Geoduck

Pack your Pokédex, your Master Balls,
Your Antidotes,
And luck!
We go afield to catch the famous,
Some say squamous,
Geoduck!
We'll knock his health points down, and throw the ball,
Soon he will be
My pawn.
With Geoduck on our side, Fire-type defenders
Shall be rendered
Dead and gone.

...

I really think you should have told me
That it's not a
Pokémon.

Godwin Slaw

     Hammer's grill sits in a glass on the table. It is sitting in some sort of denture cleaning solution, and little bits of foul-smelling purple glitter are being carried to the surface of the fluid by the effervescent bubbles. Hammer's grill is an awful thing.
     Anvil resolves to pitch the whole thing, glass and all, into the trash as soon as Hammer's back is turned.

ANVIL: Hey... what's that, Hammer?

     Anvil points at something in the corner of the room.  Hammer turns to look, but looks back in time to catch Anvil throwing the grill in the trash.  Hammer is indignant.

HAMMER: Dammit, Anvil.  What the hell?  That was my best grill, dude.

A: Sorry, Hammer.  That thing was stinking up the whole room.  All those bubbles in that denture cleaner... rubbing all along the... whatever it is that your grill was made of... absorbing its foul essence through contact, only to burst to the surface and release noxious vapors into the atmosphere...

     Anvil spends a few quality seconds trying to think about it without vomiting.  The air in the room now smells like a profane mixture of Pine-Sol and fried onions, with a hint of both boiled broccoli and skunk.

A: Man, that thing is eating a hole in the trash bag.  Seriously, can't you buy a grill that isn't imported from Hell?  That thing is eldritch.  That grill is a perfect example of why humanity cannot be allowed to live.  It's like an Aesop's fable, some Brothers Grimm shit.

     Anvil warms visibly to his insult, leaning forward and beginning to gesticulate.

A: The start of the story, the start of the whole hideous mess, is that you are warned not to mess with powers beyond your comprehension by an elderly witch.  Naturally, your tragic flaw is hubris, so you immediately invent this fucking grill.  To build it, you willfully use parts that were scattered to the four corners of the world by the gods to prevent exactly this occurrence.  Yada yada, hero's journey, the grill is cast into Mount Doom, and the moral of the story is, fuck you and your grill too.

     Hammer just sort of stares at Anvil.  Eyes slightly unfocused, eyebrows slightly raised.

H: What?

A: I, uh, sorry.  Yeah, that was a little much.  Look, I'll buy you some rhinestones later and we can glue a set of dentures to 'em.

H: Yeah!  We'll put the rhinestones in a plastic bag, cover the dentures in rubber cement, and drop 'em in.

A: It's like Shake 'n Bake - and I helped!

H: OK, Anvil.  I think we're getting way off topic.  Didn't we have something new and internet-related to discuss?  Ah, yes, here I have my notes: "Discuss Godwin's Law and its use on the internet." Who wrote these notes, Anvil?  This isn't my handwriting.  Why do I have notes telling me what to do?

A: Ahhh, yes, the topic.  Godwin's Law.  What is Godwin's Law?  Godwin's Law is a cute little statement formulated by some guy I don't remember the name of, that states "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1."

H: Anvil, if I didn't write this, and I've never seen this piece of paper before, why did I look in my pocket for it expecting it to be there?  Anvil... why do I have notes telling me... to have a discussion with you?  What the hell is going on?  Is any of this even real??

A: So the gimmick is, someone's going to compare something to Hitler in an argument on the internet.  The joke is that it will always happen, given a discussion of infinite length.  OK.  That's fine.  It's both trite and pointless to point it out habitually, but it's fine.  It's probably true.  However, what is really bad is what it's turned into on the internet.

H: Anvil!  Seriously, man!  I'm freaking out!  Why is this...

     Hammer trails off.  He crumples in a heap on the floor, and Anvil continues, tossing the needle in the trash can.

A: Godwin's Law has been transformed.  Its original intent was a gentle, but general, reminder not to cavalierly compare trivial unpleasantness to the Holocaust.  Now, on the internet, basement-dwelling nerds treat it as an argument finisher.  Anyone who mentions Hitler or Nazis immediately has someone respond "GODWINSLAW!  You lose argument!"
     When did this come about?  Who thought this was a good idea?
     Godwin's Law was originally kind of a remark about bad argument.  It reminds people that the Holocaust is a really major thing, and comparing little things to it is probably a bad idea.  It's a really bad idea for the additional reason that doing it is inflammatory; your opponent in a debate is probably not going to respond favorably to you comparing something (that he's probably defending) to Adolf Hitler.
     But now, Godwin's Law is being misused, and in fact furthers bad argument.  Now, anyone who makes a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler in any way - justified or not - is dogpiled by the kind of smug internet nerds that we all know and lov... uh... that we all know.
      "You've heard of a little thing called Godwin's Law, right?" "GODWIN MUCH?" and other extremely clever variants of this.
     The problem is, now people on the internet can use this to avoid reading or responding to an argument posited by the other person, because that person happened to break a completely arbitrary internet rule when making an assertion.  As I said, it furthers bad argument.
     Moreover, it's still not OK to argue ad hominem just because you've slapped a cute name like "Godwin's Law" on it.  You're not really making an assertion when you misuse Godwin's Law in this way, and you haven't made a point.  You are using a meme to argue.

H: This makes you an idiot.

     Hammer, unnoticed by Anvil, has awakened.  He chimes in suddenly to bark this sentence with venom.

H: Using an internet meme to prove a point is a stupid action.  And not thinking about things before you respond to them does a disservice to everyone involved.  I know it's just arguing on the internet, but wouldn't it be nice to at least pretend everyone's maybe out to earnestly exchange views?  I have a proposal.

A: By all means, expound, Hammer.  Did you enjoy your nap?

H: When Hitler or Nazis are mentioned in any way in a debate, Godwin's Law is invoked, and the target is said to lose the debate.  How about this.  This is an open suggestion to anyone and everyone.  I propose Godwin Slaw.  It operates very simply.

Godwin Slaw: The first person who mentions Godwin's Law in any way has lost all credibility because invoking it is not an argument!

     How's that?  The goal is not to have another quick way to falsely win arguments - the goal is to stop the memetic misuse of Godwin's Law in the same way as Godwin's Law successfully stopped the rampant misuse of unwarranted comparisons to Hitler.  It did its job, now let's kill it, because the cure has become the disease.

A: [REDACTED], incidentally, has no interest in trying to take credit for this.  We just think that this modern formulation of Godwin's Law is complete shit, and we are trying to counteract it.

H: We're against areas of low information content in discourse, especially if those areas spread memetically.

A: We propose, in the spirit of solely furthering the message, that when Godwin Slaw is invoked, it is invoked necessarily not with that name, but with a name of one's own choosing if one wishes.  Preferably alliterative.  I'd call it Anvil's Antipode, for example.  Look, call it whatever you want, the name isn't important.  But this ad hominem Godwin's Law shit has gotta stop.

H: Q. E. D., you fucking goons.

Rap Game

Hammer: It's H to tha AMMER and I'm all in yo grill!
Spittin' lyrical winnin' with a SICKENIN' skill!
Got my spinnaz and my fo-pound,
homies, forties, shorties on the town,
If lyrics is a car, got a LEARNER'S PERMIT to kill!

Anvil: ... Look, Hammer, I love this "gangsta deconstruction" thing you've been doing for the past few weeks.  Really I do.  It's like practice for Halloween.  You dress up as whatever the fuck that is, and I go as the guy who tries not to kill you.

Hammer adjusts his two crooked baseball caps, listening.  His grill, due to insufficient mouth space, says "HAMME" when he smiles, and glistens with things like cheap imported rhinestones and lost sequins from hooker dresses.  Hammer's grill is decorated with the kind of shiny objects that get magpies bullied by other magpies.  

Hammer manages an expression of magnificent, thoroughly street disdain as Anvil continues. 

A: But seriously, Hammer. "If lyrics is a car, got a LEARNER'S PERMIT to kill?"

H: Yo, word.  Ya heard.

A: No, seriously.  Think about what you're saying.  OK, I get it.  You're not saying license to kill.  You're saying learner's permit.

H: I'm just comin' up, Anvil.  I'm not yet an O. G.  I only have a learner's permit to kill.  You mad?

A: Right, OK.  A learner's permit to kill.  But what does that have to do with lyrics being a car?

H: Dammit, sometimes you is so mothafuckin' obtuse, dog.  Obviously you need at least a learner's permit to drive a car legally.  You gotta admit, that shit is cogent.

Hammer folds his arms and nods sagely, confident he has won.  He even throws a little improvised gang sign, which looks suspiciously like a butterfly shadow puppet.

Anvil does not strangle Hammer, which is a win of sorts, albeit largely one on Anvil's part against his own instincts. 

A: Listen.  I get it.  A learner's permit.  For a car.  But does that mean you ... drive... murder?  Or that you're just in training to kill lyrics?  Is this manslaughter, of the lyrical vehicular variety?  Are you saying that you can only drive rap lyrics when you are supervised?

H: Look, it rhymed, dog.  It rhymed.  Why you gotta hate?  And back the fuck up off me, son!

