A Future We'd Like To See 1.49 - Tales of the Sunny City, Act I
By Twoflower (Copyright 1994)
 
     An essay on Summer, by Benton Hunt.  Chapter one.  Ahem.
 
     When it's Summer, it's always sunny and bright.  Suburbia
has that seasonal filter of Depressing Autumn, Dark Winters,
Rainy Springs, and Sunny Summers.  It's the season when the trees
are green, the ground dry, the heat on, the AC cranked, etc.  The
long boring stretch that you get to fill with fun and excitement,
if you can find any in the burbs.
 
     Summer in the city is enjoyable, Summer in the suburbs is
not.  The 'burbs on Terra are the worst burbs of all : a thick
layer of middle-income housing with high security and plenty of
boredom.  However, in the city, Summer is the period when people
can get on each others' nerves... crazy from the heat, I guess. 
Lots of fun things happen in the city during Summers, not all of
which are my fault.
 
     When you're in school three seasons of the year, you lack a
life... normal kids can get out on the weekends, but when you're
a High High student, you can kiss THAT goodbye.  There's just too
much work to do.  You can't go anywhere; the city, to the other
side of the burbs, ANYWHERE.  School is your life.
 
     High High is the name we've given to our school.  It's one
of those prissy little paid-for educational services parents send
their kids to in hopes of getting them smarter.  It works, too,
through a variety of unconventional teaching techniques... mental
training courses... smart-drugged food... shock treatment... etc.
It's not high up in altitude, it's not high in moral standards,
it's not high in drug-induced euphoria, it's high in IQ...
whether you like it or not, going there will make you a full-time
student with a brain the size of Montana.
 
     But Summer's another matter.  In Summer, you can LET your
mind ditch the busywork of school.  You can put your obscenely
intellectual mind to more illegal and entertaining pursuits.  You
can live life and be a proper teenage hoodlum.
 
     I've got two other HH henchmen.  One, Jody, is a computer
scientist who got rammed into that occupation by heritage.  Her
dad was a computer scientist, her mom was a computer scientist,
her grandfather, her great grandmother, etc. etc. etc. on back to
days when the abacus high tech.  Family tradition is an ugly
thing.
 
     The other, Mitch, is this little psychology basket case. 
Highly manipulative; he's way too good at guessing what you're
gonna do, almost like reading your mind, which isn't too far from
the truth.  He explained it to me one day in between runs into
the city, how he samples little details and forms prediction
tables about behaviors, but I guess you just have to be into that
stuff to get it.
 
     Me, Benton, I'm an artist.  Art is one of the less-respected
departments of High High, which stresses mental activity that
involves digits and factoids.  Supposedly I've got this wildly
symbolic vision that sculpts pure ideas into material form... at
least that's what Mr. Higgins (the Amazing Bald Wonder) claims. 
Me, I just put some junk together and let them sort it out.  I
don't think the treatments HH gives affect me.  Maybe one of
these days they'll realize I'm not smart and kick me out.
 
     Now, the careers we're studying for are terrific pursuits
and will probably get us big houses and fast ships in the future,
but right now we want to have FUN.  And the only place for that
is the city.
 
     I always wear my HH uniform for city runs.  I find it to be
a good terror device, since city dwellers everywhere know that
the only things that follow High High brats are war, death,
famine, plague, sitcoms, etc. etc. etc.  It's a simple outfit,
really... a blue shirt with the 'Oppenheimer School of Higher
Order Thinking and Mental Development' logo printed on the back,
and matching pants.  Girls wear a similar blouse and a long
skirt.  They don't bother with ties or suits; outward appearances
should mean little, humble outfits are enough.  Of course, I
don't follow that, so I'm wearing my leather jacket as well with
the neat flaming skull on the back.
 
     Jody's land rover pulled up, rolling along on two of its
wheels, tilted at some absurd angle.  She twisted the wheel,
slamming down the other two wheels and swinging a tight ninety
into my driveway.  She leaned on the horn.
 
     I took a quick check in the mirror to make sure I didn't
look like a dog, and hopped out the window, swinging down the
monofilament cord I always kept tied to the gutter.
 
