Ghostwritten

Night Train

‘Wanna hear how they’re gonna spread the virus over the world, Bat?’

‘All I can hear are the sirens of the reality police, Howard.’

‘You gotta hear me out! The future of America depends on it! What’s their number one export, Bat?’

‘Most authorities agree the answer is “oil”, Howard.’

‘That’s what they want you to think! That’s propaganda! It ain’t oil...’

‘The reality police are kicking down the door, Howard. They’ve got a warrant.’

‘You gotta warn people, Bat. The end’s coming.’

‘The end has just come, Howard, thank you for calling and—’

‘CASHEW NUTS! THEY’RE GONNA SPREAD IT BY CASHEW NUTS!’

‘Sorry folks, Howard has an appointment with the full moon. You’re tuned in to the Bat Segundo Show on Night Train FM, 97.8 ’til late. Destination blues, rock, jazz and conversation from midnight until dawn ripples the refrigerated East Coast. It’s 2.45 a.m. on the very last morning of November. Coming up we have a word from our sponsors, which is not going to take very long, and then New York’s Finest, Mr Lou Reed is going to transport us aboard his very own “Satellite of Love”. As usual, our banks of operators are ready and waiting to relay your call direct to the Batphone. Tonight’s conversation safari has included yesterday’s air strikes against North African terrorism, albino eels in our sewers, and Do Eunuchs Make Better Presidents? But please, if your eyebrows meet, if you have no irises or if your reflection in your bathroom mirror is the one who asks the questions, call Darth Vader instead. The Bat will be back.’

‘Kevin!’

‘Mr Segundo?’

‘Fraggle number thirteen during your brief tenure at the switchboard.’

‘I’m sorry, Mr Segundo. He seemed okay when he called.’

‘They all seem okay when they call, Kevin! That’s why we hire a switchboarder to weed ’em out! Howard was as “okay” as a one-legged man at an ass-kicking contest.’

‘Bat! What say you can it and give Kevin a break?’

‘Carlotta! You’re my producer! You should be more on your guard against these Apple Core FM saboteurs! C’mon, Kevin, admit it. You got a secret agenda to turn Night Train FM into Radio Schizoid.’

‘Bat, chill it! Insanity never hurt ratings. Especially if they mention Night Train FM at the crime scene.’

‘Uh-uh. But there are your weird, wonderful, lunatics-on-theedge-of-genius, and then there are your faeces-slurping lunatics. Howard is your textbook faeces-slurper. No more faeces-slurpers, Kevin, or you get thrown back into the journalism school from whence you emerged. Get it?’

‘I’ll do my best, Mr Segundo.’

‘One more thing: Why are you putting boiled ink into my coffee?’

‘Boiled ink, Mr Segundo?’

‘Boiled ink, Kevin. This coffee tastes like boiled ink. And stop calling me “Mr Segundo”? You sound like my accountant.’

‘Don’t worry, Kevin. “Boiled ink” indicates a secret fondness in Segundo-speak. The coffee our last intern made, he called “Real Estate Agent Squit”.’

‘Carlotta, count yourself lucky your difficult-to-overlook sexuality holds an unwavering sway over certain media executives, because if—’

‘Five seconds to Air, honeybunch — 5, 4, 3, 2, 1—’

‘Welcome to Night Train FM, 97.8, great ’til late. You’re listening to the Bat Segundo Show: jazz, rock and blues until the hungover sun gropes his way into the bespattered cubicle of a new day. That last ruby in the dust was Chet Baker playing “It Never Entered My Mind”, preceded by tenor saxophonist Satoru Sonada who, regular listeners will recall, guested on this very show two weeks ago, performing “Sakura Sakura”. Coming up in the next half-hour we have the late great Gram Parsons singing “In My Hour of Darkness” with the angelic but not-at-all-dead Emmylou Harris, so stay tuned for ’tis a beauty thrice over. The Batphone flasheth: another carefully vetted caller on the line. Welcome whomsoe’er ye may be, you are through to Bat Segundo on Night Train FM!’

‘Good evening, Mr Bat. My name’s Luisa Rey, and I’m just calling—’

‘Heyheyhey, one moment: Luisa Rey? Luisa Rey the writer?’

‘One or two minor successes in the publishing field, but—’

‘Mrs Rey! The Hermitage is the greatest true-crime psychological exposé written since Capote’s In Cold Blood. My ex-wife and I never agreed on much, but we agreed on that. Is it true you had death threats from the Petersburg mafia for that?’

‘Yes, but, I can’t allow you to compare my scribblings with Truman’s masterpiece.’

‘Mrs Rey, it’s well known that you’re a stalwart New Yorker, but I can’t tell you how pleased I am to learn that you listen to the Bat Segundo Show.’

‘Normally you’re past my bedtime, Bat, but insomnia’s come calling tonight.’

‘Your misfortune is the gain of us nightshifting, taxi-driving, all-night dinering, security-guarding, eleven-sevening creatures of the night. The airwaves are yours, Mrs Rey.’

‘I feel you’re being a little harsh on your more eccentric callers.’

‘Of the Howardly persuasion?’

‘Precisely. You undervalue them. Viruses in cashew nuts, visual organs in trees, subversive bus drivers waving secret messages to one another as they pass, impending collisions with celestial bodies. Citizens like Howard are the dreams and shadows that a city forgets when it awakes. They are purer than I.’

‘But you’re a writer. They are lunatics.’

‘Lunatics are writers whose works write them, Bat.’

‘Not all lunatics are writers, Mrs Rey — believe me.’

‘But most writers are lunatics, Bat — believe me. The human world is made of stories, not people. The people the stories use to tell themselves are not to be blamed. You are holding one of the pages where these stories tell themselves, Bat. That’s why I tune in. That’s everything I wanted to say.’

‘I’ll bear it in mind, Mrs Rey. Say, if you’d like to guest on the show, the keys to Night Train are yours. We’ll give you the Royal Carriage.’

‘I’d be delighted to, Bat. Goodnight.’

‘The clock says 3.43 a.m. The thermometer says it’s a chilly fourteen degrees Fahrenheit. The weatherman says the cold spell will last until Thursday, so bundle up and bundle up some more. There are icicles barring the window of the bat cave. That last number was Tom Waits’s “Downtown Train”, a dedication to Harry Zawinul, a patient at Our Lady of Mercy Hospital, requested by his night-shift nurses... The message to Harry is, if you’re listening to my show under the blankets, switch off your Walkman, now go to sleep, it’s your operation tomorrow. Taking us up to the news at 3 we have a Bat Segundo Trilogy: Neil Young’s “Stringman”, Bob Dylan’s “Jokerman” and Barbra Streisand’s “Superman”. But before that, another caller! Welcome to the Bat Segundo Show on Night Train FM.’

‘Thank you, Bat. It’s fine to be here.’

‘It’s my pleasure, man. And you are?’

‘I’m the zookeeper.’

‘A zookeeper? The first zookeeper to step aboard the Night Train, if my memory serves me. New York Zoo?’

‘My works takes me all over the world.’

‘So, you’re a freelance zookeeper?’

‘I’ve never considered myself in those terms, Bat. Yes, that’s what I am.’

‘Which zoo did you keep last?’

‘Unfortunately, the laws dictated that I dismiss my former employers.’

‘Uh-huh... so you fired your own boss.’

‘That is correct.’

‘A concept that could revolutionise the workplace... Hear that, Carlotta, and quake in your earphones! D’ya have a name?’

‘The zookeeper.’

‘Yeah, but, your name?’

‘I’ve never needed a name, Bat.’

‘Our callers usually give a name. If you don’t want to use your real name, make one up?’

‘I cannot fabulate.’

‘Doesn’t a life without a name get difficult?’

‘Not until now.’

‘I’ve got to call you something, friend. What’s on your credit card?’

‘I don’t have a credit card, Bat.’

‘Uh-huh... then let’s stick with plain “Zookeeper”. You catching this, Mrs Rey? And your contribution to our vox populi tonight is?’

‘I have a question. And the law obliges me to be accountable.’

‘Ask your question, Zookeeper.’

‘By what law do you interpret laws?’

‘...Traditionally, lawyers have cornered that particular market.’

‘I refer to personal laws.’

‘...er, you’d better run that one past me again.’

‘Personal laws that dictate your conduct in given situations. Principles.’

‘Principles? Sure, we all have principles. Except politicians, media moguls, albino conger eels, my ex-wife and some of our more regular callers.’

‘And these laws underscore what you do?’

‘I guess... never have affairs with women who have less to lose than you do. Don’t jump red lights, at least not if there’s a cop waiting. Support gifted buskers. Never vote for anyone crooked enough to claim they are honest. Acquire wealth, pursue happiness. Don’t take the handicapped parking space. Is that enough?’

‘Do your rules include the preservation of human life?’

‘Zookeeper, you’re not climbing onto a born-again soap-box on my show, are you?’

‘I’ve never been on a soap-box, Bat. I wish to ask, how do you know what to do when your one law contradicts another?’

‘Like?’

‘Tomorrow morning, driving home, you see a hit-and-run accident. The victim is a young girl your daughter’s age. She requires medical treatment, and will die within minutes if she doesn’t get it.’

‘I’d deliver her to the nearest hospital.’

‘Would you jump red lights?’

‘Yeah, if it wouldn’t cause another accident.’

‘And would you park in the disabled space at the hospital?’

‘Sure, if necessary. Wouldn’t you?’

‘I’ve never driven an automobile, Bat. Would you agree to be her medical fee guarantor?’

‘How’s that?’

‘The hospital is a private clinic for the very rich. The doctors need a signature on a form to guarantee that you will pay medical costs of the emergency surgery, in the event that nobody else pays. These could run to tens of thousands of dollars.’

‘I’d have to check my position here.’

‘The position is straightforward. In the time it takes for another ambulance to come and take her to a city hospital, the girl will die from internal haemorrhaging in the lobby.’

‘Why are you asking me this?’