Hammer, Anvil realizes, has a valid point; with every rhetorical question he has leaned closer and closer to Hammer's begrilled visage.  He relaxes, but he has a disgusted look.

A: Hammer... that grill of yours stinks, man.

H: I know!  I don't know how to take it out!

ENDGAME, Inc.: Shooting

::holy shit do you expect me to read all this

     June 23.  It was a sunny day, which felt inappropriate.  June 23 was a rainy day, as far as Jim Houston was concerned, no matter what the sun and the clouds said.

     Remembering the same sort of sunny day, years ago, he lifted the freshly poured shot glass on the corner of his hardwood desk.  His office was fine, decked out to his preference; hardwood this and burnished brass that.  Very well-kept.  He'd gotten quite good at keeping his home shipshape, over the years.  After all, he'd had plenty of time to learn the little cleaning and tidying rituals since...

     Since he'd retired.

     His hand shook suddenly.  He jerked his hand toward his mouth and downed the shot of whisky in a single hasty movement, a marionette with a jittery puppeteer.  He winced briefly and set the shot glass down again.

     It was all part of the ritual.

     He spun the old globe on his desk, slowly, lazily letting his finger trace over the Pacific, before stopping the globe by pressing his fingertip against North America.  Jim had crushed Iowa with his carelessness.  

     He left his finger there a long moment, lost in a bit of reverie.  Iowa and its corn fields, its fields of soy.  June 23, the sun in a field... He dropped his hand into his lap, then fidgeted idly.  The large desk calendar under his elbow was completely unmarked for any day of the month.  Retirement, he mused, had a way of doing that to a man's calendar.

     Jim Houston sighed heavily.  He pulled the handle, tarnished but clean, and the desk drawer slid smoothly open with a sound like a little roll of thunder.  In spite of himself, he smiled at this.  His smile shocked him even as he felt it appear on his face; it seemed quite untimely.

     He reached in and withdrew the old M1911 from the drawer, closing the drawer with the same sound.  He examined the pistol meditatively, rubbing his fingers over the textured grip and testing the hammer with his thumb.  The ritual.  He knew it was loaded, and he knew the safety was off.  There was nobody in the house who could turn this weapon into a danger to themselves, or to him, so he kept it ready to fire for the sake of simple expediency.
     June 23.  A rainy fucking day.
     Jim heard a rustling from the bushes outside, through his open window.  He wished he'd had another drink, but there was no time now.  He aimed the pistol and pulled the trigger.
     All part of the ritual.

     -----

     [six days after the shooting]

     Jim Houston was in a small gray room that was locked from the outside and lit with an incandescent bulb housed in a cone-shaped metal fixture overhead.  The sign on the outside of the door said "INTERROGATION" in block letters, and over the word was a one-way mirror so the interrogations could be watched from outside.  Jim was dressed in black-and-white stripes, seated at a table across from a squat, cyclopean alien with doughy grayish skin and a single terrifying red eye on a pseudopod instead of a face.  Jim took a deep, slow breath, and stared into the Doc's eye.
     "It's been a long time, James." the Doc began.  As the Doc did not ever speak audibly, it communicated this to the human by simply transmitting the words that it wished Jim to hear, into the part of Jim's brain that understood language.  The Doc also relayed its transmission to the two jailers watching with interest, invisibly, from the other side of the one-way mirror in the door of the interrogation room.  They were not aware of this, however; the alien was quite circumspect with its cortical tampering.  The guards heard the words and thought that the alien was just talking.
     Jim sighed.  His hands were clasped together.  He fidgeted repetitively with his thumbs.  He nodded. "Yeah, Doc... it's been more than eleven years since I retired from ENDGAME."
     "You know, we do miss you, those of us who are still there from your time.  You were a star player."
     "I miss you too!  You know those were some of the best years of my life.  Working with the company, doing good deeds..."
     The Doc conveyed a bit of amusement as it responded. "And bringing in good cash for doing them."
     Jim, in spite of himself, smiled.  Yes, he'd had some good years with the company.  And ENDGAME was still taking care of him now.  He guessed that was why his old friend, and boss, had pulled the strings to get in here to see him.
     "So." the Doc began, more soberly. "You shot someone at random outside your home.  A passerby." Its red eye looked at the man across the table, motionless.  Specks of yellowish matter floated in the gel of its eyeball. "Is there something you'd like to explain to me, James?  Because we'd very much like to help you."
     Jim shook.  His face fell, then a moment later he fell, his face landing in his hands as he crumpled against the table.  He sobbed.
     "I know, Jim.  I know you haven't really faced it.  How could you do this?  I know you well, James." the Doc said.  The Doc meant this very strongly.  A mind-reader's friend is a very well-known friend, even if the mind-reader's ethics forbid casual forays into the minds of others, as the Doc's personal moral code did.  The Doc picked up plenty of things nonetheless. "You are no random killer. Whatever stress you're under, I think we're speaking of serious mitigating circumstances.  And I think we can help you.  But I need to understand.  Will you let me learn the truth?"
     The Doc was asking Jim to submit to its mind probe.  Not a probe involving discomfort of any kind, but a probe that would immediately illuminate Jim's entire mental state with regard to the shooting, as well as anything related.  No, it was not a discomforting mental probe, but it was certainly an intrusive and invasive one, even if consented to.  Jim had seen it done more than once by the alien across the table during his years with the company.
     Jim's head came up off his hands.  He sat up in the chair and stared at the Doc levelly. "I'm sorry, Doc, but no.  No, no, I'm not letting you inside my head, not like that.  Not that way." He stared at his hands. "I know you're trying to help me, Doc.  I'm sorry."
     The Doc was not an unethical telepath.  Its ethics were strict because its power in the minds of others was great; greater than it could ever safely let any person learn.  It would not pry into the mind of its old friend, even though the sudden revelation of every last relevant fact in Jim's thoughts would almost certainly tell it what it needed to know to bargain effectively for Jim's freedom.
     However, while it was not an unethical telepath, it had once been a very good friend of James Houston.  They shared a bond of friendship still.  And a telepath as strong as the Doc did indeed pick up a thing or two from a friend.  The Doc picked up a couple tidbits, prominent fragments standing out in Jim's consciousness.  Those fragments were:

     Cecilia.

     and a feeling of empty repetition, a shapeless feeling, like a human hamster in an unstopping and uncaring wheel, running endlessly for years with no sleep and no chance of release and not even a person to watch over him, the worst part, not even a person's help but simply the presence of another to witness the quiet fact of his existence, to be close

     Cecilia.

     The Doc stood up, as nearly as it could do so given its lack of proper legs.  It moved away from the table where its old friend sat.  Jim sat in stripes and salt-and-pepper beard, looking very old as he stared at the Doc wearily.  He had no idea that the Doc had learned anything in those few moments, and simply continued, "You understand, don't you?  This is..." he choked up, recovered. "You know.  It's too personal, Doc.  I'm sorry." Jim stood and nodded, slowly and respectfully, to the Doc, as the alien had no hands to shake.
     "Thanks for coming by."

     -----

     [41 years before the shooting]

     Jim leaned forward in his chair.  He nodded, smiling thinly. "Yes, I'm really looking forward to it.  I feel I've got something great that'll be a true asset to ENDGAME."
     His interviewer, Molly, smiled back at him politely.  However, she was not really listening.  Rather, she was examining him and his behavior very closely.  Something didn't seem right.  It was obvious that he was excited about working for the company, and he clearly believed he had some kind of superhuman ability that would benefit ENDGAME, as he'd indicated on the application, but he appeared outwardly to be a completely normal, reasonably fit man in perhaps his late 40s.  That wasn't what caught Molly's attention, however; lots of the company's super operatives appeared to be completely human to a casual inspection.  What caught her attention was Jim Houston's manner.
     His eyes, while animated, would drift off dejectedly from time to time. His mouth would slacken when he wasn't speaking about the opportunity ENDGAME was giving him, would fail him as he mustered a smile.  There was something about the way he'd occasionally sigh quietly, but long, before beginning a new sentence.  Yes, underneath a veneer of enthusiasm, she was sure she saw a profound sadness, and an old one.  A sadness so old and deep that it was ingrained in him, like grease on a cast-iron skillet.  Baked-on melancholy.
     He was wearing a wedding ring, but had identified as unmarried on the application.  It struck her suddenly, but leaving her no doubt that it was true: His wife had died, and he had never recovered.
     She realized she was just staring at him when she noticed that he was looking at her blankly, waiting for a response.  She opened her mouth, closed it, and pushed her glasses up on her nose.  She smiled awkwardly. "James - can I ask you something?  It looks like we're missing some data from when we processed your application.  How old are you?"
     "Well, Molly, that is a great question." he said, giving that smile again, tinged with sadness. "I left it blank because the application system called my answer invalid.   I'm two hundred eighty-seven years old.  And please...
     "I'd prefer to be called Jim."

