Month: July 2017

Today’s Theme Music

I heard this song in the car while running our usual weekend errands, and turned it up and listened. It employs an honesty and simplicity in the lyrics and melody. Later, I learned one of my favorite recent guys, CeeLo Green, was one of the people behind it. The song was inspired by a conversation between CeeLo and Danger Mouse about artists not being taken seriously unless the artists were insane. Yet, watching the news since then, I get the impression, in this era of personality, that being taken seriously when acting insane extends way beyond artists and into politics and business. We’re inundated with the mundane and tedium, so the insane draws our attention. Then, we start listening more carefully to what the insane are saying, and wonder, “Hmmm…can they be right?”

Here’s Gnarls Barkley with “Crazy,” from two thousand five.

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Vaughn

To recap. The Beagle is a colonizing starship that arrived at a new world, Feynman. Juancho Ferrado is a bureaucrat who lives and works on the Beagle who was selected as part of the Coronado landing party. Shortly after the Coronado’s successful descent to the surface of Feynman, the Beagle inexplicably exploded. All personnel onboard were assumed to be killed. That left the Coronado’s crew as the only survivors. Four years later, only Juancho remains when Roger Lancey startles Juancho with his sudden appearance on the Coronado.

Then Lancey disappeared. 

Now, the tale continues. Don’t worry, it’s certified completely organic and vegan, GMO-free, non-fat, and with no added sugar.

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“Hi, Vaughn.”

Opening his eyes wide, Vaughn Parks looked around Captain Mayhew’s office. Vaughn had once been a heartbreaker, a man with a slender, athletic build that prompted thoughts of grace, and green eyes that glistened like wet emerald jewels. Pronouncing, “I’ve seen enough of life, and now I want to experience death,” he’d chosen to age and die once they’d reached Feynman. “Captain.”

“How do you feel?”

“I feel like I was dead, and now I’m apparently alive again. I feel like warmed-over leftovers, something you may not know, Captain.”

Captain Mayhew chuckled. “I’m older than I look.”

“Probably.”

“I know what leftovers are. I like leftovers.” Captain Mayhew smiled at private memories.

Vaughn saw that and changed vectors. “Virtual stimulation via artificial intelligence?”

“What?”

“I’ve been brought back by virtual simulation via artificial intelligence?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“We need your opinion.”

“On?”

“I’m about to impart that.”

“Sorry. I seem to think very fast.” Vaughn gazed up at the ceiling. “It’ really interesting, like I’m experiencing time on a different level.”

“Perhaps you can follow up on that when we’re done here.”

“Oh.” Vauhn swiveled his look to the Captain and grinned. “Yes, you brought me here for a reason, didn’t you? What sort of emergency has invoked the virtual regeneration? This is the first time I’ve been back, right?” Face crinkling with humor, Vaughn continued, “Never mind, I’m catching up with my records. Unless you’ve manipulated my records, this is my first time back since I died, just two years ago.”

His expression changed. “Just two years? We’ve been on Feynman for two and a half years, and now there’s a problem that you think I can help you with?”

“Correct.”

“Well, fill me in, then.”

“It’s Juancho.”

“Juancho.” Recognition flushed Vaughn’s green eyes. “The ship’s artificial intelligence?”

“Yes. You should have access to Juancho’s logs.”

Looking inward, and mildly squinting, Vaughn said, “I do.”

“Go ahead and read them.”

“I have.”

“Already?”

“They’re digital, I’m digital…there’s a certain digital sympatico taking place.”

“Oh.” Captain Mayhew looked interested. “That’s fascinating.”

“But something to pursue after this.”

“Yes, if you’re interested, and willing to stick around.”

“Well, we’ll see. So I’ve read the document….”

“Yes, you’ve read the document.”

“What do you think?”

“Of it? I don’t understand that question.”

“Well, Juancho appears to be fantasizing about the Beagle exploding, and essentially, being the last human on Feynman and living on the Coronado.”

“Yes.”

