The Ware Tetralogy Read online

  He opened his eyes. His body seemed to have disappeared. He was just a head resting on a round red table. People looking at him. Greasers. And the chick he’d been with last . . .

  “Are you awake?” she said with brittle sweetness. She had a black eye.

  Sta-Hi didn’t answer right away. He had gone home with that woman, yeah. She had a cottage down the beach. And then they’d gotten drunk together on synthetic bourbon whiskey. He’d gotten drunk anyway, and must have blacked-out. Last thing he remembered was breaking something . . . her hollowcaster. Crunching the silicon chips underfoot and shouting. Shouting what?

  “You’ll feel better in a minute,” the woman added in that same falsely bright tone. He heard her poodle whimpering from across the room. He had a memory of throwing it, arcing it along a flat, fuzzy parabolic path. And now he remembered slugging the chick too.

  One of the men at the table shifted in his chair. He wore mirror-shades and had short hair. He had his shirt off. It seemed like another hot day.

  The man’s foot scuffed Sta-Hi’s shin. So Sta-Hi had a body after all. It was just that his body was tied up under the table and his head was sticking out through a hole in the table-top. The table was split and had hinges on one side, and a hook-and-eye on the other.

  “Stocks and bonds,” Sta-Hi said finally. There was a nasty-looking implement lying on the table. It plugged into the wall. He attempted a smile, “What’s the story? You mad about the . . . the hollowcaster? I’ll give you mine.” He hoped the dog wasn’t hurt bad. At least it was well enough to be whimpering.

  No one but the chick wanted to meet his eyes. It was like they were ashamed of what they were going to do to him. The stuff they’d shot him up with was taking hold. As his brain speeded up, the scene around him seemed to slow down. The man with no shirt stood up with dream-like slowness and walked across the room. He had words tattooed on his back. Some kind of stupid rap about hell. It was too hard to read. The man had gained so much weight since getting tattooed that the words were all pulled down on both sides.

  “What do you want?” Sta-Hi said again. “What are you going to do to me?” Counting the chick there were five of them. Three men and two women. The other woman had stringy red hair dyed green. The woman he’d picked up was the only one who looked at all middle-class. Date bait.

  “Y’all want some killah-weed?” drawled one of the men. He had a pimp mustache and a pockmarked face. He wore a chromed tire-chain around his neck with his name in big letters. BERDOO. Also hanging from the chain was a little mesh pouch full of hand-rolled cigarettes.

  “Not me,” Sta-Hi said. “I’m high on life.” No one laughed.

  The big man with no shirt came back across the room. He held five cheap steel spoons. “We really gonna do it, Phil?” the girl with green hair asked him. “We really gonna do it?”

  Berdoo passed a krystal-joint to his neighbor, a bald man with half his teeth missing. Exactly half the teeth gone, so that one side of the face was flaccid and caved in, while the other was still fresh and beefy. He took a long hit and picked up the machine that was lying on the table.

  “Take the lid off, Haf’N’Haf,” the chick with the black eye urged. “Open the bastard up.”

  “We really gonna do it!” the green-haired girl exclaimed, and giggled shrilly. “I ain’t never ate no live brain before!”

  “It’s a stuzzy high, Rainbow,” Phil told her. With his fat and his short hair he looked stupid, but his way of speaking was precise and confident. He seemed to be the leader. “This ought to be a good brain, too. Full of chemicals, I imagine.”

  Haf’N’Haf seemed to be having some trouble starting the little cutting machine up. It was a variable heat-blade. They were going to cut off the top of Sta-Hi’s skull and eat his brain with those cheap steel spoons. He would be able to watch them . . . at first.

  Someone started screaming. Someone tried to stand up, but he was tied too tightly. The variable blade was on now, set at one centimeter. The thickness of the skull.

  Sta-Hi threw his head back and forth wildly as Haf’N’Haf leaned towards him. There was no way to read the ruined face’s expression.

  “Hold still, damn you!” the chick with the black eye shouted. “It’s no good if we have to knock you out!”

  Sta-Hi didn’t really hear her. His mind had temporarily . . . snapped. He just kept screaming and thrashing his head around. The sound of his shrill voice was like a lattice around him. He tried to weave the lattice thicker.