     (You'll notice us students are a bit show-offy.  High High
insists on using your cranium to the fullest, pushing that
intelligence envelope in every activity.  Of course, they
probably meant we should read more books or do volunteer work at
some big corporation for MORE busywork, but the kids interpret
the rule one other way; you've got a mind, use it to look as
impressive as possible.  I hear jocks do the same thing with
their muscles.)
 
     The handle on the invisible rope slid me down to the lawn,
where I landed on both feet at walking speed.  A neat trick which
requires practice, practice, practice.
 
     "Did you hit the mailbox this time?" I asked, out of
tradition.  Jody just rolled her eyes.
 
     "I haven't done that since freshman year.  Get over it
already.  Come on, we gotta go pick up Mitch."
 
     "Where is Freud Junior, anyway?" I asked, jumping over the
convertible's door and into the back seat.  (Mitch always got the
passenger seat.  I think it's a power thing.)
 
     "He's doing some last minute details.  He's got this weird
idea about mass hysteria he wants to try.  You know Lindsey?"
 
     "Lindsey?" I asked, running through a mental cardfile of
other HH students.  Let's see, Lester (physics), Ld'yyk
(navigation), Lindsey (biotechnology).  "Biotech.  What about
her?"
 
     "Apparently Mitch was trying to get her to go out on a date
with her.  Worked."
 
     "And?  Come on, get to the meat of the story."
 
     "And that's it.  Apparently she cooked up some idea that
involves the screens near Central Station, and talked him into
getting US to help.  So we gotta go grab them plus whatever
materials they've got and go into town.  He didn't say anything
else."
 
     "Sounds mysterious.  Still, a gag is a gag.  Hey, you gonna
pull out of my driveway already?  I wanna get home before supper. 
It's Stovetop night."
 
     Jody shrugged, and threw the rover into reverse.  She
slammed the gas, rocketing the car backwards, and turned one-
eighty before roaring down the suburban road.
 
     "You ever consider giving driving lessons?" I asked.
 
     "Ha," she stated.
 
     To the untrained eye she might look like some wild, out of
control driver.  Not so.  She's got all the angles and velocities
calculated out, directions memorized, traffic patterns taken into
account, etc. etc.  She's a speed freak that way, in programming
and driving; the object is to get from your home (the beginning
of the program) to your destination (the last compile) as fast as
humanly possible.  What chaos you cause along the way isn't
important.
 
     So she'll tear around corners, drive on sidewalks, lift up
on two wheels to roll BETWEEN traffic lanes, etc.  Sure, the cops
ticket her, but she has a link into the cop computers and just
erases any new records.  She coats her bedroom walls with tickets
long forgotten by the police, sort of a tribute to her unearthly
powers over the suburban security militia.
 
     I cross-checked my mental cardfile to the map to see where
Lindsey lived.  Not too far away, really; at 97 MPH we'd be there
about-- now.
 
     The rover's advanced brakes (programmed by Jody, of course),
screamed to a halt in Lindsey's driveway.
 
     I had never seen Lindsey before; I only knew her name,
grade, and chosen occupational path.  Biotech HHer's were by
tradition a bit disturbed, using their superior greymatter to
modify themselves in strange ways.  A diagonal scar along her
forehead and a small metal socket indicated that she had toyed
with her own brain a little too.  Easy computer access, I
suppose, to let you work fast enough to handle neural
programming.  Certainly more efficient than a suction cup jack.
 
     Mitch was busy making out with Lindsey on the porch-swing. 
Only Mitch, though; Lindsey ignored his slobbering.  Jody
politely slammed on the horn, and they broke it up.
 
     I can see how Lindsey could have easily encouraged Mitch to
get us involved in this trick.  See, he has this weird problem
once he starts dating someone.  That person is the only one he
can't analyze and manipulate...  Sort of a blind spot, I guess. 
Poor guy.  Don't worry, he'll return to normal after the
inevitable break up, then everything I've said about him will
ring true.
 
     "Greetings, fellow adolescent ones," Mitch said.  "Hey,
Benton, get your ass in the front seat.  We want the back this
time."
 
     "There's just something more arousing about the historical
usage of backseat, right?" I joked, hopping out.
 
