Pied Piper Inc.

Mayor Fitzgibbons carefully picked his way up the steps to the City Council Building. Fortunately, the first homeless person, he stepped over was too drunk to notice. But the second one held out a cup and said, "Mr. Mayor, some change, please? After all, I voted for you."

The sad thing about that was that it might have been true. These people can lose their jobs, their houses, and even lose their consciousness from drink, but we still have to let them vote, thought the Mayor. Democracy is a truly bizarre thing.

After he had finally entered his private chambers, a room which did not contain any homeless people (yet), the meeting was called to order. "Now," said the mayor, "I understand, someone has requested an audience with us today."
Isol
"Yes, Mr. Mayor," said the First Secretary. "It's a businessman who claims he can help solve our homeless problem."

"We can't say no to that," said the Mayor. "Show him in."

The man who entered was wearing a plaid sport coat and a straw boater. "Greetings," he said, "I represent Pied Piper Inc. The Company with the latest in genetic frequency technologies."

"Genetic frequency?"

"Right, I'll explain that in just a minute. But first, let me ask you what is the real cause of your problem?"

The mayor shrugged. "I assume you're referring to all this homelessness. Well, we don't what causes it. There have been sociologists and economists arguing about that for centuries."

Now the man laughed, "Economists Shmonomists. The real cause of homelessness is actually quite simple. It's genetic."

"Genetic?"

"Sure. A certain gene makes people predisposed to worthless behavior . Isolating that gene was our first great achievement."

"And the second?"

"The second was figuring out what to do about the gene. And that's where frequency comes in." The man reached into his briefcase and pulled out a cylindrical device, "This," he said proudly, "our latest patent. Listen to this." He flipped a switch.

Absolutely nothing happened.

"I don't hear anything," said one of the Mayor's advisors.

"Neither do I," said the man with a laugh. "And it's a good thing too. The only people who can hear it are people with the homeless gene."

To make his point , he opened a window and held the device outside. Immediately, there were several homeless gathered around the window all clawing to get in. He turned off the device, and the homeless went away.

Turning back to the council, he smiled, "Shall we discuss payment?"

* * *

It was eventually agreed that the town would pay 1000 credits to get rid of the homeless.

Once that had been decided, the representative of Pied Piper Inc, strode out into the streets and turned on his device. The homeless that were nearby perked up and started following him. The homeless that were far away found their way through the streets and surrounded him.

He smiled and walked through the entire town until he had every single homeless person was gathered around and following him. Then, he strode out of the village with all the homeless following him.

A few hours later, he returned to the village all alone.

"What did you do with them?" asked Mayor Fitzgibbons/

"Do you really want to know? Your voters might not like it."

"Well, I really feel like I should know. . ."

"Fine, You know that cliff outside of town? I walked them all off of there. Don't worry. It was painless. Now about payment. . ."

Just then, a mob of angry women came marching up the street and Mayor Fitzgibbons noticed that his own wife was in the forefront.

"What did you do?" shouted one woman.

"Where are our children?" shouted another.

"Where is Francis?" That came from the Mayor's wife and Francis was his son.

"Now, dear. Why don't you calm down and explain what happened."

"Well, we saw how that man made all the homeless follow him, but he also made some of our children started following too. We tried to stop them, but they just went running off."

Mayor Fitzgibbons glared at the stranger. "Can you explain this?"

The stranger just laughed. "Don't blame me because your kid was doomed to be a worthless bum. In fact, thank me for saving you the trouble of raising them. Better yet, pay me. . . 1,000 credits please."