Death Ray Butterfly

Chapter Seven

Now that I'm here - where I think I am, at least, it's hard to know for sure - I have a lot of time to think about things, and I've found that the more time I have to do that, the more they bother me. Things in general, that is, like marching bands - I don't know why, but they make me feel like throwing and breaking things. Then there's rich people looking for bargains. It just bugs me. If you can afford to buy something and you want it, then buy it. Don't try to get it cheaper, especially when the person you're haggling with is probably earning almost no money at all. Or when the news-people tell you things that you know aren't true, and they know aren't true, and they know that you know, but still they tell you anyway, such as the price of something is due to "supply and demand". It's nonsense but they keep on trotting it out on every occasion.

I've got lists and lists of peeves, pet ones and otherwise. Like professional announcers who mispronounce words, even famous people's names! Or they accentuate the wrong word in a sentence. The other day I heard somebody saying IG-nub-bull, instead of ig-NO-bull. And these are people who are paid to say things right. Then there's the people who launch their booster packs right in your face, never mind the noise and dust. And the doctors who give you diseases so you don't get them later on and they call it "good for you".

I was in a place the other day where I had to wait in one line just to be able to wait in another. I had to submit my papers for inspection. You have to carry them around, and they do these spot checks, where they'll haul you off to the stadium for the night if you don't happen to have them on you, and that's not enough. No, you have to go into their offices every three months to get your papers renewed. You wait in the first line so you can wait in the second line, and in between the two lines there's a man who takes some money. You have to give him the money or else he'll put you back to the end of the first line.

You get to the end of the second line and present your papers to the person behind the bullet-proof glass, where he or she will shuffle them for a few moments and then, depending on whether he or she likes the look of your face, will either stamp them with a rubber stamp, or send you outside to wait in an outside line to buy a different stamp from somebody else who takes some money. There's no way out of this, even for a member of the police force, or an ex-member like myself. I could probably get an exemption from the General, but he wasn't very happy with me last time I saw him.

The General had gone to the trouble of bringing me from the future to help him with that case he had. It's true, he wasn't looking for me in particular, I just happened to be there, and there wasn't much I could do for him anyway, nothing much that anyone could have done. He knew, or said he knew, that a three-year old girl was going to kill someone and he didn't know where or when, but she'd have a gun and she would be doing it deliberately. She was an assassin. A three-year old assassin. It sounded pretty crazy to me. Although I had a nephew once and I wouldn't have put anything past him. My little sister's kid, Wilhelm. Brat used to whack me with a sword every time I came within striking distance. Had a notion to pick him up and heave him across the room. Sister wouldn't have been too thrilled with that so I just put up with it.

The General put me in a nice hotel room. I appreciated that. The lobby was draped with curtains that looked like they were made of gold, and maybe they were. And the lounge chairs, velvet and red, were very cozy. I took some real good snoozes there. Couldn't complain about the liquor either. I was never much of a booze hound but they had some fine Scotch in that place. Every day the General would join me for breakfast and barrage me with questions about my plans. Where to begin? What to do? Where to look? How would what he called "a seasoned investigator" approach such a problem.

All I could do was press him for every detail he could remember about the case. Which wasn't much. On his first trip to the future he'd seen a headline in a newspaper machine, stooped to read the story but didn't have any change to actually buy the paper, and before he could run off to get change he was pulled back into the machine and returned to his own time. The girl had no name. The woman she shot had a name but it wasn't her real one. She was rushed to a hospital. That was pretty much it. I made him tell me the story over and over again.

I didn't get was so urgent about this. Clearly, people running for president got protection, and this candidate, whatever her real name, would have more protection than usual because of the General's discovery, but when I told him this, he became very nervous and finally admitted his real concern was that there even was a presidential candidate. Because, as it turned out, there were no elections to be had. The General and his friends ran the country themselves and were quite happy to keep running it indefinitely. The last thing they needed was an election. I began to get the idea that it wasn't the little girl he wanted to stop, it was the other one, the candidate. I was in no hurry to help him. Politics has never been any of my business.

People who cheat. That's another one of my peeves. The General was out to cheat history. That's almost as bad as people who take on some enormous challenge and then do everything in their power to make it easier, like sailing around the world and doing it with an enormous yacht with all the comforts and conveniences. Why bother? Might as well stay at a nice hotel for a few days until the machine pulls you back and returns you to your own time and place.