The Nervous System

by Nathan Larson

  At Petraeus, I park in the AMBULANCE-ONLY TOWAWAY ZONE, and I’m whisked past a teenaged Russian girl with a crushed foot. Stitched up in no time. Clean shoulder wound. Painful tetanus shot there. Would’ve stood for a tetanus enema, a bleach bath, after that dip in the river. Hand is set in a plastic brace, wrapped in gauze.

  Broken rib from that .357 shot, nothing to be done about that. They ask no questions but I get the usual rap: stay off my feet, blah de blah. Lucky to be alive, blah de blah, et-fuckin-cetera. Do I need anything else?

  Moi? Well … sure I do. Drugs.

  J. Crew was also good for something in the murse family. I have to be realistic about my world now, can’t go carrying everything in my pockets. Black fabric sort of bike-messenger bag. Stuff it full of pills and PurellTM, grab my two pistolas that a nurse dried off for me, and bounce.

  Dr. Feelgood doesn’t even protest anymore. The man is terrified of me, and I don’t do anything to dissuade him in this respect.

  Back in the Volt, zoom downtown, return to the swamp that is Chinatown. Kathleen will be okay for another couple hours. Probably.

  I watch 154 Hester for a good twenty minutes. I watch for others watching. Trade a bottle of Percocet (keeping a couple for myself) for a pack of Lucky Strikes and a shitty Chinese electric zippo, and with one stroke I am a heavy smoker again.

  Kill four cigarettes end to end. Nobody looks at me twice. PurellTM up no less than six times. Tap out yet another pill. The wrapping on my hand filthy already.

  Choppers overhead, moving uptown. Always, always with the choppers.

  I figure it unlikely that a) anybody would have traced action down to Dos Mac’s hideaway, and that b) they would have been able to gain access, Cyna-corp or not. So what the hell.

  Make my way down the street and casually lean on the A button (NO MENUS/NO CLONES). After an age I give the door an easy shove, and it comes open. My stomach drops.

  Slide my gloved hand along the edge of the door, feel around the central lock, my digits come away covered in gray powder. Gingerly I smell it … nitrates. Explosives.

  Oh, Dos, goddamnit my brother. Pull out my CZ and chamber a bullet. Ease the door open with my shoulder, darkness within. Slide inside. No clue where the lights might be. I make my way around the big chamber, back to the wall, feeling for a switch.

  The only illumination stems from the multiple screens, which I’m unable to see clearly from where I’m at, but show the street, the corner, and the downstairs “soundstage.”

  “Dos!” I call out, figuring fuck it. Everybody gone. Listen to nothing but the hum of the monitors.

  I’m about a quarter of the way around the whole joint when I run into what I believe to be the mains. Deep breath and throw the switch.

  There’s far more to see but my eyes are naturally drawn to the two bodies, one of which is flat on its face in Cynacorp garb, closer to the main door. And the other of which is Dos Mac. He is cuffed to an Aeron chair and appears even at a distance to have been beaten.

  Fuck, Dos.

  I wait for a moment and absorb as much as possible given my compromised brain. The joint has been torn apart.

  Move. Go to what remains of the Mac. Feel for a pulse. Nada. Man is dead, plain and simple, and it’s not a pretty picture cause they got to fucking him up bad. Body cooling, but not yet cold. I spin him around. He’s shirtless, revealing a beautifully rendered stylization of his subway map across his back. Turn him front again. Lacerations around his neck and chest. Burn marks, some from cigarettes and a few look more like taser trauma. Familiar stuff. We’re old buddies, torture and I, having done it to others, and having had it done to me.

  Dos Mac was a friend. I brought this horror here. My man. I meditate on the Mac, sitting down here with his righteous works, and me with mine up in Midtown. We were cut from the same sheet of leather, no doubt. Damn shame we never really got it together.

  Cruise over to the Cyna-corp soldier. Kick the body over. Knock off the helmet. Another corpse, this a muscular black dude with shaved eyebrows, sightless peepers. Put the helmet back on. Consider shooting him up, airing him out, but I doubt if that would improve my mood.

  Back to Dos. Need to suss this fast. Gotta look deeper. I inspect his mouth. Feel around his scalp. Then, there, right there on his left hand … in blue ink, scrawled: D! 116.

  I stand upright. 116. Is that an address? An indication of time?

