Lickbum's Quandary
Caprice Henrich Lickbum III had many problems. The foremost of these
problems, and often most painful, was that he kept getting beaten up. He didn't
know why people liked to single him out and then commence ravage him. Maybe
it was because his first name was better suited for a girl or maybe it was that his
last name was Lickbum. Lickbum, for Christ's sake. He'd found out very soon in
life (but not soon enough, it would seem) that with a last name like Lickbum, you
didn't last very long anywhere – especially if that anywhere included public
schools.
Some of the other guys at school with promiscuous appellations had
adopted nicknames and were only really shamed when an ignorant substitute
called out their humiliation in full. Some of them had made a joke of their names
and got known for their sense of humor, some of them had become good in macho
things like sports and so made up for their shortcomings. But Caprice had ignored
the problem completely and, in doing so, had made it much worse.
But even if he hadn't had a funny name, Caprice would defientely still have
been shunned. He was a geek. Not just any geek but The Geek as far as any of his
classmates were concerned. Not only could he recall the names and species of the
entire Star Trek cast, but he also had a vast collection of black socks, reeked of
bad hygene, and was skilled with computers. Quite skilled, actually, which would
explain why he had picked the lock to the school computer lab at 12:03 Wednsday
morning. He wasn't planning to steal a computer, he told the pircipal at a later
date, he just sort of wound up needing it.
The reason Caprice liked to use the school computers is that they couldn't
be traced directly to him. And for the kind of hacking he was diong on them, it
was a very good attribute indeed. But at 12:03 on Wednsday morning, Caprice
wasn't hacking into a government mainframe or changing his grades – he was
tracing a rumor. It had been a rumor that was less than a rumor, really. A whisper
overheard by chance, an idea which glinted and darted but was never really heard
or seen. It wasn't a rumor because it wasn't something you spoke of, lest it
disappear on the tip of your tounge and it wasn't a rumor because every time you
got a hint of what was going on, the whispers would stop and the scent would
fade. It wasn't a rumor, it was a murmur And that murmur was The Matrix.
"The Matrix." said a voice behind Caprice. In the movies, he would have spun
around in his chair cooly (and he would have ahd a spinning chair instead of just a
cheap school one) or arranged his face into an Oscar-winning inquisative look. But
this wasn't the movies, this was a dorky little boy who smelled like overcooked
broccoli hacking into things that weren't meant for his eyes.
"Eep!" squeaked Caprice dived under the computer desk he was sitting at. While
Caprice Lickbum was a very smart person, diving under his desk wasn't a very
smart thing to do. The desk had obviously not been designed for diving and he
managed to injury his head, cut his leg, kick over his chair, and become so
entangled with wires that the computer toppled off of the desk and hit the floor
with a satisfyingly gut-wrenching crash. Plus it was dark down there and Caprice
couldn't see his assailant, not that he'd be any less scared if he could.
He waited there, shivering in the cold and dusty enveloping darkness for
quite some time until he realized that there was nobody else in the room. This led
him to make two conclusions: either there had never been another individual there
with him and the voice had been totally imagined, or that the other person was still
there and was just a really quiet breather. Or maybe they were deviously holding
their breath, just waiting for him to become less suspicious, come out from
underneath the table, and commence to get his head blown off. That's what
usually happened. Caprice knew because it occurred in about every action flick
ever created, and he wasn't about to fall for it.
There wasn't really another choice, however, because his legs were getting
cramped and it was a little hard to breathe under the miniscule desk. Maybe he
could take his assasin by surprise.
"AAA!" he screamed, leaping awkwardly out from under the desk and holding his
hands in the approved Jackie Chan kung-fu stance. But no one was there. The
eerie glow from the streetlight outside turned the darkness of the computer room
into a series of shadows, but still no one could be seen. What could be seen,
however, was a very smashed, school-owned computer.
"Oh, man…" he said, knowing it must be bad now, because now he was talking to
himself, "Right, now if I can manage to get it home somehow, I can hide it in my
closet until I can fix it. Or buy it." This plan sounded optimistic enough, until he
stared down and viewed the extent of the damage. The monitor looked like it had
been simultaneously involved in a nuclear blast and trampled by enraged zoo
elephants. He hoisted the wreckage back onto the desk and surveyed it.
