CHAPTER 7: Syllables Count.

The historical tradition of Haiku Battle dates back to when the intelligentsia were blacklisted by Government, inc. Over-educated and under-employed, grad students, MENSA candidates (the society itself was outlawed and driven underground in '07), and previously tenured professors fell through the cracks; and like any marginalized and underprivileged social group, soon tribalized and turned rogue. In the beginning, they were still unaccustomed to violence, and settled on spontaneous haiku to work out any confrontations. Several years toughened them up, however, and now the haiku were merely preambles to savage beatings, and occasionally death. Paul was their current leader, and a fairly sharp poet. I was going to have to play this one carefully.

The crowd traditionally called out the topics. I sized them up, trying to see what disciplines they were leaning toward. I soon found out: "Irrational Numbers!" a scrawny kid with glasses shouted out. Paul cleared his throat, and began:

"An endless number,
Square root of negative one.
Math is for the birds."

The crowd murmured appreciatively. Well, at least they chose an easy one to start with, I thought. I said:

"They do not exist
Except inside our own minds.
Magic, to be sure."

Silence. Then a brutish thug of a Classics professor wielding a bat stepped up, and calmly swung hard into Paul's shoulder. Paul didn't flinch, but you could see the rage in his eyes. After all, he was used to this, and while I may have crossed paths with him once or twice, he did this for fun. A young woman stepped forward. "Mayflies," she uttered, and stepped back. It was my turn to begin this time. Mayflies?

"Pesky little beast.
More than one hand can deal with.
Where's the flyswatter?"

Guffaws erupted from the mob. Shit. A dread-locked English Lit grad student shouted, "He ended with a preposition! He ended with a preposition!" Paul, with an evil grin, puffed his chest out, and said:

"It lives for one day.
An Eternity for them;
For us, a moment."

Ok, that was pretty good, I thought, as Paul grabbed the neck of a rum bottle and swung it at my head, catching me directly in the mouth. My lip split wide open, blood splattering the faces of a few nearby Pure Math hoodlums, who giggled psychotically. I felt a tooth loosen, and the room grew dim. A moment later, the pain caught up with the trauma, and I found myself on the floor, with Paul's boot trying to make a soft spot in the back of my head. It took a couple of Latin students to pull Paul off-- After all, there was one more haiku before the melee could really begin. A delinquent Philosophy professor spoke up. "The history of the Universe." Paul was quick to speak up this time. A total ringer. What a crock. Total set up, I thought groggily.

"There was a big bang.
Heat, and light, and life, and death.
We go to the void."

I was still down on one knee, and I could hear the cracking of knuckles as the crowd tensed up, ready to go to work. My lip was essentially useless. How could I even speak, let alone think of a decent haiku right now? I just hope I can make it through the beating. I tried to relax my mind and my body, preparing for the inevitable.

I felt a gentle hand on my shoulder, and a smell like the forest on an early October morning. Erin stood next to me, squared her shoulders, and cried out:

"Chaos; then order.
We make all these things happen.
Order; then chaos."

A few gasps ricocheted through the crowd. Paul stood, stunned. "You... you can't substitute," he stammered, breaking form. "That's not the rules."

"Bullshit," I said, getting to my feet, trying to speak through the blood and loose tissue. "I know the rules as well as you. Substitutes allowed if they're willing to take the punishment as well."

"Fuck you, Mr. LMNO. You're not getting away from me." Paul curled his hand up into a fist and walked forward. "And the bitch is gonna get hers too, you better believe... Urk," Paul stopped, and looked down at the sword that just sprouted from his chest. With a blur, the sword disappeared, leaving a bloody hole. In an instant, Paul's right arm dropped to the floor. Screaming, Paul wheeled around, just as the sword ripped through his stomach, spilling his intestines onto the floor at the feet of a tall man with a cigarette dangling from his mouth. He looked around at the crowd.

"yuo knwo teh ruels. L geos free. Adn I buy ihm a drnik."

I stared. "Horab? What are you doing with these freaks?"

"Latre. Let's get taht faec of yuors fixde."

