The Impossible Fortress Read online

  “Three hundred and eighty-six dollars,” he said proudly. “But don’t you worry, Billy. I fully intend to share the wealth. We’re all in this together, you know?”

  “Sure, sure,” I said.

  “We could end up clearing five hundred bucks.”

  “That’d be amazing,” I said.

  Alf took a long drag off his lady cigarette, exhaled the smoke, and then stared at me, like he was waiting for me to say something else. “So now, what about the alarm code?” he finally asked.

  The end-of-lunch bell rang but not soon enough to help me. “I’m working on it,” I said.

  All around us, the other student smokers were stubbing out their butts and popping Tic Tacs.

  “We don’t have a lot of time,” Clark said. “It’s May twenty-second. That gives us seven, eight days tops.”

  I slung my backpack over my shoulder. I was eager to get back to the library, back to working on the game. “Don’t worry,” I told them. “I’m getting really close.”

  1500 REM *** BOOST SCORE ***

  1510 IF LIVES=3 THEN SCORE=SCORE+50

  1520 IF LIVES=2 THEN SCORE=SCORE+75

  1530 IF LIVES=1 THEN SCORE=SCORE+100

  1540 PRINT"{HOME}{CSR DWN}SCORE:",SCORE

  1550 DG=DG+DX*.15

  1560 IF DG>DX THEN DG=DX

  1570 IF DG>50 THEN GOSUB 7000

  1580 IF DG>100 THEN GOSUB 7500

  1590 RETURN

  ZELINSKY NEVER SAID HELLO, never attempted small talk, never even looked at me—except at seven o’clock, when he stomped back to the showroom and told me to get out. And those were usually his exact words: “Get out” or “Go on, now,” he’d say, like he was shooing a dog off his lawn.

  “Your dad hates me,” I told Mary.

  “It’s just an act,” she insisted. “He actually likes you. He’s impressed by your work ethic.”

  “He said that?”

  “Well, not in those exact words.”

  “In any words?”

  “He’s impressed,” she said. “Trust me.”

  I tried to get on his good side. I never left cans of soda on the computer desk (even though Mary did so all the time). I kept my voice down, I said “please” and “thank you” and generally tried to stay out of his way. But every time I arrived at the store, Zelinsky looked disappointed.

  That Friday, I was working in the showroom while Mary assisted a customer with a typewriter. Once again I was the only person in the back of the store, when out of nowhere this kid wandered past me. He was maybe ten or eleven, dressed in gray denim from head to toe, and carrying a Big Gulp soda. He ducked behind a rack of Energizer batteries, disappearing from view, and I knew right away he was a thief.

  He returned a moment later, still holding the Big Gulp and sucking on the straw. Nice detail, kid.

  “Can I help you?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “I’m good.”

  I stood up and followed him to the front of the store. I’ll give him credit: he was smart enough to stop at the register and buy something—a pack of Bubbalicious chewing gum.

  Zelinsky almost didn’t even notice him. He was busy repairing a typewriter for a collector in Princeton. “Just the gum? That’ll be two bits.”

  The kid stared back.

  “You don’t know that expression? Two bits?” Disappointment fell over his face; it was a look I knew all too well. “It means twenty-five cents.”

  The kid pushed a wrinkled dollar across the counter.

  “Where’d you get the Big Gulp?” I asked.

  “7-Eleven,” he said.

  “There’s no 7-Eleven on Market Street. The nearest one’s five miles away.”

  He frowned. “Do you, like, work here or something?”

  “You’re stealing batteries.”

  The words hadn’t finished leaving my mouth and the kid was already out the door. Zelinsky lunged after him, but I told him not to bother. The kid had left the soda cup on the counter. I pried off the lid, revealing six C batteries submerged in a few ounces of warm cola. Zelinsky’s eyes went wide, like I’d just performed some kind of miracle.

  “Son of a bitch,” he said. “How did you know?”

  I couldn’t tell him the truth—that Alf and I had practically pioneered the Big Gulp stunt, using the 64-ounce cups to steal cellophane-wrapped music cassettes from Sam Goody.

  “I heard him messing around by the batteries,” I explained. “I figured he was up to something.”

  That night Zelinsky let me stay an extra half hour, and when the time was finally up, I almost didn’t recognize his voice. Instead of “Get out” or “Go” he said, “We’ll see you tomorrow, Will.”

