The Textile Planet

Sue Lange

Chapter 1

Immediately following Marla Gershe’s nonexistent coffee break at three in the afternoon, a policeman shot her through the mid-section with one of those newfangled xanthan guns. That simple act changed her life forever. Actually, her life had been changing slowly over the previous few months, but everything came to a head starting at 5:15 a.m. the day she was shot. Let’s take a look.

5:15 a.m.

“Mama! Where’s Sa...” Marla Gershe barged through the aluminum doors leading to the looming floor, stopping abruptly to stare at the far wall where ten names on the in-board lit up red confirming the obvious: Mama had only half a staff. The flimsy doors behind Gershe waffled in the silence. She looked over at the short woman wearing optical enhancers on her nose.

“Where are your weavers?” Marla called, jerking her head toward the nearly empty room. Five in the morning and she was already annoyed.

Mama, whose name nobody knew, was referred to by her position as head weaver. She stood with the lint screen from the third shift’s leavings in one hand and a shop vac suction in the other. Her loom, hooked directly up to the Anthusian CIA (Central Intelligence Agent—some would describe it as a mainframe), was the largest and most complicated machine in the room. The cast iron affair, proudly as wide as a shed, held a conglomeration of wooden warp frame, plastic computer components, weft attachment, high-speed shuttle, and numerous LED readout panels. There was a little coffee cup holder next to her, set at waist height, on her right.

Mama looked over her specs at Marla. Five in the morning and she was already annoyed.

“Parker shifted ‘em over to O’Halloran,” she said, apparently bored with the ineptitude of upper management. “Supposed to be some big do there today. The president’s over for a visit, or something.” She switched on the pump ending the conversation without so much as an editorial “naturally,” or “as usual,” or “of course.”

The day’s ten weavers, by now arriving at their respective stations (which, being only the size of a cow’s trough, were puny compared to Mama’s), mimicked her actions down the line, turning on their vacuum pumps and cleaning out the third shiftâs lint leavings. The dust in the room had only recently settled from the previous shift’s activities. It swirled up in the ritualized onset of the first shift, filling the air with the familiar smell of dust, must, and rust that made Marla Gershe think of an Okie panhandle — the likes of which she had never in her life experienced so how the hell would she even know.

“That’s great!” Marla said, kicking Mama’s unit. “God forbid they’d slack us off in comp.” Then, raising her voice over the noise of the vacuuming, she said to no one in particular, “Where’s Saddle? Where’s today’s designs?”

“Here, Marla,” a voice called from behind her.

Marla spun around and saw the waifish owner of the cutest black bobbed haircut any employee of BAC Enterprises ever had the nerve to sport.

Saddle rushed up breathlessly, pink plastic barrettes perched on top of her head to hold back her overgrown bangs. She wore a fluffy pink sweater — undersized—with a ribbon trimming the neckline.

“You late today?” Marla asked.

“No,” Saddle replied, handing Marla a sheaf of papers. The top one had a turquoise patch of fabric glued onto it. “I noticed you weren’t in your office so I ran out to find you. We’ve got an awful day ahead of us, I think.”

Marla grabbed the papers and began sifting through. “No shit,” she said. “There’s a full show here with only half a staff. Where’s that fucking Parker?”

“I don’t know, but they gave us a couple of zingers too.”

“Great!” Marla headed back through the aluminum double doors and out into the noiseless hallway. “Get me Parker’s access number.”

“Here, Marla, here.” Saddle scrambled after her, holding out her personal pink buzzer with its accompanying bubblegum mixed with lipstick odor.

Marla stopped abruptly and grabbed the yakker, pushing “send.” She grimaced at the yakker’s fragrance and waited as the line played its annoying double beep. Finally, the receiver clicked on.

“Parker?” Marla jumped in. “Did you know...”

“Grant Parker is unable to receive at the moment. Please buzz back or press ‘call back’ to have him return your buzz when appropriate.”

“Fuckinâ hell!” Marla blurted out in exasperation, hitting the end button. “Where’s Torpid at on this thing?” She jabbed her finger at the hologram screen, randomly searching for the phone book.

“He’s in there,” Saddle answered, stepping over to see if she could help. “Press T.”

Marla fiddled with the colored lights, alternately selecting some sequence and then placing the earpiece next to her head. At one point, the object screeched so loudly, the lift down the hall summoned itself to the loom floor, thinking it had heard a call. “Floor please,” it asked after its gates opened and it had been sitting there for about ten seconds without anyone ordering a floor.

Frustrated, Marla tossed the yakker to Saddle and made her way down to the lift, thinking she might as well take advantage of it since it was already here. “You need to get that thing fixed or something. Where’s mine, by the way?”

Saddle caught the unit mid-air and hit “clear” and then punched up the point list. Two seconds later, she was running after Marla, holding the crescent box in front of her. “Here’s the line, Marla,” she called.

She handed the yakker over while Marla stuck one foot on the lift’s pad to keep it from leaving.

“Yeah, hi, Gershe here,” Marla said into the yakker. “Listen, Parker took half my staff for something over at O’Halloran and I’ve got a full show. I gotta get some weavers. I need half a dozen, or the zingers those asshole third shift designers put on my scroll gotta disappear.”

“We need the zingers, Marla,” Torpid answered like a father who’s gone over this a thousand times before but junior just isn’t getting the fact that taking out the trash is his special place in the world. When he gets his own house and pays his own taxes, then he can make up the rules, but until then, Dad’s in charge.

“The line is flagging,” Torpid continued. “You know this. Just settle down. I’ll see if I can borrow some people from Ted. He’s not going to like it; it’s the second time this month you’re asking favors.”

