McClendon's Syndrome (v1.1)

by Robert Frezza

  “Point taken. Whatever happened to Lieutenant Commander Stemm?”

  “Commander Stemm showed up dehydrated and severely disoriented from watching a week’s worth of Fast Eddie’s Westerns. He checked himself into the hospital on arrival. I have a friend there, and Stemm is under what people refer to as heavy sedation.”

  “You don’t sound very high on him.”

  “Bobby Stemm?” Catarina’s nostrils flared slightly. “No. There are people who make you realise the blessings of being shorthanded.” For a second, I thought she was describing half the planet.

  Six Days Thou Shalt Work,

  and Do All Thou Art Able;

  and the Seventh the Same,

  and Pound on the Cable

  Things started hopping on Sunday. While we were getting ready to send people up, the newspapers reacted exactly the way Bunkie had predicted. As soon as they found out that we had called up reservists and commissioned the Scupper, they brushed aside our coy assertions that nothing was amiss. The papers came out with banner headlines that read “War!” Bucky added fuel to the fire by closing down the embassy and refusing to issue an official statement.

  None of the candidates for election had any statements to make. Apparently the early opinion polls were all over the place.

  After Catarina and I got back from mass, Bunkie ushered us in to take an urgent conference call from the Schenectady Chamber of Commerce. Commander Hiro arrived a moment later.

  “Bother,” he said. “Do I have to talk to them, Lindquist?”

  Catarina nodded.

  “Bother.” Hiro took a deep breath. “Put them on the screen, Bunkie.”

  About a dozen people appeared on the big screen, jammed together so that we could see all of them. They were all wearing nearly identical suits, and they were all smiling. Two of them were women.

  The man in bangs in the middle opened by saying, “Hi, I’m Buddy—Buddy Shishekli. You know, ‘Buddy’s Convenience Shoppes’?”

  Hiro nodded politely.

  “A few of us happened to get together to discuss things, and we’re so very happy we could touch base with you to discuss our mutual interests. Right now, there are rumours circulating that the Rodents are preparing to present a hostile takeover, and we feel that this might have an adverse effect on the overall economic climate.”

  Commander Hiro made a pleasant noise in his throat.

  “Commander, I have to tell you that this hostile takeover that the Rodents want to drum up financing for comes at a really, really bad time, market-wise. I don’t know if you’ve been following trends, but our banking industry has developed some weaknesses recently.”

  Hiro looked at him blankly. “Say that again?”

  Shishekli took a deep breath. “Commander, you’re a hard bargainer, and I’ll lay it on the line for you. I want to personally assure you that both our banks are sound institutions that are strong, strong boosters of the local economy. This hostile takeover, coupled with a soft real-estate market and an apparent downturn in retail sales, might have a really, really severe impact on them.”

  Hiro quickly said, “Thank you. Excuse me one moment, please.” He blanked his screen. “What did he just say?”

  I cleared my throat. “Sir, he said that the local banks are stuffed to the ceiling with unsecured sweetheart loans to friends and neighbours, and that going to war will cause their unsuspecting depositors to hide their money in mattresses and cause all of those bad loans to pop out like mushrooms. After that, both banks go under, and everybody concerned goes to jail.”

  Hiro nodded firmly. “Thank you, Mickey.” He turned the screen back on. “Sorry to be away. Please continue.”

  The next guy to launch was a stiff fellow with a waxed moustache named Mahmoud who introduced himself as manager of the local J-Mart.

  “Commander, we have some little financial disequilibrium here. I’ve heard some people say that we’ve been a little over-ambitious in our growth objectives...”

  J-Mart provides Schenectady with its upscale shopping. There’s a joke to the effect that when God calls all the poor people to heaven, he’s going to start by flooding J-Mart.

  When Mahmoud ran out of breath, Hiro politely disengaged and placed us on mute. “Mickey, did he say anything?”

  I stopped polishing my nails and looked up. “Not yet.”

  “That’s what I thought.” Hiro flipped us off mute. “Is there something else, Mr. Shishekli?”