  Mary elbowed me in the ribs.

  “You see?” she said. “He’s warming up.”

  1600 REM *** OUT OF TIME ***

  1610 PRINT "{CLR}{12 CSR DWN}"

  1620 PRINT "{12 SPACES} YOU ARE OUT"

  1630 PRINT "{14 SPACES} OF TIME."

  1640 PRINT "{2 CSR DWN}"

  1650 PRINT "THY GAME IS OVER."

  1660 FOR DELAY=1 TO 1000

  1670 NEXT DELAY

  1680 IF LIVES=0 THEN 3300

  1690 RETURN

  THE DAYS PASSED QUICKLY. The air turned warm, flowers blossomed, and Memorial Day signaled the official start of summer. Normally Zelinsky closed for the holiday, but he agreed to open the store so Mary and I could spend the afternoon working. Our classmates were off at the beach or movies or fireworks, but we were stuck in the showroom, working away.

  Our contest entry had to be postmarked by Friday, May 29—and by Wednesday, May 27, we were nowhere close to finished. We had created the perfect ML subroutine, an elegant loop that scattered the guards in different directions—they ran with bending knees and waved their arms and shook their spears. It was beautifully animated and lightning quick. But when we tried pasting the loop into the main program, the game crashed and crashed and crashed. No matter what we tried, the 64 returned an error message:

  BAD SUBSCRIPT

  DIVISION BY ZERO

  ILLEGAL DIRECT

  ILLEGAL QUANTITY

  FORMULA TOO COMPLEX

  CAN´T CONTINUE

  CAN´T CONTINUE

  CAN´T CONTINUE

  CAN´T CONTINUE

  CAN´T CONTINUE

  Mary and I read and reread How to Learn Machine Language in 30 Days, desperate to find our mistake, but we were doing everything right; we were following the instructions to the letter. I was tired and frustrated and suddenly All Your Favorite ’80s Love Songs were driving me crazy. Phil Collins was singing “Against All Odds” for the millionth time, and his desperation seemed to echo my own lousy mood. We were out of ideas and out of time.

  “I’m done,” I said. “I give up.”

  Mary didn’t look up from her book. “We’re close.”

  “No, I’m serious. I quit.”

  “You’re going home early?”

  “I quit the whole game. I don’t want to do this anymore.”

  “You can’t quit,” she said. “You have to win the PS/2 so I get your 64. That was the deal. We shook hands.”

  “We won’t win,” I said. “We did everything the book told us. It’s not working. My eyes are blurry. My wrists hurt. My back hurts. We’ve been stuck in this store for A days, and I’m tired.”

  Mary laughed like I made a joke.

  “Go ahead and laugh,” I told her. “I quit.”

  “You know what’s funny? You just said ‘A days’ instead of ‘ten days.’ You’re thinking hexadecimally, Will.”

  I refused to believe her. “I said ten.”

  “You said ‘A,’ ” she insisted. “That’s real progress. We’re so close to beating this thing, I can feel it.”

  And then the lights went out.

  The computer died, Phil Collins stopped crying, and suddenly we were in total darkness. There were no windows in the back of the store. I couldn’t see my own hand in front of my face.

  �
��Power failure,” Mary said with a sigh. “Happens every summer when the stores turn on their AC.”

  No power meant no computer. No computer meant no progress. I stood up and smashed into a file cabinet.

  “Stop,” she said. “Where are you going?”

  “This is a sign. God just pulled the plug on our game.”

  Mary reached through the darkness and found my arm, holding me back. Her fingers laced through mine and suddenly I was holding her hand. It was disorienting—like my entire center of gravity had shifted to my arm and the rest of me was adrift, weightless, like one of those giant balloons in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. I reached out to steady myself and found Mary’s shoulder.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I can’t see.”

  “Give it a few seconds. Your eyes will adjust.” Her hair tickled my cheek and she whispered into my ear: “You can’t quit now, Will. I won’t let you. We’re too close.”

  I leaned forward, pressing against her. Mary’s hair was soft and smooth and cool to the touch, and I’d never felt anything quite like it. The store was completely silent; I could hear her breathing. I wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her closer, reveling in her fresh clean scent.

