” He questioned, with ever-so-slight but audible condescension.
“No. What I have learned came very slowly & with great risk.” The “boss” responded, pretending not to hear the patronization. “I sometimes marvel I didn’t kill myself in the attempt.”
“I’m sure.”
“In a way though, I guess I did do exactly that.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Personal identification, Les.” The “boss” said quietly. “One who accepts responsibility, as great as mine, does not redefine oneself easily, nor just mentally. Changes are imperceptible spiritually, genetically… Lamar…” He faltered but, slapping his knees and rising, continued. “Gotta’ leave now.”
“Please do.” Lester said, aware of exacerbating a growing animosity.
Pausing before walking out the door, Mr. Aloirav asked. “Before leaving, I’ve got a question of my own. Are you familiar with apoptosis?”
“You mean the programmed cellular-death gene?”
“That’s the one. I think that was my greatest hurdle to date.”
“How?”
“Getting my vectors with simian receptor homology in the right sequence with it. The difficulties encountered took the most time to surmount. The isolates it’s now in, however, are quite lethal.”
“That’s not hard to believe,” Mr. Frye said without enthusiasm.
“Discovering one of the main genetic connections between life and death was intriguing. It proved axiomatic for me.”
“How’s that?”
“There’s a greater nexus between the same two phenomenon in Society as a whole. That association is proving very hard for you to assimilate.” The “boss” said, walking out the door, expecting no reply.

We work in the dark – we do what we can – we give what we have. Our doubt is our passion, and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art. James

Chapter Thirty-One

Mr. Aloirav felt certain necessary milestones were nearing completion. His cataloged stock of biological weapons and their protective vaccines was large. Viral clones with host cell cultures were in glycerol or DMSO (DiMethylSulfOxide) suspension. Their containers bathed in liquid-Nitrogen. He could use or accumulate further resources with them as desired. He never wanted for opportunities to practice with their capacities.
Leaving the warehouse and Lester, one day, the hotelier went back to the hotel reminiscing. His mind fixed on all the time spent learning to construct his various organisms. Just getting the tyrosine kinase gene into one was a real trial. Developing a malignancy-at-will disease was the goal. He discovered that gene to be the wrong one for his purposes. It hurt. Then, his most effective organism reverted or seemed to revert. That lesson was also bitter. After multiple successes, the twin setbacks were disconcerting.
Second thoughts about the negative aspects of the reverting virus were growing in his mind, however. Entering the hotel apartment, shared with Gloria, the “boss’s” mind went back to late March 1995. He remembered rushing into that same room shouting.

“Gloria! Where are you? Gloria!”
Having just stepped out of the shower, she answered while toweling. “Here. In the bathroom. What’s the trouble?”
“Guess what Bacon just told me he saw on the 21st?” Mr. Aloirav replied, rushing into the bathroom and grabbing the naked woman.
“What?” She asked, extricating herself slowly from his arms.
“The program “60 minutes”?” He queried.
“Yah..?”
“He said the newscaster reported there was a guy in England died of an AIDS-like disease.”
“And?”
“He was exposed to it in 1957.”
“So?” Ms. Gold questioned, rubbing her hair. “It takes a long time to go with that disease. You know that. What’s so special about him?”
“He died in 1959!” The “boss” exclaimed.
Why the time of death was so wonderful, she would have no possible idea. He was as unappreciative of that fact as she was of his. “Two years! Isn’t that great?”
“I still don’t get it. Your first was better than that. I’ve heard you say, many times, it took weeks.”
“It’s true, but they found a virus similar to mine in his tissues!”
“I guess I don’t understand the significance. If you say it’s great, I guess it is. But, you weren’t even in the picture back then. Unless you’re a lot older than you look.”
“Don’t you see? I thought I’d messed up, somehow.”
“In what way?”
“My “little dude” got real slow. I thought because I’d underestimated the canalization capacity.”
“But you didn’t?” She tendered; still not understanding any significance attached to the new development.
“No! I did not misjudge the tendencies of the virus. I was right on the mark. It needed to subordinate virtually all activity toward maintaining a viable host.”
“Why?”
“Maximum amplification. The virus needs to keep the victim alive as long as possible. Not just to grow and replicate itself but to infect other members of the population. Perpetuity is the whole reason behind lysogeny.”
“Lysogeny?”
“Lysogeny is when viruses sneak into bacterial DNA molecules “integrate” and hide there. Instead of killing at the moment, they use the bacteria. The virus fools the larger microbe into thinking it’s normal bacterial DNA. The two allow each other to live, incestuously. The host replicates viral DNA right along with its own. Sometimes the virus gets to liking it there, staying a long time. It continues putting a clone of itself in each bacterial daughter cell. Sometimes it gets scared, due to an environmental stress, and jumps out. When that happens, it blows up the host. But, not before making a hundred copies or so of itself, using bacterial machinery. These progeny go looking for new bacteria to invade and repeat the process.”
“Like pac-man.”
“Yah.”
“What’s this about “integrating for incest” again?” She asked, sensitized to the racial connotations.
“Integration, in the DNA sense, is one of Nature’s methods for genetically engineering evolution. Even human evolution has its examples. Understand?”
“A little, I guess.”
“Anyway, I thought I’d taken care of those things, when I built my first retroviral agent. Then it slowed down. Death started taking years from where it was just weeks. I thought I’d screwed up.”
“Now you really lost me. If you were right, then why didn’t you account for it enough, so it wouldn’t happen? You’re saying you did or…didn’t?”
“No, no, no! This guy took two years, exposure to death. That means homologs are out there.”
“Homo…who?”
“Homologs. Similar “bug’s. They might have deletions or additions in the “env” or “gag” region. If so, when complementing mine, the mutation could slow it down.”
“Not much of a compliment,” Ms. Gold joked.
“Ha, ha,” he responded. “It’s either that or the “bug’s” have other agendas. Schedules that cause spontaneous loss of “env and gag” fragments from their genome all the time. Changing the program, the way I did, was the answer.”
“But you knew that all along, didn’t you?” She asked, unafraid of flattering him, throwing the towel in the hamper.
“No.” Mr. Aloirav replied, admiring what stood before him. “I hoped what I did would work without too much spontaneous reversion. I wasn’t sure, until now. Two years is excessively slow for a strike weapon. Mine might still be useful. It’s not necessarily the cause of delayed deaths in my targets. It could be that my virus has been so compromised that it has turned into a necessary but insufficient cause of the disease I wanted to develop. Even so slowed, though, it could still be of advantage. ”
“Are you finished?”
“Yah, why?”
“You’re standing in front of my clothes. Can I get dressed now?”
“No.”

Leaving the apartment now, years later, the “boss” went to meet with some members of his “Group” thinking. “Two years is indeed too slow. But, it isn’t all bad. Even longer periods, before ultimate death, help. My vectors already stress population numerical viability. From years to months to days to hours, they continue improving. Soon the word “lentivirus” will mean rapid virus instead of slow virus.”
The hotelier finished his “Club” business a few hours later. He arranged his schedule to accommodate meeting with Lester again the following day. Then the “boss” went home to his legal wife and unmarried son. Ms. Gold was out West with Jason. They were returning him to his graduate work at Stanford.
Motoring out to Cascade, the “boss” pondered Lester’s intransigence. Such independence contained both negative and positive aspects. They both knew that. Unwilling to break Mr. Frye’s fragile spirit, Mr. Aloirav also wanted the present situation to end. Hoping it soon would, he turned into the oval driveway on the Thornapple River home.
The hotelier parked the car near the fountain instead of in the garage. He never knew when leaving fast might become necessary. Before disembarking, the “boss” prepared himself for entering the beautiful riparian mansion. It always took courage to do so.
Inside, he needed to face an unhappy woman. Although, she had everything money could buy, it made no difference. Many years ago, Mrs. Aloirav learned about Gloria, and it ended peace forever. His legal wife always used sex as a weapon against him, and he retaliated using the same tactic. Sex as a weapon is a two-edged sword and easily wounds its wielder.
Mrs. Aloirav couldn’t have thought much of her marriage. If she did, she never would have picked up the weapon, considering its risks. At that time, Mr. Aloirav still might have been able to give Gloria up. His marriage would have been damaged but salvageable. The “boss” remembered how the following conversation forestalled that possibility forever:

“…The cop said yer’ fuckin’ a nigger wench! Is it true?”
“No.”
“Why would the cop lie?”
“That’s his job! He’s a cop! They’re like lawyers, priests, and shit.”
“I don’t believe you. It’s true, Rav, isn’t it?”
“No.”
“Why? Rav.”
“Don’t you think it a little strange? A cop calls you outta’ nowhere ta tell ya’ yer’ husband’s cheatin’ on ya’?”
“It’s true. I can see it in your eyes. I know we haven’t been getting along. Couldn’t you at least have found a white girl?” The “boss” said nothing, so his wife continued. “Can’t you see how that makes me look? My husband’s mistress…black.”
“I guess I can’t. I don’t understand. What difference does it make?”
What difference does it make!? They’re at least one standard deviation down from normal intelligence. Suppose she got pregnant?” The “boss” just shrugged his shoulders. The woman pressed. “You’d have contaminated your blood. Doesn’t that bother you?”
“How?”
“Have you no sense of racial purity?”
“You’ve got to be kidding?!”
“I am not! Do you think I’d ever let one touch me?”
“Don’t know. Would you?”
“My family is pure Castilian Spanish.” The brown-eyed woman shouted. “Generations of pure blood. I would never do such a thing!”
“You poor dear. Those brown eyes of yours didn’t come from “pure” Gothic forebears, and you forgot to check my racial provenance. Your son is part black, lady.”
“I’m not in the mood for jokes, Rav. It’s not funny. Yer’ pretty damn one-way.”
“I’m not joking. I’m an octoroon. My great grandmother was a Moroccan pied noir.
“Rav. Please. You’ve already ruined our marriage. Don’t destroy my life too.”
“I can’t believe you feel that way in this day and age. I had nothing to do with it. Accident of birth. But I’ve gotta’ say, you’re making me rather proud of it.”
“You’re serious?! You’re really serious!”
“Yes. Of course.”
His wife’s face paled. She staggered to the kitchen table. Dropping to a chair, her head fell to her hands. After a few minutes of silence, Mrs. Aloirav started moaning. In between muffled groans, Mr. Aloirav heard. “My son, my son. How could this happen? How could I have done it to you?”
It just so happened at that moment, hearing the shouting, their son entered the room. He asked his father what was wrong. Mr. Aloirav said. “We’re gonna’ have to take you to see the doctor tomorrow.”
“Why, Dad?”
“It seems your mother feels you’re contaminated. It’s going to be necessary to undergo some blood bleaching treatments. Probably need to take pills too.”
Jumping up, she screamed. “You dirty bastard! You think it’s funny! Well, you keep your little nigger whore. You’ll need to. You’ll never put your filthy black penis in me again, ever!”
Threats, maniacal outbursts, and destruction to his self-esteem continued, and he left her bed forever. What seemed like days, years went by in such a manner. He never allowed his legal wife to share in the youth elixir. She continued to grow older in every way. He continued growing in many ways but older, especially in money and power.
Gloria and he became ever closer. He and his legal family grew ever more estranged. Entering the house by the front door, now, he took the usual insults. Greeting his middle-aged son, the “boss” retired for the evening.
One day Mr. Aloirav entered the warehouse. Discovering Mr. Frye still in bed, he wandered around the laboratory alone. Mr. Aloirav examined the various vertex-joint orchestrations. Some were very unusual and impressive.
A slight noise made him turn and hear. “Like what you see?”
“Very much.” The hotelier said. “You’ve been working hard.”
“I have a prototype, I think.”
“Really? That is good news. You’ve been assiduous. I’ll get the financing arranged.”
“Before we go any further, I need to know something. I’ve been thinking about it all night. That’s why I was still in bed when you arrived. I fell asleep just a couple of hours ago.”
“Sure, Les.” He answered, noticing how the man’s facial lines gave the appearance of weeping. “Whad’ya wan’na know?”
“You once spoke about apoptosis genes.”
“Yah?” Mr. Aloirav replied, shooting a quick glance at him. “So what?”
(Apoptosis genes are natural, evolutionarily conserved, methods for multicellular development. Some cause cells to develop protein flags, inciting destruction by the body’s own immune system. The “boss” extracted and subverted their function, producing possibilities for substantial human cellular-destruction. Once installed in retroviruses, he considered them among his most elegant achievements. It was a great accomplishment for him. True programmed-death became available for his “best” agents. He made each successive viral – bacterial vector more potent and quicker acting than those previous.)
“How do you know when you’ve got a real apoptosis gene?” Lester asked.
“It was initially an empirical assumption on my part. To be sure, you would sequence it, comparing your information to that published. I acquired particles with tentative “death gene” fragments in-frame and tried them out. My tissue culture monolayers grew well, prior to inoculation. Just minutes after introducing the agents, the cells sort of bubbled and shrunk. Outer membranes wrinkled, and the nucleus deflated. It constricted to degeneration. DNA within shriveled and deteriorated, until it fell apart. Within an hour of introduction, just short oligonucleotides existed.”
“It sounds horrifying!”
“Oh, for the cells, it was. Why do you ask?”
“While I was doing tissue culture for my calein organism, I got frequent massive cell death. I just wondered if yours was anything like mine.”
“Don’t know. Could you describe it as programmed cellular-death? That’s the theory behind apoptosis, right?”
“Yah, I guess so. Did you sequence the oligonucleotides?”
“Later, when I had various combinations categorized. I introduced them selectively.”
“On human guinea pigs, I presume?”
“Yeh. I used the best carriers I could build to introduce ‘em. Just one ever gave me a problem.”
“What?”
“Well. It’s a bit embarrassing.”
“If you’d rather not…”
“No, it’s all right. It turned out to be a two-part problem. One of the carriers was refractory to induced immunity.”
“Isn’t that what you wanted?” Mr. Frye questioned, confused.
“No.”
“Then it wasn’t refractory and didn’t kill your victim, before building up an immune response? Is that what you’re telling me?”
“No, but almost.”
“I give up. Did you fix it, or do you still have a “bug” you can’t use?”
Thinking about his answer, he said. “I lucked out. The apoptosis gene’s intron, I took from…never mind…must have mutated or maybe the gene itself. The exact opposite orientation might have occurred in places. Maybe other exogenous viruses, having similar sequence homology, entered. I can’t say. Gel information didn’t help. At any rate, something blocked cellular death, or things might have been much worse. Some trophic factor mucked everything up on the very one for which the vaccine failed. It was unfortunate and a most fortunate coincidence.”
Clasping his hands together, the hotelier bent forward making a semblance of thanking some power before continuing. “Whether recipients of that particular carrier died or not became unpredictable. It degraded to a multiple gene effect. Everything hinged on the production level of each gene, messenger RNA and protein. Killer and anti-killer proteins vied for supremacy in hosts infected.”
“How did you discover all that?”
Holding up his hand to indicate coming to the answer, the “boss” said. “Previously, once an apoptosis-gene carrier was in the human cellular-network, it was all over. No anti-apoptosis gene or anything similar was strong enough to overcome my agent’s anti-trophic factor. The one cure for the disease was through the host’s immune system. Destroying the viral carrier in the usual antigenic-stimulatory method was fundamental. Without vaccination, death was quite rapid. I never expected a virginal immune response to mount with enough speed to interdict it.”
“But it did?”
“Sure did, a couple of years ago in Uganda. Something must’ve been smiling on me, or I never would have known. Morbidity dragged on for much longer than I’d calculated. It made me suspicious. My vaccine for that one virus didn’t work for shit either!”
“How’d you discover it didn’t work without losing your vaccine recipient?”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. Someone who meant a great deal to me took it. If that particular viral carrier hadn’t been defective, I would’ve lost big time. Making the introductions, my friend got as close to death as did the intended. It was a very very close call. I was ravenous to investigate.”
“What happened?”
“It was bad. Really bad. The one “bug” I created that failed to outwit – manipulate the human organism’s immune detection system. My secret to an elegant biological weapon. I may have been careless. It was a double mistake, considering the concomitant vaccine failure. I guess I learned from it at a most opportune time. I might have released a whole line of inutile vaccines & viruses.”
“What did you do about it?”
“Changed the CAEV.”
“CAEV? What do goat viruses have to do with it? Am I missing something?”
“No, you’re not, Les. I left a gap in my story. The caprine virus contains an antigenic moiety that stimulates vital antibodies.”
“I don’t understand. I thought you were using simian viruses for your basic raw material.”
“Yes. I was, and I am.”
“You lost me.”
“It’s not all that recondite, Les. CAEV is a lentivirus about 9.7 kilobase pairs long. It causes both arthritis in adult goats as well as leukoencephalomyelitis in kids (goat kids & human kids).”
“So? Why use that as an immunogen? Why not some human or simian virus? A strange lentivirus seems so non sequitur. It doesn’t make any sense.”
“You’re right, and I was using simian epitopes. It started out long ago with basic ignorance. You need some background.”
“I guess so.”
“As you may be aware, these lentiviruses are exogenous viruses. Conventional thought maintains they infect just ungulate (hoofed) mammals. The American Dairy-Goat Association, for obvious reasons, wants people to believe they never jump. Can you imagine the economic impact if the truth got out there was human receptor homology?”
“I’m beginning to see. Natural greed and fear made the world close its eyes to you.”
“Simple denial. It worked, too. But you’re getting ahead of me, Les.”
“Sorry.”
“No problem. The truth of the matter is not quite as glorious as it seems. My plan wasn’t as ingenious as it appears. In actuality, it was very much the opposite. The American Dairy-Goat Association’s propaganda fooled me too. Do you remember me saying I used goat serum to feed my tissue culture?”
“Yes.”
“Well. During my initial tissue culture days, I must’ve acquired a sick goat by mistake. CAEV infects tons of them. I managed to get one. The serum was contaminated. I made an artefact part of my biological weaponry.”
“No kidding!”
“‘Fraid so. It took me a long time to realize it. When I did, it was after PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) technology was standard stuff. I went back and sequenced all my best agents. A large percentage of the vaccines were derivatives – variations on the CAEV strain contaminating my serum. Taxonomically, evolutionarily, and cytopathically lentiviruses are quite similar to human retroviruses. Morphologically and in fine structure, they’re indistinguishable. Many of my best retroviral agents were siblings of a contaminating CAEV! One I thought way too slow may have redeeming qualities after all.”
“Let me get this straight. A virus, according to conventional wisdom just infecting goats, now integrates into human DNA. You gave it the capacity to infect humans by recombining it with a simian virus. Have I got it right?”
“Sort of. The truth is, they often jump species without my help. The human arthritic-encephalitis disease produced is similar to that in goats. Hence the immune response.”
“How did you fix the vaccine to make it right?”
“Pretty chagrined. I isolated a clean wild-type CAEV. From there, I made some site-directed mutations in both the 3’ and 5’ domains of the “pol” gene. A few other selected regions of the genome got a repeat of that same process. When I finished, it would integrate and productively infect successive populations of human cells. Once it consistently bound human cells and DNA, I made a cascade of papulary vaccines from it. When sure of effective immunization against the bad virus, I rebuilt the defective segment using it. Introducing the feeble virus was never again an option. I, myself, did a controlled test with the improved model on some Burmese recipients.”
“You’re genetically-engineering human evolution!”
“Please, Lester, you’re embarrassing me.” Mr. Aloirav replied with mock modesty. “But yes…I guess so.”
“Lamarckian, I might add, also flying in the face of contemporary thought.”
“Yes. While the virus is in human DNA, it can, indeed, mutate or change the host’s heredity. The viral endogenous state causes variation of the DNA sequence in the germ line. So, you’re right, it’s a Lamarckian evolution of sorts.”
“Of sorts!? The germ-line DNA is changed. That’s the one de facto definition of evolution I know. Your predisposed vaccine recipients are inhuman or at least somewhat different than other humans.”
“They’re different. Even they’d agree with that.” The hotelier said, laughing. “With other vectors containing apoptosis genes, it’s a bit more complicated. These factors all need promoters and enhancers, added to the various sequences, at discrete genomic locations.”
“It integrates, still functioning as a goat virus, protecting against retroviral agents?” Mr. Frye asked, shaking his head up and down, to beleaguer a more rapid affirmative.
“Yes. I wanted it endogenous to potentiate protection of host and progeny in consecutive cellular generations. But, it’s still a goat lentivirus. I put a strain of the weak one with my other failures, bugs for further study. I call them my “Brand X”s”
“Amazing.”
Marveling at the magnitude of the American Dairy-Goat Association’s deception, the “boss” said. “You’ll find no veterinarian, anywhere, admitting in public CAEV’s rendering protective immunity against retroviruses or creating zoonoses. Yet, I often facilitate both.”
“Ego?”
“Me?”
“No, the vet virologists.”
“Collectively? Absolutely. It’s dogma. None dare buck conventional wisdom. Compounded by the industry’s need for silence, it produces an unholy alliance. It´s as devastating as the TV-Sports marriages. Keeps me in the shadows undetected.”
“Where you want to be.”
“Of course. Infection with my vaccine constructs produces neutralizing antibodies. In most cases, they’ll cross-react with the original CAEV and similar retroviral antigens. To perfect my new viruses, as effective weapons, undesirable side effects need eliminating. Aspects of their “two-edged sword” qualities must go. I was fortunate to discover what was necessary with that one defective apoptosis weapon. Things could have been much worse.”
“You said CAEV produces similar diseases in humans as in goats?”
“Yah. I’ve heard anecdotal evidence. Children can die from an arthritic disease caused by the wild-type CAEV’s encephalitis. Some of my people, inoculated with derivatives of the CAEV construct, got a fever then arthritis. Most recovered fast. From what I hear, though, some kept the pain quite a while. It’s perhaps understandable when you consider what each new member faces. For protection against all of my agents, the possibility exists of undergoing eventually over 200 injections. At least 50 contain CAEV antigens.”
“You’ve acquired a lot of information epidemiologists and modern medicine could use.”
“You said a mouthful there. They’re still chasing epitopes.”
“You mean that’s a dead end?”
“I think so. You know why I’m still ahead of the disease detectives?”
“They can’t match your human experimentation?”
“Well, of course, that helps in getting immediate answers to my questions.” The hotelier replied, not expecting such an answer. “It goes deeper than that, though. The defective apoptosis virus and its faulty vaccine were but a part of a bigger picture. Within the human, body and race, the answers lie in microbial ecology.”
“How?”
“I did some critical epidemiology testing of my own. To continue circumventing the disease detectives, I felt I needed to be my own best critic first.”
“Sounds reasonable. Isn’t that what your human trials in Africa and other places were all about?”
“Sure. I also had to know how fast my “bugs” would mobilize as well as attenuate.”
“So, what did you do?”
“Put a large genomic deletion into the human-cell-receptor sequence info of a rabies derivative. Then I inoculated the “little dude” into some long-tailed Mindanao Island macaques. D’ja ever work with ’em?”
“No.”
“Well, those little bastards can jump! Let me tell ya’. I was bitten well.”
“Were you satisfied with what you learned?”
“Oh, very much so…caused quite a stir. I’m going to put my best genes into influenza or some other respiratory particle now. Aerial dissemination will amplify them into versatile military agents. I should be able to decimate World population, in a two-week period, using but two viral carriers.”
Mr. Frye could not contain his horror and turned away for a moment. Taking the move to mean that Lester perhaps found his statement to be indicative of hubris, Mr. Aloirav said. “The only foreseeable problem is one of over-achievement. There’s no public infrastructure in place to handle a megadeath scenario. Unexpected simian viruses or bacterial diseases may emerge during postmortem clean up. Uncontrolled “bugs”, for which I’ve no vaccine’s, would be counterproductive.”
Mr. Frye said nothing for a few seconds, seemingly pondering, and then he replied. “When I listen to you, I know. There’s something horrible about man. Your talk makes it very clear. As far as Nature is concerned, man is not horrifying.”
“We´ll solve Her problem for Her?”
“Yes. And, you’re right in a way. She cares not a whit about him as an individual.”
“She cares until that individual is no longer able to reproduce.”
“Well. I feel my reproductive life is over. To Nature, I’m just excess meat. What keeps me alive, Rav?”
“Lester…”
“You? No. I could kill myself at any time. I know how to use my wrists or even a handful of salt if necessary. There’s something about our existence that speaks to the presence of more than just Nature.”
“Please don’t tell me you’re getting religious, Lester. I don’t want to vomit!”
“It was Nature made my house fall; She made the town brutal, malicious, and cowardly enough to destroy my home & lab. Nature made that fat pig Washed Beaches eco-thug townie steal my work and the entire Plymouth County aquifer. She made the pols prevent my rebuilding. She made venal attorneys & judges torpedo me… All the …torment I took in the wake. So, what is it that keeps me on the track of trying to develop planetary hope? There must be something more, Rav. Something protects the good and recognizes the horrible for what it is in man.”
“Your naïveté is incredible, Lester! There is no legitimate authority, anywhere! Only power, or money-mad monkeys, posing as such, gambling with entropy! Even after what they did to you… after Viet Nam! Lester!!! You made it clear earlier. You still believe there is value in democratic authority! Now, you’re imagining a super-father out there! I could hold enough toxin on the end of one of my eyelashes to destroy all human life on the planet. You know it! Those Massachusetts’ cretins thought they could stop a person whose motives were productive of such a purpose.”
“They were afraid.”
“They were pols, Lester, filthy, elected imbeciles! It would take plausible means to remove the homicidal motives from the mind of a person so tormented.” A situation of that magnitude would require kid gloves, not a bulldozer & Gestapo tactics. Fools, blockheads! That’s whom you want to trust with your contingencies?! And now you’re looking to put the same trust in some Supreme moron?”

It is the difficulties that show what men are. Epictetus

Chapter Thirty-Two

One day, the hotelier was about to leave the warehouse. After many years of sequestered research, Lester blurted out. “Rav, I want to go for a walk outside.”
“Fine.” Mr. Aloirav replied. “I’m a little pressed for time, but I guess I can make the adjustment. Let’s go.”
“I’d like to go alone.” Mr. Frye said. “It’s been years. I’ve almost forgotten what it means to be free.”
“You’re welcome to leave. I’m not holding you prisoner.”
Lester was almost out the door, when the hotelier stopped him, saying. “What assurances do I have you’ll not make me kill you and have to explain your death?”
“You have my word,” he said, stepping back in and closing the door.
“That’s one. I’m underwhelmed, Les.
“That’s all I have,” Mr. Frye responded, turning to face him.
“Mind telling me what made you decide to give it?”
“I trust I can be candid?”
“Certainly. I’d expect nothing less.”
“Conceptualization and lack of instinctual motivation may be qualities separating us from most other animals. There’s one thing, however, which unquestionably maintains the distinction between us and the rest of life.”
“Yeah, and what’s that?”
“Our capacity, or sentence, to feel the need to evaluate conduct and act accordingly.”
“And…?”
“I think what you’re doing, your whole raison de etre, is an abomination.”
“That’s old news. So what? You sound like a preacher, Lester.”
“I know, but I mean it.”
“Keep talking. I gotta’ say, though, you’re not doin’ a very good job of convincing me so far. And you still haven’t answered my question.”
“Being involved with you will probably kill me. But I intend working my tail off, getting the Pontibus erected, to frustrate your intentions.”
“All right! Struggle. Now you’re convincing me!”
“I’m holding you to your word. You won’t harm the human race, if I succeed?”
“Prevent me from needing to make periodic planetary decimations, and we’ll both succeed. I hate the human race. I’ll not deny it. But, I am not disinclined to believe that, given time, we might improve.”
“Then, under those conditions, I’ll cooperate with you.”
“To show my good faith, I’ll convene a meeting tomorrow to introduce you to the “Group”.”
“Is that necessary?”
“Yes. I want to see how they take it. Plus, it’ll show you you’ll never want for assistance.”
“I already know that. Are you sure it’s necessary?”
“Yup.” He said, preparing to leave. “I’ll send Francis by to help you re-enter society.”
“What the Hell? Why not?” Lester said, returning to work.
“Lester, I wish you wouldn’t be so depressed. It can’t be doing your work any good.”
“It’s not. I miss my wife, Rav. So much…she was such a friend. Always a help to me. Not in my work but as a person. All the joy and sadness she gave me. All the fears and anticipations we shared. She was my star, gave me my children, made my life have meaning. I destroyed her, and I’ll never see her again. She’s…gone.”
The last words left his mouth weak, high pitched. The “boss” consoled him. “You’re not that old, Les. You’ve been taking the elixir and can still create another family.”
“Physiologically, perhaps, but no. I still love her so. She was always so good to me, despite my shortcomings. Always thought of me before herself. I wanted to make her happy and proud of me. I never could. My selfishness always got in the way.”
“Frog farts! It was your lack of selfishness got in the way, your damn altruism and sense of duty. If you’d a been more selfish you’d never ‘a let’em get away with bulldozing your home. They’da been too scared of you ta steal your “bugs” or drive ya’ outta’ town. Your wife would still be sane. Ya’ fucked up! Swallow it! Clean up yer’ mess. Find another woman. Have more kids.”
“As long as she’s still alive, I can’t. Everything I’ve accomplished I owe to my wife.”
“Horseshit! I knew her! She was way out of your class! Yer’ a fuckin’ liar!”
“Every normal aspiration, endeavor, cherished hope, dream, or desire I could hold close to my heart, she extirpated with her vitriol.”
“Ah…I see now what you mean.”
“Every demise to my telic quests propelled me in their wake to new heights. Each gave me ever greater and grander ambitions. How can I forget that? I owe her.”
“Damn it, Lester! Don’t you ever do anything without thinking about your fucking duty, first? She was a hateful ol’ bat. Now she’s just old. Past the change for decades. Menopause is Nature’s way of telling men to jump ship. Doesn’t life mean anything to you?”
“It means a great deal to me.”
“That’s not the way it appears. You seem to have learned nothing from your Viet Nam experience. You were here for the aftermath. How often d’you need’a see the treachery in following the duty path? Duty creates impasses, breeds subhuman parasites faster’n flies. Life doesn’t come with a protocol. We’re all walking wounded and blind. It sounds to me like you’re terrified of living free. Yer’ lookin’ for some kind’a guideline to follow for getting through it.”
“That’s wrong?”
“Fucking A, it’s wrong! Life is to be lived, teleocentric, perhaps but paid for as it happens. Not enthralled to somebody else’s archaic idea of exemplary conduct. Define yourself as you go. The dead made morals for living in the past. Life is in the present and the future. Carve your own trail through the bush. You’re a goddam fanatic.”
“Unlike yourself?!”
“Take a bath. You’re covered with guilt!” The “boss” said, shaking his head, walking away exasperated.
Mr. Frye yelled after him. “Doesn’t loyalty mean anything to you?”
Obsessed over loyalty, the stinging words knifed through him, but he defended himself, saying. “You’ll not find anyone to be a more faithful friend than I. I wasn’t disparaging your wife, willy nilly. I know what you think, as far as women and myself are concerned. You’re wrong. No man respects them more. I’m capable of destroying human beings without feeling the slightest pinprick of pain in the process. But, I can neither create nor prolong life. They can do both. The light in their eyes, the sparkle of their hair, their beautiful skin, moves me to distraction. Soft sympathetic affection bouncing off emotional thunderstorms…all of it. Their savage wildness serves as a constant inspiration. I love all their mental, physical, and spiritual machinery. But, your wife is essentially dead, Lester. Bury her! Keep attached to the past. You bury yourself with her.”
“”Let the dead bury the dead”?” Mr. Frye quoted the pervert and purported zombie, J.F. Christ.
“It’s your funeral,” Mr. Aloirav replied and walked out the door.
The human condition, blessing each of us with the promise of inevitable dissolution, lends urgency to our several tasks. Protecting itself from momentary stresses, a mind can go blank. Possessed of clear thinking again, troubled and trembling, one can say. “Because present events aren’t in accordance with my ideas of fate, I cannot accept them, but they will pass.” Yet, suffering with such intensity, so exquisitely, as to give up eternity to prevent a recapitulation. That is to suffer, indeed.
Waiting for Francis, Mr. Frye felt his days of mental roller-coastering were over. The realization was clear. He could, indeed, make it to the end without retreating again into madness. Like birth, Lester caused much pain. He knew it.
It was necessary to accept the loss of major battles. He accepted. The man was, nevertheless, aware of still being able to contribute a great deal to Life. He wanted to make up his own mind to join the “Group”. Coercion offended him.
He saw no value in the “boss’s” threats. The past years convinced him of the path to follow. As if an adolescent wench, Mr. Frye hoped to save his pimp’s immortal soul. He would rescue the World from decimation.
Lester felt life without principle was as bland as a meal of stale bread and water. He always tried to maintain congruence between his thoughts, feelings, and actions. That held, even if it meant breaking the law. Yet, he couldn’t accept the hotelier’s draconian argument, which was:
“If your dream violates every cultural more on Earth, then to Hell with cultural mores. Marks against personal character matter little in a country where they consider just having character a defect, oftentimes an imprisonable offense.”
Mr. Frye thought. “Man was born to contemplate the highest good, not the second highest. Any compromise, accepting less than the best, isn’t right; nor is it for me. If I fail, I fail, so be it. I’m reaching as far as anyone else has ever reached, perhaps farther. Aloirav may benefit the planet for a limited time. I’ll benefit it forever.”
He found Rav intriguing, his words reasonable, yet quite mad. Lester knew homicidal behavior was irrational. The years had internalized the ethic in him that each person’s life meant something. Man’s curse was not myriad attempts to achieve “good” but in his frustration. Mr. Frye believed everyone’s sojourn on the planet served some purpose. Human life, including his own, was not just a temporary component of a global cancer. No one would convince him otherwise.
Ameliorating humanity’s destructive effects was not an evil desire. Building biological weapons to facilitate those ends was horrifying. Mr. Frye wondered what government or organization financed the terrible work. He thought they must have been keeping their New Society involvement a secret. Rationalizing his own connection with the “Group” was not without despondency. Lester kept the feeling at bay by assiduous attention to his goal.
He always tried to be kinder than most to the world’s unfortunate. He envisioned, through his own efforts, someday to realize a paradise for all Life. The “boss” too showed compassion for the World’s helpless. His work took a different approach. Mr. Aloirav felt maximizing the good for all was not possible except through minimizing humanity. There was that “Law of Limited Good” with which to contend.
The “boss” found force and violence acceptable methods for attaining his ends. Justification rested on an admirable goal, not a new rationalization. If such measures also facilitated personal ends, the hotelier discovered ample precedent exculpating their use. Force effects change. He exemplified good reasons for guns coming into existence over a hundred years before books.
Pondering the awfulness of such coercive methods, Lester could avoid confronting his own inconsistency. Thinking a search for truth, prior to action, was the correct path, sensibility to his hypocrisy dissipated. Realization of his collusion would still well up within him. He couldn’t bury the guilt. Becoming a willing partner was like a slap in his face. One step removed just meant enjoying the fruits of heinous methods by default, like eating meat killed by another. Is this the way one sells one’s soul, the first step in becoming a monster? What should or could he do to stop it?”
Mr. Castle arrived in a late model BMW coupe. As often in the past, “Group” members took Lester for supervised walks outside his warehouse. John Ball Park was a favorite haunt of his. Time spent there now, with Francis, passed with some awkward moments. The Greek café conversation of years ago still rankled. The reasons came out for his revealing what Mr. Frye felt was privileged material.
“The guy saved me from having to do years more time, I mean years.” Francis said. “Of course I’m gonna’ tell him if someone thinks he’s dangerous or insane.”
“I never said he was insane.”
“No? You were thinking it.”
“How do you know what I was thinking? Been studying ESP, Francis?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Mr. Frye.”
Mr. Frye still felt it was a betrayal of confidence, but accepted the explanation to maintain cordiality. Within an hour, they parted. Mr. Castle reminded him of the “Group” meeting on the morrow. Lester wasn’t pleased but agreed to expect him at the time specified. Being out of the warehouse for a time was always exhilarating. The feeling of going around unsupervised after so many years of chaperones was indescribable. He enjoyed just walking the city alone. Stopping in a restaurant, Mr. Frye noticed a hotel employee outside moments later. Assuming the person to be a tail ruined his day, and he went back to his warehouse apartment.
The next day, Francis showed at the promised time. They walked to the Blue Barnacle. Avoiding the enforced enclosure of a car, their conversation met with success. It continued into the establishment. The two men walked over to the bar and took two of the stools. Mr. Wainright waved, and they returned his greeting.
A pretty Chippewa girl came over to take their order. Wearing no make-up, she was in a short skirt and low-cut halter-top. A tan headband held her waist-long black hair in place. Mr. Castle’s lascivious eyes followed every movement as the India took their cheese sandwich and coffee request. While they waited for the food, Francis ordered a shot of whiskey for his coffee. Lester looked around thinking.
“How much time does it take to destroy a sense of morality? Whose ignorance and apathy is it, victim or perpetrator, causing crime to happen? When does suppressing the sense of a better life respond by producing non-conformity to accepted standards? Did desperation drive Rav Aloirav’s associates to impropriety and covert activity? Frustrated with standard means of change at their disposal, could conditions have forced their atrocious measures? The ones I’ve met seem like normal guys, except for their criminal past. Will Lester Frye also forge asocial attitudes and means in the near future?”
Rumination stopped, and he jumped when the rear door of the bar crashed open. The kick on it came from Frank, dragging a passed-out client through the opening. Arriving at the alley, the bartender stacked the drunk next to the trashcans. Mr. Castle chuckled, as he began relating an anecdote about the colorful owner. Backs to the building’s rear, they were oblivious to his return.
The dealer prattled on about him. “…a warrior, a pure fighter. He’ll never know the meaning of defeat. Can’t help but admire him. His wife even left because of it. The guy doesn’t let setbacks, like that, ruin him. Every time they knock him down, he comes up a’swingin’.”
“He doesn’t seem to accomplish much by it.”
“So what? His compassion for these people is honorable and pure. More sincere than anything I’ve ever seen. You’re always griping about service to others. Isn’t that enough of an accomplishment? Is achievement always necessary? I don’t know anyone who’s sacrificed more for the care and feeding of the underprivileged than Frank. If you don’t believe me, ask the “boss”.”
“I don’t need to. I believe you. Rav already told me about him. I was made to understand that, unless you’re one of the City authorities… to know him is to love him.”
Mr. Wainright approached them from the rear. Hearing just the last phrase, thinking they were talking about Mr. Aloirav, he said. “…unless you’re an accumulator or an idolater.”
“Yeah, that’s right.” Francis said, forcing a smile, not choosing to correct the mistaken assumption. “I don’t understand it all that well. He says they’ll never like him.”
Mr. Frye missed what happened. Confused, thinking the other two were making sport of him, he asked. “What are you talking about?”
Walking around to the other side of the bar, the proprietor said. “Aloirav doesn’t think people should have more money than they can spend in their lifetimes. If they hoard and pass it on to heirs, he calls them “Accumulators”.”
“That’s right,” the dealer agreed. “The “boss” says idolaters worship two graven images called the “Golden Calves”. Says the animal’s names are “Quality” and “Quantity”. Never could understand him. Says the prayerful’d be terrified, if they knew him better.”
Lester was aware of the Biblical connotations and their contemporary implications. It surprised him that Francis was not equally aware, being a religious. The food arrived, changing the subject. Explaining the symbolism involved later, Lester said. “Those who advocate prolonging all human life using whatever available “heroic” means are “Quantity” idolaters. Ostentatious living, using the most expensive of goods, makes one a “Quality” worshipper. Such adulation, heedless to planetary costs, makes Life suffer in silence.” The “terrified, if they knew” phrase made Mr. Frye uncomfortable, and he found it difficult to intellectualize his feelings enough to explain it.
The two barflies took in their cheese sandwiches and coffee. As they did, customers were entering and leaving as usual. Soon, however, the clientele began changing. Most of those entering remained. The latest to arrive went over to Mr. Castle. He introduced them to Lester as the “boss’s friends”. It wasn’t long before the bar filled up with these “friends”. All were waiting for something to happen. It was obvious.
When Mr. Aloirav arrived, he welcomed every individual. Each rendered him unmitigated respect. To Lester, every table appeared to be composed of strong, self-confident looking people. They all seemed to have determined expressions, with a tinge of desperation, coloring their faces. He was ill at ease and wanted to leave. The feeling came over Mr. Frye that he was about to participate in a Mafia meeting.
Without warning, the hotelier said to the Indian girl. “Close up shop, Big Joe.” Turning, he said. “Clear the bar, Frank.”
“Right.” Frank said. Turning to the regular bar patrons, he shouted. “Everybody out!”
Regulars were not pleased at being relieved of their stations. Mr. Wainright explained it would be but a couple of hours. Most acquiesced without further ado. Lester got up, prepared to leave.
Francis put a hand on his shoulder and pulled him back down on the stool, saying. “Whoa. Where dy’a think yer’ goin’?”
Before an explanation could come out, the “boss” noticed the motion and said. “Please don’t leave, Lester. I told you this meeting was going to be in your honor.”
“I…I don’t understand why,” he stuttered.
“You will,” Mr. Aloirav said, putting his hand on the others’ shoulder.
Within a few minutes, all patrons were gone except for “Group” members. They spent a few more minutes checking all available hiding places before pronouncing the premises fit. When Bacon was satisfied the place was safe, he nodded his approval. The Chippewa girl was the last to go. Frank locked the door behind her, saying. Come back in two hours, Barbara.”
“OK, Frank.”
Returning, he said. “It’s done, Rav. Big Joe was the last”

“Thanks Frank.” The hotelier said. Looking around the bar, raising his voice, he continued. “My friends. In Antwerp, we discussed how the World’s Y2K problem fit into our goals. People who understood the particulars spoke to us. They answered our questions and provided the information on how it was we would arrange history to fit our needs. We now also have our own media personnel. These people have been working for the Times. As many of you already know, that paper is the leading media whore in the country. It’s been protecting the public from reality for nearly a century. Very successfully. The Times has been in fellatio with the government and Rothschild since Ike got rid of Syd Gruson in 1954. The New Society has since removed all evidence that any of us have ever existed.” The “boss” stopped until the applause died down, and then he said. “Our past and present never occurred. Our future activities will take place in a vacuum. The Organization now has unlimited capacity to dehistorize. Except for late-breaking news, we own our personal “whorth estate”, just like the government. (More applause.) We “advise” thirty percent of the World’s government honchos and twenty percent of the multinational corporations. Today you will meet our new member, partner, and the 23rd Century.” The guest-of-honor looked most self-conscious during the applause. He tried to shrink into a smaller figure, as Mr. Aloirav persisted. “Unbeknownst to most of you, Mr. Lester Frye has been working with us for a long time. Even more than the Y2K interventions, his work is our greatest insurance policy for ultimate success.”
With all eyes on him, it was absurd for Mr. Frye to try appearing unobtrusive. The mention of some of his kudos elicited a few more polite rounds of applause. He maintained his seat with uneasiness. The situation made him well aware of his agreement. Becoming a willing participant in the organization’s goal was happening. The bar now contained about forty of the New Society’s upper management. There was no escape now and never would be.
Lester looked at the people around him, thinking. “All these violent people in one spot. How vulnerable I am. Any one of these fools with a gun or microbe could undo all my work. Entropy. Even if I wished to go back on my word to Rav, informing now is impossible. It will mean having this bunch’s recognition and anger with which to contend.”
Keeping silent, he sat and waited for it all to end. Mr. Frye knew what was happening. He saw how the situation was supposed to affect him. The hotelier was cognizant of Lester´s ambivalence to join forces. The manipulative actions, attempting to frighten and impress, were transparent. The meeting was to display little more than Rav´s raw power. The intent, to force further acceptance of defeat, worked. Lester capitulated. He would stay, as much as possible, on the good side of them. The meeting would leave him certain to keep his mouth shut and go about his own business. It was not difficult to rationalize inaction vis a vis such might. Mr. Frye hoped someday to prevent their designs by using his Pontibus. He took it all in, weathering the storm in his conscience.
The “boss’s” panegyric flowed on. It skewed towards philippic. “…and it’s high time we rid the earth of neonatal units, iron lungs, dialysis machines, and respirators. Blood transfusions, blood-derived-products for hemophiliacs, organ transplants, and life-support systems for the unhealthy must disappear. If an individual can’t stand on his own two feet, let’im lay down. How, with a clear conscience, can he expect his neighbor to support him, dragging both down into the morass?” Addressing an imaginary enemy, he said. “Be strong sicko or die! Make room for the healthy to carry on the struggle for existence. Strong people have a duty to the race, not just to procreate, but also to destroy you.”
The crowd in the bar applauded and shouted. “Right! That’s right!”
Mr. Aloirav waited for the clapping and shouting to cease, before he continued. “We must destroy the weak, never support them gratis. Time’s too short. We can no longer afford the humanistic fallacy, the altruistic mistake. The religious miasma of human offal is revolting. Turning the other cheek threatens Man and all other life. Man needs a struggle to live. Those fighting the hardest become the strongest. To them the world belongs, not to the weak and supported. Brave men do not recognize human law! Brave men do not kneel!”
Deafening applause and obvious agreement came from the congregants. Promised a chance to stop such plans, Lester became convinced he was on the right track. Preventing these people from realizing their goals, substituting his own, would be a worthy ambition. Nevertheless, the situation worried him. Such ideas weren’t new. In the past those espousing them, now considered war criminals, the Nuremberg Tribunal tried and convicted.
“The human race has gone mad,” the new Fuhrer was saying. “It’s distorting healthy mental attitudes, looking upon them as immoral, cruel, and criminal. Unless we prevail against the organized weaklings, we will in the end destroy ourselves. It’s as simple as that. “Kill or be killed” is the Law of the Jungle, our law.” He stopped for emphasis. “We understand this law. They don’t. It’s still the one true mandate from Nature. Unless we take necessary measures now, conquering our enemies, tomorrow may not have a place for us. Without us, taking the responsibility, stopping the perversion, our children will have no future on Earth. Our DNA will be destroyed or diluted out of existence.”
The applause reminded Mr. Frye of sounds heard as a child before the Saturday morning cartoon shows. He remembered that same cheering after speeches by Adolph Hitler on newsreels about the Third Reich. Lester sat still, while the diatribe and its response went on around him. He saw Mr. Castle watching with rapt attention. How could the man not see the inconsistency of his values?
Mr. Frye’s thoughts multiplied, and he wondered. “I’ll bet the weapons Rav builds are not foreign government subsidized. Why did I ever think so? He’s building disease organisms for himself! How many of these people are in charge of other people? How many have their own supplies, personal cultures, of biological weapons? With such numbers of followers, it wouldn’t take long to cause periodic decimations of the world’s human population. He’s not bluffing. These “Club” members. Is this all or are there even more?”
The hotelier was saying. “The cold war potentiated us for the concept of ultimate species extinction. Resource exhaustion, ozone layer depletion, pollution, and overpopulation now appear greater threats than nuclear holocaust. Mr. Frye knows that. These four categories in some way or other can subsume all other major planetary problems. They will do what Russia & the USA’s atomic madness failed to do. Loss of respect for prophecy in our day is an advantage to humankind. It deals a blow to the power of suggestion, cursing man‘s endeavors. Here, a self-fulfilling prophecy of doom still pursues us.”
He looked around at his Group and continued. “Reducing the situation to basics, one finds resource exhaustion from overpopulation to be our one true enemy. Population increase must cease, using the means at our disposal. If not, we can prepare to watch our children accept a lingering and painful death! Either way, the cost to our species’ social & esthetic values will be enormous. Our one alternative hope is to increase planetary assets. To do that, we would need to find a way to make our most precious resource, Earth, larger.”
He paused for a member from the audience to ask. “Is that possible, Boss?”
“Mr. Frye thinks so.” The “boss” said, smiling and thanking the questioner. He then pointed his upturned open palm at Lester as if to say, “you’re on.”
Mr. Frye’s legs felt as lead, but he got up, anyway. He never liked standing up before crowds and this time was no different. Looking at all the eyes fixed on him nearly overwhelmed the man. But, then, he seemed to feel uplifted and began, saying. “Can we, indeed, increase the radius of the planet without a concomitant increase in density? Yes. I believe so. Before explaining technical aspects, however, I would like to justify the investment. (Respectful attention) In the past, there was always a way to feel tomorrow would be a better day. No longer. The oceans are dying. Atmospheric Ozone is disappearing. Almost out of trees on the globe, we stand in dire need of a lumber substitute. Without an attitude change toward our fellow planetary creatures, we ourselves cannot survive. We are all connected. (Increased attention) Imagine yourself in the shoes of an aware twelve-year-old. One becomes immediately cognizant of what terrors might dwell there. That child faces a bleak future, if any. Algae burned from the sea, wild forests and beneficial insects gone, toxic waste everywhere. Oxygen, fresh fruit, vegetables, and placid climate are insufficient. At present rates of population growth a cardboard box or plastic bag will soon be a treasure. Without changing our habits, the youngster will age, hoping just to live…in squalor. (Rapt attention) I offer no stopgap political compromises. I have a technological solution to the greatest mutual problem facing us as global species, our survival. There is much hard work and many disappointments along the path. That road, nonetheless, is a healthy nuclear-terror-free world for our…your children. It may seem like an impossible task to harmonize with the universe. It is not. We may, indeed, not achieve such a state of affairs, but it is possible. To do so means assuming a style, which the human race has heretofore never experienced. (Silence) Life gives some people, biological aristocrats, the ability to dream big dreams, a priceless gift. (Applause initiated by the hotelier) The bounty carries with it, though, an awesome caveat. If they don’t pursue the dream, in giving it up, scorn and painful destruction await. Dreams are the stones with which to build the future’s castle, in our case, the Pontibus. In the reaching is where our greatness as a species lies. Nature is always looking for the most economical way of getting the job done. She never fails, because natural principles have no beginning and no end. Failure is a human idea. It’s but a tool to use until no longer needed. We have a purpose in the universe, but we must prove our right to survive. Nature means it for us, but ignorance and apathy can skew our special evolution into oblivion. The first generation will be skeptical of a non-solid celestial Earth. Children must be born on my bridges before a true affinity can develop. Whether you consider me a crank or a genius matters little. If I fail in my vision, my dream dying, we’ll rot together in the same planetary coffin.”
Strange looks went in their leader’s direction. Mr. Frye’s negative self-demeaning eccentricity was bringing disrespect. The technical description, not intellectualized, now began to cause a glazing over of eyeballs, but he continued. “Man’s larger biomass and low cellular productivity is well suited to a tetrahedralized space environment. A triangle gives either 1(itself) or 3, 16, 48, etc. smaller triangles. A tetrahedron, composed of four triangles encloses an octahedron and four other tetrahedrons or 12 tetrahedrons. The topside of an octahedron underpins a tetrahedron, and it acts as the bottom side of another tetrahedron also a side and base of a 20-sided icosahedron.”
(Shuffling, scratching, coughs, etc.) Mr. Frye was losing his audience, but he couldn’t feel it. Glancing over the “Group”, Mr. Aloirav could and interjected. “Mr. Frye is telling us that the Earth, our Earth, is going mad, because it can’t resolve enormous problems. The politicians are even attempting to legislate and poison away human copulation. The World’s population is 7.5 billion and climbing.
Enough bizarre behaviors occur to convince all but the most obtuse we’ve entered social dementia. The humanists, liberal do-gooders, and abortionists get ever more invasive. The scales’ other end is no better. Right-to-life-no-matter-what-er’s saving of misfits & defectives, ad infinitum, is just as obscene. There is no room for such a philosophy. Our failing energy supplies alone condemn it. With nuclear energy, because the technology is effective, they feel we must use it. That alone disenfranchises us all! The madness continues.”
Looking at Lester, seeing relief in his eyes, the hotelier continued. “Men are not, never have been, created equal. Democratic bullshit! The “majority” is always the most stupid, base, brutal and weak. Pushing such nonsense wastes valuable energy and time! There’s too much useless subhuman animal junk in the world that frivolous Man calls human. An unmolested Nature wouldn’t allow it for a second. Without inappropriate use of science, we wouldn’t be able to maintain it either. The race of man can’t go on supporting biological misfits and decaying aged defectives. Interbreeding with terminal substandard beasts will cost us our selective strength.”
Finishing the last segment of his speech, he saw Bacon gesticulating. It alerted the “boss” to a police officer approaching the bar’s entrance. A cruiser also pulled around the corner and slowed down in front of the building. The entire “Group” went on red-alert.