     "Don't be crude.  Lindsey, after you," he suaved, putting
all his usual smooth-operator moves into use.  She didn't seem to
care, really, opening the door wider on her own and slumping into
the back seat.  Mitch shrugged, and glided in after her.
 
     "Lindsey, these are my partners in crime.  Jody here is into
computers.  Don't worry, you won't die from her driving."
 
     This was also a Mitch maneuver, putting down his pals to
make himself look big in front of his new girl.  (Not normal
behavior for him, but he WAS in date-mode.)  I could tell Lindsey
wasn't falling for it, but Mitch's normally powerful
observational skills were on hold.
 
     "And this is Benton.  He's an ARTIST," he sneered, in the
same way one might say "Minimum Wage Earner".
 
     "Hi," Lindsey greeted flatly.  "Put the rover in gear, we
need to be at Central Station before rush hour."
 
     Jody mouthed "Gee, SHE seems nice" to me, and floored the
gas, cutting very close to the plastic mailbox.
 
     "So what's this joke you guys have planned?" I asked,
turning around in my seat.
 
     "I'm--"
 
     "We're gonna brainwash the city!" Mitch grinned evilly,
cutting off Lindsey in mid sentence.
 
     Lindsey looked irritated at the interruption.  "Not
brainwash.  Encourage.  The plan involves the holovision screens
at Central Station."
 
     "The ones that are always running soda ads and HNN, right?"
I asked.
 
     "The same.  Here's how we'll do it.  Step one, get inside
the building.  Step two, hack into the network that controls the
screens.  Step three, insert a subliminal sequence of images that
will send the brain into a lowered-inhibition mode.  Then the
real fun starts."
 
     "This isn't anything permanent, right?" I asked.  "See, you
may be new to the Terrible Threesome here, but we've got one
cardinal rule, you never harm anybody permanently.  Takes the fun
out of it."
 
     "Nothing significant will occur.  Mitch, get your hand off
my leg."
 
     "Hmm?  Oh, sorry.  How'd that get there?"
 
     "You're a pig, Mitch," Lindsey stated, unemotionally.  "But
a useful pig.  Be happy you're in on my master plan."
 
     Mitch just smiled sappily back, lost in the throes of blind
devotion.
 
     "Ooh, she's got a master plan," Jody muttered under her
breath.  "I feel SO lucky."
 
                              *
 
     So the ride continued, Lindsey explaining the plan.
 
     Things went this way.  Mitch would launch another
unsuccessful attempt to turn Lindsey's attention towards him. 
Lindsey would ignore him and fill me in on her plan, then Jody
would make a sarcastic comment to me.  I'd spoon-feed Lindsey
another "Then what?" and the cycle would repeat, etc. etc.
 
     Apparently, the sequence Lindsey was going to run on the
screens would cause anybody who saw it to start babbling about
peace, love, and harmony.  This would be amusing, since not
everybody would see the screens at once... having the newly
formed hippies interact with the yet unaffected commuters and
workers would be thrilling indeed.
 
     The willpower inhibition effect would wear off in about an
hour, leaving us enough time to laugh, shake hands and go back
home.  All in all a solid gag, much better than last week's
incredible 'Mood Building'.  (It was an office block that changed
color every now and then depending on the inside stress levels. 
Always remained blood red with stress, so not nearly as neat as
it could have been.)
 
     This was fine and good, but I seriously hoped Mitch wouldn't
be under Lindsey's spell for very long, because she and Jody did
NOT get along.  Jody has this thing about being talked down to,
and Lindsey was a bit, you know, not ixnay on the
ondescendingcay.  I'd be happy once the gag was over and done
with.
 
     Lindsey was the High Higher stereotype, only amplified. 
Self-centered with the incredible inflating latex ego, regarding
anybody else as a silly goo-bag with no purpose to exist.  Of
course, we're all a bit like that -- you can't help it, you
simply ARE more intelligent than Joe Average -- but she would rub
your face in it.  EEEEEVIL.
 
     The rover pulled outside the subway stop of Central Station,
just below the office building the screens rested atop.  One of
those buildings they usually set on fire for made-for-HV movies
about the triumphant nature of the human spirit, ie, tall and
foreboding.
 
