He would swallow the pills.
He really would.
Really.
In an hour or two, perhaps.
Probably.
Chapter 23
“What the hell was that?” said Ian, gasping for air.
“I dunno,” said Zeus, wiping blood and grime from his forehead. “But it wasn’t friendly. And it was coming for you,” he added, nodding at Ian.
“Sacre merde,” puffed Napoleon Number Four. She fired off a volley of indecipherable phrases in Napoleonic lingo before slumping into a heap.
“You’ve said a mouthful,” said Rhinnick, leaning back against a convenient dumpster and gulping several lungfuls of air. “It’s a bit thick if you ask me, all of this rushing about, dodging aerial whozits and hover-whatnots, ducking into alleyways and being chivvied about by those who wish to do our band a bit of no good. I mean to say, it’s more than a man of decorum can stick at any price, what?”
Rhinnick paused, mopped his brow, and slumped to the ground. “This whole ordeal,” he continued, pausing for breath, “is calculated to take the spring from the Feynman step. I’d gladly part with a pair of kidneys for a brace of cocktails. Preferably Zeus’s. The kidneys, I mean. Not the cocktails.”
“I think Tonto’s starting to wake up,” said Zeus, who now crouched over the recumbent guide. Zeus still wore only his underpants and a pair of fuzzy slippers, having donated his hospice robe to Tonto in the name of public decency. He now tugged carefully at the robe so as to ensure continued concealment of especially noteworthy bits of Tonto’s sub-robular regions.
Tonto stirred briefly, groaned, and fell silent.
But all of this, you may have noticed, is getting a bit ahead of the plot. One minute our heroes are standing near the grounds of Detroit Mercy, staring down an insane, knife-wielding Napoleon and a gaggle of Hospice Goons, and the next we find them here, grime-encrusted and wheezing, hiding behind a dumpster in an alley dozens of miles away from where we left them. This will not do. Rewind a bit and observe their progress.
Cue montage.
There is, of course, no montage. That is because this is a book. The little bold and italic phrase you noted above is a script notation from the screenplay of Beforelife: The Movie, indicating the spot where the screenwriters have spliced a series of clips depicting the journey of our heroes from Detroit Mercy Hospice to the aforementioned alley in East Detroit. There is, alas, no literary equivalent for a montage. More’s the pity. In motion pictures, the montage is an efficient way of moving principal characters from point A to point Z without bothering with all the tedious bits of the alphabet in between. Rather than watching some boxer shed thirty-seven pounds of excess lard over the course of a sensible swath of time, we can see him begin the montage as a model for the “before” side of a gastric bypass brochure, watch a series of brief vignettes in which he punches, pushes, puffs, jogs, and hefts his way through an appropriately inspiring musical score, and cheer enthusiastically as we see him, minutes later, mounting the steps of a public building — sweat glistening from a Zeus-like physique. In any case, this highly efficient process largely eliminates the viewer’s need to tag along for a realistic, loathsome, and time-consuming process which would include months of monotonous practice, weeks of dreary dieting, and bloody knuckles. Those details inspire yawns instead of cheers and don’t pair well with rock anthems.
The path from the grounds of Detroit Mercy to the aforementioned alley in East Detroit was similar in nature. It featured several moments of overcrowded activity, but also many hours of tedious walking. Some stretches of this journey were punctuated by spurts of jogging, the stealing of bicycles, sidling past officious onlookers, and waiting for coasts to clear. Others featured intermittent sprints, quite a lot of hiding and ducking for cover, a good deal of cursing, and more than a little stopping-to-go-to-the-loo. Some of this would make for compelling cinema. Most of it would not. Hence the montage. In Beforelife: the Movie, the montage begins with a rising electric bass line that erupts into an anthem suitable for any large arena set in the southern United States. It proceeds as follows:
Cue music. Ian, Rhinnick, Zeus, and Napoleon Number Four are seen running hell-for-leather along Sanatorium Road, the hospice disappearing in the distance. A berobed Tonto is draped unconsciously across Zeus’s hulking shoulders. The camera zooms to a tight shot of Zeus’s face, revealing patches of fresh blood on his chin and a remnant of what appears to be a Hospice Goon’s uniform stuck on one of his incisors. The words “Zeus, sic ’em!” seem to echo in the distance.
