The United States of Air: a Satire that Mocks the War on Terror (14 page)

Plus he was fat. Bigger even than Fatso. I frowned. Weren’t we at War on Fat? Surely a general should have superhuman faith, and a waistline to match. Then I spotted the golden tape measure around his belly, and did a double take. His faith was superhuman, all right. Eleven inches! Almost as skinny as the Prophet himself.

“Lieutenant Krapp,” our escort announced. “Civilians to see you, sir sir sir sir sir.” He flung out an open palm. “Go the Power of Air!”

The General returned the salute. “I got no time for civilians, Lieutenant. Tell them to come back later.”

“Sir sir sir sir sir,” Krapp said. “One of them is Skinny Service. Here by orders of the Thin House. Thought you’d like to know, sir sir sir sir sir.”

“Interruptions are bad for the digestion,” the General grumbled. He put something in his jacket pocket and swung himself over the chrome railing onto the shoulders of the sergeant-at-arms. The enlisted man’s face turned purple. He knelt down and set his cargo on the ground. The General stood up and brushed what looked like crumbs but were no doubt dandruff from the front of his tunic.

I stepped forward and held out my hand. “Can I just say what an honor it is to meet someone so successful at eating air?” I said. “Please share your faith with us before we go. To see you so skinny…” I was overwhelmed by his waistline, the dandruff on his lapels, the sandwich peeking out of his jacket pocket, a challenge, I was sure, to keep himself honest. “I wish I could eat air like you.”

“Well you know, son,” the General said, and took my hand, “we aren’t called the Air Force for nothing.”

Erpent jostled me aside. “We bring you orders from the Prophet.” He held up the biohazard bag.

“It’s dead French spy poo,” I added proudly.

The major frowned. His name, I saw, was Major Turdd. “Forgive me, General, allow me to explain the protocol?”

“By all means, Major.”

Major Turdd addressed the three of us civilians. “It is standard military protocol to address the NSA commander at all times as ‘sir sir sir sir sir.’”

“Isn’t one ‘sir’ enough?” Green asked.

The lieutenant swung an arm up at the General’s rank balloons. “He’s a twenty-five-star general,” he hissed. “One ‘sir’ for every five stars.”

“That must take an awful long time to say,” Green said.

“It used to be one ‘sir’ for every star,” the major explained, “but it was decided that in battlefield conditions that might not be desirable. For instance.” He turned to face the General. “‘The food terrists are attacking, sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir sir!’” He turned back to us. “You see? That’s why it got shortened to just one ‘sir’ for every five stars.”

“Couldn’t we just address him as ‘General’?” I asked.

“You could if that were his rank,” Lieutenant Krapp said, and laughed.

I scratched my head. “But didn’t you just say you were taking us to see the General?”

Krapp stood to attention. “Sorry, sir sir sir sir sir. It’s just they’re civilians, sir sir sir sir sir, and to explain to them how we—”

“At air,” the General said with a smile. “Perfectly understandable. In your position I would have done the same thing.”

The lieutenant shuffled his feet. “Thank you, sir sir sir sir sir.”

“And I’m sure you will enjoy your new career as a poo detector specialist, installing equipment in the sewers,” the General said, and added, “Airman First Class Krapp.”

The color drained from the lieutenant’s face. He reached up and untied the rank balloons from his shoulders. They floated up into the air until they bumped into the ceiling far above.

The General smiled at us. “There are, after all, only a handful of twenty-five-star generals in the US Air Force. We have to maintain a certain prestige.” He threw out his chest, clicked his heels together and said, “Director of the Department of Homeland Air Security, Protector of Our Precious Air, Head of the Toilet Safety Administration, Commander of NORAD and our Nuclear Arsenal, I-SEE-FAT Call Center Supervisor, Poo Propulsion Laboratory Test-Pilot-in-Chief, Striker of Fear in the Breasts of Food Terrists Everywhere, Leader of the NSA, CIA, DIA, MIA, and WTF, Exalted High Almighty General of Generals Full O’Shitt at your service.” He bowed. “Full O’Shitt is my
nom de guerre,
of course.” He parted his service ribbons to reveal the hidden name tag.

“Thank you, sir sir sir sir,” I began. “We’re here to—”

“That’s ‘sir sir sir sir
sir,’”
corrected the former lieutenant.

“What are you still doing here?” Major Turdd barked. “Report to the Poo Detector Installation Brigade. Double time, march!”

