The Click

For several weeks after visiting the CIA Library, Oliver Hitchcock brow beat

himself into believing he could find more on the Click, especially on those dissidents who seemed to have vanished into the blogosphere. At some point he gave up and called on his friend once again.

“Listen, Julian, I will explain everything, but not over the phone. Why don’t we meet at the Pearly Gate? … …. You’ve never been there? … In that case we will

definitely meet there. It’s on E Street, North West, up from Seventh. … Yes, tomorrow night at nine will work, and you’re in for a treat.”

Before he knew it, Hitch found himself meandering down Pennsylvania Avenue and up Seventh before turning right on E Street. There on his left stood the entrance to the Pearly Gate, big as life. Ellen Dee WELCOMES YOU to The Pearly Gate read the marquee in alternating blue and white lights chasing after themselves above the front entrance like greyhounds chasing a pound of flesh. Hitch felt comfortable seeing it. He spent many hours there since discovering he wasn’t going to be done in by the Click. But then his feeling of well-being quickly dimmed dark, as if he were the pound of flesh caught in the grips of a man-eating puzzle he could not solve. This wasn’t a social night out, nor was it a game.

“I’m sorry, sir, this is a private establishment. Entrance is by invitation only,” a recently hired young man perched behind a standup desk and dressed in a tuxedo announced as Hitch was about to enter, as he tried to put behind him the frustration he felt.

Hitch pulled a membership card from his wallet and handed it to him. “I’m Oliver Hitchcock and I left a message to have Julian Iscar meet me in the lounge if he arrived ahead of me.”

“One moment please, Mr. Hitchcock.” The man behind the desk tapped on the screen of his ultrathin shell which like other computation shells housed all types of transceivers making it possible for the actual software processing to take place remotely, somewhere in the blogosphere most peopled guessed not being familiar with the Spider Rooms dotting the planet. From protolytes above, computations, data, in fact everything that made the computation shell do its job could be streamed into and out of the device that contained only the transceivers, a video screen, a keyboard, and video/audio means. In that way the shell could be designed as an ultrathin tablet, light weight, and extremely inexpensive to manufacture. Indeed, all computation shells and other such digital devices including portable tablets, computabs they were called, and scuds were built in the same way and relied upon Spider Room processing. All such devices fascinated Hitch. He loved the latest and greatest almost as much as a good bottle of whisky, a straight flush, a pretty woman, and a challenging covert operation.

After several more taps at his screen, the tuxedoed man made a call on his scud, and a minute later a beautiful brunette who couldn’t have been more than eighteen appeared and introduced herself as Vanessa. “Follow me, Mr. Hitchcock.” She led him across thick red carpet with bright gold edging down a wide hallway past a number of double doors on both sides, each guarded by a tuxedoed sergeant-at-arms similar to the bouncer out front. One of the doors happened to open just as Hitch walked by. His eyes widened and he froze in place for a second, just long enough to take in a gigantic casino lit up like an indoor football stadium. He hadn’t played on green felt for years, ever since graduating from Gamblers Anonymous. Fortunately they continued on and stopped in front of a guard-free door labeled Lounge C.

“Here we are Mr. Hitchcock. Mr. Iscar is waiting for you at the bar.

Hitch stepped into what appeared to be a dark, empty room but after a second or two his eyes adjusted and he saw a man waiving him over.

“Hitch, my friend, have a seat and buy me a drink. Apparently my money is no good here.”

Hitched laughed. “That’s right; but before we drink, let me take you on a tour.”

Hitchcock led him from the bar into the wide hall where they entered the first set of double doors on the right and found themselves in the back of a theatre. In front of them were at least four hundred seats filled with an audience mesmerized as it watched a modern ballet up on stage, burlesque style—mostly naked women waiving semitransparent colored scarves four and five feet long. A few minutes later they proceeded up the hall and edged into the casino that Hitch caught sight of when he first arrived. It was one of the largest he had ever seen and wished he were still playing. To his right, three steps up, a raised floor of poker tables came into view causing his heart to pound against his ribcage. Julian knew the look and quickly steered his old friend back out. After poking their heads into a fancy restaurant, a bowling alley/pool hall, and a large steam room, they wound their way back to the bar and ordered beers on tap from Rudy Havercamp, originally from New Orleans, heavy set, white and Cajun to the core. He wore a firearm, one of the classic low level red lasers, on his hip. Hitch could never get over the idea of civilians carrying fire arms, civilians who had no idea how to use them. But they did and it scared the hell out of him.

“So, being the intuitive librarian you are, Julian, what is it you observed on our little tour?”

“That it takes big bucks to be a member in this palace of fine art.” “Yes, that’s mostly true, but what else.” “I give up, what?”

“The people, the members as you call them. They are all men approaching seventy-five if not already there, well-to-do dirty old men—waiting to die.”

“Are you saying that all these people have heard the Click?”

“Many have heard it, felt it—whatever it is that happens letting you know the clock’s ticking, or soon will. But in any case, they are waiting to die and, as you know, they only have around three months following the death knell until it happens, which they take one day at a time. And if they can afford it, why not enjoy every last second.”

“And their little women stay home darning casket linings?”

“Not at all. The women’s version is just as elaborate … if not more so.”

Julian picked up the napkin under his drink. Ellen Dee’s Pearly Gate. “So who is Ellen Dee?”

