From ZAP FORCE: ROYAL BLOOD, a hard rockin' novel of teenage science fiction superheroes in a 1995 that never was, where the good guys never say die, the bad guys always scream "DIE!", and everything blows up real good:

From The National Star, November 11 - 18, 1976:

MYSTERIOUS WAVE OF PENTAGON CRANIAL EXPLOSIONS COVERED UP

Spontaneous combustion occurs nearly 300 times per annum although the so called 'mainstream' media refuses to provide it with any responsible coverage, willfully buying into the government sanctioned conspiracy of silence on such matters designed to keep average Americans sheeplike and contentedly consuming. But sources inside the American military hierarchy revealed to the Star recently that in a strange, bizarre and horrifying development, 5 high ranking members of the Armed Services involved in various top secret weapons research programs have experienced what can only be described as 'skull bursting' incidents similar to something from the SF thriller "Scanners". According to these confidential sources, over the course of the last six months, these five high ranking officers have all, suddenly and without warning, simply had their heads explode in the midst of their normal daily routines! One source remarked "the Medical Examiner has been told to note each of these deaths as being due to sudden aneurysm..."

Marlena stared down at what was left of Datathrall 7601, who had once been a 34 year old woman named Erin Moran. Marlena herself was mostly unresponsive to female beauty, nonetheless, Moran had been an obviously attractive person, prior to the telepathic inquiry that had quite literally burned her brain out. The heat from the igniting neurons had singed off her long blond hair, popped her beautiful blue eyes like soap bubbles, and blasted her pulped eardrums out both sides of her head in reddish gray fans of steam-burned tissue. Smoke now curled up out of Moran's blackened eye sockets and ruined ears, nearly masking the seared and blistered skin peeling back away from her now cooling skull in several places.

The Old One stood a few feet to the side of the interrogation chair the dead woman was strapped into, looking on impassively. "Pyrotic telepathy," he mused, apparently to himself. "Does anyone know precisely why the braintissue itself spontaneously combusts when this sort of interrogative technique is employed?"

Marlena willed her shoulder muscles to relax as she replied, moving her hands rather stiffly to take off the psionic amplification crown she was wearing. "Like most H'nrrian technology, Sire," she said, somewhat wearily, "our understanding of it is imperfect, at best. It seems to have to do with differing energy potentials in the conflicting brainwave patterns. If two separate brainwave patterns are incompatible enough, then they can't be brought into alignment, and a normal telepathic scan becomes impossible... the mind of the scanning telepath will shut itself down rather than risk this kind of terminal organic feedback."

The Old One simply stood there, but there was a note of interest in his voice. "And yet, isn't it a given that all sentient beings of roughly the same physical metabolisms and organic thought processes do possess roughly compatible brainwave patterns?"

Marlena drew a breath in. "In the vast majority of cases, Sire, that is very true. There are two known general classes of exceptions. First, there are Royals whose Gift takes the form of an entirely incompatible brainwave pattern from the human norm. This seems to be caused by an extremely unusual juxtaposition of the dornos/Dornos gene glyphs. Such people are rare, but highly prized by those Clans fortunate enough to have them, because their minds cannot be telepathically probed in any way. Of course, such people cannot use telepathy at all. However, quite often, this particular Gift coincides with very powerful, albeit often extremely eccentric, manifestations of psycho- or dynamokinesis. Your own Royal vassal Friend of the Devil possesses this particular Gift. The linkage between the dornos/Dornos glyph and the Altos or Chi'asto Royal gene isn't clearly understood, but seems to be... "

The Old One's eyes fluttered closed, then open again; otherwise, he remained as still as glass. Marlena immediately went silent, and kept herself from flushing in embarrassment by an act of will. Sometimes she could be very pedantic.

"And the second general class whose mental patterns resist telepathic probing?" the Old One asked, his voice paper thin.

Marlena shook her head. "Those who have been deliberately conditioned to resist it, of course, Sire."

The Old One nodded slightly. "And this Datathrall was in which of these classes?"

Marlena closed her eyes and rubbed her eyelids lightly with her fingertips. "She wasn't Royalty, Sire; the standard recruitment procedures would have revealed any upper case H'nrrian-created DNA in her. Those same procedures, of course, included a basic telepathic scan to look for conflicting loyalties. Given her... er... incindiery... response to the enhanced probe, the only assumption we can make is that she was carefully, and very skillfully, blocked against standard telepathic probes... which is to say, her knowledge and awareness of her true allegiance was camouflaged behind some extremly artful and very subtle implanted screens."

