Number 9 dream Page 0,104
I do beg your pardon. Pleasant dreams.’ When Buntaro has gone I take the pictogram into the living room and inspect it by the lamplight. Nagano, Mountain Paradise. Something tells me Buntaro’s memory lapse was no accident – this is from my mother, forwarded by Uncle Money. I sit down and balance it on my knee. It hardly weighs a thing, but it weighs so much. Skies grey with snow, mountainsides pink with cherry blossom, snow turquoise with sky, happy hikers, happy skiers. More intimate blame-shifting revelations. The creator of Goatwriter looks down at me from her shell-framed gloom. I cannot see her eyes but I can hear her voice. ‘I don’t think you’re being very fair. Go on. Open it now and spare us all the agony.’ Just like Mrs Sasaki, she is sympathetic and stern in equal measures. ‘Ah,’ she sighs, and the drowsy sea in the background sighs too, ‘the young.’
Pithecanthropus’s long fall was broken by a semi-mesh of wires and cables. Far above, a pinhole let in a ray of light, to which the early man’s nocturnal vision adjusted. He grunted. ‘Yes,’ replied Goatwriter, wobbling, ‘m-my fall was providentially parried by a potpourri of porous packing. Mrs Comb, Mrs Comb – can you hear me?’ The housekeeper clucked. ‘It’ll take more than that to knock my stuffing out, sir! An old bird I may be but I still have the use of my wings. But what is this cobwebby stuff everywhere? I can barely move!’
A wall of light opened up and a female voice blazed forth: ‘Welcome!’ A woman’s face appeared. ‘Welcome!’ She wore a Technicolor crown and a shoulder-padded power suit. Her blond hair sunshone, her lips glistened, but she seemed two-dimensional because she was. The wall was a screen, lighting up a chamber strewn with electrical cables. The floor was soft with skin flakes and eyelashes. ‘Welcome, o Goatwriter! I am Queen Erichnid. This is my website.’
‘I am unfamiliar,’ Goatwriter began, ‘with your m-majesty’s genealogy.’
‘My genealogy is the media! My empire is the future!’
‘Right grand, doubtless,’ said Mrs Comb, ‘but we were looking for a stolen fountain pen and we have reason to suspect it might have ended up here.’
‘Indeed.’ Queen Erichnid deigned to look at Mrs Comb. ‘I had it stolen.’
‘Grand behaviour for a queen!’ cooed Mrs Comb. ‘Sneaking and snooping and off with decent folks’ possessions! We call your like thieves where I come from!’
‘Queen Erichnid never stole it herself, ya scraggy cutlet!’ rang a rodent retort. ‘I lifted ya poxy pen from under ya noncing noses, while her majesty digitalized da birdstorm!’
Pithecanthropus grunted in amazement. ‘ScatRat!’ gasped Goatwriter as he appeared on-screen with Queen Erichnid. He leered and harpstringed his whiskers. ‘Ya can refer 2 me as “Da Artist Formerly Known as ScatRat”.’ Mrs Comb huffed and clucked. ‘But how did you get here?’
‘Being marginalized was boring! I been trucking along in ya
Number 9 dream
ing rustbucket ever since ya caveman wrecked my scatpad. Dis morning, her divine majesty’ – a twenty-four-carat smile from the queen – ‘made me an offer no honest rat could refuse – I lure ya 2 her website, and she digitalizes me into da world’s #1 computer rat!’ Queen Erichnid tousled ScatRat’s ear and his tail quivered in ecstasy.
‘But why,’ – Goatwriter chewed his beard – ‘would you voluntarily renounce your solid state for the virtual?’
‘Why? Why! Da Internet is my rat-run, Goatee! I lightspeed down da cables I used 2
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-up my teeth chewing! Lemme cut 2 da quick. Queen Erichnid has granted ya dis audience to make ya da same offer, Goatee.’ Queen Erichnid close-upped until her kaleidoscope eyes filled the screen. ‘Indeed, o Goatwriter. I am offering to download you to the side of the screen where the future awaits! Link up with the cyberagents, the e-bookshops! The paper book is dying!’ Her hair crackled static as her voice scaled operatic heights of passion. ‘Compose your stories in a virtual paradise! I will act as your cyberagent, and—’
‘Aye,’ pecked Mrs Comb, ‘the nub!’
‘Silence, hen! Goatwriter, digitalization will perfect you! Iron out that troublesome speech d-d-defect! Sentences at the speed of light instead of the speed of amputee m-m-marathon day!’
Goatwriter glared proudly. ‘My stammer distinguishes my true friends from the false, fawners, feigners and flatterers! I refuse!’
Queen Erichnid filed her nails. ‘How very positive of you. Then I’ll digitalize you anyway, ram-raid your virtual brain, synthesize every story you could ever make, and dump the leftover bytes along with your tedious companions Mr Id