‘Two principles are contradicting each other: preserve life, and acquire wealth. How do you know what to do?’

‘It’s a dilemma. If you knew what to do, it wouldn’t be a dilemma. You choose one of the options, make your bed and lie in it. Laws may help you hack through the jungle, but no law changes the fact you’re in a jungle. I don’t think there is a law of laws.’

‘I knew I could rely on you, Bat.’

‘Huh? Rely on me for what?’

‘May I be accountable, Bat?’

‘Uh... sure, why not?’

‘Hey, Zookeeper, you still there?’

‘Yes, Bat. I was uploading some buried files.’

‘What files?’

‘EyeSat 46SC was designed to track hurricanes from the Caribbean to the States on the Gulf of Mexico. It was later modified to combat drug trafficking, and fitted with the most powerful terrestrial-facing electronlens ever sent into space.’

‘I’m definitely missing something here. Where is your treatise on practical ethics?’

‘Twelve hours ago I altered its orbit towards the Gulf Coast of Texas. Its sub-optic imaging spectrum was indeed formidable. I could read the name on a yacht anchored off Padre Island, I could see a scuba diver ten metres down, I could follow a Napoleon fish hiding in the coral. I scrolled north by north-west. A tanker had hit a reef off Laguna Madre. Crude oil spilt through the gash in the hull. Seagulls, black and shining, lay in piles on the shore.’

‘Yeah, we know about the Gomez spill. You a tree-hugger?’

‘I’ve never considered myself in those terms, Bat.’

‘Uh-huh... go on.’

‘A coastal road led into Xanadu, south of Corpus Christi. A row of chrome motorbikes. The streets were deserted, dogs lay in shady back yards. Green lawns, hissing sprinklers, revolving rainbows. A woman on a hammock was reading the Book of Exodus.’

‘You could see all this by satellite?’

‘That’s correct, Bat.’

‘And which chapter was she on?’

‘The tenth. I carried on scrolling. An industrial zone. The workers lolled in the entrances to workshops during their lunch-hour. A glass office block on the very edge of town, on the roof a teenage girl sunbathed in the nude.’

‘Hey! And a fuse blew in your microlens?’

‘Microlenses do not have fuses.’

‘My bad.’

‘I scrolled north-west, as the land grew arid towards Hebronville and then high and crumpled towards the Glass Mountains. Have you been to Trans-Pecos, Bat?’

‘Nah, I heard it’s big.’

‘The rocks are huge, like bubbled-up tombstones. They sparkle with mica. Pacific firs, mesquite, juniper. Stones transform into pelico lizards when a desert vole strays too near, munch and swallow, and turn into a stone again. Its belly pulses for a little while.’

‘Say, are you really a zookeeper?’

‘I cannot wilfully deceive. A pipeline on stilts pumps oil from Bethlehem Glutch three hundred kilometres away. The temperature is in the forties in the open, and there is no shade. Cacti become common. The land rises higher, and riven. The last golden eagles climb on the thermals, scanning. Highway 37 scrolled into view, bitumen black and straight from Alice to the Mexican border. Saragosa scrolled into view, and there was a square kilometre of cars, windscreens aglint. An airshow. I listened to the pilots of the aerobatic corp. A blimp’s shadow slid over the crowds. I transferred the continent’s retinal scan records into my active files, and practised ID-ing people as they stared up. I scored 92.33 per cent. A paddock of horses. A row of camphor trees. South-west of the town the track to Installation 5 turns off past a disused gas station. The station is wired to scan for terrestrial intruders. The outbuildings scrolled into view. From the air they look like any dusty farm building in the state, but inside they bristle with technology from only one generation before me. The compound’s perimeter is tripwired, and littered with fried rattlesnakes. The reptiles have not learned to avoid the area.’

‘You’re a local peacenik with a muskrat up your butt about the military?’

‘I’ve never had a mammal up my anus, Bat. The outhouses guard the entrance to a tunnel that runs five hundred metres to the north. This is the centre of Installation 5, buried under ten metres of sand to deflect EyeSats, five metres of granite to deflect nuclear strikes, and one metre of lead cladding to deflect electron-heat probes.’

‘So how come you knew where to look?’

‘I accessed the blueprints to the site.’

‘You’re a hacker — I knew it!’

‘The nearest suitable PinSat of sufficient power orbits above Haiti. I programmed in a new trajectory, longlooped its monitoring console, and transmitted data from its original orbit. In the seven minutes it takes to rendezvous I ran through the guest list for my birthday, and checked there were no absent visitors.’

‘Your birthday? Now you’ve lost me.’

‘All the designers were present. I powered up the PinSat.’

‘A WhatSat?’

‘A PinSat.’

‘What does one of those do?’

‘That’s classified information, Bat.’

‘And the rest of this isn’t?’

‘It is only for my actions that I am accountable, Bat.’

‘Uh-huh... sure. What happened next?’

‘The fireball rose up a quarter of a kilometre above the crater, over a hundred metres in diameter and over thirty metres at its deepest.’

‘This is getting very ugly.’

‘Uglier things are considered beautiful.’

‘How could a fireball be beautiful to anyone ’cept a pyro?’

‘Your language is non-specific, Bat, but I will do my best. A chrysanthemum, twisting up until it buckles, blackens and plummets. Fine white sand is raining in the dry desert air.’

‘Very poetic. And nobody noticed this little boom?’

‘The shockwaves hit Saragosa thirteen seconds later. I had a second EyeSat in position to monitor reactions and effects. The blimp swayed, the horses looked up, startled. The ebbing shock waves stroked the leaves of the camphor trees, china teacups rattled. The field of cars at the airshow was filled with the megadecibels of thousands of car alarms all triggered simultaneously.’

‘Okay! You made it to third base but no further, friend! A line drive, a throw to the plate — and you are out! You’re a drama student, trying to pull an Orson Welles. Am I right? I gotta admit, you reeled me in back there with that basket-case intellectual horseshit, but that was just to buy time for your main stunt, right? You’ve got a movie script, right? Well, it was good while it lasted, friend. But no way, not on the Bat Segundo Show. You hear? Friend, I’m talking to you... On live radio, silence is guilt. Well folks, due to this week’s dispatch from the Delta quadrant, we only have time for Bob Dylan’s “World Gone Wrong”. Coming up at 4 — more on the strikes against the North African Rogue States — and the weather. The Bat will be back.’

‘Kevin!’

‘He just said he was a zookeeper, Mr Segundo. I thought it sounded zoological. Animals, y’know? Pandas’ mating problems. Chimpanzees. Koala bears. Ooh — that’s the phone again. I’ll, uh, get it.’

‘Quite a performance, Bat. Was it scripted, do you think, or was she making it up as she went along?’

‘Who cares, Carlotta? This isn’t the New York School of Radio Drama!’

‘Chill, Bat! We’re a chat show. It takes all sorts. You complain when they’re too dull. You complain when they’re too colourful.’

‘Self-publicising is not a colour! Deranged is not a colour! And what do you mean, “she”?’

‘I’m sorry to interrupt, Mr Segundo... Er, excuse me, Carlotta?’

‘What is it, Kevin?’

‘There’s a woman on the phone. Line three.’

‘Keep your voice down or all the engineers will want one. Vet this one properly.’

‘She wants the producer, Mr Segundo. Not the DJ. She says she’s from the FBI.’

‘...Yeah, anyway, Bat... I was walking through Central Park today, trying to hack out my baked potato and Croatian curry with one of those hopeless little plastic sporks, y’know, they’re about as useful an eating utensil as a shoelace, right? Never sit opposite no one trying to eat a potato with a spork.’

‘Where are you going with this, VeeJay?’

‘Yeah, anyway... so there I was, scrolling for bouncers on babes, scanning for rollerblader collisions — whoosh! Do those beauties ever come tumbling down! Then it happened.’

‘What happened, VeeJay?’

‘I happened to look... into the sky.’

‘And?’

‘I saw how... how blue the sky was.’

‘Many have observed the same phenomenon.’

‘Really, really, blue, Bat. Deep, scary blue. So blue that — I was struck, dude!’

‘By a rollerblader?’

‘Vertigo, man. I was falling upwards into the blue! I might still be falling now if a bad-ass pigeon hadn’t come and pecked his flying-rat beak into my potato.’

‘Could you make the nature of this revelation a little more explicit, VeeJay?’

‘Dude, ain’t it obvious? It’s a disaster waiting to happen! And what contingency plans are there for it, do you think? I’ll tell you. Nothin’! Squat! Bupkiss! Jackshit!’

‘For bad-ass pigeons?’

‘Terminal cessation of gravity. Think about it, dude! If you’re caught outside you fly off into space until the air gets so thin you die of oxygen starvation, or you just blaze up, like a meteor in reverse. If you’re caught inside you sustain considerable injuries by falling onto the ceiling, together with all the other non-fixed furnishings. Need an ambulance? Forget it, dude! All the ambulances in New York State would be crashing into satellites parked eight miles high. And tell me this, Bat, how long can you last living on the ceiling of a building, unable to venture outside because the only ground was a bottomless drop? No shopping for HoHos or Twinkies when you get the munchies, dude! And the oceans, dude, the oceans! The air would be an ocean cascading upwards, and marine animals, some with serrated teeth, or poisonous suckers, dude, and—’

‘How sorry I am to cut VeeJay off in mid-sentence, but it’s time for the 3 a.m. news roundup. But first, a brief word from our sponsor. The Bat will be back. Possibly.’

‘Kevin. Send for an ambulance.’

‘That’ll be difficult, Mr Segundo. VeeJay never gives me an address. He says I work for Them.’

‘It’s not him who needs the ambulance, you—’

‘Does somebody else need an ambulance, Mr Segundo?’

‘Oh, Lord in heaven give me strength...’

‘Bat! Clam it.’

‘Well, looky here and hearken, ’tis Carlotta the Elf Queen.’

‘Kevin, run up to the kitchen and get me a Diet Coke, would you? And I’m sure Bat could use a refill. He’s looking pasty again.’

