by C. L. Moore
Billy Van Ness and his ETP—extra-temporal perception; could Billy, in his few lucid moments, help? How? By locating Ridgeley? Finding the courier wouldn't be enough; DuBrose thought the key would be motivation. And that motive might lie thousands of years in the future, in the world from which Ridgeley had presumably come.
Well, then—the Duds? The monuments of that lost race from the inconceivably far future, now tattered, dissolved domes of impermeable force? Nothing there.
The equation.
Pell had proposed it to the chief as a casual theoretical problem. Who could solve a formula based on variable logic? And Cameron had named Lewis Carroll—a thoroughly elastic mind, one not bound by conventional values.
But no mathematicians existed today who wrote fairy tales of symbolic logic. DuBrose had already used the big files for a screening on technicians by avocation. He hadn't found much. One mathematician seemed a possibility; he was a sculptor of mobiles but he was also one of the men who had gone insane while studying the equation.
Pastor had gone further than most. DuBrose decided to attack the problem from a new angle. If he could pick out the factors that had made Pastor nearly successful in his attempt, there might be an answer there.
He made a psycho-chart, omitting the name, and noted a few questions. Cameron could probable get something out of this pattern. But DuBrose dared not take the chart in now. The director would certainly smell the concealed rat.
He shoved the chart among some other routine folders waiting Cameron's decision and sent them into the director's office. Now he could only wait—on that point anyway.
"What next, Seth?"
"I can't tell you anything except the words you put in my mouth. You know that. Remember me. Visualize me. Think what I might say."
"I'm trying to."
"Get drunk. Eat some Pix. Take Deep Sleep for a year. Use that blue key I gave you. Try some high-powered hedonism; it opens the right doors for that."
"Escapism. I'd be trying to dodge responsibility."
"Semantic trouble. Your responsibility's limited to keeping the chief on the beam. He's the guy who can keep the works from blowing up. But don't let him know that."
"Maybe if I checked over those screenings again—"
"Maybe."
-
DuBrose did that. He drew up some charts, ran off several lists, and studied them. Avocations: badminton, baseball, bowling. Cards—a whole sub-group. Oil painting, surrealistic, classic, tri-dimensional. Writing Creepies, the sensory "movies" of the period. Chess, several varieties. Were there several varieties? What was fairy chess, anyhow? Rabbit raising. Hydrosphere exploration. Adagio dancing. Dipsomania.
DuBrose thought the dipsomaniac sounded like the best bet.
Then Kalender vised. He had bad news. The war plane sent to blast Dr. Pastor had failed; Pastor couldn't be located.
DuBrose began to feel like a target aimed at by a dozen expert archers. "I won't ask if you've done everything possible, Mr. Secretary. You know the importance of this as well as I do."
"We've put scanning rays on the whole area, and psych-radar detectors, tuned to the frequency of the adult mind. No response."
"Pastor's instruments didn't work on M-204. It's possible that Pastor's mind is running on a different frequency now."
"Well—we've done infrared aerial pix, and picture-series to check on ground movement. Nothing but deer and a few pumas. There's a copter registered to Pastor. It can't be located. Did he have it on the mountain with him?"
"Maybe. He might have destroyed it. You've sent out an alarm?"
"A kill-on-sight priority alarm, Mr. DuBrose. It's a general alert."
"The first shot must be mortal, you know. If Pastor retaliates—"
"I've seen what he can do," Kalender said, moving his mouth stiffly. "What I want now is suggestions. Let me talk to the director."
DuBrose said, "I can't. I'm sorry. He gave orders, you know—"
"But this is emergency!"
"I know it. But it's equally vital that Mr. Cameron be kept isolated from such things for a while."
Kalender flushed darkly. After a moment he said, "Then put on Seth Pell."
"He's unavailable. I'm in charge in his absence." DuBrose went on without waiting for an explosion. "Pastor might head for his home. I think he's emotionally attached to his family. He may go there either to be with them, or to destroy them. They're symbols of his past, too. He promised not to use his power again, but ... I suggest spotting some logicians with your blasting crews, in case of trouble. Pastor's weakness seems to be metaphysics. A good logician might be able to argue him out of retaliating. Though the only safe way is to kill him on sight."
"Mm-m—That makes sense. All right."
"One more thing." DuBrose had made his decision. "Record this, please. Daniel Ridgeley's a spy."
Kalender jerked back. "What? Im—"
DuBrose's back stopped crawling. "Wait," he said, letting out his breath. "I had to get that recorded fast. I didn't know if Ridgeley might kill me before I could get the words out. But it's on the record now. If he murders me, you'll get on his trail."
The Secretary of War said slowly, "Mr. DuBrose, what's the matter with your department? Are you having mass hallucinations in Psychometrics? Ridgeley has been invaluable to us—"
"Hallucinations? Is Pastor's power imaginary? What's so fantastic about Ridgeley's being a Falangist spy?"
