Acid Burn

As a kid born in 1975 I didn’t really become a sentient being until the ‘80s. Most kids are barely thinking instinct machines until they hit five years old. Around ‘85 I started having the beginnings of being a sexual creature, starting to notice the difference between boys and girls. The valuable wisdom of Schwarzenegger‘s Kindergarten Cop wouldn’t grace the public until ‘90. I just knew that looking at girls made me feel good, that they usually smelled better, and that cooties were very likely not real. The first time I felt that funny feeling below the belt was watching Madonna’s “Open You Heart” video. In the late ‘80s it was Marie Fredrikssen of Roxette that inevitably stirred that feeling. To this day a woman with punky short hair is one of my weaknesses. Miley Cyrus wasn’t even remotely attractive until she cut it all off.

That later mutated to include any punk style and hair colors not found in nature as well as facial piercings (but not face tattoos… that just looks trashy). As you can imagine the recent trend to blue (or pink, or purple, or green, or…) highlights and undercut bobs has had my inner pervert dancing for joy.

In 1995 the movie Hackers was released and it had a fabulous cast. Johnny Lee Miller would later go on to some serious stardom; in a year he’d star as Sick Boy in Trainspotting. Mathew Lillard was already the nerd’s nerd. Fisher Stevens is a fantastic character actor. But the real breakout star of the movie was the scion of Hollywood Royalty, a nineteen year old Angelina Jolie as Acid Burn. With her hair in a slicked down tight pixie cut and those legendary lips… this is where the legend started, and I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one who formalized a short hair fetish because of her.

I bring this up because BigWig was a dead ringer for her.

As I let her in, I was just as articulate and erudite as I ever am.

“Er…”

“Nice to finally meet you.” She pushed past me and sat down at my table, taking a sip of the coffee I’d poured for her before her arrival. As I seated myself opposite her, she reached out and stole one of my Camels, placed it between those two heavenly pillows resting betwixt her slightly upturned nose and gracefully pointed chin, and looked at me expectantly.

I stared like an idiot for a second before I got the hint and pressed my trusty old Zippo into service, lighting her smoke. After the kind of drag from it that originates fetishes, she tapped it on the ashtray needlessly, and looked across the table at me. “The first rule of Rabbits is that you don’t talk about Rabbits.”

Chuck Palahniuk wouldn’t release Fight Club for another two months (and Fincher’s movie was still 3 years away) so this didn’t send me into fits of giggles “So… why Rabbits?”

“You’ve read the Manifesto. That was tacked to a laundromat wall in San Francisco during I. A couple players we’re struck by the picture and the name stuck. Really the game doesn’t have a formal name though. It’s just what players call it.”

“One… like the Roman numeral I?”

“Yeah. After the ‘59 game ended they just started referring to the different iterations by numbers. Which might have something to do with The Circle.”

“Circle?”

BigWig looked at the out of date neon yellow and red Swatch strapped to her wrist. “Easier to show you. She stood up and headed for the staircase, stopping in the doorway to turn her head. “Coming?”

The beauty in front of me sure played a mean pinball. For all of about 5 minutes before Midnight Madness started. A six ball multi ball mode with massively inflated scores from targets and bumpers. It’s total chaos and a complete blast to play. Shame Williams doesn’t put it into modern machines. After the last ball finally drained she let her game end. Instead of the usual High Score screen, the display board in the back showed a list.

I. Mickey Mouth
II. The Condor
III. Alison Cat
IV. Radio Knife
V. Carbon Thing
VI. Californiac
VII.

“That’s the Circle. Sort of a Rabbits hall of fame. It tells us a few things but most importantly that seven has started. Now we just need to find the trailhead.”

I was quite stupefied at this point and could only repeat back “Trailhead?”

“It’s a phrase that shows up and tells players where to begin. ‘The door is open’.”