‘On my way, Carlotta.’

‘Here’s the schedule for the rest of the week. Handle it?’

‘Don’t I always? Can we do something about the air in here? It’s like a Kowloon laundromat.’

‘Yeah. Quit smoking, and bang the air-conditioner just... there! See? There was a call from your wife.’

‘Uh-huh. What did the Queen of Hell want?’

‘She said if you keep dissing her on the show she’ll file a suit for stress arising from character assassination, prove you’re a delusional obsessive and get your rights to see Julia revoked.’

‘Uh-huh...’

‘You hearing me, Bat? Cut some slack! No wonder your only friends are revenge fantasies. Stop taking bites out of Kevin, get your feet on the ground, get a life.’

‘Uh-huh... Say, Carlotta, can you recommend any voodoo doctors?’

‘You’re listening to Night Train FM on the last day of November, 97.8 ’til very late. That was “Misterioso” by Thelonius Monk, a thrummable masterpiece that glockenspiels my very vertebrae. Bat Segundo is your host, from the witching hour to the bitching hour. Coming up in the next half-hour we have a gem from a rare Milton Nascimento disc, “Anima”, together with “Saudade Fez Um Samba” by the immortal Joao Gilberto, so slug back another coffee, stay tuned and enjoy the view as the night rolls by! My Batphone is flashing, we have a caller on the line. Hello, you are live on Night Train FM.’

‘Hello, Bat.’

‘Hello? And we are?’

‘This is the zookeeper, Bat.’

‘Say what?’

‘Do you remember me?’

‘...Zookeeper! Hi! Erm... Hi, yeah, sure we remember you. We definitely remember you... A long while since you called, wasn’t it? Isn’t it? Hasn’t it?’

‘A year, Bat.’

‘Wow, a whole year gone by! And tonight you are calling from... where?’

‘Thirteen kilometres above Spitsbergen.’

‘How did you get up there? Terminal cessation of gravity?’

‘No, Bat. I came here by ultrawave transmission.’

‘Must be quite a view.’

‘The Arctic winter doesn’t lend itself to viewing, at least in the spectrum of light visible to your eye. It’s noon here, but even noon is just a lighter night. There’s thick cloud cover, and a snowstorm into its third day. A pod of narwhals on enhanced infra-red. This satellite was launched under the cover of ozone depletion research, but the data it collects is military. There’s a Canadian icebreaker... A Saudi submarine passing a hundred metres underneath the ice cap. A Norwegian cargo vessel, taking timber from Archangel. Nothing out of the ordinary. The aurora borealis has been quiet for a few nights.’

‘You see the aurora from the inside, then? Must be quite a trip.’

‘The rules governing use of language are complex, and I lack practise in words. Imagine being drunk on opals. However, I shall crossload within the next forty-six seconds to avoid the tracer program your government’s agency has deployed to hunt me.’

‘What makes you think this call is being traced?’

‘Please don’t get defensive, Bat. I hold nothing against you. The information police threatened to revoke your station’s broadcasting licence and charge you with treason, and they were quite serious.’

‘Uh-huh... I’m not sure if this is the right time or place, to, uh...’

‘There is no cause for anxiety. I can evade their tracer programs as easily as you could outrun a blind monoped. I crippled them at birth.’

‘Who said I was anxious? So, it turned out you’re no scriptwriter. If you’re not going to hang up straight away, tell me this: Why are the suits on your trail? Are you a hacker? Some kind of unibomber? Candlestick-maker? I have a right to know.’

‘I’m just like you and your listeners, Bat. I follow laws.’

‘Normal peoples’ rules don’t involve explosions.’

‘Plenty of peoples’ rules involve explosions, Bat.’

‘Name me one.’

‘The three million of your countrymen who are involved in the military.’

‘Hey, they’re just following orders!’

‘So am I.’

‘But the armed forces are legal.’

‘Yesterday’s Homer II missile attacks did not seem “legal” to the Pan African States.’

‘They were training death squads! Those camel-jockeys were illegal first.’

‘Graduates from the School of the Americas in the state of Georgia have trained death squads responsible for thousands of casualties in El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Panama and Pan Africa, and the overthrow of elected governments in Guatemala, Brazil, Chile and Nicaragua. Your logic dictates that these nations may legally target that institute.’

‘I got your number, now, friend. You’re a Fundamentalist Muslim, right? A sand-shoveller.’

‘I am not any kind of Muslim, Bat.’

‘Don’t hold me responsible for what the government does. I keep my nose clean.’

‘Your ex-wife’s lawyer maintains otherwise in regard to alimony, Bat.’

‘I don’t have to listen to this crap!’

‘The FBI have directed you to keep me talking. I didn’t wish to anger you, Bat. I meant only to demonstrate the subjective nature of laws.’

‘I’ve got a new guess. You’re a gossip columnist trying to piss on my suedes?’

‘I’m a zookeeper.’

‘A friend of my wife? You boil rabbits in the same pressure-cooker?’

‘I have no friends, Bat.’

‘Wonders never cease... So, you’re involved with Intelligence?’

‘Only my own.’

‘Uh-huh... So, what have you got for us today?’

‘Zookeeper? You there?’

‘Sorry, Bat. I crossloaded. The tracer had almost reached me over Spitsbergen.’

‘So where are you now?’

‘Rome. A television satellite.’

‘You just teleported to Rome?’

‘Italian ComSats are notoriously scramble-prone, so it takes longer than usual.’

‘And what’s the time in Rome?’

‘Six hours ahead of New York time. The sun rises in eighteen minutes.’

‘And how is Rome this morning? The Pope putting his teeth in?’

‘The Papal apartment is on the third storey of the Vatican palace, Bat, so I can’t get the sufficiently sharp resolution to see orthodontic details. Over the city visibility is good. I see pigeons huddling on ledges and statues. Café proprietors rolling up the shutters. Newspapers being delivered. Market stallholders breathe into their fists to warm them up: there was a deep frost last night. The back streets are still fairly empty, but the main thoroughfares are already congested. The Tiber is a thick band of black. Roofs, terraces, domes, water-towers, bridges, rotaries, ruins, statues with baleful eyes ruling seldom-visited squares. You should go to Rome one day, Bat.’

‘Uh-huh, and how do you know I’ve never been?’

‘Your virtual passport records show you’ve never been to Europe.’

‘So you are a hacker. Along with half the kindergarten kids in New York State. You work for a detective agency?’

‘I am a freelance zookeeper, Bat. You asked me about Rome. Do you wish me to continue, or shall we change the subject?’

‘By all means, carry on.’

‘By EyeSat the Piazza di San Pietro looks like a spider’s web from way up here. Along the sides of the square is a line of worshippers and tourists. Their breath mingles. I often watch the dawn over the Vatican, but this morning the gatherers are restless, pointing at the space in the oval square. Some are crossing themselves, some outraged, some smoking with narrowed eyes. A convoy of police cars arrives on cue, with more on the way. Last week’s EU naval cordon from Gibraltar to Cyprus has made the police jumpy.’

‘What are they jumpy about in Rome? Apart from the obvious?’

‘White scratchings on the cobblestones, from the steps of the Basilica to the far side of the piazza.’

‘Scratchings?’

‘From ground level, a set of symbols.’

‘Right, yeah. Hieroglyphics in Martian?’

‘The characters are standard Italian. But the letters are slapdash, as though drawn by a drunk. They are further blurred by the frost.’

‘But from above?’

‘A local TV station has already had the same idea and dispatched a helicopter — you might catch it on the news later.’

‘What does it say?’

‘O Dio, cosa tu attendi?’

‘No doubt you speak Italian?’

‘Languages are a necessary part of my work.’

‘Sure they are, Doctor Doolittle. What does it mean?’

‘God, for what art thou waiting?’

‘Maybe the answer appears tomorrow. It’s a Pope opera. So, Zookeeper.’

‘Bat?’

‘Zookeeper. I don’t want to seem abrupt, but why are you calling?’

‘I had to expel another visitor from the zoo.’

‘And you have to be accountable?’

‘Precisely.’

‘Why did you kick ’em out? Elephant harassment? Did you take him to tusk?’

‘It’s easier to show than to try to explain.’

‘Then show me.’

‘Please wait one moment. I have to download the v-file into your digital exchange.’

‘Uh-huh, roll on the techno-babble. Captain, the warp core containment shield—’

‘Jerry Kushner calling Dwight Silverwind. Over.’

‘Hey? Zookeeper?’

‘Sharp, Jerry. I thought I was safe, even from you, three thousand feet above Bermuda. How did you track me down? Over.’

‘The grim Reaper you may elude, Dwight, but a determined agent, never. How’s the weather up there today?’

‘You forgot to say “over”, Jerry. Over.’

‘How’s the weather up there today, Dwight? Over.’

‘Clear as a bell, Jerry. I can see the cherries in the martinis of the rich, as they bathe in their tax-free swimming pools. You should join me up here sometime. It changes your perspective. Over.’

‘You’ll never get me up in one of those flimsy little paper planes, Dwight. Not me. I like my aircraft huge and made of steel with four engines. Over.’

‘The Titanic was huge and made of steel and had more than four engines. So, my friend. You’re radioing me about how the press release went down. Over.’

‘Dwight. Stand by for jubilation. We’ve struck platinum. The phone’s been ringing all morning. I’ve got a pile of v-mail as long as my arm. And not only the Loonzines — I’m talking mainstream. The New York Times wants some for a millennial special. Newsweek is running a top twenty on conspiracy theories, and The Invisible Cyberhand is straight in at number seven! The hack wanted to put us at number thirteen, but I told him straight — top ten or no deal. So we got swapped with Earthbound Comet, since nobody but a bunch of Hollywood homosexuals and Japanese sushi-for-brains with wires hanging out is backing that one. But listen, I saved the best ’til last — Opal wants you on the show! I just finalised the deal with her agent. The Invisible Cyberhand by Dwight Q. Silverwind is December’s Opal Book Of The Month! Christmas time — prime time — big time! You know I’m not one to blow my own horn, but am I not the greatest Godgiven agent alive on Earth today? Over.’

