ref: b9fbb17c04e4ccfb2021dac818e514351ca8f646
dir: /troff/0303.ms/
.LP \& .ce .sp |4.25i .PP .ps 12 .CW ░ Peter considered life a waste of good resources. That is to say, \fIall\fR life. He didn't much care for these so\-called pleasures of the flesh, the same ones that so enticed his twin brother. Well, he just didn't care about pleasure. Such thoughts passed through his mind dispassionately as he awaited the call to action. .PP .ps 12 His brother was, shall we say, not cut from the same cloth. Peter marveled at Tommy's inexhaustible capacity for spinning out, blowing a gasket, tripping over his own Reeboks in the neverending quest for sensation. Clichés seemed appropriate for this troubled and troublesome fellow who was not, himself, appropriate. Hey, if the shoe fits... .PP .ps 12 For one thing, there was his body: Tommy had one. Arms and legs too skinny, his belly pooched out. Instead of an eyepatch, his entire face was wrapped in a wide plastic strip that apparently enhanced his percept instrument, though Peter had never ascertained the precise mechanism, or witnessed any direct evidence of its effectiveness. If Peter had thought Tommy was smug before, the plastic strip removed all doubt. This, too, was common amongst the children of their generation. .PP .ps 12 But Tommy wasn't all bad. His buffoonery sparked joy. Whenever Peter felt like giving up, there was Tommy saying something stupid, there was Tommy with an interesting new book, there was Tommy hatching a lucrative scheme involving other people's money, or what have you. .PP .ps 12 There was Peter, falling in love with his captor. His sidekick. His twin brother. .PP .ps 12 He wondered what Tommy thought about when he was alone. .PP .ps 12 Or so Tommy liked to assume Peter would have thought. .PP .ps 12 Who, in point of fact, knew what went on in that silly pirate's head? His brother certainly was an odd piece of work. What had been the inspiration behind him? What had Tommy been thinking about when he created him? No matter, he decided, Peter got the job done. .PP .ps 12 Tommy removed his penis from Peter's methodically working mouth and zipped up his black leather jeans. Wiped his hands off on his shirt. "Get out of here, man," was all he could say, dismissing his sibling back to whatever hole it was he always seemed to crawl into, off, elsewhere in the silo, whenever he wasn't needed. "Too much teeth." .PP .ps 12 Peter fucked off to his hole. .PP .ps 12 Head thus cleared, Tommy resumed a more businesslike stream of consciousness. Re\-attached drivetrain to wheels without downshifting, slipped the helmet of his mind back into place over his vulnerable cranium as the mechanism peeled out, burned rubber, etc. He leaned forward in his seat and waited for the road to appear before him. .PP .ps 12 His visor went to work. .PP .ps 12 Working... .PP .ps 12 Headlights punched twin pinholes in the darkness. Tommy could see the road in front of him as a more or less focused corridor of scrolling, generative nonsense. Like third\-party ads, receding. His visor made it, made him. Perfect apprehension of the details no one else would notice even in broad daylight, even while standing perfectly still. He reckoned it was no wonder he got tired so quickly. .PP .ps 12 Tommy shifted gears. .PP .ps 12 Scanning for marks. A girl he knew down the silo had allowed him to go through her purse, just like it was nothing. He pocketed whatever looked interesting, and she never so much as complained. Peter had just stared on. Focused. Tommy wondered what else he could get away with. .PP .ps 12 At lunch, the other kids were starting to avoid him. Or was he avoiding them? Peter would probably say, \fIthe glass is half full of whatever you wanted, and half full of whatever it really is.\fR Whatever that was supposed to mean. .PP .ps 12 One, two, three, four, nobody in the cafeteria was carrying. Tommy switched back to ambient and performed a mundane visible spectrum scan of the open floor plan mess hall. Pretty soon now it would be time for class. .PP .ps 12 Working... .PP .ps 12 Bear would sit and listen to them eat. For hours and hours he'd track their conversations, the stupid things they thought about and allowed to escape through parted (paper) teeth. The stupidity was a reliable indicator he'd tuned into the right channel. .PP .ps 12 They were like ants. .PP .ps 12 Hm. .PP .ps 12 Bear's coffee shop was open for business. Appropriately dubbed "The Filling Station," for within its confines libations were dispensed from thick rubber hoses by attendants clothed in striped coveralls and angular wool caps. The booths were intended to resemble old style "bench" car seats, each customer dutifully strapped across the waist by a webbed belt fastened to an archaic looking, metallic locking mechanism. Peter accommodated a mouthful of steaming coffee from an attendant's petrol hose as Tommy continued with his tirade, already in progress. .PP .ps 12 "The problem is, nobody here understands \fIlying."\fR .PP .ps 12 He paused so the attendant could squeegee his visor. .PP .ps 12 "You and I, we lie all the time. And this is good. But, so many of our contemporaries get hung up on the supposed truth or untruth of a given utterance, I fear that they are in danger of sacrificing the five human senses\(emliterally, the visceral experience of the surveillance\(emin favor of some wildly overestimated, farsical \fIunderstanding\fR of the signifier's specific, factual flaws and deficiencies." .PP .ps 12 Peter nodded, uncritically. .PP .ps 12 "What I'm advocating instead is a return to the deployment of \fIknowing artifice\fR in human relations. Traditional, face\-to\-face bullshitting, both parties partaking voluntarily in the error. Tear away the modern skein of earnestness! Arch your fucking eyebrow! \fISmash the policy of truth!\fR .PP .ps 12 The Filling Station sounded a loud .I ding .R as a new customer entered from the street. .PP .ps 12 "I know exactly what you mean," Peter said. .PP .ps 12 But it was not enough. Mere agreement could never be enough. Peter could only nod, knowing not the details, but the gist of what was coming. .PP .ps 12 "Say what you will," said Tommy, once again shifting gears, "But I think it was stupid for William to just come out and \fIadmit\fR to his mother that we went to see the Doctor. She had no way of knowing. She could never have guessed." .PP .ps 12 Peter knew he was right. .PP .ps 12 .PP .ps 12 "He could have .I lied," .R Tommy said, boarding the train of thought even as it abruptly braked in conspiratorial, knowing silence. .PP .ps 12 "Anyway, our insurance will cover it," said Tommy. .PP .ps 12 "I hope," he added, and downed another gulp of his coffee. .PP .ps 12 Bear liked running the coffee shop. He had regular (paper) customers. The petrol station gimmick was clever, but that wasn't what kept them showing up, day, after day, after day. Bear's customers craved certainty, and to a lesser extent, his excellent coffee. The costuming they could take or leave. .PP .ps 12 Penguin sidled up to Bear's cash register, receipt in hand. .PP .ps 12 "Say, Bear, it seems I've been charged for three mugs of chocolate, when in reality I've only been given one." .PP .ps 12 Bear studied the receipt, and then looked slowly up at Mr. Penguin, his snout forming the tip of a blunt spear which he aimed directly at his customer, his eyes drawing so narrow that Penguin assumed he had fallen asleep. .PP .ps 12 "Yoo hoo, .I Bearrrrrr..." .R Penguin said. .PP .ps 12 "We'll call it even," Bear finally said, stuffing the receipt into his cash register. Penguin didn't complain. Bear's best customers never complained. .PP .ps 12 "I'll have another mug of chocolate," Penguin ventured, and climbed back onto his bar stool at the far end of the counter. .PP .ps 12 Bear wiped the sweat from his forehead with a shop towel he kept tucked into the back pocket of his coveralls. .PP .ps 12 The entrance \fIdinged\fR again as another customer made their way into the shop from the street.