  Then a feeble beam of light cut across the showroom, and Mary sprang away from me. Zelinsky was patrolling the store with a handful of miniature flashlights, the kind that sold next to the cash register for a dollar and ran off a single AA battery. “You kids okay?”

  “We’re fine,” Mary said.

  “Uh-huh,” I mumbled.

  He gave us flashlights and raised his voice, calling out to the rest of the store. “Any customers back here? Anybody need help?”

  A frail voice cried out from the typewriter aisle—an elderly woman who’d crouched down at the time of the blackout, fearing she’d suffered a stroke. Zelinsky helped her stand up, and we all walked outside onto Market Street.

  The customer scowled at Zelinsky. “You should pay your electric bill on time,” she said. “I could have been injured.”

  “It’s not our fault,” Mary said, but Zelinsky talked over her. “I’m very sorry for the inconvenience, Mrs. Durham. I hope you’ll come back and see us tomorrow.”

  “Don’t count on it,” she huffed.

  The old lady hobbled down the sidewalk and Zelinsky turned to Mary. “The customer is always right,” he said.

  “That old kook is never right,” Mary said. “She blamed the Challenger explosion on the Vietnamese. She calls parachute pants ‘the devil’s pajamas.’ It’s like her glaucoma has spread to her brain.”

  Mary was grinning at me, waiting for me to laugh at her jokes, but my mind was still back in the showroom, I was still holding her hand and touching her hair. I felt like something extraordinary had just happened—like I’d just caught a glimpse of a different world—and the transition back to reality had left me with whiplash.

  Up and down Market Street, merchants were flipping their door signs from OPEN to CLOSED—except for General Tso, who stood on the sidewalk handing out 15 percent–off coupons while his staff filled the dining room with hundreds of tiny votive candles.

  “I think we’re done for tonight,” Zelinsky said, but I barely heard him. I’m pretty sure I stumbled down Market Street without even saying good-bye.

  1700 REM *** HERO ATTACKS ***

  1710 FOR I=0 TO 24

  1720 POKE L1+I,0:NEXT I

  1730 POKE L1+24,15:POKE L1+12,160

  1740 POKE L1+13,252:POKE L1+8,80

  1750 POKE L1+7,40:POKE L1+11,129

  1760 FOR I=1 TO 100

  1770 NEXT I

  1780 POKE L1+11,128

  1790 RETURN

  ALF AND CLARK AND I lived at the bottom of a hill on a dead-end street called Baltic Avenue. Our classmates loved to remind us that Baltic Avenue was among the cheapest properties in Monopoly, that the rent was a laughable four dollars. On rainy days, the storm drains would overflow, flooding our cul-de-sac and the sidewalks. We’d have to take off our sneakers and cuff our jeans just to wade out the front door—unless we cut through the old cemetery that bordered our backyards. It was the largest Catholic cemetery in New Jersey, ten acres of tombstones, and growing up, we played beside every single one of them.

  I found Alf and Clark walking in the center of the road, faces down, like they were counting all of the tiny cracks and divots in the asphalt. They both looked exhausted. I biked alongside them and braked.

  “Where the hell have you been?” Alf asked.

  “At the store,” I said. “What’s up?”

  “I’m screwed is what’s up,” Alf said.

  “He lost the money,” Clark said.

  “What money?” I asked, and then it hit me: “The money money?”

  “I didn’t lose it,” Alf said. “It just somehow fell out of my pocket.”

  “So it’s the money’s fault?” Clark asked. “I told you this would happen! But you had to carry it around. Showing it off every chance you got. You had to be Mr. Big Stuff.”

  “How much was there?” I asked.

  “Four hundred and sixty-eight dollars,” Alf said.

  “Jesus!” Clark exclaimed. “You’re so screwed.”

  “I had it when I left school,” Alf told me. “It’s somewhere between here and my locker.”

  “That’s a mile and a half,” Clark said. “We’ve checked the whole way. There’s no sign of it. The money’s gone.”

  “Let’s check it again,” I said, but I suspected Clark was right. Our route to school was well traveled by cars, pedestrians, dog walkers, and kids on bikes. And it was a beautiful afternoon. Everyone was outdoors, enjoying the spring weather. No one living in Wetbridge could afford to overlook a fist-size bundle of cash.

