by Adam Felber
Leonardo da Vinci dies in hiding. His last invention is the video camera, which he gives to the Templars who’ve been keeping him alive all these years. They start shooting their secret Archive.
In China, Ming was the Thing and pottery was all the rage. The Empress commissioned the world’s first vibrator, which was ceramic and required fourteen slaves to power it with cleverly designed pedals. It was installed at the Summer Palace, and by August you couldn’t find a mah-jongg game within fifty miles of the place.
All right, ladies, I’ve got to go find some lunch elsewhere. Harvard Square is crawling with robots.
“Scientists should never philosophize,” said Dr. Schrödinger, biting into his sandwich, unconcerned with the viscous mess spilling out the other end. “We should know better. But we can’t help ourselves.”
We were dining by ourselves, and then, suddenly, we were dining with the doctor, watching him fling his cape over a chair and overturn his top hat, now stuffed with currency. He seemed jaunty, almost robust, a marked contrast to the wraithlike and tedious blatherer of a few days before. We were, shockingly, faintly glad to see him, even though he had ordered without thereupon directing the waitress to us, and she promptly saved herself the trouble by ignoring us entirely, leaving us without any sort of meal for the moment.
“See, we scientists don’t know anything more about the meaning of existence than anyone else. But we know people will listen. We’re ‘qualified.’ But whenever a man of science steps out and makes sweeping pronouncements about life’s mysteries, he inevitably says something extraordinarily dumb and accidentally brands himself a Nazi or a nihilist or worse. Because, of course, human ideas are scientifically inscrutable, despite what they’re screaming about down at Yale or wherever they are these days.”
We tried to summon up some fury, some of that “Dr. S. Must Die” fervor of the night before, but it somehow eluded us. Instead, we made a vaguely encouraging noise.
“So,” said the formerly dorky doctor, “resolved: Scientists should never philosophize.” He took another squelchy bite of his sandwich. “Now, let me tell you something about life….”
INT DARKENED MOVIE THEATER–NIGHT
There’s a large crowd, seated, watching the screen.
On the screen, we see the familiar five-second countdown, an invisible clock hand wiping each numeral away and revealing the next, Then …
We see file footage (all black-and-white) of American flags being waved, parades, and U.S. soldiers marching in perfect unison.
MUSIC: Horn-laden up-tempo military march. Slightly distorted and tinny. Continues throughout.
TITLE: “Movietone Presents”
ANNOUNCER
(excited, authoritative)
Movietone presents …
TITLE: “News on the March”
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
News on the March!
We see (in black-and-white) a farmhouse in the northern U.S., jeans-clad locals patrolling with guns.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
Dateline, Montana. A small group of ranchers declare independence from the United States, proclaiming the Free State of Montana.
MEDIUM SHOT of a few freestanding walls, some with windows.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
These would-be rebels don’t see eye-to-eye with anyone, not even architects, it would seem.
The audience giggles. Onscreen, we see a woman huddled against one of the walls.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
(dripping with disdain,
but still jaunty and positive)
Here’s a hint, madam–your “roof” might have a leak!
The audience laughs outright.
CUT TO a wide shot of soldiers performing exercises on an obstacle course in bright sunlight (in black-and-white, eternally, always in black-and-white).
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
But don’t worry, our soldiers don’t take any threat lightly …
CUT TO a shot of police and military personnel outside of the farmhouse.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
… and Montana’s boys in blue take heart as literally dozens of our boys in green show up to lend a hand.
The audience applauds, chatters. CUT TO a wide shot of the rebels, sparsely placed but implacable.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
Things seem bleak for the ninety- acre nation, as their “president” is already missing and time is running out….
TIGHT SHOT of two young boys playing behind one of the walls.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
Today in class, Johnny’s going to learn about Waco–the hard way!
The crowd guffaws, cheers, applauds.
CUT TO an overhead shot of the Charles River, sunlit (b&w–must we always remind you?).
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
(less serious)
Meanwhile, in Boston, a new craze is sweeping the city …
MEDIUM SHOT of grassy bank, dozens of people holding little black balls.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
… as everyone wants to get their hands on a “Dr. Schrödinger’s Humdinger.” Folks say they’re useful. And fun. These handy little items are made of a single molecule!
We see a man holding a black ball aloft as a small cluster of people gaze in wonder. Followed by a shot of a small girl throwing her little black ball up a few inches and catching it. Followed by a shot of four young men proudly displaying their black balls for the camera.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
These little wonders were just invented by the late physicist Dr. Erwin Schrödinger….
File footage: Dr. Schrödinger with Albert Einstein.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
This brilliant scientist is best known for the invention of your kitties’ litter boxes, and with a second great advance to his credit, he’s sure to make history.
A SHOT of a young Hispanic woman in a satin showgirl’s costume and headdress. She is attempting to smile. She holds a small cigarette-girl’s wooden box supported by a strap around her neck. In the box we see dozens of Humdingers.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
And with a sales force as lovely as this one, no wonder these have rapidly become the best-selling molecule of the century. Anything you say, miss–I’ll take seven!