     "Okay, we're here," Jody announced, as if we hadn't known
already.  "Everybody out."
 
     We climbed out, readied the tools of our trade, and enabled
the electrocution anti-theft device on the rover.  Mitch had his
manipulative little brain geared up.  Jody, her tiny palmtop
cyberdeck.  Lindsey, her floptical disk with the hippie program
on it.  Finally, my... pencil.  Just in case anybody wanted
anything drawn.
 
     "First step is to get up the access tunnel," Lindsey said,
immediately taking charge.  "The chute here at the base of the
building leads directly up to a control room.  It's normally used
for messages and packages, but we can easily fit inside and climb
up.  Jody, you need to cancel any send orders to clear out the
tube, then get us a way up there."
 
     I was going to suggest just using the DOOR, but that'd be
too easy.  I mentally slapped myself for considering such a
thing; it just wasn't the High High way.  Blasphemy.
 
     "Got it," Jody said, selecting a wiretap on her palmtop and
thumbing the suction-cup jack into her forehead.  She had ones
for user access, computer access, robot access, you name it. 
"Okay, I'm canceling the message drops.  As for climbing... hmmm. 
Not sure."
 
     "Monofilament," I said.  Lindsey turned to me, surprised to
see I had an idea.  I explained.  "See, I've got a cable of it at
my house.  It's super strong, and if you have a good winch it
could pull all of us up the chute."
 
     "We can't drive back to your house," Lindsey said.
 
     "You don't have to.  Here, Jody, hack me up about forty
credits.  I'll be in the sporting goods store over there."
 
                         *
 
     Okay, picture this; me holding onto the sole handle of the
mountain-climbing winch, as it pulled us up this narrow metal
shaft hundreds of feet up.  The others are chained together on a
safety linker, being pulled up like a string of beads.
 
     Quite fun, actually.  I highly recommend it to any other
bored students.  Wear a hat and yodel for the full effect.
 
     "Have you gotten into security yet?" Lindsey asked, voice
banging off the cramped tube.  The echo resounded pleasantly,
able to skitter along a hundred feet of metal chute.
 
     "Yeah.  We've got one guard in the screen-programming room,
armed."
 
     "Hey, I'LL handle this.  Let Mr. Casual take him out, then
you folks can do your duty," Mitch suggested, sounding more like
Mr. Macho.
 
     "Good," Lindsey said, "You do that.  Are we near the top of
the chute yet?"
 
     "Almost.  Mitch, you climb up me and get through the opening
to deal with that guard.  Bang on the hatch once you've got the
guard disabled."
 
     "Watch this, Lindsey.  A master at work," Mitch boasted,
climbing up the chute and out the hatch.  I heard the surprised
gasp of the guard just before the hatch swung shut again.
 
     "What an twit," Lindsey commented, not to herself.
 
     "Yeah, but he's OUR twit," Jody spat.  "The only claim
you've got to him is some weird seductive spell.  I'd admire that
if it weren't for the fact that it's got me trying to hack
systems while hanging on an invisible cord a hundred feet from
the ground!"
 
     "Put a sock in it," Jody helpfully suggested.  "Just
concentrate on getting us into the computer.  I've got too much
riding on this to let petty arguments get in the way."
 
     "Come on in, folks," Mitch said, pulling open the hatch and
bracing it with a nearby book.  "The area is secure.  That guard
won't bother us."
 
     I locked the winch and helped the girls squeeze through the
narrow access hatch.  After some huffing and puffing, I managed
to jam myself through and into the control room as well.  
 
     "Feeling any better?" Mitch asked the guard, who was
collapsed into a fetal position, sobbing.  "Anybody got a hankie? 
Randy here isn't doing too good.  Awful job, a wife who hates
him, a father who thinks he's a shame to the family..."
 
     Randy the guard sobbed more as Mitch described the horrors
of his life.  "...and so on, and so forth," Mitch concluded. 
"Poor guy.  Here, Randy, take my business card.  Come down and
see me and we'll talk about your Oedipus complex.  Maybe I can
help you get over all this."
 