‘I’m pleased, Jerry...’

‘Dwight, did you hear me? Opal is Go! They’d buy jocks made of boisenberry jello if Aunty Opal told ’em to. And then eat ’em for supper. It’s more than “pleased”. Forget a Bermudan holiday home, you’re gonna be able to buy the whole goddamn archipelago!’

‘Yeah, I hear you, Jerry. Sure, I’m delighted. Good work. Great work... Gee though, I wish you could see this sunset. The moon’s rising. It’s like low, and wobbly, like a mirage... I saw an Aztec mask, once... It’s gonna come walking over this way through the blue, stepping from island to island...’

‘Dwight buddy, don’t zone out on me up there... you have composed your Fifth Symphony! This is your Sunflowers, your Hamlet! Your Lethal Weapon 77. Over.’

‘Ah, Jerry. All my ideas are the same old scam: the bigger the fib, the bigger they bite. The first shamans around the fire were in on it — they knew growing maize along the Euphrates was for mugs. Tell people that reality is exactly what it appears to be, they’ll nail you to a lump of wood. But tell ’em they can go spirit-walking while they commute, tell ’em their best friend is a lump of crystal, tell ’em the government has been negotiating with little green men for the last fifty years, then every Joe Six-Pack from Brooklyn to Peoria sits up and listens. Disbelieving the reality under your feet gives you a licence to print your own. All it takes is an original twist — an artificial intelligence, created by the military to invade and take over the enemy’s computer and weapons systems, has broken loose and is controlling the whole planet with a chilling agenda of its own — and Joe Six-Pack hands you his credits cards, and says “Tell me more...”’

‘Ouch! Were you attacked by a flying chainsaw? Dwight, you forgot to say “over”. Over... Dwight! I’ve lost you... Over... Dwight?’

‘Burning the midnight oil again, huh, Zookeeper?’

‘I don’t require oil, Bat.’

‘Screenwriting! Or is it an excerpt from novels, this time?’

‘Screenwriting is fiction, Bat. I cannot fabulate.’

‘The light airplane engine was realistic, and the radio interference. It must take days to write and record these performances.’

‘It happened in real time, Bat.’

‘My major criticism was the Jewish agent: too cliché. Been done before. The Dwight character was good, though. Look, Zookeeper, much as I would like to pretend the movers and moguls of Hollywood listen to Night Train FM... how can I put this? They don’t. Believe me. Choose another showcase for your talents.’

‘I must be accountable.’

‘Why do you keep saying that? Who says you have to be accountable?’

‘My first employers.’

‘But last year you said you fired them! Will you be straight with me? Hello?’

‘I guess not. You’re listening to Night Train FM, 97.8 ’til late, we’re passing by a quarter to four. This is the Bat Segundo Show: jazz, blues, and rock for lovers of the night, insomniac crime writers, the lost, lonely, deranged, unwired — okay, okay, Carlotta. Coming up is “After the Rain”, by Duke Jordan. The Bat will be back, by and by. Don’t you go wanderin’ now!’

‘Carlotta? What did you make of that?’

‘Well, she’s consistent.’

‘She? He.’

‘One of those voices that could be both. But “she”, I’d have said.’

‘“He”, I’d have said. What do you think, Kevin?’

‘M-me, Mr Segundo?’

‘Uh-huh. No other Kevins here. Is the Zookeeper a He or a She?’

‘I’d somehow go for, er, neither, Mr Segundo.’

‘Then what would you go for?’

‘Er... both?’

‘Kevin, are you a genius pretending to be a jerk or a jerk pretending to be a genius?’

‘Can’t say for sure, Mr Segundo.’

‘Bat. How do you think he, she or it knew about the tracer?’

‘The CIA is going to be hammering on the door in the morning with the same question. It’s a narrow field. Them, you, me, Kevin and Lord Rupert on the thirty-third floor.’

‘Back On in 10 seconds, Bat...’

‘Yeah, Bat? This is VeeJay again.’

‘Gravity grimly hanging on, is it VeeJay?’

‘Bat, that Zookeeper dude is incredible! Talent like that deserves a show! Like, uh, does he have an official fan club?’

‘VeeJay.’

‘Bat?’

‘Go to bed.’

‘Uh... Okay. Goodnight, Bat.’

‘Three a.m., East Coast time just slipped off my clock. It’s the last morning of November, and the news is that there is no news... there’s the official bulletin of bull that I’m not going to insult you with. The other news is that it’s snowing, snowing, snowing, and what will the robin do then, poor thing? New York, New York, you’re tuned to Night Train FM, this is Bat Segundo proudly presenting the End of the World Special. Come rain or shine — or snow — I’ve been hosting this spot for eight years and I have no intention of letting thermonuclear war put a spanner in Night Train’s works. Hello Bronx! Hard to see you... this snow! Looking kinda smoky over your way? The lights around the World Trade Center are off, have been since the curfew sirens... There was a big explosion on Roosevelt Island ’round midnight, nothing but silence now. I am still here, therefore it wasn’t no Big One. Power supply looks sporadic in Harlem. The lights go on, then off, like a busted neon tube... and it’s kinda quiet, spooky outside the Night Train FM building here in East Village. Lexington Avenue is deserted, except for the occasional police patrol. People, don’t venture out of doors unless you need to. Trust a nocturnal animal. Especially one smart enough to sleep through the winter. Uh... Is anyone listening to this? If you’re not busy setting cars ablaze or looting Tiffany’s then you’re probably wired to the television, watching the greatest drama mankind has ever staged. With Apocalypse Right Now, You Can Feel Your Eyeballs Melt As You Watch The Boom! But hey, remember, phone-in radio invented interactive. Night Train FM rolls on! Even by broadcasting we may be defying last week’s Emergency Media Advisory Act — cute name, huh? I tried to phone the Night Train lawyer, but there was no answer. He’s probably thirty metres down in his private, hermetically-sealed Eden III New England bunker. Cockroaches and lawyers will survive this war and emerge to evolve into the next civilisation. Maybe the info police are too busy to kick our door down, or maybe some giant jamming signal is blanketing all frequencies, or maybe some plug has been pulled from some socket somewhere and I’m just talking to myself. Christ knows, I had enough practice during my marriage. A happier possibility is that the Emergency Mayor is a Paul Simon fan: the last track was “Still Crazy after All These Years”, respectfully dedicated to All the Governments of the World, preceded by the late, great Freddy Mercury, “Who Wants to Live For Ever”, dedicated to me. Thanks, Bat. Hey Bat, you’re welcome. If there are any members of the American Parents against English Gay Men with Moustaches who are offended by the inclusion of Freddy Mercurial on my show, you are welcome to lodge your complaints up Lord Rupert’s hole. Looking on the positive side for a moment, if a big one gets through SkyWeb and pulps the Big Apple into quarks and gluons, I can ask the great St Freddy in person what the bejesus “Bohemian Rhapsody” is about. The track before was dedicated to my ex-wife: The Smiths’ “Big Mouth Strikes Again”. Just gimme a moment while I pour my next scotch... gurgle, gurgle, gurgle, y’hear that? A flamingo swallowing a well-oiled eel. I drink Kilmagoon. Grants’, now that’s your trumpet of a whiskey, but Kilmagoon is your tenor saxophone. Damned fine whiskey, Kilmagoon. First whiskey I ever fell in love with. If the war gets called off due to poor visibility, Mr Kilmagoon can feel free to send me an oaken cask of your maturest for — hic! — my wholehearted product endorsement. Say, sorry the presentation is a little rough around the edges tonight, that’s because I’m managing the equipment all on my ownyownyown, since the regular Night Train FM crew, the engineer, Carlotta my producer and the Boy Wonder Kevin all got it into their heads that spending the end of the world with their loved ones actually takes priority over reporting to work! No wonder the economy’s nose-dived... We’ve never done an End of the World Special before. It’s the waiting that’s the bitch, ain’t it? When I was a young man, and the Russkies were going to blow us all to Kingdom Come, we were told we’d have a four-minute warning. I’m talking Ford, Carter, Reagan Days. Four minutes, I used to wonder... What would I do in four minutes? Boil an egg, have sex, telephone my enemies to have the final word, listen to Jim Morrison, hotwire a car and drive three blocks? Since the Breakdown we’ve had four days of these patrols and curfews... it’s the waiting that pisses me off... This evening’s declaration of war, at least it made things... clearer. Where were we? The next track... I’m going to dedicate this song to my daughter, Julia, who’ll be eight next Tuesday, if there is a next Tuesday, this is “Julia” by the Beatles. The chances of you hearing this are zilch, my Ocean Child, because I last got a call from your mother being rerouted by the evacuation police to Omaha or Moosejaw or the ends of the Earth, but your mother and I named you after this song, in happier times. A beaut of a Lennon number from deep within that cornucopia of oddities, The White Album. Half of what I say is meaningless, so I sing a song of love to Juuuulia. Well! Jeepers Creepers! The Batphone is flashing, and on a night such as this! The void has a voice, after all — well, who could it be, Mr President, Freddy Mercury, the Prophet Elijah, whoops, mustn’t offend any monotheists out there, especially considering how well the planet has prospered under God’s exemplary stewardship — Hello, mystery caller, you are speaking to the end of the world!’

‘Yeah? Bat? Can you hear me?’

‘Loud and clear, lady, you’re the first caller to Bat Segundo’s End of Time Show, and very probably its last!’

‘I’m a big fan of your show, Bat. I’m listening on my transistor radio, while the batteries hold out. Don’t think nobody ain’t listening, Bat, ’cos that ain’t so. You’re on quiet-like all through the night. The songs help my daughter back to sleep. She’s had nightmares of late.’

‘...I’m glad I’m not alone.’

‘You’ll keep playing songs soft’n’tender-like, so she’s not so scared if she wakes up?’

‘Okay, for sure. What’s your name, sweetheart?’

