Lying on her bed on the second floor, Nektar heard the unaccustomed sound of a car engine.
Night before last, the beetles had come in her sleep like a fever dream, and ever since then she couldn‘t fully wake up. The beetles kept wedging her orphidnet access open, kept getting into her head.
She was too weak to sit up, and there was no hope of using the orphidnet to examine her
garage, what with the virtual beetles in the way, each of them a jagged oval core with faceted eyes, pinchy-feely mouths, and zigzag legs.
Although Nektar was a big celeb, nobody was here to help her—other than some little shoon
robots she‘d gotten from Jil Zonder.
Right now, so far as the public understood the situation, Nektar was on a weight-reducing
sudocoke binge. But in reality she didn‘t use sudocoke; and that was talcum powder on the mirror by her bed. The beetles had made her lay out the lines; whenever she balked at their requests, they‘d feed her images she could barely stand to see. At least so far she‘d refused to cut an ad for Dick Too Dibbs. That‘s what they were after.
Nektar strained her ears to listen for more noises from the garage, but all she heard were the chirps and clicks from the beetle currently in her visual field.
―You say sorry about insulting Homesteadies,‖ repeated the beetle. ―Make Too Dibbs
testimonial now.‖
Out of the question. The first Dick Dibbs had sent the nants to eat the Earth. Nektar would
never ever forget that. Nor would she forget that her husband Ond had let the nants eat their son Chu in order to pass some viral code to the nants. Nektar had stopped loving Ond then and there—even though Ond‘s crazy plan had worked. The nants had reassembled everything they‘d destroyed,
including Chu.
President Dick Dibbs and his vice president had been impeached, convicted, and executed
like the rabid dogs they were, but Jeff Luty had escaped. And Nantel had regrouped as ExaExa.
According to Ond, Luty was safely hidden from the orphidnet within the quantum-mirror-shielded walls of the ExaExa labs. They‘d had the mirroring in place even before they released the orphids.
Taking care of the boss.
Nektar drifted back from her reverie. Probably the malware beetles were a Jeff Luty product.
Ond said Jeff liked insects better than humans because they were closer to being machines. Not only ants, but beetles as well, especially the sacred scarab dung beetle of ancient Egypt. Back at Nantel, Jeff had given Ond a mounted giant beetle as an award; it was still kicking around the house
somewhere.
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If Luty had made these software beetles, then no wonder they‘d come to attack Nektar. Jeff
had always had it in for her. Back in the Nantel days, Luty had tried to take over Ond‘s life, keeping him at the lab till late, seven days a week. Maybe he had some sick crush on Ond. It had taken some severe tantrums on Nektar‘s part to get Ond a more reasonable schedule, and Luty had never forgiven Nektar.
Ond always said Luty was like a child, forgetful of the niceties, a genius in the rough, but
Nektar had never liked the guy, not his chewed-down fingernails, not his weird vocabulary of made-up words, not his lip balm, not his greasy ponytail. Why couldn‘t Luty take ten minutes off and cut his hair? Of course, the worst was that he‘d enlisted Ond into his nant project of destroying the natural world. Yes, Ond had backed off in the end, but by then it had been too late for Nektar. If Luty hadn‘t warped Ond, then Nektar and Ond might still have been together.
Gathering her strength, Nektar executed a savage mental lunge that closed down the image of
the beetle currently threatening her. She glanced over at her bedside clock. Ten fifteen in the morning. And now the minute hand bent up and out toward her, articulating itself like a beetle leg.
Nektar willed the leg back into a minute hand. The clock face dropped off, and a fresh beetle crawled out.
―You must record ad,‖ it insisted. ―We exhaust time and patience. More punish.‖ Day before
yesterday, Nektar had ranted against Too Dibbs and the Homesteadies, putting the truth out there for her Founders audience. That‘s what had set this off.
―You know I won‘t help you,‖ said Nektar flatly. ―I‘d rather die. I meant what I said and I‘ll say it again.‖ She threw her remembered words in the beetle‘s face. ―The Homesteady Party wants people to be like sheep, easy to fleece. That‘s why they‘re against personal freedom, against quirky culture, against self-expression, against education, against art. They want a mass mind they can mass-process like synthoid tomatoes. Is anyone in the orphidnet channeling me? Listen to Chef
Nektar. Too Dibbs will make you sicker than the Banana Surprise at MouthPlus-Plus.‖
In response, the beetle‘s chirping grew guttural, sinister. Nektar braced herself. An image of her son Chu appeared. A long, solemn knife hovered beside him like the bow of a violin.
