Bredenberg - The Man in the Moon Must Die

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Jeff Bredenberg

Benito

Fried squirrel.

Sounds like something the grubbers might serve up for Saturday dinner, doesn't it?

Ha maybe they did. Maybe Albert had feigned the disgust that twisted his face as he held the crispy critter up by its singed tail. Maybe, the moment I turned my back, the old gardeners gave way to a flood of pent-up salivation as he packed the little rodent off to his shanty at the edge of the grounds. There, I imagined, with a flurry of his ragged smock, he would present his Ma with the furry morsel. Her eyes would bulge with delight, and...

Thats enough.

If I go on with that kind of reverie you might think me a Separatist of the worst kind. Perhaps I was, later on, but I like to think a like better of my past self, before... well, before that fried squirrel did a Cuisinart job on my life.

All of this began the morning Elvis, my Cyber wife, downloaded the twice-weekly medical diagnostics. It was just before breakfast up in the study dome. I was pressing one of those round BandAids over the punctured vein in the crook of my arm and staring through the rounded glass. Thirty stories below, the willows were barely visible through the rain clouds moving in. I remember the lingering thought exactly: Ican build an amusement park on the Moon, but still there's no better way to sample blood than to gouge a hole in my skin with a needle.

There were many indignities that, at the time, I thought I should be exempt from.

So Elvis was sucking in the diagnostics with her usual frown of consternation. She tapped her finger in perfect seconds on the rim of the computer key padone of the earliest of the human mannerisms I had taught her. As the download progressed, the terminal screen flashed white and then black again in the same one-second intervals. I decided then to factor in syncopation the next time I popped the lid on her CyberGo.

To save a few minutes' reading time on the terminal, Elvis had hooked the computer's feed cable into the 103-prong port just above her left temple. When the download was done, she jerked the cable free and patted her short black locks into place again.

"The cancer's spreading pretty fast," she said to my back. "You gotta go to the Moon."

I turned away from the window. "Maybe I can fit it in late next weekafter I finish up with the .union geeks from Disney Division."

Then she gave me the pouty-lips expression, the heart-melting gesture I purloined from the genetics of a twentieth century entertainer.

"Bay-buh," she murmured, "Your blood readouts say you takin' 3.86 times the recommended dosage of Libricotum and 2.4 times the legal level of Zenithialate B. Honey chile, you die this time, what makes you think I'll pour you into the TeleComp again? Maybe I'll juss dump you into the composter with the potato peelin's."

She had a point. For the last few weeks I had been sloshing through a wash of sedation. I felt no pain. The puncture in my arm for the blood test had brought no discomfortit was just that the sight of the stuff soured my belly.

I paused, with a touch of dramajust the way I would have it done in one of my company's holovids. Hmm. How is it that I, the owner of the largest entertainment conglomerate under the sun, could keep the same Cyber wife for forty-three years, save for a few component updates? I asked her, "Elvis? You love me?"

She pretended to think it over, swinging her head so that her silky hair flew back. "Yeah," she said, "guess I love ya."

The next day I called the home office in Philadelphia to leave word for one of the VP's, Del Wortham, to handle the union matters. I had out-of-town business, I explained. I didn't mention how out of town the business was. Habitually, I avoided mention of the Langelaan Tele-Compositorsa point of jealousy. I'm the only one in the company approved by the Interplanetary Commerce Commission for TeleComp travel. One of only a few dozen people on the planet with regular access to one. All others in the companyVP's on downhave to cool their heels on the shuttle when they have business on the Moon.

The chief secretary in the Philadelphia offices hesitated on the line. "Mr. Funcitti, Del Wortham is fishing in Maine. You want to have Brian Dietz handle the union meeting?"

"Wortham took his satphone along on the trip?"

"I assume so," she replied.

"Then get him in. If he's not on the case by tomorrow afternoon, have building services clean his office out. Move Brian Dietz into it. Then have Dietz handle the union meeting."

There were a few seconds of silence on the phone as the secretary stared stonily out of the holo screen. Then came a curt, "Yes sir."

I flicked the phone off and walked to the TeleComp at the back of the study. I punched the Start-Up button. The booth door popped open, the interior light blinked on and the lighted console buttons inside flashed to life.

"Elvis!" Where was she? I glanced at my watch and saw that I was two minutes early. Elvis was not human enough that she would arrive early, or late for that matter, for an assigned duty.

But the preliminaries were easy enough that I could handle them myself. I sat back in the padded booth and strapped my legs and left arm in. The armrest whirred, and a moist brush whisked across my palm, scouring away just enough skin to get a genetic reading. (Now, why cant we make a blood test that painless?)

A familiar message appeared on the interior terminal:

Identification: Benito O. Puncitti...

confirmed.

ICC clearance...

confirmed.

Please enter Langelaan TeleComposltor receiver coordinates.

With my free hand I pecked in the twelve-digit number on the key pad. The screen responded:

Destination 3451-7721-1032 is...

the private TeleComp receiver registered to Fun City Corp.

Lunar station, Sector 32.

Does this destination coincide with your travel plans?

I entered, "Yes." Elvis leaned her head into the booth and glanced at the progress on the terminal. The next question appeared on the screen:

Do you wish to employ medical or genetic code restructuring features? If so, please establish MediComp link.

I reached for the key pad, but Elvis clicked her tongue reprovingly. She pushed my wrist against the armrest and flipped the restraining strap over it so that my hand was immobilized.

"I'd better do this," she said, "or you'll turn yourself into a smoked ham or something." Then her fingers flew over the key pad, ordering up the restructuring that would strip away my cancer while I, or a digital version of me anyway, was being beamed through space.