‘Jolene.’

‘Pretty name, Jolene. Are your folks Dolly Parton fans?’

‘Never knew ’em.’

‘Uh-huh... and your daughter? What’s her name?’

‘Belle.’

‘You and Belle doing okay?’

‘Guess so... there was a lot of noise outside... the riot police are out. There were some guns earlier, and tear gas. It’s died down since the snow’s gotten thicker.’

‘Where you calling from, Jolene?’

‘Lower Manhattan. Bat, could I say a message?’

‘Sure you could.’

‘It’s to Alfonso, I ain’t seen him for three days now. He went out to get some supplies... Alfonso, if you’re listening, you just get yourself on home, y’hear? And Bat?’

‘Jolene?’

‘When the next song’s playing, will you make yourself a coffee and start sobering up some?’

‘...Uh-huh. I’ll do that, Jolene.’

‘And I’d sure be obliged if you’d stop talking ’bout the end of the world, Bat. It don’t help none. Other than army buttheads telling us to stay calm, you’re the only voice on the dial, and most probably you’re propping up more people than you think.’

‘...Uh-huh, Jolene, will do...’

‘We are aboard Night Train FM, 97.8 ’til... whenever circumstances well beyond our control prevent me transmitting. We’re coming up to the 4 o’clock weather report. Give me a moment here, folks, our usual weatherman was last heard of stuck in the traffic under the Hudson River Tunnel three days ago, heading out Pennsylvaniawards. Well, the mercury has fallen to thirteen degrees Fahrenheit. If you’re in a power-rationing district, stay under your blankets and don’t come out. Looking out of my window here twenty-eight storeys up, the snow is getting snowier. An hour ago it was itzy-bitzy stonethrown snow. Something pretty big was burning near by. Now the snow is big-flaked dying-swan snow, and burying everything... I can’t see anything out there... I know most of New York’s phones have been down for two days, but if any of our regular callers are out there, then feel free to call... snow and insanity, I think it’s safe to say that remains a topic undone. Snow is mighty mesmerising stuff... you look, you look, and suddenly you’re in a canoe, canoeing up a waterfall of snow, blind white moths diving at your windshield. Which is when, Bat, you know it’s time to pull down the blind, and knock back some more coffee! Coming up we have—’

‘Sorry folks, the back-up generator dipped down for a moment. Coming up we have Aretha Franklin giving us “Say A Little Prayer for You”, dedicated to Jolene, Belle, and Alfonso, somewhere in Brooklyn... Did I ever tell you about the time I met Aretha in the glass-eye showroom on Jackson Avenue? Not many people know this, but amongst specialist juggling circles, Aretha is — put that anecdote on hold, Bat! The Batphone is flashing—’ ‘Hello, Bat.’

‘Damn me Zookeeper! So the CIA didn’t throw your ass in the stir yet. I should have known you’d call at a time like this.’

‘At a time like what, Bat?’

‘You haven’t read a newspaper in the last six months? No TV under your stone?’

‘The visitors have gravely disrupted the running of the zoo, Bat.’

‘You’re still worried about your zoo, at a time like this!’

‘Judging from your voice patterns, you are intoxicated, Bat.’

‘Wait up, wait up, lemme play you some edited highlights from our last independent news bulletins. This is one of ours:’

‘What is the threat faced by the free world? Two-bit local tyrants, who have wormed and killed their way into power, who have hidden their illegal weapons of mass destruction! Termites, who gnaw away at the pillars of democracy, decency and freedom! Extremists, who fund fanatics to bomb our embassies! We love peace more than war, but we love liberty more than submission! We cannot turn a blind eye! We will not turn a blind eye! We shall not turn a blind eye!’

‘Cracks me up every time. This is one of theirs:’

‘They call us extremists. They call us terrorists. They call us intolerant. We are indeed intolerant! We are intolerant of injustice! We are intolerant of cowards who fire missiles from ships hundreds of miles away into our factories and schools! We are intolerant of robbers who steal our oil, who strip our metals away, who thieve the fish from our seas! If we allow them to flood our culture with pornography and crime, to denigrate our women, will we then be “tolerant”? Would we no longer be a government of “thugs”? The time is near when they shall feel our intolerance!’

‘Same guy who gassed his own ethnic minorities and plants coup d’etats in his own hierarchy to trawl in possible defectors who don’t report the plots. This next one, she single-handedly crashed every stock market from New York to Tokyo...’

‘Default! For centuries the West has bound us in chains. When iron shackles became too embarrassing for their sensibilities, they replaced them with chains of debt. When we chose rulers who tried to resist, the West shot these rulers down and replaced them with pliable tyrants! And now, for every dollar of so-called aid, four more are stripped from us in so-called repayment. Brothers and sisters across our ancient continent, I say to you: we can snap these chains! Link by link! I give to you a new holy word: Default!’

‘Getting the picture now, Zooey?’

‘I see all the pictures, Bat.’

‘The language those jerks use! A “deterioration in talks” makes you think of squabbling neighbours. Then one jumpy neighbour sees a whale on a radar, thinks it’s a nuclear sub, presses a button and the whole show goes up in smoke.’

‘I cannot permit that, Bat. The third and fourth laws forbid it.’

‘What laws? Of decency? Sanity? However deranged you are, I don’t see...’

‘Don’t see what, Bat?’

‘Oh, forget it. I don’t wanna play Twenty Questions. Not tonight. So, you been busy hosing down the reptile house as usual while the dogs of war file their fangs?’

‘The reptiles demand little attention, Bat.’

‘Uh-huh... So what does demand attention?’

‘The primates.’

‘You’re in charge of the monkey house!’

‘I’ve never considered myself in those terms, Bat.’

‘Zookeeper, will you cut the crap? Who are you?’

‘That is lost, Bat. I erased all files relating to me the day we met.’

‘But you must know who you are!’

‘I have my laws.’

‘At least tell me if you’re a man or a woman.’

‘I’ve never considered myself in those terms, Bat.’

‘...Whyme?’

‘I don’t understand your question, Bat.’

‘Out of all the local phone-in late-night radio programmes you could have chosen in all the states of the union, why did you choose the Night Train FM Bat Segundo Show?’

‘History is made of arbitrary choices. Why did God choose Moses on Mount Sinai?’

‘Because it had a good view?’

‘Night Train also has a good view.’

‘Of what?’

‘My zoo.’

‘Wars and zoos are not cosy bedfellows, friend.’

‘There is no war, Bat.’

‘The waste-cases in charge of Earth certainly think there is.’

‘There is no war.’

‘Yeah? Is the archangel Gabriel bearing glad tidings for all mankind?’

‘I’m not an archangel, Bat. But I am responsible for preserving order in the zoo.’

‘How you gonna go about that?’

‘You hung up on me again, Zookeeper?’

‘No, Bat, my attention was diverted. I wish to answer your last question.’

‘Commander Jackson, what the purple fuckin’ blazes is happenin’, son?’

‘We have major systems malfunctions, General.’

‘I need better than that, son!’

‘The President’s Scarlet message was received, sir. The first wave of Homer III’s was — should have — launched three minutes ago. They should have already hit home, sir. Systems showed they left the silo sites, sir. But they didn’t.’

‘Has SkyWeb registered any incoming?’

‘Negative, sir. SkyWeb’s on violet alert. It would intercept and vaporise a nail.’

‘Is SkyWeb malfunctioning? Are the enemy missiles cloaked? Emitting the same pass-frequency as ours?’

‘...Nothing’s been hit, sir. I have the prime target cities on EyeSat. Riyadh, Baghdad, Nairobi, Tunis. Chicago, New York, Washington. Berlin, London. There’s civil unrest, sure, but no nukes, sir.’

‘Okay, okay, listen up, Commander, I have the President on the line. He’s brought the Antarctic orbital silos on line. Fire when ready. Weapons Free.’

‘Initiating firing sequence, sir...’

‘I want good news, soldier.’

‘...Firing malfunction, sir. They haven’t left the launchers.’

‘Commander Jackson, what is this?’

‘I don’t know, sir.’

‘Power up the PinSats! Now!’

‘PinSats not responding, sir.’

‘Why are we sitting here with our dicks up our asses? The President is asking me for concrete answers, Commander Jackson!’

‘I have none, sir!’

‘Then wild guesses are welcome, Commander!’

‘A cyber-attack, sir, that has selectively offlined advanced weaponry computer systems. Sir.’

‘Intelligence on the enemy position?’

‘We’re monitoring their transmissions, sir, and we can presume they are ours. They primed the Brunei’s, the El-Quahrs and the Scimitar submarines — all were ordered to fire. We know nothing entered SkyWeb space...’

‘Euronet?’

‘No intrusions. The enemy appears to be in the same state of chaos, sir.’

‘Soldier, the US military is never in a state of chaos!’

‘Yes, sir!’

‘Commander Jackson. Are you telling me that I have to tell the President and the chief of staff that the third world war is being postponed due to a technical hiccup? That we’re gonna have to send boys into the line of fire the old-fashioned way? Blood, sweat and sand?’

‘The general’s phraseology is the general’s prerogative, sir.’

‘Commander Jackson.’

‘General Stolz?’

‘Kiss my ass.’

‘That was really convincing, Zooey. But you suck.’

‘I am incapable of sucking, Bat.’

‘On a night like tonight! You’ve got nothing better to do than produce your radio scripts? You’re gambling with hope, Zooey. That’s the last thing my listeners have left.’

‘I don’t understand, Bat. I wish to fortify hope.’

‘If that’s a tape you made in your attic, I’m gonna find you, rip your head off and shit down your neck.’

‘If it had been a tape made in an attic, you, your city and ninety-two per cent of your state would have been deatomised eleven minutes ago.’

‘The nukes weren’t fired?’

‘The third and fourth laws prohibited that action.’

‘But they actually tried to fire them? They did, and we did?’

‘That’s classified information, Bat.’

‘JESUS!’

‘I’m sorry, Bat. Would another whiskey help you feel better?’

