A Highly Unlikely Scenario, or a Neetsa Pizza Employee's Guide to Saving the World by Rachel Cantor Page A

and Franciscan friar who lived from 1214 to 1294, or thereabouts, or maybe from 1220, it’s hard to know. He was the most brilliant man of his age. He wrote the Voynich! Really, you haven’t heard of him?
    Does he have a food chain? Leonard asked.
    No! Sally said, disgusted in a way that pierced Leonard’s heart. He decided he’d ask no more questions.
    He was a Master at Oxford, then he taught in Paris. We don’tknow where he was between 1247 and 1256, though I have my ideas. He became a friar in 1256, expecting that this would lead to another teaching position, but instead, a few years later, the Franciscans prohibited him from publishing. He eventually got around this through Pope Clement, formerly known as Cardinal Guy le Gros de Foulques, who instructed him in 1266 to write about the place of philosophy in theology. Am I speaking too fast?
    No, Leonard said.
    You have a glazed look on your face.
    I think you’re very pretty, Leonard said.
    Sally stomped her foot. Her freckled cheeks became pink.
    I need you to listen, she said. This is very important!
    Leonard listens best when someone pretty is talking, Felix said. That’s what he meant.
    Oh, Sally said. Sorry.
    Please, continue, Leonard said.
    Where was I?
    Leonard had no idea.
    The place of philosophy in theology, Felix said.
    Right. It was at this point that Roger Bacon produced the works for which he is most famous—and she pointed to some tomes beside her cot:
Opus Majus
,
Opus Minus
,
De multiplicatione specierum
.
    Latin, Felix said.
    Of course, Sally said. For the remainder of his life, Bacon alternately taught and suffered under house arrest, but this doesn’t interest us.
    It doesn’t? Leonard said.
    No, Sally said. Anyone hungry?
Code yellow
    We should eat before I tell you the best part, the part nobody knows.
    Jujuberries? Leonard offered.
    Yuck, Sally said. Really, the only thing I like, besides legs, is, don’t laugh …
    Neetsa Pizza, Leonard said.
    Sally looked at him with wonder and new respect.
    How did you know?
    Golden Mean pizza?
    Yes! she cried. It’s like you know me!
    It’s my favorite too! Leonard said.
    We can order one from a greeter on the Walking Grounds, Sally said.
    No, we can’t, Felix said. He’d gone to the window, which he now opened. Sounds of mayhem exploded into the room—which is to say, shrieking, shouting, banging, clanging, more shouting, alarm whistles, and innumerable varieties of cacophonous song.
    A riot, Sally said, as Leonard arrived to look over her shoulder.
    Hundreds of neo-Maoists and food representatives were wrestling, throwing punches, and chasing one another around the Walking Grounds. Some carried sticks; others flaming torches. Strawberry Parfait soda jerks made rude gestures at pizza greeters, who brandished clipboards. Tapas chefs from Jack-o-Bites menaced scantily clad Whiggery Piggery barbecuties with kebab sticks. A tree in the middle of the ground was alight—the Heraclitans’ doing, no doubt. Only the Dadaistsseemed uninterested in fighting: they were … yes, they were admiring a stoveroom sink propped against a jujuberry tree.
    The music came from dueling musicians, established in different corners of the grounds—Leonard could make out the Heavenly Spheres rock band, some court troubadours, a suburban-peasant-worker chorale, bagpipes, and Whig fanfare, all egging their representatives on with morale-boosting melodies. Leonard couldn’t help but feel Pythagorean pride as he heard strains of the Neetsa Pizza theme song.
    The police are arriving, Sally said, and she was right: it was their alarm whistles they’d heard, and they were getting louder. A police caravan screeched to a halt and dozens of police jumped off the back, justice sticks and ID spray in hand, some still wearing their Chipmunk Patrol sashes. They began spraying and beating fighters and passersby indiscriminately.
    Oh, no! Felix cried.