Scene Two: The background music thrums with mounting intensity as we watch our heroes pass warily through those sorts of urban settings that are best left untravelled — the sorts of neighbourhood given nicknames like “The Shank,” “Dogtown,” or “Hades’ Kitchen.” While assorted members of Detroit’s criminal element eye our heroes from deep shadows, Ian et al. appear to pass by without incident. A clever series of close-ups draw our attention to the reason: although passing through undesirable regions of Detroit with a half-naked and unconscious supermodel might invite unwelcome attention, the credit side of the ledger featured three panicky-looking mental patients and a giant covered in blood that one could readily conclude wasn’t his.
Scene Three: Discordant notes enter the anthem, indicating a sinister change of mood. The picture jumps to a darkened room recognizable as Detroit Mercy’s infirmary. A crowd surrounds a bed. Included among those present are Matron Bikerack, Dr. Peericks, Mistress Oan, assorted members of Detroit’s Chamber of Commerce (clearly present in their capacity as the Committee for the Furtherance and Improvement of Mental Hygiene), and an especially rumpled-looking Inspector Doctor. Dr. Peericks tenderly prods a bump on his own head. The camera pivots around the group to reveal the bed. It is occupied by Napoleon Number Three, also known as Jack, or Bonaparte. He lies handcuffed to the bedrails, straining frantically and exhibiting all of the mad frustration and pent-up rage one might expect from a serial killer who is surrounded by immortals. He screams something that is obscured by the rising anthem. The camera pans to reveal Inspector Doctor’s notes. Three legible passages read “Alice,” “Man in Black,” and “Vera.” The latter is underlined and circled.
Scene Four: We flash back to our heroes as they skulk toward a building marked by a sign that bears the legend IPT. It is surrounded by a shuffling, surly mob brandishing picket signs and pamphlets. Ian turns to Rhinnick and mouths the question, “What’s an IPT?” Rhinnick rolls his eyes and mutters something that astute lip-readers interpret as “hopeless boob.”
Scene Five: The anthem’s tempo rises. See the City Solicitor in his lair, brow creased, entering a series of commands into a datalink. A tight shot of the screen reveals a 3D rendering of Ian accompanied by a series of alphanumeric codes. These are followed by the words “Commence Retrieval Operation.” The City Solicitor presses “enter.” The scene cuts to a squadron of aerial drones, hovertanks, and unmanned rovers fanning out from City Hall.
Scene Six: Another hospital bed, this one surrounded by high-tech monitoring devices and occupied by Socrates, still lying in a coma. The anthem’s bass line rises as the camera pans and zooms to Socrates’ face. His eyes shoot open and register rage. Socrates rises from the bed, pulling various cords and cables out of his body as he stalks into the darkness.
Scene Seven: Discordant tones drop out of the anthem and the music rises toward a dramatic crescendo. We see our heroes haring away from an approaching aerial drone. A close-up on Ian’s face reveals his obvious exhaustion, his terror, and at least four days of stubble. The aerial drone arcs out of the sky, its afterburners firing and propelling it toward Ian. We suddenly flash to the drone’s perspective — targeting scanners lock on Ian, displaying the words primary target — engage and disable. Zeus charges into the frame, his massive legs pumping with Herculean effort as he leaps on Ian, forcing him into the mouth of an alley. The dr
one overshoots its mark and strikes the wall. The explosion blasts our heroes several yards into the alley.
Ian rises to his knees and brushes debris from his hospice robe, surveying the wreckage.
Montage ends.
“What the hell was that?” said Ian, gasping for air.
“I dunno,” said Zeus, “but it wasn’t friendly. And it was coming for you,” he added, nodding at Ian and, as you may have noticed, bringing us back to where we were. After a pithy snatch of dialogue that doesn’t bear repeating, Rhinnick turned to Ian and said, “It seems these mindwiping bimbos, or whomever they might be, have declared war on you and yours. And they aren’t sparing the horses, either — or rather the hovertanks and aerial thingummies, if you take my meaning. You appear to have cheesed someone off in no small measure. As for their motives, who can say? Perhaps they wish to correct a botched mindwipe, perhaps they wish to put a gag on those who seek to reveal the truth of the beforelife. But whatever their goal in chivvying all and sundry across the city, one thing is clear, my moon-faced chum. We’ve got to get you to Vera postey-hastey.”