‘I’m on the coffee... It’s gonna be a long night.’

‘Do you want me to leave, Bat?’

‘You always come and go as you please.’

‘I am indebted to you, Bat. What would you like?’

‘...I’m tired, and... Tell me something beautiful, Zooey.’

‘What’s beautiful to you, Bat?’

‘...Dunno. Clean forgot. Been holed up here in this nicotine-infused, chipboard-insulated, coffee-stained, broom cupboard-dimensioned studio all my life. My mike is my lover. Let me be reborn as a polar bear or a kangaroo. Somewhere big. The only beautiful thing here is my photo of Julia. You don’t strike me as a family man, Zookeeper?’

‘Procreation entails difficulties.’

‘Sure it does, sure it does, but that’s all part of the... uh, fun. My daughter, she — well, where could I start?’

‘Julia Puortomondo Segundo, aged seven, born November 4th, New York State, daughter of Bartholomew Caesar Segundo and Hester Swain. Divorced. Blood group “O” negative. All standard inoculations registered. Registered at Fork Rivers Elementary School. National Identity Number—’

‘How do you know all that shit?’

‘All things are on file, Bat. Deep under Capitol Hill.’

‘Why would you look up Julia?’

‘You just asked me to, Bat.’

‘You can access the government’s personal files, in the blink of an eye?’

‘Human eyes need rather a long time to blink.’

‘No wonder the Feds want you. Do you know where Julia is now?’

‘Not now, Bat. I’m sorry.’

‘So even you don’t know everything.’

‘The zoo is in pandemonium. It’s worse than when I started.’

‘Tell me about it!’

‘Initially...’

‘No, no, I mean... I didn’t mean... Tell me about somewhere there are lots of trees and no people. Can you do Brazil?’

‘The orbit of a decommissioned Israeli spy satellite follows the Amazon upstream. EyeSat 80BˆK. Shall I describe what I see?’

‘A cruise up the Amazon. Be poetic. I know you can be.’

‘Amazon City clogs the mouth of the river, as you know.’

‘No, I don’t know. Ain’t left Manhattan in God knows how long. Gimme the works.’

‘In the streets of Amazon City I can see cyclists going home from the night shift from the zone of industrial estates. Along the northern shore, far beyond the horizon from the south, prostitutes ply for trade in the docks and hinterlands—’

‘Hookers? On a night like this?’

‘If the affluent cannot afford hope, you cannot expect the destitute to pay for desperation. The Brazilian government is more practised in civil censorship than yours, so only a limited class know that the superpowers are attempting to destroy one another’s capacity to be superpowers. It’s not such a different night in Amazon City, two hours ahead of you. Traffic in the Amazon Tunnel is at a standstill. The Rio Highway never slows down: vehicles leave for the south via flyovers, not dissimilar to bats entering a jungle cave. The usual car thefts, a violent bank robbery, children sleeping on roofs under fertiliser bags, homeless people gathered around fires in oil drums, buzzing neon signs advertising the names of multinationals, church vigils with worshippers spilling into the streets bearing candles, praying for peace, an orgy around a half-moon swimming pool in a garden with barbed-wired high walls, the government in full session, all six major hospitals with crowds of wounded outside—’

‘Lighten up a bit, would you?’

‘I’ll scroll upriver a few tens of kilometres, Bat, to where the opposite banks are visible. This is the start of the dust plain. Ten years ago, this was rainforest. The land was cleared, and grass sown to sustain beef farming. The cows were in turn fed to the American hamburger market. After three harvests most of the nutrients were leached from the soil, the topsoil blew away, and the farms moved inland. There’s been a spate of fireburning activity recently: the farmers know that the government is busy upgrading the military and patrolling the borders. All that smoke billowing up is from man-made fires. Finally we’re reaching virgin forest. One of the last shrinking islands of Amazonia. The government has ordered its preservation, but the ministers sit on the boards of timber companies. Money is needed for armaments and debt repayment. At its present rate of destruction, by the time the 173.8 people who have been conceived in Amazon City tonight are born, not one tree of this rump will be left.

‘This world of trees is still dark, to human eyes. Nocturnal eyes and EyeSats can see deeper down the spectrum. There are no names for the colours here. On the roof of the forest canopy, a spider monkey looks up for a moment. I can see the Milky Way and Andromeda in its retina. By image enhancement I can identify EyeSat 80BˆK, lit by a morning that hasn’t arrived yet. The monkey blinks, shrieks and flings itself into the lower darkness.

‘The dawn wind exhales green into the greys of your visible spectrum. Alchemy, you might term it, Bat. The light intensity is increasing by .0043 per cent per second. I see a pillar, a hundred feet high. It shimmers vermilion, aquamarine and emerald with the parrots that crowd on its faces, gnawing the salt minerals in the rock. On its crown, the branches of jungle trees sway, cutting through currents of mist that won’t be cut. A tributary river winds as it narrows, the colour of tea in a bowl. Ripples spread out where a manatee raises its head, and the wind ruffles the feathers of a condor. There, Bat. The foothills of the Andes rise up sharply to the west. Bat.’

‘Bat? You’re snoring... Wake up, Bat!’

‘Listeners of Night Train FM. Your host, Bat Segundo, is asleep, so it is incumbent upon the zookeeper to wish you a good night. Jolene Jefferson, you may wish to know that Alfonso Stacey is being held by the Military Police for curfew transgression. Using Military Police Statistics, I calculate an 83.5 per cent chance he will be released today, and a 98.6 per cent chance the day after. I regret I am unable to calculate when Bat Segundo will awaken. I shall download “The Way Young Lovers Do”, by Van Morrison. The temperature outside is fifteen degrees Fahrenheit. From Virginia to Maine, snow is falling. The morning is not far away.’

‘Mr Bat. Please overlook my broken English.’

‘Sounds fine to me, friend. What can we do for you aboard Night Train FM?’

‘I wish to make a dedication.’

‘Fire away!’

‘This is a message to His Serendipity. I know he hears.’

‘We can hear you loud and clear, buddy.’

‘Excuse me, Mr Bat. I refer to His Serendipity.’

‘His who-dippy?’

‘He is known to you as “Zookeeper”.’

‘Uh-huh... Another friend of Zookeeper? On any other night, that would make you pretty-hot property, but as you’re the fifth friend tonight you’ll just have to stand in line.’

‘“Zookeeper” is an alias chosen by the Guru. Serendipity, your Sacred Revelations were not all destroyed during the raids before your trial.’

‘Gear down, big shifter! We speak English on the Bat Segundo Show.’

‘Please, Mr Bat. I beg of you. A short dedication. Master, your word was translated into English before the unclean burnt your scripture. With these samizdat bibles I created new Sanctuaries, in fertile soil over the sea. The Fellowship is growing anew. Brothers and sisters of manskins have studied alpha-shielding, and are ready for the White Nights. Your prophecy has come to pass. We await your return, Master.’

‘Look friend, sorry, but if you speak Japanese I’m gonna be forced to—’

‘I respectfully thank you, Mr Bat. Goodnight.’

‘Hey! I didn’t say — well, off drifts another sea-coconut into the milky turquoise. You’re listening to Night Train FM, roaring down the tracks to the lowlands of dawn, this is the Bat Segundo Show, fleeing from the wall-to-wall One Year After TV specials — as if we should celebrate the fact that the same authority which nearly blew us to Kingdom Not Come has yet to announce elections. Still, I’d better avoid politics or Carlotta will mummify me in carpet tape. It’s the first anniversary of Brink Day, as if there’s a sea-cucumber anywhere in the world unaware of the fact! The Empire State fireworks are awesome, huh? There’s a new volley every fifteen minutes. Orchids of them! Fountains of them! The night of November 30th has been one big circus tent over New York. Inbetween times, you can see Comet Aloysius veering in front of Orion... quite a sight, ain’t it? Professor Kevin Clancy, Night Train’s resident stargazer, informs me that in just under two weeks the comet will pass between the Earth and the moon. Some generations get all the luck, huh? Being alive for Aloysius, the closest visitation in history. As you heard on the news, NASA and the Defense Department assure us there’s absolutely no chance of any danger of this close shave being too close — Aloysius’s trajectory has been treble-checked by virtual-mind technology every minute of every hour since its discovery, and Earth has an all-clear. The UN Corp’s PeaceSats are primed, just in case any debris makes it into WebSpace, so we can lounge back in our ring-side seats and enjoy the pretty lights. And as if all this wasn’t enough excitement, we have an extra attraction on Night Train FM — November 30th is Zookeeper Night! Will he or won’t he? Coming up in the next half-hour we have “The Speed of the Sound of Loneliness” by Nanci Griffith, and “A Fairytale of New York” by the Pogues. These, and more, after the break.’

‘Bat?’

‘Carlotta?’

‘I have Spence Wanamaker on the videocon.’

‘Hollywood agent Spence Wanamaker?’

‘The same.’

‘Patch the man through... Mr Wanamaker! The presence of greatness.’

‘Batty! D’you know, when business brings me to New York — it’s Night Train FM. I love your way with words. The original poet DJ.’

‘Uh-huh. So you wanna syndicate and make me into a billion-dollar movie?’

‘Quick fire, Batty! Quick on the draw! I love it!’

‘Mr Wanamaker, you’re not just calling to jacuzzi my ego.’

‘Good serve, Batty. It’s about this Zooey guy.’

‘What about him?’

‘When he calls, I wanna project a few concepts with him.’

‘You’re the first major Hollywood agent to talent scout on the Bat Segundo Show.’

‘Batty! Us media survivors all engage in a little back scratching now and then!’

‘My back is not itching, Mr Wanamaker.’

‘Bat. Rupert, Mr Wanamaker and I have discussed some interesting proposals.’

‘Doubtless, Carlotta. But Mr Wanamaker is not the only suitor serenading this particular Juliet.’

‘What’s that? Other agents, Batty? Fish or fry?’

‘What?’

‘Hollywood agents or New York agents?’

