Dyscountopia (24 page)

“
I loved ya, baby, baby
.
 
Baby, baby, yeah.
 
Ooooo
.”

Albert hazarded a glance beyond an enormous wire bin stuffed with inflatable rubber balls.
 
A purple clad custodian danced in the aisle just on the other side, his eyes half-closed, twirling his mop in slow circles.

“
But you had to go and leave me, baby.
 
Baby, baby, yeah
.
 
Ooooo
.”

Albert waited until his back was turned, then darted behind a pyramid of cartoon spattered lunch-pails, holding his breath until he was sure that he hadn’t been noticed.
 
He heard no steps approaching, no cry for him to stop.

“
And I miss ya, baby, baby.
 
Baby, baby, yeah
.
 
Ooooo
.”

He wormed his way down the aisle, flat on his belly, stowing away inside a Bongo Brand™ Tiny Teddy Fun Beach Playhouse just in time to avoid a heavily laden metal cart with a sleepy-eyed young stocker at the helm.

“
Baby, baby, baby.
 
Baby, baby, yeah
.
 
Ooooo
.”

Albert extricated himself from the Bongo Brand™ Tiny Teddy Fun Beach Playhouse and dashed behind a rack of posters portraying the precocious, pink-haired Lulu herself, dressed in a purple body-suit and belting lyrics into a pink microphone.

“
Baby, baby, yeah, yeah, yeah.
 
Baby, baby, yeah
.
 
Ooooo
.”

“Hey, you there!
 
Stop!
 
What are you doing?”
 

Albert turned to see a man approaching him swiftly down the aisle.
 
He wore an immaculately pressed purple vest, and a bright purple Ollie the Otter tie that flapped back and forth across his navel as he went.
 
Albert didn’t have to read his name tag.

“Victor?”

“Albert, is that you?”
 
Victor squinted at him.
 
“I thought you were … gone.
 
What are you doing here?”

At the sight of his old friend, Albert’s eyes filled with tears.
 
He grabbed Victor by the arms and shook him earnestly.
 
“Victor, listen to me.
 
There’s not much time.
 
We were wrong.
 
Some things are more important than safety.
 
Some accidents
are
unavoidable.
 
Bowling isn’t the way to find a President.
 
There are more colors in the rainbow than Omega-Mart purple.
 
I’ve seen it, Victor!
 
I’ve seen a better way!”

“Sure, Albert,” Victor whispered soothingly, prying the madman’s hands away and taking a step back.
 
“Sure.
 
You’re gonna be just fine, Albert – just as soon as we get you some help.”
 
Victor carefully lifted his walkie-talkie to his lips.
 
“Security, we got a burnout over here in Playland.
 
Send someone ASAP, willya?”
 
He turned his attention back to Albert.
 
“Now, just calm down, Al.
 
Everything’s gonna be okay.
 
Help is on the way.”

The Guardians’ response crackled over the radio.
 
“Ten, four.
 
Moving to your location.
 
Keep the nut busy until we can intercept.”

Victor moved to take his arm.
 
Albert hesitated.
 
He snatched a yellow foam football from the shelf and stepped back in a defensive posture.

“Now, just hold on there, Al.”

Albert launched the spongy object at Victor’s face, hitting him square in the nose, and fled in the opposite direction.
 
Victor screamed into his radio for back-up as Albert boosted a bicycle from a nearby rack (Model 742 Duffy Little Big Man Dirt Bike for Little Big Men ages 8 to 12, a bargain at $109.95) and pedaled like mad for the Playland exit, his knees moving in a rapid circular motion around his ears.
 
Two teenage stockers with bored expressions watched him leave as he sped through the checkout scanners toward a distant jungle of imitation leather recliners.

Lights flashed and sirens blared.

“YOU HAVE ACTIVATED OMEGA-MART’S INTERNAL SECURITY ALARM,” a robot voice warned in a polite but firm tone.
 
“PLEASE STEP BACK AND WAIT FOR THE NEXT AVAILABLE ASSOCIATE.
 
YOU HAVE ACTIVATED OMEGA-MART’S INTERNAL SECURITY ALARM.
 
PLEASE STEP BACK AND WAIT FOR THE NEXT AVAILABLE ASSOCIATE.
 
YOU HAVE ACTIVATED OMEGA-MART’S INTERNAL SECURITY ALARM.
 
PLEASE STEP BACK AND WAIT FOR THE NEXT AVAILABLE ASSOCIATE.”

“Alert, alert!
 
Threat condition Orange!
 
We have a situation here!” Victor screeched into his walkie-talkie.
 
“He’s gone to Home Furnishings.
 
Repeat – he’s Lifted a bicycle and he’s headed for the furniture.”

Victor watched helplessly as the bicycle thief drew farther and farther away, furiously peddling his stolen merchandise.
 
He had to do something.
 
Now was his moment to shine.

“Taxi!
 
Taxi!”

