A Hundred Thousand Worlds (28 page)

I
f the bar seems a bit generic when Gail first arrives, it feels much less so once dozens of comics professionals are filling the booths, buying rounds, slapping shoulders, and sketching on napkins, trading the results like baseball cards. Zero to geek bar in ten minutes. But all of it is subdued, the joviality not forced but held in check. No one’s called it a wake, but there’s no question it is.

Gail, whose social batteries are run down, buys a pitcher with three glasses and sits at a bistro table in the corner, counting on an easy gravity to draw Ed and Geoff over eventually. She didn’t run into them at the convention, having spent most of her afternoon walking around with the moderator of the “Distaff Goes the Distance” panel, a woman with a pink-dyed crew cut and piercings who had no right to be straight but probably was. Gail is holding out hope she’ll show up here later, although she didn’t have the nerve to invite her. There may have been flirting involved. That’s the quantum quality of flirting: its existence is provable only in hindsight.

She spots Ed, Geoff, and Fred at the far end of the bar. They’re talking to Phil Weinrobe from Timely. Not just talking; in cahoots. There is very obvious cahooting going on here. Gail wishes she were the type of woman who would mutter something like “I’m going to get to the bottom of this,” then stomp across the bar and do just that. But if she possesses such a Nancy Drew gene, it must be recessive or dormant. So she tries to read facts and details in their body language from across the bar. All she can determine is that they are definitely in cahoots.

Weinrobe concludes whatever discussion they’re having and, drawing
himself up to an impressive full height, calls, “Excuse me,” in a voice that silences the bar. Gail thinks this silencing is sycophantic, since the careers of most of the people in the bar depend on or could be improved by Weinrobe. But even the booths of civilians quiet and turn, Weinrobe having one of those Moses-like voices.

“We’ve all suffered a great loss,” he says. He speaks like he’s the patriarch of the comic book industry, which Gail supposes he is. “No one has been more important to comic books than Levi Loeb. And I’m saying this knowing someone’s going to pass it on to NerdFeast and I’m going to get an earful from my bosses tomorrow. Not to mention a certain nonagenarian gentleman who shall remain nameless.” This gets a chuckle. “But it’s past time someone at Timely said it, so I’m saying it. No one has been more important to comic books than Levi Loeb.”

Some people in the crowd lift their glasses in a
hear, hear!
The Brewer-versus-Loeb debate has tended to draw a line between writers and artists, although a fair number of writers, Gail included, side with Loeb. Other people have whipped out their phones, no doubt sending this news tip to one of the blogs or fan sites.

“There was a plan,” says Weinrobe, “to have Levi Loeb here in L.A. tomorrow for a big announcement. I bet none of you knew that. Hey, Hampton,” he calls to someone down the bar, “we finally managed to keep something a secret.” There’s a roar of laughter from a knot of what Gail assumes to be marketing or publicity people, her assumption based on the fact that they’re dressed like adults. “We’re still going to make the announcement tomorrow. Levi Loeb won’t be up there on the dais with me, like I always imagined he would. And Hampton and his hacks will have a speech prepared for me that bobs and weaves through a lot of legalese. But, Ham, you’re going to cringe now. Spoilers on.”

The number of smartphones visible doubles.

“I’m telling you this because it’s about the history of what we do. The people who’ll be there tomorrow, they’re fans. And you know I love the fans. But you all are the makers. You guys. If I was a smarter guy, I’d
remember that speech from
Henry V.
The Saint Swithin’s Day speech or what you call it. I could rightfully say those things to you. Because I feel that we in this room, here, are a band of brothers.”

“And sisters!” Gail yells before she knows she’s going to do it. If everyone isn’t staring at her, it certainly feels as if they are.

Weinrobe purses his lips. “You know what,” he says, “I’m gonna drink to that.” He takes a swig of beer. “I always say everyone needs an editor.” Gail sits up a little straighter in her chair, and across the room, she and Weinrobe exchange a look she can’t interpret.

“Fifty years ago, this company made a mistake. It was the kind of mistake, born of carelessness, born of hubris, that plays a crucial role in the origin stories of so many of our characters. We betrayed, for the sake of money, for the sake of financial expediency, one of the fundamental builders of the Timely Universe.

“Life moved along, we made a lot of money off creations that relied, deep in their DNA, on the imagination of Levi Loeb. So much money, in fact, that when, twenty years later, Levi Loeb sued us for his rights, the money he deserved, it would have been impossible for us to pay him. The company would’ve been broke. And all our stories would have ended. The Timely Universe, destroyed by its creator. That’s not a story Levi Loeb would have wanted us to tell.