“You still haven’t told me who she is,” said Ian, wincing as he prodded a bruised rib.
“Ah, right. Profuse apologies. I thought I’d mentioned it. Must have slipped my mind, what with the stabbings, explosions, gunfire, and whathaveyou. In any case, this Vera, as any well-informed member of the cognoscenti knows,” he said, pausing for dramatic effect, “is a medium.”
“A medium?” said Ian.
“A medium. And quite a good one, I imagine. I’ll be quite interested to meet her. Perhaps she can fill me in on any upcoming revisions that the Author has in store.”
“Right,” said Ian, dully. “But why —”
“Cease your questioning, rattled bumpkin. Vera is the person we have to see, and so we must go and see Vera. QED. But before we skip for the hills there is a matter of some delicacy we must moot, if ‘moot’ is the word I’m looking for.”
“What is it now?” asked Ian, wearily.
“It may wound you.”
“I’m sure I’ll be fine.”
“I only wish to spare your feelings, old crumpet. I mean to say —”
“Just spit it out.”
“Very well then. What I am driving at, old chum, is this: when the moment finally comes for us to conference with this Vera, it would, on the balance, be for the best if you were to slip into the background. Leave the cut and thrust of conversation to me. Defer to Feynman. If woodwork is present, fade into it. Remain silent. I’ll handle whatever dialogue needs handling.”
“Why?” asked Ian, flatly.
“What I mean to say, befuddled roommate, is that while I’ve no doubt that you’re bountifully equipped with all of the personality traits and psychological whatnots necessary for succeeding as a regulatory compliance thingummy, when it comes right down to it you are a rube, lacking in suavity and cosmopolitan sophistication. A salt-of-the earth, hayseedish whatchamacallit, who lacks the wide experience needed for —”
“Get to the point,” said Ian.
“No sense getting shirty about it, Brown. But when dealing with mediums —”
“Media!” said Zeus, brightly.
“When dealing with mediums,” Rhinnick continued, a bit austerely, “what you want is someone more whatdoyoucallit — a suave, sophisticated, seasoned man of the world. What you want, in short, is me.”
Ian blinked at him and crossed his arms. Rhinnick didn’t seem to mind, and carried on.
“These mediums are a tricksy lot,” he said “They require careful handling by men of wide experience and cunning, and can’t be trusted as far as I’d throw a pair of Zeuses. It’s their dashed twisty way of dishing out the advice. It warps the mind and strains the senses. The upshot of all this is that any medium worth the name will babble a lot of mystical-sounding hoo-haw that can trap or misdirect a feeble mind. They must be treated with kid gloves, these mediums. The cause, of course,” he added, nodding sagely, “is television.” He waggled an eyebrow or two, denoting wisdom.
“Television,” said Ian, flatly.
“Yes, television,” said Rhinnick. “Also called ‘TV.’ I trust you’ve never heard of it.”
“Of course I have,” said Ian.
“Ah, well. Then you’ll understand.”
“Understand what?”
“Why it is that only a man of cunning and wide experience should brave the conversational whatnots with a medium, old chum.”
“Because of television,” said Ian.
“Yes. Television,” said Rhinnick.
“We’re not talking about a box with moving pictures, are we?”
“A what with a who now?”
“A box with moving pictures,” said Ian. “Television. You watch shows on it. Movies and things. You know . . . TV.”
“Talk sense, man,” said Rhinnick. “Television, as any well-informed bean knows, is the supernatural power to see things at a distance, the mystical knack of perceiving far-off times and distant places. An extremely rare gift, one might say, if one were inclined to call it a gift. But if one were to ask me — which is always an advisable course of action — I’d explain that it is not a gift, but a curse. As I was saying, television gives these mediums —”
“Media,” said Zeus, doggedly.43
“— it gives these mediums a bizarre way of perceiving the world. And this is because your average medium has no life experiences of note, having shied away from the hurly-burly of real life and confined herself instead to viewing the world through the distorting lens of television — perceiving events through misleading secondhand visions, distant images which supply a cock-eyed view of the subject matter. Those who view the world through TV are one step removed from reality, as it were, always observing, never participating. It is as though they peep at the world through some sort of thingummy.”
