Bobby was oddly nervous. He was wearing a tight fitting one-piece suit of bright scarlet, with a color morphing kerchief draped around his neck. He was a gorgeous twenty-first-century dandy, she thought, as out of place in the drab, elderly multitude around him as a diamond in a child’s seashore pebble collection.
She touched his hand. ‘Are you okay?’
‘I didn’t realize they’d all be so old’
He was right, of course. The gathering congregation was a powerful illustration of the silvering of America. Many of the crowd, in fact, had cognitive-enhancer studs clearly visible at the backs of their necks, there to combat the onset of age-related diseases like Alzheimer’s by stimulating the production of neurotransmitters and cell adhesion molecules.
‘Go to any church in the country and you’ll see the same thing, Bobby. Sadly, people are attracted to religion when they approach death. And now there are more old people – and with the Wormwood coming we all feel the brush of that dark shadow, perhaps. Billybob is just surfing a demographic wave. Anyhow, these people won’t bite.’
‘Maybe not. But they smell. Can’t you tell?’
She laughed.
‘One should never put on one’s best trousers to go out to battle for freedom and truth.’
‘Huh?’
‘Henrik Ibsen.’
Now a man stood up on the big central throne. He was short, fat and his face shone with sweat. His amplified voice boomed out: ‘Welcome to RevelationLand! Do you know why you’re here?’ His finger stabbed. ‘Do you? Do you? Listen to me now: On the Lord’s day I was in the spirit, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet, which said: ‘Write on a scroll what you see … ‘ And he held up a glittering scroll.
Kate leaned toward Bobby. ‘Meet Billybob Meeks. Prepossessing, isn’t he? Clap along. Protective coloration.’
‘What’s going on, Kate?’
‘Evidently you’ve never read the Book of Revelation. The Bible’s deranged punch line.’ She pointed. ‘Seven hovering lamps. Twenty-four thrones around the big one. Revelation is riddled with magic numbers-three, seven, twelve. And its description of the end of things is very literal. Although at least Billybob uses the traditional versions, not the modem editions which have been rewritten to show how the Wormwood date of 2534 was there in the text all along … ‘ She sighed. ‘The astronomers who discovered the Wormwood didn’t do anybody any favors by calling it that. Chapter Eight, verse ten: The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water-the name of the star is Wormwood … ‘
‘I don’t understand why you invited me here today. In fact I don’t know how you got a message through to me. After my father threw you out.’
‘Hiram isn’t yet omnipotent, Bobby,’ she said. ‘Not even over you. And as to why-look up.’
A drone robot hovered over their heads, labeled with a stark, simple word: GRAINS. It dipped into the crowd, in response to the summons of members of the congregation.
Bobby said, ‘Grains? The mind accelerator?’
‘Yes. Billybob’s specialty. Do you know Blake? To see a World in a Grain of Sand, And a Heaven in a Wild Flower, / Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand, / And Eternity in an hour … The pitch is that if you take Grains your perception of time will speed up. Subjectively, you’ll be able to think more thoughts, have more experiences, in the same external time. A longer life available exclusively from Billybob Meeks.’
Bobby nodded. ‘But what’s wrong with that?’
‘Bobby, look around. Old people are frightened of death. That makes them vulnerable to this kind of scam.’
‘What scam? Isn’t it true that Grains actually works?’
‘After a fashion. The brain’s internal clock actually runs more slowly for older people. And that’s the mechanism Billybob is screwing around with.’
‘And the problem is … ‘
‘The side effects. What Grains does is to stimulate the production of dopamine, the brain’s main chemical messenger. Trying to make an old man’s brain run as fast as a child’s.’
‘Which is a bad thing,’ he said uncertainly. ‘Right?’
She frowned, baffled by the question; not for the first time she had the feeling that there was something missing about Bobby. ‘Of course it’s a bad thing. It is malevolent brain-tinkering. Bobby, dopamine is involved in a lot of fundamental brain functions. If dopamine levels are too low you can suffer tremors, an inability to start voluntary movement – Parkinson’s disease, for instance – all the way to catatonia. Too much dopamine and you can suffer from agitation, obsessive-compulsive disorders, uncontrolled speech and movement, addictiveness, euphoria. Billybob’s congregation – I should say his victims – aren’t going to achieve Eternity in their last hour, Billybob is cynically burning out their brains.