“I’m asking favors? Who put all this together? Those freeze heads on the night shift are strung out on Dolly pills and I’m asking favors? Parker took my — hold on.”

She placed her finger over the mouthpiece and hollered over to Saddle who had been faithfully hanging around. “Go back and tell Mama to clean out all the machines before she starts. We may be getting more people, and even if we don’t, if one of the looms craps the bed, another one will be ready immediately. The fabric is going to be late this morning anyway.”

Saddle turned to go back through the looming doors.

“And send up a double for me, black,” Marla called to her. “I’ll be in the office.”

“Okay.”

“And one for yourself and Mama, and the whole crew in there.”

“One?”

“Don’t be smart. I’m too pissed off. Put it on Parker’s tab.”

The lift had started nagging her about holding it by now so she stepped onto the platform, flicking her hand over the little window for her floor — 410.

“Well, well, you sound like you’re handling things there, Gershe,” Torpid said through the yakker. “Fine job.”

“Fine job, my ass. This is the third time this week some shit like this has happened and it’s...”

“...only Wednesday. Yeah, I know. What you gonna do? Ever since Campbell...”

“...went plastic, yeah I know, we have to quick-march to keep our prices down. It’s bullshit. Keep ‘em up high. Natural fabrics...”

“...are worth more... Yeah I know. Is there some way we can not have this conversation some morning? Listen, you’re doing your job, you’ll pull through. Get a double, take some Tums. See you...”

“...after the show. Yeah, I know.” She clicked the yakker off, stashed it in her back pocket, and ran out as the lift stopped on her floor. She was in her office by the time the elevator said, “Four hundred and ten.”

Leaning against the edge of her work organizer, she shuffled through the sheets with the day’s show designs. Papers from previous shows lay strewn about the floor, on the two high chairs, on the standing light box, on her organizer hovering in the middle of the room, on the storage units. In short, pieces of Marla Gershe’s life — a gigantic puzzle, perhaps never to be assembled — covered every horizontal surface of her office. The daily designs that made up each do, the threads and fabrics to show the designs off, the themes of the moments, the desired effects, the colors, the swirls, the sweat and tears, and most important, the money to be made by this line of BAC’s textile enterprises, were all there in a convoluted mess. If someone put the last year’s collection of bits and pieces of fiber lying here and everywhere in order, not only would Marla Gershe have a clear picture of what she had been doing for 52 weeks of her life, but she’d easily be able to find the controls to Agnes — the CIA mentioned earlier — that were installed somewhere on her hovering organizer.

Alas, that would not be happening any time soon. She stood, leaning and flipping through the current orders, searching for the zingers Saddle mentioned.

“Knobby double knit — one bolt,” she mumbled to herself. “Reversible mohair — one bolt. Japanese hand weave...what the fuck?”

Six more pages of cotton/linen type mixes and then the zingers: a pink taffeta with an odd metallic cross-grain shellacked in, and a new stretch knit she’d never heard of. According to the sheet, the thread to work with it hadn’t been invented yet. The sample patch wasn’t there. Even the “freezeheads” couldn’t put it together.

She reached for the yakker and pushed “last.” The tone double beeped for an interminable time. Finally, it rang clear.

“I can’t do this,” she jumped in before Torpid answered. “I need...”

“Dread Torpid is not available at the moment. Please buzz...”

“God dammit!” she shrieked, throwing the crescent-shaped yakker (some people called their personal communicators bananas) at the wall in disgust. Its gelphan coating cushioned the blow when it hit the wall and simultaneously attached it there, just as it was designed to do.

“Fuck!” she said, sinking into her high seat and dropping her head into her hands.

“I’m sorry?” the walls to her office were confused as to what she wanted.

Marla sat at her desk that was littered with yesterday’s and last week’s and last month’s programs, sample sheets, and patch pieces. She shoved it all onto the floor and sat with her eyes crammed into the heels of her hands. She would’ve cried if she’d had the time for it. She would’ve quit if her short-circuiting brain could have thought about it. All she could do was run through options in her head and try to remember how to run a loom.

Finally, after about five seconds of respite, she lifted her head and answered the walls.

“I need the list of hand weavers brought up. Click message each one — local please, no email — and see who can come in today. Forward any replies from anybody to me immediately.”

“Even Doran?”

“Oh Christ! No, not him. Anybody but him. Don’t even call Doran.”

“How are you going to get a message if your yakker’s stuck to the wall?”

“Just call please. And that’s Saddle’s phone anyway.”

“Where’s yours?”

“I don’t know, why don’t you tell me?”

“I don’t know. Where did you leave it?”

“Oh Gad! How the hell should I know, you bleeping idiot.”

“Don’t get nasty just because I’m not ambulatory. It’s in your wastebasket at home, where you threw it last night.”

“Fine. Have them call Saddle’s phone when you send out the messages.” Marla began thumbing the inviso pad installed on the upper right corner of her organizer, signing her print onto each piece of paper.

“Agnes!”

“Yes.”

“Is Saddle’s still working?” Marla asked sheepishly.

“What is a Saddles?”

“Saddle’s phone.”

“Yes.”

Just then, Saddle herself bounced through the door on a wave of company coffee aroma—raunchy, rich, and double caffeine. She set one of the steaming cups on Marlaâs organizer.

“Mama’s pissed,” she said. “Said she doesn’t have time to clean two machines when she’s got a full show.”

“Is she doing it anyway?” Marla asked.

“Of course.”

“Well then, what do you care?”

“I’m just sayinâ...hey! What’s my banana doing on the wall?”

“I put it there so I wouldn’t lose it.”

“Oh, good idea.” Saddle moved to the far wall to grab it.

