Distraction - Bruce Sterling [203]
12
The U.S. Navy arrived off the shores of the Netherlands. The War had reached a point of crisis. In order to have something to do, the American armada announced a naval blockade of shipping in the ports of Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Since large sections of those cities were already underwater, this was not a crushing economic threat.
Still, there seemed very little else that the Navy could do. They hadn’t brought any land troops or tanks with which they could physically invade Holland. The battleships had long-range naval guns, with which they might easily devastate major cities, but it seemed unthinkable that the United States would physically blast civilians in a nation offering no organized military resistance.
So, after enormous fanfare and intense press coverage, the hot War with Holland was revealing its rickety underpinnings as a phony war. The President had whipped the nation into frenzy, and strengthened his own hand, and ended the Emergency. He had made his pet proles into a nationwide dandruff of cellular-toting miniature Robespierres. That was an impressive series of accomplishments, more than anyone had dared to hope for. Now the smart money had it that the War would soon be folded up and put away.
The smart money took the unlikely personage of Alcott Bambakias. The junior Senator from Massachusetts had chosen this moment to make a long-expected tour of the Buna National Collaboratory.
The Senator was much improved mentally. The rainbow of neural treatments had finally reached an area of his emotional spectrum where Bambakias could lodge and take a stand. He was quite simply a different man now. The Senator was heavier, wearier, vastly more cynical. He described his current mental state as “realistic.” He was making all his quorum calls, and most of his committee assignments. He made far fewer speeches these days, picked far fewer dramatic fights, spent far more time closeted with lobbyists.
Oscar took it upon himself to give the Senator and Mrs. Bambakias a personal tour of the works in Buna. They took an armored limousine. With the Dutch War stalling visibly, it seemed somewhat less likely that Huey would launch any paint bombs.
However, this had not stopped the construction frenzy in Buna. On the contrary, it had liberated them from any pretense that they were sheltering themselves from gas. With thousands of people continuing to pour in, with guaranteed free food, free shelter, and all the network data they could eat, the city was tautly inflated with boom-town atmosphere. One group of zealots was constructing a giant plastic structure roughly the size and shape of the Eiffel Tower, which they had dubbed the “Beacon of Cosmic Truth.” Other hobbyists had taken smart geodesics and airtight skins to a logical extreme, and were building aerostats. These were giant self-expanding airtight bubbles, and if they could get the piezoelectric musculature within the tubing to work properly, the things would engorge themselves to the point where they could literally leave the surface of the earth.
Oscar couldn’t fully contain his enthusiasm for these marvels, and he sensed that Bambakias and Lorena could use some cheering up. Bambakias looked much better—he was clearly lucid now, perhaps even cured—but stress had taken a permanent toll on Lorena. She’d put on weight, she’d sagged, she looked preserved rather than put-together. In her husband’s company she offered Oscar mostly bright monosyllables.
Bambakias was doing all the talking, but it wasn’t his usual bright and tumbling rhetoric.
“The hotel was good,” he said. “You did very well with the hotel. Considering all the local limitations.”
“Oh, we enjoy the hotel. I still sleep there most nights. But it doesn’t begin to compare to the scale of what’s been done to the town.”
“They’re not doing it right,” Bambakias said.
“Well, they’re amateurs.”
“No, they