The things flung their glowing balls and spattered the cavern walls with the glowing entrails of cave salamanders. It illuminated the eight-hundred-foot shaft all the way to the top, where the young man looked out through his tiny peephole and laughed at them.
They screeched more. They dug their great talons into the living rock and climbed up, up—but the limestone ran out. The granite was too hard for their claws to find purchase. They tumbled and slipped, breaking bony arms, cracking open their exoskeletal faceplates. One of them climbed to within a hundred feet of the young man, then plummeted, cracking its face open during the fall so that its skull split like a coconut, right along the ridge of its nose.
They screeched at the young man until the progress of his excavating machine forced him to move on. They were screeching until long after the tiny hole was covered with detritus.
The young man was chuckling. He was truly insane, and he knew it, but insanity felt good.
The world was in a nasty mood.
This was nothing new. The world was made up of nations controlled by people who had no business being in control.
Once, it had been survival of the fittest, and the most brutal caveman in the valley got to boss around all the other cave people. Then brains got bigger and people began working cooperatively to oust the brutes and give control to better leaders. Three million years later, the valleys were ruled by a new form of brute.
A politician was a human being who wanted power, and this by definition was exactly the wrong kind of person to be handed the reins of power. In some nations these brutes became dictators through their cunning, charisma and duplicity, always masked behind doctrine, always dependent on the whims of fate. Fate almost never allowed honest men to become dictators.
In other nations, they became prime ministers or presidents—through cunning, charisma and duplicity. They projected a false doctrine. They used public perception to distract the people from their evident lies. The people singled out one confident man or another to control their government because they had no real choices, and because they convinced themselves that the manufactured image of sincerity was genuine sincerity. The system was designed to bring charlatans to power. Fate almost never allowed honest men to be elected to high office.
Even the world’s biggest democracy was not a democracy, but a democratic republic, where the culture of mass media and easy answers made a mockery of the democratic process. Yet it was still the best system of national government that could be found.
Which meant the other systems were flawed in the extreme.
When the leaders chosen under all these systems became agitated by forces beyond their understanding, they lashed out at whatever target was convenient. It felt good to do so.
The world became a despicable place.
Chapter 2
His name was Remo and he had lately developed this thing about people who didn’t get the recognition they deserved.
“I got maps of the Walk of Fame,” said a street corner punk with crusty hair.
“I’m only looking for one star,” Remo said.
“You’ll never find it without a map,” the punk insisted. “Just five bucks.”
Remo considered it, then handed over a five. He was back a minute later.
“Hey, this map’s no good,” he told the punk. “It doesn’t show the star for Alan Hale Jr.”
“Sure does.”
“Show me.”
The punk rolled his eyes and snatched Remo’s five-dollar map of Hollywood, flinging it open and stabbing one finger at the pages.
“Right there.”
Remo looked at the spot the punk pointed at. “Can’t be.”
“Can be.”
“It’s almost a side street. I don’t believe it.”
The punk sneered and thrust back the map. “I grew up in Hollywood, dude. I know every inch of the Walk of Fame. That’s where they put Alan Hale Jr.”
Remo scowled deeply. The punk couldn’t decide if the man was about to start crying or whip out an AK-47 and begin a spree.
“Hey, you know how they decide who gets a star?” the punk asked. “It’s all politics. True talent’s got nothing to do with it. I guess Alan Hale Jr.’s people didn’t work it good enough to get him a better spot.”
Remo shook his head. “Maybe he wasn’t a good actor, but he’s still way better than most of the schmoes on this map.”
The punk shrugged. “You ain’t gettin’ no argument from me. Look at all them people up the street. They been camped there for days, keeping a—what they call it?—a vigil. You know whose star that is?”
“Who?” Remo asked.
“That kiddy-diddler. Miguel Jackon.”
Remo’s eyes grew dark. “Are you telling me they give a primo star spot to that wacko and then they go and put Alan Hale Jr. next to a stinking alley? It’s a crime. Somebody ought to do something about it.”
The punk shrugged and looked away from the nerdy tourist. Something about the nerd’s eyes made the punk uneasy. “Be my guest.”
“I will.”
The punk was surprised when his customer turned and marched up the street toward the crowd of Miguel Jackon supporters. Just what did that guy think he was going to do?
Remo wandered into the crowd, which had closed off the street around a mound of flowers, stuffed animals and handmade signs proclaiming undying love to Miguel Jackon: Miguel Is Innocent! and Free Miguel!
“What’s going on?” he asked a woman with long braided hair and a face full of black mascara streaks.
“We’re showing our support for Miguel,” she said.
“Miguel who?”
“Miguel Jackon,” she explained impatiently.
Remo did his best impression of an ignoramus. “What movies was he in?”
“He’s not an actor—he’s a singer, you jerk! How can you not know about Miguel Jackon?”
“Yeah, what are you, a retard?” demanded a dowdy, short man in a suit and tie that he’d been wearing for days.
“Hey, sorry, just a sightseer. But I thought only actors got stars on the Walk of Fame. How come they gave one to some old singer?”
The crowd grew uglier by the second. “He’s not old!” insisted a pair of Latino women in matching Miguel Jackon satin jackets.
“He’s the biggest star of them all!” the rumpled-suit man proclaimed. “Remember the Jackon Five, the band he was in with his brothers in the seventies? Remember Thrillride? He sold thirty million copies of that album.”
Remo scratched his chin and looked at the grimy sky thoughtfully. “I don’t remember any of that.”
“He must be a retard!” insisted one of the Latino women.
“Wait.” Remo snapped his fingers. “The child molester! So this is sort of a memorial for all the kids he abused, huh?”
“Lies!” the short man spat.
“Those children lied to get Miguel’s money!”
“Really?” Remo said. “I thought they had DNA evidence.”
“More lies! They stole his semen and used it to frame him!” the mascara woman said.
“Truly?” Remo asked.
“He could never do that to a child,” the mascara woman wailed.
“But what about the pictures? And the videos?”
“There were no pictures and no video,” the Latino woman declared.
Remo grinned playfully. “You kidders. They’re showing the video on the news right now.” He pointed out the display of televisions behind the barred window of a nearby electronics shop.
“Oh, God, it’s true,” wailed someone.
“No, they’re more lies! He couldn’t have done it.”
The supporters crowded down the street to the electronics shop and Remo slipped through them, stepped over the mound of flowers and teddy bears, and rummaged around for the sidewalk star of Miguel Jackon.