BigBug

It was a clear cold icy day in Amsterdam. The Dutch loved it. They were happy. They could skate on their rivers, lakes and canals and there was a good chance, for the first time in years, it might be cold enough for the eleven canal skating race to take place. Seamus was sitting in the warmth and comfort of Finnegan’s pub, watching through the frosty snow speckled window, the Dutch who had dodged off work, skating up and down the Wittenkade canal that ran past the pub. He was doing the books for Marjolien and getting the place ready for opening in the afternoon. He finished his work, and rang a geologist who was working at the Vrije University, Amsterdam, the VU. His name was Dr. Igor Beria. Seamus explained to Igor Beria that his friend, Moon had dug up this odd rock in a potato patch in Amsterdam. The rock was magnetic and a magnet stuck strongly on it and he thought it might be a meteorite of some kind. Igor was sceptical.

“It is probably slag, Mr Mulgreavey. Meteorites are very uncommon and most objects sent in for analysis that are magnetic do in fact turn out to be slag or some other man-made artefact.”

“Well, we don’t think it's slag. It has a specific density of 3.9, it does not scratch glass and it appears to be burnt uniformly on the surface, forming a thin black skin or crust. I think it is a fusion crust. Perhaps, more interesting under the microscope; there are many small circular shapes which I think may possibly be chondrules.”

There was a pause as Igor digested this information. A flicker of interest across the ether.

“Chondrules are unique to meteorites Mr Mulgreavey,” he said in his thick East European-Russian-Cold War-KGB type accent, “so they are probably some other type of spherules but it does sound interesting. I will examine this rock for you in my laboratory.”

“Ok, that’s good. Where shall we meet, and when?”

“I am a very busy man but I can meet you. This afternoon is fine. Is that ok?”

“Sure where do we meet?”

“At the tram stop outside the VU. When I finish work at 16.30 hrs. Is that agreeable Mister Mulgreavey? Do you know where the VU tram halt is?”

“I’m sure I’ll find it. I mean it’s not rocket science. Ok, and I will bring the slice of the rock.”

“You have cut the rock?”

“Yes, otherwise how could I look inside it?” Well, that made sense to Seamus.

He grunted and sighed, and there was a short but distinctly disapproving silence. “With what did you cut the rock with?”

“With a stone cutting saw I hired from Bo-rent. A saw with a 25 cm diamond blade.”

“That is not such good thing to do with a geological sample, Mister Mulgreavey. A sledgehammer to crack an egg as you English says.”

“I’m not English, I’m Irish and we don’t batter eggs or nuts with sledge hammers.”

“Irish?”

“Yes. I am an Irishman.”

“Ah!” he said as if that explained everything.

“It won’t be me, you are meeting, Mr Beria.”

“Please call me Igor.”

“You will be meeting my friend, Mr Moon. It’s his rock. How will we recognise you, Igor?”

“I will be standing on the platform by the timetable schedule with a banana in my right hand at precisely 16.34 hrs.”

“A banana?”

“Yes, a banana. A yellow, blotchy, vile banana.” He sounded pissed off.

“When Mr Moon arrives, I will throw the banana into the rubbish bin provided as I do every day. I detest bananas and I cannot understand why anyone persists in placing them in someone’s packed lunch.”

“Ok, Mr Moon will see you at 16.34 hrs. at the VU tram halt. Bye Igor.”

“Good. A word of advice, please do not cut my sample further. Good day Mr Mulgreavey.”

The way he said, “My sample,” you would think he believed it was his rock. And what was all that about the banana? Well, Seamus had been warned that scientists are somewhat eccentric. It was only 13.30 hrs. Plenty of time to arrange for Moon to deliver the rock. Seamus left Finnegan’s and went across to the apartment in Marnixstraat to give Moon the good news. Someone, a doctor of geology no less, was going to examine the meteorite. ‘Happy days are here again’, he thought.

Moon was sitting at the table, staring up into deep space and smoking a joint of Northern Lights. He grew the super weed himself, in his plantation in Seamus’s basement, with much love, great care, and devoted attention. He was listening to and watching Johnny Rotten on his laptop disturbing the peace.

The rock and the slice of rock were missing from their perch.

“Where’s the meteorite Moon?”

“It’s sleeping with the fishes.”

Seamus looked at the screen on his laptop – no, he was not watching, The Godfather, just his idols the Sex Pistols.

“Moon, we have a doctor of geology who is going to look at the rock for us - an expert in igneous petrology.”

“They said no water on Mars? Well, there is now.”

“Which means?”

“Sure, Mars is covered with water.” He pointed at his fish tank. “It’s up over the roofs. It’s a deluge. A Martian tsunami.”

He was staring at his fish tank now and there, inside the tank, was the main mass of the meteorite resting on its flat bottom, its nose pointing out of the water and on top of this, perhaps, the most valuable of rocks, was a small turtle peering down into the tank, where on the bottom, a sucker fish had attached itself to the slice of rock they were to take to Igor. All Moon’s fish were merrily swimming around the rock.

Seamus didn’t get upset. There was no point. He lifted the rock and the slice of rock out of the aquarium, set them on the table and dried them off. There should be no damage. This rock had lain in the waterlogged garden for thousands of years and the land was reclaimed land so it was possible the rock had been buried under the seabed for a long, long time. There was no use asking, Moon why he put the rocks into the fish tank. No point at all. He might tell you this, he might tell you that, but no rhyme or reason to it all at all, just, Moon mysticism and PIE. Seamus went military on him to get his attention.