“Is there reason for us to be concerned?”

“Why?”

“Well, it’s A.I. Do you think Juancho will act on it?”

“Oh his fantasy?”

“Exactly.”

Leaning back, Vaughn crossed his legs and stroked his mustache. “I don’t know.”

Mayhew exhaled. “That’s not thrilling to hear.”

“Sorry.”

She stared at Vaughn. “This doesn’t concern me?”

“I’m still thinking about it.”

“What about the part where he pretends one of the crew members is looking for you, and doesn’t know where you went.”

“I thought that was interesting.” Vaughn grinned. “I wanted to know where I went.”

“Does any of this worry you, though?”

Slicking down half of his mustache with one finger, Vaughn uncrossed his legs, and replied, “No. It’s just simple fantasy. My take is that Juancho is a powerful A.I. system. He brought the Beagle across the galaxy to Feynman. That required tremendous resources. Now, I suspect, he’s bored.”

“Bored.”

“Yes.”

“That’s what some of the engineers suggested.”

“They’re probably right, I think. Let me ask you this.” Straightening his frame, Vaughn said, “Have you asked Juancho about it?”

“We tried to. We’ve sent people in, but he plays games with them. He will only permit certain people in, in the first place. For example, he wouldn’t talk to me.”

“Yes, yes, I read that. He said you were disturbing his muse.”

“Yes, exactly. That’s why we’re worried.”

“But, other than this fantasy, he’s functioning normally, and nothing has gone wrong.”

“Yes, but we’re worried. You can see why.”

“Sure, sure, I can.” Rubbing two stubby fingers together and looking at them, Vaughn inhaled.  “What do you want me to do? Want me to talk to him?”

“Do you think that’ll help?”

Vaughn shrugged. “I don’t think it’ll hurt. Hang on a moment. I’ll be right back.”

Mayhew’s brown eyes widened. “You’re going to do it now?”

“Why not? You have a reason why I shouldn’t? I’m here, he’s there…let’s get it on.”

“Okay. Great. Do it, then.”

“Okay.” Eyes becoming lost in a nest of wrinkles, Vaughn smiled, flashing straight, white teeth. “I’ll be right back.”

Coming tomorrow: the conclusion.

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A Drink of Fun

The young man walking toward him looked like a tall drink of fun. He wondered what the man was really like.

He’d once been a tall drink of fun, he rued. Well, not a tall drink, but a tumbler of fun. More like a shot, really.

He’d been a short shot of fun.

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Not His Problem

Icebergs breaking off and rising sea levels…they weren’t his problem. Seas rise. That was their problem. Their own fault, for buying land on the coast and building a house there. Their own fault, the fools.

Like building a place where you know there’s an earthquake, or volcano. Only a fool does that.

No, his problem was the dust. It was going to be another hot, dry, and dusty year with not enough water to bring grow the crops. The water levels were down everywhere.

That was his problem.

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Today’s Theme Music

Woke up feeling like some Squirrel Nut Zippers.

I began listening to them in nineteen ninety-seven. I was working for a medical defice startup called P.A.S. in Palo Alto. A young co-worker introduced me to the S.N.Z. sound with the second album, “Hot.”

I became particularly fond of “Hell.” It was a good song to sing along to while seat dancing  when I was stuck in the SF Bay Area traffic. I still smile when I hear this song.

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Purrjesty

Purrjesty (Catfinition): a feline thrumming sound of great and impressively beautiful quality.

In Use: “Dark-tipped tail erect, his purrjesty filling the room, the ginger cat pranced over the floor, leaned against his body against the man’s legs, and looked up at him.”

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Gone, Man

I, Juancho, finished my first blackberry margarita of the day. It was so refreshing, but I drank it so fast, and I was anxious, that I clutched my handgun and ordered another, to drink more slowly.

