CHAPTER 26
TWINKIES AND SWOLLEN HEMORRHOIDAL TISSUE
Things are not as bad as they seem. They are worse.
- Bill Press
On Saturday morning it was a Space Bus full of dismal and weary travelers that left the Wawa. Oscar's Bus seat remained painfully empty, except for a couple of crushed Bud cans that nobody could bring themselves to throw away. The Team tried to keep themselves busy, but still couldn't help thinking frequently of their lost friend Oscar.
Even junk food didn't help. Bates sat with a pocket full of neglected Slim Jim's, next to Mel. On Mel’s lap sat an untouched bag full of Hostess cream filled chocolate cupcakes. Even Milo was off his feed; the dog had eaten only half the microwave pepperoni pizza that was on the seat next to him. Across the aisle Barns was actively devouring a pile of Twinkies, but it had to be considered that he was still making up for three days without any food at all.
When they were out of sight of the Wawa, Flood drove the Bus a few inches above the pavement, which saved on tire wear and allowed increased speed. In the daytime the small plume of fiery exhaust under the Bus was almost invisible; there was no indication that the other few travelers encountered on the highway noticed. If they did, they probably thought that the Bus was one of those power-sucking air cushion vehicles that were once more common.
They made good time. However, for the first time in nearly two days, they were in no real hurry to get anywhere in particular. Despite their grief, they had to make plans.
They pulled off the main highway and entered the first mountainous, forested area that they found, flew the Bus into a secluded valley, snuggled it under the cover of a stand of pine and aspen trees watered by a small stream, and powered down most of the Bus systems for the day.
Closing his eyes and visualizing a smiling, robust Oscar Oscomb that would have raged loudly against the current addle brained inertia of the melancholy Team, for the hundredth time during the last few hours Bates said a silent prayer for his friend, and gave thanks for having had the honor of knowing the man. However, in spite of their loss, they still had no time to waste. Bates reminded everyone that there was less than six days left until the end of the Earth, and called the whole Team to the front of the Bus for a meeting, with the exception of Milo, who was detailed to guard duty and jack-rabbit watching at the door of the Bus.
"OK folks," announced Bates, "we need to get organized and get to work. I'm going to assign tasks and responsibilities, but I want you to all think about what we're doing and make suggestions that you think might prove helpful. First, as you all know, our goal is to save the Earth. Is there any disagreement or discussion on that point?” He didn't expect any.
"Yes," said a perceptibly rehabilitated Barns. Food and a good night's sleep had gone a long way towards rejuvenating the whole Team, Barns in particular. "I think that an alternative mission should be seriously considered.”
Bates and the others were completely surprised as Barns continued. "Let me begin by asking all of you a question. Do any of you have the slightest idea how to stop Dannos?” It was the central issue that had been nagging at each of them from the moment they had first found out about the problem.
"I had hoped," replied Bates, "that we might find some ideas in the data cubes, in accordance with our interpretation of the Jigs riddles.”
"Of course," said Barns. "The riddles and cubes are interesting to academia inclined professionals such as us. But based on what we can conceive of as actual science-supported possibilities for actions, does that even make any sense? Do you know what we are talking about here? After decades of trying we can't even control an Earthquake or a thunderstorm, and that's child's play compared to stopping Dannos. And we only have a few days, not years!”
Barns turned to Mel. "Well Dr. Guthery, can we blow it up?”
Mel shook his head sadly. "From what Janet has told me, it's an iron-core asteroid at least ten miles across. I doubt that Earth ever possessed the arsenal that could blow it up completely. Perhaps if some of the nuclear arsenal of decades ago could have been applied to it earlier, that would have been enough to destroy or divert it.”
Barns turned to Norma. "Dr. Carbuncle, do we possess an arsenal?”
"Well, no," she replied. "We had a small one, but it's missing. That's what I was checking on just before we left the Base. Annex 10 is empty! I'd probably have brought it up earlier, but I've been busy throwing up most of the time since then."
She went on to explain that the celebrated, historic public dismantling of the 'last nuclear bomb' a decade ago had been a hoax. The DOD had preserved three 'emergency' nuclear devices in Annex 10. This was shocking news to Bates and the others. Equally shocking was the fact that the supposedly nonexistent bombs were now actually missing.
"How powerful are they?" Janet asked.
"Not very. Each equivalent to fifty kilo-metric tons of TNT. They used to be considered mere tactical weapons," Norma replied. "Why?”
"Because," replied Janet, "a hundred fifty kilo-tons is exactly the size of the explosion that some of my colleagues calculated would have been needed to change the course of Dannos seven years ago!”
"Fudge Winkies!” snorted Bates. "The Ra!”
"How could something like this happen?" asked Janet.
Barns had the answer. "I'm afraid that only three people at DOD knew about the bombs hid on the Base. Myself, Norma, and Melberg."
