Miss Brandymoon's Device: a novel of sex, nanotech, and a sentient lava lamp (Divided Man Book 1)

by Skelley, Rune

  Shaw affected a bashful look as those assembled hastened to agree with that critique. He raised a hand as if to wave off the approbation, but with a subtle shift of his posture transformed it into a gentle command for silence.

  “Let us fix our minds upon the future, friends. This week I will be in Webster to meet with the Buckminster University religious studies department about a new program, and to interview finalists for next year’s scholarship award. Declan shall keep the home fires burning in my absence.” A pause to nod warmly at Spitz. “He will now reveal to you what he has in store.”

  Reverend Spitz addressed the group, leaving Shaw to contemplate the next few days. The Buckminster engagement was a nice publicity move, but mainly it served as a pretext for spending a block of time in the vicinity of Webster. The unpleasantness with Gregory forced the exodus of his entire covert staff and all the marvelous jewelry to a new, less civilized locale, and he’d taken the further step of expanding his security force. Now it was time to review the troops.

  If only that operation was as easy to manage as this one. Spitz was telling Miss Chatham the quarterly financial summary would be needed by Wednesday afternoon for the meeting to compare allocations for operating expenses to donation requests. Everything Spitz mentioned so far was one form of monetary issue or another. Typical Monday.

  Shaw inwardly rehearsed his planned motivational talk with the research technicians out at the secret workshop. He’d expected the program to be farther along by now and would use his unexpected appearance at the previously abandoned factory to give his mad scientists some incentive to accelerate their progress.

  Deciding where to hide the operation had been far easier than Shaw would have dared to hope. A huge, untenanted, isolated building on the outskirts of a college town. Not too distant, yet far enough. Provident, truly, that one of those shirking technicians attended a rave there and divulged the location to Shaw.

  Keeping other ravers away was now a bit of a concern.

  More important was for Shaw to be vigilant during his travels to and from the facility. Gregory’s people, the TEF, would be watching him, would plan to tail him. Well, let them try. Gregory’s mission turned out to be a failure, in the end. For at the end he’d unwillingly divulged many valuable facts. Shaw now knew all of their faces, and he knew all their tricks. There was nothing to be worried about as long as he took sensible precautions.

  Eventually Spitz reached the end of his list of chores and the assembly dispersed to their own offices, and Shaw stood and gazed out the window, planning.

  *** *** ***

  Fin stood at the bus stop in front of the library, wearing a Buck U ball cap and matching gray and green varsity jacket he’d borrowed from Kyle without asking. His trench was bundled up in his backpack, and when the next bus pulled up he would retreat into the library to remove the cap and switch coats. Thus re-attired, he would resume his stakeout.

  He had been unable to stop wondering about the setup in that basement office. In particular, the fourth member. Having the same spaceship dream again last night cemented his resolve. Now he stood across the street watching the alley. Man number four had better “respect the organization,” because otherwise how would Fin know it was him?

  Booth had agreed to ride the 11:45, get off at the library with a spare leather bomber jacket, and run over to Magic Beans for a cup of Ironsides. Fin recalled being less than specific that the coffee was to be for him. He looked up at the clock on the front of the library.

  10:32, well before reveille for Fin and too damn long to wait for his next cuppa. Deciding the guy was unlikely to show up in the next five minutes, Fin resolved to go to Magic Beans before his withdrawal symptoms started to register on seismograms in Buckminster’s geology department.

  He removed the ball cap in the coffee shop, releasing his dark unruly hair. The dampness gave it even more attitude than usual. Fin lit a cigarette, said a polite ‘Go to Hell’ to the six people who wrinkled their noses at him, and paid for his coffee. He didn’t try to act unhurried returning to the bus stop. People are always dashing to the bus stop.

  The gray morning steadily became a drizzly gray morning over the next hour. The library offered an overhang for shelter, but it was set back too far to give him the best vantage on the alley across the street. He spent some of his time keeping dry and most of it getting wet when Kyle’s jacket displayed a startling lack of waterproofness.

