Cryptonomicon

by Neal Stephenson

This is an allusion to a Randy/Avi conversation of two years ago wherein Avi actually calculated a specific numerical value for “fuck-you money.” It was not a fixed constant, however, but rather a cell in a spreadsheet linked to any number of continually fluctuating economic indicators. Sometimes when Avi is working at his computer he will leave the spreadsheet running in a tiny window in the corner so that he can see the current value of “fuck-you money” at a glance.

When Shaftoe stepped over the threshold of that Nip restaurant, he passed into the realm of legend.

After making sure that his will was in order and writing a last letter to his parents and siblings in Oconomowoc, Shaftoe went to that park one morning, reintroduced himself to the surprised Goto Dengo, and made arrangements to serve as human punching bag.

A disciplinary proceeding is hastily called. Shaftoe is found guilty of being courteous (by shining Frick’s boots) and defending the life of a Marine (himself) from a crazed attacker.

A taxi will only get him there faster, and he is too nervous to get there fast.

The only other thing he notices about them, before he gives up and slinks back into the cargo hold, is that they are fucking armed to the teeth. Like they were expecting to have to kill twenty or thirty people on their way from the airplane to the latrine and back. Bobby Shaftoe has met a few of these paranoid types during his tour, and he doesn’t like them very much. That whole mindset reminds him too much of Guadalcanal.

Waterhouse is ready for this. He is so ready that he has to hold back for a moment and try to make a show of discretion.

“Shit!” he says. “What’s wrong, Sarge?” “I just always say that when I wake up,” Shaftoe says.

This major body of water is only a stone’s throw away and is trying vigorously to get much closer.

Arguing with anonymous strangers on the Internet is a sucker’s game because they almost always turn out to be—or to be indistinguishable from—self-righteous sixteen-year-olds possessing infinite amounts of free time.

These in combination with the photographs of family and friends give it a cozy, domestic flavor which is, however, completely ruined by the framed picture of Adolf Hitler on the wall. Waterhouse finds this to be in shockingly poor taste until he remembers it’s a German boat.

He speaks, not as a way of telling you a bunch of stuff he’s already figured out, but as a way of making up a bunch of new shit as he goes along. And he always seems to be hoping that you’ll join in. Which no one ever does, except for Enoch Root.

Far too complicated for a Kapitanleutnant to mess around with, especially when he’s busy trying to effect a dramatic reduction in Nn.

You asshole, you tricked my German—for this you shall die!

“You’re finished. I haven’t even started,” Randy says. “Started what?” “Telling you why there’s no chance I’m going to be bored in the Philippines.” Avi blinks. “You met a girl?” “No!” Randy says testily, meaning Yes, of course. “Come on, let’s go.”

“Yeah. I keep bothering him to get Ordo and encrypt his e-mail, but he won’t.” “That is really unprofessional,” Avi grumbles. “He needs to be more paranoid.” “He’s so paranoid that he doesn’t even trust Ordo.” Avi’s scowl eases. “Oh. That’s okay then.”

“It says that I am not to ask you any more questions.” “What!?” “Under no circumstances,” Beck says, “am I to extract any more information from you.” “What the hell does that mean?” “Probably that you know something I am not authorized to know,” Beck says.

It has been about two hundred years, now, since Bobby Shaftoe had a trace of morphine in his system. Without it, he cannot know pleasure or even comfort.

“You were all in swimming trunks. You all had whores on your laps!” Shaftoe shouts. “Unless those were your wives—in which case I’m sorry your wife is a whore!”

Shaftoe’s never felt better. What a fucking deal! He’s getting morphine out of the Germans in exchange for telling them German military secrets.

Perhaps if I had joined the Hitler Youth, they would have given me a surface ship.” “Then you’d be dead.” “Right!” Bischoff’s mood brightens considerably.

Root rolls his eyes and heaves a sigh. “You have forgotten to allow for the possibility that Rudy might be a homosexual.” It takes Shaftoe a long time to stretch his mind around this large, inconveniently shaped concept. Bischoff, in typical European fashion, seems completely unruffled.

Shaftoe looks around at the others, but none of them laughs, or even grins. They must not have heard it. “Come again?” Shaftoe asks, proddingly, like a man in a bar trying to get a shy friend to tell a sure-fire thigh-slapper. “Wehrmachtnachrichtungenverbindungen,” von Hacklheber says, very slowly, as if repeating nursery rhymes to a toddler.

“What was your position in all this, then?” asks Root, and Shaftoe nearly jumps out of his chair, startled by the sound of a voice other than von Hacklheber’s. Given what happened the last time someone (Shaftoe) asked a question, this is heroic but risky.

and he’s off again talking about the structure of the German bureaucracy. Terrified, Shaftoe flees from the room, runs outside, and uses the outhouse.