Paul Dvorak: King

“Now that you are King we have something wonderful to show you.”

Oh no...now what... “Oh?”

His graphic coalesces in the air between us. It sharpens into the image of an architectural monstrosity mash up of over stylistic gaudy features. I'm reminded of any tera desert casino complex.

“We going to Vegas?”

“Ha ha you are so funny! No this place is yours. It's being built for you.”

“For me?!” My own ghastly casino! Would I be 'house' then? Naturally the odds are always rigged. Do I get to keep the punters money?

“Who would you like to join you there your majesty? Your are the King now so anybody you ask for would have to go with you.”

“Oh! It's a party eh?” How many can I invite? What's the capacity of that place?

“Hundreds or thousands if you want. They will all be glad to go for the king.”

I love a huge party. “When is the party then? Has a date been set?”

“As soon as you are dead, my king.”

“Dead. This is the model of your tomb. Much room of course for the thousands who will die with you.”

“What! You're already building my tomb!?”

“Oh yes. No telling how long you'll last. We have to get started right away. In fact now even...could you please choose a color pallet for the entrance lobby and atrium? The artists have made a range of suggestions that won't clash with the sacrificial crypts of your family the ministers and close advisers.”

“Would that include you?” I gave him my special look of violent disapproval which after much mirror practice might kinda look more like I have abdominal pain. I just got be King only minutes ago and here they are planning my funeral!

“Oh yes! Here's the plan for my condo mausoleum with all my favorite stuff waiting for the afterlife.”

“What if I live another hundred years? All your furniture would be out of style, your domestic gadgets obsolete.”

This made him chuckle like he knew that wasn't going to happen. “Should you...” pause for eye contact, “survive long it would all be modernized. I would never enjoy an eternity of death without the latest appliance features and trendiest furnishings. Everyone buys new cloths when the King dies just in case they are asked to join you.”

How would it screw up their society to demand all the salesmen proceed me into death. These traditions have probably kept this economy going for centuries.New King gets to screw a few virgins, has a good meal, tombs done, everybody buys new stuff and on to the next king.

from the ANSWER

Funny. I don't see me here in the Rocket lounge. Real launch tanks of marstini don't lie.

What do you say when you get a call from yourself? The holo guy looked just like me. The ID said: 'Paul Dvorak unknown loc'. From the future? If this is me from the future why holocall? What are the charges like on a call I haven't made to myself yet? Since suit is paying I accept my crisper self image into the contact cone.

“Paul.”

“Paul.” Do I call myself 'Paul' like this thinking?

”You're me”

“I'm you?”

“From the future?”

“No.” “The past then?” “No.” “So...I've been cloned again?” Darn DNA scattered all over the place!

“Just shut up and listen to what I've got to say...”

“Who the hell are you? If you are me how come I don't know what I'm about to tell me?” Suit says the call comes from my sleeve holo company lami. How can I holo call myself? Does this cost me double? Looped up somehow? I would think me from the future would remember how drunk I am right now.

“Listen! There is no time! No time right now! “

“What time is it there? Here?” Suit says 14:25. Is this a call to someone else that's time lagged? Have I got a lagged line now? Pings me fat bandwidth...

“No! It's now everywhere! You are me now. I'm you and you're me. Now listen!”

“Why should I listen to me? I'm not a good judge of my character. I wouldn't believe anything I'd tell myself. I'm often right about being wrong. Like now cause I'm usually always right. If I'm me and so are you then you would know that I would never take any advice that I would give to anybody much less myself.”

“It's too late? Listen! Shut up and listen! It's too late now!”

“That's what I'm trying to tell me? That it's too late? Too late for what? Why didn't I tell me earlier?”

But I couldn't tell me anything more. I was gone with a sparkling 'blip'. Alone again in a bar full of drunks who weren't paying any attention.

“Paul.” Suit got something to say.

“Yes Carla?”

“What was that about?”

...so the smartest, richest pants in the whole solsys is asking me now for answers...

introducing  an excerpt from the first of a new Grant Parachor series:

THE DIAMOND ASTEROID

a Savage and Jones mystery

Becky Savage senior partner of the investigative firm Savage and Jones could smell trouble. She's always had a good nose for trouble. The tubular wall architecture here helped.

