Willis, Connie - SS - Blued Moon.pdf

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BLUED MOON
Connie Willis
One of the chanciest areas of scientific study is that which tries to delineate and predict the laws of
probability-for probability is subject to change without notice, it seems. (Actually it isn't- but it's always possible for
strange things to happen that stretch those "laws" without breaking them.) Here we have a funny novelette that will
stretch your grin as much as it stretches the laws.
Connie Willis won two Nebula Awards in one night in 1983 for her short fiction, most of which is thoughtful and
moving. So is this story, but it brings an added dimension of humor that's rare in science fiction.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Mowen Chemical today announced implementation of an
innovative waste emissions installation at its experimental facility in Chugwater, Wyo-ming.
According to project directors Bradley McAfee and Lynn Saunders, nonutilizable
hydrocarbonaceous substances will be propulsively transferred to stratospheric altitudinal
locations, where photochemical decomposition will result in triatomic allotropism and
formation of benign bicarbonaceous precipitates. Preliminary predictive databasing indicates
posi-tive ozonation yields without statistically significant shifts in lateral ecosystem equilibria.
"Do you suppose Walter Hunt would have invented the safety pin if he had known that punk
rockers would stick them through their cheeks?" Mr. Mowen said. He was look-ing gloomily
out the window at the distant 600-foot-high smokestacks.
"I don't know, Mr. Mowen," Janice said. She sighed. "Do you want me to tell them to wait
again?"
The sigh was supposed to mean, It's after four o'clock and it's getting dark, and you've
already asked Research to wait three times, and when are you going to make up your mind? but
Mr. Mowen ignored it.
"On the other hand," he said. "What about diapers? And all those babies that would have
been stuck with straight pins if it hadn't been for the safety pin?"
"It is supposed to help restore the ozone layer, Mr. Mowen," Janice said. "And according to
Research, there won't be any harmful side effects."
"You shoot a bunch of hydrocarbons into the stratosphere, and there won't be any harmful
side effects. According to Research." Mr. Mowen swivelled his chair around to look at Janice,
nearly knocking over the picture of his daughter Sally that sat on his desk. "I stuck Sally once.
With a safety pin. She screamed for an hour. How's that for a harmful side effect? And what
about the stuff that's left over after all this ozone is formed? Bicarbonate of soda, Research
says. Per-fectly harmless. How do they know that? Have they ever dumped bicarbonate of soda
on people before? Call Research…"he started to say, but Janice had already picked up the
phone and tapped the number. She didn't even sigh. "Call Research and ask them to figure out
what effect a bicarbonate of soda rain would have."
 
"Yes, Mr. Mowen," Janice said. She put the phone up to her ear and listened for a moment.
"Mr. Mowen…" she said hesitantly.
"I suppose Research says it'll neutralize the sulfuric acid that's killing the statues and
sweeten and deodorize at the same time."
"No, sir," Janice said. "Research says they've already started the temperature-differential
kilns, and you should be seeing something in a few minutes. They say they couldn't wait any
longer.''
Mr. Mowen whipped back around in his chair to look out the window. The picture of Sally
teetered again, and Mr. Mowen wondered if she were home from college yet. Noth-ing was
coming out of the smokestacks. He couldn't see the candlestick-base kilns through the maze of
fast-food places and trailer parks. A McDonald's sign directly in front of the smokestacks
blinked on suddenly, and Mr. Mowen jumped. The smokestacks themselves remained silent
and still except for their blinding strobe aircraft lights. He could see sagebrush-covered hills in
the space between the stacks, and the whole scene, except for the McDonald's sign, looked
unbelievably serene and harmless.
"Research says the kilns are fired to full capacity," Janice said, holding the phone against
her chest.
Mr. Mowen braced himself for the coming explosion. There was a low rumbling like distant
fire, then a puff of whitish smoke, and finally a deep, whooshing sound like one of Janice's
sighs, and two columns of blue shot straight up into the darkening sky.
"Why is it blue?" Mr. Mowen said.
"I already asked," Janice said. "Research says visible spectrum diffraction is occurring
because of the point eight micron radü of the hydrocarbons being propelled…"
"That sounds like that damned press release," Mr. Mowen said. "Tell them to speak
English."
After a minute of talking into the phone, she said, "It's the same effect that causes the sunsets
after a volcanic eruption. Scattering. Research wants to know what staff members you'd like to
have at the press conference tomorrow."
"The directors of the project," Mr. Mowen said grumpily, "and anyone over at Research
who can speak English."
Janice looked at the press release. "Bradley McAfee and Lynn Saunders are the directors,"
she said.
 