"Geez, I'm fucked," he spoke to himself again while staring down the crushed
monitor. Oddly enough, the computer seemed to be working despite it's recent
maulings. To the left of the screen, in small white letters, read: "You are so
fucked." Just like that. It was rather rude, Caprice thought. First mysterious voices,
and now his computer was swearing at him. The computer was right, though.
"Yes," he said, a little bemused, "I suppose I am."
The cursor blinked sullenly for a second, then spelled out. "So am I."
"Well, I should think so, I did drop you on the floor for a second, there. I'm
surprised you're still working, to tell you the half of it."
"Not the computer, you idiot. Me."Caprice nodded like he understood completely.
"Ah," he said meaningfully, meaning nothing at all.
"What you find is what you seek," the computer blinked dully, "Follow the
orange armadillo." The screen flickered and died with a lonesome "Bloop" and
Caprice arched a bewildered eyebrow.
"Right. If anyone cares to know, I am officially insane," he said to himself. He
searched around the room looking for a broom for a while until his cell phone rang
urgently from his back pocket. Caprice thought about not answering it, just in case
it was his dad realizing that his son wasn't in bed. But something made him
answer it and so he picked up cautiously.
"Hello?"
"There's a broom in the closet to your left." It was the same voice that had
frightened him before, but now it seemed as if he had almost expected hearing it.
"Oh, right. Thanks."
"Hurry up already, will ya? This leather is really chafing me."
"What?" said Caprice, back to being confused. But the person on the other end
had already hung up. Caprice was once again shocked at the rudeness of the world.
He turned to his right, got the broom out of the closet, and swept up the broken
monitor glass on the floor. There were still some bits and pieces left when he was
done, but he really was trying to hurry, so Caprice picked up the monitor with
some effort (watching Star Trek doesn't really tone the muscles) and hurried out
the door and into the night.
Caprice Henrich Lickbum III had many problems. The foremost of these
problems, and often most painful, was that he kept getting beaten up. He didn't
know why people liked to single him out and then commence ravage him. Maybe
it was because his first name was better suited for a girl or maybe it was that his
last name was Lickbum. Lickbum, for Christ's sake. He'd found out very soon in
life (but not soon enough, it would seem) that with a last name like Lickbum, you
didn't last very long anywhere – especially if that anywhere included public
schools.
Some of the other guys at school with promiscuous appellations had
adopted nicknames and were only really shamed when an ignorant substitute
called out their humiliation in full. Some of them had made a joke of their names
and got known for their sense of humor, some of them had become good in macho
things like sports and so made up for their shortcomings. But Caprice had ignored
the problem completely and, in doing so, had made it much worse.
But even if he hadn't had a funny name, Caprice would defientely still have
been shunned. He was a geek. Not just any geek but The Geek as far as any of his
classmates were concerned. Not only could he recall the names and species of the
entire Star Trek cast, but he also had a vast collection of black socks, reeked of
bad hygene, and was skilled with computers. Quite skilled, actually, which would
explain why he had picked the lock to the school computer lab at 12:03 Wednsday
morning. He wasn't planning to steal a computer, he told the pircipal at a later
date, he just sort of wound up needing it.
The reason Caprice liked to use the school computers is that they couldn't
be traced directly to him. And for the kind of hacking he was diong on them, it
was a very good attribute indeed. But at 12:03 on Wednsday morning, Caprice
wasn't hacking into a government mainframe or changing his grades – he was
tracing a rumor. It had been a rumor that was less than a rumor, really. A whisper
overheard by chance, an idea which glinted and darted but was never really heard
or seen. It wasn't a rumor because it wasn't something you spoke of, lest it
disappear on the tip of your tounge and it wasn't a rumor because every time you
got a hint of what was going on, the whispers would stop and the scent would
fade. It wasn't a rumor, it was a murmur And that murmur was The Matrix.