“Gosh that's a horrible smell!” The air flow was in her face. Smelly trouble directly ahead. “That Chevrolet!” She thought. The image of her co-partner Chevrolet Jones relaxing at Steel Beach on the other side of the moon stuck a manicured finger in her eye. “I get all the dirty work and she has all the fun!”

A tap of a tab. “Chevrolet. Chevrolet. What are you doing?”

Chevrolet Jones's accepted the call video only.

“Hi Becky. Pedicure. Then a wax and buff.” She was wrapped in towls.

“Check this atmospheric.”

“Yikes! Becky that must smell terrible!”

“Can you holo call me back and go in first?”

“Um what?...you're breaking up...sunspots...gama raysss...Becc”

“I got great pings here.” Becky knew Chevrolet could hear her. The diagnostics showed good coms both ways.

She could still have a decoy by projecting a recorded holo and send it ahead to get shot first. In skins available was one that matched Chevrolet. She gave it Chevrolets face. Looped a six meter sashay walk with a progressive stop/start sequence. Would the image pause be too close? Depends on the trouble.

Hood up, visor closed, air filters testing and scrubing Becky followed the projection warily into the gloomy tube.The curved walls were raw rock with a thin crust of dirty ice. The floor flatened to the limit of the curve for some vehicle.

The holo strode ahead with some fashion model attitude. At ten meters did a shoulder throw turn with the hip thrust of a styling program that knows it looks good. A millisecond flicker then it turned back toward the trouble to resume its loop.

Becky hugged as close to the wall as she could. She crouched like a gunfighter to present a smaller target. It here occurred to her that perhaps she should draw her weapon since she prolly looked like she was about to shoot somebody. A sleek flat black acu-zap appeared in her right hand. The sleeve drop neuro holsters held much more; devices small and expensive she secured anywhere not necessary to her stylish cutaway blast suit. They moved forward another sequence. The acu-zap target aquire scanning saw nothing ahead but round empty.

“ooo” She murmured. The sniffer lami at her collar spiked a reading that was still flashing numbers. Smelly trouble was coming right at her for sure. It seemed like the thick air had gotten under her suit. “Suit air on.” But if she had to run for long she knew it would overload the re-breather membranes and the suit would let the smell back.

The holographic Chevrolet Jones cat-walked the papparazi gauntlet to the pause turn reset.

“Becky.”

What now? thought Becky touching the tab that let the call thru.

“What Chevrolet? Are your coms okay now?”

“Becky wait!”

“Look I'm trying to sneak here. You're not making things easier.” She had to move to catch up with simulated Chevrolet whose last pause turn had to be getting close to the projectors limits.

“Abort! Abort! Get out of that tube tunnel now!”

Becky couldn't help but think: “She's always doing this...interrupting me with dire warnings. Here we go again...” She spoke on coms: “I took this job and you were too busy to help and now here I am sneaking up on trouble and you gotta call and butt in again!”

“It's no trick. I'm not sure you know what you're up against.”

Huh... she used the word 'trick'? Becky wondered ...are we in the 'trick' code mode? Time to move another ten meter chunk. That code word means coms are compromised. No doubt she has been zeroed by some targeting program. Her suit starts the emag spoofing routine to shift her biosignals closer to the holo.

“I know it really stinks. Hey. You could help by calling back on a holo line and go up with the other you to draw more fire.” The acu-zap made her trigger finger tickle, which means a target in range. Too far to tell what? Animal or deadly kill-bot in a very straight tunnel moving at four KPH. Dark Shadows camo starts its magic. Becky becomes a section of curved rock.The fashion model Chevrolet is put on pause standing with one beautifuly shoed foot raised to step back into the sequence looking saucily toward the unknown.

Another holographic Chevrolet twinkled into conversational mode in front of Becky. She appeared armed with several weapons systems.

“Turn around and step to the side please. They shoot at you I'll get hit.” Real Chevrolet, as usual safely hundreds of kilometers away. ”Can you see ahead of me?”