  “Certainly, Commander,” Shishekli said smoothly. “Now, we also feel that we should stress the negative cash flow situation across the board. We’re not talking R-word numbers yet...”

  “Recession,” I translated.

  “But long-term corporate prospects are not good. There are a couple of high-stakes mergers on the table that might be impacted by any negative publicity. It occurs to us that it might be a real mistake for you to try to block this hostile takeover by the Rodents. Interest rates could go up, many of the businesses that depend on the seasonal business would be hit hard by any loss of consumer confidence, and a lot of us feel that the extra buying power that these Rodents would generate could rebound the economy, really move the indicators, if you know what I mean.”

  A thin, hatchet-faced woman wearing three layers of makeup broke in in a bright, bubbly voice. “We at Mary Keye think that’s absolutely right. We’re looking at a real opportunity for explosive growth if we can just turn this corner. We’ve crunched some numbers, and we think that a good buying surge from the Rodents in the touristry niches would do the trick. All we need are some positive vibes from you for us to jump on targeting the short-term opportunities here.”

  Apparently noticing that Hiro was beginning to nod off, Shishekli jumped back in. “Commander, I can see you’re a bottom-line man. To come right to the point, all of us here feel that we need your help in avoiding any event-induced pressure on the money supply. Now, when the rubber meets the road, can we count on you? That’s what we’d like to know.”

  “Thank you. One second, please.” Hiro blanked his screen.

  Catarina looked at me, and I shrugged. “They asked us not to fight. Christmas sales have been lousy, the shopkeepers are getting antsy, and they figure that having a few hundred invading Rodents in town buying up souvenirs would be real good for business.” I shrugged again. “I didn’t understand the part about the rubber in the road.”

  Hiro digested all of this. “Does this mean I can shoot them for treason?” he asked hopefully.

  “Treason requires two overt acts, and besides, we’d have to have a trial,” Catarina explained tactfully.

  “Hmmm.” Hiro pondered this. “Can I tell them to pound sand?”

  “Why don’t you tell them that the idea has snap to it, but you need to run some long-term projections through the accountants and run the idea up the flagpole to see if anyone salutes,” Catarina said smoothly.

  “That almost sounds military,” Hiro mused. He flipped on the screen. “Well, the idea has snap to it, but I need to run some long-term projections through the accountants and run the idea up the flagpole to see if anyone salutes.”

  “Commander, I feel that we have had a really productive exchange of views, and we’ll wait to hear back from you,” the industry spokesman said with evident relief.

  “Thank you. I certainly enjoyed sharing thoughts,” Hiro said, switching off the phone. “I really wanted to tell him to pound sand,” he added wistfully.

  “Sir, you did, but it’ll take them a few days to figure that out,” Catarina told him. “Fortunately, there are a couple of two-story buildings in town that they can jump off of.”

  “It’s nice to know that the people here appreciate what we’re doing for them,” I observed.

  We got Spooner to dock the Scupper at the space platform so that Piper and Kimball could start militarising the ship, and Bunkie dug up an old simulator program for the AN-33 launcher system and started training our two launcher teams, which were Sin and Trujillo and Har
ry and Dinky. While they fiddled with their joysticks, the rest of us started accumulating the things we needed to make the space platform liveable, including a portable rest room.

  By midafternoon we were ready for another shuttle run, and sent up Hiro, Catarina, McHugh, Clyde, Harry, and Dinky.

  Catarina talked me into staying behind to keep an eye on things downside, which was probably a polite way of saying that my talents wouldn’t be missed for the time being.

  The rest of us worked through lunch on Monday—an eggplant-curry concoction that Chandrasekhar whipped up—and I was looking for a quiet corner where I could take a nap when Bunkie called me over to the window.

  I went over and wiped away some of the smudges that the cleaning crew had left. “What the heck?” I said to no one in particular.

  The Civil Guard, all eleven of them, were marching down the street in uniform carrying signs proclaiming a strike. They stopped a couple of meters in front of the door, where they set up a picket line. A couple of them started singing “The Red Flag”:

  “Then raise the scarlet standard high!

