Sunny, Bubba and Colby stood in a massive lobby. It was colder than it had been outside on Sweetwater Street. It was very quiet. The silence seemed to echo. A vague aroma of coffee tinged the air.
To their left lay a pleasant-looking sitting area, with the usual sofa and chairs and coffee table and end tables. Pleasant though it may have been, no one was presently sitting there.
A gleaming, well-polished floor filled the center of the lobby. In the center was the image of an enormous, fierce-looking eagle with a piercing gold eye and a razor-sharp beak. Its wings spread out over a solid midnight-black background of polished marble. In each of its talons it clutched two red-and-white striped candy canes, crisscrossing each other. In its beak it held a sweeping banner with strange words.
“What language is that, Sunny?” asked Bubba.
“Latin,” Sunny replied. “Aspicio illa dulcis specialis.”
“What does that mean?” Bubba asked.
“I’m not sure,” said Sunny.
“Can I help you?”
Stationed across the lobby, a receptionist sat perched behind a mahogany desk. She stared at them as if she’d just watched three hissing cockroaches scurry under the door into her pristine lobby.
Colby screamed, a high-pitched wail. Like a teenaged girl at a rock concert.
Sunny and Bubba jumped. Even the bird-like receptionist flinched.
“COLBY!!!!!!!” wailed Colby. He began jumping up and down.
Sunny and Bubba followed his line of sight and saw Parker and the four men in dark suits standing near the elevator, waiting for the car to arrive. Sunny began hopping up and down with Colby and shrieking along with him. Bubba saw her glance sideways at him. He began hopping and leaping and waving his napkin in the air as they were. He followed them as they ran over to Parker and the four men.
“Colby, Colby!” yelled Colby, “can I have your autograph?” He waved his napkin at Parker. Sunny and Bubba joined in. All three of them leaped up and down, shrieking and calling out “Colby! Colby!” They waved their white napkins in the air, shoving them toward Parker.
The elevator dinged and the silver doors slid open. Colby shoved Bubba from behind. Bubba stumbled into Parker, who fell backwards into the four men as they retreated into the elevator. Colby grabbed Sunny by the wrist and pulled her into the elevator just as the doors slid closed.
Sunny, Bubba, and Colby jumped up and down, still demanding an autograph. The elevator became a tangled, crowded cacophony of shrieking kids and angry men in dark suits poking and prodding and jostling for position.
In the center of it all stood Parker. At the sight of his friends, relief surged through him. Then another emotion welled-up within him: concern. Concern for his friends and their safety. Oddly enough, he found himself stifling a laugh at the sight of his two best friends and the one-and-only Colby Max all waving Bubba’s extra napkins and jumping up and down in an elevator. This was apparently their attempt at some sort of rescue effort.
“QUIET!”
Sunny, Bubba and Colby stopped jumping up and down. They quelled their exuberant demands for a signature. Jim stood with his hands in the air as if he’d just finished conducting an orchestra. The other three men stood looking at him as well.
“Don’t you kids know better than to jump up and down in an elevator?” said Jim.
Parker met Bubba’s sly gaze. He knew Bubba was recalling the many occasions on which they had searched Sky City South to find an empty elevator car for the sole purpose of jumping up and down in it, particularly just as it accelerated downward. When combined with an appropriately-timed leap into the air, one was afforded a half second of joyous, slightly terrifying weightlessness. It was a staple of their entertainment diet and had been for years.
“This installation is rather old. The cables could snap,” Jim continued. “We’d plummet to the bottom of the elevator shaft and get flattened like pancakes.”
“Pancakes?” Bubba said hopefully.
“And not to mention all this yelling,” said Jim, ignoring Bubba. “It hurts my eardrums. When we’re indoors we use our indoor voices. Do you understand?”
Sunny and Bubba nodded their heads in exaggerated understanding. Neal and Bob stood behind Jim, nodding along absently.
Parker caught Colby rolling his eyes and then quickly pretending to scratch an itch on his brow in an attempt to conceal his disgust.