“I need that,” Marla said. “Leave it, please. Agnes is going to call with names of hand weavers that can make it in today.”

“Christ! You mean we have to hand-weave today?”

“Yeah.”

“Tell them no. We can’t do that today.”

“‘Tell them no.’ Yeah, right.”

“You can say ‘no’.”

“Just like Mama can say ‘no’?”

“This isn’t fair. This is the third time this week we’ve had more than our share.”

“Yeah, well, you do good work, keep mopping up spills, etc. and you get more of the same. That’s the way it is. Hopefully, in the end you get paid in kind. Can you process these please?” She handed the sheets to Saddle, her thumbprint signature having been added at this point.

“Yeah, right!” Saddle stood and stared at her, deliberately ignoring the papers in Marla’s outstretched hand. “They’ve been hinting at no pay raises again because of what Campbell’s doing.”

“Just take the papers and keep track of what’s happening. We can grieve later. Next week.”

“Next week, next month. We don’t have time to grieve. Besides that’s a Union thing. We’re not in the Union. Tell you what though, one day Mama or somebody down there is going to knock a hole in her head and then we’ll all be grieving for real.”

“Yeah, OK, at least we’ll have time to complain then. Please, get these fabric orders to Barge, so he can get started, so Mama can get started, so we can get started.”

“Oh don’t worry about Mama. She’s still cleaning the second machines and trying to buck up her staff.”

“Good, good.”

Saddle snatched the papers and stomped out of the room, her yellow plasto-pants swishing angrily.

Marla sat down with the two zingers and flipped through formula buttons on the centered pad of her organizer. The computer was just about to give one of her programmed joke lines, like “Oooooh, that tickles,” when Marla hit the “No Discourse” button.

She had to find the formula for the new fabrics — the zingers — soon. That would give Barge and his boys in the basement enough time to dig through the piles of dusty spools that were dragged out once every decade, whenever a genius designer came up with a brilliant something or other they were convinced would be the “start of something grand,” but actually wound up embarrassingly outdated within a few weeks. Something like their famous “fishweave” — nylon fishing line woven across graphite fibers complete with baby three-way hooks tacked on at intervals. Everyone from the weavers to the mannequin dressers went home bloody that day. With any luck, last night’s designers were in a conservative frame of mind, and they hadn’t mixed any alcohol with their Dolly pills. All she needed right now was to have to work with some sort of exploding-sequin coated zinc/poly alloy. That would top the whole day.

Just as Marla found the last thread number for the bizarre taffeta piece, Saddle burst back into the room.

“There’s a reversible mohair here, that takes twice as long.”

“Yeah, I saw that. Put that one last. I’ll do it myself if I have to.”

“You’re kidding! The Union’ll bust you.”

“Oh, I’m so scared. The Union. The Union that allows its workers to quicktime four days out of five? That Union?”

“Fuck!” Saddle spun and fled through the doorway, plasto-pants positively livid.

Marla whipped through the electronic pages frantically looking for a substitute for the thread on her list that hadn’t been invented yet. Nothing compatible came up. The stretch capacity of the new knit was so high, everything on hand would be tensioned to break if used with it.

“What the fuck is it made out of?” Marla asked herself. “Mucilage?”

“Rubber bands,” Agnes answered aloud, and then it started spewing out formulas as fast as Marla flipped through the pages.

“What?” Marla yelled, glancing at the toggle switches on her organizer; her arm must have bumped the “No Discourse” button to the “off” position. “Shut up!” She hollered, slamming the offending button “on” again.

She grabbed the cup of coffee, gulping the contents without noticing the scald. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and continued scrolling through pages of formulas.

“Rubber bands, rubber bands, rubber bands,” she incanted.

Knocking the “No Discourse” button off, she asked, “How many hand weavers have you come up with?”

Just as she asked the question, Saddle’s yak box, still hanging on the wall, rang.

“There’s one now,” Agnes answered. “But to answer your question, I sent out fifteen calls.”

Marla wheeled herself back to the wall where the mellophone was buzzing and grabbed it.

“Marla Gershe here.”

“Hello? You called?”

“You do hand jobs?” Marla asked. “Who are you? I’m not clocking an ID on you.”

“Yes, of course. My line is disrupted so my ID doesn’t disseminate at the moment, but I’ve worked for you before. It’s Charlo Doran.”

Marla winced and mouthed “Christ” to herself.

“Uh, listen. Not sure if we’re going to need you after all. I’m trying to change the program. Oh, wait a second. You ever worked with latex?”

“You bet, Marlie girl. Latex, teflo-tape, pine tar, sweet gum, anything sticky or stretchy. That’s my specialty.”

“Why is that not a surprise?” Marla said. “Listen, get in here in half an hour. See Sivia on 200, she’ll have directions.”

Marla’s morning continued in this vein. The activity intensified and the stakes gradually, almost imperceptibly, rose. By 8 a.m. she was on her fifth cup of scavenged coffee, one of which had been left over from the previous night’s show. It was cold and had a cigarette butt in it, but Marla didn’t notice.

Periodically she was reminded that Grant Parker’s show at O’Halloran was infinitely more important than hers. Nothing punctuated that more than when Al Shurm, president of BAC, and two of his lackeys, one of which was Lamont—her boss’ boss— showed up on the looming floor for a publicity inspection.

Marla was setting up a loom for herself at the time. Union rules were adamant: no management was allowed to weave, but Marla was desperate. Half her staff had been sent to Parker. At the same time, her show had not been trimmed to compensate. Somebody had to weave the patterns.

The Pres and his boys listened to her complaints about the situation as well as the assertion that she’d get grieved for stepping on Union workers’ toes. They responded by admiring her creativity under adversity. They continued on in their photo-op inspection, pestering Mama with questions and viewing out-of-date equipment stored in the room but having nothing to do with the facility’s operations.

