"Hallo?" said a musical voice into the phone. Almost perfect English, with only a bare trace of accent. Quite charming, really.
"Hello, Miss Jansen? We have a slight problem. One of our Authors speaks only German and we have no one to translate for him. Could you act as translator?"
"Well, I don't know. . . ."
"Please. It would take some of the workload off of Mr. Adama as well. He's tremendously overloaded with work. You could translate the German episodes FOR him while he's occupied elsewhere."
Slight pause. Trace of a sigh. "All right, I'll do it. Let me put on some clothes."
"Fine. We'll send someone up to escort you."
"Give me fifteen minutes."
"Okay. Bye."
"Bye-bye." CLICK.
Opera turned to the Operator. "Shall I summon a couple of Cylons?
The Operator smiled. "No. Here's where I pay Fitzgerald back for--" The Operator realized that maybe it wouldn't be a good idea to mention that, in another thread, he had basically taken Jenna Bush over to Dick's Last Resort and balled the living daylights out of her. "--um, for something he did for me once. Call Fitzgerald. Let HIM escort her to Herman the German. Knowing Fitz, he'll probably make a date with her before they're out of the elevator."
"Gotcha." Opera Taur dialed Fitzgerald's office.
Fitzgerald, for his part, was only too glad to act as escort for Nadine Jansen. For the longest time Roberta Pedon had been Fitzgerald's all-time favorite. All-time, that is, until he had seen pictures of Jansen, then Pedon had dropped to a close second place. Fitzgerald trooped up to the Sixteenth floor (or the Sixth Floor, or whatever the hell it is). Jansen answered his ring. She had on a simple but form-fitting yellow pullover top, blue jeans, and sandals. Her huge bust was packed, apparently, in an equally huge brassiere.
She smiled and introduced herself, extending her hand for Fitzgerald to shake. Fitzgerald hand was doing quite a bit of shaking on its own, but he shook her hand and smiled. They walked to the elevators. The usually suave and debonair Fitzgerald was, for once in his career, struck almost mute. He tried not to stare at Jansen, but the inside of the elevator was covered with mirrors, so no matter where he looked, there she was, smiling sweetly at him. "You're an Author, aren't you?"
"Y-yes," stammered Fitzgerald. "I-I'm a big fan of yours, Miss Jansen. I love your photos. They don't do you justice, really."
"Thank you. That's very sweet. Call me Nadine."
Fitzgerald probably would've called her Nadine, but they had arrived at the German guy's floor. They got out of the elevator and walked down to the proper door.
Fitzgerald rang the bell. A man answered. He was about 5'8" or 9", sandy brown hair with a very high forehead and pronounced widow's peak, round head, round face, and an expression on his face that could only be described as "elven mischievousness." He seemed to be smiling at a joke who's punchline only he knew. The expression, Fitzgerald soon found, seldom left his face.
"Guten aben! Commen! Commen!" The German waved Fitzgerald and Jansen into his apartment. Jansen and Fitzgerald gave their names. The place was almost all one big room, mostly an artist's studio by the look of it. There were easels and canvases, palettes and trays of oil paints, sketch pads, sticks of charcoal and pastels, and a large platform with a very large lump of unmodeled clay. Next to one wall was a computer monitor. At the far wall was a couch and wide-screen television. To the right of the entrance was a big kitchen with stainless-steel appliances and hanging copper pots. A set of double doors led off to the right of the main room, probably to a bedroom. The room was in pleasant disarray.
"Klaus Maria Eugen von Weber!" the man announced twice, first to Nadine and then to Fitzgerald, giving a little bow to each in turn. He did not extend his hand to be shaken, apparently considering the bow to be sufficient. He had pronounced his name "Clowse Maria OY-gin von VEY-ber," in proper German fashion.
Weber spoke to Jansen in German for a moment, then turned to Fitzgerald and spoke again in German. A moment after speaking, Jansen began translating:
("Thank you very much. Here's a little something for you. . . . We won't need you . . . any more today!")
Weber reached over and stuffed a twenty dollar bill in Fitzgerald's hand. Fitzgerald stared at it for a minute. "Tell him I'm not one of the help!" Fitzgerald said. He place the twenty on the kitchen counter. "I'm an Author like you are, Weber. Well, come to think of it, maybe NOT like you are!" Jansen translated.
("Keep it anyway!") Pause. ("Oh, and I don't like to leave the apartment, so . . . I'll need you to come up periodically . . . to take the episodes she's translated . . . down to Adama personally!") Fitzgerald found it disconcerting to hear Jansen say the word "she" while referring to HERSELF.
"Tell him to teleport it himself! You can do that, you know!" More translating from Jansen. "Tell him to get an imp to do it! Tell him I've got better things to do than--"
Weber was escorting Jansen over to his computer, ignoring Fitzgerald completely.
("Please let yourself out! Thank you! I'll call you when I need you!") Fitzgerald looked back at Jansen when she was translating. There was a strange look in her eyes that said, first, "It's not me, it's him saying that," and second, "Good by, and thank you!"
Fitzgerald let himself out, as Jansen and Weber began speaking to each other in German.
Fitzgerald snapped verbally at the next three people who spoke to him, which was unlike him. What worried him most was that he didn't know WHY. . . .
Tue Aug 21 12:13:59 2001
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