The man had not returned to the break room. I thought he’d be back by now. The Coronado is not large. There is the quarters car, and the community car, where I sit in the break room, also called the social club, because there is a break room in the biz car, and another in the ops car. I don’t believe the utility car has a break room. I may be mistaken. I’ve visited it, because that’s where the utility vehicles are housed, and because Madi used to spend her time there. I watched her on the security camera. There was nothing else to do. I was waiting to see who would be last, and I worried that she might be a killer. I don’t know why I wished to stay alive, in this terrible situation.

Holding the gun in my left hand, and my drink in my right, I visited the security post in the room’s corner. From there, I can set down my drink, or my gun, and change monitors and look for people. The system has said that Roger Lancey is dead, so I don’t know if it’ll find him on the ship. I have no idea how he entered the car. No alarms went off. He entered the break room as though he’d been onboard all along. This, I know, is impossible. I, Juancho, have been on the Coronado for four years. The last six months have been alone. Before then, it was Madi and me. We were the last little Indians.

He’d been asking questions about his Uncle Vaughn. Yes, his Uncle was an important man. Apparently, he disappeared before the Beagle’s explosion. I don’t know what that’s about. Perhaps it’s meaningful; a number of the Coronado’s survivors disappeared without apparent reason. It scares me, Juancho, to contemplate the meaning behind these disappearances, and whether they can be connected.

The system does not find Roger Lancey. I, Juancho, am not surprised. I use the manual features to check the cameras, going from place to place. The engineer was looking for Commander Alves, so I look where he should look, at her quarters, and her office in the ops car. Roger Lancey isn’t at either location. I look in the control deck. He’s an engineer, and this seems likely as a location for him to go. He can attempt to contact the Beagle from there. It seems strange that he does not know about the Beagle. But, then, if he is onboard, and it exploded, he was killed. This is why the system calls him deceased.

Yet, he is here.

This begins me on a new tour of my private circle of hell. He is either a zombie, or I am insane. If I’m insane, I could be imagining him, or I could be imagining this entire story. In that regard, as I said to Ricardo before his disappearance, we could be in a virtual simulation or game, couldn’t we? We wouldn’t know. That seemed to greatly upset Ricardo. He disappeared within two days of our conversation. Deceased, the systems say.

I can’t find Roger Lancey anywhere. I think, perhaps he’s gone to the utility car to take one of the remaining vessels and leave. I, Juancho, can’t conceive of where he would go, but other engineers on the Coronado discussed that as an option before their disappearances. The cameras don’t find him there. The vehicles remain.

I, Juancho, am disturbed. He is gone, as he came, without clues or warnings. This seems too much for my personal systems. That cannot happen.

That cannot happen.

He must be on the Coronado.

Yes, I, Juancho, realized. He was hiding, waiting for me to come look for him, so that he can kill me.

That can be the only explanation of events.

Well, I, Juancho, laugh at that. I am a bureaucrat. We are conditioned to wait. We must be patient. Everything takes time. The systems, decisions, and events, cannot be hurried. We understand that better than others. I, Juancho, decided I will have another margarita, and wait for Roger Lancey to give up on his ambush and return to this room to find me.

And I, Juancho, will have my gun, and will be ready for him.

He’ll be sorry that he plotted to ambush me. 

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A Sign

He takes the car down the road to the dilapidated cinder block car wash, where most of the features no longer work. Take the change, for example – please! – he laughs to himself, because his first quarter rolls right through the coin slot and machine, and out the other end, clinking on the wet and broken cement pad. He finds a penny when he picks up the quarter.

That car washed, he returns with the other vehicle. He takes it to a different stall, where – deja vu! – the same thing happens with the quarter, and he finds another penny.

Two cars, two stalls, two quarters, two pennies. He cups the pennies in his hand and shakes them.

It must be a sign.

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The Reason

You hear about it all the time, but it never happens to you. You read about another one just yesterday. Still, it’s the police. There must be a reason they’re shooting and killing all those people. They wouldn’t do it, unless they had a reason.

Those victims must have been asking for it, or the police would have never killed them. After all, they’re the police. They protect and serve.

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