It is not the strength but the duration of great sentiments that makes great men. Nietzsche

Chapter Thirty-Three

Ordinarily, there should be no reason to suspect that people, listening to a barroom speech, were nefarious. It’s not a behavior indicating some need for arrest and prosecution. Then again, the US Marine Corps started in Tun’s tavern after a drunken speech. During the Vietnamese War, it was the only military organization in the world capable of overthrowing the US government. Perhaps there was, indeed, room for some anxiety.
The individuals involved here were most concerned. The RICO (Receiving Income from a Criminal Organization) Statute and “associating with other known felons” applied. A plethora of technical parole violations was occurring. Most “Club” members were not yet comfortable with the knowledge that dehistorization was now a fact. Most of the attendees had not yet internalized that assurance. They believed enough infractions lay resident to send almost everyone back to prison for many years. Head shaking to show his disgust, Frank went to talk with the police.
On the way out the door, he said. “After all this time, they won’t let old wounds heal.”
Returning a few minutes later, Mr. Wainright said. “It’s all right, Rav. Someone complained about my closing the bar in the middle of the day. I assured the pigs everything was okay. Barbara Big Joe told them we were conducting a scheduled daytime business meeting.”
Mr. Aloirav nodded his head and said. “Smart girl. You handled it well, Frank. It would’a been tough to get everyone otta’ here before the bastards came back with a warrant.”
“Tell me about it! I know of just three of us who wouldn’t get sent back just for “associating” alone.”
“I’m not so sure of that, but I am surprised they didn’t demand ta have a look-see.”
“They wanted to. Tried ta peek around the corner. Never came right out and asked, so I never offered.”
Both men laughed, and the hotelier said. “Isn’t it tedious, though?”
“Sure is.”
“I’d be very happy, living alone in the jungle, apart from all this shit.”
“Why don’t you? You can afford it.”
“For the same reason you stay connected to the bar.”
“You feel needed?”
“I do. I feel for Life, Frank. Sounds corny, I know. But, the thread and I are connected. If it weren’t for that cruel kinship, I would, in a heartbeat. It’s my destiny to destroy a culture. It’s yours to play nursemaid to a bunch of drunks. I suppose it’s possible to learn to love it, but I do not. I’ll continue trying, though, as will you. We’re just not cut out to be happy hermits.”
Frank nodded his head, grunted, and walked back to the bar.
“What’s the trouble, Rav?”
“Socialism and religion, Les.”
“What?”
“The US is a socialistic country. It’s also a religious society. Where socialism allies with religion, willful possession of character is criminal. The land of the free and the home of the brave have become the welfare state & the slave’s choice. We can’t be too careful, now can we?”
Before Mr. Frye could ask what he was talking about, the hotelier resumed his speechmaking. “…As many of you, I spend a lot of time away from my family. Because it’s for them, it’s time well spent. They grow into their futures. I think we all agree on that. It does weigh on me. I’m sure it does on you too.”
Looking around the room, seeing he was connecting, the “boss” continued. “Why is it up to us? Why must we do the job? Why not some other group who has worn our shoes? Well, perhaps that’s just it. Maybe it’s the single reason; no one else has worn our shoes.”
The “Group” listened with fervor, as he said. “One begins participating in politics naïve and idealistic. Ignorance declines. You realize that in the USA you live in a tyrannical socialistic ochlocracy whose only redeeming feature is its corruption. But even that dwindles as the tyranny grows. You discover those pols appealing to your better tendencies are the worst. So, you vote for the most stupid. That posture fails also, but it hurts less. You quit voting, because it just makes the bastards think they’re wanted or needed. Why legitimize that filth? You realize that anything, weakening or tending to destroy the state, is your friend. You retire to the thing that works. It’s a carnival. You kill the bastards that pop up.”
The bar was silent, as Mr. Aloirav said. “Maybe some do, but I don’t remember ever being imprisoned before seven years old. Solitary confinement. I’ll never forget it. Like yourselves, I got just what you’d expect. Unable to deal with me, they locked my ass up!”
Hearing a quiet murmur, an effective amen, he persisted, as if it was undetected. “Communism, socialism, criminal prosecution, etc. are examples of Society’s failure in competence. It’s obligatory each person have means and desire to do well by his fellow creatures. When individual members fail, it’s because Society has failed to instill social beneficence in them. Schweitzer’s “he who has been given must give in return” dictum is all fine. However, it needs to proceed from within – not by force. If it’s forced – it’s wrong. Oppose it as any other tyranny. It is the devil behind taxation and democracy!”
Not thoughts engineered to elevate spirits or support high-mindedness. The majority of his listeners understood, however, and found them interesting. They would have rather heard one of the hotelier’s venomous speeches about what he would do for them. It was acceptable, though. Most cared little for the philosophical aspects of their leader’s goals. They risked for the power and substantial remuneration received. None were aware he recognized their ambivalence to his thoughts. It mattered naught. They stayed there out of respect. The violent & strong man delivered what he promised. If they kept up their end, there was nothing to fear.
Glancing at Lester, the “boss” continued. “As I said earlier, two alternatives are now open to us. We stop population growth in its tracks, or we make the Earth larger. For years, the “Group” has worked symbolically on the former. Now, we’re gonna’ make the Earth larger.”
Audible buzzing filled the bar. Fidgeting at the lecture’s abrupt turn, the majority showed their discomfort. He didn’t miss the effect his last statement produced, nor was Mr. Aloirav unconcerned. Impressions could turn into incredulity, rapidly, if he couldn’t rescue the moment. Disbelief, absurdity, or misunderstanding spelled i-n-v-i-s-i-b-l-e.
The hotelier needed to spark calm interest in the concept, so he said. “This is how we’re gonna’ do it. We’ll accelerate replacing incorrigible World policy-makers with our handpicked people. Those we can’t intimidate into acquiescence, as “advisees”, we’ll destroy at an increased tempo. Our minions in various computer sinks around the World are ready. The Y2K problem modified selected “facts” for us. Various algorithms are now in place. We’re creating more every day. The New Society has permanent access to libraries, repositories, museums, and other historical record depots. Soon social and financial information will also be “compatible” with our goals. (Interest resumed.) We’ll continue to make friendly contact with other clandestine revolutionary groups.
In addition, we’ll allocate funds to create a 2.5% scale model of a skyhouse prototype, 192’ by 156′. The structure will represent a structure similar to that about which Mr. Frye was speaking. It will be 5 feet in diameter and 4 feet high. We’re going to enclose it in acrylic sheets for protection. You’ll all be able to view it in the hotel lobby. After that, we’ll transport it to various displays around the world.” (Audience quiet and placid.)
Mr. Frye soon became aware of the described scale model’s identity. It was the one Mr. Otorp helped him construct, years ago, with the first “royalty” check. The reason the “boss” mentioned it now, as uncompleted, was odd. Lester surmised it was to display alacrity at getting things done. Mr. Aloirav, ever the biologist, knew how to make necessary allies over-estimate his competence.
The people in the bar listened, as he proceeded. “When ready, we’ll construct a life-size prototype and a press-release video. Past media productions on the subject didn’t present an accurate concept. The publicity a well-made dramatization generates will create interest and resulting investment. The total downstroke will be about $1 million. The New Society will supply these resources. Once we offer the commercial units for sale, we’ll need expansion funds. If venture capital is not forthcoming the “Group” will front it.”
The buzzing started again, but the hotelier continued, louder and unhurried. “Up-front cost estimates are from $5 to $10 million. That will carry us until production begins. It covers office supplies, rent, utilities, management wages, complete engineering drawings, patents, administration and travel. After these pre-production events, there will be factory rent, materials, utilities, and wages from $10 to $30 million. When the units are ready for larger prototype-neighborhood construction, there will be more. Testing-retesting, redesign adjustments, marketing, advertising, travel, manufacturing specifications, equipment, material, insurance and depreciation from $10 to $20 million. Are there any questions?”
Members propounded skeptical inquiries concerning the substantial treasury drain. He described how additional funds would soon be forthcoming due to accelerated removal of financial gatekeepers. He explained how he was allying the New Society with a professional remover of planetary parasites and an expert in internet hacking technology. In answer to timetable questions, the hotelier acknowledged possible delays due to the Pontibus Company not yet having a qualified management staff. He went well beyond the necessary to prove his wholehearted sincerity. He didn’t want Mr. Frye’s criticism over any putative lack of commitment. The hotelier intended to continue in that manner, until doubts ceased over their respective positions.
Handing out drawings of sky houses in different phases of construction to each person, he said. “Some testing has already been done. The product has not presented any technical problems of which to speak. While looking for key management people, we can expect minor risks due to initial delays. Current housing-construction codes for uninstalled prefab or mobile home products will subsume marketability certification. Product liability exposure will be of some initial concern. We’ll need to undertake proper measures for limiting insurance premiums. (Many members looked askance at him as he said the last sentence.) The Pontibus’ peculiarities may create negative, albeit frivolous, environmental activisms at the construction get-go. However, when exposed, these concerns should dissipate.”
The “boss” gave them an opportunity to view the drawings and discuss the situation. Then he said. “Regulatory considerations will be dealt with on a module by module, sky house by sky house, basis. We’ll mimic the manner in which super-malls are constructed. Our need to exceed height maximums may require additional “effort”, however.” (Certain members, once again, gave him knowing glances.)
As his listeners calmed down, Mr. Aloirav continued. “Land-based models could evoke unacceptable governmental delays. “Persuasion” may fail or become too expensive. If so, the “Group” may need to use our special expertise to convince recalcitrant pols of their errors.”
Attendees smiled and looked at each other with happy shouts and jibes, as the “boss” continued. “Should all methods fail, or become unwieldy, the Company can assemble the structures with ease on the ocean. Over and within circumscribed patented flotation devices, Maritime Law will control set policy matters. Once we overcome inertia, future sales of modules and service contracts are incalculable. The sky is no longer the limit. There are, in effect, no restrictions at all to increasing the Earth’s size. The Pontibus duplicates the perfect balance of the carbon compound and allows for unlimited growth.”
The last sentence, somewhat technical, he finished and went on to explain. “Temperature, oxygen, and water seem to be our main constraining influences. Intrepid individuals assembling piers within and above upper tropospheric levels will require special clothing and supplies. We’ll store toxic waste and collect the majority of our energy there. After production begins, improvements will continue. They’ll come via small design changes and pier material alteration, when discovered. Regarding that last aspect, Mr. Frye has, once already, discovered a unique genetic element. A gene that’s responsible for calcium deposition into proteinaceous matrices. In short, a building material made from seawater. He was researching ways to mass-produce it for Pontibus purposes, when the government took it from him.”
The “boss” saw increased interest grow in his members over the last statement, so he elaborated. “Like us, Society robbed Mr. Frye of part of his life. He now wants to help us, and we him.”
Gratitude glinted in Lester’s eyes for so linking him to the “Group”, and the hotelier proceeded. “A portion of profit from modular units will be allocated to research. We must never forget. The Pontibus isn’t just a product. It’s the seed of our future. A seed containing two embryos. Cause and opportunity for the New Society to develop a new industry. The industry will make us supreme on the planet.”
The speech ended. After the applause died down, people came around the speakers with optimistic handshakes. It was a sustained river of praise. In spite of his reservations, Mr. Frye was impressed and pleased at the reception he received. The afternoon ended on a pleasant note, as they brought him back to the warehouse in state. The car stopped in front.
Stepping around the rear of the vehicle, the “boss” opened the car door for Lester. The man got out and started for the warehouse. Mr. Aloirav handed him the keys to it and said. “We do agree on most of the problems facing us, don’t we Les?”
“Definitely.”
“Did we solve anything today?” He asked.
“I’m sure you did.” Lester replied. “I couldn’t help but admire the manipulation. You are a master, Rav.”
“Thanks. Glad you liked it.”
“I didn’t…”
“I know, I know. It’s not important.” He interrupted, closing his eyes. “Did we come to any better understanding?”
“I think not. My reluctance in joining is a fact we can’t deny. It still doesn’t please me. Long ago, I thought we were friends. Today’s tour de force, and the coercion I experienced these past years, disabused me of that notion. We shall remain reluctant bedfellows and just according to our agreement.”
“I understand why you feel that way, Les, but we are friends.” The hotelier disagreed without a hint of resentment. “The display of support, you saw today, was intended to keep us friends. Let’s have dinner and talk about it.”
“I’ve heard enough for one day.” He replied, trying to deliver a quasi-insult. “You did sufficient convincing to last me quite some time. I don’t need any overkill.”
“That wasn’t my intent. I just wanna’ talk with you, share ideas, like we yousta’ do. Exchanging opinions, views, and hypothetical solutions in a peaceful non-judgmental framework is harmless. Is that so hard to take?”
“There’s now a purpose to it! It’s no longer just stream-of-consciousness. You’re holding all the cards. What more could you want?”
“Your companionship and philosophical viewpoint. I’m cutting a new path through the bush here, Les. Personal definition is not a university subject. It’s no Liberal Art. No one’s qualified to advise me. It’s lonely. You haven’t ever felt that way?”
Having experienced and spoken about those feelings for decades, Mr. Frye felt it was a cheap shot. Nevertheless, he said. “Okay. I’ll have a bite with you. But just us. Your “Group” sickens me.”
“Sure thing.”
The “boss” sent the car to the hotel. The two old men then walked to a restaurant near the Grand River neither ever visited. Mr. Aloirav picked a table far from the kitchen. He ordered coffee for them both. Being late afternoon, business was slow. Enough separation from other patrons assured privacy. The view over the river was a pleasant backdrop for a conversation.
The hotelier began, saying. “To make the world & all protoplasm better & healthier, that’s our goal. Right?”
“I think so.”
“What stands in our way?”
“I would have to say many things.”
“Weaklings, Les. Weaklings stand in our way. Even they, en masse, are strong obstructions. We must be stronger. I know you think I’m pure evil. It’s not true. But, trying to convince you otherwise is tough. I have an orchestra in my mind, yet when I try to hold a symphony for you, all I can do is whistle. Like a reformed thief trying to convince someone he’s telling the truth.”
“You’re prepared to be a bit more forceful than a common thief, Rav.”
“Yes. That’s true. But, I’m not pure evil. I wish I was. It would make my job much easier. No, Les. All of us are composites of good & evil, positive & negative. Each man must choose whether he will follow malum in se or malum prohibitum. The best & most positive are also the worst & most negative. The difference is in who is able to survive free, against society, long enough to make a lasting positive impact. The quality of benefit is irrelevant yet inherent.”
“Sophistry, semantics!”
“If it’s that, and that’s all there is, Les, then for what do we strive?”
“To make the world a better place.”
“Goddamn it, Les! Don’t act like such a fool. Good, bad, better, worse. These are meaningless terms in a world that changes its values by the micro-generations. We can but pick a value and hope it will continue after we leave. You can’t have 100%!”
“My every cell retches with the pain of knowing the misery you may cause.”
“Relieve. Think of the misery I’ll diminish. You’re not making it easy.”
“I don’t want to.”
“A little more time, Les, a bit more strength, a touch more madness, and I shall be ready. Ready to increase biodiversity and enforce less total misery incident on protoplasm. Ready to release my destiny and rule the world. Humanism has gone far enough. Silly liberals argue over human rights! Just around the corner lays the annihilation of the entire race, protoplasm itself.”
“And you’re going to assist it!”
“Don’t play the conservative religious fool with me, Lester. You know better. There’s just so much air, water, food, and natural environment. Nuclear, subhuman, and toxic chemical proliferations threaten our existence. If we do not limit us, we will destroy us. Extinction! Despite her behavior vis a vis her Almighty God lover, Entropy, Nature is not a whore. She is almighty eternity. Leave her alone, and she will grant tranquility & beauty. Fuck with her & you fuck only yourself!”
“And what are you doing?”
“Following Natural Law. Very successful life forms are cancers, metabolic parasites, on all life. Each “too successful” species must learn, genetically or culturally, to limit its malignant growth. The question involves the will to do so without also buying eventual annihilation. Let’s wipe out the present sick population, renew it with healthy specimens in one generation! Learn from the dinosaurs.”
“No!”
“Let’s make a new world of greater possibilities for all life, not just 7 or 8 billion sick subhumans with a few fugitive humans and some transhuman bizarrities.”
“My bridges offer that.”
“A future where Man too can survive to evolve in ever increasing numbers.”
“My bridges…”
“The alternative will be to Homo’s own and all life’s detriment. It will result in an unwinnable conflict between protoplasm per se and Homo. Even in winning, Homo loses. So went the dinosaurs to extinction. So went the viruses to genetic coexistence with the rest of life.”
“My bridges will give us time to learn coexistence.”
“Not before the world’s other species are extinct, Les. Every day dozens of species go into oblivion, waiting for you to wake up the world! One must learn to cultivate a healthy regard for the sanctity of all life. That is, all except subhuman, which is worthless at present levels. When numbers decrease to a billion or so we can assign our value with some certainty. The solitary hope for us is one-man rule…of the world. Such is my fate – total domination or die trying. A coup d’ etat is something you cannot take back to the drawing board. One either wins or loses.”
“Spoken like a true madman.”
“Semantics. What does a genuine man want, Les?”
“Define a genuine man.”
“Fuck you and that semantic blather. A man wants to know that the cunt he chooses is clean, his kids are his, and that they’ll survive.”
“Damn! You’re crude!”
“Natural is the word, Les.”
“Crude!”
“People can’t all find a leader that means something to them. So, they pick a person that seems to know the right path to take. Him they follow. I never found anyone to follow. I’m following me. Life moves so fast there’s no time to undo mistakes.
“I believe that is just what you are contemplating.”
“Time will disprove that hypothesis.
The conversation took on a more subdued tone, and the “boss” asked. “What is the price of a man’s dreams? How many bodies do I leave behind in my quest for a more perfect world?”
“That’s your cross to bear, Rav. You’re the one into self-definition.”
“Right. Remember Tet 1968, Les?”
“Yes, Rav.”
“I was in Hue.”
“You already told me that, years ago. I was there too.”
“The bodies, Les! The bodies! All those little pagodas. I was 18 yrs. old – it was too much.”
“That it was. It was.”
“We’ve come a long way, you’n I.”
“I see where this is going, Rav. Let’s get back to business.”
“OK, Les.”
“When can we start the prototype?”
“As soon as you feel up to it.”
“How about tomorrow.”
“Great! I’ll send Bacon by in the morning to get your requirements.” The “boss” responded, and then changed the subject. “Lester, I’d like to know what you think about something.”
“And what is that?”
“Our species has accomplished a great deal in its thirty or so thousand years. Has it ever done anything for the planet beyond gathering information, ya’ think? Have we ever given Nature anything in return for what we took?”
“I suppose not. Did anyone ever think it compulsory?”
“Must we destroy the planet in order to learn all its secrets, do ya’ think?”
“Seems like it, sometimes, doesn’t it?” Lester replied in a subdued tone.
“Could it be like one of Bohr’s “complements” to Heisenberg’s “uncertainty principle”?” Mr. Aloirav questioned. “A kind of knowledge-protection pivot. The more we learn about the Earth the less we protect it and visa versa.”
Not caught up in the other’s thoughts, Mr. Frye asked. “How is that?”
“We’re all just a bunch’a poor sailors buffeted by the sea of evolution and mass action. Where’s it all leading, Les?”
“More chaos – Entropy – 0th Law.”
“Of course.” The hotelier retorted, dissatisfied with the response. “You disagree with what I do. What I’m contemplating.”
“Assuredly.”
“I’m cauterizing a wound. It’s painful. It doesn’t please me, but sitting here, without having your Pontibus solution, I see no other way.”
“You’re a maniac and a bigoted control freak.”
“So’s Jehovah. So’s all Science. You have such a high opinion of me, Les. I’m flattered. Go on.”
Ignoring the comment, he said. “I believe, one day, even should I fail, they’ll stop you somehow.”
“Stopped by whom?” Mr. Aloirav replied, increasing his level of arousal. “Are you back to your snitching dreams? Are you planning to be a whistle-blower, should you flop?”
“No, but it’s within the realm of the conceivable, is it not?” Lester queried, not having thought that far.
“It was, earlier. Now, I think you understand the actualities involved. Trying to stop me in a manner not of my choosing could prove dangerous. Might even precipitate a worse state of affairs. You have but one recourse to sidetrack my plans.”
“Capitulate to your extortion.”
“Continue to exercise your intellectual capacity in creative endeavors, as you’ve always done. You are opposing me, the one way you can, with my blessing. If I’m stopped by a snitch, Les, it won’t be you.”
Thinking for a moment, Mr. Frye asked. “You were really locked up at seven years-old?”
“Yes.”
“What did you ever do to get yourself imprisoned at that age?”
“I was a difficult child. I grew up under the tutelage of poor, ignorant, and superstitious parents. Living among such people is a very humbling experience. Recognition they give comes from their greed for, or fear of, money. They talk a lot but recognize no other value. Like all Christians & most AMWAY people, my father expressed self-esteem only when he could look down on his betters. He was overjoyed with me.”
“What State locks up a child of seven?”
“It wasn’t the State.”
“Who?”
“Leaders of a religious cult. A bunch of sick superstitious whackos. It’s funny. We call each other fanatics. I grew up within a circle of religious fanatics.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“Why’d they lock you up?”
“If I tell you, you’re liable to get the wrong idea about me.”
“Well. As things stand, it can but improve your standing.”
“Yah, you’re probably right.” The “boss” replied, laughing. “I’ll tell ya’. Our people grouped around a farming community near the little town of Neola, Iowa. My parents and the other members were agriculturists. Ignorant, poor, superstitious, schizoid…typical religionists. The leaders maintained they were God’s “chosen people” and members bought it. But the religion was unlike other elitist religious groups. They were very secretive about more than their doctrine. Most local non-members never even knew of the cult’s existence. Everyone just thought members were strange.”
“What was the cult’s name?”
“They referred to themselves as “Christ’s Disciples”.”
“Seems generic Christian rot.”
“It was. A Calvinist offshoot. Anyway, one of the “Disciples” took a particular dislike to me.”
“Why?”
“I had an Indo-Germanic Northern European blood contamination.”
“What?!”
“Yes. It masked, and yet prevented, an unconscious ancestral genetic predisposition to anti-Semitism. An egregious malady.”
“How so?”
“Somewhere between the ages I became perambulatory and five years, some unfavorable information emerged about me. My best friend and confidante was a pretty German Jewish princess named Miss Betty Schwartz. Betty (we were always on a first name basis) and I were inseparable. We would finish Mrs. Schwartz’ dinner plate sized oatmeal cookies. (I have no doubt; she produced them just for the two of us.) Escaping to the barn, we’d look down through the knotholes in the floor at the sows suckling their young. Those sows seemed as large as panel trucks to us. Tiring of that interesting occupation, we wandered further down the hill toward the privy. Not having adult strength, the naked display of raw biology exhibited by the pigs was more than resistible. We waited for the spirit, (or whatever), to move us. Then we scurried about looking for “wild rhubarb” as a hygienic aid. Vegetation in hand, one of us entered the Temple of Shame to signal when ready. Receiving the indication, the other scampered around to the rear of that Cathedral and lifted the cleanout door. Turning our respective gazes rapturously upward at the majestic source of all edification and pleasure, we shouted gloriously, when appropriate, “It’s comin’ out! It’s comin’ out!”
Thinking back on those halcyon days, it is difficult to accept.”
“What?”
“There’s no way I can justify the ancillary nature of Mr. Schwartz. His existence is still very much controversial in my mind. Her father’s pig farming occupation was somehow not just an appendage to my friend. How could I explain that she & I found the process of defecation so interesting? Arranging the logistics from the rear perspective of a local outhouse seemed appropriate. Nevertheless, he reported apprehending us inflagrante delicto. From the evidence presented at the hearing, the Dominie determined my guilt was egregious and the greater. Being Semitic, Betty was not of our cult. The Dominie gave me some minor punishment. I forget what it was.”
“Not prison?”
“Not yet.”
“What got you locked up?” Mr. Frye asked, laughing.
“Well, I had a gig I used to do. The shit-dropping watching brought me under heavier scrutiny by this guy.”
“Gig?”
“Yah. It was harmless. I believed I could predict the future. Forecasting what greedy ignorant superstitious people contemplate doing, given a particular set of circumstances, isn’t very difficult. To a normal imaginative youngster, it’s elementary. The “Disciple” noticed my six-year-old antics and the minor accuracy of my predictions. He brought it to the attention of one of the “elders”. They both hauled me before the Dominie. The childish predictions, coming true, compounded with my past prurience, got me deemed a child of Satan. I was pronounced possessed, a latter-day witch.”
“So you had to be exorcised?”
“Sort of. It was a crude operation and not too sacerdotal.”
“What happened?”
“After a little powwow, they decided on ostracism & community movement restriction.”
“So what did they do?”
“The Disciple hating me had an old abandoned car in his back-forty. I don’t remember what make it was. The guy couldn’t use it for some reason. They determined “Satan” could be extracted, were I to be placed in its trunk, solitary-confinement style.”
“No!?” Mr. Frye said shocked. “I don’t believe it.”
“Oh, it’s true. Each time they caught me giving my perverse little spiel, I’d go to the trunk. Like a broken record, or a computer, repeating the same algorithm, I just couldn’t seem to stop. They put me in there for most of the day, two or three times a month. It went on from my seventh year. It wasn’t healthy, and I was cold in the winter. After my 8th year, more or less, they put me in there for other infractions.
“How did you ever survive it?”
“It wasn’t quite as bad as it sounds, although it did give me TB. The space didn’t deprive me of all sensory stimulation. I still heard mice and rats running around. It wasn’t too drafty. As I said in my bar speech, Society reacts the same way with all habitual criminals. It can’t deal with them, can’t modify their behavior to satisfaction. The criminal can’t or won’t change, so it’s the lockup.”
“I see. Now you repay your hurt by holding the World for ransom.”
“Like you, I’m no longer a young man. If you choose to cheapen my resolve by so characterizing it, I won’t argue. I intend making requisite resources ample again, or Homo population will face periodic decimation.”
“The theory being that starvation and war will end along with the curse of pollution. Fewer people consuming, competing, and trashing.”
“Available resources and space will go much further.”
“It all sounds so simple and practical. Until one considers the millions of lives you’ll destroy.”
“Billions. Unless you get the Pontibus erected, providing sufficient habitat to forestall implementation.”
“You know, that’s a hell of a burden to put on someone!”
“You put it on yourself, Les.”
“You feel no personal guilt?”
“Guilt is something you grow with every lie your parents tell you. Purge! You would allow destruction of all non-Homo life without the concomitant achievement of some powerful principle. Such behavior is brutalizing and a blow against sustainability.”
“Like I have a choice. What about stability, if I fail? Have you thought about that? After you die, and the planet becomes overpopulated all over again, what then?”
“There again, you pop into the picture. Isn’t it amazing how that works? You must not fail. What’s more, even if you succeed, but too slowly, people will die. I feel as much remorse killing a human being as I do killing a mosquito, (multiplied by the weight differential, of course).”
Very concerned, oscillating between being flattered and appalled, he said. “You sure push an advantage, don’t you?”
The hotelier didn’t answer but asked. “Have you ever asked yourself, Les, where success lies, or failure? I’ve often wondered about it. There doesn’t seem to be any pure goodness out there, any justice. No winners, each lost and saved. In your dream, there’s compassion and love for everyone. You’ve a place for male and female, young and old, sick and healthy, best and worst. You’d accept religionists as well as the conscious. All needed and taking parts with equal honor. I want to see that someday. That may be what heaven is. Meanwhile, I deal with what is. I just imagine what might be. You deal with what might be. That’s what’s in your vision for me. You. I believe in you.” Mr. Frye sat unmoving, speechless at the revelation, so Rav continued. “I shall proceed as I was doing before having met you. You may fail. So, don’t get too smug or filled with yourself. Understand. You’re not the single answer. Humankind is the sorcerer’s apprentice. The greatest benefit, my weapon or yours, will be that Man buys time. Time to evolve, time to learn how to leave our planet, colonize others. Time is of the essence. We must find a way to the stars, your way or another. The evils that have struck the planet, plaguing humankind, must never come again. We cannot allow extinctions to prevail. Soon, it will be us. They send us here to be born human. Over-attaching to life, most forget their mission – to inform & make the world a sustainable place. They never grow beyond monkeys. No one believes it’s happened. Seems like every spirit develops roots and makes a support system their one purpose. They forget why they manifested. The time here is so short. You can’t keep it, anyway. Get back into your charge, Les. Accept the courage. Fight until the bastards kill you!”
“There’s no way to buy that much time. Interplanetary travel is science fiction stuff.” Lester said. “You must know such talk is utter madness?”
This time, with the word “madness”, something snapped in the “boss’s” demeanor, and he began shouting. “Madness, madness, you say? You think I’m crazy!? Putting too much responsibility in my own hands? You said before, I was a raving megalomaniac. You called me a madman a few minutes ago! You do indeed think so, don’t you?”
“Please, Rav,” Mr. Frye said. “People…”
The few restaurant patrons all turned to look in the direction of the disturbance. Curious stares focused on the two men. Peering downward, Lester reddened. He was aware of how unbalanced the behavior was. Mr. Aloirav noticed the crimsoned physiognomy growing ever darker across the table. Then, he directed his gaze elsewhere to see the restaurant staring in their direction.
Regaining volume control, but with a contorted face, the hotelier stared into the distance, saying. “Yes, I’m mad. The mad “Hope of the Planet”. Despite what Lord Blackstone would say about my sanity, I am the “Savior of Mankind”. I’m nobler than any man yet born, Lester, excepting perhaps yourself. I have defined myself and shall will my fortune. I’ve a brilliant mental image before me. My destiny is to rule the heavens and the earth, and I accept it. I’ll learn to love and cherish whatever fate brings me. I will embrace it and say, “So be it. I love thee, oh my fate, let me not be found wanting”. For half my life, I acted as a pawn of the Absolute. It was time to change things. My spirit, one day, will cover the Earth. My courage already rises up and flows like the sea. I’ll soon have the majesty of a lion and the strength of Goliath. I am my own God.
Leaving his reverie, he excused himself. Many restaurant eyes followed him to the rest room. Minutes ticked away, as if hours. As earlier, Mr. Frye found the “ultimate solution” concept reminiscent of National Socialism. The derangement suffered was far different from his own particular brand. He speculated it to be some self-hatred malady that would destroy the man. It was a matter of time.
Lester sat, watching the bathroom door. He thought. “Is this what’s in store for me? Did endless frustration bring on such lunacy? Given his childhood abuse, it’s understandable, though not forgivable. Ignorance and insensitivity in those with whom the man tried to deal may have precipitated it. Authorities might defuse him in a mental institution alone or in prison, but the “Club”? Is it dependent on his weapons and personality? Could it exist as an entity without him? If he should disappear, would eradicating the rest be easy? No. It wouldn’t.”
The “boss” returned and after a respectful silence, Mr. Frye said. “You sounded like Adolph at the bar today.”
“Did I?”
“Yes.”
“He was a good orator. Thank-you.”
He nodded and asked. “What did you mean you were a pawn of the Absolute?”
“Think about all the times you administered pain, Les. Could you have stopped yourself, if you’d wanted to? I doubt it. The Absolute enjoys giving creatures pain. We are just minions! We must take hold of ourselves. Dare the limits of the Souls dominion!”
“You say God is sadistic?!”
“Of course it is! If One exists. Highly unlikely. Anyone, living long enough, if he simply can’t learn to despise humankind, becomes a misanthropist. A Yahweh imitator. A baby God.”
“Why?”
“Because we are all damned!”
“The people, you see as your enemies?”
“Yes?”
“How long do I have to change your plans regarding them?”
The hotelier thought for a moment and said. “Put thoughts of becoming some kind of Hollywood super-hero out of your mind, Lester. Vanity’s not your style. All you can do is build the Pontibus. Pray you make it in time to prevent some dying.”
“I see. I guess I was fantasizing a bit.”
“I guess you were. Forget about stopping my work. Stay out of my business. Concentrate on your own goals.”
“I understand.”
“I hope so. Your job is habitat, mine is population control. You must maximize, and I must minimize. Anti-selective aspects in the DNA of our species are the enemy. It’s not blacks, Jews, Christians, socialists, or any other subhuman race. Man has the most advanced cortex on Earth, as far as we know. He has a mandate to protect life here, all life. He’s not done so to date. Many species are extinct, or near so, due to His nepotistic depredations. Humans overpopulating cost the planet every day. Eliminating the weakest of our species has Nature’s blessing. She’ll aid the effort.”
Regaining some self-esteem, Lester argued. “That’s so anthropomorphic! Nature feels nothing. There must be some other choice.”
“There isn’t!”
“You know you can’t remove recessive genes from a population by removing individual phenotypes. Even if you could, destroying the species’ weakest wouldn’t limit sufficient population to save planetary life. Just the opposite, you’d accelerate population increase. That’s the entire force behind the pro-homosexuality argument. So what do you propose?”
“Biological weapons to save the day. What’s more, without the residual toxic mess the bomb would bring.”
“The suffering such a solution entails is…” Lester started to say.
“Suffering, bullshit! Eradicating pollution and nuclear death forever requires force. I have that force! The bomb is powerful, but it’s a chained giant, shackled to international politics, lunatics. Any population reduction via nuclear methods leaves toxic residues virtually forever, certainly forever as far as our species is concerned. My means are unrestrained, absolute. They represent a sword more powerful than any weapon ever conceived. I’ll remove the threat of ecological collapse and nuclear holocaust through a vast international coercion.”
“Perhaps, but the price! The cure may be worse than the disease.”
“Impossible! You know that’s not so, Lester. It’s nowhere near as great a cost as you imagine. We can accomplish a great deal, through extortion, without using maximum possible force.”
“Extortion! How do you propose to do that?
“A few letters, news broadcasts, an ultimatum or two’ll serve the purpose.”
“Suppose people don’t believe you?”
“A few well-focused disposals and some destroyed communities will convince. Hold-outs can be dispatched by other means.”
“Judging from the military men I’ve known. I can’t believe many will yield under duress. You’ll have to prepare for a great deal of homicide.”
“You may be right. So be it. Terminations will continue symbolic for the time being. We’ll inactivate parasitic individuals in key organizations around the World. Those creating nuclear power and weapons or catering to that monstrous industry must leave, immediately. Removing pols, large-scale polluters, developers, mega-bankers and other bloodsuckers won’t abate. What a wonderful gift to the planet, having these eco-thugs destroyed.”
He understood the hotelier better now than before the bar meeting. Mr. Frye even swallowed some of the arguments. Nevertheless, he could not sympathize and his uneasiness grew. The idea of biological weapons was just too terrifying. Perhaps it was because the potential was so real to him.
The “boss’s” delusions of grandeur didn’t seem to minimize dissemination of his influence. It appeared he possessed the entire infrastructure necessary to institute a new World Order. Trusted accomplices, similar to those he encountered in the bar could, indeed, be on every major landmass. Continents, islands, and oceans alike were all vulnerable. Travel was so easy. Having access to biological agents, and the capacity to introduce them surgically, would mean drastic alterations. The World was in for a big change. Mr. Aloirav might acquire all the power he claimed. Society would not beat him with ease.
“You’re aware. Most people will feel the planet much better served with you neglecting your heartfelt obligations?”
“Oh, yes,” the hotelier answered, laughing. “You’re among that group.”
“Most definitely.”
“Perhaps I’ll change your mind before I’m through.”
“I doubt it,” Mr. Frye replied, appalled at the other’s callous indifference to wholesale murder.
Pausing for strategic eloquence, before resuming, the “boss” added. “Time will measure our values with its yardstick, Lester. Melpomene directs the play Homo sapiens sapiens. The one constant winner is the dermestid beetle.”
“What a Sophist, you are.”
“You’re so sure you’re right, my friend. . . when effecting homicide or survival, life or death, I’m never so sure of myself.”
“I’m not claiming perfection.”
“Suicide is rational. It alone can bring willful perfection. Why is it only irrational people do it?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s an eternal riddle; I might as well ask the wind. Only the wind can give answers to such questions. Maybe it’s because we return to the wind in the end.”
“You could make Mom’s apple pie sound like a communist plot & visa versa.”
“Because I ask the questions nobody dares to ask?”
“Partly, I suppose. I can’t say it’s untrue.”
“Of course not! To prevaricate is to deny reality and so life. Lying is dying, Les. Because I postulate answers to such questions, it’s unsettling. I’m not waiting for the wind.”
“The problem is. You act on your answers.”
“Appeals to the death-mongers for fairness and magnanimity have been to no avail. They’re insensitive to pleas for consanguinity. It’s necessary to separate and hold parts of humanity in abeyance. Throwing ourselves on Nature’s largess to bless our intentions is our single recourse. We need’a be free. In that freedom, we owe allegiance but to happiness within Natural Law.”
“Wrong!”
“The bomb and toxic chemical-dumping reduce population by indiscriminate killing.” The “boss” said, ignoring his interlocutor. “Biological weapons will take out the weakest first, functioning much like a concentration gradient.”
“What if you…or I are the weak ones?” Lester asked, brought almost speechless by the contemplated scenario.
Unlimited and untempered by civilized compassion, unmoved by an onerous presence of conscience, he retorted. “I told you earlier. We’ll administer vaccines and such, negating that situation prior to any actual vector deployment.”
“Then some are exempted from your “natural” culling?”
“Of course! Germ-line adjustments and gene therapy will reduce the deficiencies of exempt survivors. There have to be some inducements to nobility.”
“You’re so sure of everything.”
“Not of everything, Les. Like you, my dreams come true, even the nightmares.”
“Then is that all there is?”
“What kind of a fag question is that?”
“Survival at whatever costs there might be to rights and liberties acquired over the ages. What does that make us, Rav? Who then are we? You’re condoning a tyranny of the better-informed or a political elite. That’s not “survival-of-the-fittest”. It’s just another crime against humanity. (“The beggars have changed places, but the lash goes on.”) The US government all over again.”
“The situation exists. I didn’t invent it. If you choose to look at it so, then yes. I’m both condoning and exploiting it. The history of the present and past planetary administrations is clear. They’re a litany of injury, with the object of tyranny and genocide. A reasonable world cannot sustain doubt of it. Man has always destroyed Nature’s champions. Ensuing chilling effects insured others would not also attempt to vindicate her. She has thus remained exposed to all the dangers present in a technological age. Man has refused to pass legislation accommodating large populations of species. Unless, that is, those species were made his slaves without representation. Councils called together for protecting Natural Law have been uncomfortable. Their purpose was to tire those concerned into accepting the status quo. Man has abjured his responsibility by declaring certain populations out of his jurisdiction and protection. He wages war against them instead. Man has harassed certain populations, prevented them from enjoying existence, migration, food, water, and privacy. Game wardens and other political custodians are shortsighted, corrupt, or stupid. A clean healthy living space with Natural Justice and impartial judges is asking for the ridiculous. Man has made it acceptable to, embattle, capture, torture, execute, and consume his friends and brother species. Semitic & Nazi cruelty was nothing compared to today’s business as usual. How many species hasn’t Homo caused to self-destruct? Man has refused to bow to Natural Law, the healthy and basic requirement for common good. He has forbidden his leaders to pass legislation insuring adherence to it. If passed, they delayed it until no longer germane. Man continues to wreak tyranny, cruelty, desolation, death, and perfidiousness. Horror unlike anything even the most savage bygone eras could boast. He’s neither worthy of the name Homo sapiens nor capable of civilization. Man has pillaged the seas, plundered the coasts, destroyed the vegetation and polluted the land. He’s ruined the lives of innumerable plants and animals. Continued injury alone answers appeals for redress. The U.S. isn’t fit to govern or even exist! World tyranny of the humanistic Holy Roman Empire promises total extinction.”
“You’re advocating bureaucratic socialism or an Oriental despotism? Are you a communist?”
“No, Lester.” He said, as if talking to a child or a fool. “I’ve already told you that! I don´t even know the current Pope´s name. Nor am I a Nazi, Zionist, or terrorist. I had the American disease, but Viet Nam cured it. Crimes against humanity? Yes. I’m guilty as charged. But, I’m in like company. Anything I’ve done pales next to the USA. The World accepted the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights in December of 1948. The US has consistently voted against their implementation. Why? For good reason. No country is, or ever has been, as cruel to the World’s disenfranchised. You too were dumb enough to fight for such an organization! Notwithstanding all that, 99.99% of the human race isn’t worth saving. Which is not to say planetary life isn’t? I’m presenting you with facts, nothing more. Our species is an over-consumer. We must make more of the World’s goods available to all or risk total war. Conflict, be it limited, terrorist, or nuclear, war is war.”
“Then so be it. Why not let the people decide?!”
“Lester! Are you listening to what you’re saying!?”
“Of course.”
“You would continue to let monkeys decide your fate?!”
“Humans are not monkeys!”
“The missionless are and always have been just that!”
“I don’t agree.”
“Of course not. You would choose to have conventional and nuclear weapons destroy a large percentage of Earth and its species? Just to satisfy your cultural prejudice for ochlocracy! Don’t be ridiculous, man.”
“I’m not being ridiculous, Rav, More species, many more, will, indeed, be destroyed before the human race gets its act together. But, think what a precedent you, yourself, will set by performing such a heinous act. You’ll be more criminal, more culpable, and as reprehensible as those associated with the atomic bomb or nuclear power generation!”
“Why? My weapons violate no moral imperative.”
“Suppose you decimate the planet once and achieve a measure of stability. What’s preventing you or another from repeating it?”
“Success.”
“And when similar conditions return?”
“They won’t.”
“What chance is there of that? Overpopulation will revisit. You know it.”
“I foresee a limited number of reiterations. The simian is not a lemming, Les. Humanity can make the necessary value changes. Once survivors see the horror forced by the absence of cultural value changes, they won’t want a replay?”
“What makes you think horror will wake the World up to the danger of ecological collapse? Horror never changed Man before. Why should it now?”
“Because it has to,” Mr. Aloirav answered with uncertainty.
“Did wholesale Jewish butchery of Canaanites, Torquemada’s Inquisition, the French Reign of Terror, Albania, the Pope´s & Hitler’s holocausts, Stalin’s pogroms, or Bush’s starving and bombing of millions of Iraqis to death change anything? Did people wake to the dangers of religion or accumulating wealth vis-à-vis poverty? Did knowledge of England’s starving to death hundreds of thousands of Irish stop Cecil Rhodes’ murders of Dutch women & children? How many hundred thousand Boers didn’t he slaughter? Did those bodies stop Pol Pot´s recent genocides, those in Rwanda, Bosnia, or any of the USA’s depredations? How many countries went on record as opposed to the Bushes’ war crimes? Think of the hundreds of thousands of women and children those silk-suited simians slaughtered! Are unmitigated greed, Nazi propaganda, anti-Semitism, and bigotry finished? Of course not. I’ve seen mega-death in Viet Nam, Rav, as have you. You’ve also seen it in the Congo, Uganda, and Biafra. Right here next to you now, I can swear. Even without your own particular brand of terror, I feel the horror will return.”
“You may be right. I can’t fault your logic.”
“Damn right you can’t! Ideological considerations are secondary. They always have been. The human race makes war and general homicide, because it likes to! Children will face the horror of war forever, unless solutions and values, yes values, like yours, change.”
“My values… like survival, a place for all, human decency, all the other heinous desires…”
“The growth outward, I propose, is the one viable alternative.” Lester finished, remembering his children. It silenced him.
Not noticing the change in demeanor, the hotelier said. “My point exactly! I couldn’t have said it better myself. It’s our opportunity! We have as much a right to die as anyone. Soon we’ll belong to history, and just time will be our judge.”
Lester felt some relief mingled with uncertainty, until these painful memories re-surfaced. He needed the means to bring positive purpose to his life. In his rope analogy, the man saw, one-day, straight hairs predominating, and an ever-closer route to paradise. He just heard that the one way to save his vision was to assist in thinning the rope.
“Is he right?” He wondered. “Rav’s gonna’ be the World’s greatest terrorist. He’ll have influence beyond what anyone can even imagine. His capacity to destroy will be more effective than the bomb. What will my role be in his new World Order?” Becoming confused, Lester said. “I think I’ve had just about as much indoctrination as I can handle for one day, Rav. After this morning, I’m getting tired. I’d like to get back to my apartment, if you don’t mind. I want to begin preparing for the construction of the prototype and factory tomorrow.”
“Sounds like a capital idea,” the “boss” replied, getting up from his chair.
After leaving the restaurant, Mr. Frye began preparing for the future. After all his trials and sacrifices, the dream was approaching. He would devote the rest of his life to the planet. The Pontibus, no longer available for his own children, would exist for the young of all species.
Before sleeping, Lester thought. “I’m making a pact with the devil, I know. It seems the only way. I’ll insist on some fundamentals before agreeing to anything further.”