     -----

     [61 years before the shooting]

     "Oh, James, it's such a beautiful day!" Cecilia beamed, her arms around his right arm.  She was leaning against him from the passenger seat.  Jim took his eyes off the scenery for a moment and looked at her, smiling back.  Her cheer was always infectious. "I'm so happy."
     "Me too, Cee.  I haven't been this happy in..." he trailed off as he looked into her eyes. "Years."
     A couple hundred years.
     He leaned over and kissed her quickly, then looked back at the road, steering with his left hand.  His wedding ring glinted in the sun.  Impulsively, he looked back at her, and he grinned again. "You know, Cee... I think we should stay married." She laughed and struck his arm with her fists, and he pretended she was protesting as he went on, mock-seriously.  He watched out in front of the car as he spoke, nodding earnestly. "No, no, now, I know what you're thinking.  I know we were planning on having a messy, heart-wrenching divorce."
     "I was looking forward to a bitter, drawn-out back-and-forth over who got to keep the big screen!" she interrupted.  He turned to her and she was looking back, her blue-gray eyes wide, seemingly completely serious.  He just laughed.
     "But really.  You're beautiful, you make me laugh... I'm the happiest I've ever been in my life... let's just... stay together." He gave the road a look as he drove, then turned back to her.
     Her smile softened as she looked back at him. "Yeah, James." she said.  She shook her hair down, dirty blonde in big, lazy curls spilling onto her shoulders, and tightened her arms around his arm as she pulled herself close. She pressed her cheek against his sleeve as she spoke, trailing off. "We'll see how it goes for a few decades before we make any rash decisions..." Cecilia seemed at peace.  She sighed very softly.
     Jim looked down at her, nestled against him.  He took a moment to enjoy the day.  Windows down, warm breeze.  Sunny everywhere.  Sunday drive down a nearly deserted county road, endless field of sun-baked wheat on the right and a never-ending line of cool trees on the left.  The shine of Cee's hair in the light matched the field, and all was perfect.
     He drove in silence for a time, as his wife had clearly fallen asleep on his arm.  She snored suddenly, then jumped without opening her eyes as though startled by the noise.  She relaxed again; Jim knew from experience she'd slept through it completely.
     Jim drove on.

     -----

     [41 years before the shooting]

     "Have you got a knife handy?" Jim asked.  Molly raised her eyebrows.  She picked up her handbag, rummaged in it for a moment.  She withdrew a small knockoff Swiss army knife, cheap and almost never-used, but with its plastic body an attractive iridescent blue--the only reason she'd bought it in the first place.  She ran her fingers over the corkscrew, the nail file, and the weird little plastic toothpick before using her fingernail to extend the small blade.  She handed the pocketknife to him, handle first.
     "Thanks," he said.  He looked at the small contraption in his hand for a moment, then closed the blade attachment, opening instead the nail file. "You don't use this part, do you?" he asked.
     "No, I get my nails done at a place."
     "Good." Jim said, then he began rubbing the little nail file back and forth against his forearm, pressing hard.  His fingers were tight around the plastic as he scraped the nail file against his skin as fast as he could.  The air filled with a strange gritty noise, like a penny being dragged over concrete.  He pressed harder with the file, and though it pressed into his skin deeply, the surface of his arm was completely unmarred by the friction.
     After a few moments he stopped, blew on the file, and handed it to her.  The surface of the file was worn nearly smooth where it had rubbed against his skin. "I didn't want to ruin your knife," he said almost apologetically, "but I could tell that you don't use the file." He rubbed tiny metal fragments off his arm with his other hand, looking at her calmly.
     She looked at the file for a long moment, then closed it and opened the knife attachment again, carefully, with her fingernail. "Jim," she said, eyebrows raised. "These pocketknives... are cheap.  I'll have ENDGAME buy me a new one.  OK?" She gave it back to him firmly, again holding it by the blade.
    He nodded, looked down at the shiny blade, then back at his interviewer.  He slowly raised the pocketknife toward his face, pointing the blade at his left eyeball.  Molly watched his eye, dark brown, looking unflinchingly at the blade two inches away.  He blinked.
     He stabbed the little blade into his eyeball with all his might.  A very strange noise resulted: a sort of metallic crunch.  His interviewer recoiled and screamed inarticulately, rising half out of her chair as her arms came up to cover her face, an instinct she simply couldn't ignore.  Jim waited until she sat down again and composed herself before handing the blade back to her.
     The blade was covered in tears from Jim's eye, bent diagonally, and covered in rough scratches where it had ground against the surface of the eyeball.  Jim blinked a few times, but his eyes were both completely intact.
     "I can't be hurt.  I don't feel physical pain." he said after a moment.  He sounded resigned. "I don't get sick.  I can't even be poisoned." He shook his head slowly. "It seems that I'm in this life for the long haul." He gave Molly a brittle smile. "I don't really have any combat skills.  I've never even fired a gun.  But I'm sure I can help your company out somehow."
     "Yes, Jim." Molly said, her formality recovered completely as she stood.  She extended a hand.  Jim stood too, and shook it. "Yes, indeed.  We'll be in touch."

-----

     [34 years before the shooting]

     Jim Houston, longtime ENDGAME operative, codename Jim Steel, shook hands in a shady bar with a shady man, and they both took a stool.  Bearded and long-haired, with craggy tanned skin, the guy looked like he'd seen more years in a punishing world than Jim had.  The man, Jim had been told, went only by the alias "Lotto."
     "Heard a lot about you," the man said tersely. "Doing dirty work for the ring.  Hustling, making it up the chain.  Lot of guys upstairs are impressed with you, Fred." Jim had given them a false name and identification, supplied by ENDGAME, and had otherwise been left to his own devices.
     Jim nodded. "Thanks, sir.  Yes, I'm just trying to make my way, you know?  After my wife died, not much use taking the straight and narrow.  Might as well take the cash instead." He smiled grimly.  Lotto turned away, downed a shot off the bar, wiped his mouth, and turned back to Jim.
     "Yeah, Fred, you got lotsa promise.  But here's what I don't get.  You'll rob a place.  Hold up a cashier at gunpoint.  Or hold a kid for ransom.  You'll break in, to a fucking police station, and destroy records and evidence to get our guys off, and nobody sees ya, and the cops got shit!  More than once!  You got stones the size of a truck, Fred!" He laughed, braying, and slapped Jim on the back as though they'd known each other for years.
     Lotto's breath was foul as he leaned close.  A stink of liquor, cigarettes and general vice.  He went on, the voice low now, the eyes questioning. "But... you won't kill?  You won't kill.  You won't kill a rival drug dealer selling to high school kids.  You won't kill the scum of the earth.  You won't kill cops, junkies, nobody.  Listen, Fred.  Ol' Lotto's telling you this as a friend."
     Jim found himself doubting that assertion.
     "You're building a glass ceiling for yourself.  You wanna go up in this business?  You gotta do whatever it is... that you're told to do."
     Lotto reached into his old leather jacket, withdrew a small pistol, and set it on the bartop with a quiet wooden thud.  The bartender, behind the counter, looked at the scene with burly disinterest with his one good eye.  The other was covered by a black eyepatch.  It was very much that kind of bar.
     "Things upstairs are kind of coming to a head about you, Freddy.  They wanna know they can count on you.  They're asking me and my associates, are you in or out?"
     Oh, no.  This was supposed to be a big drug deal.  What was happening?  Jim maintained his calm, but he could tell things had taken a turn for the unplanned, and for the worst.
     Lotto pushed the gun toward Jim rudely. "Take it." he snapped, in a tone that permitted Jim no option but to take it indeed.  Lotto's face cracked into a sudden, unpleasant smile. "Now, Jim."
     Jim?
     Lotto's smile turned nastier still. "Yeah.  That's right.  Jim." He dragged the name out maliciously, enjoying Jim's sudden look of fear. "Yup, Jim Steel.  ENDGAME.  You guys contracted to the Feds?" His face contorted in rage. "Do you think I am a fucking idiot?" he screamed, standing up and shoving over his barstool.  All the shady men in the bar were standing as well, having produced either knives or handguns.  They stood silently, watching the scene.  The bartender walked slowly around the bar and stood close by, hands folded over his belly.
     "Bring him out, boys!" Lotto shouted.  From the back room, two men emerged holding a struggling boy by the arms.  He could not have been more than eight years old, and looked terrified. "Now, Jim," Lotto continued, his voice threatening, loud in the close air of the bar. "You got two options here.  You shoot the kid, we let you walk.  That's right.  You walk right outta here alive.  But!"
     "We make sure it gets out that you're ENDGAME.  And all these fine witnesses here--" he gestured around at the armed criminals-- "attest to the fact that you used, deplorably, I might add--" he sneered-- "some young kid off the street as a human shield!  To protect your worthless ass after you blew the op!  So you live.  You live in infamy, maybe in prison.  And ENDGAME goes under, because word gets out that they hire psycho chickenshits!  ...Who would let a kid take a bullet for 'em."
     He lowered his voice menacingly.  The men with weapons moved closer. "Or... you refuse.  You refuse like a cunt.  To shoot this kid to save your hide." He walked over to the captive boy and smacked him in the side of the head with the butt of another pistol.
     "So we shoot the kid, and gladly.  Then we overpower you, and easily.  And we put our guns away and tie you up and torture you to death with knives.  And it takes three days.  We close the bar." Lotto walked back over to Jim, his eyes narrowed.  Jim just watched the criminal's face, trying to come up with a plan, saying nothing.
     "We close the bar for three days. 'Renovations.'" he smirked. "And we give you water, keep you goin'.  We'll torture your ass in shifts.  And by the end we'll have little piles of different parts of your skin in little red, reeking corners of the room." The captive boy howled in terror, and someone clapped a hand over his mouth. "And your fondest wish will be a bullet in your brain.  Jim Steel.  You traitorous piece of shit.  ENDGAME." Lotto spat on the already-dirty floor of the bar. "What's your super power?  You Spider-Man?  Your pussy webs aren't gonna save you, Jim Steel.  And I don't care how strong you are.  There's eight of us and one of you.
     "So what's it gonna be?  You gonna save yourself?  Asshole.  You gonna save yourself and shoot this kid... or are we gonna skin you alive?"
     Jim hesitantly picked the pistol up off the bar.  Lotto grinned, enjoying this as only a true misanthropist could, and stood out of the way so Jim could get a clear shot at the kid. "Yeah, good man.  Good man.  You ain't as stupid as you look.  Save your skin."
     But the bartender with the eyepatch was not fooled.
     As Jim stood and raised the gun, he pivoted and raised his arms, leveling it at Lotto's greasy head.  Just as swiftly, the bartender stepped up behind Jim, grabbing him with an arm around the chest and viciously stabbing him below the ribs with a serrated knife.  He had been ready for this.  The possibility had occurred to him that Jim might make an exception here to his refusal to kill the scum of the earth.  The bartender expected that he would simply twist the knife a quarter-turn in Jim's back.  Perhaps a half-turn, if this Jim Steel character decided to get squirrelly.  Following this knife-twisting, the man with the eyepatch had confidence that the torture would proceed as planned.
     What could not have been predicted by the man with the knife, of course, was what actually happened.  What happened was that the knife, instead of going in as it had done to perhaps a baker's dozen other kidneys, made a scraping-metal grinding noise and came back with the tip bent.  The bartender brought it up to his face and stared, agog.
     During the moment where everyone was stunned, Jim struck.  He launched himself bodily against one of the men holding the boy, and pulled the child clear of his other captor's arms.  Lifting the boy up against his chest, and enfolding him in his arms, Jim turned and simply ran through the door of the bar, turning slightly to strike it with his shoulder.  It burst into wooden fragments.
     Several of the men found their wits quickly, and their bullets bounced off him and took chips out of the floor.  The man Jim had knocked over with the tackle, however, took a long time to get up.  It was discovered later that he had sustained several cracked ribs when Jim Steel had landed on him.