The assembled Team groaned. Melberg again! It was clear to everyone that the Ra had used mankind's own bombs to put Dannos on its deadly course!
"But why bother?" asked Mel. "I can't believe that a society as advanced as the Ra had to depend on human technology to divert Dannos.”
"True enough," explained Barns. "But it seems to me just the sort of irony that the Ra would appreciate. It's the way they think. They like to put something over on their enemies. Hidden agendas and so forth. Trick somebody into shooting themselves with their own gun, and they would probably be twice as happy about it as shooting them outright with Ra guns. But the main point is that nuclear bombs were our only conceivable approach, and we simply don't have any."
"OK," said Bates, "so we still don't have any bombs. We've known that all along, so what's the point of your point?"
Barns was pacing the Bus isle, as he launched himself back into his lecture. After a couple days of food and rest he seemed more like the old Barns. Bates sort of liked the tired, helpless, terrified Barns better.
"My point is this, we can't save the Earth. I'm sorry, but we simply can't. That's a hard thing to face, I know, but we shouldn't waste our time on fantasy. Instead, we should try to do something valuable that we have a good chance of accomplishing."
"And what's that?" asked Bates.
"Well, let's look at what we could do with this Bus," said Barns. "We can put a small group of humans in orbit for several months, with data and tools to rebuild a civilization, plus some seeds and maybe even a few small animals. After the worst of the disaster is over, we could land and start re-populating the Earth.”
"I see some technical problems," said Norma. "This Bus is a short range transport, not a space station. It's simply not designed for voyages of more than a few weeks, tops, with a small crew. Less than that, if you carry the crowd that you'd need to replenish at least several species of plants and animals."
Bates breathed a sigh of relief. It looked like Norma was going to scuttle the Barns agenda.
But Norma wasn't through talking. "Instead, I would propose orbiting only a few breeding age females and sperm banks. We should also add some additional equipment to provide better air and water recycling.”
"And I would suggest that we establish supply deposits in remote areas on Earth out of the direct impact zone," added Mel. "We wouldn't have to put heavy tools, data, food, and seeds in orbit, at least not right away. They could be recovered after the impact, but before the destruction spreads to them.”
Barns sat nodding his head and smiling. "That's a start.
There isn't much time to do the job, but I think we have a pretty good chance. Do we all agree?"
Bates had sat quietly, his mood growing blacker by the moment. "Never!” he erupted. "I will not simply abandon the rest of humanity that way, or the American public. I'm a Government man, a servant of the people. What you propose would be just like a crew abandoning its passengers on a sinking ship. I know that from a logical scientific standpoint my plan seems totally hopeless, but sometimes you have to make decisions based on other things.
“I confess that right now I don't know what will stop Dannos. Maybe it won't be science; not human science anyway. I think we have to look for the visitors from afar, like Jigs said, and take it from there. It sounds like a crazy long shot, I know. But this other plan of yours, I'm sorry; I want no part of it. I wouldn't want to be the one to pick what species to save, and what breeding females have to survive to see everything else destroyed. And I wouldn't want to be sitting up there in orbit with the Ra for even just several days, either. The Bus would be a sitting duck in space. More important, I won't sit up there safely in space and watch Earth get smashed and everything and everybody die. And finally, I'm just not going to let the Ra get away with this, period. This is our planet, damn it! All or nothing!”
Bates had done his best, but there was no immediate supporting response at all from his companions, as he had hoped there would be. Instead, several of his silent friends avoided his gaze. Barns sat gloating. Frustrated and disappointed, Bates suddenly felt compelled to simply get away from the others. He got up and walked to the door. "This is too important a decision for one person to make," he said. "You know what my vote is. Why don't the rest of you hash it out. I'm going to take Milo for a walk. If you decide to go with the Barns plan, just leave a few days rations for Milo and me. This would be as good a place as any to spend the few days that are left. Even with snakes.” Then he and Milo walked away.
After a moment's silence, heated debate began.
An hour later Mel went looking for his friend. He found him and Milo a short distance away, in a small grove of Aspen next to the life-giving stream that wound through the valley.
"Hi Mel," Bates said. "I was just thinking of how I met Milo. Did I ever tell you that story?"
"No," replied the physicist.
"Well, a few years ago I decided that I wanted a dog."
"Sure, why not," remarked Mel.
"So I went the library and extensively researched the subject."
"Of course."
"Essentially, I studied breeds and assigned values to each characteristic, then determined what I wanted in a dog and assigned values to those."
"Then you of course numerically integrated the product of the two sets of numbers, said Mel.
"Naturally. Anyway, the best breed for me turned out to be the Australian Shepherd, with a score of 0.86, after normalization."
"Milo's an Aussie Shepherd?"