The comedy graduated to tragedy when Agnes died. It just quit working. Saddle had only then started preparing the night’s printed program on Marla’s computer (her own was offline itself due to a local malfunction) when one final whine and crank signaled the end of activity.

By now Marla should have been pretty much off her head, but besides the fact that she had lost half her staff, this morning had been true to type. Boring almost. Things were about to warm up, though.

11:00 a.m.

“Saddle!”

“Torpid called,” Saddle replied without waiting for Marla to ask anything.

“Where’s your box?”

Saddle tossed her the yakker.

“How’s the layout coming?” Marla asked.

“I didn’t get yesterday’s program downloaded before Agnes, uh, doo dooed the bed; so I’m starting from scratch.”

“Oh Christ! When’s that copywriter getting here?”

“Half an hour. The tailor’s downstairs; says she’s got a bunch of mannequins but no specs and no bolts.”

“And Agnes isn’t a priority. Great! Torpid? Gershe here. Why is Parker’s mannequin a higher priority than Agnes here? I got...”

“Look, I don’t have time for your whining. Lamont was just in here. Said you were yapping to the president about having no loomers.”

“Nothing I never said to you before. How’m I supposed to put a show together with half a staff and now my CIA is down? You want me to walk everything through? I should be down on the floor helping Mama kick the shit out.”

“It’s not my fault you left your yakker at home. The president wants you to double the rate of your workers just for today. They get no lunch — twice pay for half an hour. Don’t loom yourself, you’ll get grieved.”

“Grieved? How about a lawsuit from the occupational hazard board for double-timing the weavers? Half the day’s already gone. We need to cut the show, we’re never going to make it. Listen, I gotta go walk the paperwork down to the tailor. Get the show backed off, I’ll do what I can with the weavers, but there is no way we can get this full show tonight.”

“You don’t get the full show and itâll come out of your pay.”

Dead silence and then, “You’re kidding, right?”

“Dead serious.”

More silence. “And you have the nerve to tell me to stay off the loom?”

“Dead serious.”

Marla stared at the wall in front of her. No one said anything.

“What’s going on?” Saddle interrupted the silence.

“I have no idea,” Marla replied, slowly handing the box back to Saddle. “No idea.”

“What do you want to do with the tailor?”

“Oh...just work on the program. Have the copywriter sit at the machine with you. Save it to tape when you’re done, and we’ll pump it in later if we get Agnes working. I’ll be back soon.” She said it all slowly with a quiet little voice. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

“Ms. Gershe?” The tech working on Saddle’s machine called through the open door. “What do you want me to do?”

A rush of aromodromed damask rose air spread out into the hallway from Saddle’s office. Marla inhaled deeply, raised her left eyebrow and answered. “Um, why don’t you fix that computer in there.” She paused and then continued. “Call your boss and ask if you can fix Agnes before heading out to yet another priority assignment for the fabulous Grant Parker.”

The tech thought for a second. “Um. OK.”

Marla inhaled again. “Fine.”

The tech waited a beat. “Fine.”

“See you later,” said Marla.

“Bye.”

“Bye.”

Marla smiled and stared at the wall. Finally, she turned from where she was standing in Saddle’s office doorway, walked to the lift and waved her hand sluggishly over the ‘downâ button.

The lift lazily came to a stop and the gates softly opened as if it, too, was shocked at the extreme insensitivity of BAC’s middle and upper management. Marla stepped in and waved for the loom floor. The lift slowly descended to three and opened its gates for her. She hesitated before pushing through the double doors, rehearsing in her head what she’d tell Mama.

On the loom floor, she motioned to Mama to step outside. Mama gave the “Are you nuts” look, but obediently placed the loom on standby, braking the shuttle. Pulling herself from in front of the machine, she walked to where Marla held the doors open for her. Once outside Mama said, “Now what?”

“Listen, Mama. Management has gone overboard now. I don’t know what to say, but they’re taking away lunchtime for a half an hour of double pay. Also they’re increasing the rate for today to double.”

“You’re joking of course. Really sick, Gershe.”

“Dead serious, Mama. They’re telling me if we don’t meet the full show, it’s coming off my pay.”

“And we’ll all be docked then. Bastards!”

“No, I’m not letting it trickle down. I took this crummy job. The shit stops here.”

“Look, why’d you even tell me this? They’re already pissed. They saw you setting up. If you move one string, they’ll grieve.”

“Like I care at this point.”

“They’re pissed beyond that. There’s just so much someone can do.”

“Tell them what I said, pass the orders around. If they give up, they give up. But at least I did my job and passed the order on, and you too. Tell them I ordered them to do it — don’t mention my pay deal. Tell them if they don’t do it, I’ll have to loom myself. If they don’t they don’t. I don’t know what else to do.”

“If they do it, you’d better not touch that yellow loom.”

“You’re right. Listen, where are we at?”

“Well, we got everything late. There’s half a staff and it’s 11:30. We’re about one-third done.”

“That’s not good. We should be at two-thirds by now. Yeah, they gotta double the rate. I’ll send down some liquid lunch. Just do your best, Mama. And have the medro send up the patterns to Minzt so she can start figuring out her sizes before the bolts even get there.”

Marla patted her on the back as she turned to the lift, not quite sure what her next move should be.

Returning to her office, she grabbed Saddle’s yakker and ordered lunch for her crew and a coffee to be sent up for herself. By now, the tech had finished in Saddle’s office, so Dittle, the copywriter, could start on the copy for the night’s show program. With Agnes down, however, there were no sheets for Dittle to work from, so instead of grinding out the current show’s copy, she sat in Saddle’s high chair mindlessly spinning on the seat’s axis like a kindergartner on a bar stool. Marla decided it was a good time to check in on the mannequins to see how the fitting was going, since the only copier capable of handling patterns happened to be located on 72.