“A lot of this has been kept secret. It’s been speculated about. But I’m going to pull the curtain back and tell you what happened twenty years ago, when I took over at Timely. I was going over contracts and statements and records. And I was finding the same thing Levi Loeb’s lawyers were finding. We were protected, on a lot of fronts. Not saying we were right, just that we were protected. But then there was the Astounding Family. They were the founding heroes of the Timely Comics universe. A brave family that burrowed into the center of the earth and were transformed into superpowered beings by the ancient gods they found there. Brewer and Loeb created these four characters for a company that was so on the ropes, they didn’t have the manpower to draw up contracts. And it looked
like, because things were done so quickly, with handshakes instead of lawyers, Levi Loeb might be able to destroy the entire Timely Universe. The same one he’d saved by creating the Astounding Family and a hundred other heroes in the first place.”

This statement alone would have been newsworthy within certain communities. Timely has always made a point of referring to Levi Loeb only as an artist. He always “draws” characters. The word “create” is studiously avoided.

“So I made a decision. I went to his writers and said, ‘I want you to kill off the Astounding Family.’ The greatest heroes the Timely Universe has ever known, and they had to die. I tasked Porter Coleman, who was the best guy working at the time, to do it. If you ask me, it’s Coleman’s masterpiece. People don’t think of him as a cosmic writer—they think of the Ferret. But ‘Dream’s End’ is one of the most ambitious stories he ever wrote. The Astounding Family died saving the universe, of course. In more ways than they ever knew. With the Astounding Family off the table, the case between Loeb and Timely was resolved. Everything else was clearly contract work. But we could never publish a comic featuring the Astounding Family again.”

This version of the story isn’t new, but it’s the first time anyone from Timely has ever admitted this is the way things went down. In the official version, Porter Coleman had come up with the story idea months before the Loeb case was decided, and Timely stopped using the characters because they were dated.

“In the years since, nothing has weighed heavier on me than the plight of the Loeb family. And the Astounding Family. It’s been my dream to bring both families back into the Timely Universe.

“Two weeks ago, we announced we were restoring Levi Loeb’s creator credits to every character he touched. What we didn’t announce then, what we were saving till tomorrow, was that we’d reached a settlement on the rights to the Astounding Family. Rights which we signed over to be jointly held by Brewster Brewer and Levi Loeb, or their estates. And
that Levi Loeb had agreed to license to Timely, at a pretty hefty fee, I tell you. The old man was a hell of a poker player at the bargaining table.

“It doesn’t fix the mistakes we’ve made,” Weinrobe says. “But it means Levi Loeb passed away knowing he had his rightful claim to his creations. And it means the Astounding Family will be returning to comics for the first time in twenty years.”

Weinrobe turns and beckons Ed, Geoff, and Fred to come stand next to him, and Gail’s whole body tenses. Her head begins to give a little side-to-side shake, involuntary.

“Right here are the three gentlemen who are going to do it. You all know Ed Rankman, because you’re reading
Red Emma
every month, same as I am. Some of you might have heard of Geoff Sukowski, who works for our Noted Competition.
Worked
for, I should say. What is it you do over there, Geoff? Talking animal books?” Gail can see Geoff blushing. “But this kid here,” says Weinrobe, pulling Fred forward, “maybe you don’t know. He’s been killing it on a little independent book called
Lady Stardust
. His name’s Fred Marin, and he’s about to step into some of the biggest shoes there are. Am I making you nervous, Fred?” Oddly, it doesn’t seem he is. Fred seems more sure he deserves to be up there than either Geoff or Ed. He bows a little at the waist, not that anyone is applauding.

“I was thinking about this all day,” says Weinrobe. “And I was thinking, for me, this is a perfect comic book story. Death’s never forever in comics. I wish Levi Loeb was alive to see this day. But his ideas, his work, and his spirit live on. So let’s raise our glasses.” Pints and wineglasses and lowballs rise into the air. Gail notices hers is empty and hastily refills.

“To a man who was the first and the best. To Levi Loeb.”

“To Levi Loeb,” echoes the crowd.

Gail has finished the entire pitcher by herself while Weinrobe was speaking. She attributes her overall dazed feeling to that fact as Ed, Geoff, and Fred approach.

“So what do you think?” says Ed.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t tell you sooner,” says Geoff. “There were non-disclosure agreements.”

“Oh,” says Gail, “well, if there were non-disclosure agreements . . .” Geoff looks horrified, which makes Gail feel awful for having said it. “It’s fantastic,” she says, trying to will herself to feel it. “I’m so happy for you guys.” Maybe she’s sold it better than she thought, or maybe they particularly wanted to buy it, but any momentary guilt they might have felt about keeping all this a secret from her is gone.

“I’m buying drinks,” says Ed, slapping Fred on the back.

