Rule 34 - Charles Stross [40]
On day three, a certain existential anomie sets in. So you amuse yourself with your bootleg phone and specs: You pull down your favourite procedural wallpaper from the cloud and overlay the bare, beige office walls with a gigantic play-space hosting an improbable orgy-themed mashup from XXXMen and BackRoomBoyz. It’s machinima-generated real-time porn, and you don’t want to look at their faces for too long or you’ll get creeped out by the inbred uncanny valley features, but all that pumping and writhing and sucking is a good distraction from the fact that is slowly sneaking up on you: You’re bored.
Here you are in your good business suit, sitting at a desk in the consulate, prim and proper as can be, like a maiden aunt haunted by fantasies of debauchery. And there is nothing to fucking do. Welcome to boredomspace. Since you hung out your shingle you have entertained one visiting trade delegation, six assorted shifty-eyed locals in search of a loaf, two adventurous backpackers, a yak-milk importer looking to make an end-run around EU animal-husbandry regulations, and seven confused visitors looking for the games company upstairs.
There are, of course, the language lessons: On your own initiative you’ve expensed a set of Rosetta Stone courseware on Kyrgyz, and you’re trying to spend half an hour a day on it. But you’ve never had much of a knack for language study, you keep tripping over the Cyrillic alphabet, and the spoken tongue sounds like you’re gargling rusty nails (and leaves your throat feeling like it, too). Google Translate doesn’t handle Kyrgyz very well: Luckily the Ministry of Foreign Affairs conducts all their correspondence in mangled English. You really wouldn’t bother except for a nagging sense that at the next interview, it might be good to know what they’re saying behind your back.
In the end, you find yourself reading the small print on the back of a bag of bread mix and thinking about what the Gnome said about home brew. Shite beer, he’d said, unless you add a cofactor. Well, it’s not like you know a lot about brewing to begin with, is it? So you hop on the web and, at considerable risk to your soul, begin searching for websites dedicated to the unclean pursuit.
When the buzzer goes off, you’re queasily engrossed in an account of certain jail-cell antics involving buckets, sugar, yeast, and unspeakable contaminants. The things neds will do to get off their heids . . . you jump, swear quietly, and hit the entryphone button. “Come in.”
You’re standing up when the door opens. Your visitor is probably white underneath the grime, walks with an odd shuffle, and could benefit from a shower and a session at a launderette. He’s probably about twenty and painfully thin. You smile politely. “Welcome to the Issyk-Kulistan Consulate, sir. Would you mind stating your name and business?”
“Ahm Jaxxie. Icannaehingyurrrbagaffbreidmix, likesay?”
Oh, he’s one of them. You nod sympathetically, walk over to the trunkful of INSECT-FREE FAIR TRADE ORGANIC BREAD MIX BARLEY-RYE, and pull out a bag. “One of these?” you ask, remembering to breathe through your mouth as you approach him.
“Gimmedat hingmie.” He makes a lunge for the bag, and you pull it away from him. He wears no specs, which is probably a good thing: He doesn’t look like the type to appreciate the panting contents of the leather sling he’s standing in front of in pornspace.
“You know how to use it, right?” You stare at him. “You know about the cofactor. What is it?”
Jaxxie stares at you in confusion. “Whut?”
“The stuff you add to the bread mix when you’re making beer. What is it?”
“Whut? Ayedinnaekenyeraxent, man. Whityurwantin?”
“What. Have. You. Been. Told. To. Add. To. This. When. You. Brew?” You hold the bag up. Jaxxie’s eyes track the bag like a dog hoping for a treat, oblivious to the gamine sailor boy and the pair of huge leather bears making out lasciviously at his feet.
“Ung. Hingmy. Awthat.” He produces a small glass bottle of tablets from somewhere in his