"I haven't the slightest idea what the hell Milo is. A couple weeks after my study, I bought an everything-on-it Pizza at Tony's. When I came out, there was Milo. He followed me to my car and jumped in and got into my pizza. The rest is history.” He patted Milo's head affectionately.
"It was fate," suggested Mel.
"It was a hungry dog and the smell of good Pizza. But the point is, Milo and I couldn't be a better match, and research and planning had nothing at all to do with it. Sometimes you just have to follow your instincts and go with the flow. Now, logic might tell us that Barns' approach' is best, but there's too much that we'd be losing."
"I was just thinking that we'd lose these forests," remarked Mel, looking around them.
Bates leaned against a young Aspen trunk and ran his fingers across the hard, smooth bark. "Did you know that Aspen propagate through their root systems? This whole grove could actually be a single tree, much more ancient and massive than the biggest Sequoia, and in a week it could be gone. Because of us. Because a race we never even knew existed hates humanity and wants to wipe us out. If we humans weren't here this Aspen would be safe.” He sat down next to Milo so that he could vigorously pet and scratch the grateful dog. “Not to mention dogs. I’ve grown sort of partial towards dogs. I wonder if Barns would have us leave all the dogs behind to die?”
Mel sat down beside his friend. "And cats too. You know that my house is full of cats. One of my cats is expecting kittens in about a month, Bates, and there's nothing cuter in this universe than kittens. Then there are my kids and a billion other kids to consider. And here's another little thing that will be lost, Bates. Without civilization we won't have any more of this!” Mel pulled out a small yellow tube that he had bought at the Wawa that morning.
Bates recognized it immediately. "Excellent stuff," he said.
"Have you ever read the ingredients?" asked Mel.
Bates read the tube. He had to take off his glasses to read the small print. If he lived past next week, he would get bifocals, he told himself. There were operations and contacts what would do a better job, but he was a glasses man, through and through. Tradition. More important, they were cheaper. He finally located the list of ingredients. "Yeast cell derivative and shark liver oil!” he exclaimed in amazement.
"Yep," replied Mel. "Now how long do you suppose it would take humanity to re-discover the fact that those particular ingredients shrink swollen hemorrhoids?”
"Oh, I don't know," replied Bates, "someone could find it out quite readily by accident I suppose.” They laughed as they visualized the improbable juxtaposition of the items required. Ouch!
"Only if there are any sharks and yeast left," said Mel. "Anyway, that was one of my arguments to the Team for your plan.”
"That's the best argument that you could think of? The potential loss of hemorrhoid cream to humanity?"
"Well, you already used up the best ones," explained Mel.
"You know Mel, I've been thinking about Barns. While he was recovering and sort of out of it I was actually beginning to like the guy. Now he seems to be reverting to form. Maybe it's all those Twinkies he eats. Maybe it's been the Twinkies for all these years!”
"A reasonable hypothesis my friend" agreed Mel. "In retrospect that's when the trouble started; after he ate about ten Twinkies.”
"Well," reasoned Bates, "I've never seen anyone affected that way by Twinkies before, but then I've never seen anyone eat ten Twinkies at once either. So anyway, I've seriously considered taking the man's Twinkies away from him, like the Ra did. That would obviously test my evil Twinkie hypothesis.”
"And?" asked Mel.
"I've rejected the idea based on moral principles. A man has a right to his Twinkies. That's probably in the Constitution someplace. Besides, they’re the best damn things I’ve ever eaten, bar none, artificial flavoring or whatever and all.” Having exhausted that irrelevant subject, Bates got right to the main point. "So Mel, how does my position fare?"
"Not too well," admitted Mel. "But you have some strong support. Hank, Flood, and Elizabeth, certainly.”
Bates sighed. A gate guard, a pilot and a coed. No scientists? “What about you, Mel?”
Mel couldn't bring himself to look at his friend. "Most of us are undecided, Narb. I'd say my heart and gut are leaning your way, but my intellect is leaning the other way. But I argued mostly on your side, this time."
Bates took a slow deep breath. Even Mel was leaning towards the Barns plan! ”So then, was anything decided?"
"Yes. A compromise, of sorts. We decided to spend the rest of the day on your plan, and then vote again the first thing tomorrow.”
Just like the Government, thought Bates. Delay a decision and do a study. But at least it gave his plan, what there was of it, a little more time.
As they walked back to the Bus, Bates wandered if Mel's tube of hemorrhoid cream or Barns' Twinkies would end up saving the Earth, or dooming humanity. It seemed amazing how the little things can change the course of history. On the other hand, he supposed that the unmeasured cumul
ative effects of hemorrhoids and sweets on human history had probably already been enormous for many thousands of years. Maybe hemorrhoid cream and Twinkies had already saved humanity several times over without anyone even noticing.
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