“No, I’ve got them,” says Gail, getting up on shaky legs. The backslapping around the room goes polyrhythmic and the fog of sorrow lifts, dispelled by the news that he is risen. When she reaches the bar, she looks back to see her table’s gone crowded, her friends obscured by a rush of well-wishers, most of whom must feel, somewhere in their guts, the same ember of resentment that glows in hers.

A
lex wakes up alone in the big bed in the big house, and his first thought is to look for his mom. The awful, pit-of-his-stomach feeling that comes with this thought makes Alex resolve that he will not let that happen again, and because thinking might not be enough, he says it out loud.

“This will not happen again.”

The words echo in the room, which is entirely bare. Alex has seen movies and television shows where the children of divorced parents arrive at the new home of whichever parent has been displaced and find waiting for them rooms fully furnished, decorated, and stocked with toys. Now, he knows his dad is not that kind of dad. There was talk the night before about shopping trips for furnishings, for clothes, for toys. The days to come, Alex has been assured, will be a spending spree. But he’s glad his dad didn’t try to choose things for him, extrapolating Alex’s tastes from what he was like at three or choosing a collection of items deemed popular for boys like Alex.

Looking for both evidence and breakfast, Alex finds his way to the kitchen. It is, of course, bigger than their kitchen, with cupboards that stretch all the way to the high ceilings and leave much of their contents out of Alex’s reach. Even the counters and stovetop are too high for him to make any practical use of unaided. He goes into the living room and finds an ottoman. It looks expensive—all the furniture looks expensive—and probably it shouldn’t go in the kitchen in case something spills. But it is the right height for his needs, so he carries it into the kitchen and sets it in a corner for later.

He opens the fridge, noting right away that the milk and orange juice are on an upper shelf and will require the ottoman to be grabbed. But directly at eye level is the holy grail of breakfast foods: bacon.

Alex inspects the package. It is horrible bacon, if there can be such a thing. It is not organic and is almost definitely from a factory farm where the pigs have no room to move or play. His homeschooling group took a field trip to a small pig farm upstate, so Alex knows how much pigs love to play, and how when they have space they’re not gross at all. Those pigs ended up bacon, but at least before that they were happy. This is not that kind of bacon. But as with the ottoman, there are compromises Alex needs to make, so he sets about finding a skillet.

The important thing, he remembers, is starting with a cold pan, so, pulling the ottoman over to the stove, he lays four strips out onto the skillet before turning on the burner. It’s a gas stove, which he’s seen only at the Idea Man’s house, but he knows you turn it to the place where it makes the
click-click-click
and leave it there till the blue flame blooms.

After only a few minutes, the kitchen is filled with the smell of bacon, and over the sizzling Alex hears footsteps from upstairs. His mom always says bacon makes the best alarm clock, and at home the whole apartment would be suffused most Saturdays with its salty tang. Alex is surprised the smell can even reach his father’s room, upstairs on the other side of the house. Powerful thing, bacon.

In stubble and paunch and a fluffy purple robe, his father stands in the kitchen doorway, rubbing sleep out of his face.

“You’re cooking bacon?” he asks, which Alex thought was obvious.

“Uh-huh.”

“You know how to do that?” This sounds like a question related to safety, but Alex chooses not to answer it that way.

“It’s important to start with a cold skillet,” he says. He wishes he’d asked his mom why this was important; it would be a good thing to know.

“Huh,” says his father.

“This is horrible bacon,” Alex says. “It has nitrates and is probably made from sad pigs.”

His dad picks up the package from the counter. “They look pretty happy,” he says, showing Alex the picture of a smattering of pink pigs in a vast green field.

“Those pigs aren’t real,” says Alex. “Real ones aren’t pink.”

“Good to know.”

“Do you like yours crispy or soggy?”

“Crispy,” his dad says, sitting down at the small kitchen table. “Almost burned.”

“Me, too,” says Alex. “Mom likes hers soggy, but she crispifies some for me.” He flips the bacon with the spatula and watches with quiet horror as spittles of grease jump from the pan and hit the ottoman, spreading into dime-sized stains on the fabric. He wishes they’d landed on the tops of his bare feet instead. Not yet knowing the rules of this house, it seems as if burns on his feet are less likely to be noticed than stains on the furniture.

“So I was thinking,” says his dad, “that maybe today we could go shopping. Get stuff for your room and all. There’s a mall about a half hour away.”

“Don’t you have to go to the convention?” Alex asks. He needs to talk to Brett as soon as he can. A little part of Alex wants to explore the house further. He’s only seen the downstairs and his room, and if the house were otherwise vacant, he could possibly collect more evidence.

“Not till the panel with your mom and me tomorrow,” says his dad.

“I think we should go to the ocean,” says Alex as he lifts charred pieces of bacon out of the bath of sizzling grease. “I feel like I’ve come all this way and I’m not done going west yet. I feel like I should go as far as I can.”