Fantastic Metropolis

2. NON

“Last winter, in the first precious weeks of war, our Senate used three of them to argue the moral turpitude of one member. That is as sad a sight as this democracy has seen this century.

—Philip Wylie, ibid.

“We kept reporting to our officers that there were large number of Germans all around us, together with heavy transport and artillery, but the brass told us we were imagining things. There couldn’t be Germans there. Intelligence hadn’t reported any.”

—Survivor, The Battle of the Bulge

“For some weeks after their arrival in Bosnia the Americans spent millions of dollars in a highly-publicised bridge building exercise. The whole time they were building it local people kept telling them there was an easy fording place about half a mile downriver. Intelligence had not reported it…”

—Survivor, Bosnia

“You have to tell the White House and the Pentagon what they want to hear or they won’t listen to you. That’s how we got blamed for the Bay of Pigs after we’d warned against it.”

—Ex-CIA officer

WE DON’T DIAL 911

—Commercial Texan home signboard painted on silhouette of a sixgun

“EVERYTHING’S PERFECTLY SIMPLE,” General Fors had rid himself of his various stigmata and had repainted his helmet a pleasing apple green. His attempts at Arabic lettering were a little primitive, but showed willing, even if his crescent looked like a sickle. “It’s just you people who complicate everything. We were so comfortable.”

They had made him security officer and put him near the revolving door. The hotel was deserted. Through the distant easterly windows guttered a wasteland of wrecked cars and abandoned flyovers, a browned world.

“Too many you know darkies.” Jillian Burnes, the famous transexual novelist, was the only resident now. She was reluctant to leave. She had been here for six months., she said, and made a little nest for herself. She had come on a British Council trip and lost touch for a while. Her massive feet up on the Ark of the Covenant she was peeling an orange. “This operation was aimed at thinning them out a bit.”

“So far it seems to have firmed them up a bit.” Jerry was helping the general buckle his various harnesses together. He dusted off his uniformed back. “All this red plush is a natural sand trap.”

In the elegant lobby, its mirrors almost wholly intact, they had piled their booty in rough categories—domestic, religious, entertainment, military, electronic, arts—and were resting at the bar enjoying its uninvaded largesse. Even the sky was quiet now. The customers had all fled on the last plane. And the last plane had gone down in the rush. They could have been in New York or Washington. Had there still been a New York or Washington.

Giving the general a final brush, Jerry wondered why so much of Jerusalem was left.

The other British Council refugee was dwarfish Felix Martin, son of the famous farting novelist, Rex. A popular tennis columnist in his own right and virtual war face for the breakfast hit Washington Toast, Felix dabbed delicately at his dockers and looked tragically up at Trixibell.

“Baby?” said Trix.

“Have you been over here before? Is that blood do you think?