  No. Dos knows me pretty well. Go to his books, mostly reference tomes on subjects like Systems Theory, Thermodynamics, Mass Movement: A Comparison of Indian and Chinese Transport Infrastructure … these I jump over, come on, come on …

  The number 116 in the Decimal classification system is “Change.” Usually in a metaphysical sense.

  There are two books that are not textbooks as such. One is the Robert Moses biography, and the other is a worn edition of the I Ching.

  The Book of Change. Snatch the slight volume off the shelf, flip it open fast. Two coins hit the floor. Scrawled on the title page is: FALSE BOTTOM LOWER DRAWER.

  Back to the desk, two metal filing cabinets supporting a plank of wood, jerk open the lowest drawer on the left, full of sketches and papers, dump this stuff. Feel around … spot a kitchen knife. Grab that and pry at the edges, the thin metal bottom comes away.

  A pile of dude-on-dude porno, a labelmaker, my hard drives, DVDs. On top a neat-looking folder marked ANALYSIS + FINDINGS, with today’s date.

  Quick work. I sit down with this in my lap, lighting a cigarette. In Dos’s neat tiny handwriting:

  SUPERFICIAL FINDINGS

  1) Discrepancies and deliberately misleading information found in digital audio on DVD marked “Four Seasons 6/27.” Audio data when opened in ProTools program was seen to be heavily edited and in some instances entire phrases attributed to a Senator Howard were constructed entirely of syllables taken from elsewhere. CONCLUSION: In comparison to unedited material, very different conversation emerges in which the men ID’d as an “ATF agent” and “Nic Deluccia” seem to be attempting to convince Howard of the wisdom of “disappearing” or murdering an individual, it is implied to be the senator’s girlfriend. The senator has a lot to say on the subject but is slippery, and ultimately he refuses the proposal outright. From the evidence it seems that an attempt is being made via tampering/deception to portray sen as initiator of hit on said g-friend.

  2) Pretty lady singing karaoke on DVD marked with Korean characters has lovely voice. Not a K-Pop fan but enjoyed listening.

  3) Dismayed to view surveillance video on hard drive (Glyph manufacture) marked NYPL RRR CAM 3, dated yesterday (Monday, November 9), as it appears to show destruction of library books via flamethrower by individual known to me as the “Librarian,” a.k.a. Dewey Decimal …

  I dry heave into my mouth. Bring my wounded hand to my lips, the dirty gauze … this … must be a mistake. Dos must’ve not seen things clearly, these cameras are … it’s impossible.

  Drag myself back to the Mac’s report, vision dimming a notch, my gorge barely under control:

  … in what appears to be the Rose Reading Room in the New York Public Library, beginning at 15:16, and terminating around 15:25. CONCLUSION: If this is not thought to have taken place as described, it is suggested the “Librarian,” a.k.a. Dewey Decimal, himself view this footage and look for indications of digital tampering or image falsification as this analyst could find none.

  END INITIAL REPORT, TUES 10th NOV

  _______________

  Hands trembling. Insert the DVD with the Korean words for Cabin Four, 3/12/94 into the iMac’s disc drive.

  Pixelated view of the now familiar karaoke cabin.

  I light another smoke off the butt-end of the one I’m just finishing. Chaining it.

  The video starts without preamble. There is a seated woman on the couch. Even with the pixelation and poor quality I can see that she is classically beautiful. I believe I recognize her to be Song Ji-Wong.

  She wears a tight black or dark-c
olored (the footage is in black-and-white) reflective dress, looks like silk. She wears her hair in a single long braid thrown over her left shoulder, which hangs down below her left breast. On the table are two martini glasses, two smaller bowls, a pack of cigarettes, an ashtray, and a dark cordless microphone.

  Song sits quite still, in silence, though faint laughter and music is audible, probably coming from surrounding rooms. She seems occupied with her nails. At one point she looks at her watch, sighs, glances around the room. She returns to her nails.

  I cannot explain it, but I am entranced. Could easily spend the rest of my natural life watching her on that couch. Observe for about ten minutes, during which time Song hardly moves. Her posture is extremely proper.

  Then she starts, as if having nearly fallen asleep. Picks up the microphone. Moves to what must be the karaoke machine and fiddles with it for a moment. She then returns to her spot. She wears rather high heels, which she now removes. Climbs daintily up on the glass table. Her stockinged feet. Closes her eyes.