  Within its shade we’ll live or die.

  Tho’ cowards flinch and traitors sneer,

  We’ll keep the Red Flag flying here!”

  The signs read BETTER BENEFITS AND RODENTS ARE OUR ALLIES AGAINST MILITARIST EXPLOITATION OF THE WORKING CLASS.

  The pedestrians in the street ignored them completely.

  Attracted by the noise, Chandrasekhar stepped out of the galley, smiled inscrutably, and went back to stirring his rice. Trujillo and Sin spilled out of Catarina’s office and joined Bunkie and me by the window.

  “We could have the police arrest them for trespassing,” Bunkie suggested.

  “The court will let them off with a twenty-dollar fine and some free publicity,” I lamented aloud. “This is not something they covered at Woolmera. Does anyone have any suggestions?”

  Asking the question was an obvious mistake.

  Sin longingly pressed his face up against the glass. Sin was Korean and appropriately named for a marine. Trujillo, the more apelike of the two, tugged at his moustache. “Begging the ensign’s pardon, sir, but Sin and I had a couple of good friends in the Guard before the wimps took it over. Sir, could we, uh...”

  Sin started twitching. Trujillo hooked his right hand in Sin’s belt to keep him stationary and gently tugged my sleeve with the other.

  I was about to say the proper thing when a couple of the Guardsmen switched to singing “Joe Hill,” slightly off-key, which offended my aesthetic sense.

  “This requires careful thought,” I temporised, stroking my chin. “Bunkie, you have access to their personnel records, don’t you? What if I called them into active federal service?”

  Bunkie stiffened at the thought, but said, “Of course, sir.”

  “Just hypothetically, what could we do with them?”

  Bunkie eyed me with a measure of respect and tapped on her terminal. “Seven discharges for ineptitude and four on medical grounds, sir.”

  “About how long would it take for us to process them?” I asked innocently. Trujillo and Sin stared at me intently.

  “If they request a board, fifteen days,” Bunkie said. “Eight seconds if they waive the board.”

  “Bunkie, please print out waivers.” I looked at my Marines and glanced down at my watch. “Gentlemen, please ask the people out there to sign them. Since we’re all probably going to get ourselves killed next week, you have five minutes beginning when I step away from the window.”

  I peeked. I noticed that a few of the pedestrians pitched in and helped Sin and Trujillo out. They came back with a pile of waivers, including a few signed by persons who were not members of the Civil Guard, and two waivers signed by my friend Bubba, who apparently couldn’t run very fast. By the time that Lydia Dare and the police rolled up, Schuyler’s World no longer had a Civil Guard. I gave the police sergeant in charge a bottle of Hiro’s sake that looked suspicious, Chandrasekhar presented Lydia with some radishes cut up to look like flowers, and we declined comment.

  The police helped Lydia leave when she started screaming imprecations. As Lydia and the cops drove away, Bunkie turned to me and said, “Sir, I don’t think Lieutenant Lindquist could have handled it any better.”

  I nursed that small glow of pride until the next contingent of visitors arrived.

  A large, muscular woman threw open our door and came in leading two little girls by the hand. She casually shoved Trujillo out of her way and rumbled, “All right, where is he? Where is my husband hiding?”

  She had more of a moustache than Trujillo, and she looked a little bit like Harry. “You must be Dinky’s wife. We just sent him up to the space platform,” I mumbled, as Bunkie pressed herself unobtrusively against the wall and edged her way out of the room.

  “Silly man.” Dinky’s wife gave me a contemptuous look and her eyes narrowed. “What would he be doing up there? If he’s in here, I’ll find him. Here, watch my darlings!” She stalked off to search Hiro’s empty office.

  Her two daughters looked at me without smiling.

  “Uh, hello,” I said awkwardly.

  The taller of the two blinked. “You must be Ensign Ken.”

  “That’s right,” I said.

  The short one blinked twice. “Mommy says that Daddy’s left us.” We listened to Mommy shift the furniture in Hiro’s office. “Mommy says that he’s abandoned his family and run away to join the navy and isn’t ever coming back.”