There is no great genius without some touch of madness… Seneca

Chapter Thirty-Four

Total planetary biomass in 2009 was 32 times living biomass. It was two million times less than total lithospheric mass. Humans felt they enjoyed a God-given right to destroy all other living things just to exist. The hotelier asked. “From where did such a bizarre notion arise?”
He answered himself. “Probably from the same place the notion of God arose, the land of irresponsible fear. All the energy that goes into meaningless logic to justify futile purposes is hard to fathom.”
Normal growth need not have created so much as a wrinkle in the 196,938,800 square miles (510,071,492 square kilometers) of Earth. Prior implementation of Pontibus technology would have multiplied arable and habitable space available for centuries. Instead, well-meaning anti-development environmentalists beleaguered hard-working real estate developers. Between concerned people and diminishing open space, mid-21st Century land development was becoming expensive. Red tape, public hearings, restrictions, political opposition, and scarcity of buildable property helped make it so.
Just a select and powerful few even desired to enter the arena. Yet, it was the portion of the economy creating the most jobs. There they produced, (what was then defined as), affluence. Mr. Frye felt that definition must change, if our species and eukaryotic protoplasm were to survive. He saw a mirage of abundance growing through caedere conversions (rendering living material into its non-living counterpart).
Lester believed the true meaning of custodianship to be the exact opposite. To him, changing dead into living should produce prosperity. He wanted to make it the Pontibus resident’s dictum of the sustainability mandate. The man felt current value judgments gave greater weight to the caedere definition of wealth. That “living into non-living” interpretation and the manner of affluence-creation needed changing. He wanted & expected his new technology to create peaceful inducements to that end. It would assist by initiating cultural changes. Environmentally benign, biologically sustainable, the Pontibus would make more effective use of near space.
Augmenting Earth’s surface area would reduce peripheral crust density. Decreasing pollution, bridge communities would increase food, clean water, oxygen, energy, living space, and freedom. Such enabling would sustain larger and healthier populations of all species. Markets for goods and services would develop. That meant commensurate increases in the economy and Gross Planetary Product. Environmental, political, economic, and spiritual needs were calling for the Pontibus.
Humanity integrated its animal roots and advancing technological capacity with difficulty. Biological adaptation languished in the light of scientific virtuosity. Society didn’t mature commensurate to its environmental manipulating potential. Mr. Frye feared human social development moved too slowly. He gave as reasons:
“Homo sapiens sapiens has been on the planet but 1/6millionth of the earth’s age. His written history has endured but 10% of his short time here. The dinosaurs were here 200,000,000 years or 6,666.67 times as long. They went extinct. Homo’s hubris is awe-inspiring! Human evolutionary progress might also be insufficient.
Another caveat is equally non-frivolous. It’s the burgeoning democracy disease. Anyone having lived during the mid-twentieth century knows about it. I want to protect my creation against such dementia. One need not be a thaumatologist to discover how fast they degenerate to ochlocracy. Our awakening might come too late to preempt descent into bureaucratic agro managerial despotism. I want to avoid, if possible, using Maritime Law on the Pontibus. The raw power available to a captain under it presents heavy consequential dangers. Escaping such a system while remaining uncooperative with pols will not be easy.”
Rav’s initial optimism notwithstanding, decades passed without success in the form of the first space house. Mr. Frye and he made many annual trips to the Amazon. After replenishing their supply, rejuvenating their bodies, they returned to their respective tasks. During that period, they watched many acquaintances and contemporaries pass into oblivion. A generation of New Society members changed, as only the closest were receiving the elixir.
The hotelier amplified his anti-selection-factor removal-velocity with an even greater army of agents. He wanted to give Lester every chance to save the human race from successive decimations. Pollution, population, and resource exhaustion continued to grow unabated. Degeneration of life on the planet and caedere conversions continued. The last time the two men went to pick the Hesperides apples they found none.
Water pollution & drought of the latter decade killed the life-giving organism. It stood in company with most other wild species on the globe now extinct. Of all the seeds and numerous cuttings taken from the small thorny tree over the years, none ever took root or bore fruit. They were never able to cultivate the plant away from the special brackish Amazon water habitat. The men kept the plant’s DNA and some protoplasm suspended in liquid nitrogen. Both hoped one day to clone it.
The loss of the Hesperides apples now lent added urgency to the tasks each man set for himself. Longevity, they could no longer take as a given. Both men knew time was wasting. Rav Aloirav grew restive. His impatience with Lester’s incapacity grew with each passing year.
Despite earlier optimism, it took Lester decades to perfect the vertex joint. Initial euphoria with aluminum also proved insupportable. In the end, he needed to change the construction material too. Experimenting with various metals and designs was frustrating and expensive. Nothing he formed seemed able to withstand the force of contrary physics encountered. The most promising of the pre-calein compositions was aluminum reinforced foamed concrete. He called the invention Al-Con.
Mr. Aloirav funded the expenses. He found sufficient capital available in the “Group” treasury to construct two Al-Con prototypes. The first was clandestine. It gave the Company a better idea of safety and efficacy. The second one tested expected public acceptability of the modules. They built that second one at a very visible Boston site. In appearance, durability, maintenance, price, quality, usability, and installation training required, the aerial housing product was far superior.
While still in the 21st Century, Lester said. “The US government cum Wall Street’s zeal to assault & rob the entire world will fail. The hydrocarbon (coal, gas & petroleum) offensive for the carrion merchants will prove too expensive, and nuclear power generation will become acceptable. The dollar will fall.”
Mr. Frye was right. Politicians debauched the dollar to make the people pay for the oil pillaging wars. The following prices may seem high to a person familiar with 1st decade 21st Century costs. Statistics from the 21st Century forward are also suspect due to dehistorization. Nevertheless, the contemporary cost of a new sky house with 10 domiciles (condominiums) was $400M. In 2000 AD dollars, the cost would have been $385 thousand.
The 1986 price of a 2×4 board foot was $0.28. In 1994, it was $0.32. The increase wasn’t just due to government counterfeiting of dollars. Timber companies replaced trees slower than they harvested. Even with huge government subsidies, lumber prices continued to rise. Quality did not keep up a proportionate pace with price increases. It deteriorated until a white pine lumber tree was as soft as model airplane balsawood. A paste ersatz 2X4 went for $400. Depletion of other planetary resources occurred for similar reasons.

The New Society assembled the first prototype’s Al-Con piers near the equator in Brazil. At the confluence of the Amazon and the Rio Negro at Manaus, the “Group” unloaded the prefabricated pieces. From there they hauled them north. The 48’ trusses went through the small token rainforest by truck. Arriving at another Amazonian headwater, the Rio Branco, the hotelier took them the final 150 miles. From Caracarai, Roraima they floated southwest into the last triple-canopy jungle left in the world. Just outside Tierra Indigena, Yanomami territory, he stopped.
Fabricators cast the two-part vertex-joints near Caracas, Venezuela. From there, the “boss” smuggled them into Brazil. Leaving Caracas, refueling on the Coroni, nobody ever saw them again in Venezuela. Their arrival at a particular jungle garipe’ (small river), off the Orinoco, was likewise sub rosa. The finished structure straddled the water, as he ordered. Below it tucahmare’ (peacock bass) and jacahre’ (alligators) fought over worker dropped food scraps.

The space house was a beautiful sight. It shone from different perspectives, as would a sparkling diamond. The structure dazzled the eyes with quasi-crystalline brilliance. It appeared as frosted glass, suspended from spider silk, supported by icicles. Never having seen anything similar, people came to Boston from around the World to see the second prototype. Gazing at its brilliance, they marveled at the architecture.
One man said, “I see it. I know it’s there. But when I close my eyes, I can only believe I must be dreaming.”
Another said, “I don’t care what it costs. I want one built on my property.”
Another said. “I’ll buy all you can build.”
Lester saw the crisis, the danger, and the opportunity. He became as famous as Mr. Aloirav predicted. In one day, they took orders for over a thousand modules (5000 domiciles). The Concern employed sufficient labor to build but one sky house a month. Nobody knew where to get trained people to build the structures fast enough to satisfy demand. The hotelier went to MIT, looking for high-caliber management people. Needing assistance in the hiring of the necessary type of worker, he left disappointed. MIT was still more interested in technologies which were unsustainable and detrimental to human evolution, like Draper Labs and nuclear power. They had no idea what the “boss” needed.
The total New Society treasury draws came to $51B. Money left clandestine banks in four separate hawala stages. Victim-plundered properties funded about half of it. The other half came from large banks and illuminati gold depots. The “Group” diverted funds from inactive fiduciary accounts through wire-transfers to translucent temporary financial records, not even banking institutions.
Messengers took funds from access points and delivered them where needed. Although, at this point, dehistorization would have protected them, the “boss” did not want to sack all of the world’s banks. The Rothschilds, Schiffs, Rockefellers, etc. were still much more powerful than the New Society. Rav Aloirav didn’t want to annoy them to the point of retribution. The “boss” did not know where that point was but felt it could destabilize his “normal economy” plans, bringing the Commission down on him.
The Pope never succeeded in his world conquest & socialistic objectives. Therefore, the hotelier saw no urgent need for such funds. He also satisfied their capital needs through equity sales to other concerns.
The Company sold stock to aluminum, concrete, and plastic producers. Insurance, energy, and communications providers took the greatest portion of the available shares. Automobile manufacturers, construction, waste disposal, and biotechnology companies bought lesser amounts. Agricultural interests and government agencies also took some. Stock sales positioned the Concern to spend a final ten billion dollars.
They hired management, prepared for production, and purchased the first factory. The two men together undertook negotiations costing thirty billion dollars. They hired additional personnel, purchased buildings, and acquired real estate & materials. Once module assembly was underway, expenses and asset depreciation increased. Manufacturing specifications, additional insurance, equipment, and material purchases cost twenty billion dollars.
The initial production run, 100 domiciles, was for ten double modules of five domiciles per module. Single modules of five domiciles were more attractive to customers. The doubles, however, were less expensive per domicile. Small print below explains aerial building technical details. One need not understand them to follow the greater story.
One can visualize the matrix through a chemical bond analogy to the metallic piers or trusses. A closed system of chained enlarged solitary molecules of methane gas will approximate. A figurative diamond cylinder extended in space also describes the construction of a truss. A carbon atom is at the center of a tetrahedron. It makes 109.5-degree angles with other carbons. The same intersections exist but with hydrogens in the case of methane gas.
The imagined 109.5 degree-angled central carbon is absent in the construct. The carbon or hydrogen bond-legs connect at 60-degree angles with each other. The Al-Con tubing maintains a simulated central bond angle with its peripherals. Piers or trusses connect internally with component 12″ Al-Con tubes. The ends of the trusses shape to connect at intersections. Jointing is similar to the internal tubing attachments. Central connections allow a maximum of six rays. All ends are equidistant.
The following cost and weight differentials do not include specifications incidental to the addition of foamed concrete. Such parameters added 23% to both aspects. The Company spent $190M for 500,000 linear feet of .035″ walled tubing. That quantity made a million 6″ tubes for hexagonal orientations. It made 500,000 of the 12″ tubes for piers.
Per linear foot, tubing weighed 0.0278 pounds and cost $380. 7.7 of the 12” tubes made a linear foot of pier, 0.214 pounds, costing $2930/cubic foot. 369.6 of these 12” pier-tubes made a 48 cubic foot truss, (1’ X 1’ X 48’), weighing 10.28 pounds, and costing $140,640. 184.8 of these 12″ pier-tubes made a 24 cubic foot pier, (1′ X 1′ X 24′), weighing 5.14 pounds, and costing $70,320.
Two habitation modules shared 55 large, 48 linear-foot-legged, tetrahedrons. 132 of the 48 cubic foot trusses were necessary to build it. There were 5 large tetrahedrons on each base and top. 10 served each module with 25 separating the two. These large tetrahedrons had a total weight of 1356.96 pounds, costing $18,564,480.
The superstructure included the 48 cubic foot trusses and 90 of the 24 cubic foot piers. 10 of the large inner tetrahedrons enclosed the two modules of 10 octagonal domiciles. Each of the 5 domiciles/module used 12 of the 24 cubic foot piers. They shared 15 with other domiciles in the complete module. The 24 cubic foot piers of the modules enjoyed a total weight 462.6 pounds and a cost of $6,328,800.
Supports for walkway-platforms used 32 of the 24 cubic foot piers. They had a total weight of 164.48 pounds and a cost of $2,250,240. Platforms or module walls and floors used the 6″ tubes. These smaller lengths cost $190 and weighed 0.0139 pounds each. Seven, vertical hexagonal-orientations required 150. That 2.085-pound patch was one layer of tetrahedrons thick, 20″ X 22″ (3.05 square foot), 1.525 cubic feet and cost $28,500. A million 6″ tubes gave a maximum of 20,333 square feet of living space.
The Concern shipped the 35 triangular module segments of such an orientation in the following manner. Pre-insulated, they were 24 feet long, 249.42 square feet and weighed 170.5 pounds with sheet-plastic-coating. The Concern delivered them in 140 quarter-segments of 42.63 pounds each. Assembling the lighter weight, easy-to-manipulate quarter-segments into segments proved quick. Connecting them into a complete module required minimal training.
A module’s outer skin and interior walls encompassed 8729.7 square feet (249.42 square feet/segment X 35 segments/module). It cost $81,572,610 (8729.7 square feet X $28,500/3.05 square feet) and weighed 5967.68 pounds (8729.7 square feet X 2.085 pounds/3.05 square feet).
A direct proportion exists between weight bearing and hexagonalization. A sky house’s horizontal needs included 5 gardens/module, walkway platforms and 3-floors/ domicile. The Company also shipped them in segments. Per cubic foot, these platforms cost $18,690 and weighed 1.367 pounds.
Hexagonal-oriented tetrahedral sheets required connection to the superstructure on their periphery. Resin coated a domicile’s 997.66 square foot garden-platform after assembly. That landing weighed 682 pounds (997.66 X 2.085 pounds/3.05 square feet) and cost $9,322,400 (997.66 X $28,500/3.05 square feet).
The 5-domiciled, 3-floored module was 24 feet tall (lowest point to highest point) and 54.72 feet wide. Walkway platforms added another 997.68 horizontal square feet to the space house. They weighed 682.02 pounds (997.68 X 2.085-pounds/3.05 square feet) and cost $9, 322,580 (997.68 X $28,500/3.05 square feet).
The two dimensions of the hexagonal first and third floors were 10.39’ X 12’. They gave about 240 usable square feet each. The rhombohedral second floor was 33.94’ X 24’ or 407.28 square feet. Assembled, in situ, the three floors, 887.28 square feet, cost another $8,290,980/domicile (887.28 X $28,500/3.05 square feet) or $41,454,890/module. The weight, 606.55 pounds (887.28 square feet X 2.085-pounds/3.05 square feet), was 3032.75 pounds/module.

Sky house (192 feet wide X 156 feet high)

Cost ($) Weight (pounds)

Superstructure
27,143,520 1,984.04
2 modules w/o floors
163,145,220 11,935.36
3 floors in all 10 domiciles
82,909,800 6,065.50
10 gardens
93,224,000 6,820.00
2 walkways
18,645,160 1,364.04
Total
385,067,700 28,168.94
Ratio of habitation weight: superstructure weight:
18,000.86:1,984.04 or 9.07:1
Ratio of garden-walkway weight: superstructure weight: 8184.04:1,984.04 or 4.12:1
10 domiciles, 10 gardens and 2 walkways horizontal square footage:
8872.8 floors
9976.6 gardens
1995.4 walkways
———————
20,844.8 total

At $385,067,700/8872.8 square feet, it was $43,400/square foot
At $385,067,700/20,844.8 square feet, it was $18,470/ square foot
Figures do not include cost or weight of finishing work. Thus extra foamed concrete, interior patinas, windows, photovoltaic exterior, doors, wiring, plumbing, telecommunications, decorating, appliances, etc. were additional. Such work added unacceptable delivery weight if factory-completed. At a modest profit, the Concern sold subcontractors materials.

The Corporation needed to stay competitive and maintain their exclusivity in the housing industry. Given the unique nature of their supply and market, that wasn’t too difficult. For post-installation work, commercial spreadsheets allowed the Company to charge $25,000 per square foot. They followed a single-model formula with a double-cost price tag, (2 X ($38,506,770 + $25K (887.28)). A domicile sold for $121,377,540. Gross sales for the initial production run of 100 domiciles were $12,137,754,000.
A $60,688,770 profit per domicile did not include additional monies from energy sales, services, insurance, etc. With the additional $30,344,385,000 profit after four more similar production runs, the pleased “Group” recouped their initial investment. Benign planetary sustainability was proving economical & feasible after all. Luxembourg banks began to swell from entering New Society funds.
First-Surface residents welcomed the fresh jobs. New genetically engineered organs for transplant allowed older workers more time to die. Abortion decreased the number of young vigorous first world laborers. Forced compliance with equal opportunity demands continued to tax employer standards. Imported worker’s rights, guaranteed by the Pope and the World’s Holy Roman Empire politicians, made unemployment high. Pandering to socialistic labor laws was good politics but very detrimental to companies, their ignorant help, and quality of product. Unemployment was at 63% and rising 1% every year. Except for the slave-labor countries in the Orient, it appeared the 22nd Century would bring but intensification of the disastrous policies of the 20th & 21st.
Other than the huge fascistic richest corporations in the world, most prospective employers shied away from getting into business. They wanted no part of the heavy penalties incident upon giving people jobs. Unless able to afford an army of scheister lawyers, only desperate people now hired employees. An employer forgetting to let a man off on his birthday paid a 400% annual wage penalty. Neglecting to pay 700% for overtime and holidays could bankrupt a small concern. Incorrigible employers paid heavy fines for neglecting to terminate help before the 30-day “rights window” started. Most workers were government bureaucrats and made orders of magnitude more money after taxes than did desperate employers.
As goods and their quality continued an inexorable decline, employers became second-class citizens. One needed more than just ordinary capitalistic greed to want to hire. Mission-minded people were the usual victims. Potential profit or benefit must be enormous to accept the risk. Space houses became more than just manufacturing jobs. Society needed them in other ways. The structures served as sociological therapy.
They answered many unanswerable questions. Their construction instilled values, purpose, and hope into people’s lives. It gave renewed vision to people made cynical by generations of “politics as usual”. The New Society too encountered workers who didn’t have the old-fashioned values, appreciating the gift of a job. They sometimes found places in the filthy urine-smelling-hospitals, waiting for Lester to pay his “penalties”. However, most caught colds and died before making it there. One year, Lester won the Employer of the Year award for having paid no worker a penalty for the entire past year.
Great bridges grew from interconnecting space houses according to Mr. Frye’s design. He saw the eventual structures eliciting many positive feelings. Not all hopeful sentiments were useful to his contemplated new culture, however. Politicians with dilemmas came around with their hands out. Calling on him for help, they produced his decades-old letter to Congressman Post.
Now that Lester was showing he could deliver on promises, the politicians saw problems being solved…theirs. Although Mr. Frye was an idealist, impractical at times, he was not insensate. Years of want and social peripheralization, not to mention political abuse, left him with residual feelings. In his opinion, such people were all just takers, never givers. The man didn’t believe even the remotest shred of integrity existed in any lawyer or politician.
He kept them at arm’s length until ready to deal. Even then, it would be on his terms, not theirs, (disregarding the disappointing Post letter). For the ultimate structure and associated arteries, politicians requested design specifications. Lester refused to comply with their request. They either capitulated or caught an Aloirav cold. The law mandated the Company give a timetable for completion of various incremental objectives. It never became available upon their request either. He ignored them. They yielded or found their way to the hospitals.
Mr. Aloirav explained Mr. Frye’s political solutions as an analogy to a new type of sewage treatment. “Democracy is a cesspool. Voters are dispersed waste. Pols are the yet to be dissolved turds, floating around the surface.”
Holding numerous contracts for the structure’s use, the Concern was the exclusive builder. It was Lester’s vision and his momentum. He named his terms. The following housing and census information in small print comes from documents printed prior to 1995. One may presume them correct. Current GIT (Government in Transition, an Aloirav term) dollars were worth 1000X less.
The average price of a single-family US home in 1990 was $118,600, $128,400 in 1991 and $130,900 in 1992. The median price of a condominium was $83,600 in 1990, $85,700 in 1991 and $84,900 in 1992. Average annual sales volume for single-family homes was $418.565 billion. The average annual sales volume of condominiums was $29.795 billion. 3,211,000 US homes sold in 1990, 3,220,000 in 1991 and 3,525,000 in 1992. 350,000 US condominiums sold in 1990, 339,000 in 1991 and 366,000 in 1992. In the US alone, 258 million persons were deciding on new housing every five years. Census Report 1992 noted the US reaching the highest number of persons below poverty level in thirty years. That same report concluded that 37 million persons were earning less than $14,000/year. Census Report 2042 noted the US reaching the highest number of persons below poverty level in eighty years. That same report concluded that 137 million persons were earning less than $100,000/year.
The Company expected many future customers to come from the foregoing buyers. Mr. Frye’s sky houses were not of substandard quality. With such information in mind, keeping them inexpensive, he felt he performed a humanitarian action. Sales, starting with the novelty buyer, added the adventuresome. The vacation-spot customer appeared.
The beachfront owner took a chance. Hotel guests, tourists, and time-share-flat owners bought aerial dwellings. Mobile home, or pre-fab, buyers plunked down their money. Then an avalanche of new customers appeared. The type of space house buyer changed.
Regular families and former owners of single-family dwellings came to dominate. Current and potential homeowners became customers. Buyers could customize Lester’s units as much as regular architecture. Costs for his single-family dwellings approached those of contemporary modular units, but customers paid no utilities. Taking a good thing, housing, he made it better and more affordable.
Wealthy Western Europe and the US became the mainstay of his market for the first few years. Japan, however, was land poor, used to modular living and dying from Fukushima poisoning. A large customer base came from there as well. The buildings attracted bargain hunters. They also drew luxury buyers, wanting seaside or resort-style living.
Mr. Frye took advantage of the housing market far more than First-Surface builders with limits did. Not even his “no sale” was definite. Buyers appeared who would not, for any reason, even in their dreams, leave the ground. Not wanting the product for themselves, nevertheless, they purchased for others. Earth may have chained his or her own soul but not that of their donee.
1950 World population doubled by the 21st century. That impact correlated inversely with the health and fate of the planet. Small doubt existed among scientists. One billion people were in the process of starving to death every day. Census taking demographers reported 9 billion persons on the First-Surface by 2030 AD. They reported 11.5 billion human inhabitants by 2050 AD.
As the 20th century ended, 31% of the World was without adequate sewage disposal or treatment facilities. 22% enjoyed inadequate safe drinking water. These figures were 4 times as bad 50 years later. Regaining and surpassing 1950 à 1984 food-supply growth was essential. Failing to do so meant hysteria a vision of Jacobean France’s extremism could recapitulate. Unless the biosphere expanded, humanity was doomed.
Lester’s modules did expand the globe, however. Earth’s radius grew at an exponential rate along with his Company. Habitat growth began resembling a direct proportion. The attractiveness of what the Concern produced soon became obvious. Demand for the new housing units and gardens grew faster than supply. Many uneventful months passed just filling orders.
Problems came and found remedies. Mr. Frye tried developing methods to install piers and modules requiring minimal instruction. Even that required time. Training binds occurred. He funded Pontibus University in Grand Rapids just for sky house construction education. The university later added a complete curriculum that became Bridge Internet accessible.
Winter months in temperate climate zones held much negative public sentiment. Higher altitudes everywhere experienced the same disapproval. In fact, after an optimum temperature altitude disapproval was directly proportional to elevation. Lester needed to adjust perceptions until plant & animal growth increased warmth and desirability. There were some, mainly insect & fungus haters, hardy enough to prefer cooler climate levels.
His market was not in equatorial less-developed countries. Lester knew, however, because of ice, snow, and altitude constraints it soon might be or his units would have to approximate such temperatures. Spring brought many maintenance challenges. Calls came in for minor design changes. Meanwhile, he added inducements, unnecessary to the primary structure.
Intricacies, such as wind-energy collection devices made Temperate Zone locations more attractive. The turbines maintained high-latitude aquaculture ponds in a liquid state all winter. The same areas got their solar and solar-electric heating units installed quicker. Partial pre-wiring at the factory included fiber-optic cable within piers and modules. It enabled faster implementation of the “Pontibus Village” technology. The Concern brought the “information highway” to cooler areas sooner than elsewhere.
Even so, climates similar to zero latitude altitudes of 4000’ – 9000’ remained most popular. With good agriculture, and without lowland diseases, one doesn’t wonder. The age-old adage of real estate investment, “location, location, location”, applied likewise to space buildings. The product self-directed its installation site.
From distant space, the planet’s periphery would one day appear as a magnified muscle cell. There was virtually nowhere the units wouldn’t go. No sky house location deficiencies existed which were not much more significant situation insufficiencies to other housing units. It was one of the greatest assets the sky modules offered. Niches, no other housing supplier exploited, were in the Company’s bailiwick.
Industrial-customer concentrations were anathema to Lester’s competitors. They were prime property to him. For example, an industrial processing facility was within a central city’s high crime area. He placed the initial units on the factory roof for the plant’s employees. The modules cantilevered out over the city like giant mushrooms.
They continued growing until they again reached the First-Surface. The connecting modules obviated the necessity to traverse the high crime area to or from work. As construction proceeded, aerial parks and other recreation areas linked to outlying district units. Personnel never needed to make contact with the central city or even the ground. The very poor increasingly came to occupy terra firma. It became apparent that someday just they and the uninformed (“the meek shall inherit the earth”) would be First-Surface denizens. Gives the sermon on the Mount an entirely new meaning.
Such distinctive behavior caused understandable problems with obstructionists, frustrated environmentalists, competitors, other losers, pols, etc. They tried using old zoning height-limit laws to delay construction. Mr. Frye didn’t understand why people wanted to prevent his improvements. He explained the difficulties to Mr. Aloirav. Problems disappeared overnight.
Offshore interests housed employees and families in floating space houses. Accessible communities were within walking distances. Long periods separating friends, because of the oil platform residency, ceased. Commercial interests located within these neighborhoods. They drew their employees and customer base from there and from other areas. Yet, the residential character of the modules remained self-evident.
Single contractors or real estate agents made most sales. As with the Home Cloning Kit, capturing the public’s imagination generated much free publicity. News release sales approaches went through holovision & the WEB. The Concern answered potential customer’s questions through promotional information & the Internet. They supplied local realtors with advertising, printed on the finest microbial cellulose, thereby achieving much in inexpensive training.
Education benefits added venture capital, service contracts, and customers. Field representatives and distributors came from the real estate industry. However, mobile home, marine, and automobile dealerships also contributed. Commissions covered essential marketing costs. Economy of scale determined future prices.
The Corporation allowed land-based neighborhoods to grow to a hundred modular living units with associated gardens and walkways. Septic systems, water vapor collection devices, wind-solar-hydro generators, information systems, animals, vehicles, etc. further illustrates the picture. If an area began growing fast, the Company soon arrived and began serving variegated interests. Countryside deficiencies mattered not; Lester’s technology was innovative.
HISTORICAL competition, not historical COMPETITION, was the enemy. It was a difficult and challenging task convincing people tradition wasn’t always a good thing. The world always did housing in particular ways. That did not mean those were the best ways. No reason existed for not doing it the tetrahedralized way.
Explaining that the old ways all used the same obsolete building principles, Lester said. “Pharaohs did it with their pyramids. One stone piled on another. For thousands of years precedent has ruled progress. The methods are antiquated and outdated. They need not continue.”
Nevertheless, he knew it took intestinal fortitude to make a sky house investment your personal reality. The structure violated many former concepts of what customers considered a safe dwelling. Religionists spoke against them as being anti-Biblical. The Bible maintained that houses with rock foundations were better. The Pope banned them from Italy and all the Holy Roman Empire vassal countries. Sky houses were without foundations, usually, suspended in air from distant cantilevers. None were square with four walls. A heavy roof didn’t hold walls in place. Outer walls were not rectangular or even plumb.
Wood that was there was cosmetic. Al-Con was cool in summer and warm in winter. Few people needed air-conditioning. Others, comfortable just when able to control ambient temperatures, felt lost in neighboring homes. Space houses were unique, their most damning quality.
Nevertheless, no other manufacturing group was so poised to capture the market sought. Differences in products, not slight, were very important. The Concern didn’t want them insignificant. They preferred the contrasts being obvious to competitors as well as customers. Lester wanted no one buying his product through ignorance or under false pretenses.
The comprehensive competing attitude in the market was recognizable as diffuse. The new product did not contend with point of view. Capitalizing on it, the Company drew marketing force from it. They exploited it unchanged. If such factors weren’t there before, the Corporation would have needed to develop them.
Temptation evolved to minimize distinctions. Mainstream opposition ridiculed and maximized the “peculiarities” as caprice. A feeling of being on the periphery, “politically incorrect”, touched a sensitive spot from Mr. Frye’s past. He was wise to that trick now. Differences were his forte’.
Discerning observers’ cogent reflections saw such features not as weaknesses but as prevailing strengths and greatness. First-Surface land prices became exorbitant. Habitation costs reflected it. Space houses became even more competitive.

The expenditure for the initial ocean Pontibus, Lester speculated decades prior, would be about $2T. He wanted the great bridge of tetrahedrons to contain over 5,000 dual module sky houses. Cantilevers would reach from Boston to Cape Cod’s Provincetown and Cape Ann. Shore property was far too expensive to acquire near Back Bay. The “Group” planned to lay the footings just within the harbors and float buttresses.
Politicians were pleased with the vast increase in tax revenues from space house manufacture and sale. With New Society help, such individuals were ever more willing to genuflect. Massachusetts DEP (Department of Environmental Protection) was happy to give Mr. Frye an “Order of Conditions”. With that, he could commence construction of the larger structure.
After the sky house profit, the Company’s anticipated investment returns would generate through fees. Revenues would come from cloud-distilled water, electrical energy, and rental bases from new housing space. Remuneration for nation-wide waste disposal would come upon completion of year-round freezing-levels. Bridge finishing promised tariff levies for First-Surface commuter access. The average commuter spent 12 years of life wasted in travel, 4-8hrs/day, or 40hrs/week. Solar pumps would transport clean air down to the city from the high troposphere. Until Boston’s air was safe to breathe, the contract on clean air carried a non-cancelable provision.
Opening 21st Century human population was 6 billion. 80% were inhabitants of less developed countries. Half lived in cities and towns. Over 75% of the United States was living within 50 miles of the coasts.
The University of Massachusetts – Amherst has an FDF = Familial Dependency Formula i.e. (parents aged 65 to 79 per children 65 per working population <65. It was 1elder/11 workers in 1930, 1elder/6 workers in 1990, and 1elder/3 workers in 2020.
Plentiful community-style energy-efficient low-cost housing was in demand. If constructed fast, waste conscious, sustainable, and near the sea, so much the better. Inexpensive yet attractive habitats for senior citizens were most welcome. Most senior citizens felt that since they contributed to the high living standard, they deserved consideration.
The under-65 age group was very much interested in a biased Social Security budget. They were even more sensitive to limiting their exposure to it. The over-65 group was just as touchy about limiting public-exposure pressure to their accessing that same budget. They were also most receptive to personal purchases of attractive vacation-like housing. If done without raising the ire of Society’s younger members, both groups could benefit.
On a less cheerful note, the American public was forever interested in housing more miscreants. Each year the people screamed louder for less freedom. Less freedom for others today, less for themselves tomorrow. More and more of them entered brutal establishments of Law & Order. Lawyers controlled access and exit and very few complained about the incredible abuse. Benjamin Franklin would have been overjoyed to see how well the American people responded to his cage initiative. Larger and more numerous private penitentiaries just approached satisfying appetite.
However, most citizens were also less desirous of paying for same in dollars and in local siting places. The problem’s easy solution didn’t appear right around the corner. Inexpensive, with isolated and secured areas, aerial bridge habitation for prisoners was most acceptable. Not just western governments found the “Group’s” proposals for isolating and housing convicts attractive. Even wasteful lawless countries, without any sense of fair play, like Brazil and Venezuela, experimented with cantilever prisons.
Viable answers to many World problems were in the Pontibus. Exploitation was the next step. The Company needed to license the various opportunities. Large contracts went out for communications, transportation, energy generation, prisons, and weapons-waste storage. Smaller ones included customer commissions, construction finishing work, service, etc.
The Corporation expected a cash-flow break-even point within fifteen years. Management decisions after year ten would limit net profits. The Company expected retained earnings would expand habitats and industrial accommodations beyond the initial 50,000-domicile enclave. They required new facilities and staff to train technicians and growth support people. Lester founded another university in Boston. Since the Pontibus would reach the stratosphere, they named it the Institute for Tropospheric Studies.
The Pontibus was to be tax-free. There were agreements with the politicians to that end. The New Society felt, with such an endeavor, they could never accept taxation’s unquestionable power to destroy. Slaves of Rothschild’s national government, forever, put too much at stake. The US’ moribund corrupt tyrannical ochlocracy, the “Club” reasoned, was only odious to enlightened individuals.
The politicians soon reneged on their agreement to allow the great bridge tax-free status. That decision came from high up in Washington. The “treachery as usual” behavior of politicians met with a phalanx of resistance. The perfidy outraged the honor-heavy New Society.
Mr. Aloirav controlled his anger, but he said to Lester. “I will not pay tribute to this or any other protection racket! Taxation is but theft!”
Replying in kind, Mr. Frye agreed. “That brothel in Washington would steal my dream. I want neither their written laws nor the judgment of God-fearing men. Pols!! There can be no dichotomy between “private life” and public persona on these bridges. Without stakes in a healthy future, directing the course of the Pontibus, it too will degenerate. Future-directed men and women with children are essential. I want assurance that after my death, just they and conventions will run the heavens. I cannot have that and give my blood to pol whores too!”
The New Society poured the Cape Cod Bay footings just a week before the news broke. Evening News reported that the politicians said they were breaking their agreement with Mr. Frye. They said his demands were excessive. Unable to confront the actual decision-maker, the two principals stopped the project. The signed papers were as worthless as the abrogated US Constitution. The hotelier made some calculated “introductions”. He discovered the decision was an NSA – multinational attempt to misappropriate the project.
A contract on Mr. Frye’s life was part of Rothschild’s puppet government’s ultimate design. They planned his assassination to occur in Iguaba Grande, Brazil, while he surveyed the salt lake for a mini-Pontibus. A special hit-team of Brazilian Federal Police was to do it, planting drugs on his corpse. A US audit was also to reveal (bogus) tax-evasion evidence. The affair involved Dr. Cinza.
The chubby cherub of change met previously with the leader of the special “corruption-free” Federal Police hit squad. The two became acquainted at a “fat-farm” in Cabo Frio. The US government had just hired the plump Brazilian Fed and his crew to remove Lester. For an exorbitant price, Cinza got the contract on Lester’s life suspended but not revoked. The New Society paid the bill.
Before an antibiotic-resistant typhoid took them to that opposite shore, about 20 politicians enjoyed the cheese soufflé. Many later wished they’d not done so with such gusto. Some even rued going to that meeting with Lester Frye. They just wanted to discuss their thoughts with him on how to tax the future New England Pontibus. Mr. Frye encouraged their attendance, explaining why he was going to postpone the project indefinitely.
The idea of constructing a Brazilian prototype came from the “boss”. Enamored of the world’s last remaining pristine rainforest, he now suggested moving the entire Pontibus down there, saying. “South Americans, Eastern Europeans, and Africans will acquire as many space houses as North Americans.”
It was for that reason; Mr. Frye planned to go there, investigating its possibilities with a model. Brazil was optimum for two reasons: The Bridge’s final length would be shorter (2000 miles), and the ozone at the equator would last longer than in temperate zones, allowing time to reach & augment it. Migrating humans would soon choose the region itself for its survival propensities. Fukushima radiation pressure, for example, was much less there than in the northern hemisphere.
Now, when the “boss” continued to press for it, he met resistance. Concerned about that area for the obvious reason, Mr. Frye asked. “What do you suggest I do? Wear a vest and carry an Uzi, take a bodyguard army wherever I go down there?”
He got his answer before they even concluded favorable agreements with Brasilia. Dr. Cinza and the fat cop were together in a Buzios’ sauna when death struck. The police officer died from complications due to endocarditis. “It does not pay to get too fat.” Mr. Aloirav warned Dr. Cinza and his corpulent cohort, earlier, as they ate at the Porçao in Copacabana.
The US DEA official hiring the special task force and supplying the framing drugs got an antibiotic-resistant peritonitis. He died after screaming for hours from abdominal pain. A DVD recording of his last hours surfaced. The US Treasury official coordinating the aborted murder got a chance to hear it all. He survived the ordeal for a few full hours in the same condition.
A transatlantic bridge now became more than a dream. The planned equatorial Pontibus ultimately will be 500X greater than Lester’s original design for New England. The structure is to be the largest, longest, highest, and most expensive, ($400,000 T), in human history. It encompasses over 25 million space houses (250 million domiciles), as I tell this story. (2251 GT, GT – Government Transcended – an Aloirav term) When Mr. Frye died, his bridges were out past the troposphere, Level-Fifty, à over 12,000 meters. When he laid his first sky house foundation, the highest building in the world was in Dubai, Burj Khalifa, at 829.8meters. The Eiffel Tower was 300 meters.
A fiber-optic cable manufacturer and an information-processing giant merged to buy the Concern’s $100 T communications contract. Equatorial South America and Africa were many miles away from the contemporary business heartbeat. At first, the investment appeared foolish. The Chairman of the communications concern took some heavy criticism for a few years. Water, however, covered 2/3 of the Planet. The far-sighted integrated management knew that fuel cost savings alone would soon recover their investment.
Moribund shipping concerns and airlines would never solve the hydrocarbon dearth problem. Regaining their former traffic was possible on the Pontibus. Magnetic levitated coaches were soon carrying passengers and freight worldwide at over 600km/hr. Energy costs via Pontibus generation were minuscule. The transoceanic bridge would employ, feed, habitate, and transport much of the world’s population, human and otherwise.
The most practical placement of 3218kms of footings meant acquiring satellite maps of the BrazilàAfrica ocean floor. At that time, global warming abetted seabed seismic activity to an average of 10 earthquakes/day. Much lava accompanied the continental drift. Normal footings were not possible. New technology appeared.
At a cost of $12.5B/km (2010 AD dollars), Lester secured the bridges with 200,000 250cm calein cables. Connected to water anchors, many were over 8 kilometers long. No human diver could withstand the underwater pressure at 8 kilometers. The Company employed a school of submersibles. Later, a geopositioning & recording system adjusted the retention cable tension as the sea floor changed.
Lester also connected his vertex joints using GPS coordinates. The “Group” poured the new ocean footings off Rio Grande Del Norte, Brazil, near Fernando de Naronha. Periodic floating buttresses with water anchors supported the growing structure. A special construction crew laid the African footings off Liberia. Getting these workers used to the new realities was not easy.
When they viewed the problems systematically, however, the crews prevailed. They found the numerous glitches succumbing inevitably to Lester’s research & development. The bridge grew across the ocean. Floating cantilevers joined others from the Canaries and the Azores. Mr. Frye spent 40 trillion (2010 AD dollars) just in raising the initial bridge to an altitude of 100 meters.
Avoiding political problems on terra firma was now more than just a penchant with the New Society. The structure, therefore, but cantilevered toward mainland shores to near-water platforms. First-Surface ferries handled logistics to and from these platforms. Lester conceived the 2,000-mile (3200km) bridge to be only 1,000,000 sky-houses long, 10 million domiciles. He needed to raise that number, however, after but a few years of breakneck construction.
20th Century people were prostituting their properties by accepting toxic and radioactive waste. They charged ever-higher prices, annually. Quotes of $150 – $250/ ton, even for the more benign toxics, were commonplace. Adequate storage-disposal of a 55-gallon drum of vitrified nuclear waste was hard to find. If found, it was expensive to an obscenity. Interring it in a salt mine cost over $500,000 in the year 2100 GT.
The immense bridge’s outer-limit platforms would store waste, frozen and inert, high above freezing altitudes. These outer levels went far beyond the point where conditions were capable of supporting life. Humans needed special suits to survive there. Waste-weapons disposal companies were also interested.
Ground surface levels do not collect wind and solar energy well. Windbreaks and other velocity dampers decrease potential. Turbines are subject to airborne contaminating grains of dirt and dust. Solar collectors are at the mercy of cloudy days, whose numbers are inversely proportional to altitude. The Pontibus’ outer limits facilitated energy collection by obviating such problems. Utility companies’ co-generation contracts were ready-made markets for inexpensive sustainable non-polluting energy.
The great bridge’s engineering allowed continued growth. Expansion was possible without additional strain. Rectangular compression buildings of wood, steel, and concrete couldn’t compete. For years, these structural dinosaurs exemplified an obsolete but persistent tradition, unfettered by progress.
There were some adjustment and access difficulties. Wild animals, unafraid of humans, got too close at times. Unexpected encounters could become unpleasant. Snakes and lizards (some poisonous) were ubiquitous, as were insects. Fast-growing vines tripped new residents.
Falling a few feet to the platforms below broke arms & legs. Narrow escapes from tumbling children scared parents. Contrary to much speculation, however, suicide jumpers never reached their predicted numbers. In the year 2050 AD, total Pontibus suicides compared favorably with those off just one bridge on First-Surface Luxembourg. With time, people adapted to the new accommodations. They expected, and received, peace of mind. Life was pleasant within the Pontibus’ intercontinental tetrahedralized matrices.
Habitation modules were aerodynamically inert. Individual piers presented a small surface-area/volume ratio. The great bridge offered little wind resistance as tested in Company tunnels. Later experience with actual storms over 300 knots showed similar small effects. That was encouraging when annual hurricanes were becoming ever more devastating due to global warming. The Pontibus’ diffusive structural topology also attenuated tremors. The quasi-flexible piers absorbed & dissipated wave motion. Earthquakes proved virtually unfelt.
Natural rain collected in sanitary pools. Water from cloud-level vapor condensers was free of impurities. Acid-base balanced water meant aerial pools of the equatorial bridge could grow healthy fish. By either mariculture or aquaculture, they were without contamination. These tasty organisms produced a desired & much-needed protein for the emerging World population.
Ocean supplies were long since exhausted. Faster-growing varieties of tambakee & coorie matah sold to the First-Surface. New residents received warnings about sky-grown fresh mullet and milkfish. Although sweeter and tastier than their terrestrial counterparts, they still required cooking. Some lower and medium region inhabitants got into trouble with anisakiasis anyway. Nothing of any major consequence ensued.
If Pontibus construction had continued in New England, collected water would have needed a calcium treatment. Air currents delivered mid-western sulfates and nitrates in perennial rain to the Atlantic seaboard. For many years, it caused acid precipitation. Multi-trillion-dollar damage estimates were conservative. A North American Ocean bridge would have needed to protect its aerial water supply with natural limestone. Such therapy would have returned the pH to healthy levels. Extra heavy resin would have protected the Al-Con trusses.
Acid rain was not a problem for the equatorial bridge. Medium altitudes were high enough to condense clean water into rushing streams. People there used, stored, and enjoyed it. They grew their food and raised animals on compost-covered fibrous microbial plastic sheeting. Mycelia and vegetation quickly covered the bare new multi-tetrahedralized piers.
Náme (taro), believed by many to be superior to other tubers, grew at 24 tons/acre. Most people also planted faster-growing sweet potatoes. Cereals, 14% protein, grew at 1 ton/hectare. They accounted for ½ the calories consumed. One kilocal of leisure work produced 50 kilocals of product. Industrious residents generated even more, which they sold to the First-Surface. Increased biomass in time enabled more extensive outward (vertical) colonization. Further sales of the Concern’s products resulted.
Methane generators under each dodecahedral living area contained human and animal waste. Aficionados either used it in situ or transported it to a central facility. Proprietary to the Corporation, the technology resulted from research Lester did in Boston prior to his dementia. A licensed Company-trained contractor now maintained these biomass-energy extractors and compost makers. The Company monitored the generators to insure acceptability of the finished product.
The Concern used it to create aerial rainforests in Corporation-protected wilderness areas. Costs to each domicile customer reflected the expense of installing such areas into the Pontibus. The Company also shared with customers expenditures for maintenance of such community property. Economy of scale reduced sky house prices. The additional areas, therefore, never caused an increase in sticker price.
Frozen First-Surface generated toxic-radioactive waste, such as PU-239, went to storage peripheral to comfortable human habitation. Assorted Disarmament Treaties mandated strategic weapon’s disposal. A consortium of Treaty signatories kept the residuum guarded. As the technology became available, these encumbrances recycled.
Industrial scale solar-wind power generation, dangerous-material disposal, prisons, etc. were under separate contracts. The Corporation handled all large water-collection systems and reservoirs. They covenanted for the few remaining external supplies such as chemicals, electronics, etc.
The Concern required residents to obtain pre-approval of all post-installation-accessories. Mr. Frye felt they should sanction such additionals whenever possible. He believed they tended to accentuate individual satisfaction with Pontibus life. Company policy, therefore, disallowed only proven detrimental alterations to sky life. Building inspectors were Concern trained. They allowed work without the pervasive pernicious political bête noirs so familiar to terrestrial contractors. Should inspectors become rigid with age, the Corporation replaced them.
Mr. Aloirav watched as communal life unfolded. He knew inattention to detail is the source of that potient from which disasters develop. Experience taught him how little time exists between individuals’ first noticing injustice and resulting total disgust for authority entrenching. Encouraging neighborhood activists, the Company acquired many useful suggestions for developing more pleasant Communities. Residents complemented regular domestic organisms with dwarfed trees and miniature animals.
Vines and otherwise unproductive vegetation supplemented Al-Con pier structural integrity, supporting forested watersheds and other wildlife. Whenever compatible with the bridge’s structural engineering requirements, the Concern instituted their undeveloped areas. These places increased the Pontibus’ resemblance to pristine terra firma. Enhancing quality of life, the natural environment induced a pleasant tranquility. The peacefulness kept with the planetary custodianship mandate.
The vestigial need for private transportation remained. The multi-tetrahedralized piers were in no way similar to concrete or asphalt turnpikes. Electric vehicles designed for sky travel needed triangularized-surface negotiating capacity. Mr. Frye introduced stratocars. He designed them to grip tetrahedralized legs like curling grapevine tendrils.
Scooting up and down the piers, they clasped and unclasped at tetrahedral vertices. Grasping tendrils rotated around the tubes, until coming to a vertex. The revolving facets spun so fast, one saw the coils from underneath just as a blur. At the tubing network intersection, the spirals showed their corkscrew nature. One curl stopped with the other continuing to whirl.
Then the former revolved and the latter quit. The helical “wheels” spun, stopping and starting, until the vehicle negotiated the vertex. Past it, windings paused but a microsecond. Then whirling in unison, the blur returned as prior to contacting the six-legged half-vertex. Once again, the stratocar flew along the tetrahedrons like water beetles on a stream.
Stratospheric solar-generated electricity powered the vehicles. Drivers controlled them by manipulating radio-frequency vibrations through Pontibus’ computer mainframes. The Company allowed First-Surface automobile manufacturers to introduce their own particular models. The Corporation’s proprietary design patterned all. Licensed Pontibus residents handled them.

In due time, the Concern introduced public transportation trains. These larger vehicles transported people around the extensive congregations of Communities. Inhabiting the Second-Level became as natural as living in any other exclusive seaside condominium-network. The sunny ocean-vista milieu approximated 2000 AD Singer Island, Florida.