The Old One nodded again. "So, the initial telepathic probe missed these screens, allowing a spy to freely enter our midst... yet under the enhanced probe, those telepathic screens set her brain on fire. And this is something that would not have happened, if she hadn't had such defenses in place."

Marlena gestured to the ceiling; above them was the central datapod itself. "This woman was the fourth Datathrall we interrogated with the enhanced probe, sir. None of the rest had an adverse reaction of this nature. Of course, they all did suffer some level of permanent cognitive disfunction as a result of the probe... even when it encounters no incompatible brainwaves, the sheer power of the probe does irreversible damage."

The Old One finally turned away from the hideous corpse in the metal chair and stared straight at Marlena. "Yes. So, in short: because of this spy, we had to destroy our own subterranean levels to repulse an attack, and we lost two of our most Gifted Royals when we did. The pseudosentient virus attacking our H'nrrian software that this spy loaded is still in our datasystems somewhere, waiting for a propitious moment to emerge and wreak havoc on us once again. We've lost the services of four of our best Datathralls, not counting this particular spy, although I am informed by you that she was, in fact, also one of our best Datathralls. We cannot rely on our H'nrrian control programs, which means we cannot rely on roughly 70% of our H'nrrian technology. We are, therefore, extremely vulnerable to attack." He paused, blinked, and went on. "Do we have any idea who is doing this to us?"

Marlena stood up, flexing various muscle groups as she did so, willing herself into relaxed readiness for anything. Not that it would do her any good at all if the Old One wished to physically punish her for her incompetence in serving him, but it was a nearly reflexive thing for her to do when she was afraid... and "afraid" was a vast understatement for the terror pulsing through her at this moment. The Old One had long since outlived all normal body language; nonetheless, she had served him in a personal, intimate capacity for over a century, and she knew he was furious.

"It's a short list, sir," she replied, not quite succeeding in keeping her voice absolutely level. "It's the telepathic defenses that narrow it down, of course. Anyone with any ability at all can put on the amplification helmet and run a pyrotic probe, if one doesn't mind that the probe's subject will never be good for much afterwards, but your Royal vassals that do security on your own Court personnel are Master Class. Only the very best telepathic Royalty could conceivably sneak something like this past your procedures, Sire. You know that has to be true, or it would be being done a great deal more often."

"And I would be long since dead and all of you would be sucking up to a new Monarch." The Old One regarded her impassively. "Which is what we're talking about. Telepaths on a Monarch power level," he said quietly.

Marlena nodded. "Yes, Sire," she said. "Anyone with enough telepathic chops to pull this off is running a Royal Clan, Sire. They'd have to be. Of course, it's not just a question of raw power level. This sort of thing also requires finesse, which means experience. Longevity. That rules out several very powerful but very young telepathic vassals in other Clans. It has to be a Monarch."

"So," the Old One said calmly, "exactly who is it?"

Marlena closed her eyes and mentally reviewed a roster of names within her eidetic memory. "The King of Wishful Thinking. Hurricane Jane. Devon Selby. The Green Queen. The Baroness. Chane Serratian. K'Weertsha Nallaga." She opened her eyes. "Other possibilities, among the rogues non affiliated with Royal Clans... the artificial intelligence called Cobalt Core. The Detroit gang leader known as Motorhead. And, of course, Professor Myron Keppler had the power to do just about anything, before he was terminated."

The Old One looked contemplative. "Keppler was a telepath?"

Marlena shrugged. "Keppler was whatever he wanted to be, Sire. As far as we can tell, he was an unlimited range psychokinetic capable of manipulating the time/space continuum on a submolar... which is to say, quantum... level. If for some reason he'd wanted to place intelligence assets in our Court, there's no reason to doubt his capacity to do it. But it's extremely doubtful; from the time he first manifested his power until Stephen Santerios of Clan Loa killed him, only a few hours passed... and he spent most of them screwing with the local reality in Sparta City. Er... most of his activities were recorded by the media, of course. He did not display high levels of organized or even coherent thought during that period. It's unlikely he launched any long term strategies."

The Old One nodded again. "And Cobalt Core self-destructed upon being defeated by Keppler's brats in Sparta City this summer, yes?"