  The taller of the two looked up at me. “Can we run away and join the navy, too?”

  I looked to see to if Mommy was out of earshot. “Give me a call on your seventeenth birthday—if your dad signs the papers, you’re in.”

  The short one nodded to her sibling. “See? Daddy said he was nice.”

  Mommy emerged flushed and dishevelled. “He isn’t here,” she said accusingly.

  “He’s up in space,” I repeated very carefully.

  She pointed her finger at me. “You tell him just wait until I find him! Come on, children.”

  I shut the door behind them. “Whew!”

  Bunkie, Sin, Trujillo, and Chandrasekhar appeared, looking slightly pale. Bunkie sniffled and wiped her nose. “Sir,” she said, “I just want you to know that that was a beautiful thing you said to those children. I don’t think you’re half as nasty as everyone says you are.”

  “Thank you, Bunkie,” I said. “I am truly touched.”

  Chandrasekhar took advantage of the momentary silence to ring the dinner bell and pass out foam plates loaded with what looked like large pastries. Sin and Trujillo began chowing down with enthusiasm. Bunkie wrinkled her nose.

  I broke a corner off mine. “What is this, a calzone? Where’s the pepperoni?” I asked Chandrasekhar.

  Chandrasekhar was short and dark, with a round and surprisingly youthful-looking face. Having been plucked out of a well-deserved retirement, he was obviously taking his reactivation philosophically. He tilted his head and looked at me very severely. “This is a roti, sir. It is filled with dhal and sweet potato and other healthful things. Dhal is a very tasty pea puree.”

  “Chief Chandrasekhar runs a vegetarian restaurant,” Bunkie explained.

  “I also have a very healthful salad for you,” Chandrasekhar said.

  “You wouldn’t possibly consider buying some meat, would you?” I asked very tentatively.

  “While it is against my moral precepts to eat meat, I would never dream of imposing these precepts on other persons,” Chandrasekhar told me. He added, “It might be very, very hard to find any, however. Unless meat is very, very fresh and very, very well prepared, it is completely impossible to eat.”

  For those among us who were slow learners, Bunkie explained, “Chief Chandrasekhar’s restaurant is going to hell every day that he’s away.”

  “I was thinking about eating out tonight,” I said hastily.

  “Sir, the persons who run these restaurants are friends of min
e. I would not want them to feed you something by mistake which might disagree with you. Lieutenant Lindquist requested of me that I watch over your health very carefully,” Chandrasekhar said. “Truly it would be better for you not to stray.”

  “Are you trying to tell me that I’m going to eat rabbit food until the day you take that uniform off?” I asked.

  Bunkie stared at the ceiling. “Sir, the chief is losing a lot of money.”

  “Truly, it would be better for you,” Chandrasekhar said, disappearing into the galley to bring out seconds for Trujillo.

  I put away about half of my roti, gave everyone a two-hour break, and decided to take a walk.

  Bunkie cautioned, “You’d better stay close, sir. We don’t know what kind of crazies may be roaming around out there.”

  I refrained from pointing out that most of them had already dropped by and headed out the door. On impulse I walked over to Catarina’s church.

  I went inside and leaned against a pew. While I was silently contemplating the altar, a heavyset man came out of one of the side doors. “Hello, I’m Father Yakub. Can I help you?”

  Father Yakub could have been a young Father Christmas. He had dark blue eyes under bushy eyebrows, and a thick, black beard.

  “I’m Ken MacKay,” I replied, a little embarrassed. “I’m a friend of Catarina Lindquist. I’ve been in here for some of your services. Last week, I remember you had a woman doing the mass.”

  “Deacon Mary Robb. Mary gives a dynamite sermon, doesn’t she?” Father Yakub smiled, exposing a row of even, white teeth. “You’re a friend of Catarina’s? Why don’t you come on back?”

  “Catarina said that you might be stopping by,” Father Yakub said as we entered the sacristy.

  “She must know me better than I do,” I said. If she did, I was really in trouble.

  Father Yakub started heating some water for coffee. “Would you like to tell me why you came?”