VIRGIL. I am sure that there are giant rats in the sewer tunnels beneath the Plex. I am sure that they're scared of strobe lights, and that strobes flashing faster than about sixteen per second drive them crazy. This may be related to the frequency of muzzle flashes produced by certain automatic weapons, but that's just a hypothesis. I know that there are organized activities going on at a place in the tunnels that are of a secret, highly technological, heavily guarded nature. As for the rats, I assume they were created by mutation from high levels of background radiation. This included Strontium-90 and Cesium-137 and possibly an iodine isotope. The source of the radiation could possibly have been what Casimir lost down the elevator shaft, but I suspect it has more to do with this secret activity. In any case, we now have a responsibility. We need to discover the source of the radioactivity, look for ways to control the rats and, if possible, divine the nature of the secret activity. I have a plan of attack worked up, but I'll need help. I need people familiar with the tunnels, like Fred; people who know how to use guns-- we have some here; big people in good physical condition, like Bud; people who understand the science, like Casimir; and maybe even someone who knows all about Remote Sensing, such as Professor Bud again.
An advantage of the Plex was that it taught you to accept any weirdness immediately. We did not question Virgil. He memorized a list of equipment he'd have to scrounge for us, and Hyacinth grilled us until we had settled on March 31 as our expedition date. Fred Fine said he knew where he could get authentic dumdums for our guns, and tried to tell us that the best way to kill a rat was with a sword, giving a lengthy demonstration until Virgil told him to sit down. Once we had mobilized into an amateur commando team, we found that our partying spirit was spent, and soon we were all home trying vainly to sleep.
The strike itself has been studied and analyzed to death, so I'm spared writing a full account. For the most part the picketers stayed within the Plex. Their intent was to hamper activities inside the Plex, not to seal it off, and they feared that once they went outside, S. S. Krupp would not let them back in again. Some protesters did work the entrances, though. A delegation of B-men and professors set up an informational picket at the Main Entrance, and another two dozen established a line to bar access to the loading docks. Most of these were Crotobaltislavonians who paraded tirelessly in their heavy wool coats and big fur hats; with them were some black and Hispanic workers, dressed more conventionally, and three political science professors, each wearing high-tech natural-tone synthetic-insulated expedition parkas computer-designed to keep the body dry while allowing perspiration to pass out. Most of the workers sported yellow or orange work gloves, but the professors opted for warm Icelandic wool mittens, presumably to keep their fingers supple in case they had to take notes.
The picket's first test came at 8:05 A.M., when the morning garbage truck convoy arrived. The trucks turned around and left with no trouble. Forcing garbage to build up inside the Plex seemed likely to make the administration more openminded. Therefore the only thing allowed to leave the Plex was the hazardous chemical waste from the laboratories; run-of-the-mill trash could only be taken out if the administration and Trustees hauled it away in their Cadillacs.
A little later, a refrigerated double-bottom semi cruised up, fresh and steaming from a two-day, 1500-mile trek from Iowa, loaded with enough rock-frozen beef to supply American Megaversity for two days. This was out of the question, as the people working in the Cafeteria now were all scabs. The political science professors failed to notice that their comrades had all dropped way back and split up into little groups and put their signs on the ground. They walked toward the semi, waving their arms over their heads and motioning it back, and finally the enormous gleaming machine sighed and slowed. An anarcho-Trotskyite with blow-dried hair and a thin blond mustache stepped up to the driver's side and squinted way up above his head at a size 25 black leather glove holding a huge chained rawhide wallet which had been opened to reveal a Teamsters card. The truck driver said nothing. The professor started to explain that this was a picket line, then paused to read the Teamsters card. Stepping back a little and craning his neck, he could see only black greased-back hair and the left lens of a pair of mirror sunglasses.
"Great!" said the professor. "Glad to see you're in solidarity with the rest of us workers. Can you get out of here with no problem, or shall I direct you?" He smiled at the left-hand lens of the driver's sunglasses, trying to make it a tough smile, not a cultured pansyish smile.
"You AFL-CIO," rumbled the trucker, sounding like a rough spot in the idle of the great diesel. "Me Teamsters. I'm late." The professor admired the no-nonsense speech of the common people, but sensed that he was failing to pick up on some message the trucker was trying to send him. He looked around for another worker who might be able to understand, but saw that the only people within shotgun-blast range of the truck had Ph.D.'s. Of these, one was jogging up to the truck with an impatient look on his face. He was a slightly gray-tinged man in his early forties, who in consultation with his orthopedist had determined that the running gait least damaging to his knees was a shuffling motion with the arms down to the sides. Thus he approached the truck. "Turn it around, buster, this is a strike. You're crossing a picket line."
There was another rumble from the truck window. This sounded more like laughter than words. The trucker withdrew his hand for a moment, then swung it back out like a wrecking ball. Balanced on the tip of his index finger was a quarter. "See this?" said the trucker.
"Yeah," said the professors in unison.