"The Matrix." said a voice behind Caprice. In the movies, he would have spun
around in his chair cooly (and he would have ahd a spinning chair instead of just a
cheap school one) or arranged his face into an Oscar-winning inquisative look. But
this wasn't the movies, this was a dorky little boy who smelled like overcooked
broccoli hacking into things that weren't meant for his eyes.
"Eep!" squeaked Caprice dived under the computer desk he was sitting at. While
Caprice Lickbum was a very smart person, diving under his desk wasn't a very
smart thing to do. The desk had obviously not been designed for diving and he
managed to injury his head, cut his leg, kick over his chair, and become so
entangled with wires that the computer toppled off of the desk and hit the floor
with a satisfyingly gut-wrenching crash. Plus it was dark down there and Caprice
couldn't see his assailant, not that he'd be any less scared if he could.
He waited there, shivering in the cold and dusty enveloping darkness for
quite some time until he realized that there was nobody else in the room. This led
him to make two conclusions: either there had never been another individual there
with him and the voice had been totally imagined, or that the other person was still
there and was just a really quiet breather. Or maybe they were deviously holding
their breath, just waiting for him to become less suspicious, come out from
underneath the table, and commence to get his head blown off. That's what
usually happened. Caprice knew because it occurred in about every action flick
ever created, and he wasn't about to fall for it.
There wasn't really another choice, however, because his legs were getting
cramped and it was a little hard to breathe under the miniscule desk. Maybe he
could take his assasin by surprise.
"AAA!" he screamed, leaping awkwardly out from under the desk and holding his
hands in the approved Jackie Chan kung-fu stance. But no one was there. The
eerie glow from the streetlight outside turned the darkness of the computer room
into a series of shadows, but still no one could be seen. What could be seen,
however, was a very smashed, school-owned computer.
"Oh, man…" he said, knowing it must be bad now, because now he was talking to
himself, "Right, now if I can manage to get it home somehow, I can hide it in my
closet until I can fix it. Or buy it." This plan sounded optimistic enough, until he
stared down and viewed the extent of the damage. The monitor looked like it had
been simultaneously involved in a nuclear blast and trampled by enraged zoo
elephants. He hoisted the wreckage back onto the desk and surveyed it.
"Geez, I'm fucked," he spoke to himself again while staring down the crushed
monitor. Oddly enough, the computer seemed to be working despite it's recent
maulings. To the left of the screen, in small white letters, read: "You are so
fucked." Just like that. It was rather rude, Caprice thought. First mysterious voices,
and now his computer was swearing at him. The computer was right, though.
"Yes," he said, a little bemused, "I suppose I am."
The cursor blinked sullenly for a second, then spelled out. "So am I."
"Well, I should think so, I did drop you on the floor for a second, there. I'm
surprised you're still working, to tell you the half of it."
"Not the computer, you idiot. Me."Caprice nodded like he understood completely.
"Ah," he said meaningfully, meaning nothing at all.
"What you find is what you seek," the computer blinked dully, "Follow the
orange armadillo." The screen flickered and died with a lonesome "Bloop" and
Caprice arched a bewildered eyebrow.
"Right. If anyone cares to know, I am officially insane," he said to himself. He
searched around the room looking for a broom for a while until his cell phone rang
urgently from his back pocket. Caprice thought about not answering it, just in case
it was his dad realizing that his son wasn't in bed. But something made him
answer it and so he picked up cautiously.
"Hello?"
"There's a broom in the closet to your left." It was the same voice that had
frightened him before, but now it seemed as if he had almost expected hearing it.
"Oh, right. Thanks."
"Hurry up already, will ya? This leather is really chafing me."
"What?" said Caprice, back to being confused. But the person on the other end
had already hung up. Caprice was once again shocked at the rudeness of the world.
He turned to his right, got the broom out of the closet, and swept up the broken
monitor glass on the floor. There were still some bits and pieces left when he was
done, but he really was trying to hurry, so Caprice picked up the monitor with
some effort (watching Star Trek doesn't really tone the muscles) and hurried out
the door and into the night.