First report from the conference

Send money for drycleaning and batteries for the prod, which is holding up so far (tell Greg thanks for the tip but I’m using it more than expected.) They’ve gone crazy and you won’t get me to another of these things, you dirty bastards. Quiet enough when it started, a balding white man to the left, a balding brown man to the right, they seem to understand each other but to me it’s just braying. Who are these people? What do they want? What catastrophic discovery will they lay on us today? All I wanted was a flying car—maybe an electric razor that really works. Not this degenerate stomping on the virgin face of decency. Something strange and terrible happens when the labcoats are set free (get research on this). Years of celibacy and overwork smash through windows scored with the wrenched lower jaws of seminar sparring partners, the penises of scientific peers flopping like resting eels between heaving wailing piles of pale flesh. They have been trained to do impossible things. Why would they stop at the lab door? I am afraid. There is no shame in that. I’ve seen people run out of sessions holding their intestines. Mothers throw babies over railings, trying for enough distance to get to the doors. Nobody wants to eat the babies. But there isn’t time for strategy—you just run with your wits and a steady nerve. They can smell fear and it doesn’t take long for a naked pile of scientists to come to its senses about the interloper’s 300 watt photo flash. Their teeth are razor sharp, their reflexes electric, and they have no patience for interruptions. Like a shark frenzy or a rutting moose, this is not something that you want to stumble into unless you’re ready. I am, I’ve seen it before and my cattle prod swings left and right with a merciless beat, keeping the bastards away from my deerskin boots. Why am I here? After what happened at the earthquake engineering conference in Lisbon, what jangled idiot told me I could handle this heat again and survive? I’ll kill you if I make it back. Jesus—two cackling, sweat streaked Nobels are climbing the ballroom wall with the carcass of a FOX News reporter. Their feral grunting adds music to the unfolding scene. It’s supposed to be a Tutorial on Graphene for chrissakes. These slobs wouldn’t get a second look any other day. Parchment skinned and balding, they can barely hold a conversation or bring a forkful of overcooked carrot to their thin-lipped mouths, but put a few of them together in a room with unlimited coffee and a video projector… It’s impossible to interview them in this state, I can only live long enough to trap one when he’s exhausted. I’ve heard that there is a pressure point between the eyes. Grab it with enough strength and they go limp—then they’ll tell you anything you want to know. An old KGB technique. I could try to read abstracts in the bathroom, but the papers are illegible, covered in blood and other fluids. And there’s always screaming, probably a member of the public wandered in. Now they’re tearing her apart, looking for something.