“I have arranged for you to go and meet a, Dr Igor Beria, at the tram halt outside the VU at 16.34hrs. He will be standing beside the timetable schedule and you will recognise him because he will be carrying a blotchy banana in his right hand. When you approach him, he will throw the blotchy banana into the rubbish bin and then ID himself. Do you have that, Legionnaire?”

“A banana,” said Moon mystified and he began to laugh; long, loud green-grass giggles that ended up in hiccups every time he tried to speak. He pointed at Seamus, “and here’s me thinking I was the only weirdo in Amsterdam. Apart from that fucking cat. Nothing is weirder than that cat.”

“Murphy? What’s Murphy got to do with it?”

“I had the rock laying by me bed, beside me head to get the vibes and Murphy pissed on it while I was asleep. That ” confided Moon, “is why I put it in the fish tank and bought a wee turtle to guard it. He knows,” said Moon addressing the cat, who was peeping around the door at him, “that he is not allowed in the fish tank so if he thinks the meteorite is a piece of the fish tank eco system, he will leave it alone. QED, which is Latin for quite easily did. I did wash it before I put it in. Did you know the price of turtles has gone up 73% in six months and there are still wankers out there who say there is no such thing as Global Warming? They are everywhere.”

“That’s great – good to know,” said Seamus, “they will be tracked down and eliminated. Well done, Legionnaire Moon.”

“Sure, where would you be without me and the EWABs?” said Moon.

Much better off flashed through Seamus’s mind but that was an unkind thought and therefore unutterable to a friend.

“A banana,” said Moon. “Carrying a blotchy banana. No problem. Advance friend and be recognised. What’s the password? FIFI! And the reply is - yes we have no bananas. Lay down your banana. No bananas! No bananas! Pass friend and no slipping.” And he had another fit of the giggles. Who needs laughing gas when you can grow Northern Lights to this very high and most demanding standard?

Moon was delighted to be going on his secret mission especially when I told him Igor was from Russia or some other workers’ paradise. When he left, Seamus e- mailed Act labs analytical lab requesting them to carry out priority chemical analysis on the rock. Seamus packaged a ten-gram sample of the rock, which he knew was going to be destroyed in the process, with the letter. He went to the post office and sent it off by express, recorded delivery. Seamus came back to the apartment and worked away on the web, researching meteorites.

All information regarding meteorites was automatically transmitted to Data. All information regarding meteorites, comets, asteroids, UFO’s or any other extra-terrestrial objects was sent to DATA on a daily worldwide basis and analysed. DATA listened to the recording of the conversation Seamus had with Dr Igor Beria on his mobile a few seconds after the call. It read Seamus’s email to Actlabs and noted his description of the rock and what analysis he wanted them to carry out. The humans wanted Actlabs to test the rock to find out if it was a meteorite or no. They had mailed Actlabs a ten-gram sample of the specimen. They stated the rock was found here in Amsterdam. How very interesting! Mr Moon was meeting a Dr Igor Beria, a geologist working at the V.U, at 16:34 hrs. to give him a 100-gram slice of the rock for examination. Such power was being handed over at a tram halt in Amsterdam and the two humans had cut the DATA rock up a big power saw. DATA shuddered. This vandalism had to be stopped. The sample had to be retrieved. DATA notified Bigbug.

Moon returned from his appointment with Dr Igor Beria at the VU.

“Mission accomplished,” said Moon.

“What was Igor’s lab like?”

“Oh, I didn’t see any lab. Are you sure that fella is some sort of geology professor? Is he a zoologist? He better not be doing animal experiments otherwise we will have to notify the Animal Rights. He is not researching chimps or monkeys or anything like that, is he? Him hating bananas and everything, right? But he arrived exactly on time, wearing one of those Kremlin furry-collared-spy coats and a Russian hat. I thought you were joking about the banana but he whipped out a banana from his pocket held it in his right hand and waved it at me.”

Moon paused to light his pre-rolled joint.

“What did you do?”

“I pulled my banana out of my pocket and waved it back at him.”

“You brought a banana with you?”

“Yeah, bought two in the Albert Hein at Central Station just in case he brought a mate, and besides, the Russians are past masters at psychological warfare. This Russian doesn’t want to think he can pull the wool over our eyes by pretending he is madder than us.”

“Heaven’s forbid and it is not good for the west or the planet if Russians attempt the impossible.”

“Fuck off! You know as well as me all those cold war clots, mutually assured destruction demons, are completely insane and profoundly paranoid. Let me tell you what happened. So I wave the banana at him. He waves his banana in recognition, then throws his banana into the rubbish bin then he says to me, please do you mind, Mr Moon? He takes my banana out of me hand using a hanky and him looking at the banana like it’s a gangrenous dog turd and he throws my banana into the bin too.” Moon was somewhat fascinated by this.

“So what did you do?”

“There was nothing I could do. It was check mate.”

“What happened then?”

“Well, we eyeballed each other for a bit like they do at Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin and the DMZ in Korea. Then, he says, do you have the rock, Mr Moon?’”

“I do, says I and I hands over the slice to him. He stuffs it into his pocket and says, ‘You and your friend will be contacted as soon as we have information for you.’”

Moon said this in a very passable Russian accent.

“He scuttled off and I followed him. He went across the road got into a fairly new Mercedes 320, it was black and I wrote down the registration, 74JR19, and then he drove off.”

“Wait a minute,” said Seamus, “did you get any ID from this guy or any kind of receipt?

“No.”

“How do you know he was a Russian?”

“Only a Russian could play chess with a banana and get results like this.”

“I’m going for a pint.”