CHAPTER 4: The Open Bar; Showdown.

As she stepped out of the car, Erin said, “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

We were standing in front of a narrow door, attached to a cramped, squat, suspiciously non-Euclidian building sandwiched between two hulking behemoth towers that loomed overhead, windows shattered like broken teeth, or spare eye sockets gouged out of the walls.

“I know, I know. They like a certain sense of mystery abut it. Makes ‘em feel dangerous.” I took her hand (the sensation of my fingers entwining with her made me think of copulating Seraphim, of snakes in the spring), and led her to the door. “Hey, OB!” I shouted at the door.

“Who are ‘They’?” Erin whispered. I didn’t have a chance to answer, as the surface of the door swelled, and suddenly had the appearance of a round, friendly face, about three times the size of a normal head.

“L, how are you? I—“The huge eyes rolled towards Erin, and scowled. Erin let out a muffled shriek and flinched back, as the door looked her up and down. “What do you think you’re doing, L?”

“She’s a client, OB. Play nice. We were just assaulted by a cell phone.”

“You sure? She looks too good to be one of yours…”

“Hey, thanks a lot, OB! Now, are you going to let us in, or am I gonna have to do this the hard way?”

The door grinned, “Oh, I was just kidding. We know your credit is good here. C’mon in.” The face disappeared, and the door was a door again.

Erin looked at me quizzically. “What’s the hard way?”

I chuckled. “Darling, there isno hard way. The Open Bar likes to play that it’s just a little kid, having awoken only a few months ago. But really, it basically could control everything that happens in itself. This includes entering. It’s a good thing we raised the energy through sex and not violence. I wouldn’t want that much negative energy in one consciousness. I prefer his silly goof at immaturity.’

OB’s face popped out of the door again. “I heard that.”

“You were supposed to.” The face disappeared again, and I grabbed the doorknob. Turning to Erin, I said, “you ready for this?” as I swung the door open.

“I guess so… Holy shit!” On the other side of the door was an enormous room, wood-paneled, with large wooden columns supporting a stories-high vaulted roof. There were tables scattered about, an enormous mahogany bar with brass railings, a stage off to one side, and what looked to be private rooms in back. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds’ cover of “All Tomorrow’s Parties” emanated from nowhere in particular. The place was about three-quarters full, and filled with all sorts of odd types: Scrabblists, Emo kids, Metalheads, Drunken Buddhists, Renegade Kareokists, and the Ubiquitous Barflys. I led Erin over to the bar, where a man with an enormous polystyrene nose was wiping a glass down with his shirttail.

“Hey, Mangrove, two martinis.”

He looked up. “LMNO, haven’t seen you here in a while. Who’s the lovely lady?”

“Ah, yes. Erin, this is Mangrove. Mangrove, Erin.”

“A pleasure,” Mangrove said, as two martini glasses filled with expensive gin and a lemon rind delicately twisted along the rims materialized in front of us. Erin looked at them dubiously.

“It’s ok,” I said. “Look up.”

The ceiling was barely visible, as there were oddly shimmering darts of light folding in upon themselves, in a perpetual mobius strip of color and illumination. “What isthat?” asked Erin, enraptured. I turned to her to answer, and was momentarily caught up in the sense of wonder she radiated, the raucous noise of the bar dimmed, the rest of the world faded away.

“Um. The, ah…” I followed her gaze up, and came back to myself. “Those are the collapsing wave states. They’re what made the Open Bar. When you concentrate hard enough, one of the wave states will fold the universe into what you were thinking about. That’s how we got this place to look the way it does. Apparently, OB can fold space-time. Mang here decided that a good bar should always be almost full, but never packed, because it adds to a atmosphere of solidarity and community. Or Something. Did I get that right?”

“Indubitably, L. Now miss... Erin, was it?”

“Yes.”

“…Erin. LMNO tends to get snobbish about his drinks, I was wondering if you would like anything other than the bitter taste of gin?” Mangrove had a sly grin on his face as he asked. I knew what he was up to.

Erin smiled back. “A white wine, if you please. Sauvignon Blanc, preferably.”

“Absolutely.” A chilled glass of wine appeared in front of her. I decided to step in before things got out of hand.

“Mang, we’re looking for Aini.”

“Why the fuck would you deliberately look for her?”

“Face-Raping Bat… It’s a long story. I’ll tell you later. Anyway, is she around?”

“Back corner. Just look for the large amount of people deliberately avoiding her.”

“Thanks.” I grabbed my glass, and took a long pull. This was gonna be tough. “One more thing, Mang,” I said.

“What, pray tell?”

