Realware

"Hold on," whispered Babs. "I want to see how it starts." After living near Kevvie for a year or so, Babs didn't have much sympathy for her. "We'll leave as soon as it gets too rank. Oh thanks, Randy." He was back with her beer. Haresh was doing a little Egyptian dance, his arms held out in that fu

"Don't do it, Kevvie," called Babs, but Kevvie went ahead and lay down on her back with her legs wide open. She gave her pelvis an encouraging wriggle.

"Go for it!" shouted a man off to the right.

The Egyptian bird-god took another step toward Kevvie.

"Stop it, Haresh!" shouted Yoke. "You're too good for this!"

At that, Haresh turned his head, peering out at the crowd and spotting them. "I am agreeing entirely, Ms. Yoke," he said, his penis going soft and then disappearing back into the mass of his belly. Ramses's nose horn went limp and his music drooled off into silence. "This show is nonsensical," continued Haresh. "Kevvie and I have already simulated a sex act today. I find it ridiculous to repeat our u

"Oh maaan," moaned the frustrated Randy. "Coin" off about our time again?"

"Put it to her!" shouted another man. Kevvie had lifted her head up and was looking around. She drew her knees together. More people were yelling. Kevvie sat up and began putting on her robe. "Don't go!" someone else shouted. "You're supposed to fuck the moldie!" Kevvie smiled, shook her head, wrapped the robe around herself and stepped down off the back of the stage. Haresh joined her, and the two walked off into the darkness together, laughing and talking like good friends.

"We'll take an intermission now," said Ramses from the stage, talking loud to drown out the grumbling. The curtains to the bar pulled away, letting in light and music. The spotlight above the stage stayed lit. "And feel free to ask any moldie you see for a 'date," continued Ramses. "The next round of refreshments is on the house, and meanwhile enjoy the zany antics of our buffoon blimps." The five blimps drifted down to about twenty feet above the stage and began circling around each other like clumsily flocking birds. "I'll have a talk with our performers," promised Ramses. He hopped off the stage and set off after Haresh and Kevvie, just now disappearing through a little door in the hold's far side. Most people began drifting to the bar, and all the Snooks moldies headed in there too.

"Those are Phil's," Babs told Yoke, pointing to the blimps. "Those are the ones he wanted to show you last week."

"Before Kevvie ruined everything," said Yoke. "She's really something, isn't she? What could Haresh possibly find to discuss with her?"

Just then Ramses came flying back out of the door at the far side of the hold. Someone had shoved his head up his ass so far that he looked like a wowo. It took him a minute to get himself unknotted, and when he did, he took off toward the bar, probably looking for support.

"Looks like Haresh is on strike," said Yoke. "We really should talk to him. Or to one of the other Metamartians. We have to get them to tell Om not to allow plutonium." Now the Metamartians were all following Haresh toward the far door-- Peg, Wubwub, Shimmer, and Ptah.

"Did Josef say they're leaving tonight?" said Babs. "Maybe they're worried the Snookses are going to hassle them. You're right, Yoke, we should talk to them about plutonium. But maybe first we need another beer." Babs was feeling merry. She gave Randy her biggest smile. "I loved the juggling, Randy."

"You got me in your spell, Babs," said Randy gamely. "How soon we goin' back to your place?"

"If you're not going to talk to the Metamartians, then I will," said Yoke, about to take off after the aliens. But suddenly her face changed. "Look --

"Oh God" said Babs.

Up above the stage the air was looking oddly warped. And the Uffin' Wowo blimp -- good lord, it was swelling up to the size of a refrigerator, the size of an automobile, the size of a house! It wobbled hugely down and then --as in some fabulous stage-magic illusion -- the spotted blimp split open to reveal a dog, a thin woman, a plump woman, and -- "Phil!" screamed Yoke, ru

"I love you, Babs," he said into her ear.

"You do?" said Babs. "You do?"

Phil, February 26

Phil woke up late Thursday morning, at peace with the world. Da was dead, yes, but in the end his death seemed to make sense. Phil's dreams last night had included Da. Da was happy. He was inside the SUN, yet still flying toward it, as if the center of the SUN were unreachable. In Phil's dream, the SUN was a point of light inside a cloud of glowing butterflies.

Phil's dream conversations with Om last night had been the best yet. He'd learned to understand the way that Om spoke in glyphs, in concept blocks, expressing many variations of a thought at the same time. He was bursting with new information. Today was going to be a good day.

For once Tempest and Darla seemed sober, and Darla was even dressed--wearing the purple caftan he had made her.

"I dreamed Om said she's putting us back today," said Darla. "Did you dream that too? Tempest can't remember."

Seeing Tempest reminded Phil of what she'd done to his face, but when he felt around his eyes, yesterday's scabs were gone. As well as remembering the dream Darla was asking about, he remembered that in one layer of his dreams Om had been healing him.

"Yes, I did dream Om is going to put us back," Phil answered Darla. "She had us inside her so she could figure out our circuitry--and now she's done. She said from now on she'll just watch people through their allas. She's going to set us back down."

"Anywhere she drops us is faaahn with me," mewed old Tempest. "Why you lookin' at me so fu

"You don't remember trying to claw my eyes out?"

"We--We was fightin' over a doll?" said Tempest, glancing around for Humpty-Dumpty, who was, of course, nowhere to be found. Tempest looked strung-out and querulous. "Young fella like you shouldn't of been pickin' on a naahce ole lady like me."

Phil didn't bother answering that one. "Om said she'd home in on Da's wedding ring," he told Darla. "She likes to have a specific thing to go for."

"Kurt's wedding ring?" said Darla. "He wasn't wearing any in here. You know where it is?"

"I do," said Phil. "It's inside a pet DIM blimp I made. I called it the 'Uffin' Wowo,' not that it really is a wowo, it's just a blimp. It's aboard the Anubis, which is beached in the mud at San Francisco. A bunch of moldies use the Anubis for a nightclub."

"Stuzzy," said Darla. "I've never been to San Francisco. Your father's wedding ring, huh?" She paused for a second. This morning her expression looked composed and intelligent. "You know, Phil, there's something we should fab about, especially since you're such a good friend of Yoke's. It's -- the gunjy way I've been acting in here --I mean with your father and everything--Phil, you have to viz that I flat out thought we were dead, so -- "