The human race built most nobly when limitations were greatest and therefore, when most was required of imagination in order to build at all. Limitations seem to have always been the best friends of architecture. Frank Lloyd Wright

Chapter Thirty-Five

Sky houses penetrated the World market. As they went, so did Lester’s reputation. Within the Pontibus and elsewhere, people experimented with the new homes. He accepted improvements, and production costs dropped. Prices plummeting confounded the competition even more. Fearing nothing, management geared the bottom line to exhaust the market in the Company’s favor. Facilities changed as necessary to accommodate the burgeoning work force, new procedures, and main markets. As technology changed, methods changed. With financial strength came independence of “Group” plunder.
The New Society controlled the product’s distribution throughout the entire World. Every lull in sales to temperate climate regions sent more welcome sky houses to the equatorial Pontibus. Promotion assumed a state of lesser importance, requiring fewer resources, as time progressed. Simple directives coming from sales growth dictated manufacturing allocations. Demographic vagaries, economics, and the nature of World population expansion determined sales. The Concern captured ever more of the market.
By mid-21st Century, a domicile cost no more than did a year 2000 mud hut in rainforest-depleted Ethiopia. The Company warranted the novel product, and the stigma of imagined safety issues dispersed. Mr. Aloirav was always vigilant to retaliate against competitive sabotage and publicized prevarication. He monitored mendacity about the Corporation from innocuous safety innuendoes to biased news articles. Outright untruths, prepared in government “disinformation offices”, were the worst but easiest to counter. With the fast-growing 1984’ish technological totalitarianism all over the First-Surface, people were becoming desperate to leave ground-level tyranny. Propaganda campaigns opposing the Company were ineffective. Customers, through actual experience with sky houses, knew and felt the truth.
Concerning slander, corporate feeling was apathetic. They believed that if negative allegations could hurt, the Company was at risk anyway. A countering media blitz would not accomplish much. Very few people were still naïve enough to believe anything the main stream media put out anyway. The hotelier investigated all verbal or written assaults and sent someone to visit the propagators of prevarication. Liars felt an immediate need to cease and desist their dissimulation.
Or, they became ill. Sickness made it impossible to pursue crusades against the Concern. Surprised & gratified heirs failed to mount similar assaults. Non-competitive products or services never caused an adverse impact on the sky houses.
The technology to coat Al-Con construction materials with acid rain and solar heat -resistant resins took time to develop. The painting protected the piers from dissolving and cracking but gave the Pontibus a slight combustibility. Concrete doesn’t burn well, at all. Aluminum isn’t flammable at the same temperature or rate as the protecting resin. The heat dissipation quotient eliminated spontaneous or sustained heat of combustion.
Therefore, natural firebreaks formed fast from the high volume/surface area ratio. Vines also protected, raising temperature of combustion, minimizing damage. They wouldn’t allow the structure to get too hot or to fall too far. As with other animals, humans fear fire well beyond its justified capacity to cause actual damage. The Company was ever vigilant to keep that in mind.
They prepared for just such an eventuality. Excision of areas under active conflagration was always rapid. Fire was a sure-win situation for unscrupulous competitors to achieve sabotage and negative propaganda objectives. Arson, with heavy losses, would cause credibility damage. Customer minds might be far out of proportion to the true casualty. The “boss” analyzed all suspicious cases. He insured arsonists never again returned to their avocations.
Unforeseen developments on terra firma occurred at times, and sales accelerated. The Concern positioned to exploit contingencies coming from such evolvements. There was seldom a negative side to such occurrences.
Effective competition reared its frightful head but once. It came in the form of the mobile home and pre-fabricated housing industry. Their main target was the Pontibus’ aerial nature. They alluded to its perceived precarious position within the troposphere. Competitors also accented aspects of the structure’s newness.
The trade alleged the modules tenuous nature meant fragility in the event of hailstorms. The mobile home industry, itself, was especially vulnerable to hail damage, and their assault was not without factual import. The attack frightened more timid potential customers. Customers soon learned how incorrect the negative propaganda was and how safe and attractive domiciles were. While they did so, Mr. Aloirav was out educating the competition. He was thorough, even showing some how to get out of the housing business forever.
Lester was ever ready to emphasize ways in which his product provided answers. With decades of contingency contemplation behind him, he capitalized on what others saw as weaknesses. The Pontibus answered problems of pollution, real estate costs, resource exhaustion, habitat loss, storms, and earthquakes. The man tried making prospective customers see sky life not as a bête noire but as strength. Despite such efforts, occasional periods of slower domicile sales occurred. During these plateaus, he resorted to producing piers and platforms for wilderness areas. Such lulls also gave the Corporation time to fill disposal and product collection contracts.
Sky houses remained independent of local real estate values. The Company’s pricing structure neglected political and uncontrollable costs. Local communities resisted encroachment on their “turf”. Grass-roots groups arose to prohibit the product in their back yards. Embracing antiquated zoning laws, they proscribed buildings over 35 feet high. The Pontibus already passed 100,000 feet in places.
During that period, Lester formulated a charge that appeared true for his time. “Every pol has a credo, similar to a lawyer’s ethics. The credo says. “I swear to uphold my mandate to the very best of my ability, unless, 1. I receive a threat. 2. I am required to think. 3. It tends to harm my image. 4. It interferes with my desire for unearned money. 5. There is a conflict involving #4. In a conflict, I shall redouble my efforts to attack people of genuine character to take the heat off myself.”.”
Mr. Aloirav said. “A pol that forsakes his or her mandate 3 times is an animal, deserves no quarter, and should be killed. We can excuse 2 times on the grounds of stupidity or cowardice but the third time is a charm.”
One dare not presume that Lester or Rav felt these credos held true for politicians in other times and places. Since their Hesperides Apple lifespans were over 300 years though, they encountered many politicians, and they expected the credo was universal. At any rate, the New Society felt time was too valuable to waste on political water treading. Yet, the land situation, at times, demanded it. When negotiations with locals reached impasses, the “Group” bribed power brokers into acquiescence. The hotelier discovered most grass roots organizers were just mercenary-minded impresarios – pols.
These individuals, for personal reasons, infiltrated and gained control of a concerned reactionary mob. The “boss” simply ferreted out the enterprising ones and waited for the appropriate moment. Inducing the opinion leader to “sell out” dedicated compatriots was easy. Very few needed to get sick. Mr. Aloirav’s alternate means of exploiting human weakness conserved risking exposure of his biological agents.
Disagreements developed with Liberia at the Pontibus’ African end. The “Group” invoked the Maritime Law. Cantilever construction near that mainland came to a standstill. Ferrying mainland residents to and from the structure ceased. The siege lifted when the mainland politicians realized the New Society needed no one. Least of all, those who wanted to institute parasitism. The problem with Liberia made the world realize why most young men still die from suicide or homicide. It, nevertheless, ended with an interesting anecdote, and the Pontibus gained a new First-Surface product.
Liberian lawyers, politicians and their near brain-dead constituents were frustrating every attempt to negotiate. Liberia had a Rothschild State Bank. There seemed no way they would ever accommodate the Company’s constraints (refusal to pay taxes). The New Society took out a few hundred of the lawyer trash and a dozen or so politicians, but the next crop of Rothschild monkeys proved just as refractory. Travelers from countries south and north of Liberia found it difficult to gain access to the bridge. The situation could not continue.
It came at the right time for Mr. Aloirav. He was looking for an opportunity to experiment with some new planetary immune-system components. The “boss” wanted to test his large-scale military capacity. The citizens of Liberia proved most helpful. Their intellectual and cortical inadequacies interconnected well with his plans for world conquest.
The media later reported that the Company was assisting Liberia with their rabies epidemic. No family members existed to bury the corpses, and the decomposing odors were reaching Pontibus altitudes. An enterprising member of the New Society suggested grinding & drying the corpses. He proposed it as a cost-saving measure to obviate expensive internment & cremations. The “boss” delivered large prototypical comminuting & desiccating machines to the Liberian proving grounds.
The finished product resembled fishmeal, so they called it “human meal”. It soon shortened to “humeal”. Lester gained a new high-nitrogen fertilizer for Pontibus virgin platforms. There were very few cries of desecration of souls. Those that did arise, the “Group” elevated.
The Corporation never permitted democracy to infest the Pontibus. A few years after the Liberian’s error became apparent, North American politicians also genuflected. They first attempted to infringe the sky house patents. Each time the consortium fielded a crew to begin their own space house factory construction, that crew took sick. The conspiratorial politicians gave up and requested a resumption of Pontibus construction over Cape Cod Bay.
Mr. Frye got his terms & tax-free status again without a quid pro quo. He named the community Luz and connected it by cantilevers to Europe. Land-based bridges allowed footings wherever necessary but never grew larger than Mr. Frye allowed. Until the Pontibus was a fait accompli, he refused to expand such communities over 100 modules. The Brazilian-Liberian Bridge and Luz made much use of Buck Minster Fuller’s patented flotation devices. Foundations of heavy concrete-rock-iron were too expensive to go very deep.
Ocean sky house developments cantilevered in toward shore for a few miles. They stopped short of actual contact. People ferried over the water to cantilevered entry gates. Biometric machines protected Pontibus residents from most First-Surface interlopers. Boston, Block Island, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, Cape Ann, Provincetown, Rhode Island, Calais, and Vigo all possessed spur terminals. Underneath the lowermost piers, the bullet monorail trains reached all gates.
The Company got complete freedom from all existing Federal and State construction restraints. The government guaranteed, on an eminent domain basis, all space between Provincetown, Cape Ann, and Boston. State, Federal or International treaties were abrogated, when necessary, to make the Concern sovereign. International agreements presented small problems to the politicians. Other countries also wanted Pontibus technology. Reciprocity prevailed. They vacillated for “personal” needs, satisfaction of disarmament treaty stipulations, or waste disposal.
Earthquake and hurricane felt areas lost increasing numbers of First-Surface citizens to the disaster-proof Communities. The stampede to the sky was not so much out of fear, although that was a factor. The exodus was also for economic reasons. Lester would allow absolutely no Rothschild paper specie (fiat money) on the bridges. So, there was not the usual bloody drain off 90% of a person’s work. Global warming also made First-Surface earthquake and flood insurance premiums outrageous. The Company’s underwriting contracts priced policies low due to the safety of the bridge sky houses. With so few claims and increasing policyholder numbers, premiums continued dropping. Everyone benefited and the word spread.
Management insisted on certain provisions in each sky house sales contract. Owner, resident or other licensee guaranteed the Corporation tetrahedral connecting rights in perpetuity. Although no great bridges were going up on land, sky houses were, and the stipulation held wherever the sky house structures located. Someday it would be necessary to put feet on Terra Firma. Customers also relinquished control over communal Pontibus biomass. Protection was to be at the complete discretion of the Pontibus governor. The clause read: The Concern prohibits harvesting or use of PONTIBUS communal biomass, except with prior approval of the governor. Violators will be summarily punished (shot on sight). The Concern appointed the governors, who enforced the contracts and Company determination.
The Company defined waste as communal. That meant they could collect all sewage, septa, and other detritus, processing it in the sky, at will. “End” products sold back to residents or went as compost for protected wilderness areas. Residents produced their own fish protein, organic foods-materials, water, and energy. Clean air and other surpluses left the Pontibus after first meeting all inhabitants’ needs. The hotelier made sure the situation went according to Lester’s wishes. The New Society was ever ready to help.
By invoking the Maritime Law, the Corporation became Captain of the Pontibus ship with plenipotentiary powers. Between that and the “Group’s” already awesome power, the Company reigned supreme over its Ocean dominions.
In 2000 AD 361 million square kilometers or 70.8% of the Planet’s surface was ocean, 350 million cubic miles of water. 14 million square miles of land received less than 10 inches of annual rain. Another 14 million square miles of soil got from ten to 20 inches. On 8000-mile-diameter Earth, farmers plowed but the top 10 inches of arable ground. Inhabitants tried supporting twice the people, as arable acres existed on which to do so.
There was not just an economic imperative to exploit Pontibus technology, but an ethical one as well. The “Tragedy of the Commons” arrived. Undercutting feelings of godliness, tending to shame, humanity’s animal nature wanted for acceptance. Lacking well-defined property lines, between themselves and their biosphere neighbors, meant a chaotic situation.
People felt it imperative to either exploit or miss the limited good. The “Devil take the hindmost” attitude ruled. Residents of the First-Surface tried telling Nature to go to hell. The Pontibus established a necessary boundary. It made each calorie, collected on its surface, accountable to the Planet. The investment consisted of non-living lithosphere segments, human labor & intelligence. The payback was photosynthetic product and derivatives. Animal (human) power raised the Al-Con tubing and presented it to the sun’s rays. Irradiated, the substratum repaid. Stored solar energy tallied up more than invested, and property lines manifested.
In 1992, Harvard biologist, Edward O. Wilson, made an estimate. He said that due to human activity, 50,000 tropical rain-forest species went extinct that year. Peter Jennings featured a Costa Rican scientist. That researcher reported Earth lost an entire species of amphibian, the golden frog, in that same year. Man was winning the habitat battle against the flora and fauna.
The victory would be Pyrrhic. First-Surface humanity sent its planetary siblings into oblivion, because it didn’t care. Lester recognized the importance of providing for such familiar roots and similar aspirations. He felt it must happen soon or horrifying social disintegration would occur. Pontibus sustenance was essential.
The First-Surface’s remaining resources were insufficient for even its human population. Other life was just an afterthought. Without habitat, the doubling in 2025 AD of pre-millennial population wasn’t a positive development. Nepotistically favored life forms pushed other plants and animals from existence faster than any previous species grouping. Humanity appropriated half the Planet to itself. By simple default, they chucked Earth’s somewhat non-comestible species to an ultimate “final solution”. Losing and feeling the loss of biodiversity hurt perpetrators as well as their victims.
Homo sapiens sapiens was wrecking eons-old natural systems. An uncultivated weed proliferated in a beautiful garden. Systems protecting life, organizing and moderating hydrogeological cycles, or de-polluting the environment disappeared. Replacing lost green species was essential to reverse Global Warming and repairing the ozone layer. 15% of humanity’s food came from cultivated plants. The plant-pollinator association went back over 100 million years.
That alliance was moribund. Toxic ground ozone and pesticides increased to endanger animal pollinated food, yield, and quality. Life-supporting atmospheric ozone was disappearing. Sound scientific evidence in 2000 AD accused Montreal Protocol violations and the space shuttle. Another 200 space trips and the triplet oxygen would no longer protect against damaging ultraviolet light. Penetrating rays hurt pollinators disproportionately more than the pollinated. In the end, both would perish.
Pontibus wetland technology began reversing that trend, protecting the animals. Increased plant-life, produced on the bridges, absorbed stippling surface ozone and the chemicals destroying atmospheric triplet-oxygen. The longer the bridges existed, the healthier the Earth became.
Seeing a child dying of hunger or the rotting body of a battle-mutilated person is frightening. No sentient being could ever say, with a clear conscience, the experience left them unmoved or unchanged. Similar scenes from floods, fires, erosion, desertification, pollution, and cold stared in humanity’s face daily. Mr. Frye felt Westerners weren’t mindful enough that such horrors purchased what they took for granted. He saw many reasons for the self-induced blindness.
The people of his time enjoyed a number of choices: By design or default, they might allow the situation to deteriorate. Humankind could accept inexorable increases in destitute, starving, and dying living creatures. Catch-as-catch-can, could extend into the future. The first World might continue issuing truncating Draconian demands like: “Limit world population through abortion & imprisonment. Encourage homosexuality. Pollute the drinking water with male-destroying chemicals.” (Destroy the spirit. Manipulate controlled starvation.)
The past is testimony to its success. Diminished numbers of Irish, Dutch, Negroes, Asians, etc. are proof of the effectiveness of such methods. All Mankind could genuflect to the reinvented US-style totalitarian imperialism. Cheering patriots could grind ways to safe population through “democratic” conquests of rape, pillage, and murder. The talk went. “Blow up a few more babies. Who really cares? They do? Kill the fathers, rape the mothers and replace them.”
Then again, they could cooperate with sensible and cosmopolitan compassionate measures. People could work with Lester on the solution. He provided a response and answer to every great environmental problem facing the Earth. Increasing available planetary surface area for plant colonization, the Pontibus reduced Global Warming. Bolstering the volume of the biosphere produced more biomass, which meant more oxygen and habitat.
Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases disappeared into the Pontibus atmosphere. Atmospheric ozone’s replacement complemented amphibians and other gentle indicator-species’ salvation. Some, with molecular biology’s help, even returned. The sky house bridges required Homo sapiens sapiens to “pick itself up by its own bootstraps”. As difficult or impossible, as it seemed, all species needed the Pontibus.
In 1992 The Union of Concerned Scientists promulgated a “World Scientist’s Warning to Humanity”. 1600 leading World scientists, 102 Nobel Laureates, concurred, stating humans “may so alter the living world that it will be unable to sustain life in the manner that we know”, using such terms as “vast human misery” and “irretrievably mutilated”.
Mr. Frye tried to look at the situation from many perspectives. Without his personal solution, he saw misery and killing in their ascendancy. The biological weapon solution or the rest of humanity’s bloody default options were but partial stopgap measures. The human race was about to experience some extreme planetary conditions. Its brief sojourn here, as a species, was about to undergo a tremendous challenge.
In the past, it followed its “pilgrim soul”. Whenever hunger or injustice lasted too long, it never hesitated to make war or migration. Schlieren patterns of human madness left no continent, archipelago, or nation-state unscathed. Other species always paid the bill.
The US National Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of London issued a joint communiqué (1992), stating. “No advances in either science or technology can be expected to obviate either irreversible degradation to the environment or the inexorable scourge of poverty for a large portion of humanity.”
The Company was not a party to that communiqué. Bloody solutions to limit planetary environmental destruction, notwithstanding, human population grew 90 million a year. Aborting, starving, imprisoning, or destroying that number would maintain the status quo. The World took comfort in resolutions that failed to provide for all.
Apes stood at a point (2050AD) in their evolution where mere exploitation of the Planet no longer sufficed. Technologically and spiritually, they were capable of doing more than accepting limited squalid pedestrian existences. Having faith in survival, Man could test his technology empirically. Appearing as an ignis fatuus for some time, the bridges were superior to most persons’ senses. Such constructions were neoteric.
The teleological validity of the Pontibus, however, was inherent in the nature of human existence. Homo sapiens’ own molecular structure exhibited it. It but needed to believe. Mr. Frye gave human beings the means to navigate the heavens, standing in splendor before each person.
Construction of the Pontibus went as fast as he could apply himself. His complete employee needs were huge and unmet. No solutions to the deficiency appeared imminent. Then the “boss” called. He was coming to the Grand Rapids factory with some of his people.
They wanted to talk business. Arriving with Francis and Gloria, Mr. Aloirav entered the building’s front door. As they started up the stairs to his glass-walled office, the Founder noticed. He went down to greet them.
Mr. Frye wasn’t surprised to see Mr. Castle with the others. The ex-dealer became quite close to the hotelier over the years. Ms. Gold, Francis, and the “boss” were now almost inseparable companions. Excepting Gloria, Mr. Aloirav trusted the ex-dealer more than he did any other “Group” member.
The four people entered Lester’s office. It was a mass of models. They looked at each other through the gaps. Scribbled on papers were approaches and techniques, investigating biological structures, processes, and functions associated with producing calein. Sheets covered much of the wall space.
A miniature constructed-wetland for treating wastewater stood before Ms. Gold. Hypothetical molecular configurations of calcium crystals impregnated in fibrous protein hung inches from Mr. Castle’s head. A prototypical fabrication device for extruding calein piers rested near the hotelier. A small representation of the latest Pontibus stretched around them. From Luz, it went to France’s Bay of Biscay.
Floating buttresses and cantilevers reached to Canada, Ireland, France, Spain, and the Mediterranean. A small laboratory nook and a few chairs concluded the furnishings. Through the glass walls, they saw employees busy on the factory floor. The workers would not have been able to hear anything of the conversation. Francis wanted to go somewhere else to talk anyway.
Mr. Frye acquiesced. The four went for a walk along Grand River. It was spring. Except for a few hardy Coho fishermen, people avoided the river. Fishing for inedible mercury-polluted creatures interested very few. Just birds remained to report on the discussion.
The “boss” opened the dialogue. “Read your book, Discovery by Risk, Les. It was beautiful. I’m sure you know we want to help.”
“That’s right,” the ex-dealer agreed, “any way we can. We’re all behind you, Mr. Frye.”
Lester looked at Gloria, asking if she’d read it.
“Yes, I did, at Rav’s request.” The woman replied. “I found it interesting but a little too technical.”
“I’m sorry about that. Sometimes I get so interested in the meat, I neglect the sauce.”
Francis said with a smile. “And you told me you were a vegetarian.”
Everyone laughed, and the Founder continued. “Thanks for the support, guys. If I don’t mention it enough, I’m remiss. You’ve already done so much. Everything is supplied so fast when necessary. I can’t think of anything I lack. Problems disappear like the morning mist.”
“You’ve made it all possible, Les. Just as you said you would, way back at Cold Spring Harbor.” Mr. Aloirav said. “In your book, you mentioned chances you took. You never told me about them. I don’t think I’ve ever known anyone so courageous, yet appearing so delicate and fragile. I wish I’d known you in Viet Nam.”
“Now there was risk!” He replied. “I was as sure, for a while, my efforts here were also in vain, and all was lost. Complete sacrifice, total loss & rejection, with depression in the aftermath. It became like another undeclared war for me. I still was learning my lesson on the double cost of altruism.”
They all smiled at him, patronizing & respectful, as the hotelier said. “We’ve been thinking of a way we can help you more.”
Looking at Mr. Castle and Ms. Gold, he turned back to Mr. Frye, who answered. “I don’t know how. I’ve got all the funding I need. We’ve signed, sealed & delivered the auxiliary contracts on the new Atlantic Ocean spurs. The structures are moving along fine. We’re flush. My one shortfall is still manpower.”
“Is that so?” The “boss” replied.
“Yes.” He said. “I don’t have enough trained people. At the rate I’m going, I’ll never finish the job when it’s expected. I’m thinking about doing a crash hiring program, but the logistics concern me.”
“It’s ironic. Coincidentally, that’s just why we wanted to talk to you.” Francis said. “The area where we can still help is in manpower.”
“And woman power.” Gloria added.
“Now that you don’t need financing.” Mr. Aloirav said.
“How’s that?” The Founder asked.
Not sure he liked the sound of their words, Lester hesitated. Gaining a measure of freedom from these people took a long time. The thought of working near them again was distasteful. They were criminals and social misfits. Feeling himself not of their breed, he still smarted over the past blackmail. He wanted to forget how his dream would never have happened without the New Society.
“We can supply, train, and manage all you’ll need.” Mr. Castle said. “We’ll guarantee completion on schedule. You just give the orders; the way you want things done, and it’ll happen. Never any manipulation or malingering from employees.”
“It sounds too good to be true,” Mr. Frye replied. “And you know what that means?”
“Too good to be true?” The hotelier asked in answer.
“Right.”
“Not in this case, Mr. Frye.” Ms. Gold said.
“It is indeed true.” The ex-dealer said. “And if you’re the man your book and song portray, you’ll accept our proposal.”
“Your flattery is touching, Francis.” The Founder retorted. “And it touches right where it should. My incredulity antennae. I don’t believe it. Your manipulation shows you’ve been working. I’m impressed.”
“Les.”
“All right. Where do you propose to get 200 thousand new people every year to handle risky high-altitude labor? Hard grueling work over George’s and Stellwagen banks, not to mention the mid-North Atlantic. It’ll fast fatigue all but the strongest!”
“We’re aware of that!” The hotelier said, looking at the other two. “We’ll take them from the penitentiaries.”
“Oh, no you don’t,” he jumped back, exclaiming. “That’s a sucker-bet. I don’t need yer’ trick-bags, Rav. I’ve had enough of your extortion.”
“It’s no scam, Lester.” The “boss” replied. “I don’t need it.”
“Perhaps not, but I require competent people, not problems.” Lester retorted. “Incarceration is a cop-out! Prisoners are losers & guilt freaks, locked up because they can’t handle life, peers, booze, drugs, sex or what-have-you. You know it as well as I do. Most convicts are not like your chosen few.”
“Most people who wind up incarcerated get there because of one mistake. An act done while non-compos mentis on alcohol, drugs, or some such.” He replied. “All they need is a chance to show their worth.”
“Your people are sober,” Mr. Frye replied, shaking his head and then looking at Francis, and adding, “…as a rule.” They choose crime out of an antisocial psychological need for it. You can control them, because they’re like you. You understand those needs. With others, you may not be so successful. I’d be serving as drug-rehab for asocial failures. Junkies that work for me now are off the stuff. They have to stay off it to continue working here. You know how death looks after falling from miles out in the troposphere? It happens because of drinking & substance abuse! Don’t be absurd!”
“You’ll never be sued.” Mr. Aloirav said.
“More preempting use of your power, Rav?” He scorned.
“You always complain but never refuse it. You never accept the alternatives.”
“Don’t forget, Mr. Frye. One out of every four people in the last millennium was drug dependent. Now it’s one out of two.” Francis drilled. “The world is an asylum. How do you propose to clear your work force of them all?”
“I might have known you’d have those facts at your ready disposal, Francis.” The Founder replied, laughing. “Body fluid tests work fine.”
“Who’ll manage the people you do get, assuming no drug dependency?” The hotelier asked.
“I will. I have so far.”
“Sure you will.” The ex-dealer replied. “You can’t begin to handle an operation that large all by yourself.”
“And why not!?” Lester shouted at his arrogance.
“Calm down, Lester.” The “boss” said. “Francis meant no disrespect. He just isn’t very smooth. You’re aging, as are we all. The apples gave us some leeway, but there are no more. It’s harder to manage young people when you start pushing the envelope.”
“Granted,” he replied. “What makes you, at your age, any better at it than me at my age? You’re just a year younger than I am!”
“We know our people, er…your people. We’ll do it right.” Mr. Castle explained, not too well. “Understand?”
Mr. Aloirav explained with more finesse. “From the word I get, you’re planning to go the calein route… alone. If so, perhaps we can’t help. If you’re that sure of success, solo, I wish you the best. I wouldn’t hazard a guess in how to proceed in that hustle. But, your age is germane, Les. Think about it.”
“Not interested.”
“If you’re sure. If you’re not, and we supply the manpower…”
“Won’t happen.”
“Okay.” The “boss” continued anyway. “With ex-cons, it’ll be necessary to have people trained in their management. They have a rather peculiar way of looking at things. You don’t have that training or outlook. You lack the means for returning to street school in youth to get it. We do, so don’t.”
“We know them, Mr. Frye. We know they just need a chance to pick up their self-respect.” Gloria added. “We want them. They want to do something to feel like deserving creatures as much as anyone.”
“No lawsuits.” Francis said. “And no troubles from any of them.”
“You can’t promise no troubles.” Mr. Frye countered and without thinking, he blurted. “And what about the sociopaths?”
Face darkening, the hotelier was tiring of being a supplicant and said. “You must mean every single great financial and political power that the world has ever known? It’s okay. I know what you’re saying. If selection methods, stringent enough, can create any microbe desired, imagine the monsters we create from our human infants. Right? Let’s see? How indeed do we dismantle a sociopath? We’ll first see what makes him tick, so we can remake him? We could build a model from scratch. Yes. Take a normal healthy baby. At 5, we’ll break his nose. When he’s 7, we’ll periodically imprison him at solitary confinement. Strangle him near to death at 13. Tell him at 17, if he doesn’t accept our superstition we’d rather him dead. If he falls in love with a woman of another race, we’ll say she’s sub-human, and he’s a degenerate. Make him beg pathetically for validation but never, ever, give it. If he will not accept our superstitions, we’ll send him to hell. Quite simple. If it weren’t for that proven method, we might have built ourselves a Mr. Lester Frye instead of a Mr. Aloirav!” A few robins broke the silence. Nobody assisted them, until the hotelier continued. “Forced to break their dependency habits, after a few years of banishment…”
“Banishment! What d’ya mean banishment?” The Founder exclaimed.
“It’s no different than what they know now, Mr. Frye.” Ms. Gold responded. “We’ll keep them, while there’s risk, where there can be no escape. Some private prisons are already aerial. You know that.”
“Yes.”
“As the superstructures connect in the Greater Pontibus Community, piers continue rising higher and higher.” She said. “Isn’t that right?”
“Yes.”
“There’ll always be new branches and spurs of bridges rising.” The woman pressed. “Right?”
“Yes, that’s true, Gloria. As Pontibi merge, there’ll be ever higher outreaching. In time, we’ll conceivably reach the moon.”
“Those branches can contain inmates.” Mr. Castle said. “They’ll be easy to guard. You can’t escape alive from miles in the sky.”
“You forget about parachutes & gliders, Francis?” Lester asked.
“Yah, I did.”
“Injectable GPS monitors, Les.” The “boss” added. “The government has used them for decades.”
“There’ll be a few inmate screws, which we’ll provide and train.” Gloria added. “Guarding needs occur at lower levels, where branch-off cantilevers meet the main structure, and underneath the cantilever piers. Our people will train inmates in the necessary skills. “Rehabilitated”, drug dependencies cured, balanced diets, cage-mentality gone. A few years later, they’ll re-enter the larger society. If they fuckup again, they’re toast.”
“Forced out into primitive and barren reaches of sky, before plant and animal colonization.” Lester remarked. “It would be inhumane.”
“Like conditions out there can be any worse than the present penal system,” she retorted.
“Somebody has to do it, anyway.” The “boss” added.
“You´ been a´visitin´ the Blue Barnacle again, Rav?”
“The situation begs a solution, Les.”
“No longer seen, feared, or controlled by First-Surface people, reciprocating cycles of punishment and revenge cease.” Ms. Gold said. “We’ll treat them correctly, show videotapes of how much the people below appreciate their work and need them. They’ll gain hope, purpose, different values, and greater dignity. Some may choose to return to the First-Surface. If so, we’ll give them new identities. They’ll appear as deserving individuals who’ve never committed a crime.”
“You’re opening a thousand doors for corruption to enter.” Mr. Frye objected. “Think of all the escapes! All on my conscience!”
“You have my word. I’ll monitor such matters myself.” The “boss” said.
“That goes double for me, Sir.” Gloria added.
“Most will choose not to return to the First-Surface.” Mr. Aloirav said. “I’m sure of it. Those will live in the sky, as part of a world they helped build. They’ll be like those British indentured servants and convicts of the 18th century, building colonies and a new world. They’ll have the capacity to lead skilled pro-life careers at some other Pontibus locale. They’ll marry and have children who can also live and grow in the heavens. As you’ve so often said, Les, they’ll be able to teach their kids to walk on clouds and ride the sunbeams.”
“You make it sound good, but no.” Mr. Frye said. “I don’t want the Pontibus built with convict labor. It’s just too heinous. You´re asking me to allow an oriental despotism to fester on my bridges, hydraulic corvee.”
The four sat at a picnic table now, overlooking the Grand River. Patches of snow still clung to trees and bushes. They were but a few yards north of the old Railroad Bridge Crossing. The Founder and Francis faced the water and their associates across the table. Lester displayed, for all to see, his critical opinion of the ex-dealer’s physical condition.
Mr. Castle was very overweight. He wasted most of his free time these days in booze parlors and “combat” zones. Full of sentiment and intense loyalty, capable of tremendous sacrifice, the man watched his leader’s face. Other than with his corpulence, he gave no indication of the great conflict in his life.
The hotelier, wildness and savagery evident through his cultivated exterior, sat opposite Lester. On the “boss’s” right, facing Francis, was Ms. Gold. Her entrance into the inner sanctum was a mystery to Mr. Frye. She seemed to have but a mediocre past to recommend her to the “Club”. How, out of all the former inmates in the cabal, could one woman get so close?
He found it baffling. She was aloof and cared just for the company of her family. The Founder surmised it was that which attracted. His mind went inward, and Gloria’s voice entered the background, talking about some matter insignificant to him. He imagined himself sitting with Eva Braun, Hermann Goring and Schikelgruber.
As the woman chattered on, Lester moralized in the surrealistic atmosphere about his involvement with them. “These weren’t the people to choose for life-long friends, given his free choice…or were they? What happened and how? Did overwhelming desire to realize the Pontibus and its planetary benefits appropriate his integrity. Did he sell his sense of right and wrong? How far, how long, was he prepared to go on in the association? Where would it end? He even accepted many of their values. Was something insidious seducing him into continuing with them? If desirous, was he even capable of leaving these people now?”
Enthralling seemed to have crept up on him almost as if in a dream. No babe-in-the-woods, he knew for years of their evil activities. Murders of those considered enemies, personal and planetary, remained quiet. Mr. Frye joined the “Group” long ago. He was privy.
His criminal guilt feelings were never more poignant than when these people were nearby. It was in his face. Continuing to associate with such creatures without also becoming a monster was his obsessive fear. Was his guilt dissimilar just in degree to that of a meat-eating environmentalist? Knowing it was wrong but continuing the behavior because it tasted too good to desist.
The Founder wondered. “Unquestioned, and heretofore unquestionable, capacity to sack others for the greater “good” was the matter’s essence. Would he too consume the Planet’s weak, spiritless, and unimaginative? If so, when? A nihilistic world, free of ethical constraints, stared back at him. Did Rav have the right to do, what he did, because of his capacity? What did affiliating with such power make Mr. Lester Frye? The premise that “the end justifies the means” was inherent in his collaboration. Does it, indeed, do so? To whom could he apply for the wisdom necessary to answer these questions?”
Mr. Aloirav’s power, acquired through his molecular biological genius, appeared unlimited. Exercising it with a plethora of cruelty, using human deficiencies as excuses, he consumed their possessors. His unequaled imagination held full sway over other’s ignorance and fear. No one seemed capable of resisting his spirit.
The hotelier’s voice broke Lester’s soul-searching reverie. “Francis, Gloria. Would you leave us alone for a bit?”
“Sure, Rav.” They answered, and did so.
The two were on their way down toward the river, when the “boss” continued. “Lester, I know all about your calein plans.”
“I thought you might.” Lester replied.
“As far as governing new colonies, the strengths and weaknesses are of no concern to us. We administer no welfare, upper crust or lower. Therefore, we need no bureaucracy or any other such burden to blather our egos.”
“It’s what we always wanted. Each Pontibus resident self-sufficient at his own sky house.”
“Assuredly.” Mr. Aloirav assented. Getting to the point, he asked. “So why won’t you say yes to our proposal?”
“I’ve told you why.”
“Won’t do, Les. Can’t leave it that way.”
“Why not? Not making enough dough?”
“Master of the cheap shot, as usual.”
“Sorry.”
“What need have I for money, Les? It’s the plaything of women & children, a whore for men. I’ll pretend that your insult came out of an unsettled mind. You were your old non compos mentis self for a moment.”
“I am sorry, Rav. You’re right. I was out of line. I had that coming.”
“The bridges look more every day like they’ll deliver what you promised. I’m gonna’ get all I ever wanted, except for one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“An end to incarceration.”
“It wasn’t part of the bargain, Rav.”
“I know that. You’ve kept your word and, so far, I’ve abstained.”
“But?”
“You wanna’ force it, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“O.K. You got it. The bridges are going up too slow. When one has achieved a portion of the goal, hesitation is costly. I can’t wait much longer. You get my drift?”
“More extortion?”
“You can call it that. But, I also know how much you want the calein replacements & the new colonies to go your way. You took a hell of a risk behind my back. I’m impressed. I’m also prepared to make a deal.”
“What kind of a deal?” He asked, throwing his head back.
“You can’t fight me, nor I you.”
“Perhaps not.”
“Collaborate a little longer. Put prisoners on the Pontibus work force. Unchain them. Help me break those bars forever.”
“No.”
“Help me remove the last vestiges of slavery over the spirit of man?”
“No.”
“Look, Les. You’re too prejudiced against our class. Prejudice is like racism. It’s a God-like quality. You arrogate too much. Hubris. You’re not God.”
“I know that.”
“These people need jobs. We’re talking a minor misunderstanding.”
“Crime is a minor misunderstanding!?”
“Property is a form of attachment, my friend. Attachment is appearance, nebulous, ephemeral, and conjecture at best. i.e. all property included with one’s person doesn’t exist. It but detracts force from our several missions. Since “there can be no injury where there is no property”. For all practical respects, there is indeed no such phenomenon as crime. Prisoners are just victims of Society’s injustice.”
“Semantics, Rav! Bullshit! Tell that to their victims!”
“Worship wildness, Les. It alone is life.”
“No!”
”I’ll hold off a while longer and give you free rein with the colonies & calein.”
“You mean you’ll give me my Company back?”
“100%.”

Continuing to work with such people was unpleasant, but Lester did accept inmate labor. Without collaboration, the future construction would have been very risky. The First-Surface wasn’t humane in maintaining prisoners. They either loathed the responsibility or sold the convicts as slaves to the private prisons, lawyer fiefdoms. Most governments paid well to eschew the responsibility. Mr. Frye learned to accept cantilever inmate sequestration as secure against escape. Criminals needed values and purpose too. He believed the Pontibus gave both.
When they’d signed all the papers, the “boss” said. “You’ve given the Planet a stable answer for sustainability long after we’re all gone, Les. I’m grateful. The bridges are hope for a future beyond our petty struggles, victories, and defeats. Our war ends with death but not the children’s. They needed our sacrifices to win their own struggles. In my organization there’s only room for warriors. Brave, resourceful, full of honor, pride, and sacrifice. As hard as you may find the thought of being so associated, Mr. Lester Frye. You are my finest example.”

Great persons are able to do great kindnesses. Miguel de Cervantes

Chapter Thirty-Six

Incremental economies of scale and advancing industrial technology cut Company costs. When the convicts came on board, however, sky house assembly expenses plummeted, as did sticker prices. Putting their creative criminal minds to work brought tremendous advances in connecting and extruding methods. Mr. Frye’s negative estimation of social misfits took a major blow. He could now install modules and piers at much reduced prices. A domicile’s cost became a small percentage of original.
Comparison situations with the first half of the 21st century are difficult but may serve to illuminate. Beautiful oceanside domiciles now sold for what a small 1.5mX2m wooden 2007AD work shed cost. Company specie also bore little relationship to pre-millennial dollars & euros in more ways than just value. The new money resembled Rothschild fiat paper but was in fact living tissue. Ex- counterfeiters, biologists, and anti-fascists, working together, kept Company specie sound.
Biologists did most of the work while criminal minds handled creativity and quality control. The technical aspects owed much to certain protocols resident in New Society coffers. Although Lester’s labs could fabricate the currency in seconds, counterfeiters found it nearly impossible to duplicate. Special monoclonal antibodies in every Company-affiliated bank tested serotype proportions for authenticity. Serotypes & proportions changed sporadically according to DNA sequence & stochastic programming. Computers filled in where changes caused contradictions.
Due to Rothschild’s incurable tendency to counterfeit his own currency, robbing citizens of their very blood, moneychangers became extremely reluctant to hold First-Surface currencies for any length of time. First Surface money dealers profit would have to be substantial to risk selling out their Company script positions. Changing Company script for dollars or Euros was always a losing proposition for the ultimate holder of First-Surface paper. Exchanges did happen because, after calein came on board, Lester would not accept dollars or euros in payment for modules. Counterfeit paper money and Rothschild-induced First-Surface inflation was too pervasive.
The First-Surface housing industry growth collapsed. No competition with space modules was possible. Unemployed turned to crime or moribund governments for relief. US pols, as usual, seeing no way to handle surplus labor waved the flag and gave Rothschild free-rein to hold his wars. New companies, created by Rothschild interests, emerged to handle all the logistics and carnage. The largest of these new carrion merchants was MMIM (Multinational Military Industries & Mining).
Mr. Otorp returned to the fold well before convict labor began. Many of his discoveries, they used every day in the sky. It seemed fitting he be a part. Now, considered a great scientist, Mr. Otorp did not experience any reference to his loyalty failing. Mr. Frye valued him, as if the man never left.
Many prisoners went into aerial Corporate factories and learned necessary bridge-building skills. From these, the Founder picked special individuals and set them to work as understudies to Mr. Otorp. Students and he discovered new fusing techniques. The best went to Lester’s two universities to train management students.
Lester passed the troposphere and breached the stratosphere. Harsh & unforgiving ambient factors presented here. High-altitude working conditions required compensatory measures. The new artisans needed protective clothing for upper level extreme cold. Suits provided heat, ultraviolet protection, and supplemental oxygen along with ease of use. Special belt tie-downs were necessary to work on the outer region structures. Steady air-currents and high gusting winds of hurricane-force were frequent.
Mr. Aloirav worked prisoners, until the greater community allowed them to join it as welcome neighbors. He couldn’t coexist comfortably with temporary incarceration. His foremost objectives were the unfortunate’s rapid release and a recidivism-free productive life.
Mr. Frye adjusted to the process schedule. He did so, as he did with toxic waste, storing the commodity until recycled into useful products. Convict impounding continued just until “rehabilitation” happened. Only the “boss” determined that magic word with any certainty, and he exercised his prerogative infrequently. Numerous governments were receptive to removing their undesirables. Depositing antisocials where private care and responsibility for them occurred made it just that much better. The Concern monitored penal licensees as to humanity and record of accomplishment on recidivism. Private slave-holding prisons-for-profit were decommissioned at an accelerating rate.
The New Society set competitive goals between authorized caregivers. Those failing to perform to New Society standards lost certification. An interesting footnote to the new system appeared. After biochemical analysis, chelation therapy, and vitamin deficiency correction, recidivism dropped 50%. Balanced diets took a big bite out of crime.
After remedial education, recidivism dropped another 40%. How interesting to note. 90% of the planet’s criminals were but looking to survive. They looked in crime’s direction. Only 10% of our criminal classes are true criminals.
The hotelier commented. “It’s incredible! Pols still maintain they have a right to tax when they cannot protect citizens from crime, on the receiving or conveying end. They try to hide their misappropriations by blaming the initial victims of their neglect and throwing them in a hole.”
Floating sky houses sprouted up over bodies of water around the world. Spherical pontoons made of resin-cloth-coated icosahedrons supported them. Later, heated conduits sent heavy concrete down to secure iron-framework foundations. Subsequent connection to a larger grouping expanded ever-increasing strength. Small-tetrahedralized settlements grew. Meager collections of modules burgeoned, until these small bridges also merged. Satellite photos showed new communities honeycombing the Planet. From the atmosphere, the embryo out-croppings resembled the small wax-bumps bees produce, prior to comb construction. Starting specks of new Pontibi covered the Earth like initial preparations for a gargantuan beehive.
Lichens, and their components, algae & fungi, colonized initial scaffoldings. Fresh clean nourishment appeared from their fine compost. Entire structures sprang to life with samambaia epiphytes, orchids, and other new species. Clouds drifted past and below, producing odd effects. Momentary feelings of weightlessness, suspended in space, were common.
Bridges seemed to float on foundations of water vapor. When that mist condensed, it produced fountains & waterfalls everywhere. They nurtured and beautified the living sky. Trees and other plants reclaimed their hold on existence. Animals proliferated.
Sheltered migrating fauna began arriving in ever-larger populations. Bacteria and fungi provided new exotic food varieties in abundance. The outer reaches gave so much solar and wind energy that people enjoyed unexpected free time. Employed as mind power, the additional unconstrained lastingness produced an even better life. Drudgery and meaningless vain employment all but disappeared into digital solutions.
Many people came to the New Realm for the freedom of frontier wildness, escaping Rothschild tyranny. They came for the promise of liberation from poverty, ignorance, written law, and superstition. There were many refugees from the scourge of democracy and the fear of mindless majorities. Progress of knowledge, wisdom, and material abundance proceeded at an increasing rate as the radius of habitation increased. Lester’s new cultural definition of wealth caught the imaginations of many. Anti-caedere biosustainable societies sprang up all over the sky.
Demonstrations in diverse neighborhoods of both First-Surface and the bridges brought similar chants. “Caedere–no! Caedere-no!” Soon other positive chanting joined it. “Upward! Outward! Yah!”
Depending on which demographers’ statistics used, when Luz appeared, well over 10 billion people inhabited the planet’s First-Surface. The bulk of that population (82%) was in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. Poor economic development, political upheaval, and bad credit slowed growth there. Lester said. “The curse of democracy and a poorly developed sense of private property keep them enthralled.”
These areas also sent representative emigrants to the new space. Poverty, few jobs, poor education, and no hope in Rothschild’s technological totalitarian New World Order drove people outward. The Pontibus promised to alleviate all these ills. It was as close to a heaven as these people would ever see. Those who escaped to try the sky life sometimes returned to tell friends.
Mendicant migrations developed. People begged, borrowed or stole sufficient money to travel to Pontibus feet. Here they congregated until they could buy bridge specie and a sky house. Even with its inhospitable climate, the North Atlantic Bridge grew. The equatorial Pontibus stayed ahead, however, sending some cantilevers north towards Luz. Tenerife, a popular foot and immigrant hub, would become the monorails´ Grand Central Station.