Marlena spread her hands. "Well, that's difficult to confirm. Its mainframe blew up. What does that mean? We don't even fully understand H'nrrian technology, and whatever Cobalt Core was, it wasn't H'nrrian." She paused. "We think. Nobody knows any more about this than we do, Sire."

The Old One's eyes grew very distant. "Adonay and Zayus. Things were never like this with them. It was so much simpler. Zayus just wanted to futter every living mortal creature, and then terrorize his half-Gifted offspring. And Adonay was completely unhinged... a paranoid, genocidal maniac... but when he pushed me too far I put the fear of Marduk into him right and proper, oh yes. But now... our children and our children's children and their children's children are old, old Monarchs, ruling their own clans. There are too many enemies... and we've let the drones get too powerful, as well, so we have to be careful how we manage them, because we're all too fragmented and unorganized to be able to present a united front against them should they rise up en masse. Nobody... nobody ever thought the world could possibly get this crazy. Our Covenants... they've served us well for millennia, preventing the sort of all out war that nearly destroyed all humanity back during the First Generation... but..."

He paused and rubbed his forehead. Of everyone there, only Marlena noted the very slight head shake he gave, in negation to some line of thought, as he passed on to another one. "And then this Keppler comes along. Some drone, a nothing, no one any Monarch has ever heard of. He gets access to H'nrrian technology... somehow, we don't know how; but we should have tried the Samedis and executed them just for that... and he gathers together eight Gifted adolescents and he turns them into something out of a Japanese children's cartoon and himself into the most powerful being since the H'nrr themselves abandoned Earth. He puts super-powered beings all over every television screen, every radio station, every newpaper's front page and every magazine cover. And then... conveniently... he dies. But he leaves as his legacy a fully equipped team of unbelievably powerful, completely undisciplined Royal brats with full access to H'nrrian technology, a penchant for interfering in the orderly social apparatus of their betters, and no inclination towards conformity whatsoever."

The Old One shook his head. "Their leader -- the one with the cape and the idiotic boots - - he gives interviews to the press, talking about how the world has already been conquered by secret, superhuman 'bad guys'. And we Monarchs are all so busy squabbling over whether Keppler should have been killed or not, and who gets the next chance at recruiting Keppler's brats, and should the Samedis be executed for gross incompetence or commended for their initiative, that we let the interview get published."

Marlena spread her hands. "No one paid any attention to it," she started. "I mean, I grant you, we should have quashed it, or at least, made sure it appeared in one of our tabloids. But still, it's mostly been dismissed."

The Old One whirled, glaring at her, the psychic power of his barely bridled rage filling the space between them like the heat off a blast furnace. "The drones are investigating us," he hissed. "They've formed a secret subcommittee. And they know something, oh yes they do, because that Zayus-buggered gladhanding cretin of a President is keeping our National Security Council out of the loop. Every Royal Clan in North America had a hand in the NSC; it's how we control the drones... and now we're cut out. And his wife is studying telepathy; we think that little brat of theirs is probably Gifted... and now he's going to be re-elected."

Marlena longingly wished that something would happen to interrupt them; nearly anything would do. North American politics were not a good subject to discuss with any Monarch this year; the Keppler disaster, followed closely by the Cobalt Core fiasco, had thoroughly disrupted the Royal Clans' normally firm control of the American electoral process. The last Presidential election had carefully positioned the Clans chosen 'independent' candidate for a popular landslide in this election. Unfortunately, the national news for the last year and a half had been dominated by the question of superhumanity. The sitting President's surprisingly firm and effective responses to the various issues raised by the high profile existence of the ridiculously named 'Zap Force' and their enemies had completely diluted the impact of the personal ethical and financial scandals that the Royal Clan Council's political vassals had carefully scheduled to target him this year.

A last minute billion dollar advertising push in key electoral states was currently underway, but it still very much looked as if the backwoods governor who had been set up to be a national scapegoat (much as that fellow from down South had been, twenty years before) was going to get his second term.

"I cannot help but feel," the Old One went on his soft voice, "as if we have suddenly been drawn into some vast, shadowy chess game without even being aware of it. That some opponent we cannot even see is sitting across the table from us, setting forces into motion that we can barely even perceive, much less comprehend."

Marlena clenched her fingers together. "You think Keppler isn't dead? That he's moving against us, behind the scenes? But what kind of agenda could he possibly have? His kids are strong, sure -- they kicked holy hell out the Samedis and Clan Loa last year -- but their independence can't last -- eventually, they'll be recruited... or destroyed."