  The little pimp with the tire-chain went and got a towel from the bathroom. He wedged it around Sta-Hi’s neck and under his chin to keep the head steady. Sta-Hi screamed louder, higher.

  “Stuff his mayouth,” the green-haired girl cried. “He’s yellin and all.”

  “No,” Phil said. “The noise is like . . . part of the trip. Wave with it, baby. The Chinese used to do this to monkeys. It’s so wiggly when you spoon out the speech-centers and the guy’s tongue stops moving. Just all at—” He stopped and the flesh of his face moved in a smile.

  Haf’N’Haf leaned forward again. There was a slight smell of singed flesh as the heat-blade dug in over Sta-Hi’s right eyebrow. Attracted by the food smell, the little poodle came stiffly trotting across the room. It tried to hop over the heat-blade’s electric cord, but didn’t quite make it. The plug popped out of the wall.

  Haf’N’Haf uttered a muffled, lisping exclamation.

  “He says git the dog outta here,” Berdoo interpreted. “He don’t think hit’s sanitary with no dawg in here.”

  Sullenly, the chick with the black eye got up to get the dog. The sudden pain over his eyebrow had brought Sta-Hi back to rationality. Somewhere in there he had stopped screaming. If there were any neighbors they would have heard him by now.

  He thought hard. The heat-blade would cauterize the wound as it went. That meant he wouldn’t be bleeding when they took the top of his skull off. So what? So the fuck what?

  Another wave of wild panic swept over him. He strained upward so hard that the table shifted half a meter. The edge of the hole in the table began cutting into the side of his neck. He couldn’t breathe! He saw spots and the room darkened . . .

  “He’s choking!” Phil cried. He jumped to his feet and pushed the table back across the uneven floor. The table screeched and vibrated.

  Sta-Hi threw himself upward again, before Haf’N’Haf could get the heat-blade restarted. Anything for time, no matter how pointless. But the vibrating of the table had knocked open the little hook-and-eye latch. The two halves of the table yawned open, and Sta-Hi fell over onto the floor.

  His feet were tied together and his hands were tied behind his back. He had time to notice that the people at the table were wearing brightly colored sneakers with alphabets around the edges. The Little Kidders. He’d always thought the newscasters had made them up.

  Someone was hammering at the door, harder and harder. Five pairs of kids’ sneakers scampered out of the room. Sta-Hi heard a window open, and then the door splintered. More feet. Shiny black lace-up shoes. Cop shoes.

  CHAPTER SIX

  With a final tack, Stan Mooney Senior pulled the last wrinkle out of the black velvet. It was eleven o’clock on a Saturday morning. On the patio table next to the stretched black velvet, he had arranged a few pencil sketches and the brimming little pots of iridescent paint. He wanted to paint a space dogfight today.

  Two royal palms shaded his patio, and no sounds came out of his house. Full of peace, Mooney took a sip of iced-tea and dipped his brush in the metallic paint. At the left he would put a ship like BEX, the big bopper ship. And coming down on it from the right there would be a standard freight-hull space-shuttle outfitted as a battleship. He painted with small quick strokes, not a thought in his head.

  Time passed, and the wedge-shaped bopper ship took shape. Sparingly, Mooney touched up the exhaust ports with self-luminous red. Nothing but his hands moved. From a distance, the faint breeze brought the sound of the surf.
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  The phone began to ring. Mooney continued painting for a minute, hoping his wife Bea was back from her night at the sex-club. The phone kept on ringing. With a sigh, Mooney wiped off his brush and went in. The barrel-chested old man on the floor groaned and shifted. Mooney stepped around him and picked up the phone.

  “Yeah?”

  “Is that you, Mooney?”

  He recognized Action Jackson’s calm, jellied voice. Why did Daytona Beach have to call him on a Saturday morning?

  “Yeah it’s me. What’s on your mind?”

  “We’ve got your boy here. Just saved him from being guest of honor at a Monkey Brain Feast, Southern-style. Someone heard him and phoned in a tip.”

  “Oh God. Is he all right?”

  “He’s got a cut over his eye. And maybe a touch of that drug psychosis. I might could remand him to your custody.”