Aerial habitats burgeoned over land regions as well as ocean. Terrestrial communities grew slower due to Mr. Frye’s proscription as much as human preference. Despite increased hurricanes, typhoons, and littoral flooding, half the world’s people lived within 75 miles of the Planet’s coasts. The great bridges provided for an additional populace to satisfy these inherent Homo predilections. Living less than a kilometer from the sea became possible for all.
Lower levels accommodated natural desires for near-sea trade and tranquility. Some wanted to go higher. Mountain-like sea views are breathtaking. Such views on the Pontibus became common to all. It was inevitable. In time, the human spirit grew to acclimate and reflect its aerial residence. Euphoria became endemic.
Company marketing personnel felt justified using the Pontibus’ raison d’ etre itself as advertising. The Sales Office pursued the Founder’s “green program”. The experiment brought undeniable success. As he foresaw, many people wanted to help make the Planet sustainable. Man was learning. They were replacing competition with Nature for cooperation. Bridgophiles now chanted. “Up And Out à Go! Cay Day Ree à No! Up And Out à Go! Cay Day Ree à No!”
Even with Pontibus growth at maximum, First-Surface-caused global warming continued. Sea level rose inexorably. Storms were twice as strong as before the 20th century turned. Ultraviolet persisted in its relentless destruction. Lester described how the Pontibus remedied these destructive predicaments. He explained to the World how it happened that with the Pontibus functional, Global Warming and ozone depletion continued. First-Surface water and soil contamination increased. Resources dwindled. In detail, he explained the extent of the ecological problem.
“One cannot expect Nature to forgive in 30 years a millennium of spitting in her face. Destiny plans the Pontibus to surpass the oceans in powering life on earth. Until then, if the seas fail, due to our neglect and rapacity, we shall be lost. The bridges protect part of what the oceans deliver to the rest of the biosphere. Instead of ravaging coastal mangrove and wetland salt marshes, they do the opposite. Lower levels replenish and accentuate intertidal lifefulness. 3000 meters and more below the rolling ocean’s waves lays half the Planet’s surface. Unique creatures, most people never see or appreciate, live there. At the depth of eternal night, no greenery exists. Organisms depend on falling detritus from living plants above. The biological engine, moving life on Earth, comes from the thin sea-surface. The remaining biosphere virtually wastes life. Plants protect Nature’s deep denizens, costing the remaining living-world nothing. Upper flora nurtures the other life without knowing or needing it. Those very same plants also sustain humankind through the food chain and oxygen produced. Our obligate duty is to return the favor and protect a healthy sea at all costs. The Pontibus accepts much photosynthetic-plant burden. Wherever it crosses the waves, it provides more assistance to deep-sea organisms. Elsewhere, the bridges make additional amounts of nourishment available.”
The largest world fishing areas fell far short of a capacity to supply all protein needs. As Fukushima destroyed the Pacific’s life, the Pontibus’ mariculture and aquaculture farms prospered. Each satisfied part of the insatiable demand for fish and their products. In the Atlantic, less damaged by Fukushima, the tragedy of drift netting on non-target species and coral-reef-protecting triggerfish slowed due to Pontibus aquaculture. Fishermen engaged in fewer bloody battles over depleted fishing grounds.
Distributing First-Surface electric power entailed many cost problems. Pressure existed to downsize the electric-utility. Large power companies were anachronisms. At least, they should have been, given environmental compliance demands. Half a new generator’s construction price at the 20th century’s turn was in restrictions. Even with these constraints, they caused a third of the planets’ global-warming. Most greenhouse-gas production came from that source alone. Government interference, corruption, compliance costs, and soaring fossil-fuel expenses were relentless. Such increasing negative-pressure squeezed the large-utility’s investment rates-of return.
Inefficiency in energy generation translates into heat. Heat was not a loss to sky people, however, as it was to those on the First-Surface. Upper levels used 100% of the issuing warmth. The Pontibus employed solar-roofing film, wind turbines, biomass energy-generators, microbial-hydrocarbon-burning fuel cells, and hydroelectric power. They produced renewable energy without all the problems and costs of the large utility.
Precious metal, platinum, made fuel cells expensive. Lester regained his Company at about the same time as Mr. Otorp re-discovered calein. The new building material began replacing Al-Con piers on all the bridges. Increased supplies of platinum came about as a by-product of calein extraction. That increase drove prices down as well as the energy derived from it.
Wherever small renewable energy-sources found employment, they gave cheaper on-site-use electricity. As they discovered on the Pontibus, using on-sites from initial construction stages forward is the answer. Their output cost 5% of what the large distant utility did. First-Surface decommissioning “in place” mega-power plants, prior to installing renewables, wasn’t easy. It meant upsetting livelihoods & antagonizing former employees depending on the dinosaurs. Eliminating large utilities exemplified in a small way why the US government couldn’t get itself out of the narcotics and arms businesses.
Pre-wiring the bridges was most amenable to the “information superhighway”. Renewable energy-sources on the bridges supported its energy needs. Telecommunication’s uses, so much a part of the pre-millennium media speculation, became a reality. Growing numbers of residents, living within the framework, “logged on”. People connected fast to centralized networks without worries over power losses or NSA spying on their private lives.
Companies controlling multi-media networks saw the potential. Factory-installed electronic connections were tabula rasas (blank slates). Analogous to the “printed circuit board”, they represented unclaimed potential. Each new domicile stood ready for the communications industry to emboss with its own imprimatur. Like notebook computers, every month, sky houses left factories with more electronics possibilities pre-installed than their predecessors did. Lester hired computer hackers to gather crews of experts to sweep each new batch of skyhouses, leaving the factories, for NSA spying bugs.
Past ocean dumping, burning, or land filling disposed of much unusable weaponry. The USA claimed they so destroyed millions of pounds of outdated World War II chemical, nuclear, and conventional arms. Such methods were long unacceptable. Nevertheless, Disarmament Treaties still required it for trillions of tons. Even maximum use of recycling failed. It couldn’t dispose of thousands of tons in military and civilian uranium and plutonium. Locations were just part of the unanswerable question.
“Can even one citizen of the world’s 250-plus nation-state systems trust their pols?” The hotelier asked. “Democracies are ubiquitous. How will they ever accomplish a treaty-mandated arsenal destruction? What percentage of the various munitions will re-cycle? Which will re-channel into black-markets or new weapon systems? The dead U.S. Constitution contained a Bill of Rights to assist in answering these questions. Those ten guaranteed freedoms didn’t survive the pols either. The last one to die was “keeping and bearing of arms”. Far-sighted pols dismantled it shortly after the end of the millennium. Love of tyranny beats in every heart.”
Notwithstanding, rendering munitions unusable became necessary. New technologies needed time to enable reclassification into raw materials for fresh products. The US Army’s proposed incineration-methods met strenuous objections. States, Greenpeace, Military Toxics Network, and other institutions opposed them. Politicians and arms-dealers made de facto quasi-transactions with different countries’ militaries. In their defense, they did their best to initiate politically “correct” Rothschild wars. Despite resistant citizenry, such endeavors were somewhat successful. Contrived conflicts did help use up surplus armaments. A great stubborn excess remained, however. Soldiers die, at times, but armament survives.
Mr. Aloirav rued war. “Modern war is frugal, niggardly, in disposing of human life as non-essential cannon fodder. Women and children are more acceptable targets to opposing factions, (Ruanda, Lebanon, Iraq, Bosnia, etc.). It’s understandable why “civilized” opposition results from such corpses far less than it does from combatants. Nevertheless, previous wars were not so fastidious. Even the hoi polloi are better educated against public trust abuse these days. Intellectuals look ever more upon generals as superfluous anachronisms. Private mercenary armies are much more efficient and far better business propositions.”
Metals were of necessity recycled. Until Al-Con’s demise, aluminum went into bridge-piers. Dismantling nuclear weapons meant rendering them into oxides. Technicians mixed in other nuclear waste and introduced the resulting product into borosilicate glass. Vitrified, miles out in uninhabited superstructure, it stored well. As glass, it also satisfied periodic international inspections from all World countries.
Local communities objected to repositories in their own area. Pontibus’ disposal options were attractive. Corporate constructed storage depots, far out over the ocean, were distant from any nation-state border. Workers treated encapsulated weaponry and toxic waste to protect it from extreme cold’s leakage affects. These packages, fitted with monitoring devices, connected to computer stations. Owners of high-troposphere-stored capsules could yet observe them from anywhere in the world.
Proper disposal of such arsenals required hundreds of trillions of dollars. Large disposal expense percentages helped fund Pontibus construction. Posterity bore some of the burden for dismantled weapons system’s storage. These same children existed in spite of them. Perhaps also due to them, however, because of research into perceived necessities for their construction. It was difficult for the day’s young to understand they were symbionts of organized legal homicide.
Monorails handled residents’ transportation needs, through the piers, when they required larger trips than 150 – 800 miles. Polymer-bodied solar-electric triangularization-negotiating vehicles provided local and most vertical transportation. Motorized transportation was an equivocal option, however. Satisfying any need on the First-Surface’s First World required a car or mass-transit. Reforms and the information superhighway made local neighborhoods self-sufficient.
The “trip” to the family “doctor” was interactive, digital, and fiber-optic. Zoning laws, anathema to efficient living and sustainability, were untenable dinosaurs. Such vestigial political remains created incredible unnecessary movement. These peculiar pernicious regulations were characteristic of First-Surface government anachronisms. Other written laws were also unacceptable on the Pontibus.
Sky-residents could access most desirable places on foot. Improvements in internet security from “Big Brother” and decriminalization of possession of plants or plant derivatives reduced the need for heavy travel between distant destinations. Aerial property-use integrated activity and encouraged diversity. It produced optimum population-densities even in the design stage.
The First-Surface got around to that, if ever, after numerous automatic reactions. By which time, areas were already developed and congested. Sky neighborhoods were not just collections of domiciles. They also contained libraries, markets, post offices, businesses, farms, power-generating machinery and much more. Because of the increased hexagonalization required for weight bearing, heavy industry went to special areas, reserved for noise polluters. Homelessness and its root cause, wasted space, were just bad memories of the First-Surface.
“No causation or even correlation has ever existed between population density and crime.” Lester said. Nevertheless, our landlords will find owning vacant sky-dwellings untenable. They will increase residential density to an optimum. The entrepreneur will be accountable to the Company for maintaining balance between human densities and crowding. Persons, plants, and animals per acre will exist in equilibrium with domicile occupants. We’ll assist the landlord, when necessary, with that responsibility. Possible loss of lucrative inducements will make it impossible to refuse cooperation.”
Cool temperatures plus low oxygen & reduced nitrogen levels plagued initial outward settlements. Plants, plastic, and platform metal interacted to diminish heat irradiation. Water vapor condensers, fish-farming pools, and animals producing higher catabolic chemical-heat appeared. As some vegetation expired, naturally, temperatures increased.
Growing plants, strengthening the redundantly tetrahedralized network, produced higher oxygen tensions. Animals reproducing, growing, foraging, and dying moderated extremes and temperature fluctuations. Except in wilderness areas, wherever flora and fauna flourished so did people. The peacefulness of aerial living provided comfortable strolling or resting. Spectacular vistas surrounded appealing environments.
Before the bridge advent, computers concentrated in the industrialized world. Initial aerial residents came from such areas. It was no surprise, when they took their computers with them. Pontibus citizens used one third of the 40 billion computers in existence. The USA, with 5% of the world’s First-Surface population, owned one-half the rest.
Unlike on the First-Surface, computers improved more lives on the bridge-communities than they destroyed. They effected better control of ecology and economics by monitoring growth and development. Gauging the health of each aerial community facilitated plans for more outward colonization. Computers reported the growth of the structure’s assimilated biomass. Software correlated disparate data (collected from oxygen meters, light sensors, thermometers, etc.) Relays sent the processed information to examining areas.
Company Control Centers compiled data to determine future designs, adaptation schedules, construction needs, etc. Second – Surface digital networks coordinated and exchanged reports with outcropping points in the global tetrahedralized community. Near ground or on the most remote energy collection or storage outpost, it didn’t matter. Enormous reliable resources were available to each bridge resident.
Each neighborhood accessed spreadsheets, search engines, word-processing, database, and other software. They manipulated, stored, and understood worldwide observations. Global-thinking plus local-action synergy didn’t come fast to the human creature. The computer assisted inculcating the Weltanschauung.
The need for human conflict, the computer’s mainstay, became less prevalent on the bridges. As it decreased, so did the negative aspects of information processing. The Concern expected that connecting disparate peoples better, through the bridges, would continue to reduce disharmony. Decreasing hunger and shelter wants, main historical war motivations, helped ease discord.
Ever the muckraker, Mr. Otorp said. “Incomplete credit reporting is a major deterrent to a happy and healthy population. Such evils cause social inequities, inefficiencies, consequent resentments, and their reverberations. The computer’s advent made the injustice an even more serious tragedy of civilization, exacerbating conditions to no escape.”
In a rare instance, the “boss” added. “I’ll second that. I think you could add criminal record abuse to that statement without changing a thing.”
Each Pontibus community, designed with demographics in mind, inculcated into residents the need to become better neighbors. They succeeded more than was ever possible on the First-Surface. Much less mistreatment due to people’s pasts occurred. Residents felt that if an offender, regardless of malefaction, paid for the offense in any one of number of accepted ways, forgiveness should follow. Hospitality and friendliness reflected a conception of the immediate post-frontier Wild West. Aerial residents considered a person’s present and future of paramount importance. Pasts, proving exemplary enough to be positive paradigms for others, excepted.
Marketing mischief, promulgated by computers, was hard to sustain on the bridges. Obsolete useless material and insipid consumer products are the life’s blood of pernicious advertising and caedere wealth. They titillate the fancy of impulsive consumer caprice and unmitigated greed. Insidious marketing practices are unsupportable for the planet. The industry’s painless aerial marasmus took the needless assault on resources with it. New, useful, and necessary products, some unique to the Pontibus, filled the opportunity vacuum in marketing and sales.
Toxic chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and their effects on humans do not accumulate as expected. Such compounds tally in an unfortunate deleterious synergism. They cause far more damage when taken together than would equal amounts taken separately. Body fluid contamination is not the single toxic effect manifested after drinking polluted water. Functional impairment and biological competence can co-exist, without demonstrating overt symptoms of disease, until too late.
Skewed biochemistry, promulgated by large banks & rapacious corporations’ manipulations of the environment, feminizes, produces crime, cancer diagnoses, and subtle unnoticed degradation. In all main physiological systems, that destruction wreaks silent havoc. Mental illness, cognitive deficits, endocrine problems, reproductive tragedy, immune system dysfunction, etc. result. To such diseases, the Pontibus inhabitant was less susceptible. Pollution free aquifers filled with pure cloud-condensate. Unlike First-Surface water, it made no prior contact with terrestrial sources of toxicity. Injection wells didn’t exist in the sky.
Growing ones’ own vegetables with pure water counters toxic effects. It decreases the poisonous industrial-chemical’s chances for entering family member’s bodies. The plant fiber and biomolecules cleanse and fortify. The Corporation interdicted synthetic pesticides and useless or noxious medicaments. Foods bearing additives not necessary for consumption also remained on the First-Surface. The bridge management thus prevented cumulative toxicity in its customers.
Foods were not as colorful as those on the First-Surface. Merchants needed to maintain fresher supplies too, but everyone was healthier. Complaints about missing phony colors fell flat. Stale goods got the treatment they deserved. Disease was moribund. Health benefits on the bridges became common knowledge. It was self-interest that drew persons in ever-increasing numbers.
Methane generators, integral to each sky house, seldom failed the Company’s regular testing. Residual non-biodegradable toxics did not remain, accumulating in the domicile’s waste-processors. Opposition was slight. Factory designed vents allowed odors from a malfunctioning apparatus, and resulting embarrassment, to enter the recalcitrant’s residence first.
Mr. Frye said. “Salubrious conditions must be maintained or our product and sales will suffer. Better that those persons, violating sustainability requirements, enjoy a few smelly hours.”
Until antibiotic obsolescence, infectious diseases accounted for small numbers in the industrial world’s annual death statistics. They were 25% of cancer’s toll. In underdeveloped countries, the former class of infirmity added up to a great deal more. For the Third World, the ratio reversed. The Pontibus semi-sequestered disease organisms naturally. Communicable disease was thereby isolated, discovered, and eradicated fast. It made positive marketing news. The benefit wasn’t small.
Countries tried to make labor-intensive products supportable and competitive. These goods are more amenable to insuring sexual equality in the workplace without fiat. Such output causes official statistics to count women more often. Funded projects for education, agriculture, nutrition, etc. decrease discrimination against them.
Such incentives did not exist on the bridges since Lester prohibited all forms of racial or sexual discrimination as he did welfare and handicapped people. Nevertheless, sky-house construction was labor-intensive. It also fed and housed the labor force. Building the large bridges between countries reduced war-risk and destructive competition between workers. It produced a product that itself employed.
In 1944, at a Hotel in New Hampshire, they created the World Bank. Its ostensible purpose was to help people of all nation-states realize their potential. The Founders maintained they intended for all to enjoy peace, progress, and faith in a free future. By the 1980’s it failed its mandate. To protect the environment, some said, the Global Environment Facility of the Bank started in 1991. It also failed.
The Planet continued to deteriorate. The Earth Summit at Rio de Janeiro in 1992 made the Bank realize some things. Awareness grew of the topology in biological sustainability, human exigencies, and economic development. It saw then that energy intensity is opposed to labor-intensive biological sustainability.
The Bank tallied up mindless development expenses vis a vis environmental cost accounting. The impact of how it failed 1944’s mandate became clear. They began using different bookkeeping formulas. New guidelines continued to value the obvious impacts of financial returns. However, they began measuring more recondite biological-impacts of development too. When figuring natural resource depletion into the depreciation tables, aspects changed. Large financial interests looked even more closely at nefarious possibilities for population reduction.
Books reflected on investments, made in the Pontibus, with favor. The pols didn’t care much for the message. The puppets stalled. Although the Founder appeared unprejudiced in other’s eyes, the extremism was there. The Bank situation, other experiences, and basic cogitation made Lester glean certain opinions. He said. “No sentient being, having any reasoning capacity, should trust a pol outside the distance body-heat travels.”
Mr. Aloirav responded to these negative feelings, saying. “Legitimized by purchased votes, chosen as their ideal by the most ignorant superstitious avaricious cowards ever unleashed upon Earth. Why would you expect it to be otherwise? It’s every person’s duty, using the limits of their courage, to work every day at destroying these parasites. Inured to living in subjection so long, most have forgotten what freedom means.”
Mr. Frye replied. “You’ll change your mind about those “cowards”, when you see how much they build for us. The planet will never supply enough. We can use every one and trillions more.”
“The problem, Lester,” he replied, “is when. How much longer?”
Almost all population growth was in the Third World. It continued so for a century. The situation in those areas did not bode well for natural systems supporting soil, forests, grasslands, and aquifers. Food and people, as always, upset a delicate economic-political – biological balance. First-Surface clean water and food extraction, continuing its relentless decline, cost more. Genetically engineered crops, requiring ever more toxic pesticides, controlled agriculture and destroyed lives. Turning the precipitous drop in resources around, Pontibus growth was the beacon to follow.
Planetary population looked ever deeper into using aquaculture to supply its animal-protein. Two pounds of grain grows at maximum a pound of fish or poultry protein. The ratio is 7:1 for grain to red meat. Pontibus technology produced fish, chicken, feed, and their habitats in abundance. Unfortunately, reversing the 7:1 ratio is not possible. Humeal research proved that one pound of red meat fertilizer would not return 7 pounds of grain.
Miniaturization technology of cattle and swine didn’t proceed as expected. Pontibus weight bearing capacity: cost constraints mediated against feedlot cattle and pork production. Aerial red-meat difficulties appeared disadvantageous to many. Naturally restricting its consumption kept them on the First-Surface. Vegetarians never rued their loss, and the obstacle went far toward increasing Earth’s average state of health.
The internet and heavy economic constraints on the pharmaceutical & medical profession made doctors feel unwelcome. Their dearth and the aforementioned health measures reflected the Pontibus Gross Planetary Product’s plummeting medical costs.
Fertile soils, increasing on the bridges, disappeared around the globe. Misplaced trust in a scientific miracle of photosynthetic super-efficiency waned. In 1984 the Fertilizer: Boosted Grain Output ratio was 1:9. Salination, erosion, water logging, and pollution of soil reduced it to 1:2 by 1994. After the turn of the millennium, the ratio hit 1:1. Soon, the ratios reversed. By 2100GT, the First-Surface ratios were 1000:7.
First-Surface capacity to promote yields was not increasing. Nobody expected it to do so in the near future. Farmers despaired of further efficacy. Land-based agriculture couldn’t hope to approach the Pontibus field’s photosynthetic capacity. The Concern built crop-platforms as fast as they found the resources.
Farmers are very much a part of the world technological cognoscente. Such people are quick to adapt to international technologies appearing to give greater yields. True capitalists, these intrepid risk-takers are the world’s foremost entrepreneurs, past and present. They came to the Pontibus for the simple promise of agricultural profit.
There seemed no way to prevent the stampede to use the aerial technology. A dramatic discovery of inexpensive desalinization would have been the one possibility. Without the bridges or more fresh soil, the world could expect a steady decrease in available food. The coming scenario would create a completely new meaning to the word “famine”. The word alone brings unstable governments and social-cultural disintegration in its wake.
100 million people entered the Earth at the millennium’s end. They required over 225 million pounds of grain nutrition per day just to fail to maintain satisfactory activity. No one listened for the shrieks of agony as the last members of 750 species took their final breaths that year. Every few hours, then every few minutes, more species went extinct because of direct encroachment on former habitats.
Those aware few felt pressure to defend themselves against whatever source or direction from which it came. The cycle spun ever faster. Biological sustainability needs forced governments into new rounds of defensive knee jerk reactions. The technology and the capacity were there. Humanity wasn’t yet showing the necessary implementation will.
Needing to grow is a biological fact. The Founder and the “boss” believed the species would not continue to evolve by destroying its unborn. Dissembling or pusillanimously defending the human species right to exist was no answer. Environmentalism and biological sustainability would never be successful that way. Yet, Man couldn’t keep exploiting with impunity. The Pontibus was the one solution having no evolutionary or moral negatives. Homo continued to behave as if children, building sandcastles on a beach, facing a tsunami on the horizon.
Someone, however, waited in Grand Rapids to force their hand before it arrived.

There is but one unconditional commandment, which is that we should seek incessantly, with fear and trembling, so to vote and to act as to bring about the very largest total universe of good which we can see. James

Chapter Thirty-Seven

An incident occurred as they pushed the equatorial Pontibus over the 100 thousand-foot level. The situation caused a re-association between the Founder and his erstwhile quasi-friend Francis Castle. It seems, inmate labor found protective work clothes cumbersome. These suits contained compressed gases for work at oxygen-deprived altitudes. They were great for the temperate zone high altitudes but too warm for the tropical medium levels. The creative convicts discovered they could chew leaves from Pontibus coca bushes & eschew the suits. Masticating the proscribed vegetation enabled them to handle the low oxygen-tension and work well too.
The First-Surface, however, still interdicted accursed coca and its derivatives. The US government pursued its fruitless & phony anti-drug war as addictively as ever. They profited at the supply end as well as the sales end and gained their life’s blood from the interdiction. Thanks to an ignorant and brutal voter-trash populace, how could they discontinue? 95% of the country, 77% of the US-Israeli slave-countries depended on drug interdiction residuals for survival. One type of chemical or another addicted 87% of all US citizens.
Excepting perhaps politicians and biological misfits, Mr. Frye wasn’t prejudiced against any living thing. He and the New Society never proscribed any plant cultivation on the Pontibus. It became a precedent. No substance abusers, the “Group” felt such epidemics were non-events. Along with homelessness, sexual perversions, domestic violence, alienation, purposelessness, Weltschmerz, anomie, etc., they were overpopulation, not drug, engendered. A conflict between the two enclaves over the matter was bound to happen.
The New Society first discovered leaf chewing on a near-Brazil cantilever. Bacon’s sector, he took the matter to Gloria. She brought it to Mr. Aloirav. He consulted Francis and then gave him laissez faire.
At the new calein factory (70W, 40N, L12), the Founder was being difficult. Repercussions, should the situation threaten New Society interests, worried him. Unafraid of detection and castigation itself, nevertheless, he argued. “It must cease!”
“I don’t understand your problem, Mr. Frye.” The dealer replied. “You’re Sovereign on the bridges like the “boss” is with us.”
“It’s not with my authority I’m concerned, Francis.”
“What is it then? It can’t be morality. The drug-war is as phony and contrived as anything Orwell could have described.”
“I’m aware of that. I’m not a child, Francis. You’ve obviously been debauching in the sky too much.”
“Why?!”
“You’ve conveniently forgotten the voracious appetite for graft in pols. Our legitimizing the situation could threaten the US Government’s bureaucracy.”
“How?” Mr. Castle questioned without thinking. “Ignorant people alone believe in the efficacy of interdiction. They’re in the majority. The preponderance of votes will keep the grease rolling in. Always has.”
He spelled it out. “The booze must be pickling your mind, Francis. How long could the aerial community avoid war?”
“War? What for?”
“For letting the cat out of the bag.”
“What cat?”
“The putrefaction in the US Administration, Congress, and Court. Without the phony drug war, the festering sore of US bureaucracy would fulminate into total national sepsis.”
“Oh. I see. So whad’ya wanna’ do?”
“What can we do?”
“Have no idea?”
“Can we keep it quiet?”
“Business as usual?”
“Yah, I guess so?”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“But I don’t ever wanna’ hear about a leak.”
“O.K.” He said, turning back toward the monorail and walking up the platform incline. “You won’t.”
Still at the ocean surface, Mr. Frye watched him go, and then shouted. “She still asks about you, Francis.”
Things continued for a time without a problem. Brasilia became ever friendlier with the Pontibus’ administration and their new neighbors. About the same time, some information surfaced. It alleged the US Government in 1971 and again in 1973 to have performed a biological experiment in Sao Paulo. Some of the Brazilian population died of bacterial pneumonia and meningitis.
Brasilia got no satisfaction with their inquiries in Washington. Resentment still lingered over the USA’s past arrogance regarding international law violations and spying on Brazilian citizens. Now, the news about bioweapon research on Brazilians did not make the negative sentiments diminish. Information also leaked about upper-level coca use on the bridges. Taking umbrage, Brazil gave the DEA no assistance. An apparent first, since Brasilia’s selling the Policia Federal to USA’s demented President Bush in 2004.
Then a reporter, Jake Gruesome, received the following note on the Skid Row hotel’s stationary.

Dear Sir:
Please expose Rav Aloirav and his criminal underground before it’s too late. He may appear innocuous, but his organization has biological weapons.
Brute – amicus humani generis (Brutus – friend of the human race)

Most would have seen such a missive fit for the wastebasket. However, the signature piqued Jake’s curiosity. Taking a chance, the journalist made a few phone calls. They increased his interest, and he dug a little deeper. The more Jake learned, the more he desired additional facts. The fellow needed to know if the letter was a practical joke or something more squalid. His editor thought the accusation merited further scrutiny. He sent investigators to Grand Rapids on the chance it might be valid. They dug into the hotelier’s life. It soon became evident. Enough motive, capacity, and opportunity existed, indeed, to create a criminal underground. With that 1984 “Cloning Kit” for kids, now nearly a century old, anyone could create new forms of life. All universities taught recombinant DNA techniques. The Human Genome Project finished long since. Having lost its initial glamour of novelty, genetic engineering was now a powerful force. Genetically altered crops were the universal staple around the world for the two poorer classes. It was old news.
The “boss” was just leaving the lobby one afternoon for the Blue Barnacle. As he stepped out the hotel door, Mr. Gruesome approached. In front of numerous witnesses, he introduced himself. Mr. Aloirav saw what was happening, when he heard the question:
“Is this building headquarters of a criminal underground?”
The hotelier ignored it, but the famous reporter next asked about biological weapons.
He replied. “I didn’t think your people listened to barroom gossip.”
Elated his hunch paid off so well, Jake pressed the hotelier. “Have you acquired such weapons? If so, why?”
The “boss” gave a short smile and said. “I’ve been expecting such questions for years.”
“Really?”
“Yes. J’ai faille attendre. (I almost had to wait.) Why now?”
The reporter disclosed that someone reported the fact, and Mr. Aloirav said. “Since very young, I’ve been looking for a measure of order and stability in the world. The human race is out of control and has been for some time. Written Law is a farce and usually no more than pantomime. Special tools have become necessary to achieve and maintain a condition of stable natural growth for all species. I now have those tools. I hope soon to see a safe return to planetary health.”
“What are you proposing?!”
“My agents are now in every country of the World. Each has a palette of useful organisms in their possession along with a vaccine repertoire. They wait for a word, or hiatus in communication, from me to adjust respective complements.”
Giddy with the magnitude of his find, Jake didn’t inquire into what “respective complements” meant. The story’s size blew him away. He asked. “How do you expect your agents and biological weapons to achieve the stability you seek?”
The hotelier, aware how to treat government-owned reporters, didn’t answer the question but responded thus. “I’ve been holding off for years to see if there was going to be any other way. None has showed itself. It might as well be now. My terms are total nuclear disarmament & power generation, an immediate moratorium on further rainforest destruction, and a draconian eugenics program.”
Mr. Gruesome’s jaw dropped, saying. “You’re mad, or joking?”
“Neither!”
“You’ll fail.”
“I think not! I want an end to nuclear proliferation & overpopulation. I want an end to this madness called social propriety. I foresee a healthy human race evolving in a sure determined future. I’m willing to kill, billions if necessary.”
“Numbers like those don’t matter to you!?”
“What matters is the end. My way.”
“And fuck-you if it isn’t yours too!” Jake argued.
“That’s right. My concern is planetary life & the human race. Anything else is superfluous.”
“You really don’t fear failure?”
“Failure, failure, you’re a broken record! It’s possible, but who loses? Me? I think not. There’s only so much oxygen, so much food, so much clean environment to go around before we’re all short. You have a choice – select….or autolyse.”
“Is that all there is?”
“Yes. That’s all there is!”
“Your goals are perhaps admirable, Mr. Aloirav, but there are too many people involved to get consensus.”
“Consensus?! I’m not a pol! I would not ever be a pol. I don’t need an election to validate me. I wouldn’t want to be elected!”
“You will need consensus, nevertheless!”
“It will come, one way or another. I expect absolute compliance from the entire nuclear-fraternity. There must be effective financial pressure placed on all remaining forested countries and those with nuclear power capabilities. I want re-licensing of all medical doctors to begin immediately. I insist upon total capitulation by the end of the year. If compliance is not forthcoming, I shall act precipitously. Should I be in any way molested, the timetable will move up.
“How?”
“I shall destroy a city with a population of at least two million.”
Hearing a rapid influx of air, he noticed an ashen-faced macaque before him and continued. “My agents in Washington have been instructed. Not hearing from me, daily, for whatever reason, they are to act. Organisms will destroy the population there. New York will follow, and then Boston. You may leave.”
“Sir! I would just like t…”
“Sir. I have work to do.”
Even without proof, the threats were substantial, the media was interested. The man was crazy, they thought. He must be. Nevertheless, the flake’s threats were too interesting to ignore. Homeland Security and the FBI were stymied.
His words alone were sufficient justification to get him either certified or sent to Guantanamo. Reporters from many countries left for the hotel. It was the biggest terrorist-hijack-hostage-extortion story ever. Toward the week’s end, hundreds of journalists converged on Grand Rapids. All hoped to interview the hotelier.
Every government agency, with access to the big computers, checked out his background. He monitored their activities. The “boss” prepared for years, with dehistorization, to confront what was now happening. Information they would find was what he wanted them to find. The first week would be most informative.
The opposition must have been satisfied there was a substantial threat. No arrest occurred. They did nothing but read the papers and make pacifying public statements. Mr. Aloirav didn’t die. He didn’t disappear. He did discover the manner in which the media discovered him.
Nobody knows for sure what went on during that period in the highest power-circles. By the following year, no one present at the strategic meetings remained alive to report. Dehistorization left no credible written or magnetic record. Eyewitness accounts and anecdotal evidence, Chairman Elan G. Aloirav collected, tends to confirm what follows:
The hotelier obliged the most famous journalists. Questioning varied but it patterned on what he wanted to accomplish and where his personal agenda centered. At various times, the media mentioned particular comments different leaders and spokespeople made. The “boss” ignored them, also sidestepping information requests for his timetable. It appeared to him, however, portraying some credibility to the masses was unavoidable.
That meant having motives focused on private aggrandizement. True altruism doesn’t bean the belly like other endeavors. Credibility hinged on caedere avarice. Therefore, he explained his ultimate objectives for the Planet embellished with private benefit scenarios. Mr. Aloirav continued to reiterate his ultimatum but kept free of tempting causes to arrest him for extortion. They continued to ask about his contingency plans, pressing him to think aloud about the negative consequences of failure.
“I’ve thought about failure.” He answered. “But I haven’t planned for it. I’ve thought more about success, planning for it. I received a greater share of life’s blessings than many. Most of what I wanted to accomplish, with my life, I have. It’s altogether fitting my death be somewhat more tragic than others. I say so not out of any misdirected plebeian sense of justice. It just seems more symmetrical. Resting on the thought of death has always been my crutch. Sometimes, it supports me more than at other times. I’ve as much right to die as anyone. One day, we’ll all belong to history. It’s inevitable. Time and Life’s exigencies will be our judges. Tragic ends are common to us all. I’m not common. Given much, I gave much more. My end should be catastrophic but exhibit far more grandeur. My death must be swift, unexpected, and yet magnificent. Such as befits the King of the Planet. It should be the transcendent perspective for me to die, as I have lived. Replete with courage, nobility, and innocent of all ignominy.”
Prompted by the apparent megalomania, reporters exchanged furtive glances. The first then queried. “What makes you feel above the law?”
“You needn’t be coy. I do not feel above the Law. I am the Law. You’re just becoming aware of it.” The hotelier responded, noticing their smug clandestine glances and rolling eyes. “No one wields sufficient prestige today to officiate at my formal coronation. That doesn’t detract from my virtual omnipotence. I have handled the ceremony in my mind. I don’t need a public display. Your question, sir, does not enter into my deliberations. The consequences and responsibilities of success alone concern me.”
“We are to assume then that nuclear disarmament, stopping deforestation, and eugenics are not your sole objectives?” Another asked. “You intend violating International Law to gain ultimate power?”
“International Law? C’est moi. I already have ultimate authority. I have had it for years. It is you who have been violating the law, Nature’s law, and my law.”
“You do not value our statutes, sir?”
“Written law is for the dupers and the duped. I don’t much care for any law. Just because I understand Nature’s laws doesn’t mean I like them either.”
“Which don’t you like, Sir.”
“I don’t like it that the most able people are precluded from their several tasks.”
“Why? Who’s stopping them?”
“There are many constraints. The most talented fear to break laws as the means of achievement.”
“It’s that important?”
“Yes. You would fault me because I did not grow older & wiser fast enough. When I talk with reporters like you, the truth gets cheated.”
“Who made you a judge?” A fat Newsweek reporter shouted.
“No one. I’m not a judge. Judges are pols.” The hotelier answered. “I’m not a pol. A judge should weigh the social power he wields. He should balance his destructiveness against a natural love for all creatures. Without exception, such behavior never occurs. The disenfranchised lose the battle for equal treatment. The scale tips away from them. Trials are preconceived shameful farces. Ruling coteries institute them to absolve craven Society from feeling the guilt of inertia & indifference. The creation, preservation, and regeneration of cooperative loving educated family-units today is unsound. If Society insured equilibrium in these fundamental forces, such judicial foolishness could end. Failing that, ugly trials continue. Your kangaroo courts serve but to punish individual scapegoats with institutionalized indifference.”
“Have you no scruples?” An inattentive and disrespectful radio commentator inquired. “Will your government be as amoral as you appear to be?”
“Amoral. A good choice of adjective. Absolutely! Natural morality is close to being human amorality. I’ve found that I can only trust Natural morality. All other is rubbish, a conditioned illogical imposition of limits in response to fear, made by dead men for living in the past. As to government, we should fear mob concocted laws. One should always fear mobs and their animal pets, the pols.”
“Legislation & written law are Man’s highest accomplishments,” said a lawyer in the crowd.
“Yes. And Man is but an instrument in bitch Nature’s inexorable pursuit of escape from Chaos, the great god of perfect anarchy. She gives life and She takes it. In human terms, Nature is not perfect and needs controlling. She is, however, even in human terms, efficient. When faced with a dilemma, whatever is strongest and simplest wins Her favor. Even my unavoidable altruism, as despicable as I find it, is part of Nature’s consistency. It’s a hydrogen bond. It’s her tool, insuring exponential growth. It pleases Her erstwhile lover, Chaos.”
“I take it then, you’re not a religious man?” The National News anchor asked with tongue-in-cheek.
“I’m addicted neither to socialism nor superstition. What need have I for some other caprice? Religion is just the means some people use to pursue an illusionary end (eternal life, power, hope, another man’s $, etc.). It’s diametrically opposed to real spirituality. Organized, it’s nothing more than devil worship, serving but to enslave, brutalize, and excuse irresponsibility. Like drugs, alcohol, crime, or any other social ill, religion is a pressure release valve, changing fear, guilt, and frustration into numbness and necrosis. It’s the worst of the panoply, since it allows full use of human destructive capacity to harm the planet.”
“Then you want everyone to be uncivilized?”
“I have never seen civilization. I have seen quaint attempts at it. Subterfuges. Embarrassed by his animal nature, Man hides it whenever possible. But, try as He might, He can’t forget. Nature won’t let him forget. His body, mind, and soul all bear the stamp of the beast. Civilization would hamstring the strong, but attempts have been unavailing in countering the condition. Religion and its bastard son, humanism, attempt to disguise the bestiality. However much Man cultivates his hypertrophied intellect, perverse weak creature propensities nullify his best efforts.”
“So you’re doing this from conviction? You feel what you’re doing is right!?” A print reporter woke up, demanding to know. “It’s not for cash.”
“No, it’s not for cash.”
“You are indeed crazy!”
“By legal definition, yes. I recognize no absolute right or wrong. It’s an idea of the weak such qualifications even exist. There’s relative strength or relative weakness, illegal or legal.”
“Then why do you feel you’re absolutely right?”
“I don’t.”
“Loser!”
“Everybody is a “loser”, sir. Some acquire or achieve more before they “lose”.”
“Ever hear about the principle of majority rule?” An arrogant Boston political reporter queried.
The hotelier responded, questioning. “Yes. Submit? Allow a gang of brutal ignorant hedonistic superstitious cowards to control me? Just because there happen to be more of them around the world than noble people like myself. I should genuflect to a preponderance of votes? Votes bought with caedere fraud. Isn’t such passivity rather craven?”
“What makes you think you’re any better than what we have now?” A woman reporter asked. “Why do you feel established authorities are not sufficient to the task required of them?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“Not to me.”
“Quis qui quod. You’ve answered your own question.”
“How?”
“It appears, at present, that we are the chosen species of Nature. It seems to be our mandate from Her to proliferate. We have the capacity to multiply ourselves and every creature here that is or ever was. Why use our good fortune to aggrandize ourselves alone?”
“Beats me. But what about my question?” She retorted, still unaware the “boss” had, indeed, answered her.
“Apathy, that’s why.” He continued, ignoring her assertiveness. “Will more or less conflict & social tension result if bread becomes unobtainable?”
“Well. More. I should think.” Her stridency lessened.
“Me too. When considering that expense, wouldn’t it be proper to inquire? Now is the time to act, young lady, if we’re to escape this madness. The authorities will soon capitulate.”
“What authorities?”
“”Established authorities”, I believe was the term you used?”
“I used? . . . Oh, yes, right.”
“I trust I’m not missing something here.” The hotelier replied. “We are talking about…politicians, are we not?”
“Yes.”
“By definition, organisms devoid of value, the lowest form of life ever given breath. Clones of lawyers. You need to ask if I’m to be any better? You do not possibly believe such detritus can even act, much less in time!”
An NBC anchor charged. “Your ultimatum is so undignified.”
Mr. Aloirav replied. “To those on the receiving end, I´m sure. You’re just not familiar with past uses of force. History is a euphemism for how we manipulate the past to give ourselves courage to face the future. The time for such chicanery has run out. Assaults on human dignity in the past have always come from war, poverty, disease, or tyranny. Soon they’ll come from just living on a dying Earth. Make no mistake. Man will destroy multicellular life, if not checked. He’s one of Nature’s experimental bankruptcies. Because of Him, She’s near to dooming herself to a billion-year evolutionary hiatus. A near-supernatural act must destroy Her human creation to change direction now. Perhaps a few might remain to renew the growth curve.”
“You and your agents being among the “few”?”
“Absolutely.”
The same man asked. “You intend using population as pawns in your grab for power. Is there any significance to the size of 2 million souls?”
“Certainly is. Simple economics.”
“How is that?”
“The bugs are expensive. Strategically, it’s just necessary to reduce the population in each of these cities by 100,000. Cholera, Typhus, opportunistic diseases, and infrastructure inadequacy will remove the other 1.9 million.”
“Where did you get your “bugs?”
“Made them.”
“How can you, with such facility, contemplate so much homicide?” A professor demanded to know, while the others gasped and whispered.
“It isn’t a question of difficulty but of will. A despicable lack of courage results in insufficient cruelty. Such cowardice turns Man into a progressively weaker and more contemptible creature. Like a junkie, Man’s flaws destroy everything in his milieu.”
“Where did you get your mandate?”
“My mandate is strength. I’m not a pol. I do not do what mobs direct. Only if there is insufficient graft do pols do otherwise. Except for accepting bribes, they would seldom take action, not to mention moving to correct any abuse. They have an irresistible desire to win wars, not to fight them. Such behavior will destroy humankind and most of the living Earth. Self-discipline, unfathomable courage, and cruelty are all that can save us now.”
“You’re truly willing to destroy billions of your fellow human beings?” A serious & respectful journalist with thick glasses asked.
“Your presumption being I shall need to do so to gain hegemony?”
“Isn’t the implication obvious? Out of over 250 countries, won’t you meet with resistance? To my mind, leaders and countless power brokers will insure you do so.”
“Perhaps you’re safe in making that assumption.” The “boss” agreed, smiling. “With a human population reduced to pre-renaissance numbers, the Earth would be much healthier. The illuminati are planning a similar scenario, behind our backs, so, we needn’t be too concerned.”
“Aren’t you people playing “God”, reducing population by millions?” A woman wearing a large crucifix asked.
“Billions.”
“Billions?!”
“Yes. 500 million would be a nice remaining number, wouldn’t it?”
Amid gasps and whispers, a journalist asked what system would both reduce population and still govern.
“You’re assuming a government will be necessary. I’m not so sure. I do not feel any government has ever been necessary, just expedient to the powers that be. Nevertheless, a neo-feudalistic Natural Selection with an eye to increasing the proper counts of manifested desired principles would be nice. I shall stress phenotypic characteristics on an individual basis. We shall allow to leave those requiring major social interaction beyond the procreative or philosophical. Life is hard. We will not disguise it by prevarications to make it appear different. If higher life is to remain, the strong must survive. The weak must return, whence they came.”
Able to grasp only part of the explanation, he responded. “I may have heard incorrectly, but it sounded like Eugenics?”
“Of course.” Mr. Aloirav riposted. “Man’s rape of the Earth has lasted long enough. Before the behavior results in his demise and that of countless other species, I intend intervening. The issue is whether life, as we know it, shall continue. Nature’s locomotive is poised at the switch. Will Man turn to the “survival” track or roll on down “extinction” road? To persist, multicellular life must be strong. That means our being true to Nature’s mandate, shepherd to Life’s flock, not wolves.”
“So you’re going to attempt implementing Nazi-style Eugenics?”
“Nazis and racists we are not. Eugenicists, we are. There’s no choice but to cut the weak from the herd. Cauterize necrotic tissue or the entire organism faces oblivion . . . our generation’s burden. We’ll learn to balance constructive and destructive influences with our own vital forces. Have we the courage? I hope so. If not, by default, Nature will destroy her mistake.”
“Supposing stressors are insufficient to reduce overall numbers.” A biology magazine’s reporter interrogated. “How will you establish guidelines, quality criteria, for survival rights?”
“Economics.” The hotelier explained. “Creatures cost the Planet. If their species expense is more than repayable, they leave. In our case, we shall institute universities for medical doctor re-education.”
An Austrian propounded the shopworn “Beethoven question”. (Humanity’s possible loss in selling short a human life because of humble beginnings.) He maintained that pre-determining any creature’s eventual worth was arrogant and impossible. A life’s contribution might someday be more than initial expectations. Summarily destroyed, it would never be able to show it. Not an easy question to formulate, the critic needed help from other reporters to phrase it. He did so well enough to get a response.
“How dare you intimate to prohibit us from disposing of human detritus by assuming that healthy babies will not achieve the same heights of performance that some blind, deaf, syphilitic, poor, white trash might? If we err, we shall not err on the side of mercy.” The “boss” replied.
More little gasps and buzzes from the press group resulted, and a man tried to quote. ”“Mercy is a quality not strained.””
He received, in answer, a quote from Titus Andronicus, Act II. Then the “boss” added. “In Butterworth Hospital, at this moment, there is a microcephalic product of a cocaine addicted mother, waiting to die! The State of Michigan has spent over $250,000 maintaining its questionable “life”! That figure could keep 2500 pre-kwashiorkor black children alive in a third world country for a year! Imagine what it could have done for 25 healthy white kids!”
“What difference does it make, if you’re going to kill them all anyway?!” Someone shouted, and another screamed. “How can you proscribe all dialogue and arrogate the right to rule and destroy the World?”
“You answered your own question, sir.” The hotelier responded to the latter.
“How?”
“I arrogated the right. No action in defense of freedom and survival is as reprehensible as one taken to destroy it. If human legitimacy doesn’t sanction what I do, then Nature will be the arbiter. If contrary, She will punish accordingly. Earth is my home, and I TAKE the right. Nuclear power & overpopulation disenfranchises me, as it does you. Global pollution and resource exhaustion are killing me and mine. Other flora & fauna destruction takes the friends of my spirit, and that diminishes me. I make my compromises with Nature and only with Nature. Scientia et potentia humanum inidem coincident (Knowledge and human power come together in one).”
Being almost Spring, months from the respite’s end, neither mass-murders nor genuflection occurred. The pols chose to accept the premise that the “boss” was deranged, but not criminally so. After some uneventful weeks, the media returned to other titillating sources for their truth obfuscating. They geared latter news pieces, concerning the coercion, to near ridiculing his supposed impotence. Articles either hinted at or accused him of mental instability. Then, as the media did with Fukushima, they stopped all relevant reporting.
As of yet, all he showed was talk. Society doesn’t react fast to counter sudden rule-changes. Potential recipients of his annihilative power elected to underestimate him. As weeks passed, politicians allowed themselves collective sighs of relief. They avoided thinking about the year-end ultimatum.
Mr. Aloirav surmised the politicians would believe what they needed & wanted to believe. He felt such organisms but mass-mouthpieces, followers. If they didn’t act immediately, countering his move, they would probably also hesitate at the appropriate time. The hotelier expected them to be unimpressive in mobilizing action or leadership to thwart his plan, and he was right. They would be even less effective than the media.
He knew they considered him demented. It was natural. People see what they think they see. They couldn´t confront the truth. Crazy is invisible.
The US Congress and the President were not the arrogant criminal agents of Rothschild & Israel, as they were in the early 21st century. Years of socialism and government subsidies made all Americans great cowards. They did put together additional fact-finding committees to placate criticism directed at their inaction. The sum total of all investigations produced an inconvenient idea. It revealed that the man might not be exaggerating his strength.
Although no record of notorious accomplishment appeared, there were hints of possible danger. Other than by disease, there were very few unexplained retaliatory deaths and no lawsuits. How does a man exist over a hundred years without making any enemies? Answer? He doesn´t. Rav Aloirav was an anomaly.
Certain known wealthy individuals died penniless after sudden illnesses. Persons of notoriety (in behavior detrimental to biosustainability) died suddenly, and it was discovered soon after that their reputed large estates were, in fact, devoid of caedere wealth. The feeling among the polery grew to tread lightly. The politicians neglected to countenance his intimidating the World. Yet, they also feared destroying him would not cure the menace. If his people acted, safety for all might vanish. When the media suggested playing him down, degrading his message, they concurred. “Ignore him. Maybe he’ll go away.”
Then, fear escalated, as Rav Aloirav turned up the hysteria thermostat. The New Society leaked copies of their pamphlets to the fact-finding committees. Taken off-guard, weak and disorganized, the politicians vacillated between indignation and despair. The “boss” took advantage of their imagined cohesion, arrogance, and assurance. He would change the rules to his own advantage and create panic. They were to become more terrified and demoralized as autumn approached.
The United Nations held a meeting to discuss possible responses. They discussed whether to capitulate only as an insult. Ignoring him, calling his bluff, they did not even ask him to come to New York. The meeting members voted to do but one thing. They named a liaison man to act as a quasi-diplomat. Although the nations angered the hotelier, they also impressed him.
It was good strategy. He would have done the same. Mr. Aloirav was not enthusiastic about letting them toy with him at that stage of the standoff, however. He required movement, a sign, demanding to know if Europe, the US, and Asia were ready to capitulate. He was not concerned about the southern hemisphere. Overwhelmingly socialistic, they were too poor to give much resistance.
He also was unconcerned about Mideast intransigence. The Arab States were followers, religious cowards, afraid of everything. Israel and the Rothschild slave-states were so enthralled by petrodollars that anything even remotely resembling masculine qualities like resistance was nonexistent. He knew he could probably expect a visit from a Mossad agent or CIA assassin, but his arrogance kept such attacks out of his realm of consciousness. He would have to depend on his bodyguards.
Other than his words, the “boss” gave them no indication of having any power beyond a moderate financial condition. The bank balance, he showed, was unpretentious. New Society funds were in anonymous numbered Luxembourg accounts or hawala, floating along in his dehistorization system. Michigan National Bank management, sycophants as ever, blocked his personal checking. They wanted to show solidarity with the US government.
The politicians’ inaction accented the success of Mr. Aloirav’s former efforts to maintain a “low profile”. Now, however, he needed to change that “all talk, no action” supposition. Mr. Castle presented an opportunity. Once again, the dealer blundered.
Mr. Castle’s position was now penultimate to Ms. Gold in the “Group” hierarchy. Nobody knew how such a womanizer and heavy-drinker had so inveigled himself. The hotelier, as disciplined as any Spartan, was not sure he even knew himself. Other men also showed their loyalty and friendship over the years in similar small ways. This man was somehow special.
Francis knew he would never be “boss”, nor did he want it. Displaying something more than loyalty, Mr. Castle accepted his own life’s insignificance. A transitory dust-grain, to be completely forgotten a few months post-mortem. Time would quickly wear away name-recognition and life’s petty vanities. Like others, he wanted some assurance of being part of something lasting. He was hedging his bets, holding on to two opposites to achieve his goal.
New Society objectives promised the dealer he would remain a positive influence longer. An effort to make a spectacular statement beyond his brief moment was not asking too much. It motivated Francis to give his all. Of course, he could not ever articulate these thoughts, even to himself. They would excoriate his other bet . . . religious beliefs. Maybe recognizing such high-mindedness, the “boss” wanted him near, regardless of his frailty.
The dealer failed to keep his promise allowing no leaks about the coca bushes. Unaware how it happened, the news took him by surprise. He learned from ex-con farmers that the DEA was confiscating their crops. Moments later, guards informed him US government people were trying to gain entrance to the convict cantilevers. There was no precedent for such an invasion. The Pontibus was sovereign territory under Maritime Law. It was an obvious & flagrant act of war.
Admitting failure was difficult. Yet, the Founder should know. He would not be pleased. How to approach him was a problem. Mr. Castle radioed Mr. Aloirav for advice.
“…I don’t know, “boss”. It happened so fast. The guys are thinkin’ the DEA must’ve breached the dehistorization firewall.”
“Not a chance. What’d Lester say?”
“I haven’t told him yet.”
“Why not?”
“He’s still so pissed at you.” He replied, glad for an excuse.
“For what?”
“That comment about taking Boston out, if they grab you. I wanted to talk to you first.”
“Frye’s real mad, hunh?”
“Like a hornet.”
“Just as well. I want him to show genuine outrage at me, when they try to connect us. He’ll be protected by moral distance. The whole scene might be just what I was looking for.” After a pause, Mr. Aloirav queried. “What’s your vaccination status?”
“I’m through series 12, Boss. I’m a little behind on those last ones you gave me.”
“Series 12?”
“Yah.”
A few seconds later, the “boss” said. “Francis.”
“Yah, Boss?”
“The DEA is still there, right?”
“Yeah. They’re hav’n a field day.”
“How’d they arrive?”
“Two DC-20’s. Landed ‘em on the second Brazilian cantilever’s airport. First’s fogged in.”
“Listen carefully, Francis. Take the fastest transportation you can get to member 1267. He’s at our place in Fortaleza. Pick up two canisters each of SV23 and RVF12.”
“Right.”
“Time the release charges for 1 hour and get a set in each of those planes. Try to do it just before they swipe the vegetation. Understood?”
“Yah… Boss?”
“What?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Well, I sure as hell hope the fuck so!”
A few hours later, the UN’s liaison man got a jingle. “This is a social call.”
“Whadd’ya want, Aloirav?”
“You got a good broker?”
“Why?”
“Got a tip.”
“What?”
“Take out as big an option on beef futures as you can afford.”
“Why?”
“I’m no expert on commodity technicals and fundamentals. Don’t know how losing a million Georgians will affect them. Seems, however, you should increase the value of your investment substantially.”
“How?”
“Why, Silly, you’re reducing the livestock in the continental US and Canada by 50%. Supply & Demand. Even with losing Georgia, it would have to drive prices up.”
“You are a kidder, Aloirav. Gotta’ hand it to ya’.”
“Chuckle about this, chum. You have 2 morgues, ETA unknown, bound for Atlanta. Have a chat with their pilots. If you still think I’m blowin’ smoke up your ass, drop in on Barbados. Watch life there implode. Otherwise, dump ‘em in the Atlantic, before they reach the mainland. If you don’t, you’ll be a rich man. Can’t lose, either way, you lucky fellow. I’ll let you go now. I know you must have a million things to do.”
The US Government ditched two aircraft, crew, cops, coca, and empty canisters 1000 miles east of Puerto Rico. They sent a special SEAL unit, attached to the NSA, to insure no survivors.
Learning 100 people were eructating 2 to 3 pints of blood/ hour elicited nothing more than a news blackout. The massacre convinced the Planet’s weakest politicians, but others kept the most frightened disciplined. After a 4-hour deadlock, they sent a “national figure” as a representative to plead their cause.
Perhaps, the “boss” was unrealistic, expecting genuflection so soon from the nation-state “leaders” not in his employ. When not forthcoming, he became concerned. Advice about relocating from Grand Rapids got a measure of consideration. Stewing over whether the resistance was defiance or indecision, the hotelier entered the lobby. Surrounded by security people, he saw hoards of reporters trying to get to him. Failing to do so, they yelled. The nation-state dignitary also entered the HOTEL ALOIRAV. He wore that naïve yet pompous “I never touch liquor” look of the confirmed oily Christianity-monger.
The politician struggled to find a measure of courage. He peered upward to introduce himself to Mr. Aloirav. Both men then retired to a hotel office the New Society prepared for the meeting. The “boss” allowed some time for meaningless political drivel. He glared with suppressed disgust at the pathetic creature’s abject demeanor.
The celebrity spent a few seconds wiping the perspiration from his hands with a silk handkerchief. Giving his pinky ring an extra polish, he won the struggle with himself to look forward. The luminary was used to applying liberal doses of flattery and guilt to achieve his objectives. Along with the expected supplication, he now delivered the same to Mr. Aloirav.
Unctuous prologue changed to adulation and ended in imploring, as the dandy said. “Mr. Aloirav. I’ve heard a great deal about you (blah, blah, blah). I’m sure you’re a man of high moral character (blah, blah, etc.). My mission is one of mercy (blah, etc.). The action you threaten will harm many innocent people (blah). Theref…”
Stopping him in mid-word, the “boss” exploded. “Moral character! Action I threaten! Innocent!? Innocent! Morality and character are opposites, my pretty, and I don’t threaten anyone, ever! You tryin’ ta swindle me, son?”
“No, Sir!”
“I made no threats. I made a promise. And, there are no “innocents”, you fool.”
Unaccustomed to being so described, the fop fumbled for his silk hankie and retorted. “Sir, I must protest your insinuation.”
“Insinuation, bullshit! I’m wasting my time with a moron.”
“I protest, sir.”
“There’s the door.”
Cowed, uncomfortable at returning empty-handed, the “national figure” said. “Perhaps, if you’d explain how I might be of some service?”
Disliking explanations, the “boss” continued, nevertheless. “I don’t like having my time wasted with oxymorons and other lies.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Innocence” presupposes “guilt”, my boy. Fools and cheats fabricate guilt to control other fools. There is no right or wrong. There’s survival or death. Mercy’s for believers in “Justice”. It doesn’t exist. Justice is a scheister lawyer’s con game. While Humanity takes one life senselessly, wastes one gram of food, avariciously frustrates creativity or life-preserving action, there are no innocents! Unwillingness to spend time in furtherance of life signifies “no innocents”! Cowardly bankers withhold accumulated wealth from worthy ideas. Prisons have closed and locked doors. People destroy themselves out of self-pity and hatred of others. Legal parasites steal labor. There’s willful pollution, wasted time, respected medical doctors, televised sports, et cetera. All proof that innocence is a mirage. Other blatant displays of apathy are equally capable of removing such a hallucination. There’s no end to evidence against “innocence”.”
Missing the point, selectively deaf, extremely unnerved, the fop replied. “You too have sinned against your God, sir.”
Mr. Aloirav realized then he was, indeed, dealing with a mental defective. He said, more to himself than to the imbecile. “I exercised my right to “sin”. True. I used technology in the interest of altruism, the one “sin” Man can commit. It’s my albatross, my cross. I don’t need your guilt mongering to tell me I’ve a burden I’ll carry to the grave. Technological destruction and failing to remove its effects constitute special offenses for which I too must answer. No defense, my excuse is simple…ignorance. I knew no other way to save my species. Fate and my cortex forced me, force me, to act in protoplasm’s cause. I am of Life. I am Life. As long as I live, I can do no other. I may be overreacting. Existence comes without protocols. Only death, total perfection, complete anarchy, answers and absolves. Survival and destruction, I understand well. Would I possessed the power to achieve the one, avoid the other, for all. There is no largesse for lack of capacity.”
The notable soon found himself in the lobby again, taking his leave. He was a bit disconsolate at going back without the prize. The two groups of security people separated with difficulty in the crowd. The dignitary was soon out the door. Then it happened.
Shattered lobby window glass tinkled over the floor. Spattering shards covered reporters and New Society members. They heard the popping sounds coming from one of two or three windows above the shoe store or fag bar across the Avenue. Blood inundated Gloria’s face, as she dropped.
The left shoulder’s momentum spun him around like a danseur. Falling against her, he descended in a pirouette. The TV camera refocused. It went from the hotelier to the still beautiful bloodied woman kneeling over him. No amount of editing would ever remove that instant flash of agonized intense devotion.
Desire for his continued desire was overwhelming. On her knees beside his body, she thought. “He can’t die yet. No! Not yet. I’m not ready. I can’t lose him.”
New Society security men closed around them, pressing too near. Ms. Gold, oblivious of the cameras, shouted to get breathing space. Celluloid captured her every motion and word. Once aware of the voyeurs, she covered his face. Exposing herself, Gloria refused to allow a taped view of his condition. As a mantea veiling a bride’s beauty, her long ebony hair caressed his prostrate form.
Sensing her kneeling over him, the “boss” looked up into her blood-drenched face and said. “Gloria, so glad you’re here. I feel so ashamed, not wanting to go through this alone. Can you forgive my weakness?”
“Oh, my darling….”
Regaining some composure, he said. “We’ve had an incident today, haven’t we? I’d like to have your opinion on it, before we get any further along.”
He failed to extract any levity out of the situation. Pain replaced the pressure sensation, before any humor could surface, and he grimaced.
Mr. Aloirav felt, more than heard, her in his ear. “I knew it was a mistake to trust Heinz with your security.” She whispered. “I should have supervised it. I told him, repeatedly, someone could be there in those windows. I would’ve taken better care of you. Why wouldn’t you let me? If I lose you now, my life will end.”
Too weak to argue or explain, he nodded his acknowledgement. Ms. Gold felt strange. The one man she had ever loved & respected lay hurt beneath her. Always there to advise and accept his friendship, now unable to help, just criticize, Gloria bridled.
She agonized. “If only I could protect him from his enemies. But, they’re so many. I don’t know where to begin looking.”
Mr. Castle loosened the tie and tore shirt pieces from the wound.
The hotelier again asked. “What do you think of this matter?”
“I think we should waste the whole fuckin’ World.” Ms. Gold retorted.
“That’s my Gloria,” he said, weakly laughing. “Always a Draconian solution, to any problem, at the drop of a hat. How ‘bout you, Francis?”
“Whatever the shooter’s problem is, it’s probably the whole world’s concern.” The dealer answered. “I don’t think we should take chances. She may be right. Don’t know. Never been in this situation before.”
“Because one man has a problem?” The “boss” replied. “Seems kind’a drastic. Poor jerk thinks he’s a hero.”
Contorted with fear, love, and loathing, she reflected. “What does he care about my need for him? He’s thinking about the guy that shot him. The bastard’s dirt under Rav’s feet. Not even worth considering.”
Gloria said. “You’ve no idea how big the group is … wanting you dead.”
“Nope. Neither do you, my love. What difference does it make?”
“A lot!” She replied, feeling tears form, eyes burning.
He got serious, saying. “Don’t, Gloria. Don’t cry! Don’t let ‘em see you care so much. They’ll take it for weakness, use it against us. Break down later, when we’re alone. Not here. I know the numbers are large. I’m not being cavalier with my life…or your concern for it. We knew it could happen. Didn’t we?”
“Yes, I suppose so.” The loyal woman replied, pushing back the tears.
“You knew so.”
“He would have had to have accomplices to get so close.” She guessed aloud. “We shouldn’t talk now.”
“Right,” Francis agreed, “but think about it, Boss.”
“What’s that, Francis?” Mr. Aloirav replied.
“She’s got a point.” He added. “A conspiracy, organized from within the “Group”, may mean a full-scale rebellion. This whole World-Conquest thing is new to most of the members.”
“That’s true, Rav.” Ms. Gold seconded. “I heard some things this morning. I was gonna’ tell you.”
“Why, Gloria?” He asked, grimacing. “They knew what our plans were from the beginning.”
“And you knew some were in it just for the vig’.” She responded. “They cared less for your goals. Besides, the members we have now are not all privy to your dreams. Most of our old “Group” died out. Very few got the elixir.”
The EMT’s arrived and prepared him to go to Butterworth Hospital on Grand Rapids’ North End.
Hearing about it, the hotelier shouted. “Gloria! Don’t let them take me there. They know there who I am. Take me to Lester. Get a quack from anywhere to get the round out. I don’t care whom, as long as he doesn’t know who I am. When I pass out, I don’t want to be away from you or Francis, either!”
“More’n one round went through ya’, “Boss”. Yer’ spittin’ blood?”
“Don’t care.” He said, and they nodded in agreement.
The EMT’s made good arguments against flying the patient to Luz. They were not happy at Mr. Castle’s intransigence. He stood firm despite the blood loss. Gloria backed him up, later contacting Boston University Hospital from the Lear. Many physicians there moonlighted at the Boston cantilever of LIH (Luz International Hospital).
Ms. Gold got one of them to extract the bullets. The “boss”, showing his age, was still vigorous. No one harbored any doubts about his strength. The blood loss hurt the most. Gloria would allow them to transfuse only artificial blood and saline.
The hotelier fell unconscious as the Lear neared Boston, and an EMT physician tried to introduce whole blood. Gloria knifed it open when the EMT continued despite her objections. He threatened her with criminal prosecution. Francis supported her. The hotelier entered the operating room close to death, his heart stopping a number of times. The last time was nearly two minutes. He was dying. Mr. Frye ordered a nurse to inject something Gloria obtained for him, and the “boss” survived.
Later that evening, against surgeon and nurse’s advice, the inner circle gathered around his bed. Francis Castle, Gloria Gold, Bacon, Carl, and Lester Frye all looked at Heinz, when he said. “We’ve been doing some thinking, Boss.”
“I hope so.” Mr. Aloirav replied. “What have you concluded?”
“We need to take measures to maintain stability, if a crisis develops.”
“Forget it!”
“We’ve got to handle this attempt on your life in the proper way.” Mr. Frye said. “What are your thoughts?”
“Somebody needs to do some good intelligence work.” The “boss” said. “What did you learn about the shooter?”
“The pigs are holding him in Monroe Avenue’s Hall of Injustice.” Bacon answered, handing his leader a photo. “He’s in the first lock-up. Here’s his mug shot. Recognize him?”
“No. Looks like any red-blooded American boy.”
“He’s no boy,” Gloria flattered, observing it. “He’s well over a hundred, your age, or more.”
“Thanks for reminding me, Gloria.”
“He was carrying no ID, when they grabbed him, but says name’s Geneva Convention.” Bacon added. “Won’t say what made him go after you. Just says to make sure you knew his name and that he used an M-1.”
“Really?” The hotelier queried. “That’s an antique piece. Nearly two hundred years old. Odd.”
“Where d’ya think he got a rifle that old?” Lester asked.
“A carbine,” Carl interjected, “he could’a got ‘most anywhere. They’re junk.”
“It was close,” Ms. Gold riposted. “Another inch, and I wouldn’t have a stud no more, just a chunk of meat.”
“Well.” Carl suggested. “We know it wasn’t from our group.”
“Why?” All questioned.
“They’da used bugs.” He replied, surprised at their mutual interest.
“We can’t be sure of that, Carl.” Gloria said, looking at Heinz.
“What? Gloria!” Heinz yelled.
“That’s right.” Francis agreed, looking in the same direction. “The “Boss” is immune. Theyda’ known the “Boss” vaccinated himself. I say we change security and beef it up. Then we get trusted people ta find out what caused the unrest, if it came from within. If it’s in the organization, we neutralize it.”
“You got a problem with my security precautions, Jesus freak!?” Heinz shouted.
“Obviously!” Gloria retorted for Francis, gesturing toward the bed.
“It don’t look good.” Carl piped up.
“What doesn’t?” Someone asked.
What’s the rest a’ the people gonna’ think, when we take the Government down?” He questioned.
“What do you mean, Carl?” The “boss” inquired.
“We can’t even keep ya’ protected now.” The jaundiced man replied.
Nobody countered him, and Bacon said. “He’s right. We aren’t gonna’ come back basking in the same light. Not the same glow we were under when we first appeared on the scene.” The others nodded, and he continued. “One more thing. I almost forgot. He asked about something. I thought was strange.”
“Who?”
“That Geneva guy, the shooter.” The chunky man answered.
“What was that, Bacon?” Mr. Aloirav queried.
“He wanted to know if you needed any blood.” He replied.
The hotelier’s face wrinkled in disgust at the offer. He would take no transfusions, least of all from an enemy. The others thought it was strange too. Heinz said. “The joker’s bananas.”
“Sure sounds like it.” Lester offered. “Must have some kind of hate in his heart. Not every day you run into someone, over a hundred, with such energy. To stalk a man, try to kill him, and then mock him.”
“With a gun that misfires every other round.” Carl added.
The “boss’s face brightened through his pallor. He asked. “Could I please see that photo again, Gloria?” Sergeant Aloirav, after gazing at it for some time, with almost an imperceptible smile, said. “Whad’ya know. “Dishonored in his own eyes. “Physician, heal thyself” Doc finally cured his cryptorchidism.”
Bacon was not at Mr. Aloirav’s level of consciousness. He didn’t know the proper reaction to display to his peers after hearing the medical term. Scrunching up his face, Bacon mimicked someone trying to make another appear as a pariah, asking. “What?”
“Lester’s right. Some kind of hate.” He explained. “It didn’t initiate from within. Find out how the guy breached our security to get into that building and fix the problem.”