Trying to draw back from the coming torment, Nektar groped for a memory, any memory,
and came up with a clip of her and rival chef Jose having their final fight in the Puff kitchen: Jose holding that same kind of long knife to his own throat, making the tiniest of cuts and lifting a drop of his blood to Nektar‘s lips, all the while glaring into her eyes. ―Taste that, ‖ he‘d hissed. ―You bitch.‖
A pair of beetle legs unfurled from Jose‘s belly, taking hold of the knife. Jose‘s face became Chu‘s.
The knife sawed into Chu‘s neck; the boy‘s head flopped back and all the blood of his body gushed out.
Nektar moaned and rocked, drawing deeper into herself. As if from somewhere very far
away, she felt water on her lips. Those good little shoons were taking care of her. Maybe the beezies would find a way to save her soon. Maybe there were people in the garage. Hang on, Nektar. A
beetle leg rummaged down through her veils of thought, its spiny foot trying to snag her attention.
Nektar burrowed deeper, replaying triumphal memories of her rise to the head chef ‘s post at Puff.
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Postsingular
Restaurant traffic had ramped up heavily after the coming of the orphids; with people able to
see and hear everything online, the nonvirtual experience of dining was becoming the centerpiece of most evenings out. Nektar liked to present a meal as table theater. And why limit the entertainment to chewing things up? She‘d added foamy, soft food to the Puff menu, and pastes for people to rub onto their bodies: peppery curries, soothing mints, moistening emulsions. Jose had been against all of Nektar‘s ideas; turned out he was a depressive jerk, always acting like a martyr. After he‘d done that weird number with the knife on his neck, Nektar had gone straight upstairs to the restaurant‘s owners, Xandro and Beatriz.
But now Nektar‘s memory citadel was broached again; the two owners resembled beetles,
their legs linked like axons and dendrites. ―Make ad for Dick Too Dibbs,‖ said the beetles. ―Do very now.‖
―Fire Jose,‖ Nektar told them, desperately hanging onto her narrative. ―Make me the head
chef. Look how many hits my orphids are getting. I‘m a star. It‘s me that brings the customers in.‖
Beetle Xandro lifted the shiny cover off a silver salver, his chitinous leg hooking the metal
handle. Beetle Beatriz leaned over the naked boy on the platter and fired up a blowtorch. ―I cook tableside,‖ she twittered, blistering Chu‘s face. ―Else make Too Dibbs ad now.‖
Groaning, Nektar twisted away and found herself in last week‘s bed with Craigor. He was
handsome and well-endowed, but not Nektar‘s idea of a great lover. She‘d only continued sleeping with him because the affair had given such a nice boost to the hitcounts of her Founders show.
Acting out the bedroom memory, Nektar ran a flirtatious finger down Craigor‘s bare chest. He split open like a pupa and Craigor‘s wife Jil crawled out: moist, throbbing, luminous, in tears. ―I was your best friend, Nektar. How could you? Craigor was my man. I‘m scared I‘m going to relapse.‖
―I‘m sorry,‖ said Nektar. ―I‘m so sorry.‖
―Make the ad,‖ said the beetle shaped like Jil. ―Then I forgive. Vote for Dick Too Dibbs. You
say just once.‖
―Hey, Nektar!‖ A fresh voice, a real voice in her bedroom.
She fluttered her eyes open. Two men and two women were here, colorful, street-hardened
kids in their early twenties, ten years younger than Nektar. One of them leaned close. His eyes were soft and intelligent beneath his green cap; he wore a T-shirt and a suit jacket with a wild hand-drawn skull on the jacket‘s back. An iridescent shoon was perched on his shoulder. The rain had stopped; the sun was breaking through.
―I‘m Jayjay,‖ the boy told Nektar. ―Aka Jorge Jimenez. We‘re the Big Pig Posse. Let me into
your head, Nektar. Give me full access. I can kill those beetles by fixing your filter dogs.‖ He flexed his fingers in intricate gamer moves.
―Yes,‖ said Nektar with a weak smile, and opened a mental door for him. In the orphidnet,
Jayjay got busy. The other Posse members were in the orphidnet watching, as well: a stocky girl with a blue tattoo, a boy with spiky hair, a Vietnamese girl with high pigtails.