The mannequins, a mob of gibbering, jabbering, primping robots in the style of Rosie, the Jetsonsâ maid (except that they were shapely and tall, very tall — eight feet tall—and had legs) had come in earlier. They were highly programmed, updated with the latest software, but unable to take orders from anyone but Marla. Even then they misunderstood them most of the time. They didn’t quite get that they needed to remain in the sizing room to get fitted. Most of the morning they spent walking around the Anthusian Unit looking for Marla to give her a cup of coffee.

Down at Sully’s sizing room, she proceeded to demand answers from Minzt the tailor.

“Where’s the bolts?”

“Nothing here yet.”

“I just left the floor, they had a third of the work done.”

“Nothing here yet.”

“Where’s your box?”

“Oh no you don’t. You’re not taking my phone.”

“I’m not leaving the room. I’m just calling down to check after the bolts. You know we’re losing 5,000 a minute when we’re not selling.”

“An hour. Yeah, yeah. Listen, where’s your box?”

“An hour, a minute, might as well be a million a minute. Broke. What’s it to you? Sully, can I borrow your phone?” she asked the fitting room coordinator and then turned back to Minzt. “Let me have the patterns for a copy wouldja? I need them for the copywriter.”

“Forget it. Use my box. I’ll make the copies.” Minzt tossed the yakker to Marla and proceeded to an adjoining room to make pattern copies.

“Thanks,” Marla replied as she punched up the transit authority’s button. Just as the back wall to the room — the freight elevator entrance — was opening, a characteristic whine was heard from that quarter indicating a squawker going off.

Marla heard a “Yeah?” emitted through the authority’s yakker earpiece and stereophonically from the room at the same time. She clicked the box off and addressed the transit officer who was just getting off the freighter with Mama’s completed one-third.

“Where were you?” she shouted across the room.

“Hello? Hello?” the transit guy kept talking into his yakker as he wheeled the bin of fabric into the room. At one point, he looked at the yakker quizzically and then stashed it in his front pocket, resuming his pushing of the bin over to the side-receiving table. He never answered Marla’s question.

“Finally,” Minzt said upon entering the room and seeing the fabric being unloaded. She handed Marla’s copies to her without stopping her own forward progress to the bolt table. She pulled out the turquoise from the pile and carried it over to the center table, sifting through the patterns to pull up the one she needed.

“Number one,” she hollered. “Height: eight foot; waist seventeen inches; thigh...

“They supersized the show?” Marla stammered.

The tailor answered, “Looks like it. We’re not going to have enough material; I can see that already.”

“Can you downsize these or cut the number of outfits?”

“Not without losing my job.”

“What if I order you to?”

“Sign a downsize order on each pattern and I’ll do anything.”

“All right, I need them downsized two feet each. Can the mannequins do that much?”

“They’re set up to reduce indefinitely. Down to a foot even.”

“Fab. All I need is six feet.”

“Sign on the dotted line,” the tailor answered, handing the patterns over to Marla.

“Thanks,” Marla replied, signing each one using her belly as a table. “Listen, I gotta go speed up the rest of your order. I hope all your cutters and seamstresses are here.”

She ran out not waiting to hear the answer, calling the lift for her floor. Up in her office, Saddle was still at the computer doing layouts. Dittle was still sitting in Saddle’s high chair, swiveling, waiting for something to do, and sniffing, as if the damask aromodrome air was affecting her sinuses. Marla ran into the copywriter and thrust the pages at her while hollering over to Saddle, “How’s it going?”

“Torpid called. He’s giving Mama to Parker.”

“What?” Marla screamed. She ran over to her own office. “Are you out of your mind? Why the fuck didn’t you call me? That’s it! That’s it! I can’t work like this. Nothing but no-brains all around.”

“I...I...you didn’t have your buzzer. I...I’m trying to do three things at once. I thought you were on your way down there to him.”

“You knew I went down to Sully’s. You should have rung down there. Oh Christ! How long ago did he call?”

Saddle pulled her yakker out to hand to Marla, her face a mass of confusion, her eyes misting. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m just caught up in the layout. It’s a bit over my head.” She got up and ran out of the room.

“Oh fuck me!” Marla said, looking after Saddle, but punching up Torpid’s number on the yakker.

“Torpid here. I’m...”

“Parker can’t have Mama.”

“He’s already got her. She’s the only one that can handle those weavers of yours. They only speak Anthusian.”

“Yeah, well they’re Anthusians, like all of us here at the Anthusian unit. Remember? They’re supposed to be over here. I don’t give a fuck. Either my show is cut by half or give me back the whole staff. We cannot do this.”

“Gershe, I’m in the president’s office right now. We can’t talk.”

“I’m on my way over.”

“Gershe, don’t come...”

Marla clicked Saddle’s yakker off.

Out in the hallway, red-faced Saddle was just leaving the bathroom. Marla tossed her the yakker.

“Saddle, I’m sorry. I was out of line; you’re the best thing I got. You know that. I just can’t do this anymore. Let me get you a drink after work, what do you say?”

She was just entering the lift as the doors closed. The only thing she heard Saddle say was, “No thanks.” She bashed her forehead with her balled up fists. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” she said and then remembered what she was doing. She frantically ran her hand over the floor numbers, trying to set the code for the West Building. She knew they’d be meeting over at the big boys’ house.