     The captive boy, an orphan named Logan, had been abducted off the street earlier that night by drug ring thugs wearing ski masks, to use as a pawn in the confrontation with the undercover agent.  Thanks to Jim's actions, Logan lived, and soon enough was placed with foster parents.
     Jim returned to ENDGAME with his report, a blown op and his undercover time seemingly gone to naught. He learned, however, that his meeting at the bar with Lotto was more portentous than he'd understood at the time.  The bartender who had tried to stab him was actually the bar's owner, and a middle-management thug in the drug ring.
     He'd been captured because he had rashly opted to attempt to chase Jim and Logan, and was pulled over almost immediately for speeding on his motorcycle, which had five ounces of very illegal cocaine--and a tiny glass vial full of a gray powder, the even more illegal Eldust--stashed in a compartment under the seat.  They call this, in law enforcement, a lucky break.  At present, he was telling lots of stories, and listing lots of names, to the police.
     The undercover operation was deemed a success.  One of many successes, for the unkillable Jim Steel.  At times, he felt almost fulfilled in his position at ENDGAME.  For days at a time, Jim could almost forget that evening of June 23, all those years ago.

     -----

     [61 years before the shooting]

     "Wake up, Cee."
     Jim shook Cecilia's shoulder gently.  She made a displeased noise and leaned into his arm a little more, not opening her eyes.  He sighed, shook his head, and reluctantly shook her again. "This is all very endearing, Cee, but I gotta get out here and get gas."
      She opened her eyes and looked up at him.  She blinked a few times, then smiled radiantly as she awoke fully and realized who she was looking at. "Oh good.  It wasn't a dream!" she said.  The corner of Jim's mouth turned up.
     "You're real sweet, babe.  You know?" He kissed her.  He pulled away, but she kissed him instead.  She put her hands on his chest.
     "Yes, I know.  It's why you love me.  Go get gas."
     Duly dismissed, he got out of the car and pumped some gas into the tank.  The sun was setting, but it was a beautiful evening.  Perfect for visiting the drive-in once it got a little darker.  As the pump made its whooshing noise, Jim contemplated an upcoming evening of making out in the car with Cecilia and occasionally glancing at the movie screen.  He couldn't imagine a better night out.
     He went inside the little gas station and paid the girl at the register. "Pump three," he said pointlessly.  Of course it was, since his was the only car and it was obvious which pump he had parked next to, but he said it nonetheless.  She handed him his change and said good night.
     He walked back out to the car and got inside.  When he started the car, someone spoke to him. "Hey, pal." There was a hunched man in a dirty greenish T-shirt standing next to the car, looking in the window.  The man drew a gun and pointed it inside, gesturing with it erratically, and generally giving every appearance of being a desperate drug addict near death.
     "Why don't ya just gimme your cash, now, pal, and I can put this thing away, alright?  Alright pal?  Gimme the money."
     It had been many years now since Jim Houston had been afraid of a gun. "Relax, babe." he said tersely to Cecilia, never taking his eyes off the gun that was waving around in his car.  Jim was not afraid of a gun for himself, but the woman he loved most in the world was sitting in the seat next to him, all too vulnerable to bullets.
     "Hey, buddy." he said softly, looking up into the crazed eyes of, yes, definitely a desperate drug addict. "You really wanna do this here?  Come on, brother.  I'll give you five bucks and you can get some chow, cool down.  Alright?  I'm reaching into my pocket.  Getting five bucks.  See?  's yours, man, take it." He proffered the bill between his thumb and forefinger, dangling his hand out the window. "I'm not upset that you threatened my life.  But you have got to put that gun away, and my wife and I have got to go now.  So take this money, get a cheeseburger, and have a nice life.  Sounds good?"
     The addict reached out with his free hand, which wobbled a bit back and forth before snatching the bill from Jim's fingers. "Yeah... thanks.  Uh, thanks." He wandered off aimlessly for a minute, looking at the gun, then at the five dollars, his gaze alternating between his hands as he shambled unsteadily.  Jim and Cecilia both watched him go.
     "Great." Jim said, his mood darkened.  He pushed the button and rolled up the window.
     "That was pretty good, honey." Cecilia said, eyebrows raised. "You talked him down like a professional." She smiled, obviously flooded with relief from tension.  She inhaled, then exhaled slowly.  Her breath shook. "Let's just get to the drive-in.  That could've been a lot worse."
     "Yeah, babe." Jim went to start the car.
     Abruptly, the driver's side window broke, scattering bits of glass all over him.  Cecilia covered her face with her arms and recoiled.  What had broken the window?  Jim looked to his left and saw nobody out the window, but an instant later the junkie just appeared, already screaming in insane rage.
     Eldust.  Why, why, why couldn't it just be meth?  Jim avoided looking into the man's eyes.
     "You talked me down motherfucker, like a real professional, alright, motherfucker," he raved, pointing the gun directly at the side of Jim's head now.  Bizarrely, in spite of his insane screaming, the junkie's aim was suddenly steady and accurate.  And how had he nearly quoted what Cecilia had said, even though he couldn't have heard it?  Eldust was scary as hell.
     "Well you know what?  I'm a professional motherfucker, motherfucker!  And what I need is about nine hundred dollars because I need about THIS MUCH Eldust" the junkie snapped his hand in front of his face, miming with his thumb and forefinger a distance of about two inches.  He obviously was indicating that he wanted a little pile of grayish, glittering dust on his dirty coffee table made of glass with a square ashtray on it made of gray plastic, and Jim knew that the addict meant to say that what he wanted was enough Eldust to make a pile precisely that size, which
     Oh dear, Jim thought faintly. Is he talking?
     He was still talking. "Yeah, Jimmy.  Jim Beam.  You mother bastard.  I'm talking.  But I ain't shooting.  I ain't gonna shoot YOU." the junkie spat.  Jim realized that the Eldust addict was leaning into the car, through the broken window, his elbows on the door, and when the junkie spat, he spat directly onto Jim.  This snapped him out of it slightly.  Whatever Eldust did to people, it seemed... contagious.  Jim was looking into the terrible, terrible eyes of a murderous addict on Eldust, and he began for the first time to feel concern for his own safety, in addition to his wife's.
     The addict sneered, distorted, a caricature of a human. "I'm infectious, fuck fuck.  Yeah, worry.  You scurry, for his own safety!  His wife!  His life!"
     Jim suddenly opened his mouth to speak for the first time since the window had broken.  He was spurred on by something he didn't recognize. "Look, Eddie!  You know exactly how much money I have in my pocket!  You can smell it, or whatever!" He was almost shouting, frantic.  He somehow knew the man's name was Eddie, and he knew with the same certainty that something terrible was impending. "You know I don't have nearly that much with me!  So why don't you just take what I've got, and we'll go home, OK?  I'm really sorry about all this, Eddie!  I'm sorry!"
     Why was he so terrified, so desperate suddenly?  He meant every word!  He realized that that thought - "he meant every word" - was not his own thought, but Eddie's thought about him.
     The addict jumped back a few inches, and the crazy light receded from his eyes, to be replaced with a sort of sullen, guilty look. "Yeah pal." He dropped the gun, rubbing his wrist absently.  Eddie put his hands where the window would've been, palms down.  He nodded slowly as he looked into the car at the terrified faces of Jim and Cecilia. "Geeze, pal.  Yeah, I forgive you.  Christ, I'm sorry, you two."
     Eddie straightened up and, with the same guilty look, stepped away from Jim's window and aimed through the windshield at Cecilia.  Of course the gun was in his hand again, suddenly. He spoke loudly so they both could hear. "I'm really sorry about all this, Jim.  I'm sorry."
     Jim saw everything in a heightened, slowed, panicked vision, with razor-sharp edges.  In desperation, he moved as fast as he had ever moved.  He flung one arm in front of his wife's beautiful, precious face - it would not block a bad shot, but it would block a good one.  And it was all the time he had.  He knew.  He knew he had to do something.  So he flung his arm in front of his wife's face, a complete last resort, as the junkie fired through the windshield.
     B-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-N-N-N-G-G-G the sound rang out and the muzzle flashed outside the car, the sound cut itself to pieces and reran all the pieces like being gassed at the dentist
     K-E-C-C-H-K-K-K-S-S-S-H-H brilliant shards of windshield glass, spinning through the air, going absolutely everywhere
     P-W-A-A-A-A-N-G metal off metal, the sound rang out as the bullet crawled up to Jim's forearm, a good shot indeed
     CH-H-H-CH-CH-K.
     NO!  NO!  NO!  NO!  NO!  NO!  NO!  NO!  NO!  NO!
     NO!  NO!  NO!


