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your bathroom.”
    “Thanks, Hassel.  Not sure if that helps, but it’s more than Gomer could tell me.”
    “I told you, it was a bad batch of ‘shrooms!!!  SQUAWK!”
    Marlowe could always tell when Gomer was really upset because he reverted to primal sounds like squawks and whistles.
    “Shut up and eat your cat food.  It’s good for you.”
    “Bullshit,” said Gomer with his mouth full.
    “No, cat food.”
    Gomer turned into the corner, another pellet in his claw.  His back to Marlowe, he started making crunching sounds as if he was eating it.  But seeing the pellet drop to the bottom of the cage destroyed the otherwise very convincing illusion.
    “House?”
    “Yes?”
    “How soon can you get me a chemical analysis of this fungus in Gomer’s cage?”
    “If given top priority, I can have a result in an hour.”
    Marlowe had other jobs queued up, for some of the other, smaller cases he was working on.  But this took precedence.  “Top priority, House.  Top priority.”
    House dispatched a fist-sized mechanical ornithopter from a heating vent to collect the samples on the table.  The thing buzzed over Marlowe, its mechanical gripper snapping open and closed, before scooping up the mushrooms.  The thing gave Marlowe the heebie-jeebies – it looked like a giant, demon-spawned dragonfly with a claw.
    Marlowe shook his head and moved to the front door.  “I’m going out.  Paying a visit to a bar of soap who needs to clean up his act.  I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
    “Cíao, baby,” said Hassel.
    “Don’t hurry back,” muttered Gomer.

 
     
    CHAPTER 4
    YOU CAN ALWAYS RELY ON FAMILY

    A flock of birds flittered up from under an awning across the street as Marlowe stepped out of his modest brownstone abode, the front door sliding closed behind him with a sharp hiss.  He walked down the three steps to the sidewalk, eying the neighborhood cautiously, wary of any potential danger.  Marlowe lived in an unassuming home in a somewhat, but not quite completely unassuming neighborhood.  Houses crowded in on either side, all built from the same design.  Tall and narrow, two stories with lots of, well, brown stones.  But not the crumbly, 50/50 limestone/Styrofoam simulated brownstone you couldn’t avoid today.  It was the good stuff, pre-Fall when the Big Fed still ran things and the North American continent had been one united country.  Too well-built to be torn down, or so Marlowe told himself, the redevelopers stayed away, leaving the neighborhood static, something generally unheard of in the City.
    Marlowe smiled as he thought about his little neighborhood, an oasis of stability in a City of change.  He loved the City.  Every year it was the same, every year it was different.  In most parts of the City, buildings went up, buildings came down.  Streets were paved, streets were torn up.  Unemployment was almost nil, what with all the construction and demolition work.  The City didn’t really need all the constant construction work; in fact, it was downright disruptive, but as urban pacification went, nothing was cheaper than a low unemployment rate.  And after all the construction jobs had been filled, anyone still needing money sold maps of the ever-changing streets.  Of course, some buildings and streets were left untouched.  Mostly the ones with toxic waste buried illegally under them.  Hate the super-genius parrots all you want, but when they wrested control of the teamsters from the mob, they’d put an end to a lot of environmentally hazardous practices like illegal dumping and mixing radioactive waste into the asphalt.
    His neighborhood, Marlowe kept telling himself, wasn’t left untouched for those reasons.  His neighborhood had historical value.  The City merely wanted to preserve their landmark homes.
    Marlowe’s trusty magno-converted ‘73 Studebaker awaited him at the curb, a fresh coating of parking tickets plastered on the windshield.  He’d fallen in love