We made our way to a table, where a busboy, dressed only in tight jeans and an apron, was waiting with a bucket of ice and some gauze. Mal knows how to dress up the help, I thought. Horab and Erin made their introductions, and then he turned to me and said, "Yuo shuold knwo bteter tahn to mess wthi thsoe guys."

It was still painful to talk. "Yeah. I know. Still, how..."

"I was in teh sotry next door, lokoign for my satrt button, adn word caem dwon form teh zebra that j0 were haedign to teh Café. I herad yuo had a new caes, so I deicedd to see how j0 were doign. On my wya donw, I ran itno the Savage Intelletculas, and we all sotr of tumbeld in togehter. Good thign, too. Yuo're not taht good at haiku, are j0?"

"Shut it. I was doing fine."

"If yuor plan was to get codl clokced and have this lovley peice of wrok," he motioned to Erin, who nodded her head at the compliment, "come adn saev yuor ass, tehn it went off wihtout a hicth."

Erin spoke up. "There was one hitch, actually. I believe it's called 'murder'?"

"Don't wrory. Those guy sfell off teh grid years ago. Not olny do tehy hold no statsu positoins in scoiety, a few of tehm are Abbie Hoffman disipcles, and nkow how to dukc teh systme, so tehre's nohting to track. So L, excatly what are j0 wroking on?"

I did my best to relate the story so far through my busted lip, with Erin providing most of the details. After he was caught up, Horab looked thoughtful. "Yuo siad Erin got a traot card?"

"Yeah."

"Well, why haevn't j0 gon eto see teh Triple Oracle? It wuold maek sense, rihgt?"

"I haven't gone, because it's always about doom with them. Remember?"

"Get ovre it, L. Evenutally, it's awlays abuot doom. Anywya, they colud probbaly keep pointign j0 in the rigth diretcion. And yuo can get good infromation, proivded yuo haev an in. And I heav an in."

"Who?"

"Dind't j0 hear? I'm srot of marired to oen of their dauhgters. Let me go adn try to find her. I tohught she'd be here, somehwere..." Horab trailed off, stood up, and wandered off deeper into the Café, which had more or less returned to normal, save for the two handsome baristas who were given the unenviable task of cleaning up Horab's mess.

"Did he say a 'zebra' told him where you were?" Erin looked like she was just about out of patience with all this. "I'll tell you, L, this is all getting pretty weird. And what's with his accent?"

"That's just the way he talks. Truth be told, sometimes I don't know what the hell he's talking about sometimes. But he's a solid guy, and (when he's not killing people) he's good for a few laughs."

"He sounds like a nut job."

"Look around you. Look at the City. Look at what became of our country. You should believe me when I say that Horab is merely synchronized with the times at hand."

I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. Malaul was coming back to the table with a ream of paper. She scowled when she saw my face. "What did you do now?"

"It wasn't me. I was drawn into a Haiku battle, and Horab had to kill Paul."

"Yeah, right. So, where's he now?" Malaul glanced over at the corpse removal job, and let out a small hiss.

"He said he was going to look for his... sort-of wife?"

"You mean Hoshiko? She's at the gaming tables, as usual."

I stared. "Hoshiko? And Horab? Is that even possible?"

Malaul gave a wan smile, and shoved more ice into my face. "Hush. They did it as a joke, but it kind of caught on. They're sort-of married, sort-of divorced, and entirely independent of each other."

"...Whatever you say. So, what have you got for me?"

"The information was encrypted, but that didn't take too long to crack. The problem is that the info itself is in code, or something... Have a look."

The first few lines of the top page of the stack of papers read:

TOWER TOWER TOWER TOWER TOWER SIXTEEN16SIXTEEN16 TOWER NOD TOWER NOD 16XVISIXTEEN TOWER TOWER TOWER NEZTACH SIXTEEN...

"Now this," Malaul said, pointing to the page, "is at least somewhat familiar. I think "Neztach" is Hebrew, and it's connected with Tarot through the Tree of Life."

I sighed. "Looks like I'll have to track down the Oracles of Doom, for sure. Because Erin was sent the Tower card, as well."

Malaul let out a low whistle. "Well, you'll need some help getting them. You better hope Horab finds Hoshiko."

"Is she still..."

"Yeah. You know what they say. Once a Scrabblist, always a Scrabblist."

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