     Jim had blocked the bullet with his arm, but the bullet had struck his arm with massive force, and... his arm, his goddamned granite steel titanium fucking whatever-it-was arm, had struck the bridge of Cecilia's nose with... equal...
     He looked at her, then he looked away.  She needed a doctor.  That was all he would allow himself to think.  He knew what a doctor would say.  But he would not allow himself to think it.  She needed a doctor.
     As he came to his senses, he saw Eddie, the crazed drug addict, through what would've been the windshield if it hadn't just been shot out.  Jim realized that Eddie was quite objectively the worst person to have ever lived on Earth.
     Eddie was laughing.  He was laughing because he was a stupid junkie and he had just witnessed, in his withdrawal stupor from his ridiculous, incredibly dangerous, deadly, expensive, life-ruining drug, something that he couldn't possibly have predicted.  The woman he shot hadn't died of a bullet, she'd died of her husband's forearm after the forearm deflected the bullet.
     "Crazy world, hey?  Like, wow.  Can you even deflect a bullet with your forearm?" Eddie resumed laughing, gasping for breath. "Wow, pal.  Can you believe that shit?"
     Suddenly, Jim's hand was around his throat.  Eddie stopped laughing, and began screaming and panicking, gesticulating worthlessly with his free hand.  His other hand still held the gun.
     "You... trash... fucker." Jim spat through gritted teeth. "Do you know who she was to me?  Do you know what you did?  DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DID?" He began shaking Eddie back and forth by the neck.
     "Yeah... pal..." Eddie croaked out.  Mystified, Jim released his grip slightly, tilted his head almost in wonder, and just looked at the drug addict in his grasp.  Eddie continued, the red shade slowly leaving his face.  He still had to croak.  "You know... You know that I know.  I could tell.  Like I said, Jim... I'm really sorry about all this."
     Jim nodded, slowly.  Then he slammed the Eldust addict who had murdered his wife into the hood of his car and began to choke the life out of him in earnest.  This would have proceeded to Jim's intended conclusion but for another gunshot.
    The look on Eddie's face was total shock.  His lips moved. "Wha... wha..." he tried to say, but only blood came out.  He slid off the hood, and the gun fell from his fingers to the ground, still smoking.  He had fired in desperation, still not really understanding, it seemed, that bullets could, and would, bounce off his assailant.  With a bloody hole in his chest, Eddie the Eldust addict met his end, bleeding out onto the ground in a parking lot.
     The girl in the gas station ran outside, hair blowing in a sudden breeze.  She held her hair against her chest with her arm, looking at the scene in silent horror.  Jim looked at the body at his feet, then over at the gas station attendant.  She stared back.
     "Walk away." Jim said simply.  He got in the car and drove somewhere in the dark, eventually finding himself back at home.
     He buried his wife at dawn on June 24.

     -----

     [11 years before the shooting]

     ENDGAME operative Jim Steel turned to his left and told his driver to wait in the car.  He turned around in the passenger seat and gave the same instruction to the two well-armed rookies in suits behind him.  This surprised them somewhat, but they were there to carry out Jim's instructions exactly.  Jim did things in strange ways, and nobody argued with him.
     Jim stepped out of the car, set his briefcase on the hood, and opened it.  He put his standard-issue chromed ENDGAME energy pistol into the case, closed the case again, and put the case back in the car.
     He adjusted his tie grimly and walked into the bank.  Several voices screamed immediately, and he turned to his right, where the hostages were being held.
     "Hi folks.  I'm Jim.  I'm with the FBI." Jim opened his jacket briefly to reveal a gleaming metal badge of some type before closing it again. "And this... this, folks, is not going to happen.  Do you get me?"
     He wandered around almost casually in the open, high-ceilinged main room of the bank.  Along the wall, there were a few muted screams as the team of bank robbers threatened their hostages.  Jim ignored all this, clasping his hands behind his back and speaking aloud to the air as though lecturing to a group of inattentive students.
     "Here's what's going to happen, gang.  You're going to throw your guns to me.  No, don't throw them, just slide them along the floor to the center of the room.  All fifteen of you.  Yes, including you four up there." Jim pointed a single accusing finger upward and to his left, without turning around, to the four men in black suits on the upper level that he could not have seen.  The men were behind a one-way mirror meant for surreptitious observation of the bank's main floor.  They were aiming guns down at the FBI man in the gray suit, and did not expect to be pointed at.
     "Once you've thrown your guns to me, I'd like you to release your hostages.  Yes, all of them.  Just let them go peacefully out the door.  Once all hostages are released and accounted for--" his voice rose-- "and I'll know when we have them all-- the building will be swarmed by SWAT, in bulletproof armor from head to toe, and you all will be taken into custody.  Peacefully."
     He stood in the center of the floor, speaking to the rear of the room, ignoring the murmurs of confusion to his right, where all the hostages were, along with most of the robbery crew.  The windows were big, and the ceiling lights were off.  It was a beautiful mid-morning, and the room was well-lit by the sun.  Tiny dust motes danced slowly in sunbeams.  Men with guns got shifty.
     After a few moments of near-silence in the big room, he spoke again. "I know what you're thinking.  You worthless low-life criminal scum." The mutters increased from his right.  He glanced in that direction, and the noise suddenly quieted noticeably. 
     "You're thinking, 'What's in it for me?  Why should I give up the game when I have all the cards?' Well, that's a good question.  You shitheads.  You think you've got the hostages.  That I'm the FBI negotiator hotshot.  I'm gonna try to talk you out of all this, and you're gonna shoot one or more of the twelve perfectly innocent people you are holding on to, maybe shoot me too."
     "Then you're gonna convince one of your innocents to help you open the vault.  And you are gonna make off with about..." Jim pretended to think about it, theatrically putting his hand on his chin. "Roughly two million, eight hundred fifty thousand dollars in U.S. currency."
     There was a startled murmur from the rabble to his right.  Jim's estimate, not being an estimate at all, had startled the criminals with its accuracy.  Out of the corner of his eye, Jim saw one of the captives, clearly a bank teller by her attire, being restrained with a rough arm around the neck after she attempted to utilize the confusion to escape.
     "Am I right so far?" he asked loudly, letting a sort of bored contempt creep into his voice as quiet resumed. "You fucking low-life criminals are all the same.  You think you've got a great operation.  You think you've got a great plan.  Well you know what?  Your plan is a piece of shit, and you all are fucked.  Would you like to know why?"
     Jim ignored the increasing movement in the clumps of concerned people - captives and captors alike - to his right.  Instead, he turned to his left, away from the robbers with automatic weapons, and shouted. "You, third from the left." He paused. "No, my left.  You dumbshit.  Just look down your scope.  Look down your scope at me.  Look very close."
     Jim looked up at the semi-silvered mirror.  Slowly, he opened his jacket again, and with his other hand, simply pointed wordlessly to the gleaming insignia on his chest.
     The man with the scoped rifle looked through the scope, thoroughly unnerved that he'd been called out through a one-way mirror.  He squinted and examined the insignia.  Jim's badge was not an FBI shield at all.  Instead, it was a little circle.  Inside the circle were two lines, one short, one long.  Jim's insignia was a line drawing of a clock, an old analog type, showing a time of 11:55.  ENDGAME.
     They were fucked.
     Down on the main floor, Jim closed his suit jacket again, and adjusted his tie as he turned to the main group of bank robbers and their hostages.
     "Don't be alarmed that you've lost contact with your men behind the one-way mirror, gentlemen.  They're unharmed." he said, putting his hands behind his back.  He saw several criminals rapidly readying their machine guns in a panic, preparing to shoot some hostages.
     "Be alarmed that your fine weaponry is rapidly approaching a temperature of fourteen hundred degrees in your hands."
     There were hoarse screams.  Arms released terrified hostages in horror.  The captives watched, numbed with confusion and fear, too scared yet to even run.  One robber dropped his rifle and hastily kicked it with a steel-toed boot as it began to glow a dull red.  Another threw his machine pistol away in desperation, launching it far away from himself almost like a shot put.  The clatter of dropped hardware was very loud in the previously quiet room.  The air warmed perceptibly.
     In the doorway of the bank, standing in a sunny breeze, a former petty criminal stood.  He was no longer a criminal, opting instead to operate on the other side of the law.  His ENDGAME, Inc. codename was Entropy, and increasing molecular motion in solid objects was a modest fraction of his capabilities.  His arms had been outstretched for the past few moments, but he let them fall to his sides suddenly.  The guns on the floor cooled.
     The psychic in the car-- the driver, codename Indra's Net-- had just informed Entropy that no criminal in the building currently controlled a weapon.  Just as Indra's Net had been informing Jim of the positions and numbers of his adversaries in the blown bank robbery.
     The expected $2,850,000 figure from the bank's vault, however, was good, old-fashioned intel, which Jim had briefed himself on during the drive over.  Not everything had to be fireworks.