  Fin stifled a sneeze. Someone said, “Bless you,” anyway, and Fin grunted and snorked the mucous back to create a suitable projectile, which he lobbed into the middle of the street. This performance earned him a few more inches of space along the curb. Watching the alley, his eyes started to droop but his mind focused on the mystery of the spaceship.

  He rehearsed his inquiry: “Why the hell am I dreaming about your spaceship?” The question would sound pathetic but it would inspire no violence. He hoped it wouldn’t, anyway.

  At 11:36 on the library’s clock, his target appeared. The fourth man was a woman. Fin gave no thought to the possibility she could be anyone else. Yellow umbrella up, ridiculous hat in place, she approached from the other end of the block, giving Fin just enough time to intercept her near her doorway.

  Fin slouched across the street, allowing cars to miss him by inches but not provoking any horn blasts from the jaded townie drivers. Straightening up a bit, he turned into the alley.

  His quarry was not alone. A short, bearded man with long, graying hair and a black peacoat shared the umbrella, in animated conversation with the blandly pretty Miss Greensweater. Fin held his course, feigning apathy while straining to pick up some of what was said as he passed.

  “...at the University. The reverend is coming to us this time,” Miss Greensweater said.

  “Fortuitous.”

  “Yes. Perhaps we can track him to the devices.”

  Fin stepped around the corner at the far end of the alley and stopped. Although he’d been unable to ask his question, the mission wasn’t a total loss. He made a mental list of things that could be called ‘devices.’ Would ‘the reverend’ know about the spaceship, too?

  The idea that going to church might be the only way to find out quelled much of his curiosity.

  Chapter Four

  DATE

  Missionaries invade foreign countries and wage spiritual warfare on the natives. Televangelists are simply domestic missionaries. Brian Shaw’s recent cryptic comments about soon reaching the unreachable - presumably those who don’t watch his show - should frighten those of us who like to think for ourselves.

  from Useless Artifacts opinion column by Brandy Moon, CTP, 07-21-2000

  “This won’t hurt more than my tongue, will it?”

  Rook shook her head. “Has the swelling gone down?”

  Rainbow proudly stuck out her normal-sized tongue and wiggled it. The silver ball in the center clacked against her teeth.

  Rook nodded her appreciation and pulled on a pair of latex gloves. Rainbow giggled and lifted her gauzy blouse, exposing her tummy. A vine of tiny blue flowers encircled her navel and trailed down under her waistband. Marcus’s work. Rook could tell by the shading on the stems. How well had Marcus gotten to know this particular blonde client?

  Rainbow chattered on and Rook half-listened as she opened a sterile needle pack.

  “It’s really weird, you know? Cos my dreams are usually really, really colorful and beautiful and cosmic. So it’s, like, really weird cos this one’s not. Except for the green UFO, it’s all, like, gray. It must mean something really heavy, doncha think?”

  “I guess.” Profound deja-vu washed over Rook. The glowing spaceship hovered clearly in her mind for a moment, then vanished. Her hands shook and she dropped the needle. Swearing, she threw it away and got out a clean one. The spaceship was gone, but it left an afterimage throbbing behind her eyelids. The anxiety faded with the image and left Rook wondering if the deja-vu was for the spaceship or the anxiety attack. To hide her confusion, she
began prepping Rainbow’s navel, all the while supplying noncommittal responses at random intervals.

  Her repeat customers all spouted about their dreams lately, and they were all about green spaceships. It wouldn’t have bothered her as much if it weren’t a reminder she wasn’t dreaming anymore. She’d thought it was because of all the peyote Marcus fed her, but when his stash ran out there’d been no change. Even so, she blamed him. His craziness seemed to be on the upswing of late, his behavior more erratic. The relationship had soured and he made a convenient scapegoat.

  ***

  Wanting to avoid Marcus out front, Rook sat at the counter in the piercing room and booted her Mac. She opened the folder for this issue’s assignment, ‘Behind the Scenes at Buckminster U — Where Does Your Money Go?’ but couldn’t even feign interest. Conspiracy Theory was supposed to be more cutting-edge. She closed the folder and sat with her eyes shut for several minutes, letting her mind wander. It wandered to a green spaceship. Rook’s breath came faster as her muscles tensed and she broke out in a sweat. Biting back a moan, she willed something to happen, but nothing did. Rook’s sense of foreboding grew. She opened her eyes and took several minutes to slow her breathing. Once calm, Rook opened a new word-processing file and named it Bullshit.