     "Th...thanks," Randy thanked, pulling himself up enough to
take the card in a shaking hand.  "I think I'll... go home now. 
I need to relax.  Rest."
 
     "Good.  You do that.  I suggest a vacation, somewhere nice. 
Get your mind off your life.  That'll be fifty credits for this
session."
 
     Randy gladly paid, then crawled out.  Miserable snuffling
noises slowly receded into the distance.
 
     Mitch may have trouble with his dates, but you don't want to
be on the wrong end of his frontal lobes if you're not female,
curvy and intelligent.  The only man who has a war cry of 'Tell
me about your mother'.
 
     "Alright, we're in.  No, don't thank me.  Let's get to work. 
The disk, Lindsey dear?"
 
     Lindsey nodded, and handed Jody a floptical disk she had in
her shirt pocket.  "Install this over the current video the
screens are playing.  That's all it'll take."
 
     "Say please," Jody requested.  Lindsey simply ignored her,
intent on gazing out the window at the crowds below.  Jody hmphed
and jacked into her deck to install the program, attaching a
patch cord from the back into the screen computers.
 
     "It's all going according to plan," Lindsey said,
absentmindedly.  "They'll see what *I* can do."
 
     "We," I corrected.  "If you'll recall, you weren't the one
who got the monofilament, triggered the guard's childhood traumas
or installed your program."
 
     "Yeah, whatever," Lindsey said, waving me away.  "The poor
sops below won't know what hit them."
 
     "Your video's in," Jody said, jacking out and pushing the
'trode back into the deck's wire container.  "Now let's see if it
actually WORKS."
 
     So we gathered around that window, all four of us, wondering
what was going to happen.  Not all of us wondering, just three of
us; Lindsey had a look of sinister knowledge on her face.  SHE
knew what was going to happen.  Her forehead socket wasn't
bunched up by any surprised eyebrow raising.  Her mouth was a
tight smile of satisfaction.
 
     The patterns of commuters, street vendors, and bystanders
changed.  Rovers wavered in their lanes, weaving in and out,
occasionally hitting each other.  The street chatter dissolved
into a series of grunts.
 
     They also were hitting each other, and jumping around a lot. 
Kind of like chimpanzees.
 
     Mitch seemed dumbfounded.  "I don't get it.  Where are the
hippies?  Did you give Jody the wrong disk, love?"
 
     "Don't call me that," Lindsey said, pushing Mitch away. 
"No, I didn't.  That's the right disk, the one that reverts the
morons below to apes.  They'll have fun clubbing each other,
breaking things, going... well, ape."
 
     We looked confused.  This is a truly rare expression to find
on a High Higher.
 
     "NOW maybe they'll take me seriously," Lindsey grinned,
clenching up in joy.  "Stupid private biotech club... so what if
there are already a dozen of them?  NOBODY said you couldn't have
a Dirty Thirteen!  If this doesn't tell them not to turn me down
twice, I don't know what will!"
 
     "I see," I said, piecing together what she meant.  "The
Dirty Dozen, right?  Black biotech?  They don't like people
muscling in on their business, so you figure you'll make some
great example of the city and strike some fear in the hearts of
man.  Yes?"
 
     "YES!"  Lindsey exclaimed, clapping.  "They said I was too
young, and not ready for real biotech manipulations... I showed
THEM!"
 
     "Good for you.  I can respect that.  Now can you get the
city back to normal?"
 
     "Why?" Lindsey asked.  "I like them this way.  Let them riot
and burn things, they don't matter.  None of this matters.  Now I
am a feared biotech doctor, Dirty Dozen or not!"
 
     "You sure she's not in the drama department?" I stage
whispered to Jody.
 
     "Lindsey, doll, that's really an awful thing to do.  Put
them back to normal, please?  For your Mitchy-Poo?" Mitch
pleaded.  A sucker to the last.
 
     "Ah, forget you," Lindsey said, making a quick swipe with
her hand.  Mitch crumpled to the floor, out cold.
 
     Lindsey pretended to blow smoke off her ring, which bore a
needle underneath it.  Drugged pinprick.  "I like him better
silent."
 
     "You realize, of course, we're going to have to stop you," I
said, trying to sound relatively heroic.
 
