Sergio De La Pava - A Naked Singularity

“Answer my question you fuck!” he said. “Do you know who we are?”

“Yeah I know who your friend is because he was lying unconscious at my feet twenty minutes ago,” I said. “I allowed him to live. And I know who you are and we both know you’re nothing close to your big friend there. No, you’re the coward who threatens women and shoots an unarmed friend in the face. So I will not extend you the same courtesy I did your humpback friend, decide now.”

Escalera pushed the woman away by the head. She ran away down First Avenue. I called to Dane on the transmitter.

“Where are you?” I said.

“Sitting in the car,” Dane said.

“See the woman?” I said.

“Yeah she just ran past,” he said.

“She being followed?” I said.

“No she’s good,” he said. “I hear cops though.”

“Yeah come get me,” I said.

“Did you get the mask?” he said.

“Yes,” I said. “Northwest corner of 122nd and Second Avenue, right now.”

I used the radio to Escalera. “Good,” I said. “Go two blocks east with Ballena. I’ll leave the bag in front of 312. I’m watching you too. If you do anything other than what I just said the bag won’t be there.” They went. I left. I went to the corner and seconds later Dane pulled up. I got in and he drove Westbound.

“Money’s in the trunk,” Dane said. “We good? We’re clean right?”

I looked at Dane.

“Well?” he said. “We good?”

“We’re something.”

“Good.”

“Fucking Dane man.”

“You all right?”

“No,” I said. “I’m all wrong.”

“This is it, what we wanted, we got the money.”

“Fuck. God.”

“Easy.”

“The fuck happened?”

“A true mess is what it was. Take the mask off man. What happened when you went back?”

“You were right. Some fuckers walked in there and started demanding the money. Then just like that they started shooting each other up.”

“It was taking too long they lost their cool and I don’t think Escalera was sure he wanted to part with the money. I could tell it was going to get bad out there. Why’d you go back? I fucking told you not to go back.”

“…”

“What did you do when it exploded?”

“I tried to split. DeLeon saw me. Then The Whale grabbed me.”

“Fucking Whale. You were right, I should have killed it when I had the chance.”

“I never said kill it.”

“You should have.”

“I’m not sure it’s fully vincible anyway.”

“Wait DeLeon saw you? Your face?”

“DeLeon’s dead.”

“What?”

“Escalera just shot him in the face on the street.”

“What?”

“That.”

“You sure?”

“I am.”

“That fuck, he’ll regret that.”

“Colon’s dead too.”

“Really?”

“Jeckle’s dead, he fell trying to jump across.”

“You saw him?”

“Up close.”

“Fuck.”

“What happened with Heckle, Dane?”

“Oh he’s gone.”

“What happened?”

“He died.”

“How?”

“Who lived Casi? Let’s put it that way.”

“Escalera and The Whale, maybe Landro. That’s it.”

“A disaster. Except for the money a perfect disaster. Fucking human endeavors. God damn it. Almost nothing was where it was supposed to be. Stupid fucks, look at them now.”

I gave Dane the radio to put in the bag with the other things to be destroyed. The pain in my neck rose to the top of my head and out to my ears. Dane stopped the car and got out.

“Take the money too,” I said.

“You take the money for now remember?”

“Take it.”

“Why?”

“Just get it out.”

“What’s up?”

“Nothing’s up, I just don’t want that stuff in the car in case I get stopped.”

Dane popped the trunk and took the bags with the money. He carried the three bags to my window where I sat. “Like I said before,” he said. “These bags will soften the blow.” He left.

I drove home. Over the bridge, the streets were empty. Everything was empty. I parked the car and went inside. I heard laughter coming from Angus’s apartment as I approached. I sped up to get away from it. I went inside my place and sat on the floor with my back to the wall.

I had a message. Alana said I should call her back regardless of the time. Marcela had had the baby, a fat boy, and Mary had spoken again. Now no one could shut her up.

For some reason my alarm clock went on then. The radio said I could have the world provided I gave them twenty-two minutes in return. The woman said that a man was shot in the face and killed on 123rd street while horrified witnesses looked on from their windows. Police responding have made the grisly discovery of several more bodies in a nearby apartment as well as in the surrounding area. No word yet on a possible motive for the killing but police are urging anyone with information to call the NYPD’s tips hotline. The woman then added that a car must have its oil changed every three thousand miles in order to operate optimally but that nothing prevented one from doing so more often than that. She then identified what she felt was the best place to go for that purpose.

The radio kept getting louder and louder until it died abruptly. The lights went off. The blinking red light on the answering machine disappeared. The little blue clock on the VCR was gone. I felt my way to my apartment door and opened it. The lights in the hall were extinguished. I went to my front window. The street lights were dead, the traffic signals blank. I looked at the Promenade. Nothing.

Across the river, the city was completely black. There was no bridge anymore, no buildings or structures of any kind. The colors of the rainbow no longer shone there; only monochromatic, primordial black everywhere. The deep blackness of the evening waters surrounding Manhattan had risen, engulfing what they once supported and submerging the newly-benighted island of lights.

I looked up just in time to witness a celestial transfiguration. The new terrestrial darkness allowed the heretofore invisible above to emerge, as the sky, now cleansed of all mortal light, became dotted with astral pinpoints. I went out and wandered the streets; for the first time in that hyperkinetic place, walking beneath the stars.

Today’s Citibank temperature is absolute zero. Once again the current Citibank temperature in Central Park is absolute zero. That temperature is bought to you by Citibank. Citibank. If you bank in the city, bank on Citibank to do your city banking. Citibank. You can bank on them. Back to you Dave .

Jim I thought the Third Law of Thermodynamics pretty much forbade that temperature from ever being reached .

I have no idea what you’re talking about Dave. I just report the number, I don’t get involved with the legalities of the situation or any of those other extracurricular shenanigans .

Okay, well I wonder, Jim, if there are any special precautions our listeners should take given that the temperature is absolute zero. Absolute zero is rather cold is it not?

Good question Dave and yes absolute zero is indeed cold as in the generally accepted value of minus 273.15 degrees Celsius and I don’t even want to get into what that means on a Fahrenheit or even Kelvin scale .

The precautions Jim .

Right, well in terms of precautions there really are none adequate to the situation. I suppose I would counsel people to stay indoors for one. If you go outdoors you will die. The cold will stop your heart in its very tracks, petrify your flesh, and freeze your blood so that it ceases to circulate. You will die .