“Like a box with moving pictures,” said Ian, flatly.
Rhinnick waved off Ian’s comment as though dismissing an especially unimpressive gnat. “In any event, take it from me, befogged companion,” he said. “Mediums are weird. They must be handled with great vigilance and care. Leave the conversation to me. You’re not up to it, old chum. No offence intended, of course.”
“But I —”
“Look, old bean,” said Rhinnick, placing a sympathetic hand on Ian’s shoulder. “I do not wish to wound you. Far from it. But let us marshal our facts. In this life, you can do one of two things: you can either play the part of the innocent pup — the naive rube who bumbles helplessly along, he-knows-not-where, inspiring charity from those who cross his path — or you can fill the role of the worldly, urbane man of wit and guile, fit for verbal sparring, diplomatic jousts, and conversational whathaveyous. If seeking the former sort, look no further than Ian Brown, a simple, gullible yokel par excellence, as the Napoleons might say. Is he fit for simpering and wide-eyed pleading? Is he up to the task of mooching charity from tender-hearted onlookers? Without question. But is he up to the challenge of engaging in tête-à-têtes with devious mystics? Keeping up with the thrust-and-parry of keen debate? Certainly not. For this, you need a Feynman.”
Ian opened his mouth to object, but shut it again in silence. Rhinnick had a point. Sort of. Rhinnick knew about IPTs. He knew about Vera. He was used to immortality, and he had eighty years of experience in Detroit. Sure, he had a penchant for pointless tirades and he believed in a cosmic author who wrote reality, but he still had a lot more going for him than Ian. Ian had been in Detroit for a month — unless Tonto’s theory was right, in which case he’d been here for who knows how many years but had lost most of his memories in a mindwipe. But either way, he knew a good deal less than Rhinnick.
Life, Ian reflected, had been much easier before he’d died. He used to know how things worked. He used to understand the rules. Being an RCO had taught him th
at rules could be as comfortable as old slippers. There was a cozy predictability in knowing which side of the highway you could drive on, or how many bags of garbage you were allowed to place on the curb, or which form you could file to avoid the fine for using herbicides in your garden. He’d been reassured by the logic that weaved through municipal codes, the sense of security that came from knowing how virtually any action would be treated by those in power.
Ian had lost that sense of security. He didn’t know anything in Detroit. He didn’t know any rules. Ian didn’t know how anything worked.
Rhinnick did. And Rhinnick was loyal, resourceful, and equipped with an unflinchingly devoted gendarme of epic proportions. There were worse traits one could hope for in a leader. Besides, the little voice in Ian’s head had insisted that he stick by Tonto’s side. She was the key. And for now, Tonto was carried around by Zeus. Zeus, of course, would follow anywhere Rhinnick led.
That didn’t leave many options.
“Fine,” said Ian. “We’ll do things your way. You deal with Vera. There’s just one thing.”
“Say on, old chum.”
“Why are we going to see a medium?” asked Ian.
“Because Norm sent us, silly ass. He sent that wool-hat-wearing chap who popped out of nowhere. I can remember it distinctly.”
“But who’s Norm?”
“Ah. There you have me. I haven’t the foggiest. But he seems to have gone to a spot of bother to send that wool-hatted bloke teleporting to and fro just to tell us to go see Vera. In these circumstances, Brown, it seems that not seeing Vera would be uncivil. And the Feynmans, I hasten to add, are sticklers for civility. So, for that matter, are the Zeuses.”
“Yeah,” said Zeus.
“Okay,” said Ian, registering a full-body shrug. “Lead the way. Let’s see the medium.”
* * *
Three days later — after a series of nail-biting escapes and additional montage-worthy exploits — Ian, Rhinnick, Zeus, Tonto, and Napoleon Number Four finally found themselves, battered and bruised, on the threshold of Vera’s shop. There was a sign above the door. It read as follows:
Beforelife Page 26