Various Fiction

by Robert Sheckley

  This latest game had something to do with becoming a fantasy character, and battling other fantasy characters. Only it was something more than moving a little figurine on a screen. In this one, somehow, through the wonders of virtual reality, you became the character, felt what he felt, saw what he saw. When you struck at someone, it was like hitting with your own fists. You felt everything—wounds, too—but you never died, never got killed, not your true self. The virtual reality didn’t go that far. Ellie thought the game thing was silly, and even faintly sinister. There was nothing normal in the way those games held Jake’s attention for hour after hour. And then there was the door: from the moment Jake sat down to play until the moment he was done, the door to the rec room stayed locked.

  Anyhow, it was an Issue, though Ellie wasn’t quite sure why.

  Now she parked the car in the driveway, picked up the bag of groceries, and let herself in the front door. She walked through the living room, through the narrow dining room with its long walnut table. Jake hadn’t put down the tablecloth as he’d promised. Somehow she was not surprised.

  She took her groceries into the kitchen. Through the side door, she could hear the faint sounds of Jake’s games. He had come right home and locked himself in again.

  Ellie was now supposed to prepare lunch, and, when it was ready, pound on the rec room door, asking and finally pleading with Jake to come out while the food was hot. He would probably emerge half an hour later, and then grumble because his hot dogs were either cold, overcooked, or rewarmed.

  It seemed to Ellie that something in this demeaned her.

  She tried the rec room door. Locked, of course. She rapped at the door. “Jake? Can you hear me?”

  No answer. She knocked again, louder. Then she found herself pounding on the door and shouting, “Jake! Damn it, open this door!”

  The lock clicked and the door opened. Jake stood there in a faded blue shirt and khaki shorts. He looked a little punchdrunk—the games did that to him—but very cute, like a young Jeff Bridges. She had admired Jake’s looks since high school, where they had met and dated, then gone steady, and finally married. And Jake had loved her looks, her long dark hair, her slim figure. Liked? Back in those days she could barely restrain him. He wanted her all of the time, in every conceivable place, and some not so conceivable. But that fine animal lust of his had fallen off a bit over the last year. Her married girlfriends told her it was inevitable. She hadn’t discussed it with her mother, but suspected she’d have a different explanation.

  He looked at her and smiled sheepishly. “Hey, doll, I’m sorry, I know I was supposed to set the table, but I thought I’d just need a minute to finish up last night’s set.”

  “And?”

  “And it wasn’t as simple as I expected. But I’ll just need a couple of minutes to finish up. These games can surprise you, you know.”

  “No, I don’t know,” she said bitterly. “How would I know? You never play any of them with me.”

  “That’s because you’re not interested in them.”

  “How did you know that? Did God send you a telegram?”

  He looked confused. “You always said—”

  “I was just being polite. I knew you didn’t want to play with me.”

  “Hey, darlin’, that just isn’t so!”

  “It’s not? Fine! If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em! Play a game with me right now!”

  “I haven’t had lunch yet.”

  “A lot of meals have waited while you finished just one more game,” she snapped. “This one can wait, too.”

  “But I’m hungry now.”

  “Maybe I’m not making myself clear,” said Ellie coldly. “Marriage is about sharing. I’m not cooking another meal until you start sharing your games with me. Maybe I’ll learn why you prefer them to my company.”

  Jake put on his best Misunderstood Look, followed by his Abused Puppy Dog Look. When neither worked, he settled for simply staring at her. “You sound just like a nagging wife,” he said at last.

  “I haven’t even started,” she promised him.

  His eyes narrowed. “You’re sure you want to do this? These games can get kinda rough.”

  “They’re just games.”

  “Don’t say that!” he snarled with the same vigor she wished he would apply to defending her when his friends made an occasional off-color remark or half-hearted sexual proposition.

  “Just show me what to do.”

  He glared at her for another moment. Then: “Okay, put on your game face and get into this helmet. We’re going to play a little game of DRAGONFLY.”

