They had all listened spellbound, and when he was done, they jumped up with cheers and whoops. Dex Fresser bowed, smiling, and then, hearing a command, whirled around. The Fan had almost crept its way off the windowsill, and he saved it with a swoop of the hand.
In the middle of the month, as the ridges of packed grey snow around the Plex were beginning to settle and melt, negotiations between the administration and the MegaUnion froze solid and all B-men, professors, cletical workers and librarians went on strike. To detail the politics and posturings that led to this is nothing I'd like to do. Let's just say that when negotiations had begun six months before, the Union had sworn in the names of God, Death and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse that unless granted a number of wild, vast demands they would all perform hara kiri in President Krupp's bedroom. The administration negotiators had replied that before approaching to within a mile of the bargaining table they would prefer to drink gasoline, drop their grandchildren into volcanoes, convert the operation into a pasta factory and move it to Spokane.
Nothing unusual so far; all assumed that they would compromise from those positions. All except for the B-men, that is. After some minor compromising on both sides, the Crotobaltislavonian bloc, which was numerous enough to control the Union, apparently decided to stand their ground. As the clock ticked to within thirty minutes of the deadline, the Administration people just stared at them, while the other MegaUnion people watched with sweaty lunatic grins, waiting for the B-men to show signs of reason. But no.
Krupp came on the tube and said that American Megaversity could not afford its union, and that there was no choice but to let the strike proceed. The corridors vibrated with whooping and dancing for a few hours, and the strike was on.
As the second semester lurched and staggered onward, I noted that my friends had a greater tendency to drop by my suite at odd times, insist they didn't want to bother me and sit around reading old magazines, examining my plants, leafing through cookbooks and so on. My suite was not exactly Grandma's house, but it had become the closest thing they had to a home. After the strike began, I saw even more of them. Living in the Plex was tolerable when you could stay busy with school and keep reminding yourself that you were just a student, but it was a slough of despond when your purpose in life was to wait for May.
I threw a strike party for them. Sarah, Casimir, Hyacinth, Virgil and Ephraim made up the guest list, and Fred Fine happened to stop by so that he could watch a Dr. Who rerun on my TV. We all knew that Fred Fine was weird, but at this point only Virgil knew how weird. Only Virgil knew that an S & S player had died in the sewers during one of Fred Fine's games, and that the young nerd-lord had simply disregarded it. The late Steven Wilson was still a Missing Person as far as the authorities were concerned.
Ephraim Klein was just as odd in his own way. We knew that his hated ex-roommate had died of a freak heart attack on the night of the Big Flush, but we didn't know Ephraim had anything to do with it. We were not alarmed by his strange personality because it was useful in parties-- he would allow no conversation to flag or fail.
Virgil sat in a corner, sipping Jack Daniels serenely and staring through the floor. Casimir stayed near Sarah, who stayed near Hyacinth. Other people stopped in from time to time, but I haven't written them into the following transcript-- which has been rearranged and guessed at quite a bit anyway.
HYACINTH. The strike will get rid of Krupp. After that everything will be fine.
EPHRAIM. How can you say that! You think the problem with this place is just S. S. Krupp?
BUD. Sarah, how's your forest coming along?
EPHRAIM. Everywhere you look you see the society coming apart. How do you blame S. S. Krupp alone for that?
SARAH. I haven't done much with it lately. It's just nice to have it there.
CASIMIR. Do you really think the place is getting worse? I think you're just seeing it more clearly now that classes are shut down.
HYACINTH. You were in Professor Sharon's office during the piano incident, weren't you?
FRED FINE. What do you propose we do, Ephraim?
EPHRAIM. Blow it up.
CASIMIR. Yeah, I was right there.
HYACINTH. So for you this place has seemed terrible right from the beginning. You've got a different perspective.
SARAH. Ephraim! What do you mean? How would it help anything to blow up the Big U?
EPHRAIM. I didn't say it would help, I said it would prevent further deterioration.
SARAH. What could be more deteriorated than a destroyed Plex?
EPHRAIM. Nothing! Get it?
SARAH. You do have a point. This building, and the bureaucracy here, can drive people crazy-- divorce them from reality so they don't know what to do. Somehow the Plex has to go. But I don't think it should be blown up.
FRED FINE. Have you ever computed the explosive power necessary to destabilize the Plex?
EPHRAIM. Of course not!
CASIMIR. He's talking to me. No, I haven't.
HYACINTH. Is that nerd as infatuated with you as he looks?
ARAH. Uh... you mean Fred Fine?
HYACINTH. Yeah.
SARAH. I think so. Please, it's too disgusting.