"I—know Ridgeley. I trust him completely. You don't know what services he's rendered—"
"Will those services save us from the Falangist equation? Sure you trust him. That's what he was after. Remember those occasional periods when he drops out of sight? Do you know what he does during those times?"
"Of course ... eh?"
"Remember this," DuBrose said. "Ridgeley is a lot more dangerous than Pastor. I can't ask you to pick him up or have him killed. I don't think it would be possible. But I'd like you to stand ready. Locate Ridgeley; don't let him know he's spotted. Put a scanner on him and keep it there."
Kalender rubbed his jaw. "We can't take chances. So I'll do as you suggest. But—when can I talk to the director?"
"You'll be the first one to talk to him, as soon as it's safe. Right now he must be kept isolated. It's a security precaution. You know the effect the equation has on people—"
The Secretary was finally beginning to understand. "There's been another suicide. An electronics man. And two more insanity cases. Not counting Dr. Pastor."
"The equation should be suppressed till we—"
"Impossible. It must be solved. You don't know your office will succeed. As long as there's a chance that someone may solve that—thing, we've got to take the chance."
"Even if it drives every technician in the country crazy," DuBrose said.
"I don't like it either. Keep in touch with me."
That was all. DuBrose eyed the window port. Claustrophobia touched him chokingly. At any second, all this might dissolve—
Pastor was loose—somewhere. And until his brain was blasted into nothingness, there would be no safety for anything or anyone, anywhere.
He sent another batch of material in to Cameron and tried to conjure up the image of Seth, without too much success.
"What now?"
"How should I know?"
"I can't rush the chief—"
"Naturally. He mustn't suspect the importance of the equation."
"What about Pastor?"
"Done everything you can?"
"I'm not equipped to find him. I've condemned him to death already. Isn't that enough?"
"What about Ridgeley?"
"Oh. Well, the more information I can get about that guy—"
-
Billy Van Ness had a private room in the infirmary. DuBrose went there to study the boy's chart and examine the patient. The excitement caused by Ridgeley's arrival last night had worn off. Van Ness was in a passive state, eyes closed, thin face relaxed.
ETP. Extr
a-temporal perception might prove valuable in dealing with a man from another time-sector. Pell had spoken of hypnosis, had tried it on the boy, with some success. DuBrose ordered gadgets brought in and used mechano-suggestion on Van Ness. When that failed, he had recourse to an injection.
K-k-k-k-kuk!
The harsh, unpleasant noise rasped out of the boy's throat. DuBrose remembered the palate deformation. Was this sound the equivalent of hard radiation emanations made audible—the probable method of communication used by that unknown race that had created the Duds?
He probed. This time it was easier to make Van Ness speak intelligibly. Pell had broken trail last night. But the temporal disorientation was still present. The mutant made no distinction between past, present and future. Some sort of temporal anchor was needed to pin down Van Ness' wildly oscillating perception. How strange the world must seem to this mutant who never used his eyes! He could see duration—
"—living and then backwards in long extension and stop ... and again backwards, and again—"
Question.
"Shining. Bright domes. So long they reach to—"
Question.
"No word. There is none at the end. Or the bend, I mean. Where they doubled back. Came to look for—"
Question.
"There is no word. Back and back, searching."
Question.
"Where are they now? ... The end is now."
DuBrose thought. Genus X, the race that had built the domes, that strange unimaginable people that had traveled back through time and left the shining, tattered Duds as their eidolons. He wondered. Searching for what?
For something necessary to their existence. And failing to find it. Back through time, in age-long leaps, back to this world that must have seemed so primevally alien to genus X. But the end is now.
"The man you saw last night. Billy—"
"K-k-k-k-kuk!"
Saw? Last night? To the mutant, the words were variables. DuBrose tried to frame his question more narrowly.
"The man. He reached in the right direction, remember?" Would it be memory or prescience to Van Ness' warped, expanded time-sense? "He was longer than anyone else. Except the shining things. He was more complete—"
"Running, running ... I saw him run. There was a fight."
"A fight, Billy? What kind of a fight?"
"K-k-k-kuk! Too short to see—those big machines. Oh, big, big, but so short!" Immense machines of brief duration. What could they be?
"Noise. Sometimes. But sometimes silence, and a place where many lives were short—running, running, as they come ... came ... will come ... k-k-k-k-uk! K-K-K-K-KUK!"
The first symptoms of convulsion began to appear. DuBrose hastily gave another injection and calmed the boy with deft hypnotic suggestion. The racking shudders died. Van Ness lay motionless, breathing shallowly, his eyes closed.
-
DuBrose went back to his office. He was in time to meet Cameron tossing some papers on the desk.