“Good,” said Jim. He smiled kindly down at Sunny, Bubba and Colby. “Now,” he continued, in a voice which you might use to address three children who were currently someplace they weren’t supposed to be, “I’m not sure how you discovered Mr. Max would be arriving here today.”
Colby scowled at hearing Parker referred to as ‘Mister Max,’ so Parker puffed himself up accordingly.
Jim continued, “Though I suspect you were across the street at the newsstand perusing your latest comic books and happened to see us arrive.”
Sunny began nodding enthusiastically at this proposed explanation for their presence. She looked at Bubba, still nodding, and he bobbed his head in unison.
“Normally you’d have been hauled out by your earlobes by now,” continued Jim, “but seeing as how we’re having a visit from such a big star, I suppose we can make an exception long enough for you to get his autograph.” Parker puffed himself further. Colby scowled again. “That is,” said Jim, “if Colby doesn’t mind.”
Parker found Jim grinning down at him, though the hospitality felt a tad feigned.
“Well,” said Parker, “since I am such a big star, I don’t mind taking time for the little people.” He looked directly at Colby and grinned. “May I borrow a pen?” He took the napkin from Colby.
Jim procured a pen from a pocket inside his coat and Parker took it and prepared to write, noticing the pen was covered in red and white stripes. One end of the pen was hooked, and it was sheathed in tight clear plastic wrap. By all accounts it was part writing utensil, part actual candy cane. “What did you say your name was?” Parker asked. He smiled and affected a vague, dismissive air.
Colby, however, did not smile. Nor did he answer Parker’s question. The only sound was the distinct whistling of breath through Jack’s nose. Everyone turned and looked at him, even Parker and Colby.
“Sorry,” he muttered, “deviated septum. Croquet accident last summer at the company picnic.” He took a surreptitious gulp of air through a corner of his mouth and then held his breath. The whistling stopped.
“Just make it out to Parker,” said Sunny, and everyone’s attention returned to the autograph session at hand.
“To . . . my . . . good . . . friend . . . Parker,” said Parker as he wrote on the napkin. The pen’s ink flowed alternately from green to red, creating a festive scrawl on the white paper. “Pull up . . . to make the houses . . . get smaller. Yours truly . . . Colby . . . Max!” He scribbled the signature in the flamboyant fashion he’d seen Colby use in Sky City Hobbies & Toys. He smelled a pleasant, mint aroma. He looked up at Jim. “Peppermint?”
“With a touch of cinnamon.” Jim smiled and winked at him. Parker handed the signed napkin to Colby.
“Gee. Thanks,” said Colby. He took the napkin as though Parker had just blown his nose into it.
“Don’t mention it. Maybe one day you can get lucky like me and be chosen to be a star despite having no talent whatsoever.”
“Actually, I think you’re quite brilliant,” countered Colby, “and I hear you work long, grueling hours.”
“No, not really,” replied Parker. “Mostly it’s just standing around looking pretty while people fuss over you, followed by thirty seconds of actual work. You know, reciting profound messages of inspiration. Things like, ‘Take it to the max.’”
Colby batted his eyes and forced a broad. “But surely flying the Go-Boy suit requires a tremendous amount of talent and bravery.”
“Actually,” said Parker, “with a bit more special effects, a blindfolded monkey could do my job.”
Colby’s fists curled into
tight balls. His knuckles turned white. The autographed napkin protruded thoroughly crumpled from one hand.
“Can I be next?” chimed Sunny. She’d seen Colby’s fury brewing, seen him struggling to choose between maintaining their cover as hapless fans or berating Parker for the assault on his acting profession and allegedly undeserved stardom. Sunny handed her napkin to Parker, coyly turning her head. She fidgeted playfully with the front of her shirt while she kept her eyes on Parker, whose attention was finally distracted from his escalating showdown with Colby. “My name’s Sunny,” she said. “You’re much cuter in person than in the movies.”