  I DON’T BELIEVE IN ALIENS

  I DON’T BELIEVE IN ALIEN ABDUCTIONS

  I DON’T THINK I’VE BEEN ABDUCTED

  I KNOW I HAVEN’T BEEN ABDUCTED

  I HAVE NOT BEEN ABDUCTED

  WHY DID I HAVE THE DREAM?

  WHY IS EVERYONE I KNOW HAVING THE DREAM?

  Then it came to her. The perfect story for Conspiracy Theory Press. The University was researching mind control. Or dream control. They obviously had a government grant and were doing something sinister to the citizens of Webster. Water? Air? Radio? Subliminals? Pattern of traffic lights? Something. Her editors at CTP would love it. The readers would eat it up and salivate for more. It couldn’t be more perfect. All she needed was some proof, or something that could be called proof if you looked at it sideways in bad lighting.

  She had two hours before she was supposed to meet Fin at Magic Beans. Plenty of time to scare up a source or two. Anonymous of course.

  *** *** ***

  Marcus could tell Rook was up to something as soon as she came into the waiting area. Sparks leapt from her formidable blue eyes as she searched the counter for her keys. He remembered a time, not too long ago, when her eyes were the thing about her that excited him most. Now they were unsettling and he tried to avoid them when she was fired up like this. He acted like he wasn’t watching as she packed her computer, micro-recorder, and wallet into her snakeskin backpack, pulled her leather jacket on over her crimson dress, and picked up her skateboard.

  She would turn more than a few heads skating through town in fishnets and such a short skirt. Marcus enjoyed his intimate knowledge of what little remained hidden. Let the rest look. She would come home to him. Talisman was closed tomorrow and he would use the free time to expand her collection of markings. It had been too long, weeks, since she’d submitted her skin to him. She thought she had enough ink, but Marcus knew better.

  “Raven,” he said. She took a moment before lifting her gaze to him. It hit him like a storm wind, but he didn’t flinch. “Come to me.”

  She took deliberate steps over to him. She didn’t blink. Her strength excited Marcus — no one could keep her. But ritual must be observed.

  There was a sewing needle affixed behind one of the end pieces of the counter. Marcus wound his left arm around Rook. While crushing her to him and kissing her hard on the mouth, he pressed his right middle finger against the needle’s point, drawing blood. He ran the small droplet through her hair before releasing her. She was marked.

  She still had her eyes open.

  “Bye.” She swept out the door before he could reply.

  *** *** ***

  Outside, Rook wiped Marcus’s kiss off. He thought he could mark her so easily. She took the stairs two at a time up to street level. Heedless of the petroleum-rainbow puddles lingering from yesterday’s rain, she skated down the alley. After dodging her way through the traffic on Linden Avenue she reached the tree-lined Buckminster University campus and quickened her pace. 1:30 classes were in session, so the sidewalks were nearly deserted and Rook made good time to the north end of campus.

  At the library, she found an unoccupied carrel on the fifth floor. Her Doc Martens thunked on the dull green linoleum as she paced the stacks, pulling books at random. After making the carrel look lived-in, Rook put her feet up and waited for her informant.

  ***

  “What do you want?”

  The informant was hostile. Probably because of the incident at Donovan’s party.

  “Just some information. Maybe a quote.” Rook smiled.

  Lara glanced at her watch, looked around to see if they’d been observed. She sighed.

  “I can give you ten minutes. I’m overdue for a break anyway.” She parked her half-empty book cart behind the carrel and perched on the windowsill, her iridescent plum saddle shoes on the desktop. Rook started the micro-recorder and set it on the ledge where Lara’s black and green fingernails drummed restlessly.

  CTP wouldn’t notice or care if she wrote her articles in her sleep, so long as the spelling came close, but she had a work ethic. Not a Protestant work ethic, but it worked for her. And she wouldn’t always work for them. When given the time to investigate, she would go through the motions. To keep in practice.