  It came with special glasses and built-in headphones. Once she had it on, it seemed to Ellie that she was in a different place, maybe a whole different world. It didn’t look like the rec room at all. It was a long slanting space made up of plastic-looking yellow and blue lozenges. The lavender walls curved upward and inward.

  Around a low pink wall, she found a bunch of big toys, all in bright colors and piled together.

  “Take the Dragonfly,” Jake said. “It’s that stainless steel one. Just walk toward it. The automatic compensating mechanism will take care of the rest.”

  Ellie started walking toward it. There was a moment when she didn’t know what was happening. The next moment, she was inside the machine; or rather, her intelligence and volition were there, because she had no sense of having any body other than the dragonfly machine. She was part of the machine, its consciousness, the disembodied spirit that operated its controls. The machine was a long cylindrical metallic object, and out of one of its ends there protruded a thin pointed tube, like a nose or a beak.

  “Where am I?” she asked.

  “You’re in Dragonfly Number 2. I’m over here in Dragonfly 1.”

  Jake’s Dragonfly had a little buttercup painted on its side. For some reason, this irritated Ellie.

  She asked, “And what are we supposed to do now? Admire each other?”

  “You have to catch the ring and carry it to my goal and dunk it in.”

  “What ring?” But as she spoke, she saw the ring suddenly appear, a glowing yellow and red torus, sitting in the air and quivering slightly.

  “Cute,” Ellie said. “Now what?”

  “Watch.” Jake’s Dragonfly moved toward the torus. With a single deft movement it speared the torus onto its long needle beak, moved toward Ellie’s Dragonfly, and jinked around it. Behind Ellie’s Dragonfly a stone-colored circle with a hole appeared. Jake’s Dragonfly sped toward it, then gracefully poked the torus through the circle.

  “Big deal,” said Ellie. “I’m supposed to do that?”

  “Or prevent me from doing it.”

  Again the torus flashed free in the space between the dragonflies. Ellie moved her Dragonfly toward it by mental command, but Jake was quicker.

  His Dragonfly hurtled in and stabbed at the torus with its long needle nose. He struck it on the side and the torus went flying past Ellie. She spun her ship and went after it. It was just ahead of her, she had it lined up—

  At that moment Jake crashed his ship into hers, sending the dragonfly turning end over end. By the time Ellie had regained control of her ship, Jake had gotten to the torus, speared it, and wheeled around toward Ellie’s goal. Ellie speeded back to block him, but he dodged around her and sank the torus.

  “Not as easy as it looks, huh?” Jake said.

  “I didn’t know one of the rules was you could bump people.”

  “That’s standard in all these games,” Jake said. “They’re full-contact sports.”

  “Let’s try it again,” Ellie said.

  She turned her Dragonfly to face Jake’s. The torus flashed into the space between them. Ellie delayed for a moment, then, when Jake had committed himself, she flashed forward and gave his ship a powerful blow against the side. Jake’s ship careened end over end. Ellie had plenty of time to spear the torus and put it through the goal.

  “Another?” Ellie asked sweetly.

 
; “You bet your ass we’ll do another!” muttered Jake, and threw his ship into motion as soon as the torus appeared. Ellie had been waiting for that. She tapped the side of Jake’s ship, not a hard blow, just enough to deflect its trajectory toward the torus. Ellie had already compensated for the tap, so she was able to go directly to the torus, spear it, elude Jake, and get the torus through the goal hole.

  They went at it five more times. In four of them, Ellie anticipated Jake’s move, sent his ship careening, and dunked the torus. For the fifth, she managed to miss her bump—on purpose, because she didn’t want Jake to get too discouraged. Jake won that one, and suggested they try another game.

  “Something a little more . . . ah . . . innovative,” he concluded.

  “Sure,” Ellie said. “What do you have in mind?”

  “It’s called ARENA,” said Jake. “I’ve been saving it against the day you turned into a harridan.”

  Flushed with victory, she replied. “Give me your best shot.”