"Why does the name McAfee sound familiar?"
"He's Ulric Henry's roommate. The company linguist you hired to…"
"I know why I hired him. Invite Henry, too. And try to get Sally as soon as she gets home.
Tell her that I expect her there; and tell her to dress up." He looked at his watch. "Well," he
said. "It's been going five minutes, and there haven't been any harmful side effects yet."
The phone rang. Mr. Mowen jumped. "I knew it was too good to last," he said. "Who is it?
The EPA?"
"No," Janice said, and sighed. "It's your ex-wife."
"I'm shut of that," Brad said when Ulric came in the door. He was sitting in the dark, the
green glow of the monitor lighting his face. He tapped at the terminal keys for a minute more
and then turned around. "All done. Slicker'n goose grease."
Ulric turned on the light. "The waste-emissions project?" he said.
"Nope. We turned that on this afternoon. Works prettier than a spotted pony. No, I been
spending the last hour erasing my fiancee Lynn's name from the project records."
"Won't Lynn object to that?" Ulric said, fairly calmly, mostly because he did not have a very
clear idea of which one Lynn was. He never could tell Brad's fiancees apart. They all sounded
exactly the same.
"She won't hear tell of it till it's too late," Brad said. "She's on her way to Cheyenne to catch
a plane back east. Her mother's all het up about getting a divorce. Caught her husband Adam 'n'
Evin'."
If there was anything harder to put up with than Brad's rottenness, it was his incredibly good
luck. While Ulric was sure Brad was low enough to engineer a sudden family crisis to get Lynn
out of Chugwater, he was just as sure that he had had no need to. It was a lucky coincidence
that Lynn's mother was getting a divorce just now, and lucky coinci-dences were Brad's
specialty. How else could he have kept three fiancees from ever meeting each other in the
small confines of Chugwater and Mowen Chemical?
"Lynn?" Ulric said. "Which one is that? The redhead in programming?''
"Nope, that's Sue. Lynn's little and yellow-haired and smart as a whip about chemical
engineering. Kind of a dodunk about every thin' else."
"Dodunk," Ulric said to himself. He should make a note to look that up. It probably meant
 
"one so foolish as to associate with Brad McAfee." That definitely included him. He had
agreed to room with Brad because he was so surprised at being hired that it had not occurred
to him to ask for an apartment of his own.
He had graduated with an English degree that everyone had told him was worse than useless
in Wyoming, and which he very soon found out was. In desperation, he had applied for a
factory job at Mowen Chemical and been hired on as com-pany linguist at an amazing salary
for reasons that had not yet become clear, though he had been at Mowen for over three months.
What had become clear was that Brad McAfee was, to use his own colorful language, a
thimblerigger, a pigeon plucker, a hornswoggler. He was steadily working his way toward the
boss's daughter and the ownership of Mowen Chemical, leaving a trail of young women behind
him who all apparently believed that a man who pronounced fiancee "fee-an-see" couldn't
possibly have more than one. It was an interesting linguistic phenomenon.
At first Ulric had been taken in by Brad's homespun talk, too, even though it didn't seem to
match his sophisticated abilities on the computer. Then one day he had gotten up early and
caught Brad working on a program called "Project Sally."
"I'm gonna be the president of Mowen Chemical in two shakes of a sheep's tail," Brad had
said. "This little dingclinker is my master plan. What do you think of it?"
What Ulric thought of it could not be expressed in words. It outlined a plan for getting close
to Sally Mowen and impress-ing her father based almost entirely on the seduction and
abandonment of young women in key positions at Mowen Chemical. Three-quarters of the way
down he saw Lynn's name.
"What if Mr. Mowen gets hold of this program?" Ulric had said finally.
"Not a look-in chance that that'd happen. I got this pro-gram locked up tighter than a hog's
eye. And if anybody else tried to copy it, they'd be sorrier than a coon romancin' a polecat."
Since then Ulric had put in six requests for an apartment, all of which had been turned down
' 'due to restrictive areal housing availability," which Ulric supposed meant there weren't any
empty apartments in Chugwater. All of the turndowns were initialed by Mr. Mowen's
secretary, and there were moments when Ulric thought that Mr. Mowen knew about "Project
Sally" after all and had hired Ulric to keep Brad away from his daughter.
"According to my program, it's time to go to work on Sally," Brad said now. "Tomorrow at
this press conference. I'm enough of a rumbustigator with this waste-emissions project to
dazzlefy Old Man Mowen. Sally's going to be there. I got my fiancee Gail in publicity to invite
her."
"I'm going to be there, too," Ulric said belligerently.
 
"Now, that's right lucky," Brad said. "You can do a little honeyfuggling for me. Work on old
Sally while I give Pappy Mowen the glad hand. Do you know what she looks like?"
"I have no intention of honeyfuggling Sally Mowen for you," Ulric said, and wondered again
where Brad managed to pick up all these slang expressions. He had caught Brad watching Judy
Canova movies on TV a couple of times, but some of these words weren't even in Mencken. He
probably had a computer program that generated them. "In fact, I intend to tell her you're
engaged to more than one person already."
"Boy, you're sure wadgetty," Brad said. "And you know why? Because you don't have a gal
of your own. Tell you what, you pick out one of mine, and I'll give her to you. How about
Sue?"
Ulric walked over to the window. "I don't want her," he said.
"I bet you don't even know which one she is," Brad said.
I don't, Ulric thought. They all sound exactly alike. They use "interface" as a verb and
"support" as an adjective. One of them had called for Brad and when Ulric told her he was
over at Research, she had said, "Sorry. My wetware's non-functional this morning." Ulric felt
as if he were living in a foreign country.
"What difference does it make?" Ulric said angrily. "Not one of them speaks English, which
is probably why they're all dumb enough to think they're engaged to you."
"How about if I get you a gal who speaks English and you honeyfuggle Sally Mowen for
me?" Brad said. He turned to the terminal and began typing furiously. "What exactly do you
want?"
Ulric clenched his fists and looked out the window. The dead cottonwood under the
window had a kite or something caught in its branches. He debated climbing down the tree and
walking over to Mr. Mowen's office to demand an apartment.
"Makes no never mind," Brad said when he didn't answer. "I've heard you oratin' often
enough on the subject." He typed a minute more and hit the print button. "There," he said.
Ulric turned around.
Brad read from the monitor,'' 'Wanted: Young woman who can generate enthusiasm for the
Queen's English, needs to use correct grammar and syntax, no gobbledygook, no slang, respect
for the language. Signed, Ulric Henry.' What do you think of that? It's the spittin' image of the
way you talk."
"I can find my own 'gals,' " Ulric said. He yanked the sheet of paper as it was still coming
 

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