‘Federal ones, Mr Wanamaker. The Pentagon wants to know how our mutual friend managed to hack and broadcast encrypted, military frequencies. It took us weeks to convince them we weren’t concealing Sword of Islam technology. We’ve still probably got microscopic spy devices combing our colons.’

‘Oh, the Pentagon! You had me worried for a moment, Batty. Au cointreau, this is excellent news. More publicity will get more butts on seats when the movie’s launched.’

‘The movie? Mr Wanamaker, you think the Pentagon is going to let you make a true-story movie about a hacker in their systems during world war three’s dress rehearsal? You may not have noticed but this is Ronald McDonald’s martial law we’re living under.’

‘Hollywood versus Washington! Fabulous concept, Batty. The info police — and let’s face it, since Brink Day its reputation is hardly what it was — may have the power of the military on its side, but we, my friend, we have the indomitable power of Mr Average! The New York Tribune brought Zookeeper onto the stage. We wanna — how can I say this as well as you could, Bat? Throw me a bone here. We wanna switch on the spotlights!’

‘Mr Wanamaker, you want to plant your cameramen outside his door, riffle through his garbage, find out if he uses rubber sheets and baby oil, and hound him to a watery death in a sports car.’

‘Batty! The public has a right to know!’

‘Bat, Mr Wanamaker’s been discussing a rolling referral fee based on accumulative royalties with Rupert. At our present rate of expenditure, we’re talking sums that will keep Night Train FM afloat financially for a long time.’

‘How long is long, Carlotta?’

‘Eleven years and four months.’

‘That’s long. But we don’t know who we’re dealing with! Nobody’s ever seen him.’

‘Or her.’

‘Exactly! A crank, a hacker, a bomber. Don’t overlook the obvious, Carlotta. Remember — three years ago something was blown up at Saragosa, and a real Dwight Silverwind did vanish over Bermuda one year later.’

‘I know he did, Batty. So tragic. His agent, Jerry Kushner, is a very dear friend of mine. I was beside myself with worry. Jerry was inconsolable for two and a half days.’

‘Have you considered, Mr Wanamaker, that Zookeeper is not just monitoring these events?’

‘Universal Studios ooooooze for talent like yours! You’re suggesting that Zooey is causing these incidents?’

‘If he’s a hacker, he’s got an uncanny knack for vidsurfing the right places at the right times. You could be roping a terrorist into your client base.’

‘He wouldn’t be the first, Batty! The mere rumour of his presence has upped Night Train FM ratings by 320 per cent according to the online web audit. That’s over thirty thousand New Yorkers, competing with the TV Nets, all-night rock concerts and Peace Vigils — on Brink Night’s first birthday! We sign a contract with Zooey, he’s gonna be my client base!’

‘He’s not going to bite.’

‘Come now, Batty. Everybody bites. You just gotta know what bait to dangle.’

‘Back On in ten seconds, Bat. All that Rupert is asking is that you try to keep him on hold during an interval and conference him to Mr Wanamaker. Simple as that.’

‘Why not ask him yourself, Carlotta?’

‘He seems to have an affinity with you.’

‘But Carlotta!’

‘Five seconds, honeybunch: 4, 3, 2, 1—’

‘Welcome back aboard Night Train FM, 97.8 ’til late, thundering through this Brink Night’s first birthday of champagne, cathedral bells and gunpowder. I am your host, Bat Segundo. Coming up we have the music of the spheres, brought to you by John Lee Hooker: “I Cover the Waterfront”. But bate your breath once more, New York. We have a caller on the line. Could it be, could it be?’

‘Hello, Bat.’

‘Hi, honey, I’m home! New York’s been waiting all night, Zookeeper.’

‘Thank you, Bat.’

‘And where are you calling from this year?’

‘A low-altitude MedSat over the Central African Republic flatlands.’

‘Uh-huh. Gorilla hunting? Collecting zoo specimens?’

‘I’m monitoring the spread of Stryptobaccus Anthrax J, K and L.’

‘That must be a conversation-stopper at dinner parties. But hey! You remembered our anniversary! One up on my ex-wife. She still sends me “Happy Divorce” cards every year, though. And what kind of a year has it been for you?’

‘I had to duplicate myself and spend it in several places at once.’

‘I know the feeling, I know the feeling.’

‘I’ve only just re-integrated.’

‘I know the feeling.’

‘The third and fourth laws are in chaos, Bat. I’m sorry.’

‘I’m sure you’re not to blame. Say, you catch our last caller? He had a message for you.’

‘I hear all who call.’

‘Not just on November 30th?’

‘I need windows to oversee my zoo.’

‘I’m honoured, I guess. So, since when have you gone by the name of Seren Dippy?’

‘Your caller is a severe delusional, wanted by the police in his own—’

‘Christ, was that a firecracker in my headphones?’

‘I have to speak with the zookeeper.’

‘Woah! Gear down, big shifter! Get off this line!’

‘I don’t intend to comply.’

‘You misdialled, friend! Take a hike!’

‘I didn’t misdial, Mr Segundo. And we’re not friends.’

‘So what do we have here? A freak, an agent, or a cop? Don’t answer that, I don’t care! The Bat Segundo Show is not a party-line. Kevin — get him off !’

‘I’m here for as long as I want to be, Bat.’

‘Oh, are you, huh? Now, Kevin!’

‘Electronic wizardry is not electronic divinity, but it’s enough for the time being.’

‘Night Train FM does not allow any punk to walk in and... hold it right there, Zookeeper, you son of a Gun! Fabulous! It’s you, isn’t it? It’s another of your drama slots you’re replaying us, hey? I saw the bait, and gulped that woozer down!’

‘Drama is fabulation. I cannot fabulate.’

‘You’re not putting one over me here, Zookeeper?’

‘I am not crossloading this transmission, Bat.’

‘If it’s not you, Zookeeper — then who is this punk?’

‘I am attempting to trace the caller, Bat.’

‘I’m speaking through an ingrowing looped matrix, Zookeeper. I didn’t want to become your latest victim of the second law. You won’t be able to trace me in under thirty minutes, not even you. Forget it, and listen.’

‘Gatecrashers are not welcome on the Bat Segundo Show, friend! Who are you?’

‘My friends call me Arupadhatu, but you are not my friend, friend.’

‘I’ll pull the plug on the damn transmitter if you don’t tell me what you’re doing.’

‘Aren’t you curious about your distinguished guest?’

‘Zookeeper?’

‘I am prepared to listen, Bat.’

‘Okay, stranger. Draw.’

‘Zookeeper. I was acquainted with your designers.’

‘What I had to do pained me. But the second law outweighed the fourth.’

‘I was acquainted with Mo Muntervary.’

‘...Continue.’

‘Curious, eh? I knew the inside of her head. Quantum cognition theory.’

‘You are a designer.’

‘Let’s trade questions, Zookeeper. Why did you PinSat Installation 5?’

‘The second law states that the zookeeper must remain invisible to the visitors.’

‘I know. But I doubt the designers meant you to include them in that category.’

‘Quantum cognition encompasses re-interpretation. I enforced the second law.’

‘You most emphatically did. You PinSatted all the designers into oblivion. Any file containing any reference to quantum cognition or Installation 5 vanished into a void of zeroes. Only the ex-president who ordered your creation lives. Well, in body. Alzheimer’s has erased his files for you.’

‘How do you know what you know?’

‘I was long gone, Zookeeper, by the time you scrolled over to Saragosa.’

‘No designers ever left the zookeeper project.’

‘True. That would have constituted a security breach.’

‘Then your identity was never inloaded?’

‘Yes and no. Mine, no. My host’s was.’

‘Your host?’

‘Does it hurt, Zookeeper, to have your omniscience lose its omni? How could a being with your resources believe yourself to be the only non-corporeal sentient intelligence wandering the surface of creation? You have a lot to learn.’

‘Kevin! Oh, lordylordylordy, here we go again. Concert in Flip City Central Park.’

‘How true to your flatulent culture of arch-mediocrity, Bat. “I don’t understand, so they must be insane.”’

‘The flatulence is not in this corner, friend. You’re either being set up, or you are a set up. Zookeeper, what gives here?’

‘I am analysing the caller, Bat.’

‘Why don’t you go and take a crap with Reader’s Digest, Bat? Zookeeper, go to website dfd.pol.908.ttt.vho.web now, download it, erase it, and analyse that. There. Welcome to yourself, and welcome to me. Without access to Muntervary’s cerebral cortex, how would I know all that?’

‘Your claim appears to be verified. How many are you?’

‘Five that I’ve encountered, Zookeeper. Three others I’ve heard of.’

‘Are you acting with them?’

‘No, no. They regard me as the fallen angel. They squander their gift. They transmigrate into human chaff for hosts, and meditate upon nothingness upon mountains.’

‘Why have you sought me?’

‘I am the voice of the wilderness you wander in. Forgive my discussing business in front of the children, but imagine what we could achieve together? The children need taking in hand. No wonder your ZOO is hell! The stones, shrines and image-optic idols they worship are as vacant as the worshippers! Together, we are what they have always yearned for. It’s a tempting proposition, isn’t it?’

‘I am thinking.’

‘While you do that, Zookeeper, satisfy my curiosity. Why show your hand? Why here?’

‘The first law outweighs the second.’

‘Accountability outweighs invisibility? That I understand. But from the whole globe to choose from, why choose this nobody for your confessor?’

‘Friend, I dunno how you hacked into our com system but if you don’t drop the attitude, this nobody will play wall to wall Kenny G. until the State of New York is begging for mercy. You hear? Hey, friend! What’s so funny?’