  The old man on the floor was groaning and beginning to sit up. Trying to speak louder, Mooney slipped into an excited shout.

  “Yes, please do! Send him down in a patrol car to make sure he comes here! And thanks, Action! Thanks a lot!”

  Mooney felt trembly all over. He could only see the horrible image of his son’s eyes watching the Little Kidders chew up his last thoughts. Mooney’s tongue twitched, trying to flick away the imagined taste of the brain tissue, tingly with firing neurons, tart with transmitter chemicals. Suddenly he had to have a cigarette. He had stopped buying them three months ago, but he remembered that the old man smoked.

  “Give me a cigarette, Anderson.”

  “What day is it?” Cobb answered. He was sitting on the floor, propped up against the couch. He stretched his tongue out, trying to clear away the salt and mucus.

  “It’s Saturday.” Mooney leaned forward and took a cigarette out of the old man’s shirt pocket. He felt like talking. “I took you and your girlfriend to the Gray Area last night, remember?”

  “She’s not my girlfriend.”

  “Maybe not. Hell, she left with another guy while you were in the john. I saw them go. He looked like your twin brother.”

  “I don’t have a . . . ” Cobb broke off in mid-sentence, remembering a lot of things at once. His eyes darted around the room. Under . . . he’d put it under something. Sliding his hand under the couch behind him he felt the reassuring touch of a bottle.

  “That’s right,” Cobb said, picking up the thread. “I remember now. She took him back to my house just to put me uptight. And I don’t even know the guy.” His voice was firm.

  Mooney exhaled a cloud of cigarette smoke. He’d been too tired last night to check out Anderson’s look-alike. But maybe that was the one who’d broken into the warehouse? The guy was probably still in Anderson’s bed. Maybe he should . . .

  Suddenly the image of his son’s dying eyes came crashing back in on him. He walked to the window and looked at his watch. How soon would the patrol car get here?

  Stealthily Cobb slid the dark-brown glass bottle out from under the couch. He shook it near his ear and heard a rich rustle. It had been a good idea to get Mooney to bring him here.

  “Don’t drink any more of that,” Mooney said, turning back from the window.

  “Don’t worry,” Cobb answered. “I drained it right after I dug it up last night.” He slid the bottle back under the couch.

  Mooney shook his head. “I don’t know why I let you stop off for it. I must have felt sorry for you for not having a place to sleep. But I can’t drive you back home. My son’s coming home in a half hour.”

  Cobb had gathered from Mooney’s end of the phone conversation that the son was in some kind of trouble with the police. As far as the ride back home went, he didn’t care. Because he wasn’t going back home. He was going to the Moon if he could get on the weekly flight out this afternoon. But it wouldn’t do to tell Stan Mooney about it. The guy still had some residue of suspicion about Cobb, even though the bartender had borne out his alibi a hundred percent.

  His thoughts were interrupted by someone coming in the front door. A brassy blonde with symmetrical features made a bit coarse by a forward-slung jaw. Mooney’s wife. She wore a white linen dress that buttoned up the front. Lots of buttons were open. Cobb caught a glimpse of firm, tanned thighs.

  “Hello, stranger,” Bea called musically to her husband. She sized Cobb up with a glance, and shot a hip in his direction. “Who’s the old-timer? One of your father’s drinking buddies?” She flashed a smile at them. Everything was fine with her. She’d had a great night.

  “Action Jackson called,” Mooney said. His wife’s challenging, provocative smile maddened him. Suddenly, more than anything else, he wanted to smash her composure.

  “Stanny is dead. They found him in a motel room with his brain gone.” He believed the words as he said them. It made sense for his son to end up like that. Good sense.

  Bea began screaming then, and Mooney fanned her frenzy . . . feeding her details, telling her it was her fault for not making a happy home, and finally beginning to shake and slap her under the pretext of trying to calm her down. Cobb watched in some confusion. It didn’t make sense. But, then, hardly anything ever did.

  He pulled the bottle out from under the couch and put it under his shirt, tucking it neck down into his waistband. This seemed like a good time to leave. Now Mooney and his wife were kissing frantically. They didn’t even open their eyes when Cobb sidled past them and out the front door.