A taxi approached through the half-light, humming out of nowhere like the divine hand of providence.
 
Victor threw himself in front of it.

The shiny green floor shuttle stopped abruptly, corrected its course, then dutifully pulled up next to him.
 
“Hello”, it said in a woman’s soft voice.
 
“Thank you for using Green-Line Shuttle service.
 
Please insert your card.”

Victor hastily pulled his credit card from his wallet and swiped it through the scanner.
 
The shuttle thought about it.

“Come on.
 
Come on!” Victor urged, swiping the card over and over.
 
Albert was just a speck in the distance.

“Card approved,” said the shuttle.
 
“Please state your proposed destination.”

“Follow that man!” Victor cried, pointing.

“One moment…. Subject acquired.
 
That is a valid destination.
 
Please enter the shuttle now.”

The doors of the shuttle split open in the center but, as Victor made ready to dash aboard, they quivered to a halt and closed in his face.
 
“Please enter the shuttle now.”

“What the heck?” Victor cried, pounding on the door.
 
“Open up!
 
This is an emergency!”

“Response not recognized.
 
Please enter the shuttle now.”

Victor thrust his fingers into the crack, trying in vain to force the doors to open, as, off in the distance, Albert rounded the bend and was lost from sight.

“He’s getting away!”

“Response not recognized.
 
Please enter the shuttle now.”

“Come on!” Victor pleaded, pounding harder.
 
“What’s wrong with you?”

“Response not recognized.
 
This shuttle will now begin pursuit of the desired subject.
 
An initial charge of 25 dollars will be deducted from your account, plus an additional 10 dollars each half-mile.
 
Please fasten your safety belt.”
 
As the little green shuttle sped away in search of Albert, Victor unexpectedly felt the unpleasant sensation of being strangled to death by his necktie.
 
Ollie the Otter had somehow become caught in the grasp of the malfunctioning doors.
 

Victor trotted desperately alongside the accelerating shuttle, pounding maniacally with both fists on the aluminum side as the two pimple-faced stockers watched him depart, wooden-faced.
 
The shuttle ignored his pleas, moving faster and faster, maintaining its murderous grip on the whiskery semi-aquatic rodent that encircled Victor’s neck.

“Help!”
 
Victor gasped.
 
“Help!”
 
But there was no help.
 
No one could stop the shuttle.
 
No one could tell it what to do.
 
In all things, the shuttle knew best.

“Help!
 
For the love of Christ, help!”

The shuttle continued to accelerate without pause, jerking him forward, forcing the scrawny, cramped muscles of his legs to keep pumping.
 
He ran as long as he could, as fast as he could, pulled to his doom by that short purple leash that had once made him so proud, suffering the final spontaneous seconds of an otherwise flawlessly calculated life.

His knees buckled.
 
He fell.
 

When someone finally caught up to Victor, there was nothing that anyone could do.
 
A shoe, a walkie-talkie, a set of keys, bits of torn fabric, all lay in a long, sobering wake behind him, ending at his broken body.
 
His tie, clipped neatly in half beneath Ollie’s whiskery chin, hung limp from his constricted neck.
 
His tongue bulged grotesquely from the side of his mouth as he considered, unblinking, the fluorescent lights above.
 
And his face was Omega-Mart purple.

****

“Did you know that the average catfish has 100,000 taste buds?”

Sergeant Alexander ignored him, sitting rigid in front of the voluminous camera array, furiously oiling her glue gun.
 
Officer Travis leaned back in a folding chair next to her, facing her, idly leafing through a glossy oversized reference book.

“Did you know that the average worker bee only makes about a twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in its
whole
life?”

The Sergeant said nothing.
 
She was in no mood to be trifled with.
 
Officer Travis pressed boldly, playing a perilous game of one-man Russian roulette.
 

“Did you know that a horse can eat seven times its own weight in a year?”
 

The Sergeant slowed her activity for a brief and thoughtful moment, as if considering the perpetration of a homicide, then once again resumed oiling.

 
“Pretty fascinating stuff, huh Sarge?”
 
Travis peered impishly over the cover of the book.
 

“You’re a disgrace to the uniform.”

“Why?
 
Because I’m trying to broaden my horizons a little bit?
 
You’re never too old to learn something, Sarge.”

“Maybe you wanna learn how to get my boot out of your ass.”

“You know, Sarge, you’re kind of a one dimensional person.”

The Sergeant refused the bait.
 
She silently sought her happy place, picturing the limp body of Officer Travis plummeting into an endless abyss.
 
Why did she put up with him?
 
Why didn’t she just find a quiet place to hide his body?

Because she needed someone with experience, she told herself -- when the day finally came.
 
And he knew it.
 
He taunted her with it.
 
Her eyes flickered briefly to the cameras.

 
“A watched pot never boils,” Travis grunted.
 

Alexander stared sideways daggers at him, drawing a clear line in the sand.
 
No one was indispensable.