John Wayne dosed; the WETA rant; the expulsion

pivotal · 17 Nov YDAU

• When: 17 Nov YDAU (the locker-room lead-up and the office interrogation)
• What: That afternoon Pemulis himself, calculating that "a win or even three-setter w/ Freer would mean a place on the WhataBurger plane," is "willing to violate a kind of personal honor-code and take pre-match Tenuate" — two spansules that deliver no competitive verve, only "a slight unpleasant spaciness" (n324, p. 1068): the very 'drine possession that will make him indefensible hours later. Meanwhile John Wayne, having taken some of Troeltsch's Seldane from Troeltsch's bedside table — which Troeltsch had spiked with Tenuate spansules "promoted" from Pemulis's stash (event 7 / scene 018) — is accidentally dosed on his "cherry-red and virgin bloodstream," seizes the WETA broadcast mike, and delivers a mind-lost, minutes-long public evisceration of the whole academy (imitating Tavis mid-coitus; savaging Thode, Leith, Schtitt, Nwangi, Bernadette Longley, and calling Hal "by all appearances addicted to everything that is not tied down"). In Avril's office, deLint, Nwangi and Watson confront Pemulis with the evidence — his yachting cap, two pharmaceutical scales, jeweller's loupes, the tow truck's Visine bottles, and Troeltsch's bottles. The dosing "had been a total accident and in no way Pemulis's deal," but he cannot exonerate himself without confessing 'drine possession, "which… would be tantamount to Clippertonizing himself." (Hal had foreseen the outcome days earlier — "It's Pemulis they want. I'm almost positive they're going to give Pemulis the Shoe by the end of the term," scene 157 — knowing the administration's real target was Pemulis, whose public dosing of the Port Washington opponent and traced urine-sales had made him expendable.) Avril — whose leverage he had used (events 16, 18) — counter-checkmates: the offer is to "finish out the term for credit or… hit the trail" to another O.N.A.N.T.A. institution with no positive reference, and word that the doorknobs are now "rubberized and grounded," the files "recryptographilated," the mirrors "reanodized," her regards sent as "may the road rise up to meet you whitherever your future travels lie." Pemulis stays "brass-mask-faced" — feeling only "the little deck-of-cards riffle of the wings of the Shit Fairy, which he privately envisions as a kind of violet incubus with the Da's saggy frown" — fixated to the last on the stakes he still cares about: "And this affects the WhataBurger, my chances?" The public E.T.A. version of the whole affair is a cover story: Wayne "had had a violent allergic reaction to a decongestant" (scene 170) — accident-in-fact vs. allergic-reaction-in-public, cite both (see Dating notes). (Cross-ref: the leverage Avril here counter-checkmates is her own exposure — her chronology, event 24.)