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“Yeek yeek,” murmured the first boy—Jayjay—swinging from bough to vine in the jungle of Nektar‘s mind, landing beside her filter dog kennel, and scattering luminous blue fleas. Instants later, Nektar‘s flea-bitten dogs had trashed the beetles.
―All good now, Nektar,‖ said Jayjay, pulling back into his real body.
Nektar sat up, holding her sheet to her breasts, free at last.
The boy with his hair in shiny spikes—Sonic—stretched out in a patch of sun on the big
Oriental rug on Nektar‘s floor, the shoons yipping and cavorting with him. He wore black wool
tights, a red T-shirt, and a lightweight leather jacket with tailored shirring.
As usual, the shoons‘ appearances changed according to the whims of the beezies currently
controlling them; right now a couple resembled monkeys, another pair was playing beetle and beetle-flea, another was a classic Happy Shoon like a bucktoothed Korean baby with a thick rubber bottom, and two had tweaked themselves to resemble Jayjay and the pigtailed girl in striped leggings.
Jayjay forced open the bedroom‘s sticky window. Sitting in the easy chair right by Nektar‘s
bed was the plain-faced woman with the blue tattoo.
―I‘m Kittie,‖ she said pleasantly. ―It‘s great to meet you. I watch Founders all the time. And I‘ve seen you around the Mission, of course.‖ Fresh air drifted into the room.
―I‘ll treat your little group to a big dinner,‖ said Nektar. ―Have you ever been to Puff?‖
―Mostly we eat garbage,‖ said Kittie. ―We‘re rough and tough.‖
―Hmm,‖ said Nektar, thinking that over, her beetle-free mind feeling giddy and agile. Kittie
reminded Nektar of the girlfriend she‘d had in college before she‘d met Ond; Kittie had that same quality of inner refinement beneath a streetwise demeanor. ―You just gave me an idea for a new restaurant presentation,‖ Nektar told her. ―We lead the customers into a dim room with food hidden in miniature garbage cans along the wall. They root out their entrees; it‘s a walk on the wild side.‖
Just to see if she still had it, Nektar gave Kittie a come-hither look.
―I want white tablecloths for our meal at Puff,‖ said Kittie, radiating back. ―Clean and calm.‖
―Did this start out as a sudocoke run?‖ interrupted the girl in the striped leggings, wandering over. ―I‘m Thuy.‖
―That‘s baby powder on the mirror,‖ said Nektar, glad to be getting this information out to
her audience. ―A hoax. I was under the control of those beetles. They wanted to set the scene so it looked as if I had a reason to stay in bed. For the last two days, they‘ve been tormenting me, wanting me to make an ad for that silly Dick Too Dibbs. I‘ve heard him come out strong against the nants, but who owns him, really? Since when did any Homesteady politician care about anyone who‘s not filthy stinking rich?‖
―Tell the world, Nektar,‖ said Jayjay. ―Listen up, Founders fans! My homie Sonic designed these six-dimensional Calabi-Yau beetle-fleas. They‘ll gnaw beetle malware out of your orphids.‖ He gestured with both arms, tossing a complete image of a beetle-flea into the orphidnet for Nektar‘s viewers to grab. Then he flopped down on the floor to join Sonic in playing with the shoons.
―I need a shower,‖ said Nektar, getting out of her bed. She was naked, but being naked didn‘t
matter anymore, what with your body visible on the orphidnet all the time.
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―Need some help?‖ said Kittie.
―Don‘t be dogging her,‖ said Thuy. Evidently Thuy was Kittie‘s girlfriend.
Nektar could visualize making love to Kittie. Having an affair with needy, unstable Craigor
Connor was enough to put a woman off hetero sex for months. Maybe it was because he was anxious about cheating on Jil, but Craigor had stinted on foreplay—like he was in a rush to notch up his score for the main event. Kittie, on the other hand, looked tender and competent, like a butch, sexy nurse.
Nektar smiled at her and said, ―I am a little wobbly, matter of fact. If you could walk me in there and maybe help me when I dry off?‖
―You got it, babe,‖ said Kittie.
―I‘m coming, too,‖ said Thuy.
―Fine,‖ said Nektar, relishing the attention.
