BEg2 ch24 Traipse onto the grid

[Michael Bailey]

“Down on the floor, nose level with an electrical outlet, she imagines for
a second she can see some great brightness of power just behind the
parallel slits. Something scurries at the edge of her vision, the size of a
mouse, and it is Lester Traipse, the shy, wronged soul of Lester, in need
of sanctuary, abandoned, not least by Maxine. He stands in front of the
outlet, reaches in, parts the sides of one slit like a doorway, glances
back apologetically, slides into the annihilating brightness. Gone.

    “ She cries out, though not for Lester exactly.”


We’re in present tense - only time in the book?
Sorry, I’m not that observant but will keep that question for future
reference -

Immediacy: “words only delta t from the signified” or something like that?

Personification of the grid a somewhat GR trope.

My distinction between the electrical grid and a communication network, or
rather one of them - not that I originated any of them - is high power vs
low
power. You see it in help wanteds: “low power technician” for alarms or
LANs.

For a power socket to evoke nostalgia for Traipse in Maxine is in a
continuum with other references to the relationship between electric power
and life - _Frankenstein_ -  but also the springs of that mattress in AtD
carrying the dreams of previous sleepers. It’s one of those scientific
things that got carried not quite verbatim into literature and enlivened
it, may their tribe increase!

So she first saw Lester on the street, then in a dream, and now entering
the high power network of Con Edison. Isn’t he going to show up in
DeepArcher later? Can’t remember.

Also - Traipse is like, a pebble in Ice’s shoe, but he isn’t even that to
Windust. So although that doesn’t make Windust’s hands much less murderer-y
- thousands or millions minus one is about the same - I begin to doubt as
to why Windust would be the Traipse-killer. Maybe - like OJ - he was
conducting his own investigation.