As the lift gates opened onto the plush West Building entrance port, the receptionist smiled in greeting — probably the only smile Marla saw the whole day besides Lamont’s condescending one, earlier on the loom floor. A barely audible Muzak track — a percussionless jazz combo rendition of Santana’s Jingo-lo-ba — played in the background.

“Hello. How are you?” the receptionist beamed.

Sterilized air circulated in the lobby. Fueled by a higher concentration of oxygen than Marla was used to, her anger rose a degree.

“Bad,” she answered. “Where’s your boss meeting with his lackeys?”

“President Shurm is meeting with his managers today. It’s a closed meeting.”

“Fine,” Marla uttered as she strode past the receptionist’s desk. Her boots clicking rhythmically on the marble-tiled floor echoed down the hall, amplifying the effect of her indignation.

“He’s not in his office and you can’t go in there anyway,” the receptionist called after her. She jumped up and ran after Marla. “He’s in a closed conference; you’ll have to wait. Ma’am. Miss! Please! You have to wait,” and so on.

Marla turned down the left hall where the conference rooms were rumored to be. A blaze of sunlight bursting through the twice-daily cleaned set of windows at the end of the hallway nearly knocked her over with its indecent natural light. She blinked to avoid the onslaught and began defiantly pushing in doors, confident she’d find the president and his smarms behind one of them. The third door on the right proved her assumption correct. It opened to a round table with seven individuals whose heads bobbled up the minute the door swished open. As big as the hallway windows were, the conference room windows were larger by three, exponentially speaking. If they were two square feet in the hallway, they were eight square feet here. Marla shielded her eyes from the intense light, barely making out the president wearing a pair of ocular shades on his nose and reading from a paper.

“What the hell is going on?” Marla shouted, looking straight at the man. “What kind of an outfit are you running here?”

Eventually the others at the table came into focus. Everyone looked like they were in the kind of daze you’d be in because today Jesus was coming again and somehow your name didn’t show up on The List. They simply had no clue.

“Gershe!” Torpid stood up and shouted.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Shurm. She just got past me...” The receptionist had caught up to Marla and was entering the room offering her apologies to the president.

“It’s all right, Cindy,” the president answered. “Not your fault, obviously.”

“Gershe! Get back to the floor.” Torpid came around the table and advanced on Marla.

“And what’s wrong with you, you jackal?” Marla addressed the advancing Torpid. “Did you tell them what’s going on? I’m sure President Shurm is not aware of what’s being requested on his behalf.”

Now Lamont stood up. “Ms. Gershy, if you have a problem with what Mr. Torpid is doing, you should contact me. You don’t need to burst in on a meeting. Shame on you, you should know protocol.”

“And now jackal number two speaks.” Marla addressed Lamont. “Give me back Mama and my workers and we’ll give you a show. We’re not even half done and it’s noon. How’m I supposed to do this? Did you even pass second grade, Lamont? Remember, that’s where you learned that one and one is two. One and zero don’t do it!”

“What are you babbling about, Gershy?” Lamont asked.

“Yes, young lady,” the president interceded on his own behalf. “What are you babbling about?”

“I’m babbling that this lame jack—al, gave Parker half my weaving staff for a show for you because you’re out on the town today. Fine. No problem, but the designers gave me a full high-intense do-off. I’m not getting a break.”

“We toured your facility. Everything was smooth. Your work is adequate.”

“My work is the show tonight; you didn’t see that.”

“There’s no need to whine. I can’t see everybody’s show. Maybe next time I’ll see yours. Mr. Lamont has assured me that Mr. uh...”

“Parker,” Lamont filled in.

“Parker’s show will delight me.”

“That’s not the bloody point. You can go to the moon for all I care. My job is to put on a show. The revenues come in from the show. My job is to do a show that brings in revenue, not entertain royalty. Every year you’ve stated that in your bull-talks. Your presence today, sir, is jacking with my mandate as given to me by you! You need to have your dogs return my tools, or I’m not going to get the flat fixed.”

“Young lady, it’s a poor practitioner that blames her tools for her inadequacy.”

“I don’t have my tools to blame! That’s the point.”

“I’m sorry, I’m not in a position to assess the situation. I’ve been informed by my managers that all the floors are humming along. I personally went to your floor and things were definitely humming. You should feel flattered that I visited. Think of all the other plants I passed over. Just because I’m viewing Mr. um...”

“Parker,” Lamont filled in.

“Parker’s show, you shouldn’t feel slighted.”

“Oh God! You are so...”

“Gershe!” Torpid shouted. “Get back to your floor. You’re wasting time. You have a show to do.”

Marla looked at Torpid whose face was getting redder the longer he stood there. Lamont was pale. The president, a charmer, was smiling. If he could pat her on the head, he would. But he was seated at the far end—too far away. And it was such a lovely day. And ahhhh.

“Gentlemen,” the president said. “Shall we resume? Thanks for the report Ms. uh, Gershy is it? We’ll take it under consideration.”

“I suggest you return to work, Ms. Gershy,” Lamont finally said.

Marla just looked from one idiotic baldhead to the next.

“I’ll speak to you later,” Torpid said quietly, as if he hoped no one else would hear.

The receptionist, Cindy, pulled her back and with a wonderful, patronizing smile said, “Would you like to make an appointment, uh, Ms. uh, Gersay, is it?”

Marla shook her arm free of Cindy’s grasp and walked down the hall.

“Ms. Gersay! Ms. Gersay?” The receptionist called after her as she strode back to the people mover and to her floor and two hours of hell.

Upon returning to her office, she lost her temper again, flaring up at Dittle the copywriter, who was dragging her feet with the night’s program. She took it out on Saddle again, saying it was her fault for not pushing the copywriter enough. Saddle, in her sensitive — some say “high-strung” way — ran to the bathroom again for another eyeful of tears.

