Makers

But not long after arriving on the scene, Church fell in with Banks, an early fatkins and stalwart of the New Work movement, a technologist who entranced his fellow engineers with his accounts of the New Work’s many “inventions”—prompting one message-board commenter to characterize him as “a cross between Steve Wozniak and the Reverend Sun Myung Moon.”

Now, eyewitness accounts have them going at it like shagging marmots, as the bio-enhanced Banks falls on Church’s wrinkly carcass half a dozen times a day, apparently consummating a romance that blossomed while Banks was, to put it bluntly, a giant fat bastard. It seems that radical weight-loss has put Banks into the category of “blokes that Suza

All this would be mere sordid gossip but for the fact that Church is once again glowingly chronicling the adventures of the Florida cultists, playing journalist, without a shred of impartiality or disclosure.

One can only imagine when the other, financial shoe will drop. For wherever Church goes, money isn’t far behind: surely there’s a financial aspect to this business with the ride.

UPDATE:

Indeed there is: further anonymous tipsterism reveals that papers have been filed to create a “co-operative” structured like a classic Ponzi scheme, in which franchise operators of the ride are expected to pay membership dues further up the ladder. All the romance of Church’s accounts will certainly find a fresh batch of suckers—if there’s one thing we know about Suza

Lester ran the ride basically on his own that week, missing his workshop and his tinkering, thinking of Suza

“I brought some stuff,” the goth kid said as he paid for his ticket, hefting two huge duffel bags. “That’s still OK, right?”

Was it? Damned if Lester knew. The kid had a huge bruise covering half of his face, and Lester thought he recognized him from the showdown—Death Waits, that’s what Perry had said.

“Sure, it’s fine.”

“You’re Lester, right?”

Christ, another one.

“Yes, that’s me.”

“Honest Fred is full of shit. I’ve been reading your posts since forever. That guy is just jealous because your girlfriend outed him for being such a lying asshole.”

“Yeah.” Death Waits wasn’t the first one to say words to this effect—Suza

Suza

Neither had said exactly that, but that was only because whenever they headed down that path, Suza

No one asked Lester or Perry, even though they were the ones who’d invented it all. It was all so fucked up. Why couldn’t he just make stuff and do stuff? Why did it always have to turn into a plan for world domination? In Lester’s experience, most world-domination plans went sour, while a hefty proportion of modest plans to Make Something Cool actually worked out pretty well, paid the bills, and put food on the table.

The goth kid looked expectantly at him. “I’m a huge fan, you know. I used to work for Disney, and I was always watching what you did to get ideas for new stuff we should do. That’s why it’s so totally suckballs that they’re accusing you of ripping them off—we rip you off all the time.”

Lester felt like he was expected to do something with that information—maybe deliver it to some lawyer or whatever. But would it make a difference? He couldn’t get any spit in his mouth over legal fights. Christ—legal fights!

“Thanks. You’re Death Waits, right? Perry told me about you.”

The kid visibly swelled. “Yeah. I could help around here if you wanted, you know. I know a lot about ride-operating. I used to train the ride-ru

“We’re not really hiring—” Lester began.

“I’m not looking for a job. I could just, you know, help. I don’t have a job or anything right now.”

Lester needed to pee. And he was sick of sitting here taking people’s money. And he wanted to go play with his mechanical computer, anyway.

“Lester? Who’s the kid taking ticket money?” Suza

“Look at this,” Lester said. He flipped up his magnifying goggles and handed her the soda can. He’d cut away a panel covering the whole front of the can, and inside he’d painstakingly assembled sixty-four flip-flops. He turned the crank on the back of the can slowly, and the correct combination of rods extended from the back of the can, indicating the values represented on the flip-flops within. “It’s a sixty-four bit register. We could build a shitkicking Pentium out of a couple million of these.”

He turned the crank again. The can smelled of solder and it had a pleasant weight in his hand. The mill beside him hummed, and on his screen, the parts he’d CADded up rotated in wireframe. Suza

He turned to take Suza

“Look at how cool this thing is, just look.” He used a tweezer to change the registers again and gave it a little crank. “I got the idea from the old Princeton Institute Electronic Computer Project. All these comp sci geniuses, von Neuma

“So I thought I’d prototype the next generation of these, a 64-bit version that you could build out of garbage. Get a couple hundred of the local kids in for the summer and get them working. Get them to understand just how these things work—that’s the problem with integrated circuits, you can’t take them apart and see how they work. How are we going to get another generation of tinkerers unless we get kids interested in how stuff works?”

“Who’s the kid taking ticket money?”

“He’s a fan, that kid that Perry met in jail. Death Waits. The one who brought in the Disney stuff.”

He gradually became aware that Suza

“What’s wrong?”

Her face was purple now, her hands clenched into fists. “What’s wrong? Lester, what’s wrong? You’ve left a total stranger, who, by his own admission, is a recently terminated employee of a company that is trying to bankrupt you and put you in jail. You’ve left him in charge of an expensive, important capital investment, and given him the authority to collect money on your behalf. Do you really need to ask me what’s wrong?”

He tried to smile. “It’s OK, it’s OK, he’s only—”

“Only what? Only your possible doom? Christ, Perry, you don’t even have fucking insurance on that business.”