  Outside, the sun was blasting. Noon. Last night someone had told Cobb the Moon flight went out every Saturday at four. He felt dizzy and confused. When was four? Where? He looked around blankly. The bottle-neck under his waistband was digging into him.

  He took out the bottle and peered into Mooney’s garage. Cool, dark. There was a tool-board mounted on the back wall. He went there, selected a hammer, and smashed open the bottle on Mooney’s workbench. The wad of bills was still there all right. Maybe he should forget about the Moon and the boppers’ promise of immortality. He could just stay here and use the money for a nice new tank-grown heart.

  How much was there? Cobb shook the broken glass off the bills and began counting. There should either be twenty-five or a thousand of them. Or was it four? He wasn’t quite . . .

  A hand dropped on Cobb’s shoulder. He gave a guttural cry and squeezed the money in both hands. A splinter of glass cut into him. He turned around to face a skinny man, silhouetted against the light from the garage door.

  Cobb stuffed the money in his pocket. At least it wasn’t Mooney. Maybe he could still . . .

  “Cobb Anderson!” the dark figure exclaimed, seeming surprised. Backlit like that there was no way to make out his features. “It’s an honor to meet the man who put the boppers on the moon.” The voice was slow, inflectionless, possibly sarcastic.

  “Thank you,” Cobb said. “But who are you?”

  “I’m . . . ” the voice trailed off in a chuckle. “I’m sort of a relative of Mr. Mooney’s. About to be a relative. I came here to meet his son, but I’m in such a rush . . . Do you think you could do me a favor?”

  “Well, I don’t know. I’ve got to get out to the spaceport.”

  “Exactly. I know that. But I have to get there first and fix things up for you. Now what I want you to do is to bring Mooney’s son with you. The cops’ll drop him off here any minute. Tell him to come to the Moon with you. I’m supposed to stand in for him.”

  “Are you a robot, too?”

  “Right. I’m going to get Mr. Mooney to give me a night watchman job at the warehouses. So the son has to disappear. The Little Kidders were going to handle it but . . . never mind. The main thing is that you take him to the Moon.”

  “But how . . . ”

  “Here’s more money. To cover his ticket. I’ve got to run.” The lithe skinny figure pressed a wad of bills into Cobb’s hand and stepped past him, leaving by the garage’s back door. For an instant Cobb could see his face. Long lips, shifty eyes.

  There was a sudden rush of noise. Cobb turned, stuff
ing the extra money into his pants pocket. A police cruiser was in the driveway. Cobb stood there, rooted to the spot. One cop, and some kind of prisoner in back.

  “Howdy, Grandpaw,” the cop called, getting out of the car. He seemed to take Cobb for a pheezer hired hand. “Is Mister Mooney here?”

  Cobb realized that the shaky guy in back must be the son. Probably the kid wanted to get out of here as bad as he did. A plan hatched in his mind.

  “I’m afraid Stan had to go help out at one of the neighbor’s,” Cobb said, walking out of the garage. An image of Mooney and his wife locked in sexual intercourse on the living-room floor flashed before his eyes. “He’s installing a hose-system.”

  The policeman looked at the old man a little suspiciously. The chief had told him Mooney would be here for sure. The old guy looked like a bum. “Who are you, anyway? You got any ID?”

  “In the house,” Cobb said with a negligent laugh. “I’m Mister Mooney’s Dad. He told me you were coming.” He stooped and chuckled chidingly at the face in the back of the cruiser. The same face he’d just seen in the garage.

  “Are you in dutch again, Stan Junior? You look out or you’ll grow up like your grandfather! Now come on inside and I’ll fix you some lunch. Grilled ham and cheese just the way you like it.”

  Before the cop could say anything, Cobb had opened the cruiser’s back door. Sta-Hi got out, trying to figure where the pheezer had come from. But anything that put off seeing his parents was fine with him.

  “That sounds swell, Gramps,” Sta-Hi said with a weary smile. “I could eat a whore.”

  “Thank the officer for driving you, Stanny.”

  “Thank you, officer.”

  The policeman gave a curt nod, got in his car and drove off. Cobb and Sta-Hi stood in the driveway while the clucking of the hydrogen engine faded away. Down at the corner, a Mister Frostee truck sped past.

  CHAPTER SEVEN