Newly minted Airman First Class Krapp about-faced and marched off.

Erpent thrust the bag of poo in the General’s face. “Analyze this.”

Major Turdd stepped forward. “May I ask what this is all about?”

“Your orders are to drop what you are doing,” Erpent said, “and find Fatso.”

“Finding Fatso is foremost forever in our minds,” O’Shitt said. “We’re doing all we can.”

“What do you mean you’re doing all you can?” Erpent exclaimed. “How many bazillion gazillion dollars do we give the NSA every year?”

“And we need every gazillion,” the General calmly replied. “You think every man, woman, child and donkey working here isn’t motivated by one single thought—Get Fatso?”

I looked around. Indeed, in one corner a herd of donkeys trotted around in a circle. Several small boys walked behind them. As I watched, a donkey did a big poo, and the trailing boy caught it in a plastic bag.

Erpent crossed his arms. “What about Total Poo Awareness?” he asked. “Surely you have some idea where he is.”

The General coughed into his hand. “TPA is classified.” He glanced at us.

“Tappity Tippity Tappity Smores Go Crunch Round The Campfire Secret,” Erpent said. “Yes. I know. Green and Frolick were cleared by the Prophet himself.”

“What’s Total Poo Awareness?” Green asked.

“TPA,” the General said, “is why the NSA exists. Our goal is to know who’s pooing, where they poo, what it’s shaped like, what it smells like, what it consists of. Only then can we finally smash food terrism once and for all.”

“And you still have no idea where he is?” Erpent said, his voice mounting toward hysteria.

“Every sewer tap around the world is programmed to alert us at the first sign of our arch-nemesis,” the General added. “He so much as farts we’ll know he’s there.”

“Only problem is he hasn’t farted,” Green said.

The General nodded sadly. “It’s like he’s a ghost or something.”

“You’ve had two years at this post,” Erpent said, shaking his finger in the General’s face. “If you still can’t tell me what I need to know, maybe it’s time the NSA had a new commander.”

“Listen to me,” O’Shitt said. “Every day we gather data on billions of people around the world. See those pipes?” He pointed at the plumbing that snaked above our heads.

“What about them?” Erpent snapped.

“Some connect straight to the D.C. sewer. Others connect to storage tanks. Millions of gallons of sewer samples awaiting our analysis. From all over the world. I got Tokyo sushi poo, I got Paris bistro
merde,
I got Moscow borscht crap—I got it all.”

“And in all that poo you can’t find one man?” Erpent shouted.

“We sweep up vast amounts of data,” the General protested. “We’re busy trying to—”

“You’re busy wasting my time,” Erpent said. “You find Fatso for me now. Today. Or what you just did to that lieutenant? I’ll see the Prophet does you worse.”

The General’s jovial features narrowed. “It is unwise to threaten me. The Prophet ought to know that by now.”

“Oh yeah?” Erpent said. “When he’s through with you, you’ll be cleaning out latrines with your tongue. Do I make myself clear, Airman Third Class O’Shitt?”

He tapped the General’s right rank balloon to emphasize his point—with the ragged fingernail I spotted in the morgue. A loud explosion made me duck. When I opened my eyes, shreds of balloon trailed from the General’s right shoulder. O’Shitt sank down on one knee, scuffing the service ribbons on his pants. His left side was held aloft by the remaining rank balloon, but it was not enough to keep him on his feet.

“Replacement balloon!” Major Turdd bellowed. “Replacement balloon for the NSA commander!” He pressed a red button on the side of the dais. A siren blared. Across the crowded floor, a team of Air Force Marines shoved their way through the milling technicians, bearing a new twenty-five-star rank balloon with them.

The General and Erpent eyed each other warily as we waited for the replacement balloon to arrive. The major grabbed hold of the General’s right side, but could not lift him back to his feet.

“Too much air,” O’Shitt mumbled.

Turdd pleaded with us. “Help me.”

Green and I managed to get the General back on his feet. For someone so skinny he sure weighed an awful lot. An Air Force Marine cut away the rubber shreds that dangled from the General’s shoulder and fastened a new balloon to the right epaulet.

“Thank you, men,” the General said.

The team of six Marines stood to attention and saluted in unison. “Sir sir sir sir sir!” they shouted, then about-faced and marched back to wherever they came from.

“Would you turn that off, please, Major?” the General said.

Turdd pressed the red button again and the alarm stopped. The bunker was once more filled with the sounds of typing technicians and slurping machinery.