The Old One barely twitched one finger; nonetheless, the gesture conveyed contemptuous dismissal. "The thought of Keppler being alive would trouble me... perhaps even frighten me... except that what I am truly afraid of is so much worse than Keppler could ever be."

Marlena's eyes widened. In a century of service, she had never heard the Old One admit to feeling anything remotely close to fear. The Old One didn't feel terror, he inspired it. What could he possibly be afraid of...?

Then it came to her like a sudden burst of darkness, and only her Gift of complete metabolic control saved her from falling to the ground in appalled dismay.

"Oh," she said, almost soundlessly. "Oh. You... think the H'nrr may have returned..."

The Old One stood rigidly for a long, long moment... then nodded once. "Even worse," he whispered. "I think the H'nrr may never have actually left."

- from ZAP FORCE: ROYAL BLOOD, by D.A. Madigan

A chapter from WARREN'S WORLD, by D.A. Madigan:

NOVEMBER 25th, 1983 - THE VARSITY PIZZERIA - 11:11 a.m.

Jimmy wandered into the V mostly just to get out of the bright sunlight. Bad hangovers always made him positively vampiric that way; the daylight stabbed him right through the eyes into the center of his brain like long burning splinters.

He wasn't hungry... after the previous day's Thanksgiving gorging, he wasn't sure he'd ever be hungry again... but he got a slice of pizza just to keep the manager off his ass, and slid into a booth with it and a plastic glass of Pepsi. Even if the V had had a liquor license, Jimmy didn't know if he'd ever want to drink again, either, after killing virtually all the beer and wine in Warren's fridge the previous night with Rick during the long game session.

Well, actually, he knew he'd want to both eat and drink alcohol again, probably in the near future... but the future was entirely hypothetical. Humanity lived in the eternal now.

Funny thing about the eternal now, though... Jimmy had worked for the V for a few months during his sophomore year, helping out in the back at the sandwich line, doing mop work, hosing down trays, cleaning up booths and wiping down the tables after kids left their greasy paper plates, half empty plastic glasses, and pizza crusts scattered all over. As far as he could remember, the V had never been open on the Friday after Thanksgiving before. In fact, as best he could remember, nothing was ever open around campus on the Friday after Thanksgiving; with most of the students gone for the holiday, nearly all the businesses took a long weekend off.

No, that wasn't right, though. Jimmy could clearly remember hearing Warren talk about businesses that closed down on major holidays just when everybody else had the day off and needed to use them the most... libraries, banks, book stores, malls, restaurants... it was one of his major bitches. And, of course, the world didn't run to suit any one person, not even someone as charming as Warren Dawson... but more and more businesses lately had started staying open on holidays, just by coincidence. Jimmy vaguely recalled Congress was even considering passing a law about it... the Equal Access To Services Act, or something like that... mandating that businesses had to stay open not just normal business hours, when everyone was at work and couldn't use them anyway, but well beyond normal business hours, and on major holidays, too.

Why did that seem so weird to him?

Jimmy was still musing over that when someone in a black leather jacket slid into the booth across from him. "Don't drink that Pepsi," the person whispered conspiratorially at him. "That's one of the ways they get you."

Jimmy blinked, and realized it was Maynard, an older, balding, deeply weird guy who was on the New Sparta University Cinema Board with him, and that he and the rest of the gang had infrequently hung out with, here and at their other favorite campus spot, Hungry Charlie's. Maynard had been cultivating a pretentious looking Fu Manchu mustache for the past several months which was mostly grey. He was rubbing one side of it nervously now, as he peered around the dark, shadowy interior of the Varsity carefully. Then he fixed his beaky-nosed gaze fiercely on Jimmy. "You're a hard man to get hold of," he said, his voice low and growly. "I've left about fifty messages for you at your place."

Vaguely, Jimmy remembered Brian and Leslie both mentioning something about Maynard calling for him. But he saw Maynard all the time at the campus movies, so calling him back had never seemed urgent. In fact...

"We worked the door for THE SIXTH SENSE last Friday together," Jimmy reminded him. "You didn't say a word then. What's up?"

Maynard hunched even lower. "I... I was..." He glanced around. "I wasn't... quite right, last Friday... even if I had been, you weren't. You had that same doped up look you always have... almost always. You didn't have it when you brought me those pills to test... and you don't have it right now... so I thought I'd take a chance." He leaned forward, transfixing Jimmy with a bright stare. "Are you straight, Jimmy?"