The audience chortles knowingly, particularly the men. Small children are heard pleading for their very own Humdingers and are quickly hushed.
CUT TO a wide shot of a suburban house. The lawn is covered with young people who are apparently camping out.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
Meanwhile, just up the road, another craze has captivated the public imagination. Are these youngsters part of a cult? Are they stargazing?
We see a young blond man stepping out of the house with a guitar. He starts to play as the crowd extends their arms toward him.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
No, they’re just here to listen to musicland’s latest phenomenon, Johnny Decaté.
PILE FOOTAGE of young women in a variety-show audience, screaming and crying. BACK ON Johnny, smiling and strumming.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
This twentyish troubadour is causing a stir with his growling guitar and his boyish good looks. It’s like Beatlemania for the new century!
CLOSEUP of an ordinary-looking young woman at Johnny’s side.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
But sorry, ladies, he’s already got a girlfriend. I guess love is blind. Plain Janes out there, take heart!
The audience chuckles.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
Besides, this teen craze may not last. Rumor has it that Johnny may or may not have died just twenty-four hours before this film was taken!
WIDE SHOT of lawn, listeners enraptured.
ANNOUNCER (CONT’D)
But whether he’s still with us or not, you’ll hear about it right here, with News on the March!
Marching-band music swells, dopplers grotesquely.
BACK ON
title screen, soldiers marching.
The screen goes white, then black, and the audience gossips excitedly until the feature begins.
Bang.
The President of Montana (On the Lam), having braced himself to remain standing with the shotgun blast’s impact, fell forward into the tall grass. He lay there, hearing groans that he didn’t feel himself making, wondering whether this was because he’d already left his body behind. A voice called his name, full of compassion and concern, oddly familiar….
Slowly, some ideas began to creep into his head. He’d fallen forward; he hadn’t felt any impact; the groaning was coming from somewhere else; he could feel his body….
“Earl? You all right?”
The PoM(OtL) looked up into a distinctly earthbound and friendly face. “Hiya, Deke.”
“You’re not hit, are ya?”
“Seems like I’m not,” said the President, gradually sitting up.
“I am,” came the voice of the Jebedite from several yards away. The Sheriff looked up, his gun still leveled in that direction.
“Serves ya right,” said Deke curtly, then, turning his attention back to the President, “I figured you’d be coming this way.”
“How’d you know I was gone?”
“When Dix started firing warning shots this morning, I knew it wasn’t you in charge anymore. So I just added two and two….”
“Dix fired at you?”
“Warning shots, but yeah. He’s over the edge, Earl.”
“Don’t I know it.”
“Some people are gonna get hurt.”
“Some people are already hurt,” whined a voice from nearby. The Sheriff looked up again.
“That’s what you get,” said the President, starting to feel better, “firing on a peaceful citizen like that.”
“He didn’t actually fire, Earl,” said the Sheriff.
“Well, he was going to….”
“True enough, and I don’t let that kinda shit happen while I’m in charge.”
“Well, you won’t be for long,” said the injured Jebedite, now breathing heavily.
“What?”
“You were trespassing! You’re half a mile onto private property, without a warrant, and you fired on me. And I’m the only one with a right to be here!”
“You were gonna shoot me,” said the President. “He was just keepin’ the peace.”
“Well, he’s gonna have to tell that to the judge, because that’s where I’m gonna take it. Plus, when Jebediah hears about this, he’s gonna be wanted inside and outside the law! You and your family, Sheriff!”
The Sheriff considered this. Finally, he spoke, quietly. “Wow. That wouldn’t’a been a really bright thing to say even if you weren’t completely alone in a field at daybreak.”
“What?” asked the Jebedite, the realization dawning way too slowly. “W-w-wait! Maybe I won’t … You wouldn’t—”
Bang.
“You’re a hard man, Deke.”
“Yeah, I guess. But Jebediah won’t call this in. He never does.”
“That’s not what I—”
“I know. But those Jebedites rub me the wrong way, even if they haven’t declared war on me yet.”
“About that, Deke, I gotta say, I’m really sorry about—”
“Get out of here, Earl. Get to wherever you’re going. Before I see you.”
“Deke …”
“Now.”
The President of Montana (in Exile) rose, brushed himself off, and looked at the Sheriff, who was now staring off at the rising sun. The President began to walk off, turned one last time….
“Love to Barbara, Deke.”
“Yeah.”
Arlene doesn’t want to go home—Furble’s absence would be too much.
Deborah, as always, is fine right where she is.
Grant, as always, is fine right where Deborah is.
Johnny—well, there’s no way to tell. He’s talking less and less.
Besides, they’re kind of trapped here anyway.