  Music starts. It’s clearly a ballad, the sounds are cheesy and wack, the chord progression simple and sad. Behind her a video commences on a recessed or flat-screen monitor, showing a ’80s-looking couple milling around.

  Song is focused, eyes remain closed. She then opens them and looks directly into the camera. The hair on my arms and the back of my neck stands straight the fuck up, it’s unsettling and inexplicably thrilling.

  Song ignores the video behind her, which starts scrolling the lyrics in Korean characters, and begins to sing in English:

  On the floating, shapeless oceans

  I did all my best to smile

  Her voice is crystalline, with smoke at the edges. It soothes and it disturbs. She’s an earthbound angel and/or demon. A sorceress. She does not shift her eyes from the camera, not for an instant. Something’s off, and I realize it might be the fact that she does not blink. It’s a physical impossibility and I chalk it up to the video quality. She slides into the next verse:

  Did I dream you dreamed about me?

  Were you here when I was full sail?

  She pauses again for the reintro. I am with her. To describe this as sexual would be missing the depth of the experience.

  Something soft grazes my neck—

  Spin around, gun aloft, a shift in air pressure, the memory of movement behind me, but there’s nothing save two dead men and a lot of trashed machinery. On the tape Song moves to the third verse:

  Should I stand amid the breakers?

  Or shall I lie with death my bride?

  I still have my gun out. My hand is shivering. I am positive I did not just imagine that. It could be … it could be military. Who knows what kind of technology Cyna-corp has at its disposal? I don’t rule out … but I have to turn and watch Song. Have to do it, no choice in the matter.

  Hear me sing: “Swim to me, swim to me, let me enfold you.

  Here I am. Here I am, waiting to hold you.”

  The music shimmers to a close. Song drops her gaze, and with that the intensity is broken, like a telephone connection. It’s abrupt and physical and I wobble slightly, unsteady. On the tape she gets off the table and busies herself with putting her shoes back on. Then she returns to her nails.

  I turn and look at the dead men. Dig the ransacked shelving.

  What the fuck just happened?

  Stand stock-still in the middle of the room for a few moments, listening. Kill the audio on the DVD. I do not breathe. Keep listening. A leak somewhere, steady trickle of rain on concrete. Otherwise nothing at all, nothing.

  My smoke singes the gauze. Toss the cigarette aside, break the quiet with a hissed “Fuck.” Think I hear something shift, something nearby. Knot in throat, I croak, “Hey.”

  And get silence in return.

  Spooked. I eject the CD, which is so hot I nearly drop it. A magical thing, a talisman. One has to be careful with this shit.

  Realize I gotta cut out, gotta dip but fast. With much effort I consider the hard drive, the one with the library surveillance. Does it matter? That’s the question. Does it matter what I might see on there? Who does it affect, besides myself?

  No one, no one at all.

  I believe Dos. I believe that’s what he saw. Or was manipulated to see. I can’t know that if I watched this material I wouldn’t be manipulated in exactly the same way. How can I know that?

  All right. Perhaps, just perhaps, it was neither Nic nor the senator, nor Nic’s people at either of these men’s bidding, who destroyed my stock back home. I can accept that.

  And if I accept that, then whatever might be on this hard drive, it simply doesn’t matter.

  Relevant: based on Dos’s analysis, Nic is/was leaning on the senator. Not the DA. It’s been Nic all along. Take that a degree further, and I like Nic for having had Song and the baby whacked. Whacked and hacked. Dismembered. Limbs, head removed …

  Drop the hard drive on the floor and crush it with my heel. Grind it in there good. Time, time. Get to fucking work, Decimal.

  Lean over the computer. Open up this freaking Skype program. This much I can do, I’m not a total troglodyte, motherfuckers. List of past callers, check it. Scroll … there. I click on BOOGIE_OOGIE_OOGIE_MAN_2.

  Peck out a message, gut saying go, go, go:

  NEW MEETUP, NIC + NEW VIBE. I HAVE DOCUMENTATION REGARDING SEN. HOWARD U WILL WANT 2 HAVE IF U WISH 2 CONTINUE BLACKMAILING TH MAN. IN EXCHNGE FOR THIS MATERIAL, AND FOR A LIVING KATHLEEN KOCH, I WANT ROSE HEE, AND I WANT U PEOPLE OFF MY ASS AND OUT OF MY WORLD 4EVER. MEETUP TOMORROW (WEDS) MORNING, 4:45AM, BROOKLYN BRIDGE TOWER, MANHATTAN SIDE. I WANT TO SEE YOU, ROSE, AND SEN. HOWARD. NO GUNS AND NO ENTOURAGE. ANY DEVIATION AND KATHY DIES.