     The police that Jim had promised escorted the bank robbers out one by one to book them.  The four men on the balcony were dragged out instead; one of ENDGAME's normal operatives had vented knockout gas into the third floor, acting on Jim's prearranged code phrase, "Am I right so far?"
     Jim made sure the hostages were unhurt.  Everything was fine.  He adjusted his suit jacket and turned to leave, when he heard a scream behind him.  He whipped around to see that one of the few remaining criminals had desperately scooped up a pistol from the floor.  The robber aimed the pistol at his own head, and his hand trembled.  It was this or prison.  Two officers immediately trained their weapons on him and prepared to fire.
     Jim rushed over and simply clamped his thumb over the pistol barrel. "No!  Nobody's dying here today." he said.  To his relief, the gun came away in his hand after a couple of tense moments, and the man was hauled away.

     Later that day, after making his report, Jim walked into the Doc's office unannounced and set his energy pistol and ENDGAME badge on the desk.
     The Doc's red eye focused on Jim intensely. "Why?" it asked simply.
     "I know we had it handled, Doc... but you didn't need me.  You don't need me now.  ENDGAME doesn't need me now." Jim's voice broke suddenly. "I'm old, Doc.  Those four goons on the third floor were set to spray the entire room with gunfire!  What if the gas hadn't worked right?  What if someone had gotten shot before the guns got too hot?  One of those clowns got a gun - and he tried to shoot himself rather than face the judge!"
     "James," the Doc began.
     "No, Doc.  No.  I can't go on here, bulletproof Jim Steel, making sure nobody dies.  Because someday... someday I won't be able to do it.  Something's going to go wrong and someone's going to die because of me.  And... I can't live with it, Doc.
     "I can't do this anymore.  I'm out.  That's it.  I'm out.  Consider me retired."
     He walked out of ENDGAME HQ forever.  His former coworkers saw tears in his eyes, but didn't know why.
     It was later that year on June 23 that Jim Houston, retired ENDGAME operative, started his yearly ritual.

      -----

     [eight days after the shooting]

     Jim Houston again found himself in the room labeled INTERROGATION.  He wondered just how easy it was for the Doc to pull all these strings.  He sighed, and leaned back in the chair slightly, waiting.
     The Doc entered the room with a small plastic bag held in a pseudopod.  The Doc threw the bag on the table, and the pseudopod withdrew, rejoining its main body mass.
     In the bag in front of Jim was a large-caliber handgun round, covered in dried blood.
     "This is the bullet, James," the Doc said unnecessarily. "This is the bullet from your gun that killed someone outside your window."
     The bullet had clearly suffered some sort of impact with something much more resilient than a human body.  It was squashed completely flat on one side, and covered in scratches as though it had been roughly filed.
     "But this bullet bounced off you first."
     Jim just groaned, an almost animal sound of despair.
     "The ritual, James?" The look from Jim across the table was suddenly hostile. "I'm sorry. I had Murph take a look at your gun.  I'm sorry to intrude on your life this way.  I needed to understand.  I needed to know if I could help you."
     The Doc's mental communications conveyed strange emotion - confusion, almost anger. "Every year you shoot yourself in the head on the anniversary of your wife's death?  What are you hoping to accomplish?  Are you just hoping that one year it'll magically work?"
     Jim's stricken look at the Doc said it all.
     The Doc reached out a tentacle and scooped the bullet off the table, withdrawing it into storage somewhere in its putty-like body. "I can't help you, James.  It doesn't matter what reasoning you have for aiming a gun at yourself.  You'll be found guilty of that killing.  A bulletproof man, hundreds of years old, shoots himself knowing that the bullet can't affect him?  And then that bullet hits someone else and they die?"
     Jim looked at the Doc, hands folded on the table.
     "Twenty-five years, James.  It's the deal.  Plead guilty.  Don't let this go to trial.  Don't let them try to find a way to execute you."
     Jim was about to speak, when the Doc went on swiftly. "I have two things for you."
     It produced a small bluish pill, placing it carefully on the table between them.  The capsule glowed very faintly, just enough to be visible, and strange glittering specks moved within the fluid inside.  Jim was reminded, strangely, of the fluid in the Doc's eye, except that this was blue instead of red. "We've had this developed for a long time.  But we have almost never used it.  We call it Hush, James.  It's the antidote."
     Jim began to speak, confused. "The--?"
     "The antidote.  Whatever made you what you are today - whatever it is that makes supers what they are - this counteracts it.  For about forty-eight hours, at this dose.  It's not a poison.  Your body won't reject it.  It'll just work, and you will be, suddenly... human.
     "Now, in your case, James, being over three hundred years old... your heart is well out of warranty.  I suspect that as soon as you begin to digest the substance, your heart will suddenly realize this.  There will be some pain, James, but it will be very brief."
     Jim instantly reached out to take the pill from the table.  It swirled, mysteriously.  Cecilia...
     "I have one other thing for you, James." the Doc communicated, placing the other object on the table, next to where the pill had been.  It was a business card, with the clock logo and the word ENDGAME printed in bold across the top.  Jim's eyes widened.
     "Fuck you, Doc." he said bitterly. "No matter how many criminals we help bring to justice... I can't bring my wife back.  And since you went and pried... you know that, to me, nothing else matters." He raised his hand to his mouth, to drop the pill inside, and his arm stopped.
     He lowered his arm, rotated his wrist.  Finding everything normal, he shook his head, lifted his hand to his mouth again and his arm stopped.  His arm would take the command to only a limited extent, then it would hang in the air uselessly until he lowered it.  He looked away from the pill and into the Doc's glaring red eye.
     "I'm sorry, James.  But you'll hear me out first." The Doc's voice in Jim's mind was suddenly cold and heavy as a glacier.
     "Doc... I know you can probably erase my entire mind from ten miles away." Jim said levelly, pointing at the Doc with his thumb and forefinger, still holding the Hush pill. "But I am not frightened of you.  If you don't release my arm, you are going to have to erase my mind as fast as you can.  Something tells me that you can't do it as fast as I can take you apart."
     "You owe me, James Houston!" Something terrible happened to the Doc's words in Jim's mind.  They echoed, and echoed, strangely like a crow's scream from the sky in a desolate field where he stood alone in his mind, just him and the voice.  Jim recoiled bodily, slamming back into his chair.  Jim, for the first time ever, realized something he supposed he should've known for a long time: The Doc was a great friend, and a powerful friend, but if the Doc was on one side and you were on the other...
     "What... what are you talking about?" Jim asked, his lips dry.  He still held the Hush pill between his fingertips, but his hand had fallen limply to the table.  His limbs were all weak, and would barely work.  The Doc had really blasted him, but it had obviously cost the alien no effort whatsoever. "You got my attention, Doc."
     "The night your wife died, James.  I had Eddie's body taken care of.  I had the blood cleaned up, the evidence removed.  And... I made that woman at the gas station forget." The menace was gone from the Doc's words now, but Jim's eyes opened wide and his still-sluggish limbs tensed up.
     "Doc... Doc..." Jim was a drowning man, trying to catch anything he could hold on to.  Finding nothing. "I didn't even meet you until twenty years later!"
     "I could not permit you to go to prison, James Houston.  I cannot explain to you how I knew what I knew, but yes.  I protected you.  Know that the testimony of the woman at the gas station would have been sufficient to lock you away for a long time.  I needed you sooner than that." The Doc's one eye was suddenly terrifying.  Calm, implacable, utterly alien, ... who knew what that eye could see?  What did the Doc know?
     "But it had to happen this way, James.  It could not have been otherwise.  I could not have changed this.  You must go to prison for this killing, accidental though it was.  You must not go on public trial for your dual crime of being superhuman, and feeling simple human despair."
     "Right now, James, the superhumans ...are the good guys, by and large.  The public loves the works of ENDGAME, Inc.  Right now, that cannot change.  Someday, it will.  But now... I cannot permit it to change."
     Doc reached out and tapped the ENDGAME, Inc. business card on the table.  Jim shook his head slowly, looking at the Doc, tears in his eyes. "Did I ever know you, Doc?" 
     The Doc did not have a face to form expressions, but it somehow flawlessly conveyed sadness. "No, James.  No, you did not." It rose from its squat position next to the table, and moved toward the door.
     "When I leave this room, my control over your limbs will cease.  You will be free to take the gift I've given you at any time, and to die at last.  But know this, James.  It is not life that you hate.  It is not truly despair that you feel.
     "It is rage.  You are thinking... this alien does not know my mind.  Why is this alien talking of rage?  All I wish is to have my long-overdue death, and God willing... finally be with the only woman I have ever loved!"
     The alien turned back toward Jim, and Jim's field of vision seemed to narrow claustrophobically as he concentrated on the Doc's words.  Jim couldn't help but think that in spite of being utterly alien, the Doc had captured his feelings very well.
     "It is Eldust that you hate.  Make no mistake, James.  You feel despair that Eldust killed your wife?  You are right to feel this way.  It killed her, as though it were the crazy gunman pulling the trigger.  It has killed many.  But you would not believe how many deaths that drug will cause in the years ahead."
     Jim realized with sudden crystal clarity that if the Doc were human, it would have been shaking with fury.
     "Eldust will ruin this world, James.  I do not exaggerate.  It will doom us all.  But ENDGAME, Inc. is not on that side.  We are not on the side of those who would destroy this planet.  I say 'we,' James, because... I speak of you and I.  I still need you at the company.  The world still needs you.  To stop this madness!"
     "Don't die because of Eldust.  Your wife already did that.  What I would ask you to do, James... is to take my other gift.  Avenge your wife's death, with me.  What is twenty-five years to you?  In twenty-five years... give me back that pill, the day you come to my office for a job.  The choice is yours."
     The Doc turned back to the door and left the room, the door closing quietly behind it.  Jim stared a long time at the alien's gifts on the table.  The faintly glowing blue pill on the left, the business card on the right.
     At least, Jim thought, I've got a few years to think it over.