Marla then made it over to Minzt the tailor’s area to make a mess of things, and got everyone there quite angry with her as well.

After that, she checked in with the rubber suit team down in the basement, berating them soundly for finding a highly toxic fastening material that also had the charming ability to be absorbed by the skin on contact, making the whole thing unsuitable in clothing. The outfit had to be scrapped, rendering the four hours of engineersâ and weaversâ time wasted. At a million a minute... well, if one were to work out the math, one would lose one’s temper. Which Marla did, but no one could tell because she was in permanent apoplectic mode by then.

3:00 p.m.

By three o’clock, half her staff and Mama were gone and the other half was demoralized. She’d been sitting in Mama’s seat weaving for over an hour. One half hour after the afternoon break — usually the time when the day was beginning to wind down — the workers were only now starting feverishly on the second half of the day’s work.

Marla was well past mad now and had been composing her resignation letter in her head since the time she left Shurm’s office. Without even the slightest hint of a possible prospect beyond her current job, all she was thinking about was how to get the most venom down on paper.

A crackle and shriek went up from loom number three — Zennie Stapper’s. Marla’s head jerked up from a scream so intense it rose above the loom din. Instantly she jumped out of her seat and ran to Zennie Stapper, screaming, “Stop! Stop!” By the time she got there, Baylie at number four had already pushed the emergency bar to stop the machine’s 350 pound shuttle incessantly crunching against Zennie Stapper’s entangled hand — skin, bone, muscle and all. Zennie was unconscious by now, the bone-crushing pain too much for her to take.

Marla took two seconds to assess the situation and ran to the emergency flap on the far wall, slamming her fist on the panel when she got there. All machines in the room stopped in the up position. Everyone rushed from their seats. The room lights flashed and a siren screamed on. The words “Emergency!” flashed in the air from the hologenerator somewhere overhead. The words reverberated from the floor loudspeakers, and Marla knew that throughout the building everyone heard the alert.

In a matter of seconds, the emergency response team rushed onto the floor. The team cut Zennie Stapper out of the machine’s entangling warp thread and strapped her onto a stretcher. She was out of the room before her forearm stopped bleeding and she had returned to consciousness.

“It’s because we’re working too fast,” someone yelled. “She had to set the machine’s speed too high.”

“Yeah, her head numbed trying to keep up, she couldn’t even think, probably. I was getting ready to go myself. That could have been me, goddammit!” someone else added.

“It wouldn’t have been me. My hands are numb. I wouldn’t even have felt it until my whole head was in there!”

Marla looked around, too angry to answer. By now, people from other stations and floors had gathered. A crowd of about twenty stood and stared.

Her anger had been building since this morning, since a week ago, a month ago even, and had climaxed when Parker absconded with Mama. She had not been thinking too clearly herself since that point. She had been maniacally pushing Mama’s loom too fast, too hard, not safely. She had hardly been watching the movement, the building of the fabric. She’d been staring ahead composing that stupid letter. Just as the weavers in front of her had probably been doing. Until Zennie Stapper experienced what each and every one of them would have experienced sooner or later.

“Tell you what,” she told the group, not one of whom really wanted to hear anything from her. “If I were you, I wouldn’t do a thing.”

“Wouldn’t do a thing? That’s your problem Gershe. You wouldn’t do a thing. You just keep kissing their...”

“Shut up! That’s not what I’m talking about.” She turned to Flannery, the man with the sharp retort. Her eyes blazed, piercing Flannery, forcing him to silence. “Do nothing. Stop working. Stand. And do nothing. We can’t possibly do good work anyway. We’re killing ourselves. Maiming ourselves. The deck is stacked against us, children. Why do they keep pushing? It’s getting worse every day. Today was just the worst. It was never going to get better. We’re never going to finish.”

She jumped up on Mama’s desk and kicked the in-basket over the side; the papers flew out at odd angles. Other workers from various offices and stations were filing in. The crowd had tripled by this point.

“You’re wrong,” she shouted at Flannery. “I told them, told the president, that asshole that came in here today, smiling and shit at Mama. I told him we couldn’t work this way. Know what he said?”

“What?” the group collectively scowled.

“It’s a poor technician that blames her tools.”

“What?” Three or four of them stepped forward toward the desk. “No way! That sucks!” Others followed. They gathered in a semi-circle around Marla.

“Yeah. That’s just what he said. It’s our fault if we don’t make the rate, if we get our bodies stuck in the machines. They give us free coffee. Why can’t we keep pumping? They’ve increased the rate four times in the last two weeks. Today was not unusual. We just reached the limit, that’s all. They want to see if we can produce more with half a staff. If we make today’s show, they’re going to expect us to do this every time. Then if we complain, theyâll offer to return the staff back to full capacity, but itâll be for half-pay. They’ll be able to give today as proof that we don’t need more people.”

A general grumble arose. Someone voiced, “I ain’t doin’ it.”

“No, of course not!” Marla screamed back. “No one is. We’re taking an action.”

“When?” someone hollered.

“Now. Right now! Zennie Stapper’s hurt. We’re hungry and dead-tired and only half done with the day. We’re taking an action right now.”

Minzt, the tailor — a non-union worker — left the room quietly and ran down the hall.

Marla jumped down from the desk. “We need some attention here. We need help here! This is an emergency!”

She strode over to the emergency flap. The previous alarm had been reset automatically as soon as the emergency crew, with their programmed rain jackets, had entered the room. Marla slammed the alarm again to get more of the building occupants, i.e., the muckety mucks over in Shurm’s office, to make it out into the cold hell of the weaving floor. The thirty occupants of the room cheered in response. She laughed and slapped those next to her on the back.