The girls helped Nektar into the shower, Kittie making sure to accidentally touch Nektar‘s
breasts and bottom, with Thuy watching: annoyed, aroused, amused. After the shower, the two
converged on Nektar, each of them holding a big thick towel. Much better to be pursued by women than by beetles. This was catnip for the Founders viewers. Nektar‘s orphids glowed with hitcounts.
Back in the bedroom, Sonic and Jayjay were still fooling around with the shoons. Happy
Shoon was pacing around to mime deep thought, but the other shoons were rolling around like
puppies.
―One of my beezies traced back the beetles‘ history for us,‖ announced Jayjay. For a
homeless kiqqie, he had a very crisp and precise way of speaking. ―They originated from some
malware that you caught from Craigor Connor, Nektar. And Craigor caught the beetle infection when he delivered a walking-chair to Andrew Topping, director of the Natural Mind center in the Mission Street Armory. We don‘t know how the infection reached Topping‘s office. They‘ve got the whole Armory shielded by quantum-mirror varnish to protect their recovering orphidnet addicts. The same kind of shielding that‘s used in the ExaExa labs; ExaExa gave them the varnish. ExaExa is one of Natural Mind‘s main financial backers, matter of fact. They say it‘s charity. For the public good.‖
―You know—‖ said Nektar, regally nude, pausing to enjoy the eyes upon her. ―I kept trying
to think what those beetles reminded me of, and now I realize they‘re like nants. That blind, pushy quality. The Jeff Luty connection fits. That man isn‘t comfortable in a human body. He truly thinks we‘d be happier if we were software. Ond always said Jeff wasn‘t really evil—it‘s just that Jeff had this big tragedy when he was younger.‖ Nektar shook out her hair, proud of herself for sounding so calm on the subject of Luty. ―What it is, Jeff is making those beetles as a way to help get Dick Too Dibbs into office. And that‘ll give Jeff an in. And down the road, I bet Jeff will manipulate Too Dibbs into launching some improved, unstoppable nants and they‘ll kill Gaia for good. Someone has to get to Luty.‖
―Right on, Nektar,‖ said Kittie.
―Go to the Armory,‖ urged Nektar. ―Go to the Armory and check yourselves into the Natural
Mind center. Talk sense to Andrew Topping.‖
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―Natural Mind,‖ mused Jayjay. ―A janitor told us to go there this morning. Coincidence or
trap?‖
―Aw, people always mention Natural Mind if you‘re sleeping in the street,‖ said Sonic. ―I‘m
down with going there. Put some heat on Topping‘s ass. He‘s a megaspammer, man. Of course, duh, thanks to the orphidnet, he‘ll know we‘re coming, assuming his beezies data-mine this conversation.
Maybe the Natural Minders won‘t let us in.‖
Jayjay made a dismissive gesture. His attention had wandered to Thuy. ―You done watching
Nektar take her shower?‖ he demanded. ―Leave that for Kittie. Come sit with me. I‘m the one who loves you.‖
Thuy strode over, gave Jayjay such a hard shove with her gold-clad foot that he fell over on
his side, then perched herself on him as if she were sitting on a log. He lay there, looking happy to be in physical contact. Poor men, thought Nektar, they‘re dogs. Jayjay was cute, too. If Thuy didn‘t want him, maybe Jil Zonder would. Jil deserved a fling. It might shake her out of her doldrums.
―Why didn‘t you and the beezies fix Nektar yourselves instead of calling in a strung-out
pighead derelict like Jayjay?‖ Thuy asked the shoons, wagging her finger at them. ―You there—the shoon that looks like me—squeak up! You can talk, can‘t you?‖
The tiny Thuy-shaped shoon bobbled her little pigtails and spoke in a surprisingly rich alto
voice: ―We can talk. We can sing.‖ Capering expressively, the shoon now performed a bit of
Papageno‘s aria from The Magic Flute, vibrating her whole body like a loudspeaker.
The Big Pig Posse kids laughed.
And then the shoon laid her little finger against her lips to mime secretiveness. ―Let‘s switch to quantum-encrypted instant messages,‖ she said. With everything visible and audible via the
quantum-entangled surface-mesh-monitoring orphidnet, the one way to have a private conversation was via dynamically encoded messaging.