Jimmy's head was really pounding now. He started to shake it from side to side... then stopped, as he realized that doing so would probably really hurt. He picked up the plastic cup of Pepsi instead. "I don't know, I guess... Hey!"

Maynard had almost spastically knocked the Pepsi flying out of Jimmy's hand, spilling it all over the table top, and all over Jimmy's lap. "Shit!" Jimmy exclaimed. "Goddam it, Maynard...!"

Maynard had grabbed a bunch of napkins from the dispenser and thrust them at Jimmy. "Sorry," he muttered, "but I told you, that's how they get you. It's in everything... everything processed. All the food. All the drink." His eyes narrowed. "You oversaturated your system with it yesterday. Typical cultural feast day phenomenon. When you oversaturate, your body kicks into high gear... you sweat it out, piss it out, burn it off. Your brain produces chemicals to offset it that it normally wouldn't, for an everyday dosage. That's why you have a headache now... and that's why you can think a little more clearly than usual. Lot of people today, waking up with headaches... noticing strange little things about the world around them that don't make sense, but that they almost never think about the rest of the time." Maynard took a plastic water bottle out of his pocket and took a swig, then wiped his mouth. "But it won't last." Maynard reached into his jacket, put the water bottle back, and fumbled out a heavy looking brown glass bottle, twisted the cap off, poured what looked like aspirin into his hand. "Here. Take..." He looked Jimmy over. "Three of these, with your body mass. Then we can talk for a while."

Jimmy had been busy patting himself down with handsful of napkins; now he looked at the pills in Maynard's hand with interest. Maynard worked in various chem labs around the City as temp help, and although he didn't have a degree, he'd forgotten more about pharmaceuticals and organic chemistry than most licensed pharmacists ever learned. Which was one reason why Jimmy had taken Dave's pills to him...

"You're remembering," Maynard said. "That's good, but it won't last. Take three of these. Quick!"

Maynard was always talking about ecological and pharmaceutical sabotage of the sick modern technological culture; for all Jimmy knew, the pills could be pure lab acid. Horse sedative. Gorilla adrenochrome. Or something really freaky.

Jimmy shrugged, reached over, picked up the three pills, and dry swallowed them.

"So when do the clocks start melting?" he asked, looking around expectantly after a few seconds.

For some reason, that seemed to strike Maynard as funny. "Oh, they've already melted," he said, after giving a couple of the flat, almost silent, barking coughs that he used instead of laughter. "You just haven't ever noticed."

He reached over, grabbed the front of Jimmy's old green Army overcoat, and pulled Jimmy hard into the table. "Are you straight now? Can you remember?"

Jimmy blinked a few times. "Uh..."

The Varsity... had never been open on Thanksgiving weekend. He was sure of it now. Looking around, he could see why... he and Maynard were the only two people in the place, and probably would be the only two people who came in all day. Business yesterday on Thanksgiving must have been even worse. Why in the name of God would a business stay open on a day when it wouldn't take in enough money to pay for keeping the lights on...?

And he had brought those pills to Maynard... Dave's pills. The last time he'd had a headache this bad. He'd palmed the pills, and then he'd gone home, and watched that videotape...

"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I remember." He looked around. "What do you mean... it's in the Pepsi? And who's they? And... what was in those pills, anyway?"

His head wasn't thumping so much any more. He was trying to remember... that night during the game session... had he had a lot to eat? A lot to drink? It seemed like...

"The associations will come faster and faster," Maynard arrived him gravely. "There's so much about... everything... that doesn't make sense. As you remember one thing, it will lead to another thing... eventually you'll cascade. Once you're through that, you'll plateau... and for a while... until the drugs wear off... you'll know." He hunched forward. "Like I've known since the night you brought me those pills to analyze. Did you eat a lot that night? Drink a lot?"

Jimmy frowned as he thought about it. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, that night I drank three 2 liters of Pepsi myself, and Rick and I split a pizza and 75 chicken wings... I had to piss like a race horse three or four times. By the end of the night I was so sick to my stomach I wasn't eating or drinking anything."

"Yes," Maynard said, nodding. "That was it, you see. Your body cleansed itself, momentarily, and you stopped eating and drinking, so your head cleared... not completely, oh no. But enough." He looked at Jimmy warily. "You could be a double agent. I know that. They could have sent you with those pills, to see what I'd do. They're Dave's pills, aren't they? He's the only one I know who takes pills that look like that." Maynard paused. "Who takes pills at all, for that matter."