Il nous faut de l’audace, encore de l’audace, toujours de l’audace. (Audacity, more audacity, always audacity.) Danton

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Mr. Aloirav’s legal family left him long before the assassination attempt. His wife was very old & his son aged. They never received any of the Hesperides elixir. No one offered them any. Now, with what happened, the “boss” felt unsafe leaving anyone close to him without protection.
Francis went to find them. He located the two in Kalamazoo and brought them to a safe house in Nebraska. Taking no chances on Government communication-interception, he reported to Gloria, personally, on an encrypted line. She relayed on their Omaha address to the hotelier on another encrypted line. Days passed, and no word came from Francis.
“Group” concern grew. The New Society wanted no possibility of the opposition using the two as bargaining chips. They sent Bacon to discover what happened. At the Omaha address, he found three bodies and evidence of a gun battle. The dealer’s wallet contained government papers.
At first, the New Society thought the papers were a decoy, intended to plant false information as to treachery. Then, Heinz and one of his men said they were quite sure of seeing something similar in Mr. Castle’s possession just prior to the killings. The documents were agreements, ostensibly betraying the New Society for cash and high position in the current US administration. Others confirmed authenticity by recognizing Francis’ signature. Large sums of money, deposited in Francis’ bank account, prior to the killings, spoke volumes.
There were many questions and but two exculpating facts. 1. A forgery expert found the signature’s legitimacy in possible doubt. 2. Why would anyone want to kill two harmless old people whose only value was in keeping them alive for some type of ransom?
The deceased alleged traitor was the hotelier’s second closest friend. How could it have happened?
Some felt his dichotomous life, filled with moral inconsistencies, finally broke his will or sanity. Heinz went to look for the dealer’s ex-wife and son. After searching for days, he admitted to a lack of success. Necessary information from a particular un-dehistorized computer required Lester’s permission, and he wouldn’t cooperate. It stymied the investigation, because the “boss” wouldn’t fight Mr. Frye.
He let the matter drop. The assassination attempt, his legal family’s demise, and loss of a good friend were three hard blows in quick succession. To most it would have been a knockout. It did leave Mr. Aloirav wanting to leave the US for a time. He asked Frank Wainright to accompany them.
By now, the Pontibus contained many places prettier than Palacios. Nevertheless, the “Group” leadership’s fondest memories remained in Honduras. Therefore, the reduced inner circle and bar owner left for Gracias a’ Dios. Heinz remained in the US for anything requiring immediate attention. He also acted as liaison with police in the assassination-attempt investigation.
The Lear left Kent County International Airport & stopped at Luz International for Mr. Frye. They soon landed at Goloson. Unable to land on the short jungle pistas (grass strips), the Lear remained in La Ceiba. The hotelier piloted them in the Cessna. He always hangared it at Palmeras for that reason.
Palacios’ denizens all seemed happy to see them. The party ensconced in the lagoon’s now-enlarged casa, as dusk settled. Morris died years ago, but a grandson brought over some congreyho del monte (wood crab). The “Group’s” meat eaters enjoyed an unusual jungle treat. The jungle, from which the crabs came, was now a preserve of the New Society. Except for Roraima, Brazil’s New Society triple canopy all other First-Surface world jungles were now but token preserves.
After the major twilight mosquito invasion passed, they went out onto the deck to chat. Big fish jumping sounds complemented the guariba monkeys’ howling. Off in the distance a jaguar coughed a masculine challenge to the serenade. While the rest imbibed libations of their choosing, the “boss” nursed a cognac sour. From his words, it was apparent the major move would happen soon.
The expected “penetration” would reach for the largest political goal – world domination. The Founder appeared uncomfortable. He wasn’t pleased with the conversation. The man was still uncertain as to his private responses regarding the recent ultimatum. Now, the latest bombshell dropped.
He was overwhelmed and queried. “When’s this “penetration” to take place?”
His involvement with the New Society was deep, but the question was all Mr. Frye could think of to say after the shocking intimation. He still smarted from the “treason” he felt occurred over the past four months. Undertaking to wrangle a crown out of the World’s politicians made him an accomplice! He had accepted assistance from the “Group” to insure his dream’s success. Now the man shuddered, thinking about his “crimes” of conspiracy and accessory.
Tempting fate was one thing. Mr. Aloirav was shaking Fortune’s very clothes off. Nobody knew where it would end. Lester knew, back then, it was illegal. All his work could fizzle out in a very short time through RICO, RICO & more RICO. Becoming involved now with genocide would compound his ethical collusion.
Being in like moral “war criminal” company with the George Bushes, Clinton’s, and Obama was no consolation. Lester wondered how much further he’d allow himself to participate. Would the “boss” even ever allow him his freedom from association?
“Depends on the populace.” The hotelier answered. “Whether or not they change their outlook and behavior?”
“What behavior is that?” Mr. Frye pressed.
“You’re aware of it, Lester. Why are you asking?”
“I’ve an idea.”
“Movement in the direction to which I’ve indicated.” The “boss” replied. “I don’t foresee that happening. I can’t imagine conditions changing so much in the time remaining. At some time or other, we’ll need to release vectors into the general environment.”
“We had a deal!”
“And I’m keeping it in mind.”
Trying to remain calm & detached, the Founder asked. “Aren’t you being somewhat pretentious?”
“Perhaps.”
“How can you be so certain there’s no other way?”
“Your bridges are doing well. Nothing else compares.” Mr. Aloirav answered. “But not well enough. They’re too slow to solve the problem. The political basura (trash) are still using abortion, lies and chemicals to reduce population. You know that’s asinine.”
“What makes you so sure your bugs will do the job?”
“They’ll work. October will be crucial.”
“Everything ready?” Carl asked.
“Yup.” Bacon said, looking at the hotelier. “Filled the last vat with polyacrylamide, before we left, like you wanted. Put all the bugs ya’ listed in the other machine and checked out the turbines. Everything’ll be ready when we get back. The four guys in Tokyo will be ready as soon as the supplies arrive.”
“Dju’ reset that hydration meter, like I told you, Bacon?”
“Sure did, Boss”. It’s workin’ fine again. The temperature control is holding everything at 4 degrees until 3 hours before deployment.”
The “boss” designed “tools” to fit requirements, and then he built them. “Club” members were in strategic locations around the World. Most held quality passports, courtesy of Dr. Cinza. Each agent knew his responsibilities. Mr. Aloirav was ready to hijack the World.
“And when is the final ultimatum to be?” Lester queried.
“When I’m ready. You writin’ another book, Lester?”
“Maybe. If you succeed.”
“I will. I’m still interested to see what happens with that last virus. It could result in many more deaths than I expected when I created it. It might solve the population problem all by itself.”
“Why is that?” Frank asked.
“It may get into insect vectors, outside our control, before the World acquires a vaccine. It’s a brand-new falcip malaria, takin’ down all who cross its path. It’s viral, not animal. I’ve replaced Plasmodium with a much more efficient microbe.”
The Founder asked. “Would the insects use it genetically or as secondary hosts?”
“You are writin’ another book, aren’t ya’?”
“Sorry. Just interested.
“It’s okay. Just jerkin’ ya’ around, Les. In answer to your question. Both. The virus’s in the DNA, as a provirus, now. Many of the easy insects in the lab exfoliate at genome-level now. I’ve seen homology on my “Southerns” with DNA digests of twenty or thirty different genomes. Haven’t seen it in mosquito yet, just in the fly proboscides. Once I do and release ‘em, look out! When they start their annual blood-sucking, there’ll be a real epidemic.”
“That’s for sure,” said the loyal Carl.
“That could be horrible!” Lester said. “If you’ve already got it in Diptera probos it could go into triatomes in a heartbeat. What if it gets out of the lab?”
“I’m ready for it. Lookin’ forward to see if any epidemiologists or other scientists can undo, unravel, or stop it. How long it takes ’em is the key. It’ll give me an idea how far I’m ahead.”
“Aw, yer’ way ahead of ’em, “Boss”.” Bacon said. “Light years.”
“Thanks for the vote, Bacon, but I can’t be too sure.”
“I don’t see why not.” Gloria said.
“I feel kinda’ like an artist. Ya’ know, Gloria? The jokers tryin’ to beat my creations are critics.”
“They haven’t got the AIDS bug figured out yet.” She said. “That was almost a century ago.”
“What can they do?” Mr. Frye defended the “jokers”. “Even you’d have trouble fighting a bug that hasn’t ever caused a death. If it’s even the same critter it was when you first built it.”
“So what?” The “boss” retorted. “It’s got the same daddy. Mycobacteria take over & the bastards kill themselves. Results the same.”
All those gathered there, excepting the Founder, laughed. Unaware of what Mr. Aloirav meant, they showed their trust in his omnipotence. He smiled at their laughter, knowing its significance.
“What was it, Bacon, you heard last week at Tufts Grafton campus?” The hotelier asked, chuckling. “Some professor or vet assistant told another guy in the lab CAEV never crosses over into humans?”
“Yah. I swear the dude says it.” Bacon declared, laughing and mimicking the Tufts’ scientist. “The fucker says. “There has never been a recorded instance of a caprine lentivirus zoonosis”. I heard the “Boss” say some guy once published a paper sayin’ it could happen. Nobody wanted to read it. I felt like sayin’ check yer’ goddam macrophage cell flanks fella. Yer’ linear DNA’s gettin’ lost somewhere!”
He smiled at his minion’s emulating hubris and said. “They’re losin’ track of the linear DNA all right.”
They all laughed at the veterinarian’s supposed arrogance. The “boss” smiled, as he thought about the Grafton fellow’s political dogma enculturation. Indoctrination is strong, strong enough to make a scientist obfuscate his own observations. People believe what they think they see, not what they actually see. The USA was the most totalitarian-governed country in the world, had been for decades, and the world still used it as an enduring example of freedom. Such behavior confirmed Mr. Aloirav’s unflattering opinion of his “critics”.
Directing his next statement toward Lester, he said. “Even without me building these gems, we’d soon be lookin’ to cure some other simian viral disease.”
“You mean the way the population centers are growing?”
“Of course. Salk said carrying capacity is 11B. We’re there. Our lawn is confluent. We’re stationary phase, Les. The Planet’s “human cancer” is growin’ too fast. Nature’s gotta’ send us some kind of plague.”
“Looks like it, doesn’t it?” Mr. Frye said, taking unwarranted strength by momentarily assuming mass unleashing of biological “tools” appeared doubtful.
His before-the-fact awareness of the “Group’s” intentions still concerned him, however. The anxiety was poignant now that his involvement with them ran deep. It wasn’t the thought of personal apprehension giving the Founder major distress. There was nobody for whom to be embarrassed due to his possible arrest. In addition, he knew the “boss” would never allow any convictions.
Witnesses, prosecutors, and judges could never withstand the glare of his power. The “boss” wasn’t some petty Mafia chieftain with a few guns, thugs, lawyers, and pols in his quiver. Just self-destruction would defeat Mr. Aloirav. It didn’t appear he was contemplating that. What concerned Lester was accepting personal complicity.
How much longer would it allow him even a modicum of self-respect?
The hotelier represented to him the antithesis of childhood training. The “boss” made slow but tremendous inroads into his superego, reconfiguring many of Mr. Frye’s ethical concepts. The Founder saw Mr. Aloirav as the absolute epitome of evil. Even limited association caused Lester to feel he was sliding down a slippery slope into “Hell”.
The short silence ended as Carl ineptly inquired about selective susceptibility to identical viruses, all conditions being equal. Pontificating well beyond necessary, the hotelier answered. “Despite what you were taught in school, Carl, all men are not created equal, under any law, especially Natural Law. Genetic susceptibility to disease is a perfect example. We’re not physically, mentally, or spiritually the same. Until humanity communicates better you’ll not see equality even under the law.”
“Get that, Carl?” Bacon asked, laughing and jabbing the man’s ribs, ridiculing his limited vocabulary.
“Fuck you, pig’s ass.” Carl replied, succinctly.
Pretending not to notice the delicate distracting conversation, the hotelier continued. “Eradicating rule of written law should be a major concern of mankind. The tyrannical democracies have neither the capacity nor intention of doing so. The Nazi’s came close, but Communism failed to do it. It keeps the USA in chains. The desire grows personal. A rich man gets rich for that reason. He tires of tearing through the net that catches the little fish. He wishes to frustrate the entire mass will. His indifference approaches solving the communication gap more than the masses alone could ever do. That’s because money and power are virtually interchangeable. Only homicide brings about incongruence.”
“Sometimes referred to as a monkey-wrench.” Lester said, as an aside.
“Power brings acceptance of ideals for which the masses strive.” The hotelier continued with barely perceived but noticeable irritation.
“Education via emulation. White man’s burden with a new twist.” Lester again commented, wishing he’d stayed on Luz. A response was almost obligatory. Mr. Frye felt as if in the “bunker” with Hitler’s clique. He would not have been surprised if they all jumped up in unison, shouting Sig Heil!
Wanting to free himself, the Founder saw no way without disparaging the “boss”, whose words now transfixed them. “…whether motives are positive is inconsequential. The mass’s insensible drive to development will produce caedere affluence. Once so enriched, they’ll understand their fellow man to a greater degree. Other species will take the heat. Our task is to establish different and higher values to strive for than caedere wealth or religious superstition. We must also find means to expedite the elimination of written law and government, utterly. Regarding riches, we must change the perverted meaning system. We need more fundamental values such as human dignity estranged from human ability.”
“Character over capacity?” Ms. Gold asked.
“Yes.” He replied. “It’s time to value men in general instead of just their competence under capitalism. We’ve become what we do, not what we are. It’s perverted! The Planet belongs to all men, plants, and animals, while it belongs to none. The view of property becomes inconsequential, if we consider the Earth free. Sounds radical, but the evil of government won’t subside, until everyone values protoplasm over property.”
“Aren’t there ’nuff people already, “Boss”?” Bacon asked.
“Yah. They aren’t valued as people, Bacon, but for what they have or can do. That’s why lawyers have value. They can pervert established systems to give capital more access to power. Law is a euphemism for corruption. At the other end of current beliefs sit the misfits, valued as human because human-like. Society forces us to appreciate misfits because people with caedere property protect them. It’s all a consequence of Supply and Demand. Too many of us. If we respected each other more, as humans, instead of property, we’d honor the living Planet more.”
“Like yourself.” Lester interjected. “Our paradigm.”
“Fuck you, Lester.”
“Admit it, Rav.” Mr. Frye said. “Your example drowns your words.”
“At times. But it doesn’t hurt to admire a psychic factor.”
“Or a positive reference point.” Mr. Frye countered. “As we build more great bridges, there’ll be less authority and restrictions. No way to enforce compliance with State constraints. Far too much wild and uninhabited space insures that. Areas containing forests preclude such behavior. People and other animals can run and hide from Man’s inhumanity. Unlike citizens of the First-Surface, our new colonists don’t suffer primitive behaviors like taxation, bureaucracy, lobbyism, etc. Policing, other organized violence, and means of social control are passé’. Non-coercive advisory councils, run by men with children, function in lieu of government. Cumbersome legislatures, clerics and weak corrupt First-Surface pols are irrelevant non-factors. All over the sky, small collections of autonomous family units know no centralized control. The State’s authority withered away and died of starvation. Communication and shared knowledge exist, where before malevolent Government stood. Ubiquitous computer cable networks facilitate cooperation instead of laws.”
“You make it sound good.” Bacon said.
“Doesn’t he though?” The hotelier added. “You can’t continue with non-coercive advisory councils for long, Lester. It’s a pipe dream.”
“I don’t think so.”
“You start smokin’ yer’ own coke?”
“We’ll see, won’t we?”
“Yeah. One does not start a New Society without blood. Homicide is the bedrock of all control over the mind of Man.”
“Violence!?”
“Yup. You think I don’t know what you’re doing? Painting me in negative colors, you in positive hues.”
“I am?”
“Tell me you’re not!”
Lester said nothing, so he continued. “Haven’t I been extirpating the death-worshippers, bringing about a healthier Globe? I remove more death-dealing necrotic tissue than any quack. Idolaters, pols, accumulators, nuclear-power producers, judges with their attorney minions all fall to my sword. Hunters with guns and nets get sick and die. But, it’s not enough. It never will be. I can’t insure my capacity to heal is gonna’ be passed on. You can’t give necroextirpation licenses in primogeniture. How long will my opinions survive, if I’m not here to fight for ‘em? Can my tongue be limited to entail? Hell, no! Without me, it all dissipates. My speech and mind are my New Society. Without them, the silence will isolate or kill it by dilution. The capacity to remove necrogenous material is more art than science. It’s instinctive. Conscious will plays a smaller role. I can’t pass it on to my children any more than idolaters can pass on their vanity or accumulators can pass on their insecurity. There’s a collective consciousness, gained through the eons, which feeling taps. I’ve tried using the tools of reason to do it. They do work for a time. My intellect may very well have saved the Planet from disaster…”
“You?!” Lester riposted.
“Yes. Me. But, it’s half the battle. I understand its inadequacy. That’s why I saved you, made you succeed! Don’t forget it, Lester! Don’t think of us in stereotypes. You’re no more all-positive than I’m all-negative. It jist ain’t so. I know we had a deal! We still do. But, I’ve been too patient. Look around you. Less than 1% of the rainforest exists of that which existed when we made our pact. Melanoma in temperate zones is up 5000 times what it was then! When was the last time you saw a honeybee or ate fresh fruit? The planet has lost too many species, Lester!”
The “boss” knew his chosen method to achieve a personal conception of “good” was not “good”. He was also well-aware of its total antithesis to contemporary morality. Mr. Aloirav wasn’t sure how much of his own identity was also mob-made. Self-definition concerned him, deeply. Under untoward conditions, it could blow his theory. That would be unacceptable.
He got up and went across the deck. His flint-face looked into the water of the lagoon. Turning to pace, holding himself in check, the hotelier regained his composure, bit by bit. As he walked along the edge, everyone saw his anger.
Mr. Frye hit a raw nerve, and now he mused over his gaff. Looking around at the others, the Founder noticed common awareness of their leader’s emotional state. None dared get too close.
Looking in the “boss’s” direction, Bacon maintained his vigilance, but he leaned closer to nudge Lester, saying. “You fucked up, Mr. Frye. He’s steamed.”
Sometimes words just popped out of Mr. Frye’s mouth. Alive and insolent, they seemed impudent, prepared against any attempt at containment or umbrage. The present moment became one of those times.
Not knowing why, nor caring, he shouted across the deck. “You’re wailing about not passing your legacy on to your kids! I have no one on whom to pass anything! Sacrificing them made me succeed. Where do you come off talking about how it was you! That’s bullshit! Blood money lent me under questionable conditions. Blood money bought your share in my Company! It wasn’t you! Your whole life is negative. The reason mine isn’t all positive is that I got stuck conspiring with you! You criticize the bulwarks of the society in which you live. Yet, you seem oblivious to the effects your activities have on the people in that world. If ever I thought I could stop you, I would!”
The silence after that outburst was deafening. Looking at each other, people tried to shrink. The fire crackled on a large flat stone in the center of the deck. It wasn’t all that was burning. Mr. Aloirav stopped his pacing. In the firelight, his face took on darkness not unlike that of the late evening tones.
Turning from the direction of the lagoon, he looked at the Founder and said. “I admire your spirit, Lester. Always have. There is a point, however, where your ignorance will overwhelm your value to me. You should know. I may be standing near one, but you are on the edge!”
Lester’s face turned an alabaster shade of white. Mr. Wainright jumped up and went over to the “boss”, saying. “I think we’ve all had a big day. It’s time we hit the hay.”
The two stood together, but the hotelier ignored him and continued addressing Mr. Frye. “They were surplus monkeys, Lester. It wasn’t as if I’d killed trees or wild animals, things of value. You, of all people, should understand that. It was you played Abraham, not me. It wasn’t me, lost my eternity in duty.”
He was just about to say something else, when Frank looked him in the eye and said. “Tempers are hotter than that fire over there.” Stepping around him, the “boss” looked at the Founder, but the bar owner moved between them again, saying. “If anything more is said right now, irreparable damage might occur. Do we want that, now?”
When Mr. Aloirav’s near homicidal demeanor and vehemence subsided, Carl said. “When do we get up in the morning?”
Gloria left her chair saying. “Not till one of the indigenas wakes us.”
The hotelier’s shoulders began relaxing as people walked away & into the cabin. Most had entered the building, before his shoulders assumed their normal position. Those remaining on the deck breathed with relief. Then, they too entered the cabin one by one.
Mr. Wainright looked around and saw Bacon alone left on the deck with him. Asking the other man if he wanted another drink, he heard Bacon reply in the affirmative. They were soon sipping together in the cool night air, and Frank asked.
“Often wondered, Bacon. Why you confessed to the robbery that got you sent up?”
“To beat a murder rap.”
“Alibi?”
“Yah. Sad story.”
“If you don’t want…”
“No. It’s okay. It’s so long ago. Doesn’t matter now. They don’t put people over 100 in jail, at least not regular pens.”
“Our “Group” is almost all that age. They might make a special box for us.”
“Maybe. Whatever. I can handle it.”
“I’m sure.”
“I was a normal square, ya’ know? Married. Had two little girls, five months & 19 months. Loved those kids more’n my own life.”
“I know wha’cha mean.”
“Frank. There’s but one thing worth having, not a possession really – a charge. Children. I’ve had many names, but none ever made me feel as proud & humble, as respected & responsible, as fulfilled & joyful as “Daddy”.”
“Where are they now?”
“Judge took ‘em.”
“What for?”
“Divorce.”
“Oh. I understand.”
“Wish I did.” The heavy-set man retorted. “It seemed to happen so fast. I thought things were going okay between us. I was a CPA with a good company. Made good money. I thought we were happy. Seemed like she was happy. Complained a lot, but all wives complain, mostly about things that can’t be helped.”
“Like what?”
“Heat, cold, bugs, washing, mopping, kids, not home enough, home too much, etc.”
“I see.”
“No woman knows what she wants.” Bacon said. “But you can bet your ass, she’ll find a man to blame for her not having it. Still, she treated me pretty well. She wasn’t young or a virgin when we married. I got my first taste of Herpes from her. I didn’t care about her past, though. I loved her. She seemed normal enough to me.”
“She wasn’t?”
“No. Not by a long ways. As I remember, it started one evening when we had the neighbors across the street over for cards. My wife wore this open-necked dress with no bra. She kept bendin’ over in front of the neighbor guy. He was smiling and all eyes. The more he smiled, the more she leaned. Her tits weren’t big, and she had no areola, but those nipples… I swear they were an inch long. Unique. Drove me crazy. Just touch ‘em, and she’d start ta moanin’. I loved ‘em. Loved making her happy. To hear her yell with pleasure gettin’ fucked was paradise to me. I wasn’t too keen on letting that other guy help, though. I told her, she was letting him see all of her tits. She said. “You’re being ridiculous. All women let men see their tits when they nurse. Yers’ are bigger’n mine. What’s the big deal?” She was pissin’ me off. Halfway through the evening, she went to the kitchen for more ice. She was in there for a real long time. I went to investigate, because the neighbor guy was absent too. I walked in and saw ‘em together. One of his hands was in her cunt and the other was holdin’ onta both her nipples. Her whole dress curled around her waist, legs wide apart, and underpants around one ankle. She’s moanin’ very soft and rubbing his fingers up and down on her clit with one hand. She’s squeezing his pecker with the other n’ tryin’ ta put it inside. Devastated, hurt, mad, scared, ashamed… I can’t tell you all the emotions I felt. In their fixation, I entered unnoticed. When they saw me, his pekker was already going inside her. They separated, but damn slow, and not before one last thrust. She put her dress right, and he put his tool back in his pants. Later in the evening, she said she wanted to fuck him. I said. “No way! Yer’ pussy is supposed to be mine, exclusively, according to our marriage contract”. She said I was just being selfish. My ego and all. We had a big fight. She says I’m boring and never buy her enough or take her out enough. I didn’t sleep all night. My world was comin’ apart. Next day I had a bad feeling and left a client early. Went home. I got through the door and heard her yells coming from the bedroom. Just as I expected. She and he are fuckin’ in our bed. He’s on his back pinching her nipples. She’s jumpin’ up and down on his tool with her head thrown back. I ruined it for them twice. I didn’t know what to do. Didn’t think I could live without her but felt she contaminated herself too. My little girls took center focus. I didn’t want to lose them. I did what I could. Put the house up for sale and moved out of state. House didn’t sell. I tried to be more exhilarating to her, anyway. Bought her more shit. Took her out more. It was expensive. Spent excessively. Started moonlighting at liquor-store armed-robberies. They almost caught me once, and I became a fugitive. Livin’ as a wanted person is straining. She got to complaining again about being bored. Kept sayin’ how I’m the most boring guy in the world. She wouldn’t read, sew, watch TV, or do anything other women do to pass the time. She just wanted to talk to her “friends”. You know I couldn’t let her give out our phone number. They’d trace it to me. She stood, screaming at the wall once for three full hours. Then told me I was free, and she was leaving. She took the car, kids… and left the state. She went back to the old house and filed for a divorce. My lawyer made me pay his fee and her lawyer’s to boot. She got child support, the house, and alimony. When she got tired of fuckin’ the neighbor guy, she shacked up with a cabby. He told her they could get more money outta’ me, if she went to the judge. With my other legal troubles, I was in no position to fight her. Judge agreed with her and said my profession enabled me to pay an additional $500 a month to the friend of the court. I couldn’t believe it! She put the horns on me, left me, ruined my life, and stole my kids. Then these pigs’a judges say I gotta’ reward her!? It ain’t right.”
“Sure ain’t. Why is it? Ya’ fuck a woman, and she has kids. Just because there’s some of you in ‘em means you gotta’ pay forever?”
“Yeah! Why doesn’t the state make her pay or pay itself? I was following the rules, she wasn’t. The state was wrong. It should pay. She was the one wouldn’t behave. The state let her have the kids. I couldn’t even see ‘em or take part in raising them. They wouldn’t let me share in their upbringing. How could I give them my values or imprint them with any of my personality? I understand they even walk like her, hunched-up shoulders and all. Couldn’t even get the kids’ custody if she croaks. She could give ‘em ta whomever she pleased, like in a will. It’s as if she owned them, her property. Yet, I had to support ‘em all, her boyfriend too. Last I heard, she was telling my little girls that I was a dog. How is that gonna’ help? I think it’s bullshit! If they’re not my kids in every way, they’re dead… to me, anyway. I didn’t pay.”
“No?”
“No. I saw no natural obligation to support the bitch and our progeny. If your mate behaves in such a way that you feel no desire to do so, the burden is hers. The perverted, gold-digging law be damned! Using force to compel a male into supporting some whore, just because you know her, is an injustice. He’s brutalized, the kids lost, and the female never learns proper behavior.”
“How’d ya’ get out of it?”
“Killed the bitch.”
“Really?”
“Yah.” Bacon paused, thinking, and then resumed. “She could never ask me a question, ya’ know, Frank? Just accuse me of her suspicion.” Shaking his head, he said. “You know what “politically correct” people these days think, Frank?”
“What?”
“They want everyone to believe that men are just deranged females with penises.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. When I think of all those years of emasculation. No recourse to knocking her on her ass, because the fucking lawyers would put me in prison should I dare to retaliate! . . . Then I went there anyway.”
“But not for murder?”
“Naw. They never got me on a murder rap.”
“You hired someone?”
“No. I did it myself. I felt I’d enjoy it more. It ruined my life anyway. I went over to the old house. I heard her talking, before she knew I was there. She was saying. “How can he say that? I was always faithful to him . . . well . . . there was that one time . . . but he never knew. . .”
“It was typical of her. She even lied to herself. Anyway, I let ‘em know I’m there. She won’t let me into my own house to talk. We talked outside on the porch. Asked her why she wouldn’t let me see the kids, making me pay anyway. She turns away and starts walkin’ into the house. I grabbed her wrist, to force an answer. Bitch screams to embarrass me. The guy, she’s livin’ with, pulls a gun and lets go a round. The cops come. I left. Scoped out the place on the qui vive for a couple of weeks. The cabby worked nights. That’s why they wanted my money. He couldn’t afford to give her everything she thought she wanted either. One night, they had a fight. It got loud. Neighbors heard it. I saw the cops pass by the house a few times. The guy left mad to do his cabbing. I waited a couple of hours after the lights went out and entered the house via the back. The neighborhood was asleep. I woke her up. Made her get me the dude’s gun, and I put it to her head. Asked if I was exciting enough for her now. The piece of fluff says, “yes,” scared as hell. I wiped the gun clean, put my hand in a plastic bag, took her out to the garage and blew her away. Put the gun in her hand.”
“To make it look like suicide?”
“To make it look like somebody trying to make it look like suicide.”
“Oh.”
“I left, immediately, robbed a liquor store, and let’em catch me.”
“And confessed to it?”
“Yah. Said I’d been in front of the store for 2 hours prior, drinking, to get up the nerve ta do it.”
“They believed me and sent me up for ten years, did 5. If I hadn’ta fess’d to it, my last meal’da had a rotten egg smell. They pinned her murder on the cabby. Thought they would. It was his gun. The fight they had that night nailed him. He copped a plea. Got 20 years. Saw him later in the joint. Shanked the dink.”
“I met you soon after you got paroled?”
“Yah.” The chunky man answered. “I met the “Boss” in yer’ bar just a few weeks after I left the penitentiary. We got the fuckin’ judges said I hadda pay the bitch ‘n the friend of the court. They died very sporty. Watched the whole thing on the “Boss’s” closed circuit TV.”
“What about the kids?”
“State took ‘em. Tried to find out where they went. They wouldn’t tell me. Never saw ‘em again. Just as well, I guess. New Society and all. No place for kids without a mother.”
They parted after the confession ended. Everyone else was soon asleep, but the bartender remained outside, staring at the fire.
The next day, Lester stayed back at the cabin. Frank and the “boss” took the Cessna south up the Rio Sico. The two planned on going to Ocotales. A friend of Morris’ grandson, who lived in Sico wanted to talk to Mr. Aloirav. It wasn’t far out of the way, as they intended passing the riparian village en route.
Jose’ was almost retired from intelligence work and feeling irrelevant in his dotage. The hotelier wanted to see him. The Indio was washing Rio Paulaya’s banks with a sluice box. Seldom seeing each other anymore, they expected to meet at his diggings. Reports put him 20 kilometers upriver from Las Champas, Ocotales’ landing strip, halfway up the mountain.
Upon arrival at Sico, as the “boss” expected, Morris’ grandson´s friend just wanted a ride to Ocotales. Not resenting the imposition, nevertheless, it was necessary to drain some fuel to balance the additional weight. The three then climbed into the small plane for the 15-minute flight. Getting off Sico’s short riverbank airstrip was a challenge even with a light load. Mr. Aloirav managed and flew them up the Rio Paulaya.
Bush pilots are accustomed to making low passes over grass strips prior to landing. It scares off ruminants and other squatters. Cows, horses, and goats share their landing strip accommodations with pigs, chickens, ducks, and turkeys. When the plane arrived, a mare and her colt were grazing on the grass field’s periphery. The hard-eating creatures saved the locals some machete work.
The hotelier noticed her while making his first pass. On the second, he went into his landing flare with full flaps doing 40 knots. Suddenly, the mare and her colt bolted in front of the aircraft. Whether from age or still weak from his healing chest, the “boss” didn’t react fast enough to turn aside. He smashed in full power, just as the plane dropped out of the sky.
Hopping over the horses, the aircraft rampaged straight ahead. Without retracted flaps or sufficient airspeed, they headed for the scrub brush at the strip’s end. The stall buzzer screamed louder than a junkie discovering there was battery acid in his needle. The trio bounced over every bump. Each time the plane hit one; it slowed, failing to pick up sufficient airspeed to rotate.
Their ride took them over all the small bushes and hillocks upwind. The jarring impacts didn’t end, however, until just before the end. They were twenty feet in altitude and doing 60 knots when the aircraft encountered higher jungle. Pines at the strip’s end preceded a cliff overlooking the Rio Paulaya. Mr. Aloirav flew through gaps between the trees like a skier on a giant slalom.
One pine, in front of them, thirty feet high, refused to move aside. Neither Mr. Wainright nor the hotelier would ever forget that tree. It came straight at them. They could do nothing about it. The “boss” pulled back on the stick, as hard as he could. Frank heard the mountings hit the firewall. The plane stalled as it struck, six feet from the top. Momentum carried them forward, sideways and then a backward loop.
Thoughts of crashes are never out of the question for pilots, seldom far from their minds. Cold sweats can happen, just hearing about them. The aircraft sailed another twenty feet before heading for the ground. The cliff on the other side of the occluding tree prevented disaster. The plane fell a hundred feet, before Mr. Aloirav picked up enough airspeed to recover forward motion.
Once back to straight and level flight, he flew along the Rio Paulaya at the bottom of the precipice. Passing the strip’s approach-end trees, on the second landing attempt, displayed the aircraft’s serious damage. The Indio passenger must have been drunk or very tired. He slept right up until the time the hotelier pulled off the flaps. After landing, they discovered the pinecone-filled intake manifolds and bent prop.
The torn horizontal stabilizer would have been a total loss, except for its being saved by the now-dented right wing. Jose’ informed them later that the mare did the same thing earlier that week. That instance involved a young missionary pilot with faster reflexes. To avoid impact, he banked his Cessna 185 to the left. The wing hit the ground, and it wrecked them. The ensuing ground loop paralyzed him and killed all his passengers.
“Praise the Lord!” The hotelier exclaimed.
With some bailing twine and barbed wire, the “boss” repaired what he could. Mr. Wainright cleaned out the pinecones, while Mr. Aloirav hammered the aluminum out somewhat with a machete. What resembled an airfoil got them back to Palacios. The “boss” did not try getting over 2000 feet on the return trip. Back on the coast, he radioed Julio regarding a new maquina (motor) and helice (prop). Neither was available in Honduras. Someone would have a dangerous Trans-Caribbean flight to replace them. The trip over shark-infested ocean with a tired engine, bent propeller, and torn airframe wouldn’t be pleasant.
Frank went back to the “Group’s” casa. The first thing he did was tell Mr. Frye about their misadventure.
Finished describing the event, Mr. Wainright looked over his shoulder. Then he murmured. “Mr. Frye. I shouldn’t even say it. But you ought to know.”
“What, Frank?”
“Rav knows you never back a man, who’s possibly got nothing to lose, into a corner. Yet he had the courage to do so with you.”
“I have nothing to lose, Frank?”
“Seemed like it. Don’t know. It’s your call. I’m out of options. You had the spirit to stand up to him. The rest didn’t.”
“Thanks. Don’t know how much good it did.”
“That’s not what I mean. I’m not stroking ya’. I got something to say.”
“I guess I don’t understand.”
“He froze out there!”
“What?”
“No shit! Never thought I’d see fear in Rav Aloirav, but I did today. Right before that fuckin’ mare got up to us. Wonderin’ whether to collide, give it full throttle & go forward, turn, shit, or go blind…he clinched!”
Just then, surprising everyone with his earlier than anticipated presence, the hotelier appeared on deck and asked. “…You know Latin, Lester?”
“A little, Rav.” Lester replied. “Whatever’s necessary for science.”
“Ya’ know what, amicus humani generis, means?”
The bar owner’s face paled, as Mr. Frye replied. “No. Friend of human genes…species, maybe? Just a guess.”
“Frank knows, don’cha Frank?” The “boss” said.
Mr. Frye noticed the change and asked. “What’s going on, Rav?”
Mr. Wainright replied, before letting him explain. “I was your friend, Rav, and they were mine.”
“They were alcoholics!”
“So was Francis!” The bar owner countered.
“Leave that traitor out of it!”
“He loved you and believed in you.”
“Bullshit!”
Tears began forming in Frank’s eyes, as he continued. “He even believed in what you were doing. His religion, without alcohol, wouldn’t let him live with himself and what you made him do.
“I never forced him to do anything.”
“No.” Mr. Wainright said, eyes now filled to overflowing. “And you never made me betray my friends either.”
“Nope.”
Shiny drops running down his face, he explained. “At first I wondered why you stopped making those African trips. Then I started losing my friends, and I suspected why.”
“Oh, you did, did you?”
“They trusted me, and I trusted you. I introduced those harmless unfortunates to you, and you used ‘em as lab rats.”
“Fuckin’ derelicts!”
Lester said. “Wait! Rav, you told me you collected tissue culture dialysate to immunize yourself. You needed derelicts too?”
“I don’t remember saying that.”
“I remember the whole conversation. You said after the fifth transfection, and at every subsequent step, to create your vaccines.”
“Oh, yes. I remember now.” Mr. Aloirav said. “I lied. Too risky.”
Uncontrollable now, Frank sobbed. “You had a wife, Gloria, and your children around you. I had just my hoboes. Bloody morning vomit and the shakes were my soiled diapers, my parental responsibilities. I knew my “kids” weren’t goin’ anywhere. Yours were. Those folks were the only affection I had. My life’s…so empty now…without ‘em. I miss ‘em so. They weren’t much, Rav. I know that. But…but I loved ‘em. You have impoverished me beyond endurance…Smokey…and Pete, Ethyl, Marty, Bogus, and even old Freddy Jones…all gone.”
The “Group”, materializing on the deck, was silent at the emotional display. The hotelier replied. “You know Frank. For a guy that appears to be well-educated… Latin, a little biochem, psychology… You sure missed the boat on biology.”
“How’s that, Rav?” Frank inquired, rubbing a wet eye with his fist, as would a little boy.
“You haven’t a clue about camouflage, distraction, or…predation.” He said, turning his back on him and leaving the area.
Later, away from the shore among the pina, again thinking they were alone, Mr. Wainright said to Mr. Frye. “You’re our one hope now, Mr. Frye.”
“I don’t know what I can do, Frank. Rav has all the options. You must know that.”
“You can…” Frank was interrupted by the “boss’s shout from the jungle near the lagoon. “That loser can’t help you, Frank.”
Seeing him walk toward them from the shore, the bartender yelled with feigned defiance. “He can’t do any less than you!”
“Wrong again, my amicus.” Mr. Aloirav responded, nearing the two. “Lester broke the lives of everyone he ever loved. Lost his way, he did. Didn’t you, Les?”
“Leave it alone, Rav.” Mr. Wainright implored, inchoate spirit dying.
“Lester’s one of those unfortunates who, bartering friends for money to buy eternity insurance, loses faith in eternity. One of those refugees from the future, he feared, that never happened.” The hotelier taunted, looking at the Founder, ignoring the other. “By the time our Mr. Frye realized his mistake, it was too late – all gone. You never appreciate people you love, until you begin making mistakes. Right, Les?”
“Please, Rav.” Lester pleaded.
“The people who meant the most in his life,” the hotelier tormented. “He deserted and neglected to death. The only ones who ever loved him… Oh, say it ain’t so, my friend. Say it’s bullshit!”
The agony, chiseled into Mr. Frye’s face, stifled all return comment.
“You ready to leave?” He queried.
The Founder looked at Frank, saying. “I guess…”
“Don’t wait for Frank er…Brutus. He won’t be going back with us. Amicus’s planning on catching a cold. Aren’t you Frank?”