―I‘m not a derelict, I‘m important,‖ said Jayjay, rolling out from under Thuy and catching his arms around her waist. ―See—the shoon-beezies want to make plans with us! I‘ll set up a secure channel for us, okay?‖
Nektar ignored the planning session. She‘d spoken her piece; let the little kiqqies work out
the details. It was time to put her look together. Her blond hair had dark roots, but that was okay. She dried her hair, combed it out, and pinned it into an upside-down bed-head ponytail. For Kittie‘s benefit, she donned sexy black underwear with red stitching, making sure the girl watched. Then came black tights and a black slip, mascara and lipstick, a cream-colored silk blouse, high black boots, and her casual red twill skirt and jacket.
The sheets on the bed were disgraceful. Nektar stripped them off and threw them into the
hamper, with Kittie right there at her side pitching in. Nektar needed breakfast: a quart of Lapsang Souchong tea and a bowl of granola with apricots and yogurt. She called over Happy Shoon and sent him downstairs to make the tea. He was the most trustworthy of the lot, Jil‘s original model.
―Would you four like to come downstairs with me?‖ Nektar asked the Big Pig Posse. Kittie
nodded, but the others didn‘t. They were so into their private conference that they didn‘t hear her.
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Postsingular
―Time to eat!‖ Nektar messaged into the Posse‘s quantum-encrypted channel.
―We had some food already,‖ said Jayjay out loud. ―Maybe we should—‖
―It‘s been a couple of hours,‖ said Kittie quickly. ―You should be glad to eat with Chef
Nektar. Are you kidding? What an honor. You guys can talk later.‖
As they headed down the stairs someone knocked on the front door. Looking through the
orphidnet, Nektar saw Jil Zonder and Craigor Connor out there, the pair in a state of uneasy truce.
―Wow,‖ said Kittie. ―We‘re smack in the middle of the Founders show.‖
―Maybe I‘ll make a special episode with just you,‖ Nektar purred to Kittie. ―Can you be a
dear and let them in? I feel like I‘ll go crazy if I don‘t get my tea this minute.‖
Nektar hurried into the kitchen and poured herself a mug of smoky black tea with two spoons
of sugar and enough whole milk to cool it down— ahh. The caffeine molecules ran up and down the corridors of her brain turning on the lights. She fixed herself a bowl of cereal, then sat down at the kitchen table as the crowd appeared.
―Poor Nektar,‖ said Craigor, pushing forward. ―You had, like, mind parasites? I would have
come earlier, but I thought, you know, she‘s losing weight with sudocoke.‖
―You would think that,‖ said Nektar, crabbily. ―Sit down; don‘t hover. Help yourself to some food. Scavenge. My four young friends here, the Big Pig Posse, they‘re used to finding their meals in garbage cans. But try my fridge first. Thanks for coming, Jil.‖
Jil looked good today; her bobbed dark hair lustrous, her figure sweet in jeans and a pullover.
Instead of answering Nektar out loud, she sent a quantum-encrypted message. ―You can have Craigor for good. It‘ll never be the same between us again. You‘ve ruined our marriage.‖ Stone-faced, she turned away and opened Nektar‘s fridge.
―Really he loves you,‖ messaged back Nektar. ―I‘m sorry I did it. The last few times were
just for the Founders ratings. And I was drunk the first time. You don‘t know what hell I‘ve been through. In my head I keep begging you to be my friend again. Please, Jil.‖
―Funny kind of friend.‖ Jil took a pitcher of juice from the fridge and poured herself a glass, her back still turned to Nektar. ―There‘s a hole where my heart used to be.‖
―I know I‘m horrible,‖ messaged Nektar. ―And you‘re wonderful and noble and brave.
Forgive me. You mean so much more to me than Craigor ever could.‖ Craigor, now sitting right
across the table from Nektar, didn‘t even know that Jil and Nektar were channeling each other.
―Hands off him from now on?‖ messaged Jil, sliding a glance over toward Nektar. ―Maybe I
could still love Craigor a little bit. For the kids‘ sake, anyway. And maybe I need this marriage. Do you promise not to reel him back in the next time your ratings are low?‖
―Don‘t worry about the ratings. I‘m planning to start up with this blue-tattoo girl. Why don‘t you give yourself a treat and pay Craigor back.‖ Nektar‘s eye fell on Jayjay in his skull-painted jacket. ―How about that one right behind you,‖ she messaged Jil. ―He‘s young and hot; he chased the beetles out of my skull. Talk to him.‖
―You‘re terrible, Nektar. What an idea.‖
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Rudy Rucker
―Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander,‖ messaged Nektar. ―You deserve that boy. Look
how cute he is. He can‘t take his eyes off you.‖
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