“Ha! Ellen Dee is a very profitable corporation. LND—your Last Ninety Days of life. We promise you’ll enjoy them, at least that’s what’s mounted over the urinal in every Ellen Dee men’s room, and all of the matchbooks and napkins include a reminder that the Click is your key to Ellen Dee. See for yourself.” Hitch picked up his napkin and turned it over to show him.

“Okay, I buy that, but what is it you’re searching for?” “Julian, do you know how this Click thing works?

“Of course. Everybody does. It has to do with our genetic makeup that somehow got screwed up or accelerated during, during …”

“During the time of the great ERAM-V plague,” Oliver Hitchcock was quick to add. “Or it was the All Mighty or Mother Nature poking a nose in our business.”

“Right. And when you hear the Click your biological clock begins winding down and you’re gone within three months or so. But what does that have to do with you?

“How old do you think I am?”

“I always assumed you were about my age, sixty-five.” Julian looked around, then at his napkin. “God! I’m sorry, Hitch, I didn’t realize you were …”

“No, Julian, I’m not going to die in ninety days, not for a long while I hope. But I am well past the Click. I’m Seventy-Eight years old and, although I thought I felt it once, nothing happened and here I am.” Hitchcock drank the last of his beer and then let his glass drop to the table with a BANG that got his friend’s devoted attention. “I do however need your help because of the Click. You see, the good news is there are a fair number of people like me in the world, Beaters we’re called, people who beat the Click, sort of like cheaters cheating death. The bad news is there are a fair number of people who experience the Click prematurely, as early as ten or eleven or twelve years old, and

...” Hitchcock went silent. His mouth closed, his lips twitched, his jaws danced as if he were chewing on his own words in an attempt to swallow them without choking. He could see OJ being wheeled into the ambulance, but it wasn’t OJ, it was Christopher.

“And,” Julian said breaking Hitchcock’s momentary bout with guilt mixed with a trace of self-pity.

“And my Eleven year old grandson happens to be one of those people who will die prematurely like my first grandson, Oliver Junior; he’s what they call a Preemie.

“He felt the Click?”

“Not exactly, but he will soon enough, I’m afraid. I’ll explain that later. For now, please take my word for it. And where you come in is this. I promised Edna on her death bed that I would do whatever I could to save Christopher from that fate—and I will need your help to keep that promise.” Hitch gulped down the last of his beer and waved to Rudy.

“Another, Mr. Hitchcock?”

“Make it bourbon on the rocks, Rudy.”

“And you, Mr. Iscar?”

Julian shook his head and looked at Hitch. “Still drinking and gambling?”

“No green felt. As for the drinking, it gets me through the day. Ever since we lost Oliver Junior, then Edna. And now Christopher at risk.

“Are the doctors sure?”

“Yes. He’s been subjected to just about every test … all positive. I need to know if there’s anything out there that can save him.”

“So this is what you were looking for the other day?

Just then Rudy started toward them with Hitch’s bourbon. Hitch put his finger to his lips. He waited to answer Julian until Rudy came and went then whispered. “Yes. I need access to those super search engine processing plants I know the Company has hidden somewhere in Virginia.” He then described what he found in Julian’s library search engine.

“Let me see what I can do.”

Hitch said goodbye to his old friend at the door and walked to his car trying to sort things out. As he retraced his steps, he couldn’t help but notice all the VAMA hearses on the street, black with VAMA in gold across each side and down the back that couldn’t be

missed, weren’t supposed to be missed, Hitch guessed. But when did they start appearing so often he thought as two passed by?

He never thought about the Vaccine Assurance and Management Agency until around his seventy-seventh birthday. During that entire seventy-fifth year Edna woke up every morning thinking it was his last. Not Hitch. He was stubborn enough, and self-centered enough, to believe no such flaw would assault the perfection he knew his DNA to be. On his seventy-seventh birthday, long after they were both convinced of his infallibility, a late night rap at the door caught him by surprise. Through the peephole he could see a young man in a pin stripe suit flashing his VAMA badge without saying a word at first. He didn’t apologize for the surprise inspection or the late hour. Hitch had passed through the throes of the Click, was still breathing, and hadn’t reported that fact to the authorities—something all citizens had to do no later than their seventy-sixth birthday if they were still living. The youngster wanted to know why he hadn’t made a report and immediately demanded to see his papers and his V-Mark. Hitch would have shown him what to do with any fucking report or his papers if Edna hadn’t intervened. After seeing Hitch’s papers and V-mark, he was instructed to appear at the local VAMA office within the next 36 hours. He complied. What choice did he have? It was comply or face the wrath of Edna, the only person who really gave a shit about him.

He stomped into the local VAMA office at the end of Vama Way in upscale Alexandria, right at the river’s edge. Upon stepping into the opened lobby under a two story glass roof and sinking into heavy black carpet he knew instinctively who he was dealing with, and it wasn’t a bunch of bureaucratic shlebs. Only the Cūtocracy had the wherewithal to show off so lavishly. After extensive processing they took blood, scraped some skin samples from his V-Mark, and more than two hours later let him go. Then nothing.

As Hitch relived his first encounter with VAMA, he reached his car. Hopefully Julian Iscar would be able to help him, although he wasn’t sure what that meant or where that would lead.