  BEST,

  DD

  Never said I was a poet, habibi. I just like books.

  Hit Enter. There’s the cartoon blip.

  Collect the rest of my material, throw it in my new bag. Hit the good PurellTM. Kiss my man Dos on the top of his head. Through the surgical mask, natch.

  Whisper: “I loved you, brother. See you on the flip.”

  Toss back a pill, shaky. And with that I dust.

  _______________

  Ghosts pursue me up the FDR, shrieking and raging. Ghosts increasing in number, in ferocity. I flee them at a gallop. Drilling it, hit Harlem River Drive.

  Major Deegan, exit 13.

  Flash through blighted neighborhoods, long ago emptied of anything organic.

  Stand before the Gun Hill Houses. Behold the architectural cruelty of American public housing. Behold the banality of economic segregation, of slow genocide.

  Observe the empty playground, and the singularly ghetto debris strewn here and there: forty-ounce bottles of Olde English Malt Liquor, Doritos bags, chicken bones, a stray toddler-size Rocawear sneaker. Et-fucking-cetera.

  Note all of this. Disregard it. Move.

  Enter the building. All surfaces are subway-car metallic, imperious to graffiti.

  Enter the elevator, which is functioning tonight, and a cloud of old piss and beer. Push the correct button with my elbow.

  Exit the elevator; follow the hallway to the correct door. Shift the bag of dried octopus and the jerky to the other hand. Two bottled waters in my bag.

  Take out the key.

  Key in lock.

  Listen at the door.

  Weapon out. Just in case.

  Open the door.

  _______________

  Thursday

  The rain ceased about two o’clock in the morning, replaced by yet more dense cloud cover.

  Naturally, I did not close my eyes even once, lest Senator Kathleen Koch slit my throat with her manicured talons. Restraints notwithstanding. Though it seemed as if she had given up.

  Kathy ate a bite or two of the food I brought, drank a bit of water, and had nothing to say that made sense. For Kathleen Koch she spoke very little whatsoever. Kept talking hazily about a migraine, and I do believe the woman did indeed have a serious headache. So
much the better. Call me weak-willed but I fed her a couple Percocet. Added value: further sedation.

  Gagged the girl again, once she seemed ready to sleep.

  Disappointed in Kathleen Koch. Was expecting a more formidable mind, if totally bonkers, but in the end it seems she’s no more than a vacant mask, containing nothing.

  Sat and smoked cigarette after cigarette. Lighting one off the butt of the last.

  Approximately four fifteen a.m. finds me propelling the Volt southward. Koch is spread out on the backseat, secured and compliant.

  I am alone with my city in that ungodly hour, the hour of the wolf, when even an all-but-abandoned metropolis takes on yet another dimension of strangeness.

  Fucking ghosts hound me all the way downtown, howling, making demands I do not understand. I’m reeling, spinning. Pedal fully depressed, and I don’t dare look back, not for an instant.

  Despite having not slept, or perhaps because of it, and despite the urgency of it all, I possess a certain tranquility, and I honor the System by choosing the correct routing: Bronx River Parkway to the Bruckner Expressway, exit to Bruckner Boulevard, cross the Third Avenue Bridge and onto the FDR Drive, which will carry us to the Brooklyn Bridge.

  Mindful travel. I force a peaceful kickoff to a day that will very likely plunge me into some fresh abyss.

  I wear my unremarkable gray suit, as if headed to an office job. Shoulder holster under my jacket with my freshly cleaned CZ-99, a fresh fifteen-round magazine. At my belt I carry the diver’s knife. Ankle holster with the P290, six rounds in the clip. On the front passenger’s seat I have my bag with the senator’s file, retrieved from the air vent, and all accompanying digital media.

  Meditate on the transient nature of corporeal existence. On the impermanence of our institutions, our monuments to ourselves. Certainly, I have seen a great many of these massive shrines to our ambition fall, dissolve, be reduced to ash.

  After the rickety UN underpass and at about 39th Street, I look west at the lights of the Chrysler Building, and I experience a profound rush of sadness, accompanied by the realization that, as the Buddha teaches, a denial of one’s true nature and clutching at perishable and changeable things can only result in acute suffering.