“You got to get a better cam lami. It's like looking through soup.”

“That's the air.”

Funny. I don't see me here in the Rocket lounge. Real launch tanks of marstini don't lie.

What do you say when you get a call from yourself? The holo guy looked just like me. The ID said Paul Dvorak unknown loc. From the future? If this is me from the future why holocall? What are the charges like on a call I haven't made to myself yet? Since suit is paying I accept my crisper self image into the contact cone.

“Paul.”

“Paul.” Do I call myself 'Paul' like this thinking?

”You're me”

“I'm you?”

“From the future?”

“No.” “The past then?” “No.” “So...I've been cloned again?” Darn DNA scattered all over the place!

“Just shut up and listen to what I've got to say...”

“Who the hell are you? If you are me how come I don't know what I'm about to tell me?” Suit says the call comes from my sleeve holo company lami. How can I holo call myself? Does this cost me double? Looped up somehow? I would think me from the future would remember how drunk I am right now.

“Listen! There is no time! No time right now! “

“What time is it there? Here?” Suit says 14:25. Is this a call to someone else that's time lagged? Have I got a lagged line now? Pings me fat bandwidth...

“No! It's now everywhere! You are me now. I'm you and you're me. Now listen!”

“Why should I listen to me? I'm not a good judge of my character. I wouldn't believe anything I'd tell myself. I'm often right about being wrong. Like now cause I'm usually always right. If I'm me and so are you then you would know that I would never take any advice that I would give to anybody much less myself.”

“It's too late? Listen! Shut up and listen! It's too late now!”

“That's what I'm trying to tell me? That it's too late? Too late for what? Why didn't I tell me earlier?”

But I couldn't tell me anything more. I was gone with a sparkling 'blip'. Alone again in a bar full of drunks who weren't paying any attention.

“Paul.” Suit got something to say.

“Yes Carla?”

“What was that about?”

...so the smartest, richest pants in the whole solsys is asking me now for answers...

excerpts from

The ANSWER

Radical border nationalism, along with borders as barriers, fell to history with the advent of the cheap flying car. What do you do ? Shoot them all down? As impractical as it is evil. No. The idea sunk in that shooting down the thousands of flying cars now darting everywhere was no way to make money. Charge them for crossing, for parking when they get where they go, for anything anybody could think of. Dead laser blast crash victims don't accrue much up-billing.

Border guards became obsolete, merely ceremonial. To the delight of the local wildlife, fences came down, traffic analysis towers went up. Regionalism became more of an aspect of the citizen divided by the unique regional quirks that make a place attract tourists with money. Certainly everybody gets their credit allotments from the Government calculated by the local regional tax and resource revenues that can be converted anytime into monets or local currency. The wealthier the citizens homeland the larger their cut of the credit. And the more skimmed from all the paids to fly from some here's to most there's, the more attractive the region. The more folks fly over or to and the bigger the border charges, tax's, fee's, ect; and when divided up into the credit the more for everybody.

Soon there were no more actual poor people. Tourists coming to see the poor people made them rich. Rich people continued to get richer. No more fears of poor people from elsewhere sneaking in and stealing jobs. Everybody from somewhere else at your particular here means more money for you to be richer. Almost everybody is proud of where they live and acept their share. Of course you don't have to be selling trinkets to be part of the benefit of all these people spending money to hang out with you in your hood. You still benefit in the local split, even if you hate them for coming around. They all leave eventually anyway. Who doesn't want to go someplace else sometime. I wish I was there now. They have to go back to keep their own local split. Or they could stay if they want. With money you can have what you want, even citizenship of someplace else.

It was all part of the themeparkization of every myriad local culture, which sometimes ment tour vehicles full of strange people in ridiculous clothes crowding the shops. This is what civilization is anyway, from the beginning: market day. And the local market is everyone, everything, everywhere. And that's how cheap flying cars ended violent nationalism

Cheap flying car tech was suppressed for decades by the rubber tire industry till they sold the flying car builders on rubber flying car bottoms.