"What is it?" Jimmy asked. "What are they? Dave takes them to control his fits... have you ever seen one of Dave's fits? He says the weirdest shit... it's so bizarre you can't even remember most of it afterward."

"I've seen them," Maynard said flatly. "And you can remember them. In this frame of mind, you can... if you want to. Think back to the last one you saw. Try to remember what he said. I remember the things I've heard him say." Maynard shuddered a bit. "If he's correct... but I'm afraid he must be correct..."

"Jesus," Jimmy said. "Look, Maynard, let's start with one simple answer. What the hell is in the pills?"

Maynard narrowed his eyes again. "You know," he said accusingly. "You're trying to trap me... trick me into an admission."

Jimmy sat back in the booth and closed his eyes and groaned. "You're nuts," he said. "I knew it. You're high or something. Greaaaaaat. When do these pills kick in? I need to get wasted myself here."

Maynard licked his lips and shot a quick glance around again... then leaned forward, nose twitching. "Hydrolized lithium dioxinate," he nearly whispered. "That's what's in the pills." Then, horribly, he giggled. "But you know what, Jimmy? We don't know how to make a hydrolized compound of lithium dioxinate yet. The molecules aren't supposed to hang that way." He giggled again. "You know what else? We don't need it! You know why?"

Jimmy opened his eyes and looked at Maynard, fascinated, appalled, and repelled, all at the same time. "Uh... why?"

"Because," Maynard said, "if we COULD make a hydrolized compound of lithium dioxinate, it would be just about the most goddam effective anti-psychotic medication in the world."

Jimmy was puzzled. "So? I mean... that sounds useful."

Maynard hunched over the table again. "Think! You can, now! For maybe as much as three hours... I don't know... it depends on how fast you metabolize it... but still, for right now, you can think, so think!" Jimmy must have still looked puzzled, so Maynard sighed, then hissed. "How many psychotics do you know about, Jimmy? WHO DO YOU KNOW WHO WOULD NEED THAT MEDICINE?"

Jimmy thought. And... it was strange... but honestly, he didn't know any crazy people who'd need a medication like that. Oh, you heard about nutjobs all the time... saw stories about them on TV... but here in New Sparta, you never saw anyone like that. As far as Jimmy knew, the city didn't even have a mental hospital. Which was kind of strange, when you thought about it... how many cities of 200,000 people or so didn't have a mental hospital?

"Only Dave," Jimmy said, finally. "Dave's the only crazy person I know. But... I don't get it. I mean... if this stuff is so powerful, why does Dave still have fits once or twice a month? And if no one knows how to make it, how does Dave keep getting his prescriptions filled? Hell, who writes his prescriptions, if the medicine doesn't even exist?" Jimmy's head was whirling. "This is nuts."

"Ah," Maynard said, stroking his Fu Manchu mustache wisely. "You're making assumptions. I said we didn't know how to make this particular substance, and that's true. At least, I've never heard of a process for hydrolizing lithium dioxinate, and I would have. But... I didn't say we don't have it. We do have it. I checked. You can order it from any pharmaceutical supply warehouse." He pulled his coat out for a second to show the top of the brown bottle jutting out of an inside pocket. "I stole this from one of the labs I work at. It wasn't even locked up, although as prescription medicine, it should be. It's not that expensive and doesn't get you high, so... nobody cares much about it."

Jimmy's head whirled faster. "But... if... I... where..."

Maynard shrugged. "They make it. THEM. I don't know how. But they make it, and... your friend Dave takes it."

Jimmy shoved his hands into the pockets of his coat. "And it makes him nuts? But... you said it would be a powerful anti-psychotic... and he takes a pill every day, I've seen him. He only has fits two or three times a month, maybe..." Jimmy thought of something. "You fed me this stuff. Jesus. Am I going to go crazy now?"

Maynard rolled his eyes. "Sanity is relative to your social context, Jimmy," he lectured. "If everyone else in the world is crazy all the time, then how crazy would someone be if they suddenly became sane for a few hours? Eh? Eh?"

"Riddle me that, Boy Wonder," Jimmy muttered to himself as he tried to make sense out of Maynard's ravings. Before he could, Maynard straightened up a bit, and said, "Interesting thing about those pills you gave me, though. Most pills are filler... chalk and wax, usually. The active ingredient in any tablet is generally the size of a grain of sand, or a bit larger... the rest is just to take up space, and make a pill easier to handle."