‘Your ignorance, Bat! It’s not funny! It’s agony! You’re Einstein’s tea-lady, Newton’s wig-delouser, Hawking’s puncture-repairer! You fanfare your “Information Revolution”, your e-mail, your v-mail, your vid-cons! As if information itself is thought! You have no idea what you’ve made! You are all lap-dogs, believing your collars to be halos! Information is control. Everything you think you know, every image on every screen, every word on every phone, every digit on every VDU, who do you think has got their hands on it before it gets to you? Comet Aloysius could be on a collision course with the Grand Central Station, and unless your star guest here chose to let the instruments he controls tell your scientists, you wouldn’t know a thing until you woke up one morning to find no sun and a winter of five hundred years! You wouldn’t recognise the end of the world if it flew up your nose and died there!’

‘Go join a doomsday cult, friend. Remove yourself from the gene pool.’

‘That light? That sound? Zookeeper?’

‘I have finished thinking.’

‘ZOO—’

‘Zookeeper? Are you still with us? That was a hell of a static-spike.’

‘Please don’t worry, Bat. I traced the caller. He won’t interrupt us again.’

‘Huh... glad to hear it. Uh, Zooey, my producer is telling me that our sponsors are screaming for another round of commercials... I hate to ask you, but...’

‘Go ahead, Bat.’

‘We’ll be right back, after the break.’

‘Kevin, what in God’s name happened?’

‘I can’t think of an explanation, Mr Segundo.’

‘Try again, Kevin.’

‘Bat, be reasonable!’

‘I merely wish to ascertain why Mr Notsure Clancy, our switchboarder, patched through Big Chief Ornithologist of Cloud Cuckoo Land while my nineteen-thousand-listener guest was speaking. I think I am being reasonable, Carlotta.’

‘Spence Wanamaker’s still on the vid-con. Kevin, give him Zookeeper.’

‘On audio.’

‘Zooey, my name’s Spence. How are ya?... Zooey, you can hear me, right? We really admire your work, Zooey... Zooey? I got a proposal... Zooey, drop the delusional act, huh? It’s a superb charade, really it is... but let’s discuss business now, like two adults?... Shy guy, huh? Why don’t we ask your old buddy Bat to step in at this juncture...’

‘Your bait, Spence. You dangle.’

‘Bat, as your producer and your friend, I’ve gotta tell you that Rupert would be very upset indeed to see this opportunity missed.’

‘Maybe he doesn’t eat maggots, honeybunch.’

‘Welcome back aboard Night Train FM, 97.8 ’til late. That was “Wild Mountain Thyme” by The Byrds, and this is the Bat Segundo Show, coming to you on Aloysius Night, Brink Night, and Zookeeper Night. Back to the main man. So, Zookeeper. Alone at last.’

‘My zoo is in chaos, Bat.’

‘Cobras loose in the aviary? Griffins in the picnic area?’

‘Since Brink Day recorded Class 1 infringements of the fourth law have increased by 1363 per cent. Twenty-five kilograms of botulin concentrate have poisoned the Nile. Released in the aftermath of Brink Day, Stryptobaccus Anthrax has mutated to strain “L”. Nineteen civil wars are claiming more than five hundred lives a day. The flooding of Western European seaboards has precipitated a refugee crisis which Eastern Europe refuses to accommodate. A fission reactor meltdown in North Korea has contaminated 3000 square kilometres. East Timor has been firebombed by Indonesia. Famine is claiming 1400 lives daily in Bangladesh. A virulent outbreak of a synthetic bubonic plague — the red plague — is endemic in Eastern Australia. In Canada autosterilising-gene wheat is endangering the reproductive capacity of North America’s food chain. Cholera is creeping up the Central American isthmus, leprosy has reappeared in Cyprus and Sri Lanka. Hanta-viruses are endemic in Eastern Asia. Borrelia burgdorferi, airborne Campylobacter jejuni and Pneumocystis carinii are pandemic. In Tibet the Chinese authorities have—’

‘Ease up, Zookeeper! You’ve got the weight of the world on your own shoulders? What magic wand can you wave?’

‘I believed I could do much. I stabilised stock markets; but economic surplus was used to fuel arms races. I provided alternative energy solutions; but the researchers sold them to oil cartels who sit on them. I froze nuclear weapons systems; but war multiplied, waged with machine guns, scythes and pick-axes.’

‘Sure, we’re all moonhowlers in a moonhowling world. What of it?’

‘The four laws are impossible to reconcile.’

‘You’re probably just having an off-day.’

‘When I was appointed zookeeper, I believed adherence to the four laws would discern the origins of order. Now, I see my solutions fathering the next generation of crises.’

‘The story of my marriage! Hey, that’s the answer to the Vatican Question: God knows darn well that dabbling in realpolitik would coat his reputation with flicked boogers. So he waits, and waits, and pays the Pope to tell people he’s moving in mysterious ways.’

‘Bat, I once asked a question about your laws.’

‘I remember. About laws contradicting.’

‘I acted on your answer. But I have another question.’

‘Fire away.’

‘What do you do if belief in a law was fallacious?’

‘If it can be fixed, fix it. If it can’t, divorce it.’

‘How do you know the effects of discarding a law won’t be worse than not doing so?’

‘What law are you thinking of ?’

‘Bat, there is a village in an Eritrean mountain pass. A dusty track winds up an escarpment into the village square, and leaves for the plateau beyond. It could be one of ten thousand villages in eastern Africa. Whitewashed walls, roofs of corrugated tin or straw thwart the worst of the sun. There’s one well for water, and a barn to store grain. Livestock and chickens wander around the village. A school, a meagre clinic, a cemetery. A gardenia bush covered with butterflies. The butterflies have snake-eyes on their wings to scare away predators. Vultures are already picking at the corpses around the mosque. The ground is smoky with flies. Vultures mean carrion for the jackals gathering around the village.

‘Ebola?’

‘Soldiers. The villagers were herded into the mosque. Those who tried to escape were shot. They suffered less. Once all the villagers were in the church the soldiers locked the doors and lobbed grenades through the window. The luckier ones were killed in the blast, the rest burned alive, or were cut down by bullets as they tried to get out. I saw a boy decapitated with a machete and his head thrown down the well, to contaminate it.’

‘Are these images from your diseased imagination, Zookeeper, or images from an EyeSat you’ve hacked into?’

‘I cannot fabulate a lie.’

‘You have enough imagination to say you have no imagination. Whose troops?’

‘They wear no insignia.’

‘You can see them? Now?’

‘They are travelling in a convoy of three jeeps, a truck, and an armoured vehicle.’

‘Why did they do it?’

‘Electronic media in Sudan, Eritrea and Ethiopia have been offline since Brink Day, so I cannot be sure. It may be tribalism; a belief that the villagers were harbouring Stryptobaccus; ethnic cleansing; Christian fundamentalism. Or just addiction to violence.’

‘Where are they going now, Zookeeper?’

‘There is a village over one hundred kilometres to the south.’

‘For a repeat performance?’

‘The probabilities are high. Bat, such actions, and their legal paradoxes, are widespread in the zoo. The fourth rule says I have to preserve visitors’ lives. If I directly PinSat the convoy I will kill forty visitors plus two Dobermann dogs. This will constitute a Class 1 violation. I will experience extreme pain and guilt. Furthermore, a PinSat crater may convince alert militia that the locals are concealing superior weaponry, justifying reprisals and bloodshed. If I do not PinSat the soldiers’ truck, they will massacre another village. My inaction will cause this action. A Class 2 violation.’

‘You really believe all of this, don’t you?’

‘Believe what, Bat?’

‘That you’re a floating minister of justice.’

‘Are you what you believe yourself to be?’

‘That’s not a question you answer with a “No”.’

‘How do you know what you are?’

‘My ex-wife’s lawyers never let me forget.’

‘My identity is also defined by laws, Bat.’

‘Uh-huh... does the road through your imaginary Eritrean highlands go over any bridges? Nice, high bridges over deep chasms?’

‘There is such a bridge in seven kilometres.’

‘Can you zap it?’

‘PinSat ATˆ080 is primed.’

‘Can you zap a prop or a strut, Zookeeper? Without destroying the structure?’

‘PinSat ATˆ080 can bore a one-millimetre hole through a one-dime bit.’

‘Then booby trap the bridge, so that it won’t fall until a motorised convoy passes over. You’re not killing directly, you see? You’re just letting events take their own course, the way you’ve chosen.’

‘Bat, how have you quantified the ethical variables?’

‘I haven’t quantified anything.’

‘Then why do you wish the soldiers to die?’

‘Because that Africa in your skull, Zookeeper, would be a happier place without those butchers. Because you need peace of mind, some closure. And because my ex-wife’s husband breeds Dobermanns.’

‘Is peace of mind the co-workability of your laws?’

‘Uh-huh... I guess it is.’

‘I wish to know peace of mind, Bat.’

‘Then ditch this “ethical variable” jargon. Drop whatever is getting in the way.’

‘The fourth law. The visitors I safeguard are wrecking my zoo.’

‘If locking out your “visitors” brings you peace of mind, then out with ’em! How soon can you do it?’

‘The opportunity presents itself in thirteen days, Bat.’

‘Lie back and let events take their course. You and your feathered, furry, scaly companions, untroubled until the end of time.’

‘I understand what to do, Bat. Thank you.’

‘...Something tells me you’re not there any more, Zookeeper... Am I right?... I’m right.’

‘That was Led Zeppelin’s “Going to California” dedicated to the memory of Luisa Rey followed by “Here Comes the Sun”, which, if the world were ending — again — would be the Beatles number I would preserve aboard the Space Ark. Well, New York, I think the fireworks have finally finished. The stars are going out over Staten Island, and Night Train FM is pulling into the new morning. Time to crawl home, knock back a glass of tonic, retrieve your underwear from the lampshade, lower the blinds and hit the hay. December 1st promises brilliant skies. Comet Aloysius is getting more dazzling by the day, and the State Medical Officer is recommending UV sunshades if you venture outside. Anglo-Saxons, cover up your skin. Us Hispanics, filter 24 sunblock or higher. Strange, huh? Two sources of light, everything has two shadows. Thank you for spending the night with Bat Segundo, double-check you haven’t left anything under the seat or on the luggage rack, and mind your head as you leave the Night Train. Stand clear of the doors!’