Parker stopped writing and looked up at her, then at Colby, meeting his gaze. To whom was Sunny referring as cute? To Colby, the actual star of the Go-Boy films, or Parker, his recently-mistaken alter ego? Parker looked up at Jim and Jack, and at Neal and Bob, both of whom were hovering at the rear of the elevator car. They all seemed to be content with their own thoughts as the elevator descended smoothly, but Parker suspected their inattention was disingenuous, and when Neal’s eyes darted from whatever was so keenly interesting on the ceiling of the elevator car down to Parker and then suddenly back up again, Parker knew they were all paying close attention.
“I’ve always wanted to meet you,” said Sunny, again capturing Parker’s gaze. “All my friends at school say your movies are the greatest. But without you, they’d be really boring.”
“Oh yeah?” said Parker. He looked at Colby.
Colby stared grimly back at him.
“Yeah,” said Sunny, “and I’ve saved all the articles about you, about how you work eighteen-hour days for a month straight, and you never get to see your friends, and how, on the Go-Boy . . . Unleashed shoot down in the Bahamas, your agent said you insisted on performing your own stunts, for your fans’ sake, and you were nearly killed in a terrible explosion.” Sunny was really laying it on thick.
“You know me,” said Parker, “You gotta keep your fans happy. First rule of show-business!” He winked at Colby. Colby stared coldly back at him. “The second rule, of course, is always leave ’em wanting more, so here you go.” He handed Sunny the napkin with his phony signature scrawled in minty-fresh red and green ink.
“Thanks,” said Sunny, “you’re the best—”
“Enough!” exclaimed Colby, “I can’t take it any more! I am the real Colby Max! Not him!”
Jim and Jack looked at Colby, then Parker, and then looked at each other. Clearly they did not want to go back on sanitation duty.
“What are you talking about, kid?” asked Jim.
“I’m Colby Max!” repeated Colby. “I’m the famous actor. I’m the movie star. I’m the one who almost got blown up in the Bahamas working eighteen-hour days! It should be me autographing these stupid napkins! They wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for me!” He threw his crumpled napkin on the floor of the elevator and looked around at everyone.
Silence filled the car, punctuated by the whistling in Jack’s nose.
“Well?” said Jim, looking down at Parker.
Parker felt all eyes come to rest on him. “Well what?” he replied. “Obviously the kid is nuts. He’s just some crazy fan. I mean, look at his jacket. I wear that on the show but I wouldn’t be caught dead in that get-up in real life!”
Jim considered Colby in his flight jacket, as did everyone else.
Colby stood with his mouth open, his eyes so wide they bulged out of their sockets, so clearly affronted was he by the insult Parker hurled at his trademark flight jacket. He blinked once, then twice. His mouth closed then opened again, though he neither spoke nor made any sound at all. The only sound continued to be the whistle of Jack’s deviated septum.
Ding. The elevator chimed pleasantly and rumbled gently to a halt. The silver doors opened. Nobody moved.
“Jimbo?” said Jack. “You want me to take these three up stairs and get rid of ’em?”
Parker snuck a glance at Sunny, then Bubba. What did Jack mean . . . get rid of ’em? That phrase presented a broad range of possibilities . . . everything from a train ride back to Kingdom City to . . . what? Incarceration? A bullet in the back of the head, like they did to the prisoners of war shown on SuperVision? Or did it mean a poisoned cheeseburger served by a roller-skating waitress at the drive-in across the street?
“Nah,” drawled Jim after a long consideration. “Let’s let General Ramsey have a go at ’em. I ain’t going back on sanitation ’cause we brought the wrong kid.”
Parker chanced another sideways look at Sunny, but she was still watching Jim. This meeting with General Ramsey had to be better for Sunny, Bubba and Colby than being “gotten rid of” per Jack’s suggestion. If nothing else, they would at least remain together. Perhaps long enough to make a break for it. Perhaps long enough to find a way home.
Chapter 8
Subsuperdumbatoonerismology