He had been on the ranch for about a week when Tatum sent him a little follow-up message stating that if Rufus really wanted to make a positive contribution to the overall security of the ranch, it would be a good thing if he could get himself squared away and his equipment up and running “before the shit hits the fan geopolitically.”
Rufus roger-wilcoed him right back, as soldiers did. But in fact he had no idea what Tatum was talking about.
The next morning he got his computer on the Internet, using his phone as a hot spot, and went to a video site and set it playing videos about Pina2bo while he spread out his tools and drone parts on the folding table. During the first half hour or so, he had a disconcerting feeling that he had got way behind on current events in the world. A week ago, when he’d driven his truck through the ranch gate, T.R.’s project had still been pretty much secret. People had figured out that he was building something big in the desert—that much was obvious just from satellite photos—but they could only speculate as to what it was or when it would become operational. Rufus’s arrival had roughly coincided with the moment when the
gun had been “brought up,” meaning that the whole system had gone into operation, and it hadn’t stopped since. During that time he hadn’t left the ranch and had paid no attention at all to news feeds. So he was taken aback by the sheer volume of Internet traffic that had come into existence concerning T.R.’s project while he had been unaware.
So much of this was flat-out wrong, though, that it put him back on his heels for a little while. His confidence began to bounce back a little as he realized how much better informed he was than everyone else. T.R.’s staff had released explanatory videos presenting the facts, and a few nerds had found those and then released videos of their own that seemed credible enough, but for each of those there were twenty more that were just crazy talk. Official news outlets had done stories about it, but all they wanted to talk about was how people felt about climate change, and what a wacky dude T.R. McHooligan was in his old videos. Even more highbrow sites couldn’t get off the mentality of what the political repercussions were going to be, who was for it and who was against it, and so on. It was difficult to connect any of this with Tatum’s reference to the geopolitical shit hitting the fan.
So he called Alastair. They’d stayed in touch, sending occasional texts and pictures back and forth. Alastair didn’t pick up right away, but a minute later he called back. “Sorry,” he said, “I was inside flagging down the barkeep, didn’t hear you.”
The scene that now completely filled the screen of Rufus’s laptop was a curious through-the-looking-glass inversion of Rufus’s situation. Rufus was at the head of a box canyon, one of whose walls was in shade, the other lit by the morning sun. Alastair was standing at an outdoor table on the sidewalk of a dead-end street in London. The buildings on one side of it were lit up by the evening sun. There were a couple of parked cars in view, but the whole street was monopolized by people on foot. Apparently he was right outside a pub. A pint glass of something caramel-colored accounted for much of the screen real estate. He was wearing a dark blue suit, white shirt, open collar, no tie. The same was true of many visible in the background. There was some variation in the darkness and color of
the suits, and the same could be said of the contents of their pint glasses. There were some women and they looked quite confident and well put together. They were all being extremely sociable.
Rufus understood that it must be quitting time in London. This must be the City that Alastair had alluded to, the part of it that was run by that guy Bob, the lord mayor. Even though Alastair was out of doors, the roar of conversation around him was such that he had to fish out headphones and put them on before he showed signs of being able to really hear what Rufus was saying.
“Looks like a very pleasant afternoon where you are.”
“It’s been filthy hot until yesterday. More like Spain. This is a little more like it.”
“Maybe Pina2bo is doing its job.”
“That is exactly the joke that is going around! Not thirty seconds ago people were raising pints to T.R. McHooligan.”
“Is it a joke?” Rufus asked. “I mean, could it be having an effect?”
“Not here. Too soon. However, coincidentally or not, it’s been cooler in East Texas the last couple of days. As you may be aware.”
“I was not.”
“Where the hell are you? I see your trailer behind you but—”