State of the Nation

:: what does a fella have to do to get a blog post around here

The State of the Nation, hosted by Hammer and Anvil.

ANVIL: Good morning, Hammer.  My, it's been a long time, hasn't it?
HAMMER: Yes... yes, it has.  It's been strange not having anything to discuss.  But it's OK.  Lots to talk about today.  Right, Anvil?

A: Right!  Now, our reader may observe, shrewdly, that some of these topics have already been covered in conversation by our mysterious author, the neckbeard known only as [REDACTED].  But, if our reader is inclined to complain about this, we'd like to offer a simple remedy.
H: Indeed, Anvil.  Here's the layout.  It starts with "shut the fuck up" and ends with an exclamation point.

A: Indeed, Hammer.  Moreover, [REDACTED] is probably not capable of talking about these subjects with every human being on the planet Earth.  At least, not in a timely fashion.
H: God, you're pompous.

A: That's why we're pals, Hammer; we make a great team.  I'm the brains, and the looks, and you're the mouth.
H: What?

A: Never change, Hammer.
First off, I'd like to address a sort of creeping problem I've observed in my trawlings 'round the Internet.  Have you ever read a discussion forum, Hammer?  A message board?  Anything where people get together and start trying to out-clever each other in text?
H: Sure.  I prefer just vandalizing Wikipedia, but I know what you're talking about.

A: OK.  Well, good.  What I'd like, in order to demonstrate this increasingly worrisome problem, is for you to go to the message board of your choice and look for some kind of creative endeavor.  Or even programming endeavor.  Basically any discussion where people are talking about creating something together.  You've got your authors, or your artists, or whatever.  OK?
H: Sure.  The clowns who are working together on making that huge robot that knits quilts the size of your mom's ass, they're all talking with each other, coordinating their efforts.  Exchanging ideas.

A: That's right!  Isn't it great!  Wait... who's that guy who just popped in?
H: Ahhh, I see him too.  JohnQJackass, 5 posts, joined forum two days ago.  Of course this doesn't just apply to forums, but you see what I'm talking about.

A: He joins the thread, and what does JohnQJackass say with his precious, valued sixth post?  He starts saying "I think when we finish the huge quilt robot we should build an even more giant robot that actually has guns, and then we could use it to kill the police in my town and my dad, god I hate my dad"
H: Indeed.  JohnQJackass is full of great ideas for someone else.  Or, in this case, really awkward ideas that kinda reveal JohnQJackass's deep personal issues, but that's neither here nor there.

A: What would they do without his input!  Note that he says "we" repeatedly, for a project he'd love to steer but has no desire (or ability) to contribute to.  Isn't that an interesting term?  What exactly does "we" mean, here?
H: Hmmm.  Interesting question indeed, Anvil.  It's a tough colloquialism to define.  I'd say it is translated roughly as "Hopefully someone, in a perfect world you, but in any case definitely not me."

A: Yes, that's rather apt, Hammer.  Your mom was clearly under some kind of mistaken impression about you when she was complaining to me last night.
H: What?

A: The point is, you see this guy, JohnQJackass, absolutely anytime any group of people are trying to collaborate on a project of any import at all.  If you think about it, JohnQJackass is being a real selfish jerk.  He attempts to co-opt the camaraderie of the group, by saying "we," saying we should implement this exactly the way I suggest, because we have such a great project, and I am a part of it.  Of us.  Aren't we glad to have me aboard?
H: No, JohnQJackass.  We kinda hate your guts.  It's my hope that anyone who sees this weblog post (Hi, reader!  Lonely out there?) will be inoculated against this subtle form of collaboration-straining.  Now that you've seen it elucidated, it will annoy you.  As it should, for the reasons above mentioned.  JohnQJackass is a prick.  And he's everywhere.
He's gonna use his seventh post to complain that he followed all the directions for building the giant quilt robot and it didn't work because his mom didn't want to buy seventeen tons of reinforced aircraft aluminum.  He's also gonna request that someone redesign it to be built out of used Mountain Dew cans, because we have so many of them handy.

A: So.  Lovely, precious, long-waiting, almost certainly not quite sober reader.  When you meet JohnQJackass or his millions of equally socially inept, childish, and selfish buddies, trying to co-opt projects you like for their own purposes, your duty is first to notice it, then to mock him relentlessly until he disappears.
H: I like "Who's this we? You got a turd in your pocket?" as an opening riposte, but you can call me old-fashioned.

A: Actually, Hammer, I like that.
H: Really?

A: No, of course not.  You're such a goddamn oaf I honestly can't believe it.
H: Shithead. :D

A: Here's one that's a little easier to explain.  Have you noticed how amazing the pizza place down the street is?  Isn't it amazing to go to McDonald's or buy a pair of pants?  It's just goddamn amaaaaazing to walk half a block when it's a nice day.
H: Do you know what amazing means?  If you actually do, you know it's positively amazing that all these people are saying it all the fucking time.

A: All the fucking time?  Surely you don't mean ALL THE FUCKING TIME?
H: Oh my yes, Anvil, I do in fact mean people say "amazing" when they don't really mean it ALL.  THE GODDAMN.  MOTHERFUCKING.  TIME.

A: Here's an idea, world: Quit it.
H: It's a good idea, we should get right the fuck on it.

A: Heh.  Nice one, Hammer.
H: I know!  Wasn't it awesome?

A: Sure was, man!
H: Yup, just ... awesome.

A: ...Wait... "awesome" has... an actual meaning, too... but... I like "awesome." Dammit. Dammit! You kinda ruined my day a little bit, Hammer. Why'd you have to go and SAY that?
H: 'Cause you've been a shithead this whole conversation, Anvil.

A: Ahhh... Well played, well played. You win this round, Hammer. Sorry I was being such a prick.
H: Eh, it's cool.  We're cool, Anvil.  I got your mom my dick for Christmas.

A: What?

3DS Max is hard to use.

This is my new windows desktop. I like it.
Click it for 1680x1050. It's huge.



This took 220 hours to render, or so. I'd click it and view it at youtube.com if I were you; part of the reason it took so long is that it's pretty high-res. Youtube's automatic compression, while pretty good, did things to the edges of the helices that I don't really like. Kind of clobbers the extremely slow-rendering focal blur near the camera, which looks beautiful. I'm still happy with it. Oh, and go all the way: change it from 360p to 480p. Then just kind of stare and let it play.



Thanks K-dot, for reminding me how to embed YouTube videos. Every time I go to do it, I have to figure it out again, and I think you just saved me 15 minutes.

This video is absurdly high-res.  It is just completely pointless to have it at 720p.  It took about 35 hours to render.  It is much less visually interesting than Cloudbusting, which is not something I anticipated.

As a visual experiment, this video is largely a failure - the stills made it look very attractive, but it's just not an interesting animation.  As practice with learning basic functions of Adobe Premiere, it was a success; I think the audio - while simple - is a good match, and a success as well.

More rambling commentary can be had by clicking on these discolored words and clicking "More info" on the right.

Thinkers, Tinkers

::what the hell happened here?

HAMMER: I was daydreaming today.
ANVIL: That's when all the trouble starts. Remember last time, Hammer? Hell, I'm still shocked the CIA bailed us out of jail. I guess they only wanted us for those goddamn unethical tests, though.