“Lemme get a cold wrought-iron crowbar.”

~~~

With the cold iron crowbar in hand, I inclined my head in Erin’s direction. “Look, if you don’t want to deal with this, you can stay here with Mang. Not only would he enjoy the experience, he’d also the closest to the Bar, so you’d be perfectly safe. Not to mention, I think OB has a crush on you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Look to your left.” A bouquet of flowers had appeared, hovering in the air, and lowered itself into a vase which rose from the bartop. Then a box of chocolates appeared. “See? What a hopeless romantic.”

A voice emanating from nowhere in particular said, “I heard that.”

Erin patted the railing, smiled, and said, “Um… thanks, uh, ‘OB’, but I really have to take care of this.” Straightening up, she looked at me with steely determination, and said, “Somebody, somewhere, is trying to scare me, and just recently tried to hurt me. So I’m in for the long haul. Let’s go do this.”

“Fair enough.” I turned, and began searching out our Troll.

It wasn’t hard to find her: There was only one place in the Bar that people were reluctant to go. A moat of empty tables and chairs surrounded a hazy mass that only slightly resembled a young woman with wings on her back. From a distance, it looked like an out-of-focus photograph, but it shimmered, like a heat mirage. Then you could hear her: From where we were, it was a low buzzing, like cicadas from a mile off, but as we drew closer, you could start making things out.

"Meep…3.14592… A FAGGOT WHO LOVES TO MASTURBATE WHILE EDITING POSTS INTO PERVERTED MESSAGE…oracles are dumb, and psychics are always wrong… meep… 65358979323846264… I sprinkle you with fairy dust...”

Erin stopped. “What’s going on? What is that?”

“That, is the Aini collective. Millions of nano-bots, all loosely connected by a driving urge to annoy as many people as possible. The thing is, each of the bots has a tiny spark of independent thought, which makes her a bit tough to talk to if you don’t get her attention first.”

“meep… 3383279502884… Stop changing what I say...”

“But why does… she... it…” Erin trailed off, dumbfounded.

“I know, she has that effect on people. Let me handle it.”

“How? How are you going to be able to deal with nano-bots?”

“The thing is, she thinks she’s a fairy. She’s convinced herself so much so, that she actually plays by the ancient rules of fairly lore.” I hefted the crowbar. “Hence the cold wrought iron. Oh, which reminds me—Turn your pockets inside out.”

“I don’t have pockets.” She motioned downwards at herself, and I foolishly looked. Her tight red dress clung to her hips like clingfilm, detailing the smooth curves of her body, a shallow dip where her thighs met, the gentle and slight protrusions of her hipbones. It was the promise of heaven, the inevitability that all men succumb, the literal birthplace of desire.

“THEY HAVE CARNAL RELATIONS WITH GOATS!!... Meep…”

Aini’s incessant ranting brought me around again. We were now face to faces, the bots coalescing, trying to approximate a face and a body, but their independence made them unable to agree on an appearance. The result was not unlike seeing the corpse of a young girl covered with insects.

“Aini, I want to talk with you. This is Erin.”

"This is Erin… 1971693993751058209749445923… I want to talk with you… meep…I ate yew. Yum! Squirrels are stupid…fairy dust…”

“I’m serious. Hey! Are you listening?”

"Are you listening?...I didn’t say that, why are you making me say that?... 06647093…GOAT FUCKER!”

“Enough of this shit,” I muttered as I drew back with the crowbar, and swung it as hard as I could at Aini’s head. The front part of her face sheared off, as hundreds of bots died, falling to the floor, no more than silicon and nanowires.

Aini shrieked, and quickly rose from the table, up, and up, her faux wings pretending to flap, as the nanobots quickly re-arranged themselves to form a bow in her hand.

" I shoot an arrow at your head!" she cried, and let loose a stream of bots. Erin screamed, and ducked under a table.

“Fuck you.” I swung again, and the ‘arrow’ dissolved into angry dust. Using the crook of the crowbar, I hooked Aini’s foot, shearing it off at the knee. “OB! Window!” I yelled. A beautiful stained glass window appeared in the wall, just as I hurled Aini’s leg. It shattered in a beautiful rainbow of glass, the shards of which disappeared before falling among the other patrons. A few cheered and clapped in appreciation of the show. I owe Agent Compassion for that move, I thought. Damn, I owe her a dollar. “Aini! Listen up,” I yelled. “I need your hyper math!” "Oh.” She fluttered down. “What’s up?"

I sighed. Why is it always this hard? I handed her the slip of paper I got from the face-raping bat. “This looks like machine code. I need to know what it says.”

“Did you know I can find out anyone’s IP address and then change it at will? It’s easy!... "Meep”

I swung the crowbar again, this time catching her in the side with a satisfying crunch. I could hear the thousands of tiny robots pulverized. Damn, it felt good. “PAY ATTENTION!”

"Ow! Dammit! Ok, ok… It’s mixed format… it’s repeating “XVI” and “16” a few times… Oh look, the inevitable “23”… It’s throwing a lot of purposeful gibberish between “7”s and “8”s… ok, a few words here... “Neztach”… “Hod”… Stupid psychics… Ok, skipping a bit… Ah.”

“What?”

“Hope you like the bohemian scene."

“Aini…”

“Whatever this is, and wherever you got it,” Aini said with what approximated a knowing grin, “it came from the shop at 42nd and 13th. Don’t forget your beret... meep…”

I knew when not to push it any further. I abruptly turned around, grabbed Erin by the elbow, and quickly walked away. “Don’t look back,” I muttered. The crowd parted for us as we made our way back to the front of the bar.

“GOAT FUCKER!!... I didn’t say that, you made me do it… 64709384460955058223… yer not kewl, and yew know it…meep… meep…”

“Just ignore her,” I said. “It will soon seem like a dream.”

“It already seems like a dream.”

“Mang! More drinks! Make ‘em doubles!”

Mangrove’s nose awaited us, with the rest of him behind it. “Hell, after that performance, why don’t you just take the bottle?”

“Fine by me. Make it scotch.”

Mang rolled his eyes. “But of course. Erin?”

Demurely, she said, “Better make it scotch for me, as well.” She turned to me, and said, “so, did you understand anything she was babbling about?”

“Yeah, one or two things. I have to work out some of the details, but I know where we have to go next.”

“…And that would be…”

“What do you know about poetry?”

“It’s usually bad, and it takes place in coffee shops?”

“Right both times. But don’t worry. The coffee there is excellent.”

*** *** *** *** ***

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