He hunched forward again. "But ALL pills, Jimmy, have a uniform dosage to them. Pointless to do it any other way if you want any kind of predictable treatment results. How could you tell someone to take two pills every four hours if each pill had a different amount of effective ingredient in it? You couldn't. You'd get random results. You'd never know when you had a big enough dose in you, or how many more you needed to take."

Jimmy spread his hands. "So...?"

Maynard lowered his voice until it was nearly inaudible. "So... Dave's pills all have different amounts of hydrolized lithium dioxinate in them. And it takes longer than 24 hours to fully metabolize the chemical. So, if Dave takes a random amount of it every day..."

Jimmy tried to think about that... but it was hard. No matter what Maynard said, the pills weren't making it easier for him to think at all. His head was full of images. Memories. Knowledge...

WDAW was playing over the V's intercom, and abruptly, Jimmy realized the song that was playing... Robert Palmer's "Addicted To Love"... hadn't been recorded until nineteen eighty... seven? Eight? Something like that... it sure as hell hadn't been around in 1983, though. Nobody'd heard of Palmer in '83.

"What the hell...?" Jimmy muttered, putting his head into his hands.

He HAD shared a split double with Warren in their sophomore year. In Robinson Hall. Room 912, right next to Dave and his roommate Drew, who had been part of the crowd back then, but who had graduated and gone to... Pennsylvania, or some place like that... a year ago. Or something. But it seemed like longer, because that had been 1982, and 1982...

Maynard broke his chain of though, saying "You see? It's ALL WRONG. Everywhere you look. The music. The movies. THE SIXTH SENSE wasn't released until the year 2000, for God's sake! And there is no fifth Indiana Jones movie! And IBM clone personal computers didn't start to dominate the market until the late 80s... the Internet didn't become an important social phenomenon until the 1990s!"

"Yeah," Jimmy muttered, grinding his fists into his temples now, "Yeah, and normally, when another guy fucks your girlfriend, you get a little pissed off about it, no matter who he is. I mean... that would be normal, right?"

Maynard looked indifferent to that; Maynard, as far as Jimmy knew, had been as dateless throughout his life as Jimmy himself. He spread his hands. "Who knows?" He sighed, reached into his coat, and put the heavy brown bottle on the table. "Whatever it is... I know when I'm out of my depth. Take those."

Jimmy looked up. "What...?"

"Two or three pills, depending on body weight, should be enough to clear the system and your head for several hours, at least." Maynard tapped the side of his nose. "Remember... it's in the food, and the water, and everything processed. I'm not sure what... I don't have access to facilities for running a really good dope screen... but I suspect it's something like a super-Valium. Keeps everyone very very calm... very very content... nobody ever really thinks about much of anything. Have you noticed that? Hmmm... I suppose it could be a concentrated Librium, spiked with ecstasy..."

He slid out of the booth, and stood up. "You won't see me again, Jimmy. I know too much now. I'm leaving... and if you're going to keep using that stuff, I suggest you do the same. Remember... sanity is always relative."

Before Jimmy could say anything, Maynard had turned and walked away... across the restaurant... out the door.

Well, let him go. Clearly, years of fume sniffing had finally caught up with ol' Maynard.

Still, he'd said that Jimmy would remember things better now... and could think about things more clearly, if he wanted to. Hastily, Jimmy picked up the brown glass bottle and put it out of sight, under his coat. Most likely, Maynard was just plain out of his mind... but you never knew.

Funny thing about Maynard. He hadn't been wearing that Fu Manchu mustache in 1983, had he? And he hadn't been... quite that grey... had he?

What had he said? Well, he'd said a lot of things. All that stuff about 'they'... well, that's how Maynard would think of it, he'd always been into that conspiracy stuff.

Jimmy knew better than that, though. There weren't any Men In Black skulking around... no hidden cameras on the light posts... no microphones under the table or Mafia button men working with the Pentagon.

No, there was only one person that this whole weird fantasy world clearly revolved around.

This was Warren's World that he, and all his friends, were trapped in. Somehow, Warren had managed to warp reality to mirror his own whims and desires, in virtually every particular... music, clothes, cars, technology... the way people looked... the way people acted.

Now, the only question was... what was Jimmy going to do about it?

- WARREN'S WORLD, by D.A. Madigan