  We followed Baltic Avenue to its end, crossed over Route 25, then marched up Crystal Street.

  “Maybe someone gave it to the police,” Alf said. “We could try to claim it.”

  “Sure,” I said. “Let’s tell the cops you made four hundred bucks selling porn to kids. I bet they’d love to help us.”

  We searched every gutter and sidewalk. We got down on our knees and peered into sewer grates. We trudged across lawns, kicking at weeds and turning over rocks until it was too dark to see anymore. But it was no use. The money was good and truly gone.

  Walking back to Baltic Avenue, Alf recited a list of the forty-six guys who had prepaid for exclusive photographs of Vanna White. He sorted the names into three different categories: (1) Guys Who Will Definitely Kick My Ass; (2) Guys Who Will Probably Kick My Ass; (3) Guys Who Lack the Physical Strength to Kick My Ass. Unfortunately, this last category had no names in it.

  “Everything’s going to be fine,” Clark assured him. “We’ll go in the store like we planned. You just won’t make any money.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that.

  “What about the guard dog?” I asked. “And Officer Tackleberry?”

  “We fixed all that,” Clark said. “We’ll show you.”

  We went into Alf’s backyard and entered his basement through the storm doors. Alf’s family had the nicest house on Baltic Avenue—two bathrooms, a living room, and a family room—but we spent most of our time hanging around his basement. It was one large room with a cold concrete floor, drafty cinder-block walls, and naked lightbulbs hanging from exposed beams. The basement was full of junk: a purple sofa with split cushions, a busted refrigerator, a wobbly table where we sometimes played Risk. A Maytag washing machine was gently humming in the corner, filling the basement with the scent of Tide.

  In the center of the basement was a large sheet of plywood resting on wooden sawhorses. For years this was the site of Alf’s massive slot-car racetrack, where we spent many a rainy afternoon wrecking cheap Formula One replicas on sharp turns. But now all the tracks were put away, and the plywood displayed a large-scale model of downtown Wetbridge. Some of the buildings were cardboard, hacked out of shoe boxes and milk cartons. Others were constructed from Legos or Lincoln Logs
. Remarkably, everything was built to scale. General Tso’s, the bike shop, the train station, Zelinsky’s—every store and sign had been re-created in miniature. There were tiny cars, tiny trees, and tiny traffic lights. There were even miniature taxi drivers bullshitting inside a miniature taxi stand.

  I circled the model, astonished. “How long did this take?”

  Clark shrugged. “Forty hours? Maybe fifty?”

  “We’re not leaving anything to chance,” Alf said. “Check it out.”

  He reached for an old power transformer and flipped a switch. Like magic, a miniature police officer glided down Market Street and turned up Lafayette, patrolling the neighborhood in a figure-eight loop. With his square jaw and crew cut, he was a dead ringer for Tackleberry.

  “How’d you do it?” I asked.

  “Slot-car tracks,” Clark explained. “They’re glued to the bottom of the plywood.”

  “We’ve been watching his route,” Alf explained. “He walks the same figure-eight loop every half hour. Right past General Tso’s, so we need to time our approach just right.”

  The policeman made a soft whirring noise as he rounded the curves, looping around the track. I knelt down, peering underneath the table to marvel at the engineering. A series of wires crisscrossed the bottom of the plywood, delivering electricity to lights in all of the buildings. It was the most impressive model I’d ever seen.

  Clark pushed an HO-scale locomotive out of the train station. “The last train from New York arrives at midnight, so we’ll start at twelve thirty. We’ll have the whole town to ourselves.”

  “What about Arnold Schwarzenegger?” I asked. “What happens when we wake up the Shit Zoo?”

  “Not a problem,” Clark said. “Here’s how we handle it.” He placed three plastic action figures in the parking lot behind General Tso’s. “I’m He-Man, you’re Papa Smurf, and Alf’s Alf.”

  “Can I be He-Man?” Alf asked.

  Clark ignored him. “We all rendezvous behind General Tso’s at twelve thirty. We hide behind the Dumpster until Tack makes his circuit. At that moment, we have exactly thirty minutes to get in and out of the store.” He clicked the small digital stopwatch on the side of the table, and red LED numbers began counting down from 00:30:00. “It’s way more time than we need,” he added. “We can do the whole operation in five minutes.”