Island of the Sequined Love Nun

little propellers on their crucifixes, drawing pictures of Christ in a flight helmet. Bottom line is the cargo cults are still around, and I hear that one of the strongest is on Alualu."
    "Are the natives dangerous?" Tuck asked.
    "Not because of their religion, no."
    "What's that mean?"
    "These people are warriors, Mr. Case. They forget that most of the time, but sometimes when they're drinking, a thousand years of warrior tradition can rear its head, even on the more modernized islands like Truk. And there are people in these islands who still remember the taste of human flesh-if you get my meaning. Tastes like Spam, I hear. The natives love Spam."
    "Spam? You're kidding."
    "Nope. That's what Spam stands for: Shaped Protein Approximating Man."
    Tucker smiled, realizing he'd been had. Pardee let loose an explosive laugh and slapped Tuck on the shoulder. "Look, my friend, I've got to get to the office. A paper to put out, you know. But watch yourself. And don't be surprised if your Learjet is actually a beat-up Cessna."
    "Thanks," Tucker said, shaking the big man's hand.
    "You going to be around for a few days?" Pardee asked.
    "I'm not sure."
    "Well, just a word of advice"-Pardee lowered his voice and leaned into Tucker conspiratorially-"don't go out at night by yourself. Nothing you're going to see is worth your life."
    "I can take care of myself, but thanks."
    "Just so," Pardee said. He turned and lumbered out of the bar.
    Tuck paid the bartender and headed out into the heat and to his room, where he stepped naked and lay on the tattered bedspread, letting the air conditioner blow over him with a welcome chill. Maybe this won't be so bad, he thought. He was going to end up on an island where God was a pilot. What a great way to get babes!
    Then he looked down at his withered member, stitched and scarred as if it had been patched from the Frankenstein monster. A wave of anxiety passed through him, bringing sweat to his skin even in the electric chill. He realized that he had really never done anything in his adult life that had not-even at some subconscious level-been part of a strategy to impress women. He would have never worked so hard to become a pilot if it hadn't been for Jake's insistence that "Chicks dig pilots." Why fly? Why get out of bed in the morning? Why do anything?
    He rolled over to bury his face in the pillow and pinned a live cockroach to the spread with his cheek.

10 – Coconut Telegraph
    Jefferson Pardee dialed the island communications center and asked them to connect him to a friend of his in the governor's office on Yap. While he waited for the connection, he looked down from his office above the Food Store on the Truk public market: women selling bananas, coconuts, and banana leaf bundles of taro out of plywood sheds; children with bandannas on their faces against the rising street dust; drunk men languishing red-eyed in the shade. Across the street lay a stand of coconut palms and the vibrant blue-green water of the lagoon dotted with outboards and floating pieces of Styrofoam coolers. Another day in paradise, Pardee thought.
    Pardee had been out here for thirty years now. He'd come fresh out of Northwestern School of Journalism full of passion to save the world, to help those less fortunate than himself, and to avoid the draft. After his two years in the Peace Corps were up-his main achievement was teaching the islanders to boil water-he'd stayed. First he worked for the budding island governments, helping to write the charters, the constitutions, and the requests for aid from the United States. That work finished, he found himself afraid to go home. He'd gone to fat on breadfruit and beer and become accustomed to dollar whores, fifty-cent taxis, and a two-hour workday. The idea of returning to the States, where he would have to live up to his potential or face being called a failure, terrified him. He wrote and received a grant to start the Truk Star. It was the last significant thing that he'd done for twenty-five years. Covering the news in Truk was akin to taking a penguin census in the Mojave Desert. Still, deep inside, he hoped that something would happen so that he could flex his atrophied journalistic muscles. Something he could get passionate about. Why couldn't the United States nuke a nearby island? The French did it in Polynesia all the time. But no, the United States nukes one little atoll in Micronesia (Bikini) and they go away, saying, "Well, I guess that ought to do for