     "Why?" she asked, laughing.  "Some infantile desire to be
the savior of the city?  Some weak compassion for your fellow
man?  A vigilante crimefighter complex?"
 
     "No, because I don't want to go to jail for your silly idea. 
I only take a fall for my own work.  I don't hit girls, though. 
Jody, hit her please."
 
     Jody didn't need any more encouragement.  She promptly
strode forward and SMASHED Lindsey one across the jaw, sending
her sprawling onto the tile floor.  The overconfident godlike
facial expression on Lindsey's face died instantly, replaced by a
Mitch-like gape of confusion.
 
     I really didn't like violence, size I clearly wasn't much
match in a fight and didn't want to place odds on myself.  Too
bad for Lindsey, since Jody didn't mind being violent at all, a
good bet or not.
 
     Jody pounced, wrestled Lindsey's head to the ground, and
pulled a long cord out of her palmtop computer.  She plugged the
cord into the socket Lindsey had installed in her forehead,
allowing her instant access to Lindsey's reconfigured brain. 
Lindsey's sleep-drug ring fell, previously reared up to slap Jody
across the cheek.  The socket-plug had her in interactive mode,
not reactive mode.
 
     Ah, the wonders of technology.
 
     Lindsey's body went partially slack, taken over by the
simple palmtop.  Jody grinned manically and jacked into the other
end of the computer.
 
     "Heh.  The little tramp certainly has an organized mind...
look at all this wonderful stuff.  Illicit medical supplies,
surgical procedures without a permit..."
 
     "You can fetch blackmail material later.  I'm just thankful
she's got that neural jack, or we'd be up the creek.  Can you
find the reversal program?"
 
     "Nope... she never figured on using one.  I'll have to make
her write one for us.  Could take some encouragement.  Stop
squirming, dammit..."
 
     It's an odd sight to see two girls jacked into one computer
engaging in low-level mental kombat.  I could draw some perverted
comparisons, but won't.  Think of two fish flopping around
attached at the tail by a rubber band, if you really want a
metaphor.
 
     In the end, one mind must triumph over the other, and
programmers beat doctors in the poker rules of mental war.
 
     "Got it," Jody said.  "Took a bit to break through her
enhanced will and get her to write it for us, but hey.  I'll
install a sleep routine now to get her out of our hair..."
 
     Lindsey's mildly protesting body collapsed, deep in a dreamy
snooze.  Jody unplugged the cord from Lindsey's forehead, stuck
it back in the screen computers and transferred code.
 
     "Running," she said.
 
     The effect outside wasn't noticeable at first; some low
level rioting was underway already, the citizenry reduced to
lesser primates.  Nobody was looking at the screens anymore, they
were too busy breaking things.
 
     "Here, link up my voice to the screen's audio."
 
     "Got it.  Speak away."
 
     "LOOK!  BANANAS!  NICE, *JUICY* BANANAS!" I screamed, voice
echoing through the hologrammatic screens outside.  A few hundred
heads swiveled up to the screen, but instead of fruit they got
direct visual brain programming.
 
     Yeah, that did it.  Confused, the people below started
climbing down from the streetlamps, gathering up any clothes they
had torn off.  They went back to their patterns, wondering what
just happened.  Safe and back to the swing of things, and not on
vines, either.
 
     "The worst is yet to come," I grumbled.
 
     "How so?" Jody asked, powering down her computer.
 
     "Now we have to get these two BACK down that chute.  And
since High High doesn't exactly have a weight room... it's not
going to be easy.  Here, grab Mitch's feet, I'll take the head."
 
                              *
 
     It took awhile, but we managed to get our sleeping couple
down the chute.  Jody drove all of us home, just in time for
supper.  Mmmmm... Stovetop.  Another ending to a typical Summer
day, made more interesting through the power of education. 
Whoever said Terran students were lazy ought to be drug out into
the street and shot.
 
     All fun aside, the day is done, time to snooze and
recuperate.  Wonder what we'd be doing tomorrow.  Maybe just hang
around the house.  Maybe see a flick.
 
     Maybe a gag with anti-gravity cows pumping methane over the
commercial district.
 
     I love Summer.