After Johnny fainted, and everyone came running, and they woke him up, and his grandmother sent Jack home, and Johnny looked out the window, and he smiled, and he got his guitar, and he went outside, and they followed him, and he played for everyone in the bright sunlight for an hour, and everyone listened … well, now that that’s happened, they’re pretty much under siege. The front lawn and the street are littered with people, mostly young, mostly peaceful, but there are just too many of them. They’re out there with guitars and video cameras and picnics thrown together at the nearby Store 24, and they want one thing only: more Johnny.
Arlene looks at Johnny there across the living room, sitting cross-legged and smiling at them all, unhurried, and she thinks there is more Johnny than there ever was. And somehow that means there’s less Johnny. Is he really there at all? The fact that she can see him, and the people outside, and the vague soreness between her legs are pretty overwhelming, evidence-wise. But she hasn’t forgotten him aflame last night. And the changes: Johnny was always a positive guy, but not this positive; he was always talented, but not this talented; he was always sweet, but not this sweet. His signal’s been … amplified, somehow—not beyond recognition, but almost, almost.
And it’s still growing.
Arlene looks around at her little group, realizing how much she’s loved this foursome, how much it’s been thrown out of balance. It feels like they’ve always been there, roaming Boston, drinking, laughing, being alternately bored and excited, gathering and splitting and gathering together again, always connected, always knowing exactly who they meant when they used words like “us” and “we.” She always knew it wouldn’t last forever—time, love, sex, and the rest of the world were eventually going to break them apart the way a storm system, no matter how strong, eventually breaks up, scatters, dissolves into newborn breezes. Intellectually she knows this, that all is process, that product is an illusion. She knows that snapshots lie, because they seem to stop the unstoppable. Hell, half of her meticulously crafted but never-shared poems are about that, not to mention the short stories. But now she thinks that she’s been writing to prepare herself and protect herself, that deep inside her she is, was, and always will be a creature that wants to hold things together, to prevent change, especially when things are good. And now Furble and Johnny have changed everything, and there’s nothing she can do but ride it out until things settle down a little and she can once again, despite everything she knows, live in the illusion of an unchanging world.
Arlene rolls across the floor, puts her head in Johnny’s lap, feeling his hand come down to play with her hair. Soon Grant and Deb have joined them, and they become a human knot, all sprawled and touching in some way, right there on the carpet, barely moving in the afternoon sunlight. They’re reaffirming the Four of Them as a unit, but Arlene knows that this is something they’d never do if the Four of Them really existed anymore.
Chapter 7
“YOUR LIFE,” said Dr. Schrödinger as he ordered another diet soda and the waitress once again slipped by us without taking any notice, “is the story that you tell yourself about what happened to bring you to this point. But if you were to tell it accurately, you’d see that it couldn’t have happened. That, from a statistical standpoint, it’s all so unlikely as to be nearly impossible.”
We don’t know how it happened, but we had come around to liking Dr. Schrödinger. Somehow, this was the Dr. Schrödinger we always wanted, the man who told us stories about cats in boxes, the man who could regale us with mysteries and wonders rather than cold scientific pedantries. His company was now almost desirable, if one ignored the fact that nights in our house were still punctuated with the plaintive meowing of Werner. We didn’t think about that. We listened.
“Any story, really, is impossible if you tell it right,” he went on. “To survive, the human brain is programmed to see clear, smooth causes and effects. How else could we survive? We need to see the patterns, learn to identify the fo
otprints of predator and prey, see where they lead, and react accordingly. We need to predict the predictable so that we can handle the unpredictable. We’d like to believe that history unfolds in a nearly inevitable way, that if Hitler had died young his role would’ve been fulfilled by someone else. But it’s the unpredictable that really runs the world. Not only did Hitler have to be Hitler, but he had to have eaten a certain rancid bit of cheese and gotten angry about it in 1926 or he never would have risen to power. Now, that’s just allegorical, of course, an invention. I don’t know anything about Hitler’s cheese. The point is that no event of any significance has ever happened that didn’t result from some nearly impossible web of happenstance, coincidence, and odd twists of fate. Mathematically speaking, these things shouldn’t happen. Almost paradoxically, inevitably, events do happen.”
We were following the doctor, but also thinking about ordering a dessert. Or something. Unfortunately, we were at one of those perennially overcrowded sidewalk cafés, where the lone overworked waitress had little motivation to squeeze through the dauntingly tight and circuitous maze of chairs and tables that led to our location. We couldn’t help noticing that the doctor had, for the first time in our memory, left over some of his sandwich. We stared hopefully at it.
Dr. S. didn’t notice. “Do you remember the cartoons of Rube Goldberg? An inventor of the most ludicrous contraptions. You know: A lever is pulled, causing a boot to kick a dog, whose bark motivates a hamster to run on a wheel which winds a pulley that raises a gate that releases a bowling ball and so on? Until, at the end, finally, the machine does something incredibly mundane, like making a piece of toast. Yes? Well, as it turns out, that’s the world. All these incredibly complex, inscrutably intertwined Rube Goldberg machines that can only be seen in retrospect when something happens.”