The General drew himself up straight. “You’ve made your point,” he said to Erpent.

“Excellent,” the SS agent replied. “You’ll find Fatso for us, then?”

O’Shitt snapped his fingers. The sergeant-at-arms came to attention.

“Take this poo to the Plumber,” the General ordered.

The sergeant-at-arms gulped loudly and clutched his yellow duck. “The Plumber, sir sir sir sir sir?” He accepted the bag of poo with a shaking hand.

“Immediate analysis. Auth Code Eggnog ApplePie Twinkie Milkshake Eggnog. Now move!”

The sergeant-at-arms saluted and shuffled off, his flip-flops slapping against the floor.

“Now,” the General said. He turned to Erpent, and tucked his triple chins into his chest. “I think it’s time the Thin House learned exactly what we do here at the NSA.”

Erpent glared back. “You took the air right out of my mouth.”

O’Shitt led us over to an open tank of water. An empty toilet stood on either side. I peered over the edge of the tank. A pair of what looked like eels slumbered on the bottom.

“Wireless toilet cams,” the General declared proudly. “The next generation of sewer monitoring technology. Drop them into the sewer, and they will find their way to their preprogrammed destinations. Eliminates the need for Air Force Navy frogmen.”

He pressed a button on the side of the tank. Within seconds, the toilet cams found the open pipes to the toilets and wriggled out of sight. We crowded around the nearest toilet.

“See here?” The General’s fat finger pointed at a brown speck at the bottom of the bowl. “The tip of its head has a tiny camera attached to it.”

“So that’s how you got those pictures of people pooing,” Green said.

“Precisely,” the General answered. “With this new technology, we can have a toilet cam in every toilet of your house—even, say, the Thin House,” —he glanced at Erpent as he said this— “lying in wait to film a food terrist in the act of defecation.”

Erpent gasped. “How long has this been going on?”

“We’ve got toilet cams in every major sewer in the world,” the General continued, ignoring the question. “Three months ago, we let loose several million toilet cams into the D.C. sewer system.” He grinned. “We know everything.” He bent toward Erpent, his grin widening. “I know where you poo and what you eat—”

“Now wait just a chocolate-licking minute—”

“—and what you mutter under your breath when you sit on the potty.” O’Shitt pitched his voice high. “Ma-ma. Ma-ma.”

“I do not say that!” Erpent turned on us, fists clenched. Our snickering continued. “I do not say ‘mama’ on the potty!” He pulled at his hair. “What am I saying? I don’t even use the toilet!”

The General tapped his temple with a pudgy finger. “The NSA knows all.”

“These are serious accusations,” Erpent protested. “You can’t just—”

“We know everything that goes on in the Thin House,” the General said. He lowered his voice. “Everything.”

Erpent went silent. He fumbled for his cell phone.

“No signal down here, I’m afraid,” the General said. “You’ll have to wait until you leave…whenever that happens to be.”

Erpent gulped and put the phone away.

O’Shitt held his arms above his head, embracing the Disneyland of wonder that surrounded us. “Gentlemen, from this bunker I can destroy the world with nuclear weapons or watch the president of France go potty. Like our motto says.” He tapped his shoulder patch. It read, “Omniscience. Omnipotence. Your Poohole.” He beamed at us. “This is Total Poo Awareness at its finest.”

“Let me get this straight,” Green said. “You’re spying on innocent people, taking pictures of them going poo-poo, without a warrant?”

The General chuckled. “Oh, they’re not innocent,” he said. “Only food terrists ever go poo-poo.”

“But it’s an invasion of privacy!”

The General’s grin disappeared. “The Global War on Fat requires us to make certain sacrifices, Agent Green,” he said. “Food terrists would kill us for the right to eat food again. But don’t panic!” He grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me. “Be alert. Not alarmed.”

An unshaven man in greasy blue coveralls staggered into view, yawning. He carried a large metal toolbox that appeared to be handcuffed to his wrist. In the other hand he carried a lug wrench.

“Yo, Fat Man,” he said. “I found your evil twin.”

The man must be myopic. Couldn’t he see the General’s tape measure? “You mean Fatso?”

“Who else you think I mean?” He turned to go. “Well you coming or arentcha?”

Ten

The General led us across the crowded bunker toward the largest copper tank I’d seen so far. The Plumber, whoever he was, had gone on ahead.

O’Shitt cleared his throat. “I know he doesn’t look like much. But he has a PhD from MITT.”