THEY ARE HULKING YET ELEGANT. SMOOTH IN THE RIGOR OF THEIR DESIGN. SHINY AND EFFICIENT TO BREACH A BARRIER NO DISHWASHER COULD, BETWEEN BEAUTY AND FUNCTION. THEY ARE AMERICA, ASSUMING POSITIONS. FORCING HERSELF THROUGH THE GAPS OF A FORGOTTEN IDEOLOGY TO STAND FREE OF THE BRUTAL UNCOUTH AND CONTINUE TO CLOSE THE PARTED EYELIDS OF DEATH. THEY ARE IN NUMBER TWENTY, SHINY AND SERENE, MAJESTIC GROWTH ON AMERICA'S FRUIT: THE MEN OF KAPPA PHI ALPHA.
Mary passes comptroller Hugh with stride of white tile morning, saluting the glorious Abernethys. Mark and Priscilla Abernethy are chief gamers on this project. "Priscilla," says Mary in devilish tones, "there was a burst in A-32 at 0500, there was a burst involving I don't remember plutonium or uranium, one or the other substance, they are both terrifically toxic but as you remember A-32 is a bat in a tire."
"A problem in the reactor?" says Priscilla.
"Generation," says Mark.
"Of toxics," Priscilla reminds him.
"Yes," says Mary. "Yes, it was very ridiculous, totalling only some milligrams. There is no need to mention..."
"The efficient autocracy of the plumbing."
"We have the essential tools, also, you know, my love."
"Priscilla," says Mary, and Priscilla smiles.
Now Mary must dash for her notes. There is a matter of adjustments. She can tell that two men are worried, they are standing so bent and unsupple at the 1x4 plate window. They must be worried, Mary decides, over perceived lack of adjustments. She taps her notes steadily as she approaches them, until they see her upon them. "Only one more thing to adjust, gentlemen," she says, and they bow uncomfortably. Synchronicity is not the dish of engineers, and seldom do they understand the eyebrow.
Mary stops dead in her tracks. "Mr. Galapagos!" she exclaims with solicitude. "Are you ready indeed? this morning?"
Curly "Winsome" Galapagos has a complexion of corpses or ash, with unhandsome freckles and innumerable lines. Mary alone is not bewildered by his face and manner, and he has found through her a deep talent for the Busy Doctor, which now happily infects his every hour. As soon as he sees Mary this morning he realizes he's been gazing at Caroline Boff, whose projects have never ceased to excite him. Caroline is headed for the comptrollers' nook, in her arms a sheaf of essentials. "Mary," "Winsome" says, "you can kill yourself jogging."
"I know," Mary says. "If you're fat." Neither one is.
"Or even if not. People die."
"Also eating salt," Mary says.
"I know. The samurais used to eat salt, to die."
"Then they'd go jogging," Mary says, with a self-effacing wink.
"Not like our men," "Winsome" says with a nod.
"Right," Mary says. "Our men would never kill themselves."
Suddenly the clock is ticking. Mary picks up a wall phone to order the final adjustments. "And the burst?" she hears. There is an air of majesty in the air. "We're fifty feet off on this one," she hears. It is too late to change it. She tells the group.
"Where's that put 'em?" asks Caroline Boff. "Chemistry?"
"Chemistry 105B or C," Mary says. "If my estimate is approximate."
"Who will tell them?"
"The man in the coonskin cap," Mary says.
"With the epaulets."
"Drinks too much."
"Has woman on his breath, every morning."
"Disgusts our boys, in a way."
"They could find it titillating?"
"I didn't say that."
"But the critique in your tones..."
"They could look at things a little upside-down. Find the breath of working-class woman..."
"Attractive. Quaintly, as in the nineteenth century, young men had 'wander years,' to explore and notice the world, appreciatively."
"Saying certain candid things to prostitutes."
"Only to be rebuffed, garrotted by the distance implicit in that social relationship."
"Do prostitutes care about the physical form of their clients?"
"An old question. You should be over it by now."
"Caroline."
"Mary."
"Ladies!" Curly "Winsome" Galapagos makes wild sweeps at his wrist with his eyes and opposite hand. "Opening gates! And you critique the milieu!"
It is at this point that most things happen. You open the gates, you can find yourself with a situation more complex than before. This time, it goes well. The men are aimed wrong, of course, but fifty feet can be corrected. The enormous steel of the hangar doors is folded back on itself and the pride of America's peacetime efforts becomes an aspect of the classroom environment.
"Look!" says Mary.
"Look!" says "Winsome."
"Look!" says Caroline Boff.
"Look!" says Priscilla.
"Look!" says Mark.
Mary rips the top sheet off her pad and twists her shoulders slightly to the left. "Look," Mary says. "They are rebelling." Everyone smiles.
THE MEN OF KAPPA PHI ALPHA SMOOTH BROWS, SHUCK NIGHT-TIME FRETS ONTO DRUNK, STAGNANT SHOULDERS AND KICK PEBBLES INTO THE SCRUB. THERE IS A BALANCED WARNING IN THEIR GAIT, AS THREE BY THREE, IN SEEMINGLY RANDOM ASSORTMENTS OF SPACE, THEY JUMP THEIR SHOULDERS AND ELBOW THEIR ARMS IN THE GENERAL DIRECTION OF THEIR PROGRESS. "SOMETHING'S WRONG," ONE SAYS. BUT IT IS ONLY A MATTER OF FIFTY FEET.