  She found herself standing in the middle of a huge stadium. Tens of thousands of people were seated in the grandstand, yelling and cheering. Although they spoke no language she’d ever heard, it sounded vaguely like the Latin she’d learned in high school. To her surprise, she was able to understand every word of it.

  Her only garment was a tattered white robe. She carried something in her right hand. She glanced down at it. It was a bible.

  “Blood!” cried the crowd in unison. “We want blood!”

  Suddenly she heard a hideous roar from behind her, and she whirled around to see what had made it.

  It was a black-maned lion, 500 pounds of muscle and sinew, and it was stalking her, belly low to the ground. It roared again, so close now that she could almost count its teeth.

  Then she blinked and almost did a double-take. Although it was clearly a lion, there was something very familiar about its face. Then she knew: it was Jake!

  Okay, Ellie, the lion seemed to say to her, the unspoken words echoing inside her head. I’m giving it my best shot, just like you told me to. Are you ready to go back to the kitchen where you belong?

  Ellie looked around for a weapon—a spear, even a knife. There weren’t any. She wondered if she could reach the closest stadium wall before Jake caught her and pulled her down. It was fifty feet away; he was half that distance from her. Besides, the wall was ten feet high; she couldn’t climb it even if she could beat him to it.

  Think, Ellie, she told herself. This is a game. There are rules. There must be a way to win!

  Survival of the fittest, said Jake in satisfied though soundless tones. That’s the only rule that matters.

  She considered her options. Her primary option was to stay there and be eaten. Her second option was to run and be caught and be eaten. Her third was to charge Jake, try to take him by surprise, maybe even knock him off his four mighty legs, and—

  And what?

  And be eaten.

  Jake approached slowly, belly to ground, savoring the anticipation. Hot drops of saliva dripped out of his mouth and fell to the ground.

  Oh, God! thought Ellie, momentarily forgetting it was a game (and who knew? Maybe it wasn’t). I don’t want to—

  And then she knew. It didn’t matter what rules governed her life and her world. This was the world of ARENA, and she did have a weapon.

  She dropped to her knees, clutching the bible to her chest with both hands.

  “The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want,” she intoned, and launched into the whole psalm.

  The lion laughed. “Nice try, Ellie. But we’ve been atheists all our lives. And even if there was a God, which there isn’t, why would he listen to you?”

  “Because I’m not an atheist in this world,” said Ellie, launching into a series of Hail Marys and Our Fathers, with a couple of Inshallahs thrown in for good measure.

  “He’s not listening,” grinned Jake, baring his teeth, so close now that Ellie could feel his fetid breath on her face.

  Suddenly a burning bush appeared between them.

  VENGEANCE IS MINE! it thundered.

  “But—” said Jake, cringing.

  I MADE YOU. I CAN UN-MAKE YOU. BEGONE, ANIMAL!

  And Jake vanished.

  “Dumb luck,” muttered Jake, back in the rec room again.

  “You didn’t think so when you were peeing over all four of your legs and shaking like a leaf,” said Ellie.

  “Okay, hot shot. You got lucky twice. Now let’s try MONSTER RALLY.”

  She looked down at the table. At first she thought it was Boris Karloff, but it was Jake, all right—Jake as she’d never seen him, as she hoped she’d never see him again, Jake with dead staring eyes, Jake almost eight feet tall, Jake with electrodes sticking out of his head and neck.

  “He lives!” cried a disembodied voice. “My creature lives!”

  Jake slowly swung his feet over the side of the table and laboriously pulled himself into a sitting position. Then his lifeless gaze fell on Ellie. The semblance of a smile crossed his lips.

  “How can you look lustful when you’re dead?” she said.

  He lowered his feet to the floor and stood unsteadily, then turned as awkwardly as Karloff ever had, extended his arms as if for balance, and approached her.

  “The Lord is my shepherd . . .” began Ellie.

  “Not in this game, He isn’t,” the disembodied voice said. “Nobody wrote Him into the rules.”