Slumping down onto a large rotting log, the bartender said. “If you say so, Rav.”
“I do.”

We live, as we dream – alone Joseph Conrad

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Mr. Aloirav arranged transportation for the inner circle back to La Ceiba. He watched them board the Lear. The hotelier himself stayed back in La Ceiba. Julio and he got the plane readied for the ocean crossing. It still needed to get over the Gulf of Yucatan and the Bay of Campeche.
The Caribbean, Yucatan peninsula, and the Mexican mountains were co-dangers. All three stretches were hours of flight without places in which to land if trouble arose. The “boss” wanted the aircraft engine and propeller replaced in Brownsville, Texas. He felt the fear, which Frank noticed, showing that day at Las Champas, and it bothered him. Ferrying the plane back himself would strengthen and test his nerve.
Mr. Aloirav returned home safe and in good spirits a week later. Then he learned police made no headway in ascertaining anything regarding the assassination conspiracy. Needing to talk with the would-be assassin, investigators were disappointed. His death, an apparent heart attack, frustrated them. The coroner ruled it “of natural cause” but wouldn’t release any information regarding tests performed.
With no news regarding the coroner’s examination, the hotelier’s mood changed. The pathologist’s reticence on the analyses made him morose. Such recalcitrance could only mean conspiracy. Someone was working with the government against him. Everyone stayed away except Ms. Gold.
The two were alone together now in his lab a few weeks after he returned. She said. “I miss Francis. He always knew where we stood.”
“The fucker sold us out!”
“Yah, maybe.”
“Whaddya’ mean, maybe?!”
“I think we’ve got a problem. And, don’t shout at me, Rav. I know you’re scared. I’m not the reason you got troubles. I’ve lived for you ever since we met. You know I’d die for you. Larry, Jason, their kids, and you are all I care about.”
“I’m sorry, Gloria.” The hotelier responded, kissing her. “You’re right. I never could hide from you. That’s why women outnumber men in this world.”
“Why?”
“They’re superior beings. We can dream, build, and destroy but you accept it all, nurture us, and survive. I don’t know what I’d do without you watching my back. How I do love you.”
“I love you too, Rav. Let’s go to the Blue Barnacle for a while. We need to think and plan. The new managers will expect a visit from the new owners. A distance from the lab will give us some perspective.”
“Fine. A glass of Cabernet with my best friend sounds good. Call us a cab.” They soon settled into a far corner of the bar. When the wine came, the “boss” said. “Still think that guy had help from inside?”
“Definitely! Look how he died. I’ll bet my meekenotes (Ottawa indigena for underpants) a blood culture would show one of your bugs. We need a plan, Rav. A way to get things back to where we feel in control again.”
“You know it.”
“I think all our problems are coming from one direction.”
“I know what you think. I’ve been wondering about him too.”
“Why not believe it? He killed your family. Except for him, you’d never a’ been shot.”
“We’ve no proof.”
“Now look who’s equivocating! You never needed proof beyond reasonable doubt before. We have all we need about your shooting. I warned everyone about that window. Heinz handled security, and he chose to ignore me or listened too well. Except for his word, we don’t know who killed your wife and son, or Francis. Doesn’t it seem strange? Two incidents. Heinz is there, real quick, to offer an explanation. Too quick and poor explanations.”
“What about those papers, Gloria? That US Government CIA seal is pretty damn convincing.”
“If Heinz’s working against us, and I think he is, it would be easy to get CIA stationary. Heinz did time with forgers. He could’ve forged the signature or got it done. I’ll bet Francis never knew about the funds deposited in his account. That deposit happened after he went out of State, in Council Bluffs, the day of the murders. The guy was dealing with your family. How would he know what was happening to his bank balance?”
“It does seem plausible.”
“Suppose Heinz planned a long time on wasting Francis and you? Once you two were gone, I’d be easy. The guy’d have the New Society all to himself. Carl, Bacon, and the others will follow whoever leads. You know that.”
“So what’s your suggestion?”
“What choice do you have? Off the fucker!”
“He’d see it in my eyes, Gloria. Heinz’s cagey. He’s caught me telegraphing before. It’s a shame, he knows about the elixir.”
“He took some too?”
“Yes he did. I gave him some twice.”
“Well, I can’t off him. He already knows I’m after him.”
“I can’t ask Carl or Bacon to do it. They’re too close to him. With the ultimatum, it’s too big a risk right now. If he is working with the Feds, we’ll have to be very careful. No bugs or a very special one. They’d suspect we’re onto them. Heinz knows my habits, many of my weaknesses, and how to avoid being exposed. I think you’re right. We’ve got trouble. Big trouble.”
“Sure do.”
“How long have you suspected him?”
“Before that meeting to off Wilkins, when I did Weiber.”
“That long ago!?”
“Longer than that.” Ms. Gold said after a moment’s thought. “I had bad vibes even before we planned Bolger. The night we celebrated the Rosario intervention.”
“Then it’s a sound premonition.” The hotelier said, straightening his back.
“What are we gonna’ do?”
“Get busy.”
”Doing what?”
“Prior to a mortar attack, Gloria, I used to get as jumpy as a hyperthyroid. At night, miles away, I’d hear those rounds drop into their tubes. Once they were in the air, I could relax, even though I sensed incoming projectiles.”
“You’re relaxed?”
“Yah. Before we came here, I had all this uncertainty. Been wrestling with it for weeks. I feel better, now.”
“Well I’m glad you do. I sure don’t.”
“We’re gonna force his hand.”
“How?”
“Tomorrow. Get ahold of that liaison guy.”
“Which one?”
“The one to whom I gave the rising beef prices info.”
“O.K.”
“First. Ask him if he made a killing on my tip.”
“Right.”
“Then, tell him we want action. If not, we take out a goddamn Senator a day, until the end of the month. October first, Tokyo goes.”
“That’s pretty short notice, Rav!”
“They’ve had all summer.”
“I mean for us.”
The “boss” smiled and replied. “Ain’t it the truth?”
“Can we do it? Gloria asked, smiling to his silent nod.
He was back accepting hard truth. One or more of his people betrayed him. The knowledge was painful. However, the man could no longer throw a bad judgment call’s shame onto a corpse. He needed to give up the hope of burying them together.
If already in the government’s camp, Heinz would face appearing unreliable to either them or the New Society. If free-lancing, he would stay with the status quo for a while longer, until doing something unexpected. The plan wasn’t perfect. It was, however, positive and would show if the engine still responded to their command. They were also not just sitting around waiting for the government or traitors to crush them. It bought time to remove the traitors. Mr. Aloirav would be no mimosa.
The following day, he listened to her conversation with the liaison man. Gloria acted docile with respect to the intransigence. Her words, although vague, clearly got across their message. The ultimatum failed to move the other side, lending credence to feelings of betrayal. After discussing the apparent arrogance with the hotelier, she finalized their private escape plans.
Members were clean with respect to biological weapon assaults’ suspicion. Prior to the “Brutus” letter and disclosing New Society goals, they hid nefarious activities well. If the contrary were common knowledge, there would have been more useable fear on both ends. The planted information in government computers was a fact. Nevertheless, unsettling questions remained. No sensational arrests, precipitating that innocuous image’s end, might actually be due to security inadequacies. The other side could be savvy to the “Club’s” potential. If so, did they expect Heinz or another New Society traitor to save them?
To discuss reasons for government stalling & confidence lapses the inner circle went into conference. Sitting around the lab benches on stools, they exchanged ideas and formulated strategies. When finished, Bacon distributed a list of all US Senators. They pored over dossiers of the ones cross-indexed with Francis’ prior ideological investigations.
The “boss” encircled all possibles in red and asked. “Who’s the guy got fifteen million bucks on that banking scam a few years back?”
“That’s Rothstein.” The large man answered, pointing to the name.
Mr. Aloirav circled the name while asking. “How about that fag all the women love.”
“Who?”
“All the broads voted for ‘im, because he got on a soapbox over that preacher?”
“Sorry, boss. Don’t know.”
“Remember that preacher, killed the crotch-butcher? He was up for parole. This pol stands up and says the guy’s a monsta’ and should stay in the box?”
“That’s the war hero, Corey. Ways and Means. Retired, almost President…”
“Yah. That’s the son of a bitch. War hero, my ass! He went to war with a camera crew. Photographed his fantasies. Never saw action.”
“He got all those medals and crap.”
“Now he remembers.” The “boss” joked.
“I saw a special on TV. He was doin’ the talkin’. Said he got the Silver Star, Boss.”
“The joker’s a fraud. He knew he wanted to be President someday. The “sheeple” would want some hero-exploits. Commissioned officers get first crack at medals the enlisted merit. The bastard’s an officer. He got some fuckin’ friend to arrange all the “above and beyond the call” paperwork. Heroism worship’s a fraud. When his exploits were supposed to have happened, they didn’t. Never met anyone there ever heard of ‘im. But, it makes no difference. He’s on the list for what he did to the preacher.”
“O.K., Boss.”
“We’re takin’ him out first. I’ve wanted him for years… Heinz.”
“Yeh?”
“You do it.” The hotelier demanded.
“When?”
“No later than midnight tonight.”
“Goddamn! That’s not much time.”
“The old fart’s been out of office for decades. There’ll be little security. Take what people you think you’ll need. Get their names to Gloria before leaving.”
“Okay. It’s not gonna’ be easy.”
“Spare me the tears.”
“Is that all?” Heinz stood and inquired, wanting to get busy. He expected having to search out the ex-Senator’s whereabouts in Washington, prior to the “introduction”.
“Bout it.” The hotelier replied. “Take the Lear to Miami, Heinz.”
“What for?” He questioned; upset about an additional task. “I thought you wanted me to do this guy tonight?”
“That’s why I want you taking the Lear. He’s giving a speech to some Cubans at seven this evening at the **** Hotel, Conference room #1239. Load him with 746-2 by six. Verstehe?”
“Yah.”
Bridled by Mr. Aloirav’s obvious preparation, the blond man left the lab. The second door closed, and the closed circuit TV showed him on the street. Then, Mr. Aloirav said.
“Bacon.”
“Yah, boss.”
“You’re takin’ out the kike. Tell Gloria whom you’ll need. Finish by tomorrow morning.”
“Right.”
“We’ll meet again tomorrow, when you return.” Turning to Ms. Gold, the hotelier commanded. “Gloria.”
“Yah.”
“I wanna’ take out that Massachusetts fag, corn holed the sixteen-year-old campaign worker. What the hell’s his name?”
“Botkins.”
“Yah. That’s the guy.” The “boss” agreed, looking straight at her. “His number’s up too. He looks stupid. It’ll be good practice for someone. We’ll use one of the new people. ”
“Rav, I’d like to do him.” Gloria importuned. “Do you mind?”
“Yes, I do. I want you here.”
“All right. Can I pick the “needle” and coach him?”
“Why?”
“I want the bastard to know who got him and why.”
“We’ll have to talk about that.”
Then the “boss” turned to the chunky fellow, saying. “Bacon, you know we have a leak.”
“Yah.” Bacon replied, swallowing hard.
“It could be one of us.” He added, looking him hard in the face.
“Sure could, boss.”
“Watch your ass, man.” Mr. Aloirav continued, putting a hand on his shoulder. The gesture left no doubt in anyone’s mind. Suspicions weren’t on him.
“’Course, always do.” He replied, leaving the lab.
“Carl.”
“Yeah, boss.”
“Heinz and Bacon are making lists of the people they’re using for the pols. Get it from Gloria, as soon as ya’ can. You got that?”
“Yeah, boss.”
“Use four of your people. Four you brought in. Nobody but you and I know about. You with me?”
“Yup.”
“I wanna’ know Heinz’ every movement, and the times, after he gets to Florida. Use three of your Miami men.”
“Right, boss.”
“Don’t get seen. It may mean our lives.”
“And Bacon?”
“Have your fourth man watch what happens there, unseen, and report back to me.”
“Anything else?”
“No.”
When Carl left, the hotelier and Gloria were alone, and the “boss” said. “Tell me the minute that liaison bastard contacts you, Gloria. I wanta’ listen in on the conversation.”
“O.K.”
The next morning, entering the lab, he waited for Ms. Gold. When she arrived, they took coffee together, anticipating news from Bacon and Carl. A phone call from the liaison man might never come. The United Nations might just choose to take preemptive action. They would need to be prepared.
Mr. Aloirav inquired. “How’d it go last night?”
“Just as you ordered.” Gloria answered. “Heinz introduced the stuff about 5:37 PM. The Senator was dead by 7:42 PM. The pol finished telling the Cubans about the warm spot in his heart for all formerly oppressed persons. He was into a tale of his war experience, calling it “a conflict to secure benefits for the downtrodden”. My man said the guy’s face got very red. Keeled over on the spot. Said it looked like the pol was dead by the time he hit the floor.”
“You’re sure of your man?”
“Oh yeah. He’ll be back soon, if you want to interrogate him.”
“I don’t.”
“He never did time with Heinz or any of his friends. Heinz never saw him in the crowd. Carl doesn’t know he exists. The man’s introduced seven vectors for us. He took out an abortion doctor, a transplant surgeon, a judge, and four Parole Board members. I trust him.”
The hotelier became pensive, saying. “Heinz is either on his own, or he’s got a lotta’ hiding to do.”
“Looks like it. What about the Jew?”
“We should know soon. I’m still waiting to get my man’s call. When I last talked to Carl, he said Bacon was still waiting. The guy and his wife weren’t back at their Georgetown condominium yet. The inoculation happened in a restaurant toilet.”
“Interesting sight.” She laughed, pouring the coffee.
They faced each other across a lab bench. Gloria set the pot down to answer the telephone. It turned out to be an apparent nonsense call. It rang again, and the “boss” answered it.
Returning to the bench, he informed her. “Never knew what hit ‘em. The wife went last. About 6 AM. No plunder, the guy was all on paper.”
“So. Two down.”
“Right. Two dead, two days, as promised.”
“So why won’t you let me take out Botkins? Francis said the molested boy was an idealistic kid. The mother said he went into politics to do something meaningful about environmental issues. I feel bad about it. She says he’s turning against everything and everyone. Even tried to off himself last month.”
“Poor kid.”
“Yah. I hate the son-of-a-bitch!”
“Careful, Gloria.”
“What?”
“Hatred & Respect – opposite sides of the same coin. Fear. What scares you?”
She didn’t answer his question, but just asked. “Well?”
He said no more, so Gloria prompted him. “Well?”
“Gloria. Remember the DEA agent who protected that Israeli politician?”
“Vaguely.”
“About 50 years ago. The kike pol beat a Palestinian kid to death. While here, he started some kinda’ international incident. The DEA pogue was in his corner. You wanted to off ‘em both.”
“Oh, yah. I remember. You said he’s just another baby killer. The Israeli army’s full of ‘em, and we’re not gonna’ start a war with federal agents . . . over such garbage! I asked you why not.”
“Right. And what’d I say?”
“You said.” She said, then mimicked. “”I told you before. They get paid shit and’re too stupid to take a bribe. Not worth plundering. You take out a few and you’ll involve the entire US Government. We aren’t ready for that yet. I’ll let you know when we are.””
“Did I let you know?”
“Yah, so what?”
“You had some “moral” reason for wanting to waste then too. There were important logistical reasons for denying you.”
“Like now?”
“Like now. Gloria, democracies don’t work. They can’t even survive without people willing to betray the trust placed in them. Many pols go into the game for laudable reasons. None, lasting more’n ten months, is still clean. You know that. They’re trash. Yet you get emotional over it. Yer’ not thinkin’ right. You can’t get rid of your own pain by giving it to others. The guy’s just another leeching pol. Not worth your time. You’re involved enough. If the kid’s suicidal, he’s already history. Forget ‘im. We’ll take Botkins out for our reasons. Our responsibility ends there.”
“I know that. But I want to get him myself.”
“Your cruelty at times… It’s so cheap…like there’s some religion left in you, Gloria. We kill, because we need to, to survive. We’ve the capacity to do so, and it’s necessary, therefore it’s right. We don’t judge. We can’t. We don’t have that capacity. So, we don’t kill to punish. You’re arrogating rights you don’t merit. You want to punish. I don’t like seeing that in you. It…it’s like you don’t like being feminine.”
“It’s not that, Rav. Sometimes, I just want to get in there and be active again.”
“Bullshit!”
“It’s true!”
“You’re in management. You have two kids, four grandkids and almost two great grandkids. That’s plenty of responsibility. You can help me off these parasites just by doing your job right. A damn-sight more’n you can by getting your own hands dirty. Our days in the sun are past. You’re an old woman.”
“Well! I liked hearing that! Thank you very much!”
“You can be much more effective near me and training new people.”
“I suppose, but…” Gloria started to say, but he interrupted.
“Another thing.”
“What?”
“I don’t think it’s smart trying to teach Botkins who did him in or why. It’s a futile gesture & not professional. Like preaching the evils of blood sucking to a mosquito before you slap it. Who cares? It’s the vanity of your principles. He’s just another planetary disease, a threat that needs curing. Get him out and be done with it. Botkins is a pol, hasn’t the sentience to know he even did anything monstrous. The very most you can accomplish by it is to instill some regret… for 2 seconds before he’s history. Forget it, my love.”
“Sorreeey.”
“Don’t patronize me, Gloria. You know I’m right. All you can do with an attitude is jeopardize us. We can’t rectify all the wrongs in the World. All we can hope to do is “do in” planetary parasites profitably. Think back to when we took out Wilkins & Co?”
“Yes?”
“Do you know why I had you do Weiber?”
“No.”
“Because I saw something in your eyes that day. A glimmer of your sympathy rose with his objection. I had to know how strong it was. You don’t approve of killing children, do you?”
“No.”
“Neither do I.”
“Then why do we do it?”
“I kill to not die. The first human I killed was ten years old. A gook insurgent. He would’ve killed me. Wilkins children might have killed us. Probably not. But, their death sent a message to the rest of the “Group”, and they might. It wasn’t to castigate Wilkins. There is only one crime in the world, Gloria, worthy of punishment.”
“And that is?”
“Living without purpose, being subhuman. All other crimes are simple adornment. Entropy.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Being missionless makes one a beast, but a beast with conceptualizing & manifesting power. It’s an assault on the spirit, a suicide of sorts. These subhumans are obscenities, menaces! The aspirationless, with their cheap thrills and pleasure pursuits, dishonor themselves every minute of their lives. These spectators need no punishment. They castigate themselves every day.”
“I see now.”
“Along the same line, we kill venal judges. It’s not to penalize them, but as a symbol to our “Group”. As much as we’d like to, we can’t kill all the bankers, doctors, lawyers, priests, and other human parasites. That kike is just another Zionist fascist. Someone who will tax the local sheep and send the ill-gotten gain to Israel as arms to peddle. More resources allocated to beat little Arab babies to death. The history of 20th & 21st century United States of America is a litany of governmental abuse of power. The privileged elite want to control the world. They’ll always suborn democracies to do so, torturing, maiming, mutilating, and murdering any living thing standing in their way.”
“U.S.A., business-as-usual.”
“Exactly. Economic imperialism sacrifices millions of men, women, and children on the state-corporate altar. The USA takes everything they have, leaving them with nothing but trite possessions and contemptible escapes. New plastic cars, TV Sports, sitcoms, skiing, drugs, etc. Since the Kennedy administration began, the U.S. Government and their minions have slaughtered millions. Viet Nam, Palestine, Bosnia, Syria, Iraq, Asia, Central America, etc. made Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, and Bin Ladin bedfellows. How do you expect us to survive, battling such people, if we don’t use similar weapons?”
“We can’t.
“That’s right! The difference, Gloria, is that we don’t do it for greed. The horror didn’t begin with us. It began with obscene caedere wealth. We stoop in self-defense, protecting those who can’t protect themselves.”
“To destroy them we must become like them?”
“We can but hope never to become as monstrous. Ever since I was 7 years old, I’ve avoided answering conduct questions. They’re futile gestures. Matters of survival have always been more pressing. You’re asking me to change now. I can’t or won’t. I vouchsafe to others the moralizing over my behavior. I try to make no judgments beyond survival. You’re trying to get me to chastise. I can’t do that either. Castigation demands understanding. Our killing is and always has been to survive.”
“A necessary evil, like revenge?”
“It is. You’re pushing it, but the right to murder is inherent, in each of us. The ability is there. The right to judge is not. To do so would be presumptuous; the ability to discriminate isn’t there.”
“As long as we’re speaking about survival and biological sustainability…”
“Yes?”
“Let’s talk about Mr. Frye.”
“What about him?”
“He doesn’t seem to like us much anymore. Could the man be dangerous? He got pretty bold down in Honduras.”
“Lester?” Mr. Aloirav queried. Then he smiled. “He’s never liked us. He only thought he did for a while. Don’t be concerned. He knows the score. The man’s a biologist. I don’t have to explain to him there’s no anabolism without counterbalancing catabolism.”
“Whatever that means. As long as you’ve thought about it.”
“I have. Unlike my erstwhile friend, I would eat meat to survive.”
“You’re both scientists, yet you disagree on almost everything except biological sustainability. I don’t understand. Isn’t science supposed to give us universal truths and incontrovertible facts?”
“It tries to do that.”
“It isn’t very successful.”
“It’s quite clear to me.”
“How?”
“Science feeds us many lies.”
“Really!? Such as?”
“Too many to relate.”
“Mention some.”
“Okay. Let’s stick just to anthropology.”
“Whatever.”
“Brain mass does not correlate with intelligence, blacks and women are as intelligent as white men, modern art is not monkey art, anthropological transitions between the Eocene & Oligocene are not just conjecture, prehistoric fossil man is not just a collection of variegated chimpanzee bones, neoteny is not still a present significant Homo sapiens event…”
“That’s enough.”
“O.K. Origins of symbolism & abstract thinking are in doubt, but Man is no more than 40K years old.”
“Old enough.”
“Not when you consider the ages of the Earth and all the extinct species before us. It’s but a thousand generations. The planet is 5 billion years old. Our existence is but one six millionth of that. The dinosaurs survived 200 million years or 6, 666 times as long as we have. They’ve left bones as evidence of their existence. Our intellectual residuals have lasted but for 1/6 of our entire existence, 6,000 years.”
“If you say so.”
“Humility, Gloria. We must learn some. Believing we’ve tamed Nature, we’re still not even our own masters…
“Faust said, “The wretched fool I was before”.”
“Exactly, Gloria.” The hotelier replied. “Just when I begin to think I’m waxing polemic, you blow me away with your perspicacity. How would I ever define myself without you to help me.”
“Don’t try. No percentage.”
The liaison man called just then, interrupting their conversation. Since last speaking with Gloria a different pitch rang in the politician’s voice, as expected. He also complained of cold symptoms. She set his mind at ease. The hotelier cautioned her about keeping the talk brief and not talking shop over the phone.
The government agent noticed the abrupt change and said. “Let’s talk business.
“Great.” Ms. Gold replied. “We’d like to see an orderly transfer.”
“Okay. Perhaps sometime in October we can arrange a meeting. We’ll sit down and discuss the matter in an open forum.”
“Shame about Senator Corey. Till later then.”
“What do you mean later?” The voice exploded to an even higher pitch.
“Still stalling. Nothing’s settled. You aren’t convinced of our sincerity. Bye now.” Gloria retorted and disconnected.
She spent the rest of the morning educating the “needle”. That afternoon, Senator Botkins met, what appeared to be, a nice 15 year-old boy. The Honorable Mr. Botkins invited the young man to lunch and later to his condominium. At 4:00 PM, Ms. Gold’s student called on his “nephew” in the Congressman’s private quarters. Over a few drinks, the Senator explained the situation to the boy’s “uncle”. Intentions were honorable, he maintained, despite the boy’s protestations and appearances to the contrary.
Mr. Botkins learned to his relief that surplus campaign contributions would help “induce” the “uncle” to “understand”. They concluded the arrangement. Even so, the pederast’s ease was short-lived. The redress didn’t dispel his headache, and he became quite ill that evening. The Senator’s very high fever came with great pain. Intense pressure seemed to bear down upon his head. He told the hospital-receiving nurse it felt as though his brain was shrinking.
People remembered seeing the Senator in the recent company of a young boy. They never sent to discover the lad’s provenance, however. There was no apparent reason to look for the child. The Congressman’s doctors told friends the man contracted some virus. The kind of skin rash exhibited precluded any suspicion of foul play.
Within a few days, the Senator was near death. His eyes and other orifices still bled. He vomited half-digested blood every hour or so. Twelve of his neighbors were also dying a similar death and many hospital staff.
The liaison man went to see him. It was his Christian duty, he felt. They talked through the isolation window. The agent reported to the Oval Office.
“How’d he look, Mr. Hodges?” The luckier politician asked.
“Not well, Mr. President.”
“I expect a better description than that, Mr. Hodges!” The frightened older politician shouted.
“Senator Botkins looks like a…rotten…”
“Well, well, speak up man! A rotten what?”
“A peach, sir.” Mr. Hodges answered. “He looks like a rotten peach or…a pear, sir. Yes, a pear, a rotten pear, Mr. President.”
“I see.” The veteran vote-collector retorted. “A rotten pear! Now let’s see. Guy meets boy. Guy takes boy to room. Nothing out of the ordinary there. Then guy comes down with fever and rash. Ten days later guy looks like a rotten peach!”
“A bloody pear, sir.”
“Yes, yes, bloody pear…Rotten.” The President mumbled. He seemed preoccupied.
The men around him ushered out the liaison man. In the ten days subsequent to the “boss’s” suggesting a calm capitulation eleven Senators died. People talked despite news blackouts. Gossip in Washington pressed for attention. The Chief Executive invited Mr. Hodges back to the Oval Office.
As he walked through the door, the President inquired. “What do you think, Hodges?”
“About what, Sir?” The liaison man queried.
“Damn it, Hodges! About that fuckin’ yoyo in Grand Rapids! Fer Christ’s sake, man! Are you a blockhead? Do you think he’s behind Senator Botkins and those other good men’s deaths?”
“It does seem more than just coincidence, Mr. President.”
“That’s all?”
“After each of his threats, the realities appear. But, I wouldn’t know, Sir. If the President thinks so, Sir, then so do I.”
“You’re a big help, Hodges!”
“I try to be, Sir. Thank you, Mr. President.”
Somewhat later, a knocking came at the door. It was a messenger. Another Senator just died. The Congressman’s mother was at the Fort Dietrich hospital, where the others too expired. She wondered if the President wanted to say anything to her.
“Send the broad the usual card. You know the drill, Hodges!”
“Yes Sir, I’ll handle it Mr. President.”
An hour later, the Commander-in-Chief met with his cabinet and Press Secretary. Mr. Hodges then contacted Gloria. As the call came through the hotel switchboard, she and the “boss” were in their apartment.
During the time it took to get a private line, he ordered. “Talk just to the President, Gloria.”
“Why, I can’t put the President on the line.” The liaison man answered her. “Things aren’t done that way around here. The President is with his cabinet at the moment!”
“Unless the President isn’t on this phone in one minute, I shall terminate the conversation.” In 60 seconds, Gloria said. “Please give him my regards and say how sorry I am to learn of his headache.”
“But the President doesn’t have a headache.”
“My mistake. He can expect one soon. Tell him not to be concerned. It won’t last last long.”
The double entendre wasn’t lost on Mr. Hodges, and he asked. “Are you threatening the President?!”
“Of course not. I’m sure you’re aware associating with us tends to give people headaches. We can be very “taxing”.”
The apparent insolence was too much to endure. Within the hour, Secret Service and FBI agents were at the front desk of the Rav Aloirav Hotel. Along with a few local police, they demanded to speak with Mr. Aloirav and Ms. Gold. He was gone, the receptionist said, but Ms. Gold would meet with the gendarmes in her office. The Federal agents did so meet with Gloria and soon arrested the woman. They pressed her to divulge the hotelier’s whereabouts.
She told them that he left in the Lear about an hour before their arrival. In an interrogation room on Monroe Avenue, Gloria listened to the “authorities” rant. They went on about how bad it looked for him. To run, under the circumstances, leaving her destitute, was admitting guilt & weakness vis a vis his enemies. The FBI and Secret Service didn’t fail to press that point.
Police questioned her for over an hour. She permitted them to insinuate her “boss” wasn’t much of a man. Wasn’t he running off to let her to take the rap alone? Loyal compatriot that Ms. Gold was, she ignored their insults. Noticing the jackets worn by the crew, the woman saw no DEA letters or insignias.
Breathing with relief, she thought. “At least this gang doesn’t beat or rape. They’ll probably stick to the psychological stuff.”
Soon, the interrogation team found formulating questions difficult. Both mentally and with respect to jaw muscles, control seemed weak. At first, they overlooked it. Then the agent-in-charge began slurring his words. The others looked at each other askance.
They smiled, as if to indicate that perhaps he may have been drinking his lunch. Counting promotional chickens, resulting from his eventual demise, they were disappointed. Discovering difficulties with their own communication, the inquisitors found it impossible to continue. One by one, drowsiness overcame them. Within moments, the investigators began drooling and micturating in their clothes.
The room smelled so much of urine; it suppressed her “perfume”. Ms. Gold asked for removal. Entering authorities, finding conditions unacceptable, consented. She left the offending room. An officer notified her that a New Society lawyer arrived to take her back to the Hotel.
There was nothing substantial on which to hold Ms. Gold. Wishing a pleasant day to the President isn’t heinous. As far as the lawyer knew, it wasn’t yet a crime. Gloria found she was free. The Lear returned to Grand Rapids deadhead.
As prearranged, Ms. Gold joined Mr. Aloirav and other members of the “Group” on the Pontibus. Grand Rapids was no longer safe. The government was proving capable of taking hostile steps. The New Society celebrated victory over the score of government people. Their new home (50W, 40N, 6) resembled Palacios.
The interrogating agent’s urinary and salivary incontinence continued. Other symptoms stabilized after the second day. Rooms occupied by these patients soon smelled noxious. All were similar to the government’s “con-air prisons”. *
(* In these prison aircraft, guards never allow inmates toilet relief. Transports carry them around the “land of the free” with facility use proscribed. Threatening individuals sit in their own excrement, shackled to the cruel environment. *)
Police doctors didn’t understand the officer’s symptoms. The prevailing opinion held it as a kind of tetanus. The government brought in specialists to study the unfortunate agents. It appeared, to the experts, that two or three different diseases competed for territory. Second opinions always brought a similar question from new colleagues. How could it be?
The officers seemed to be experiencing a “cocktail” of infirmities in conflict with each other. Sometimes it even appeared as if disparate afflictions inhabited distinct segments of the same person. The physicians often saw such conditions in chronic skin diseases and in immunocompromised patients. However, these agents were healthy individuals before the hotel arrest.
An authority on tropical medicine examined them. He determined it to be similar to, yet different from, diseases with which he was familiar. Victims all presented symptoms moments after leaving the Aloirav hotel. They quarantined the building, closing the door after every horse escaped. Considering the state of modern epidemiology, the action was not comforting. Because nobody else took sick, hotel lawyers soon forced the interdiction’s lifting.
The feeling developed that the officers contracted the malady in Washington and brought it with them. The District was already experiencing epidemics of strange provenance. Perhaps it was just another risk incidental upon living near the Capitol. The sick officers’ control over motor functioning partially returned over the next two years. They never recovered from their new mental problems.
The Times reported the Vice President, until confirmed as President later that month, would keep a very relaxed schedule. Just two dignitaries were visiting the White House during that period. The new Commander-in-Chief expected the head of some cartel and his elegant dark-skinned consort. The media was not invited.
They laid the Chief Executive with his wife of twenty years to rest in Arlington cemetery. On orders of the Surgeon General, Congress, and others, the burials were closed-casket. Papers were replete with extremely conjectural information relating to the President’s sudden death. Stories surfaced of projectile vomiting of blood, bloody tears, urine, perspiration, etc. Speculation poured out of the CDC. They branded the mysterious Washington disease, experienced that year, a new version of swine flu. More than a dozen Senators and numerous other government people contracted it and died.
At the same time, an obituary column in the Boston Globe reported on a sad demise. A New England multibillionaire, his wife of many years, all their children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren left the world. The cause of death was a similar mysterious disease. The patriarch’s children contracted it first. They seemed to have transmitted it to the great man’s entire family.
The Boston Globe article read. “The World mourns the loss of an icon of enduring greatness today. He and his Washed Beaches Company have cleaned up many major chemical disasters over the years. The self-made man began his career in Plympton, Massachusetts. Before he died, his company had disposed of many billions of dollars in oil spills and accidental toxic-waste dumpings. A veteran of multiple highly publicized heart & lung transplant operations, the man led an exemplary life. The last 2 decades of it, he was under a doctor’s constant supervision. Except for a small fringe group, all those he knew considered him their friend.”
A few peripheral individuals, marring his opulent remembrance, objected at the funeral to (what they termed) his apotheosis. The disaffected coterie said. “Washed Beaches is responsible for polluting thousands of aquifers around the Country. Millions of people will pay in suffering, sickness, dementia and early death due to his depredations. Fines paid were never commensurate with the vast amount of damage done to the environment here and abroad. The man’s true legacy is in the measure of viability loss for all planetary life.”
The media, government & corporate spokespeople countered such vilification, replying. “The moderate fines could be expected from such an intense schedule and display of burden undertaken. The insignificant amount is but testimony to the care Washed Beaches took in their work.”
The hotelier and Gloria enjoyed their brief stay in the White House. They were glad when the readjustment work finished, however. The relocated New Society estate on the Pontibus was much more pleasant.
The “boss” moved into position as true head of the Country. He left the ex-pastor former Vice-President alive to be a presidential figurehead. The politician’s pomposity bored Ms. Gold to distraction. She found the puppet as oleaginous and artificial as any the evangelical profession could boast.
Mr. Aloirav kept the true state of affairs hidden from the Press. He allowed appearances to continue as if the former regime remained, running things. The inner circle felt it was a poor idea to let news of the conquest escape. Further deaths were necessary commensurate with insuring the helm change going without fanfare. The hotelier made modifications, until the situation stabilized.
His next changes ordered penal institution records scrutinized. Wardens could no longer frustrate his desires for inmate transfers. Capitulation was fast. The “Group” took all prisoners out of First-Level incarceration. Most inmates found themselves working in Pontibus educational institutions in the sky designed for rehabilitation of lawyers. Many joined the New Society. A small number, incorrigibles, the “boss” shipped to the spurs.
Inmates who remained without homes joined employees of large banks in assisting the filling of sacks of humeal. The New Society converted empty penitentiaries into humeal warehouses. Marion Prison’s closing precipitated a “Group” celebration. Here was where the former government gave its most feared political prisoners mental poisons. The institution would never again destroy a mind. The “Group” left that responsibility now to the surviving churches, mosques and synagogues.
Mr. Frye assigned arriving convicts to special cantilevers. Former prison administration officials and parole board members went to lawyer re-education classes. They joined a very small number of recycled politicians and medical doctors. Many resisted and found more economical positions in sacks of humeal. New sky forests & jungles appeared more verdant at increasing rates.
Rav Aloirav, speaking on agricultural issues, said. “The Pontibus welcomes new nitrogen as much as the First-Surface welcomes the demise of its parasites.”
Meditation & group therapy rehabilitated the surviving few former wardens, guards, and judges. “Restoring” those to “useful” occupations sometimes required biochemical analysis, chelation therapy, and vitamin deficiency correction. Conflicts developed as the New Society proscribed organ transplant operations, intensive care for the aged and neonatal units. The new regime classified them as “Obscene Surgery” crimes. Violating doctors and occasional critics enjoyed the same rehabilitation re-education classes as former incarcerators.

There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. Machiavelli

Chapter Forty

“Reforms” came as no surprise to New Society members. The “boss” preached about them for years prior to ordering their implementation. Instituting acceptable conditions and adjustments did take time. There were involuntary retirees. A single burning match does not often become a bonfire. Without organized confrontation, little changes. Resistance diminished. His modification’s initial successes encouraged the hotelier.
The events of September 28 came as a letdown. They were not entirely unexpected, however. Gloria informed him that the United Nations resisted conquest. Underestimating the remaining extent of global racism & machismo, sending her as vice-regent backfired. Carl heard the heads of some States muttering amongst themselves.
They complained that sending a black was bad enough but to send a woman was downright insulting. His misstep was understandable and curious. Socialistic states with heavy black & female majorities were the angriest. They would rather have had the “boss” himself preside over the delivery of his demands.
Despite his authority, he wanted a smooth transition. The man knew power’s use could produce strange affects. He preferred dialogue. Mr. Aloirav hoped Ms. Gold’s darker skin & sex would find ready acceptance with 98% of the World’s population. He was wrong. It didn’t. They refused to genuflect. His de jure suzerainty remained incomplete. Conceding to his demands for complete dominion would require further persuasion.
The hotelier now wanted to repair her image. Some of the enemy leadership’s machismo & bigotry could be instructive in a negative way. The remaining World needed to learn of the Planet’s need for female parity. He intended showing them how important it was to civilization and biological sustainability. The “boss” felt no desire to expend a great deal of time in the effort. He instructed her to deliver but one more ultimatum.
“Maybe they’re more interested in freedom than you think.” She said.
Mr. Aloirav answered. “Mobs everywhere are more concerned about their bellies and painless titillation than liberty. They only move their butts for security. Refrigerators, TV, bars, and brothels are much more important. Allowing Rothschild to bleed them dry, they must borrow their present from our children’s future. They have paid no interest except in hopelessness. It’s gone on long enough. Good citizenship cannot allow these fellows to go unrewarded. The period for silent endurance & contempt is over. It’s time to risk & fight. They’ll either submit prior to October 1, to all the New Society’s demands, or prepare to experience requital. A collective megadeath of at least thirty million individuals will occur by October 2. We are finished with dialogue, Gloria.”
“What if the introduction doesn’t work, Rav?”
“Why wouldn’t it?”
“I don’t know. Something might go wrong. Remember the Sudan.”
“Even if something goes wrong, and not as many get sick as I expect, it’s no problem.”
“Why not?”
“All we have to do is make a few thousand sick to get systems to fall apart. We can rush in reinforcements.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Fall apart they will. Human institutions are fragile. Just a little wind bowls them over. It’s unimaginable to most people, even at that small number. Incredible means invisible.”
“You know how many people will be screaming for our skins if you’re wrong?”
“Billions.”
“That doesn’t bother you?”
“I welcome their hatred. Every one of them deserves to die, Gloria!”
“But the innocent life that…”
“There are no innocents!”
“Babies, Rav?”
“Yah. Babies are innocent, and these monsters kill’em as if they were changing their underwear! I will not let dead men’s morality undermine my resolve. It’s weakness! My babies are important. Not those of my enemies. People can ignore the world today, as my parents ignored the nuclear holocaust threat. I grew up terrified with it, while they buried their heads. My cross is the environment. I will not hide! I will not shirk my responsibility! It’s relative, whether the bastards go by way of my “bug” or the coming environmental collapse. It’s but a few short years either way. Let ‘em come after me. We’ll rot in the same coffin, come what may.”
New York burned the midnight communication lines of 253 ambassadors and vicars that evening. Hope went back-to-back with prayers that capitulation instructions would be forthcoming. They never came. The mirage of power is an addiction and politicians were facing withdrawal. The ministers formulated a response and delivered it to the woman on September 29 as if they still retained some semblance of masculine virtue. “No more Sudetenlands!”
Receiving the directives with cool serenity, she measured her words. “You leave us no choice. Prepare your people for death!”
As Ms. Gold turned to leave the speaker’s platform, a British delegate strode forward. He was shouting obscenities and gesturing as if about to strike her. The man confronted an immovable obstacle in Carl. The Brit came no closer. The aged convict behaved as if expecting such a reaction. A score of New Society people jumped to stand around the embattled two.
Repeating what the “Group” instructed him to say, should something similar occur, he said.
“Back off, sir! I am armed. I will not hesitate to destroy you, if you persist in blocking Ms. Gold’s way!”
It worked. The man backed off. He continued swearing, however, directing his frightful vernacular at both Carl and Gloria now. A number of other delegates also felt the warmth of his disfavor. One UN member from an Asian country lowered his head and charged at Carl.
As the man’s co-members picked his bloody body off the floor the great room rang with loud voices. Pandemonium ensued. Nevertheless, the two “Group” members made it back to their hotel without further incident. There, they informed their leader of what transpired. Taking it all in, he asked Ms. Gold if logistics were all in place.
She replied in the affirmative. “Target is in position.”
The “boss” ordered the crew to check out of the First-Surface hotel and return to the Pontibus. The New Society expected an evening deployment of vectors. The following day was September 30.
It was well over four years now since the CEO of a major Japanese corporation insulted Gloria. It happened while she was on a mission for the New Society. The Japanese nation had never possessed much respect for civilization or other races. Rav wanted to know if there was anything he could do to stop Japanese destruction of the oceans with their irresponsible nuclear power generation. He thought maybe a few well-placed surgical biological agents might go miles towards civilizing Japan.
Japanese men, as a rule, were extremely aggressive if given the power that enabled such behavior. They allowed, even encouraged, cruel and non-custodial behavior that was much worse than that of the rest of the brutal human world. Some older Japanese men were also blatantly disrespectful of dark-skinned females. That particular businessman was rude to her because of both her color and sex. The prejudiced Oriental assumed all American blacks, Ms. Gold included, were mentally deficient low-class hoodlums.
He acted on his supposition; Gloria and another agent heard him say. “Freedom is a luxury of the lazy. The nigger comes by his indolence naturally. The black color absorbs heat more than lighter colors. In tropical settings, if he worked like a human, he would meet a quick death.”
The man knew Gloria was listening to his words. He enjoyed the discomfiture they gave her. She reported the incident to the hotelier. He didn’t ignore the affair. That same day, the wealthy oriental man was taking a stroll in New York City’s Central Park. He met another Japanese man also taking a constitutional. They struck up a conversation, dined together, and did some business over the next few days. One evening, a short time later, the insulting Oriental took sick and died…penniless.
Mr. Aloirav didn’t want his woman seeing him as old & effete. Going unrewarded, he felt the matter would be bad for morale and risk member loyalty. The hotelier couldn’t leave it with just a compensatory savage action in kind. He informed his people the insult would receive an exponentially measured response later. A few months ago, the “boss” informed his people the measured response was about to materialize. Tokyo was the target.
Years prior, he anticipated the World would be recalcitrant to subject themselves to him. Despite his vassal countries acquiescence, the man knew total genuflection wouldn’t occur without antecedent fear. Therefore, he altered his emphasis from vectors of assassination and close-contact weapons. His construction efforts refocused into biological weapons of mass destruction, epidemics & pandemics. Mr. Aloirav knew the illuminati were also doing such research and development.
He felt it was only prudent to be just that much more prepared. So, he departed from strictly using his molecular biology skills and dabbled in the world of chemical engineering. The machinery he built encapsulated his vectors in an intricate combination of agarose, carrageenan, and polyacrylamide. Galactose moieties made them refractory to elements and machinery. Thin plastic acrylamide covers provided freedom from UV cracking & desiccation. It also provided a capacity for large-scale aerosol dispersing. Coating lasted just long enough for microbes to escape and breach victim’s environmental interfaces, passages, and cavities.
The first US-Iraqi War, found the US government threatening the hotelier’s sons with the draft. During the media event called “Desert Storm” the hotelier made an inspection. He spent hours examining (incognito) the US military’s latest biological and chemical warfare protection gear. Their shielding devices for pneumonic-introduction interdiction were outdated and would prove ineffective if challenged. Saddam Hussein might have retaliated with high-tech biological and chemical weapons.
If so, Mr. Aloirav felt it would have been disastrous for all Rothschild’s slave countries and puppets, including the US-Israeli aggressors. The “boss” breathed great sighs of relief his children were not interested in the rabble’s general military. Subsequent events proved the Arab either more civilized than his opposition or insufficiently ruthless. A restricted scenario occurred in the desert. The hotelier said.
“Americans were fortunate the leader of a half-million victims of their atrocity was either a gentleman or deficient in audacity. Those later termed “war criminals” are often so privileged . . . prior to defeat.”

Gloria left the Pontibus minutes after her return from the UN. She touched down in Tokyo, Japan, still the evening of September 30. As midnight passed, the “Group” kept its word. Special jet turbines circled the metropolis, spraying a fine mist into the air above it. With little wind, the droplets descended gently on the city.
The simple completion message radioed from the Lear was succinct. “Rav, the city is yours…Gloria.”
Mr. Aloirav’s vectors didn’t do the entire job themselves. As he planned, infrastructure inadequacies and opportunistic infections took many. Swamped institutions gave little support to the inundating hoards of people. The usual therapy for cholera: salts, glucose, and antibiotics were unavailable within hours. By that date, most antibiotics were useless anyway. Late morning October 1 saw all of Tokyo a gargantuan third-world hospital.
Of the double-digit millions in Tokyo-Yokohama, just three million miners were still healthy. Days later, in a phenomenal example of Japanese efficiency, strength and resilience, the City organized a giant morgue. Most survivors, now numbering in thousands, no longer functioned mentally, physically or spiritually.
The “Group’s” strategy appeared effective. Top politicians of the major nation-states invited the hotelier’s vassal states to a meeting. They discussed capitulation terms. Two countries required further convincing. They soon got it. Johannesburg and Buenos Aires ceased to exist as corporate entities by mid-October. South Africa & Argentina before long joined the other 251 countries in unconditional surrender.
The new king put his lieutenants in primary positions of power in all the World capitals. To insure total compliance, many former second-in-commands became the new leading “figures”. They were allowed such ostentatious positions only after displaying their particular brand of loyalty first by personally dispatching their former leaders. They remained de facto penultimate in their new administration as in the previous.
The First-Surface became a “Brave New Society”. The transitional US, under the “boss’s tutelage, became prototype to a New World Order. He moved to make it universal. Dehistorization deepened and enveloped the Planet. Except for the Trilateral Commission, Bilderbergers, and a few other holdouts, most people were unaware.
As in the US, the extent of helm changes went largely unnoticed. Thoughts went about that the new Presidents were strict and repressive. The World attitude mirrored the US experience at each phase of adjustment. The new King’s “reforms”, although profound, were sub rosa for the most part. Pontibus’ news swamped all other stories in the New Society media, the only media.
The “Group” monitored records of recently closed hospital neonatal units. Persons having ever been within these institutions, returned for critical evaluation. Those deemed survivable, without drugs or special equipment, continued living. The New Society scrutinized re-evaluatees’ progeny. If physically or mentally unable to render any positive planetary function, without technological assistance, the kingdom denied them existence. Humeal factories sprang up to handle demands.
The new regime interrogated ruthlessly those who recently applied for welfare benefits. Those found to possess legitimate genetic deficiencies became humeal immediately. Normal malingerers, the vast majority of “benefits recipients”, were allowed a chance at redemption in the new establishment. They found space near the recently released convicts and TV sit-com producers.
Hating all sports’ professionals, Mr. Aloirav felt them to be but purveyors of time-wasting obscenity. Such imbeciles pushed “masculinity by proxy” onto the drug-de-masculinized populace for the former establishment. Those who supported, condoned, or profited from such enterprises met re-education classes. “Reforms” likewise comminuted & desiccated all contenders, organizers, and contributors of over $500 to the Special Olympics.
Medical doctors and other euphemisms for health-swindlers went to re-education classes. They either became emergency room physicians or went to humeal-heaven. Former organ-transplant surgeons and executives of large pharmaceutical corporations needed special dispensations to avoid the humeal option. If they could not prove extenuating circumstances, the offense was considered as grave as having once been a lawyer, pol or banker. For these latter, there were no re-educational possibilities. The answer was always . . . humeal.