H: Yeah. Sometimes, the transmitter that they installed in my head... I can see its light blinking behind my left eyeball, if I look in the mirror in the dark.

A: All the same, Hammer, you brought it on yourself. It's really best for you to avoid having ideas at all costs.

H: I agree. If I ever get any ideas, from now on I'm going to give them back.

A: Good man. Remember: If a light bulb goes on over your head, sell it immediately. Buy yourself a candy bar or something.

What were you daydreaming about, exactly?

H: I was imagining a twisted plot of mine many years in the making coming to fruition, Anvil. You see, certain trusted parties have been sent letters accompanied by instructions to only open these letters when a specific codeword comes by anonymous post. When I begin the chain, at a moment of my sole choosing, it will all start when I send the first letter to the first recipient, containing the first codeword. The recipient will open his letter, and the letter will contain instructions: Send a single card, on which is written a specific word, to the address given.

Anvil leans forward with some interest.

H: You see how it shall go, Anvil. Each recipient shall, in turn, receive instructions to 'trigger' the next recipient in the chain. And on and on. In the end, the final envelope shall be opened, by my extremely large, but extremely dimwitted second cousin. It will contain $100 and a set of instructions to accomplish in exchange for this payment. He lives in this town, as a matter of fact, and I will never disclose his identity to you. Just know, that if a six-foot-four oaf wearing a bad toupee walks up to you out of nowhere and kicks you in the shin, that there is a reason, Anvil.

A: Does he already have the letter?

H: Perhaps he does, Anvil. Perhaps he does not; I fail to see how it is relevant.

A: It's quite relevant, Hammer. You see, I will just carry around $200 at all times. I shall put a special compartment in my shoe for this purpose. This $200 will be used to outbid the offer you have made to your dimwitted second cousin. Surely he would rather take $300 to walk away than kick me and lose the $200 I offer. He is surely not that dimwitted.

H: Well, in that case, I shall simply place $300 in my letter and pre-emptively outbid you. Your flaw, Anvil... if I may speak a bit critically of you, dear Anvil... your flaw is your overconfidence. You thoughtlessly told me how you would outmaneuver me, which enables me to out-outmaneuver you.

A: By all means, Hammer, send off the letter. Enclose $300. But know that I will simply choose to carry around $400.

H: I believe the solution to this inevitable infinite regress is simply to send a completely undisclosed amount to Cletus. You will have a hard time outbidding a number you are not privy to.

A: You will have a hard time making a bid at all, Hammer, if I've stolen your wallet.

Anvil hands over Hammer's wallet. Hammer gapes slightly and puts it in his pocket.

ENDGAME, Inc.: Untitled

The buzzer rang, but when they opened the front door, nobody was there. The sensors had caught nothing, either. It was as if the package had just appeared.

The package sat on the concrete steps leading up to the entrance doorway. Cubical, a little over a foot on each side and wrapped neatly in brown paper, the package had a handwritten white paper card stuck on, one corner under the packing tape. "Work-related," it said, in a fairly elegant cursive. The card flapped in the breeze, tapping sporadically against the side of the box.

ENDGAME had operatives on hand that could smell explosive residues at less than one part per billion. They also had fairly sophisticated computerized hand-held bomb-detecting equipment that would keep even a baseline grunt safe from the most cleverly hidden explosive.

They also had Murph, who happened to be in the lobby, smoking a cigarette under the smoke eater. He knelt down, touched the box for about a quarter of a second, declared (correctly) that it wasn't a bomb, and brought it to the Doc.

"Special delivery, Doc!" he declared, strolling in to the office with no further announcement, and setting the box on the desk. "It's not a bomb, and the card on the side says 'Work-related.' Feels heavy," he added.

"Work-related. We can always use some work," the Doc responded telepathically. Its 'tone' (as much as one can apply the term to a telepathic transmission written straight into someone's neurons) conveyed skepticism.

"Exactly. Shall I open it?" Murph's voice did not in any way conceal his curiosity. "The packaging isn't radiating any danger, but I'd really like to read whatever's inside. It's funny, I don't really have a good feeling about it, even though I know we're not actually at risk." Murph trailed off somewhat, bemused, looking down at the box.

"Hmm. I can see why you are so eager. I, too, love a mystery. Proceed, Murph. And...do it cautiously, if you would?" The Doc communicated this with slight amusement. If Murph didn't detect any danger from the box the package was wrapped in, there was no danger. However, if the objects inside were at all delicate, Murph endangered them with his famous, rather cavalier approach to unwrapping presents.

The Doc's one, fairly terrifying red eye - an almost featureless sac of red gel perched atop a foot-tall grey pseudopod just forward of the Doc's center mass - stared at Murph with interest, and at the mysterious 'gift' he held. In spite of the Doc's appearance, it was in fact often a nice...thing... once you got to know it.

However, it bears mentioning that at the time of this story, not a single being on Earth had ever actually gotten to know the Doc, although some thought that they had, and what they would learn in the process of really getting to know it would almost certainly make them decide to try to kill it. Nonetheless, the Doc regarded a few humans and mutants on Earth as its friends, and one of that small number stood in front of the alien now, trying not to tear open a mysterious box with his bare hands.

Murph restrained himself, however, simply using a rusty multi-tool knife in his pocket to open the tape and pull open the top flaps of the box. After the flaps underneath were open as well, and a wad of the same brown paper packed atop the contents was removed, inside the box was nothing but a large-bore energy pistol, obviously well-used, with the word ENDGAME engraved on the barrel. Murph's eyes opened wide with alarm.

The Doc moved slightly on pseudopodia, pressed a button under the desk, and the door closed behind Murphy. "OK, Murph." the alien thought at its friend. "Sit down, and tell me everything."

The office only had one chair, and it was not on the Doc's side of the desk. If the Doc wanted to sit, it just sat. Where it was. Its body was just that way. Hector Murphy pulled the tan office chair out of the corner and sat in front of the desk, while the Doc watched him with more interest than even Murphy realized. Murph took the gun out of the box carefully, with his fingertips, and exclaimed. "Wow, Doc - I'm not even starting to go and read this, it's just flooding--" he broke off, sitting back, looking down at the firearm, dumbfounded. "They're breaking in..." he began.

It was a sunny day. Clouds patiently rolled by overhead, and the air was still and warm behind the Hammer Industries compound. The scent of trees was close and pleasant.

In the clearing behind the building, six guards had suddenly found themselves punctured and dead. Only one of the guards had seen anything.

This guard had happened to notice a shadowy man, outline slightly indistinct, sneaking through some brush near the trees. The shadowy man was cautiously looking around for surveillance or guards, but did not notice that he was being watched. Occasional attempted break-ins happened all the time, so the guard did not hurry as he leaned casually against the building, out of immediate view, and pulled his walkie-talkie from his belt. He pressed the "Talk" button.

Even though he had attempted to transmit, a high-pitched squeal came from the speaker, its volume causing the speaker to crackle. He yanked the walkie away from his head like it had burned him, and he suddenly, too, found himself dead, bleeding out from his neck as he fell.

The other shadowy man, the one he hadn't seen, had used his mind to disable the radio before using a small but fearsomely sharp blade to disable the guard. The mutant operative, codename Scramble, had been able to get that close to the guard because the guards were not trained a hundredth as well as the men who had come to kill them.

The other man in the black sneaking suit, codenamed Syme, looked around carefully for any further trouble, and saw none. When Scramble raised his hand silently and beckoned, Syme dashed toward the building, careful to stay out of the vision of a camera placed over the door they intended to open. As Syme flattened himself against the wall, Scramble looked up at the camera.

Instantly, its servo malfunctioned. Swinging hard to one direction instead of sweeping back and forth, it began clicking rhythmically as its motion controller processed a stream of invalid instructions.

Syme withdrew a lockpick from his pocket and jiggled it in the lock, putting his ear close. If it had been an electronic lock, Scramble could have disabled it by effectively short-circuiting the hardware logic that verified the passcode. Keying any set of digits would then have opened the door. Scramble had no influence on locks of a physical nature, but that's why Endgame partnered him with Syme.

Syme had claimed he could open a bank vault with a credit card and a hairpin. While this was an exaggeration, he nevertheless had the door open in seconds.

The two men in black slipped inside and the door closed behind them, Syme reaching backward to quiet its sound expertly. The camera continued to point off into the trees, and its motor continued to click stubbornly.

Someone in the control room might miss a glitching camera for a while, but they would certainly not miss the two corpses covered in blood that the camera would swing directly past once its proper operation resumed. Scramble had filled its buffer with the maximum length of invalid commands, but that would only give them about twenty minutes.

Scramble and Syme found themselves in an empty, blue-lit corridor when their eyes adjusted. The lighting buzzed overhead. "So," Scramble transmitted suddenly (and soundlessly) through his suit radio.

Syme jumped and restrained the urge to smack his teammate in the head. "Jesus! I don't need a heart attack, Irving! You realize we're in fucking mortal danger here? You could tap my shoulder or something. Fuck. I almost shot you!" The pounding of his heart slowly subsided.

Scramble frowned. He went to push his glasses up on his nose, but of course, he'd forgotten that Endgame had paid for the surgery. Old habits die hard. "Don't call me Irving. It's Scramble. That's my goddamn codename. How do you like it? Gabriel."

~ more coming!!