  What was the monster afraid of? she asked herself, trying to remember the movies. Ah, yes—fire!

  Ellie reached into her various pockets, looking for matches or a lighter and cursing herself for giving up smoking two months ago.

  There were guns and knives on a desk in the corner, but she knew they were just for show. You can’t kill something that’s already dead.

  All right, she thought. What else scares a dead man? I can’t use God. I can’t shoot him or stab him. I can’t set fire to him. What’s left?

  She backed away as Jake approached. He cornered her, and she was barely able to duck under one of his arms and run across the laboratory.

  One of these vials? she wondered, looking at all the test tubes. No, I flunked chemistry. I wouldn’t know which one to use or what it might do.

  He reached for her again, and again she ducked away, but he came closer this time.

  Think rationally, Ellie, she told herself. You’re in a lab. This is obviously science fiction, and science fiction has to obey the known laws of the universe. The answer’s here somewhere.

  She looked around. Still more test tubes, more chemicals, more notebooks scrawled in German.

  Wait a minute! she thought. Dead men don’t walk in science fiction. But look at him—he’s awkward, he’s having trouble just turning corners, he can’t even speak. He’s Mary Shelly’s creation, all right, or at least Hollywood’s version of it. Suddenly she frowned. But if Jake’s the monster, who am I? She looked at her reflection in a barred window. I’m not Elsa Lanchester and I’m not his bride. She stared harder. She looked exactly like Ellie. I’m not even in the damned book! What’s going on here? THINK!

  Jake reached out and grabbed her. She screamed, and realized that she had only seconds to come up with a solution. Would he kill her, or perhaps rape her?

  Dead men don’t rape people. They don’t have any desire, and he has to obey the rules of science.

  And then it hit her.

  Wait a minute! HE has to obey the laws of science because the book was science fiction when Mary Shelly wrote it. They thought electricity could animate dead flesh. But now we know that’s wrong, and the book has become fantasy, so I don’t have to be science fiction. I can be fantasy!

  The second the thought crossed her mind, she concentrated and began growing. Suddenly she was six feet tall, then seven, then ten, then twelve. Jake could no longer hold her; in fact, he was cowering in terror.

  “Hi, there, little fella,” she said as she sprouted wings, waved her hand and caused a wall to
vanish, picked him up, and flew out over a deep mountain gorge.

  Jake was trying to say something, but his mouth couldn’t form the words.

  She magically created a telepathic link to him.

  Don’t drop me! came his panicky thought.

  “I thought it was just a game.”

  It is. Probably. But my blood pressure is going through the roof, and my heart is pounding so much it hurts. The scare alone could kill me.

  “Just tell yourself it’s not happening,” she said, flying higher and higher.

  Please!

  “Who won this game?”

  Damn it, Ellie!

  “My wings are getting tired,” she said. “Who won?”

  You did.

  “You wet yourself again. I think I’m going to let you do the laundry this week.”

  “One last one,” said Jake.

  “One of us is a slow learner,” sighed Ellie. “What’s this one called?”

  “A CHILD’S GARDEN OF VERSUS.”

  “Don’t you mean VERSES?”

  “I know what I mean,” growled Jake.

  Ellie found herself in a child’s bedroom, surrounded by huge toys. Suddenly a large toy began to walk toward Ellie. It was about ten feet tall, man-shaped, huge, misshapen and ugly. Its skin was colored a dark beige with an undertone of green. Its mouth was a long red gash filled with pointed teeth. Its eyes couldn’t seem to decide where they wanted to be. They migrated between mid-cheek level and the top of the head. They teared constantly, and tiny windshield wipers kept blinking so the creature could see. Its walk was simultaneously awkward and frightening—a sort of lurching movement, from one pile-driver leg to another. It was Jake, of course—a monstrous version of him. It appeared to be immensely strong. But more frightening than its strength was its look of insane ferocity. Ellie wondered if this was one of Jake’s idealized images.