The Corporation’s molecular biologists worked very hard. However, they were no more successful than were their First-Surface counterparts in enhancing nitrogen fixation capacity. The nitrogenase systems located in Pontibus biomass proved insufficient to handle the frenetic superstructure growth. Azotobacter vinelandii and some Rhizobium species, along with the blue green algae, failed to produce well or enough. Other photosynthetic bacteria in pools of Klebsiella, Achromobacter, and Clostridia also fixed sub-optimal atmospheric nitrogen levels.
They couldn’t meet minimal nitrate requirements for the tremendous influx of new life on the platforms. Protein surpluses ceased everywhere. After exhausting all avenues in the search for answers, the Founder turned to humeal purchases from the First-Surface contractors. Compounding the sky problems were the first generation methane generators. Effluents were deficient in silicon.
Also, the first bridges waited nearly 2 decades for calein piers to appear.
Until that time, without imported silicates, necessary sewage treatment weeds foundered. Calein took much more calcium carbonate out of seawater than it did silicates. Post-calein extracted seawater became a sufficient source for the hydrophilic plants’ silicon needs. During the twenty-year hiatus, the Company, under duress, imported high silicon beach sand from the First Surface for its sewage treatment needs. Atmospheric ozone layer stopped its annual incremental thinning for the first time ever.
In other areas, Mr. Frye’s technical problems complemented as enantiomers Mr. Aloirav’s political modifications. For the former friends & enemies, work never ended. There was not enough time to do everything. They became involved with their own separate issues, and there was little personal contact.
King Aloirav ordered the dismantling of all nuclear weapons and power plants. Firing mechanisms removed, rocket plutonium and reactor fuel went up the bridge network for storage. As Mr. Frye did on the Pontibus, other than pharmaceutical drugs, the “boss” decriminalized all narcotic offenses on the First-Surface. Without the old-government’s graft machine, except for a temporary saprophytic unemployment nuisance, the narcotic problem ended. With it, however, went the solvency of all the major world banks and Wall Street’s subsidized corporations.
Rounding up all the unemployed nuclear, banking, and conventional arms-manufacturing executives for humeal treatment became a major task. The job fell to former convicts, police detectives, FBI agents, TV sitcom producers, and welfare cheats. Bounties were paid in lieu of wages. Each head-price was commensurate to the value to the planet for the parasite’s capture and dissolution.
Except for a universal sales percentage, all First-Surface taxes disappeared. The New Society sent all IRS agents to the same humeal center that served the Federal Reserve, the US Treasury, CIA, and the DEA.
Displeasure and complaints embellished the new King’s ascendancy. Political enemies, degenerates, and biological misfits, (formerly major recipients of his “bugs”), he now dealt with summarily. As with other foes, they accumulated in makeshift morgues. New employment terms greeted citizens. Sanitary engineers worked 20-hour daily shifts for weeks.
They converted previous penitentiaries and “superstition pavilions” (churches, mosques, and synagogues) into warehouses. Desiccated, comminuted, and bagged former “parasites” became the contents of these repositories. His “optimum solution” required special hammer mills & lyophilization “freezers”. These accumulated around the First-Surface as “Mom & Pop” shops. Then, smaller humeal companies merged and became “Group” institutions. Processed corpses then conformed to standard fishmeal regulations.
The Founder was unaware of the provenance of additional nitrogen sources for the Pontibus compost supplement. The Company purchased the recycled remains from the “Group” in 50-kilo bags, labeled as “fishmeal”. Valuable animal and plant life now benefited from the recycled biomass of former subhumans and human parasites.
As the New Society solved other problems in these unique ways, unemployment ended. A semblance of equilibrium replaced population excess. Brazil and other socialistic countries’ “Trabalhista Laws” and pension abuses disappeared along with her lawyers & politicians. No longer were there people on the dole, sucking the blood of healthy people. Living standards improved everywhere.
Although Pontibus construction was still first, education-rehabilitation became the second largest areas of employment. The third was finding and arresting fugitive subhumans, parasites and illuminati. Unfilled government printed forms accumulating concerned some, as bureaucrats around the world disappeared. King Aloirav said. “Work of government is of questionable value. Private enterprise will fill vacuums where necessary tasks go undone.”
Vassal country leaders dealt with their “demented” & “contaminated” subjects without mercy. Communistic and superstitious South America experienced repetitive upheavals. The new King would not countenance the willfully ignorant, poor, and extravagant. He found it necessary to make many arbitrary rulings on caedere wealth. Such problems resulted in many mistakes. Birth of the new humanity came with much blood & pain. The afterbirth, as always, went to the Pontibus as high nitrogen fertilizer in the form of humeal.
People began to live in harmony with themselves and other life. Pockets of awakening grew. Signs of hope took shape. Man appeared to be maturing in time to save the Planet from the threatening dangers. The Pontibus reached ever further into space.
The two great leaders, no longer friends, developed a symbiotic respect for each other’s intransigence. Lester’s gentleness, strength, and creativity balanced the King’s wild courage, wisdom, and grasp of natural principles. They acknowledged needing each other’s uncompromising audacity.
Willingness to make hard decisions stood high on Mr. Frye’s list of favorable qualities. He saw that in King Aloirav. The King’s savage character and his respect for wildness impressed the Founder even more. However, the desire to believe in some kind of morality and the sanctity of human life, Mr. Frye couldn’t eschew. Lester never quit hoping that someday he’d find signs of greater power than raw Nature. He almost did, when they discovered the Einstein-Rosen bridges.
Irreconcilable distinctions between the two leaders prevented rapprochement. The “boss’s” position skirted the untenable. He was a spiritual fluid within a sea of protoplasm. Having no concept of topological location must have held incomparable agony. Those believing in the sanctity of human life would deem it essential. How could the King, define, value, or even be aware of his own humanity? One can but speculate and marvel.
Being so interdependent, each man grew every day to value the other’s existence more. One did nothing without first considering what the other would think and how it would affect him. It seemed as if the visions contained in their separate souls were enantiomers. Their disparate means approached similar ends not unlike convergent evolution. The love they held for non-human life and their mutual respect was unparalleled. Yet, the two never approached singularity of mind and spirit. Brahma-Creator balanced Shiva-Destroyer. Vishnu-Preserver benefited from a protected Earth.
Mr. Frye awakened each morning thankful of that. He was aware that their combined chiral value to planetary biomass was inestimable. No longer driven, he pulled, never failing to consider all the consequences of malingering. The Founder believed that veering from his perceived purpose meant serious risk. Both men felt as necessary to each other as the yin to the yang.
Then, Lester discovered the source of his new fertilizer. It was a few months after King Aloirav deposed the pope, making himself the Holy Roman Emperor. Horrified, nevertheless, Lester knew better than to oppose Emperor Aloirav. Mr. Frye harbored no illusions as to his own indispensability or who would enter the “humeal” factory. The arrangement was, as ever, tentative. Humeal deliveries to the sky communities continued.
Chosen from aerial residents, Pontibus Council members were distinguished men and women. Only bridge citizens, proven by their deeds to be exemplary parents, could serve. Their vision was more far-reaching. Exemplars enjoyed and gave more love & respect for life than their fellows. They exemplified more cosmopolitan pity and compassion than did others, and their provincial pity & compassion was always qualified.
No “compassion vultures”, person with a past in the medical profession or organized religion, could ever be a member. Such ignorance of human evolution had no place in initiatives of biosustainability. Both Planet and human race must have benefited from exemplars individual action to enjoy selection. If sacrifice is selfish action in the interest of immortality, they were so egoistic. All their peers saw in them self-offering for the spirit of man and protoplasm. Residents drafted members, never elected them.
It was not just show or media mendacity. People deserve the media they have, and Pontibus residents wanted the truth. These leaders gave more than any other contemporary did. Their superiority was never in doubt. Biographies were open books, and their deeds expressive of their right to rule.
If a year brought no exemplars, the year was without a draft. The governor alone could admit or dismiss a member and only for a good reason. Other members could resign en masse if the governor’s fiat was in error. Once in the Council, exemplars showed their continuing value by decision and deed. Instituted for life, fellow members allowed resignations, not the governor. He could accept them after their peers did.
The Council chose its own leader for as long as they felt it necessary. That person answered to the governor alone. From the beginning, the Founder chose the governors. Lester was the first. Mr. Otorp was the second.
The First-Surface retained most old customs, precedents, and statutes. Emperor Aloirav felt there were just too many people and boundaries involved to make a blanket change. They all would want individual fiat decisions made. He would not have time to do anything else. Therefore, the Emperor didn’t feel up to eradicating the curse of written law overnight.
He spent his time battling world democracy. His feeling was that lawyers derived their corrupt power from corrupt government. So, eradicating government would also rid the world of the popular desire for these demon parasites. Lawyers serve no purpose beyond institutionalizing confusion in the interest of the state and the scheister. Their perceived “need” by the populace should disappear with the disappearance of human abuse by government thugs.
Lester was more idealistic or felt he was up to the challenge. He too felt written laws were anathema, and he refused to accept their authority. Reducing reality to symbols, allowing a priesthood of lawyers to deceptively argue over those semantic representations was execrable, he maintained.
Vested interests could always escape sanctions and the disenfranchised could never avoid them. Written Law kept poor people poor and rich people ever richer. Lawyers were the tools of that perverted implementing process. A special province enthralled life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. An area disproportionately allowed to possessors of greater amounts of caedere conversions. Entities without accumulated death objects or access to its symbols got limited inclusion to legal privilege.
Mr. Frye concluded. “Most people understand justice to be the proper disposal of the poor caedere man by the rich caedere man. Wealthy castigate. The poor enjoy punishment. To a certain extent, this is as it should be. Poor people are generally far too extravagant with life’s bounty. Life itself castigates. It makes no allowance, gives no license, for ignorance, irresponsibility, or incapacity. Struggle & suffering result as means to reverse natural deficiencies. Written law, however, legitimizes belief, along with confusion, making the world of man get no better. It’s one of two Judas goat tools of the true god, Chaos. The other tool is medicine. Medicine augments and perpetuates weakness & suffering. These two, unfettered, will result in annihilation of the species if not eradicated. Thermodynamics conquers, extinction happens, Chaos wins. Men are unequal gregarious beasts. They are unlike in physical manner as well as in capacity for life, liberty, and the pursuance of happiness. Equality only exists in the imagination, as electromagnetic waves emanating from cephali, confounding all possibility of an unaided utopia.”
Computers freely accessed custom, precedent, and past statutory law. No proscription existed against consulting dead men’s thoughts. “They can be aids,” Lester said, “never authorities.” Decisions left the Council after exacting the utmost from personal consciences. Membership carried no minimum age requirement.
Having grown biological children, however, required a certain maturity. Lester allowed no religious or political viewpoint, finding such perspectives weaknesses. Except for emergency sessions, members met once a month for as long as necessary. They kept a journal of the proceedings. In the interest of transparency, the minutes were published on the computer network. The Council did not bifurcate as new Communities established. One served all.
Almost overnight, the Council represented a role model system in which everyone could believe. Valuable human and planetary benefactors supplanted “wealth” accumulators as archetypes. The Founder felt past “leaders”: economic, political, and religious were more often illegitimate and despicable than not. He never knew of any, even the best paradigms, to show qualities Council members exemplified. Those icons, most admired from history, were usually twisted, tormented freaks and psychopaths, seeking to impose their perverted fiats on weak, ignorant, demented fools.
The New Society handled overall defense, leaving the Founder in no doubt as to his ultimate place. The Pontibus maintained a small security force. Training, leadership, and discipline went according to the Company’s direction. Forts, arsenals, and martial logistics were questions the Council decided as it saw fit. The protection group was different from most militaries. It acted as a militia to execute the Council’s directives and suppress actions tending to damage the bridges. Responsibilities included internal vigilance as well as peripheral defense. The world’s two most powerful men both expected extra-Pontibus hostility someday to occur.
The Company coined the bridge’s specie and regulated its non-caedere value. Standard weights and measures never changed throughout the planet. The metric system prevailed. Computer communication obviated most needs for a common post. Remaining mail desires, the Company licensed to private carriers.
Construction and repair of Pontibus roads and wilderness forests continued to be collective maintenance under the Corporation’s aegis. Company subsidized libraries, laboratories, and universities kept the progress of science and the human arts promoted. Authors, inventors, and creative people of all kinds discovered special privileges available to them. News, tending to criticize the Company, needed to go to Lester before publishing. A free press´s interdiction was an area where Lester agreed with the democracies. Just one point must disseminate truth to the rabble. Free speech flourished in the universities, not in the media.
The Council established inferior free courts and regulated their necessary numbers. Parties to disagreement were given every opportunity for resolution prior to case initiation. These courts made no distinction between civil and criminal cases. All were civil. The judges were persons familiar with accessing statutes, custom, and precedents via computer.
Litigants paid judges extremely high fees for time and decisions. As fees were equal for both parties, the caedere poorer litigant sometimes needed to equalize its inferior position by murder. The burden of proof then lay with the victim. As everyone was armed, there was no need for a Pontibus police force. Professional lawyers were banned. Corruption, once proved, meant instant death for the judge. A special segment of the Council, the High Court, took ultimate and supreme authority in their regard. They alone could decide whether a judge was acceptable or needed killing. They determined whether a case merited advanced adjudication, banishment, termination, or some alternative.
Other than the New Society and the Founder, the governor and Council were the powers on the Pontibus. They alone could take extreme measures for acts against the Planet. The security force could not suspend Habeas corpus, except during insurrection or invasion. A special tribunal in the Council handled treason & conspiracy with alien forces cases. The Council allowed no bills of attainder, ex post facto or any other written laws. They bestowed no titles of nobility.
The Company was alert to position-holder or role model corruption. They ferreted it out and investigated every accusation to the extent of the allegation. The security force dealt with each infraction as if three capital violations occurred. Should a Council member or judge be guilty of a grave anti-planetary or human crime, the governor himself took responsibility for the offender. Either banishment or termination was the sole option.
“Position holders must be held to a higher standard than other residents,” Mr. Frye said. “We must never let our own controls degenerate to even the appearance of the level of First-Surface pols.”
The High Court acknowledged all individual violent acts and their perpetrators. Having the accused’s needs unmet to such a degree was inexcusable. To be insufficient enough to feel a need for brutal behavior meant a gross inadequacy in the system. The courts tried these alleged individual offenders for questions of fact alone. Apologies, psychological assistance, education, or re-education answered most transgressions.
The Council instructed defendants in how to help, forgive, or change the system. Recidivism meant cantilever labor, banishment, or humane destruction. Recidivists, unconvinced their repetitive actions caused more harm to biomass than help, required termination. If the system was incapable of ever insuring compliance, there was no equivocating. The Council acknowledged their inadequacy and asked forgiveness of their victim.
The “ultimate solution” was at the incorrigible’s option. It consisted of an act of contrition by the Company, an apology to the perpetrator (victim) and his or her family. The individual became beneficial to the Pontibus as nutrient material. Such draconian measures never happened under an appearance of punishment. The High Court made it clear that the action was because they knew of no better alternative.
Council and Company regulated all near space. In the event of conflicting opinion, the governor decided the issue. The system solved the uncertainty of periodic unemployment. Every human being became a valuable part of the whole. As fast as the bridges grew, there was always a dearth of humans.
Runaway deficit spending, residuum of the old nation-states and the Rothschild banks, never materialized. Without authoritative written laws and a corrupt court system, professional lawyers disappeared. If they would not leave, willingly, the Company treated them as recidivists. Lawyers became Civil Court judges or secretaries to the new judges or they changed professions. Legal parasitism on human endeavor ended. Allowing no politicians, the Council never encountered problems with drug interdiction. That, plus the ban on pesticides, slashed crime & disease to 10% of former levels. People no longer were carrion for cancer. Until banned entirely, doctors became emergency-room physicians or second-class citizens.
Mr. Frye asked. “Why allow doctors? Most are merchants of false hope or just technicians & promoters for deceitful drug companies. Even if successful, they fail by perpetuating disease, human weakness, misfits, overpopulation, resource exhaustion, and myriads of misconceptions. They wallow in sewers of fear, misery, and compassion, looking down on their betters. They might as well be Christians! Doctors, lawyers, fiduciaries, bankers, religionists, etc. all prey on the weak & vulnerable.
“Ridding the world of demon doctors will not succeed without also eradicating their master, the Devil, i.e. pharmaceutical companies.” Mr. Otorp said.
Lester agreed and commissioned him to solve the problem. Company biochemists soon began looking into all existing chemicals. They proscribed most medicines. People needed to recover fast from any transient illnesses. Medical chemistry touched very few. Lester allowed just those medicines that held benign side effects, reduced pain or made people well in a short time period. He outlawed possession of chronic illnesses and their accouterments. Those feeling a desire to behave so would need to leave the Pontibus for treatment.
The Company representative said. “The majority of pharmaceuticals are poisons or clear deception. As with the medical profession, we will allow just emergency and short-term use. Each one must pass the scrutiny of our scientists before coming onto the bridges.
Just because a First-Surface profession was socially acceptable, even admired, did not make it honorable. The Company gave them all rigid scrutiny. Honor belonged to the missioned noble. Most people were not noble, having little right to survive. Only those with missions possessed that right. Missions contrary or opposed called for war.
Curiously, Mr. Frye never proscribed dentists, saying. “Nature made an egregious mistake, allowing fish scales to evolve into teeth. Humeral immune system components deal with microbial infections inadequately, when seawater is not in residence. Man cannot very well return his teeth to a marine environment.” He went on to say. “The poor dentist gives pain all day to relieve pain. He receives but filthy lucre for his time and odious job. Let him be.”
As for other professionals, he said. “True crime is not having a mission. Doctors & lawyers assisting the missionless are accessories to crime. They make the world an ugly place, helping missionless people survive. Allow them here to destroy what few healthy humans the world has? No! Keep them out of our lives.”
In time, he relented somewhat. The Concern allowed emergency doctors for accident cases. In his limited reprieve, Lester said. “Many people fear death. Fear renders doctors unmerited esteem, causing transactional neuroses to develop. As long as I am around, doctors will never again get the chance to starve healthy children to death. Resources wasted on dead-end cases, because of the status rendered hospitals & doctors, ends here & now. Hunger from similar such causes shall never bring war to the bridges.”
Someone brought up the issue of doctors relieving suffering, and the Founder replied. “At the century’s turn the USA possessed the world’s finest existing health recovery service. It also was the world’s greatest polluter. That hospital capacity existed just to stay ahead of normal exotic & wonderful diseases incident upon that pollution. You talk about suffering. Good or bad? The case is against the doctors. Life would cease to exist without suffering. It’s usually self-induced and a way of teaching us natural morality. Doctors are irrelevant midwives to misery that cost the planet way too much.”
He then showed films of Central American kwashiorkor & Ebo children’s bellies. Someone asked why the Company didn’t allow doctors and lawyers, and just tax them heavily for their heinous attributes. Lester replied. “That begins to sound very much like the welfare scam on the First-Surface. The swindle hurt everyone but deadbeats and the professionals. Aberrations like socialism, communism, Christianity, etc. come about from having too many sub-humans chasing too few resources. It won’t happen here. Emperor Aloirav deposed that commie Pope for good reason.”
Exhaustive testing of aptitudes and desires started from birth. Once tentatively determined, trained individuals delivered an explanation to the ascertained. Electronically tabulated and exchanged exercise of abilities then met future needs. Each person found fulfillment in work and other aspects of life. The need to accumulate for economic survivability virtually ended. Protection of personal DNA and social-cultural species education assured individual immortality to the extent possible.
The Founder believed that most social aberrations manifested through ignorance. He and the Council made great efforts to counter it. They insured each resident consumed as much knowledge and nutrition as possible. In such a manner, residents determined their own mission in life. Some were not willing to accept the system. They found their own way to the First-Surface or got help doing so. Those not willing to accept Lester’s rules, and not wanting to leave, encountered insurmountable obstacles.
Zifcan, a famous practitioner of frivolous medicine, is a case in point. He came to the Fourth Level with his hangers-on. He wanted to open a large ocean-view facility for his wealthy sick patients. Lester asked him to leave, even offering to reimburse him for his investment. Zifcan refused, thinking he was still on the past decadent democratic First Surface. Mr. Frye equivocated. Rav intervened. Zifcan lost his practice . . . all of them.

The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues. Rene’ Descartes

Chapter Forty-One

First-Surface world government moved to Brussels. Countenancing no equal, Emperor Aloirav was nearly supreme on Earth. Except for the Pontibus, the Commission, the surviving Bilderbergers and 13 illuminati families, and a few Asiatic Mountain holdouts, his political power was absolute.
One would think such a situation would make any megalomaniac happy. However, it was not to be. His self-esteem wrestled with the death of his legal wife, son, and Mr. Castle. The fatal bullets’ locations made it appear Francis shot the two in response to their hostile fire. Appearances indicated a plan to coerce the bioweapon siege’s lifting by taking the Aloirav family hostage.
With time for reflection now, the “boss” let it consume ever-greater portions of his mind. He wasn’t ready to believe one way or another regarding the dealer’s loyalty. The Empress made him see the possibility Heinz was involved. She now headed “Group” investigators, poring over old-government records to get at the truth.
Mr. Aloirav felt personal shame at the breach in loyalty. After the incident occurred, guilt and grief plagued him for days. He found no peace from lingering questions and implications. Answers the Emperor did receive made it even more unsettling, indicating unknown traitors in his organization. Then they discovered the letter.
“We found this in Fort Detrick’s archives yesterday.” The Empress said, handing him the document.

General Trilate, Dugway Proving Ground, Utah – Corey – Senator, Ways & Means. 746-2 – H

After reading it, he asked. “Are you surprised?”
“No.” Ms. Gold replied. “Are you?”
“No. Written confirmation. I guess our little plan worked.”
“Yah, we were looking for documents bearing Corey’s name.” She replied, gesturing to the letter. “Bingo…Not that it helps much.”
“Oh, it does. More than you know. It makes one traitor, for sure. It just doesn’t let Francis off the hook.”
“No, and it doesn’t lead to any others. Nobody ever heard of General Trilate.”
They were both silent with concern for a while, until Mr. Aloirav resumed. “George Merck started Fort Dietrick for FDR. In 1969 Nixon trashed it, and despite his biological weapons’ quasi-halt in 1968 and signing the 1972 ban, research continued. Reagan spent 42 million at 24 universities to acquire some biogoodies. But, when Dugway resumed testing in 1993, I wondered what was going on. Who’s the enemy, I thought? The Cold War ended. I had suspicions.”
“Who?”
“Us.”
“No!”
“I couldn’t prove anything, so I just watched.”
“Why didn’t they simply arrest us and be done with it?”
“You don’t understand. I was speaking of all of “us”. Not just the New Society.” The whole goddam world.”
“What?!”
“It sounds wild. Did to me too. Thought I was getting paranoid…until Heinz passed our test.”
“How did that clarify things?”
“Being unreliable to the US government didn’t seem to damage him. So, I felt he was free-lancing his thefts. I didn’t know where his buyers were. But, it was clear. Either the pols couldn’t stop us or they didn’t want us stopped. Heinz was bringing them my bugs. I was doing their work for them.”
“No!”
“Oh, yes. That CIA letter gave me some trouble. It appeared so genuine.”
“Too genuine.”
“I don’t know. You knew I sent people to follow him.”
“I was in the room.”
“Yah. It was very complicated. You put a chain on a man or animal & he develops the desire to run. I didn’t want that. We watched him on the qui vive for years. I know almost every bug he could’ve delivered. We have the vaccines. He stole some of our defectives. He got a good one now’n then, but no more than 1% of our arsenal.”
“Why’d you let it continue?”
“Like Hansel & Gretel’s bread crumbs, I wanted to find out where they were going.”
“Did you?”
“Sort of.
“So…where?”
“The biggest assassin of the US Constitution after the President, Congress and the Supreme Court.”
“NSA? (National Security Agency)”
“Yup. In 1996, their annual budget was 8 billion. 100,000 NSA monitors perused every electronic message in the world, many written ones. They recorded every electronic communication entering and leaving the US. Did since the 1970’s that I know of. I don’t know why that Snowden fellow got so much publicity. It seemed to me that everything he divulged was already old news.”
“But I still don’t understand why the US government needed such devastating weapons against the world’s population.”
“They didn’t!”
“But, Rav…”
“Who owned the NSA, Gloria?”
“Multinationals?”
“The biggest. Plus, the 13 families and other illuminati. Some, like the Papacy, are over 1800 years old.”
“Why kill their golden goose? They’re making trillions off living people. Even the very poorest.”
“Almost true. They’re not making money off people. People are their agents. They’re death worshippers. Their business is caedere, turning living things into dead things. An unmitigated success. I needed to put the Pope to the rack to find out the extent of their planning. His commie propaganda notwithstanding, the monkey was an accumulator. They knew, long before we took over, the oceans and the rainforests were dying. Wouldn’t last any longer than their oil reserves. Soon the only purveyors of living things would be bridges-by-Lester and them. With no food, water, or energy, even bigs are at risk. They have the stored food, but they’re security freaks. Starving people attack, dead don’t. Besides, it’s just another recession to them – some lay-offs. Hell, who wouldn’t do it? With right and wrong as plastic as a pol’s backbone, it’s quite reasonable. Not like it’s without precedent. Human history’s replete with orgies of death worshipping genocide. Jews, Greeks, Romans, Tatars, Mongols, Albanians, Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, England, Hitler, Stalin, USA… all tried to cast out their fellows. Extermination’s understandable. Of what value are poor subhumans? That’s why it’s so concerning. In the past, logistics always stopped the killing, not decency. Contemporary decency always condoned it! England, in the tradition of Cecil J. Rhodes, chose to starve the civilized Dutch and pander to savage blacks. The Dutch were their brothers! Logistics isn’t a concern with biological weapons and vaccines. Except for themselves and their slaves, Earth’s wealthiest families plan to wipe out the world!”
“But we’re in power. They can’t do anything now.”
“I may be Emperor & King, Gloria, but my power is qualified. It’s political. Theirs is economic. The two types are interchangeable, but only to a point.”
“What point?”
“Governments prize 4 special cardinal virtues, my love. These character attributes are: concupiscence, betrayal, cowardice, and stupidity. Democracies, tantamount to anarchy, hold these four virtues as sacrosanct. Humans, those who produce, do not prize such virtues. They value integrity, discipline, loyalty, intelligence, which have no place in a democracy. Governments like to force all people to pay taxes to support their four virtues. The pols hire thugs, generally sub-humans with personal axes to grind, to collect them. Persons of substance do not like to pay taxes.”
“Taxes destroy substance.”
“Very true. There is no room in a democracy for character. Pols try to tax it to death. Producers hire experts to help their cause. $40K/year government gangsters cannot hope to best these experts. So, the $40K guys search banks for their betters’ money hiding places. When they find it, they steal it. The more they steal the better they feel.”
“Governments even give them $200 annual raises to reward these efforts.”
“That they do. Wealthy people understand such tactics, however, and do not use regular banks for this very reason. Only little people do. The poor and moderately wealthy pay, and pay, and pay, because they’ve nowhere to run. Pol appetites are voracious. Taxes are never enough for them. They print paper money, counterfeiting the promise of Au, to cover their shortfall. Few are aware that all the Au in Fort Knox does not support even one hundred thousandth of a cent of the country´s specie. Other money systems around the world are similarly bogus. Paper money is essentially just a mnemonic device in Rothschild’s fantasy world. Accountants and banks with computers control and monitor the counterfeit Au. But even that is forfeit to the pol’s tax tribute.”
“Where does money go to hide from the pols?”
“There are many places. None is safer than a fruit jar buried in the garden. But it does not suit everyone.”
“So where?”
“Your best friend.”
“You?!”
“Diamonds, Gloria.”
“Really?”
“Let me explain.”
“Okay.”
“Since the de Beers conceived it, there have always been 2 diamond markets in the world, illegal and legal. World currencies are like the diamond markets. Most power does not rest in the hands of “titans of industry”, as many believe. It is but effected through them, quasi legal. Real power rests in a fantasy world of faith. Faith in computers & paper. We can compare it to the illegal diamond trade.”
“I’m beginning to see.”
“Many people do not know about the real power structure, even though it dwarfs the first. Like the illegal diamond market, it exists quasi-unknown. It superimposes exponentially on paper faith and warehoused Au. This ancient hawala system grew out of a prehistoric Semitic need for safe transferring of currency. It quickly became another way of protecting assets from pol depredation. Underpinning and circumscribing the financial world, it sits at the very top of wonderland.”
“Wonderland?”
“The Semitic controlled financial structure of our society. World counterparts of Brazil’s Messer and his friend Favel (Svetch’s little boy), symbolize the quintessence of hawala. Four close walls circumscribe their quasi-human wire-world. Lives here consist of 24 hours spent in remembering credits and debits quickly jotted down on small pieces of paper. Amounts, which so expand the sanctioned paper pyramid, not even the most delusional paranoid could imagine. Adolph Hitler was not a lunatic. He knew where the power lay, and he went after it. His mistake was in losing himself, chasing its mirage. The little Semites, he persecuted, were as much victims of Rothschild’s hawala as the descendants of Ham & Japheth.”
“A computer hacker could not possibly destroy world financial organization?”
“No. Only its legal structure. Remember 2001? The Ishmael-Semitic cartel wanted to wake the world up to certain flaws in the fantasy system.”
“The twin towers?”
“Yes. They chose not to hit the fantasy hawala network. If they had really wanted to cause a great defenestrating, they would have bombed all the jewelers’ buildings in financial capitals around the world. That would, however, have pissed off their Issac-Semitic brothers. They also didn’t want to destabilize the world’s financial cradle while they rocked within it. The Ishmael-Semitic cartel, instead, hit but a show target. ”
“Maniacs.”
“No. They got scooped, and used. The Ishmael-Semitic cartel was not simply a lawless mania. Make no mistake. Flaws existed. They had an objective. Think back 3000 – 6000 years. The rest of the human race found solace at night huddled in glorified holes. Not our Jewish & Arabic ancestors. They were studying. They mapped the stars, wrote poetry, and used mathematics long, long ago. They were experimenting with demon Law, these sons of Shem, while the rest of the world mindlessly swung through treeless savannahs.”
“And you’re now saying that….”
“They, not I, still control the economic power.”
“I understand.”
“One does not easily destroy in a few years what took thousands of years to perfect.”
“OK, I understand. Go on with your story.”
“Well. As long as I was following Heinz’ movements, I never discovered who the principals were. I kept coming up with names like this General Trilate. They go nowhere.”
“Not very original is he? Speaking of Heinz. Have you seen him?”
“No.”
“Nobody else has either.”

The continuing strain set the Emperor to spending more time in his lab, alone. He left Ms. Gold in charge of the other matters. She became quite visible as Empress when the Emperor went on his sanitizing campaigns. Once, with his army in the former Russian steppes, hoping to destroy recalcitrants, a 1990 report fell into his hands. A gift from Lester, it included a description of an old Siberian peasant habit, along with other odd practices of mushroom lore.
Their practice of eating the dried fungal carpophores with vodka, he found interesting. They did so believing in its properties of allowing conversations with the dead. After garnering information from locals, the Emperor learned that one or more of a group would ingest the material and sicken. The rest waited for the afflicted to urinate. Then, they drank the resulting liquid.
The second group thereby avoiding a similar nausea, except perhaps long ex post facto for obvious reasons. The delirium, inebriation, and mania following ingestion resulted in sensual derangement and a death-like sleep. Profuse perspiration and hallucinations accompanied the state. Taking a sabbatical from biological weapon’s research, the “boss” began working with the “soma”. A year after the World fell at his feet he began collecting large quantities of Amanita muscaria from around the world.
The Emperor left the steppes and returned to his new Brussels laboratory. There he continued to acquire the carpophores. Despite his ardent desire to know what happened to his family and Francis, he didn’t believe in the mushroom’s purported power to talk with the dead. That wasn’t his research objective. Mr. Aloirav’s motives were twofold.
He hoped to find something, an intuitive knowledge, in the chemically induced quasi-séance to assuage his nagging uneasiness. Another incentive grew out of his former research, where he often encountered optically different molecules. The Emperor developed a concept about other possible existences than our own. Some unknown dimension could be using biomolecules of the alternate optical rotation. In so doing, he felt, it might be virtually invisible to us. Perhaps the dead were only dead in one optical rotation, still existing in the other, hiding in retinal blind spots. Death could be just a translation process. Ghosts and such being incomplete transfer of optical attributes.
One day, nearly 4 years after conquering the World, he was working alone in the European lab. Leaving his desk, the Emperor went over to the dried mushrooms soaking on the table. The biochemical-isolating process was routine. Extracting ibotenic amino acid and its decarboxylation product, muscimol, from the carpophores was simple but tedious. Hydrated and in solution, an ethanol and mild acid wash followed.
These fungal chemicals were good molecular probes to research GABA receptors. They could excite and sedate spinal neurons. The first purification step of the endeavor neared completion. He was used to the operation. After chopping up the carpophores, the “boss” would pop them into an ethanol-water azeotrope.
Letting the mixture lixiviate for a few hours, he would filter, etc. Slicing the last one, Mr. Aloirav threw it into the alcohol-water vat. The chunks were all boiling on the bench. Back at his desk, a few of the white-spotted red-capped mushrooms lay beside his research notebook. Picking one up, he scrutinized it before making a notation.
Amanita muscaria is “the fly agaric” (due to its capacity to attract and kill insects). The rare fungus is somewhat poisonous to certain people. It never attained the popularity of the Psilocybes and Panaeoli as a recreational hallucinogenic drug. The mushroom has been “studied” for thousands of years. It may very well be responsible for the oldest and most popular religions in the World. Ancient literature indicates Man using it for nearly four millennia. Hindu scriptures and Near Eastern religions, alluding to it, go back even earlier. Sounds and visions encountered while experiencing the death-like trances are quite poignant. Many believe these circumstances relate to religion’s superstitious thoughts and beliefs.
The Emperor also once tried a few. They made him sick, as expected, and he didn’t repeat the adventure. According to his notes, the “boss” experienced what the ancient priests and Siberian peasants must have discovered. On one particular page of his notebook, he wrote:
“The typical vision was a phantasmagoric of aromatic hydrocarbons. Myriads of benzene rings surrounded me. At times, they entered my head. I speculate that the effective agent holds perceptual protection mechanisms in abeyance. If so, the phenomenon allowed my total sphere of stimuli, internal and external, to enter. There seemed to exist no hampering by tissue concerned with psychic gating mechanisms. “
From that point on, Mr. Aloirav tried finding a more comfortable means for employing the organism. His objective was to develop tools to investigate psychic-neural functions and the biochemical processes governing them. He believed human “personality” to be an ephemeral hitchhiker on our parasitically controlled organism. Mr. Otorp proved it in the Meinholtz case. Chemical traces alone can have large affects in psychic and mental processes.
The boiling mushrooms now filled the alcohol-water container to the brim. Concerned about them boiling over, the Emperor left his desk to reduce the heat under the pot. He adjusted the rheostat knob and bent down to move an empty mushroom bag. Doing so, the open sleeve of his lab coat caught the corner of the heating mechanism. That movement upset the hot solution.
The “boss” reacted fast but ineptly. Perhaps he was bored, tired, or preoccupied with unsettling memories. Maybe it was from being too close, too long, in the proximity of boiling ethanol. For whatever reason, the man did not steady the pot as intended. Instead, he made the situation even more perilous, because the vat fell.
Averse to grabbing the hot container with bare hands, Mr. Aloirav’s inappropriate action failed. Springing toward his entire day’s work, he watched it fall onto the lab bench and break. As it did, his undirected hand hit the corner of the bench. The hot wet surface allowed the momentum of the Emperor’s hand to carry forward. Uncontrolled, it flew fast, distal to the connected body. More horizontal than vertical, he leaned without support.
Catapulting to the floor, the “boss” went down fast. He struck his head against the centrifuge apposite the lab bench and then the floor’s hard tile. The twin blows knocked him senseless. His consciousness left, taking his lucidity with it.
The rest of the story, as to the day’s events, is conjecture. Lester made biochemical tests, observed the data, and spoke later with prison psychologists. Along with Gloria’s observations, he speculated on what happened.
The hot liquid continued pouring over the side of the bench. It went onto the floor and all around the unconscious man. As of yet, the solution’s chemical contents were more than neurobiological tools. Albeit in a crude state, they were neurotoxic agents. The compounds showed molecular similarity to the insecticides pantherine and agarin. Narcosis potentiating, in structure the drugs were close to kainic acid. Along with the ethanol, these were not desirable chemicals to have traveling in large doses through one’s body.
His cotton lab coat’s wicking action absorbed the hot liquid. The material assimilated the solution. It crudely filtered and kept the concentrated fluid in close proximity to Mr. Aloirav’s skin and lungs. He lay motionless for about two hours. Only extracted mushroom shells, scattered around in disarray, accompanied him. The concussion sustained made the Emperor oblivious to the pain. The hot liquid and later the cold from the tile floor made no impression. The room grew silent except for his breathing. The rattle of rodents in cages on the nearby animal rack broke the monotony. Bathed in muscimol and ibotenic acid, he aspirated much of the remaining ethanol-dissolved vapor constituents.
The Hesperides elixir may have saved his life. It seems that the more man tries to find tranquility and peace by controlling his environment, the further he removes himself from them. Perhaps Heisenberg could give us answers here. Whatever. The exact mechanism producing the subsequent bizarre effect in the Emperor is unknown. No reports of the phenomenon’s repetition exist. Whether it was oxygen deprivation, ethanol, or the GABA agonist’s irreversible neuroexitatory activity, nobody seems to know. It may even have been something volatile the “boss” added but hadn’t yet mentioned in his notebook. Subsequent chromatographic analysis of blood samples detected no substance, alone or in concert, definitively responsible.
Whatever it was, he changed. The man’s cortical DNA underwent a remarkable transmogrification. While unconscious, he experienced perceptive-conceptive faculty degeneration. Concomitantly, his psychological memory regressed into retrograde genetic memory. That recollection translated further into a state of flux. Such a state approximated an immune system’s potentiating capacity.
Due to realizing certain mutations, Mr. Aloirav began to actuate abnormal facets of his perceptive faculties. These aberrant changes were not compatible with the human psyche, as we know it. He also lost other aspects of discernment. Apprehensions, the Emperor felt, even in his as yet unconscious state, were unworthy. They were those ordinarily preempted by brain vigilance. Schizophrenics and persons taking hallucinogenic drugs experience such sensations.
Histamines and adrenaline, rushing around his body, transported him into a world never before experienced. The realm, he enjoyed, became similar to that of mammalian species first arising from their forbears. It was somewhere in the Mesozoic between the Jurassic and the Cretaceous Periods. During that interval in time, Aegiaiodon DNA began terminally differentiating into Holoclemensia and Pappotherium.
Here, the “boss’s” chaotic cortical activity resumed some of its former ordered state. The recapitulated command, however, was the simple premammal mandate from one hundred million years ago. What he encountered was a complete perceptual gating regression, a mental reversal of ontogeny. Mr. Aloirav went down, instead of up, the evolutionary ladder of accretion to modern cognition. In short, he became a “beast of the field”, in every sense of the word. Having lost the capacity to conceptualize, the Emperor was now a modern-day Nebuchadnezzar, (Bible: Daniel: 4:32).
Regaining “consciousness”, he sensed frightening stimuli. Rising to hands and knees, the “insane” man’s body wanted to rebel. Crushing head pain wracked the agony of burned skin. That didn’t bother him as much as did a sense of lurking danger. Looking about, he saw nothing usual, nothing familiar.
Then, recognizing somewhat familiar creatures on the animal rack behind him, the “boss” quadripedaled closer. The smell and action there left him overwhelmed with a strange sense of foreboding. Unaware of bipedal locomotion, he scampered toward a corner of the room. Neglecting to find relief there from his trepidation, Mr. Aloirav’s knees lifted. He scurried to another corner of the lab. Such behavior continued, until the Emperor found a dark area under a bench. That space afforded some respite from his enveloping fear.
He spent an hour in the semi-darkness, motionless. Then the “boss” peered out from behind the bench. Seeing nothing customary other than distant Rodentia relatives, he jerked back, quivering in the shadows. In time, the caged mice effected calm upon him. The creatures didn’t seem discomfited by their situation. Hours passed, and the lab became dark except for the red standby lights on the equipment.
With the onset of darkness, the man felt safer. He explored the lab, formerly as familiar as curves on the Empress’s body. Moving around the 1,000 square foot room, the fellow stopped every foot to listen and smell.
After a day or so, a door opened and lights came on. He scrambled back to safety under the bench, remaining there all night. Strange noises and smells came to him during that period. Then other noises. . . .“Rav, Rav? What’s happening? What are you doing? …Oh, no!… Oh, my god,… no! No! No! No!”

Mr. Frye walked into the lab. She remained in the doorway, crying. Seeing the deranged man cringing under the DCC chromatograph machine, he realized Ms. Gold was right. The Emperor was non compos mentis. They needed to do something.
Getting him to a safe area was essential. The man required protection from himself and any arising opportunistic political contingencies. He was helpless. The Founder and Gloria got Bacon, Carl, and some other trusted agents to capture him. Restrained and subdued, the Emperor arrived on the Pontibus.
There he remained, while they watched and treated his dementia. Lester was very concerned the state of affairs might worsen. He could imagine his Pontibus disintegrating, as the New Society devoured itself. With enlightened self-interest, Mr. Frye enlisted the Empress’s help. Together, they spirited records away from the world laboratories.
If the frantic efforts were more to save the Founder’s own skin than to help the “boss”, it is understandable. Lester was too deeply involved in the negative aspects of the “Group”, as well as the positive. Protecting the Company also fit Gloria’s needs, and she helped. They sequestered every ledger, research document, and hard drive tending to implicate. Lester also hid all the vaccines. He found no vectors.
Mr. Aloirav alone knew their whereabouts. He kept that information in three separately located encrypted laptops. Mr. Frye collected these computers and put them in a pressurized cache, hidden in one of the Pontibus’ wildernesses. Then, as he feared, notwithstanding all their precautions, word leaked out about the King. After 48 months of purges, old-governments still contained elements hostile to New Society rule.
Never acclimatized to the regime, Rothschild’s agents and investigators stormed the Brussels headquarters. They demanded to speak with him. The Empress tried dissuading them to no avail. Special illuminati envoys went to the “boss’s” Pontibus sanctuary. There, he soon revealed his incapacity to continue as the World’s first Autocrat. Gloria couldn’t raise the force of will on her own to act as regent for their heirs. No long history adorned them, making sovereign mental incompetence understandable, as in leading European families.
Hooked on contemporary morality, the Founder was too kind and insufficiently ruthless to help. The kingdom disintegrated as it materialized, very fast. The vengeful World restrained and stripped the upstart of all his power. One by one the countries overthrew their recent overlords and reinstated local political riffraff. The former Emperor disarmed his vassals shortly after assuming absolute power. None could mount a defense. Many countries imprisoned the now powerless New Society people.
Others destroyed them. Ms. Gold was always so visible; they treated her with even more harshness than Mr. Aloirav. Japanese, South Africans, and Argentineans clamored for her skin. Not inclined to pardon the past’s persecution of their “profession”, remaining lawyers were reluctant to defend her.
Gloria’s legal costs alone were a tremendous drain on the “Group’s” treasury. When she exhausted her resources, the fallen Empress turned to Mr. Frye. Lester needed to keep the Pontibus, Company, and himself safe from world vengeance. It meant he must also defend the ex-Emperor & family and, by extension, the New Society on the qui vive. The fact the ex-Emperor received a life sentence, instead of death, indicates how insane they found him. It also indicates, somewhat, how much Lester spent to accomplish everything. Over the years, Mr. Frye gave hundreds of trillions of dollars to First-Surface lawyers, politicians, and the media. Dehistorization and never finding biological weapons in anyone’s possession helped.
Larry and Jason, with their wives, children, and grandchildren, managed to remain undetected by the mob. They never escaped the stigmata of having such ancestry, however. Some progeny fled society completely. When all investigations and trials were over, all the First-Surface governments were back in control. Without disposable resources to continue its former frenetic growth, the Pontibus languished. Atmospheric ozone layer resumed its relentless thinning. Global warming returned.
Releasing the “boss” from the mental institution, they decreed him competent to undergo the semblance of a trial. Penitentiary imprisonment began upon his return to sanity. He later co-existed with many former cohorts in the same prison. New administrations tried getting the Founder to separate them. There were too many, however. It was impossible to know all the interconnections. The ex-Queen went to Spandau, Germany to await hanging.
In a dingy First-Surface room of Hotel Bristol in Luxembourg, alone and unknown, lay aged Carl. A phony Cinza passport clutched in his hand, asking for Mr. Aloirav, he breathed his last. A few days prior, doctors said they never before saw lung cancer at so advanced a stage. How could he have remained living so long with a condition so extreme?
A doctor questioned Carl, in a rare lucid interval, asking the old man his age and what kind of drug he was taking. Carl just smiled, having drunk his last cup of special tea long ago. They confiscated all his assets. What they found fit in his cardboard coffin with him, prior to his cremation. There were original copies of each New Society pamphlet distributed and a photo of himself with the “boss”. He held an inscribed fired .30 cal. M1 round in his hand. The faithful old man died knowing it was not a biological weapon that caused his demise.
Bacon and a few other New Society officers managed to get to Dr. Cinza before capture. On short order, they acquired new passports and financed new lives. Heinz wasn’t hurt much. A month after testifying, he left Danbury, Connecticut’s country club prison. Then, he disappeared.
Lester fended off allegations that the Pontibus was New Society property. He needed to show the Company was his own asset. The ultimate cost of extricating himself, Corporation, and Pontibus Council from the clandestine organization’s corpse was immense. Platinum, gold, and diamonds in bribes and legal fees left the sky for years. Not just politicians required suborning. Survivors and media conglomerates each wanted their pounds of flesh. Lester was no greater friend to lawyers than was Rav Aloirav, and they took their own pounds of flesh.
Mr. Frye never got completely free of the tribute, and it drained the biosustainability initiative. Most of his travail did end however with final tenders accepted & paid. He buried the New Society and its very bad but fading memory. Cantilevers from the North Atlantic Pontibus and the equatorial bridge joined over Tenerife. The entire structure now received the name of LUZ. LUZ is the subject of the next episode of The Pontibus Journal.
The Company built a special speech platform 8,000 feet over the mid-Atlantic for the dedication ceremony. The module attached to it became the Founder’s new home. In time, he would see tropical rainforest surround and isolate him. Just plants, animals, sky, and ocean, framed in tetrahedrons, as far as the eye could see. Dignitaries from every country in the world arrived days in advance to witness the momentous occasion. Pontibus guest-modules filled to capacity. The World listened.
A few clouds passed below him, as Lester rose to make the following speech. “Those of us living here are destined to give our lives to new space. We pledge our honor and our fortune to its perpetuity. In order to limit Man’s power to alienate and destroy life, we created this Community. To insure peace and union between Homo and all the other life forms, we now exist. To make our individual and separate worlds come together, we strive. To protect all types of protoplasm, we have established our New World.
The Pontibus always was, always shall be, intended to promote liberty for all life and its progeny. Never again must a generation achieve security by borrowing on the security of the next. Life creates its various forms with unequal adaptability. Sometimes, for peculiar arrangements of DNA . . . life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are strained. When such a condition obtains, other DNA arrangements are obliged to rectify the situation.
Redress must remain of paramount interest. It is of utmost importance we understand and internalize that concept. Should the Pontibus Council ever deviate from such a course, we must redirect it to that goal. It is Man’s purpose via these bridges to guarantee “weaker” species a place in the sun. If a Supreme Being exists, it either does not care or is mani-sadistic. Man is his own God. Nature gave Man more, and it is from Man that more is required. We shall will the safety and happiness of all life. It shall be our beacon. We live in a world without order, ruled by Chaos. We exist only because we are perverse.”
Mr. Frye stepped away from the podium. The ceremony ended. It took a while for the cantilever to clear. Evening came as the final guests passed out of sight. The sun dropped from the horizon behind Barbados 1000 miles west. Silence reigned supreme in the pre-wilderness region.  A light wind carried a few smells of lower-level vegetation to the edge of the platform.  Here he now stood, looking out over the ocean at the last tint of orange. His vision blurred. The Founder imagined himself walking on a beach, holding a small hand. No one saw the glistening of moisture under his eyes. Lester Frye was … alone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our duty as men is to proceed as if limits to our ability did not exist. We are collaborators in creation.
Teilhard de Chardin

THE END

(The Pontibus Journal continues with LUZ-BETHEL in ROOM 2B THE PONTIBUS JOURNAL 3

 

Now that you’ve read Variola’s Revenge, you’ve shared my vision of a great habitat bridge for all life. Carbon taxes and other draconian measures to stop global warming will kill a billion people in the 3^rd and 4^th world. Rothschild et al may kill billions more in democides or engineered simian plagues. If you know of anyone that might wish to make a film out of Variola’s Revenge or a YouTube promotion of The Pontibus Journal please ask them to consider it. It might be just the assist we need to save the human race from genocide or an ecological collapse. Could there be any better way to fill your last moments on Earth than with the knowledge that you did your best to save our planet? I’m down to my last buck and getting old. We can’t wait much longer. Contact me at aloirav@gmail.com.  Do not come visiting unannounced.  I am still a fugitive from Rothschild et al. From time to time ill-wishers come looking for me in Amazonia. You may kill me of fright if you do not advise me first of your impending visit. A bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon would be a great help.

 

Larry Lee Slot

Copyright © 1995 by Larry L. Slot
Paperbound edition published 2000
Copyright © renewed 2004 by Larry L. Slot
Revised edition published 2005
Copyright © renewed 2010 by Larry L. Slot
Revised edition published digitally in 2010 by Astri – Amanayara Press
Revised edition published digitally in 2013 by Astri – Amanayara Press
Revised edition published digitally in 2014 by Astri – Amanayara Press

Revised edition published digitally in 2015 by Astri – Amanayara Press
Andirobal, Maranhao, Brazil
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