‘Some of the doctors are putting two and two together. But nobody has been able to prove anything. What I really need is evidence from his own labs that Billybob knows exactly what he is doing. Along with proof of his other scams.’
‘Such as?’
‘Such as embezzling millions of bucks from insurance companies by selling them phony lists of church members. Such as pocketing a large donation from the AntiDefamation League. He’s still hustling, even though he’s come a long way from banknote-baptisms.’ She glanced at Bobby. ‘Never heard of that? You palm a bill during a baptism. That way the blessing of God gets diverted to the money rather than the kiddie. Then you send the note out into circulation, and it’s supposed to return to you with interest … and to make especially sure it works, of course, you hand the money over to your preacher. Word is Billybob picked up that endearing habit in Colombia, where he was working as a drug runner.’
Bobby looked shocked. ‘You don’t have any proof of that.’
‘Not yet,’ she said grimly. ‘But I’ll get it.’
‘How?’
‘That’s what I want to talk to you about … ‘
He looked mildly stunned.
She said, ‘Sorry. I’m lecturing you, aren’t I?’
‘A little.’
‘I do that when I’m angry.’
‘Kate, you are angry a lot … ‘
‘I feel entitled. I’ve been on this guy’s trail for months.’
A drone robot floated over their heads, bearing sets of virtual Glasses-and-Gloves. ‘These Glasses-and-Gloves have been devised by RevelationLand Inc., in conjunction with OurWorld Corporation, for the full experience of RevelationLand. Your credit card or personal account will be billed automatically per online minute. These Glasses-and-Gloves …’
Kate reached up and snagged two sets. ‘Show time.’
Bobby shook his head. ‘I have implants. I don’t need …’
‘Billybob has his own special way of disabling rival technologies.’ She lifted the Glasses to her head. ‘Are you ready?’
‘I guess.’
She felt a moist sensation around her eye sockets, as the Glasses extruded membranes to make a light-tight junction with her flesh; it felt like cold wet mouths sucking at her face.
She was instantly suspended in darkness and silence.
Now Bobby materialized beside her, floating in space, holding her hand. His Glasses-and-Gloves were, of course, invisible.
And soon her vision cleared further. People were hovering all around them, off as far as she could see, like a cloud of dust motes. They were all dressed in white robes and holding big, gaudy palm leaves-even Bobby to and herself, she found. And they were shining in the light that streamed from the object that hung before them.
It was a cube; huge, perfect, shining sun-bright, utterly dwarfing the flock of hovering people.
‘Wow,’ Bobby said again.
‘Revelation Chapter Twenty-one,’ she murmured. ‘Welcome to the New Jerusalem.’ She tried to throw away her palm leaf, but another simply appeared in her hand. ‘Just remember,’ she said, ‘the only real thing here is the steady flow of money out of your pockets and into Billybob’s.’
Together, they fell toward the light.
The wall before her Was punctured by windows and a line of three arched doorways. She could see a light within, shining even more brightly than the exterior of the building. Scaled against the building’s dimensions, the walls looked as thin as paper.
And still they fell toward the cube, until it loomed before them, gigantic, like some immense ocean liner.
Bobby said, ‘How big is this thing?’
She murmured, ‘Saint John tells us it is a cube twelve thousand stadia to each side.’
‘And twelve thousand stadia is … ‘
‘About two thousand kilometers. Bobby, this city of God is the size of a small moon. It’s going to take a long time to fall in. And we’ll be charged for every second, of course.’
‘In that case I wish I’d had a hot dog. You know, my father mentions you a lot.’
‘He’s angry at me.’
‘Hiram is, umm, mercurial. I think on some level he found you stimulating.’
‘I suppose I should be flattered.’
‘He liked the phrase you used. Electronic anaesthesia. I have to admit I didn’t fully understand.’