  Rook began the ritual as she did every time. “You are an employee of the University, are you not?”

  “You know damn well I am.” Lara reached around and cracked the window open. She lit a cigarette and took a long drag. Exhaling, she ran her thumb over the chrome stud protruding below her bottom lip.

  “And you are involved in many of the major research projects?”

  Lara looked around at the books on her shelving cart and filling the library and snorted, “Yeah.”

  Rook tried to sound serious. “So you are, no doubt, aware of the University’s involvement with dream control?”

  Lara choked on her cigarette smoke trying to suppress a laugh, coughed, then said, “Who told you about that?”

  “So you’re aware of it.” Rook sat back. “Are you involved?”

  “Not personally.” Lara watched Rook intently.

  “But your co-workers are?” Rook prodded.

  “Undoubtedly.”

  “What does the University hope to gain?”

  “What does the University ever hope to gain?”

  Rook thought for a moment before replying, “Money.”

  “Precisely.” Lara looked at her watch and pushed up the sleeves of her baggy black sweater.

  Rook took another minute to consider before asking her next question.

  “How are they doing it?”

  “The dream control? How do you think? There aren’t many viable options.” The informant clearly enjoyed putting the reporter on the spot.

  “How do they hope to make money by having everyone dream about spaceships?” Rook wondered aloud.

  “Green spaceships?” Lara was suddenly interested. She stubbed her cigarette on the windowsill before tossing it out.

  “Yeah.” Rook decided to act cagey to see what her faux informant might really be able to tell her.

  “In the dreams, what does the spaceship do?” Lara tried to hide her nervousness.

  “You tell me.”

  “Bitch. Tell me what you know about the dream!” She stood and stared down at Rook, trying for menace but managing only desperation.

  “The University is using its own employees as guinea-pigs. Was this with or without your consent?”

  “Rook! Tell me what this is about. I don’t want to play your stupid game anymore. If this is some sort of weird payback for me hitting on you, you can go fuck yourself!”

  Rook turned the tape recorder off. She felt rotten for pushing the act this
far after it stopped being fun for her friend. “Shit, Lara. I didn’t mean to piss you off. This was just another fishing expedition. I didn’t expect to catch anything. You’ve had the dream too?”

  “What do you mean ‘too’? What’s going on?” She lit another cigarette and started inhaling.

  “I don’t really know what’s going on,” Rook said, thinking how smoothly she screwed that up. “I’m supposed to be writing about what Buckminster does with tuition money and thought this would be an offbeat twist.” Rook took a drag from Lara’s cigarette. “Calm down, would you? You’re starting to make me nervous.”

  “Have you had a dream about a glowing spaceship?”

  “I had a recurring one, but not recently. A lot of people I talk to mention similar things. I figured it was because of the whole UFO culture. Now I don’t know. I guess I’m just paranoid from working with all the nuts at CTP.”

  “Yeah? Well I’m completely freaked. This sucks.” Lara tugged on her lip stud and paced.

  Rook said, “Hey, look, we can pretend this interview never happened.”

  “Maybe you can.”

  Rook sighed and said, “I’m sorry.” She ejected the tape and offered it to Lara.

  Lara handed the unfinished cigarette to Rook in exchange for the tape and started down the aisle with her book cart. A few yards away she yelled back, “If this is some sick joke, I’ll kill you.”

  “Oh great, a death threat. That helps with the paranoia,” Rook muttered. After finishing the smoke and tossing it out the window, she booted her computer and began typing.

  A source at Buck U who spoke on condition of anonymity confirmed...

  One hour and two files later, Rook shut down her Mac, packed her bag, and found the nearest bathroom. She spent a minute applying more black eyeliner and mascara, ran a brush through her hair, and made sure she didn’t have anything stuck in her teeth. She gave herself the once-over in the mirror. This red satin minidress with its embroidered dragon was perhaps a bit obviously flirtatious, but it looked damn good on her, which was why she’d chosen it. Time for her coffee date with her pushy piercing client while her boyfriend waited at home. With a smile Rook hurried out of the library and skated through the crowds as quickly as possible without running anybody over, arriving at Magic Beans five minutes early.