“It’s a poor boss that blames his slobs!” she said to Cheever standing next to her.

“Ha!” said Cheever. “It’s a poor boss that blames his slobs!” Cheever yelled to his neighbor who then yelled it to her neighbor. Before long, everyone was yelling it to everyone else. Marla started to chant it. She started a dance around the inside of the circle that had formed around the emergency flap. Others jumped in behind her. Cheever, Baylie, Flannery, all of them. They sang and danced and clapped to the new beat: “It’s a poor boss that blames his slobs! Ha! It’s a poor boss that blames his slobs! Ha!”

Suddenly the emergency sirens and holograms were silenced. The shouting chilled down to a whisper, the dancing stopped, and the clapping stilled. They looked at each other, and then over to the emergency flap, where they saw the president himself flanked by Lamont and Torpid and six other lackeys.

By now, the second alarm fire team was making it into the room. Marla assessed the situation, broke out from the ring and ran to the flap, engaging it again, making it a three-alarm emergency. Now the police would be responding. The workers followed Marla to the flap and surrounded the president and his men. When the alarm resumed they sent up a shout and started chanting maniacally facing the president. Torpid started screaming at Marla to stop. She merely chanted louder and spit the “Ha!” directly into his face.

“What is your problem!” he screamed red-faced.

Lamont began hollering also. He and Torpid surrounded Marla, cursing at her, spitting, bobbing their heads back and forth like the mannequins who were by now ducking into the room and joining the fray.

Meanwhile, the mob had separated the president from his entourage. Backed up against the wall, he pleaded, white-faced, for everyone to settle down. Marla screamed back, broke away from Torpid and Lamont and ran over to Mama’s top desk drawer, retrieving a foot-long mag-lite. She took the torch and squeezed in between the mob members, holding it like a beacon. She joined in the chanting and the mob backed off a little to let the mag-lite have its effect. She held it up to block any attempts by the president to disengage the emergency flap. The chanting became louder and louder as the mannequins and various other laggards entered. They were happy to join in, having themselves been run ragged in the past two weeks. Everybody had been waiting for the signal to do this for quite a while.

Lamont rushed out through the aluminum doors and screamed to the incoming emergency police, which included a very green corps of security officers. They ran into the room, leaving Lamont sweating on the side in the hallway. He panted like a dog with eyes wide and tail dangling between its legs.

In the middle of the room, Torpid stood shouting “Stop her!” pointing to Marla with the mag-lite raised above her head and seemingly aimed at the president. The room was mass confusion. The chanters had broken up and were kicking the looms and using whatever trashcan, lunch box, or other blunt object was available to damage the cast iron structures. The mannequins, by now programmed for AI mode, immediately saw what was going on and began a systematic disassembling of the looms using the handy-dandy toolbox installed in their lower abdomens.

The president screamed “Stop!” at Marla, at the robots, at Torpid, at anyone who could possibly stop. The robots of course were responding mainly to Marla, who shouted, “All work must stop,” fueling their destruction of the looms. Now the president shrank from fear, his knees buckling beneath him, his eyelids fluttering as if he was trying to block out the scene and at the same time take in information; his brain quickly short-circuited to open/close mode.

A mixed smell of textile dust, oily rust, and burning computer components filled the air along with the deafening noise.

Just at that moment the greenest individual of the green corps, fresh from the Academy only a week earlier and not much more than a mannequin programmed for AI himself, pulled out his xanthan gun — a riot weapon, capable of firing long-chain organic compounds that temporarily maim the target, but not mortally. After a time, the organics dissolved in the body leaving a big gouge. The gauge of the “bullet” determines how big the gouge is. “Gouge-gauge” they call it.

The cadet was quite frightened by the clanging robots, the screaming, dancing and chanting workers, the nattily suited president down on his knees, blubbering, and Marla maniacally standing over him and threatening him with a mag-lite. All of the officers had their weapons drawn but only the greenest of the green corps guy was visibly shaking.

The head officer, unaware of the panicking newbie, busied himself with trying to figure out how to stop the mannequins. It was against the law to actually shoot his weapon (it wasn’t a xanthan gun) except in self-defense, so he resorted to shouting out questions which nobody heard. “Who’s in charge of the mannequins? Who’s in charge here?”

The firefighters also responded as per their standing orders. Their job was first and foremost to prevent destruction of any kind to company equipment. The fire chief ran to the emergency bar and broke the glass. The sprinklers immediately came on, dousing the room, but no one skipped a beat. A scream arose when the water hit the chanters, but that was it. The increased sound level merely added a blip to the general din. Marla turned to see the new developments as the water mixed with foul air. She stood and laughed, her hands on her hips. The robots would probably short-circuit in a minute, as would everything else. But the chanting continued — muddy rain everywhere.

With Marla’s back turned Torpid saw a chance to disengage the emergency flap. He snuck around behind Marla and just as he was raising his hand, she turned to smash it with her mag-lite.

The green cadet, twitching his head back and forth from Torpid to Marla, reacted immediately upon seeing the blunt object raised in violence by the one person in the room everyone seemed to be looking to; seemed to be afraid of, seemed to be following in the charge. He took timeless aim and shot into the belly of the beast.

The emergency alarms cut off immediately as Torpid’s hand connected with the emergency flap and Marla fell to the floor, dropping the mag-lite with a crash. The noise in the room continued for a few moments, until the chanters one by one saw Marla lying in a pool of blood. The robots, too, stopped clanging when they sensed their leader sinking to the floor. Only the sprinklers continued to stream, like a light spring shower. It was the only sound in the room. Everyone listened except Marla Gershe. For her, all was silent.

 End Chapter One

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