"I'm going home, Ben," the director said, "A bit of a headache. I couldn't do much with these problems. Managed a few. Where's Seth?" He watched DuBrose's face. "Never mind. I—"
"Nothing's wrong, is there?"
"No," Cameron said flatly. "I'll see you later." He went out, leaving DuBrose to wonder. Had Ridgeley got to the chief again?
Symptoms: headaches, nervousness, inability to concentrate—
DuBrose hurriedly leafed through the folders, looking for one in particular. He found it. But the dossier on Dr. Emil Pastor had apparently not been touched. Maybe those other screening charts listing the avocations might—
Nothing there either. Or wait. Opposite one name there was a lightly penciled check mark.
Eli Wood, Low Orleans, mathematician; home, 108 Louisiana b-4088; avocation, fairy chess—
-
IX.
None knew him. He was grateful; he felt deep humility because he could walk through the Ways of Low Denver and not be recognized for what he was. The Ways swept past, crowded with warmen, but no one watched the small, quiet figure strolling on the stationary central path. This was the second test, and probably a more difficult one than the first. Destroying the symbols of his past had been dangerously easy. The temptation had been there. Because he knew, now, that all things were hollow, he also knew how easy it would be to prick the world bubble.
For he could not die. His thought would live on. In the beginning was the Word, and in the end would be the Word, too.
He had wanted to go home, but this test must come first, and Low Denver had been the nearest cave city. His credentials had enabled him to enter. He had used those credentials just as though he were an ordinary man. And he would go on pretending that, in all humility. Only his thoughts, the thoughts of God, would blaze between the stars, the hollow stars, into the hollow universe that he could destroy—
That was the test. He must never use the power again. How often the other God must have been tempted to erase the universe He had made! But He had refrained, as Dr. Emil Pastor must refrain.
He would still call himself Dr. Emil Pastor. That was a part of the program of humility. And he would never die. His body might, but his thought would not.
All these warmen on the Ways—how grateful they would be if they knew they continued to exist only by the loving-kindness of Dr. Emil Pastor. Well, they would never know. Pride was a snare. He didn't want altars.
The firmament was an altar revealing the glory of Dr. Emil Pastor.
An ant crawled out of a crevice and raced toward the Ways. Pastor chased it back to safety. Even an ant—
How long had he stayed here? Surely there had been time enough. He had passed this test of humility; nothing had tempted him to reveal himself to the warmen of Low Denver; he wanted to go home. He hoped his wife would not realize the change. She must always continue to believe that he was Emil-dear, as the children must never guess he was anyone else but Dad. He could play the role. And he felt a surge of tenderness toward them because he knew that they were hollow.
They could vanish—if he willed it.
So he must never will it. He would be a kindly god. He believed in the principle of self-determination. It was not his task to interfere.
Time enough had passed. He stepped on a Way and was borne toward one of the pneumocar stations. In the car, he clutched a strap—the acceleration always did odd things to his stomach—and leaned back, waiting for the brief blackout to pass.
It passed. Fifteen minutes later he stepped out at a Gateway. A group of uniformed men were standing waiting. At sight of him an almost imperceptible tension touched them. But they were well trained. Not a hand moved toward a pistol.
God walked toward them.
-
Cameron was dining with Nela. He watched her calm, friendly face and knew that there was no sanctuary even there. As he watched, the flesh might melt from her skull and—
Music murmured from an audio. Fresh pine-scent filled the room. Cameron picked up a spoon, dropped it again, and reached for a water goblet.
The water was warm and brackish. The shock to his taste buds was violent. But he managed to set the glass down without spilling more than a few drops.
"Jitters?" Nela asked.
"Tired. That's all."
"You were like this last night. You need a furlough, Bob."
"Maybe I'll take one," Cameron said. "I don't know—"
He tried the water again. It was freezingly cold and very sour.
Abruptly he pushed back his chair. "I'm going to lie down for a bit. It's all right. Don't get up. A bad headache is all."
Nela knew how he hated fussing. She merely nodded and went on eating. "Call me if you want," she said, as Cameron went out. "I'll be around."
And then upstairs, in the bed that at first was pleasantly soft and relaxing, and then too soft, so that he kept sinking down and down into a feathery, pneumatic emptiness, with that nausea in his stomach that droppers always gave him—
He got up and walked around the room. He didn't look into the mirror. The last time he had done so, his image had made ripples in the glass.
He walked.
He was walking in circles. But presently he noticed that he was always facing the same spot, the same picture on the wall. He was on a turntable.
He stood motionless, and the room tilted. He found a chair, closed his eyes, and tried to shut out all sensory impressions.
Hallucination or reality.
If reality, then it was more dangerous. Were Seth and Ben DuBrose involved? Their hints about assassination were palpable red herrings. He might have believed them under other circumstances. But these hallucinations—
It was difficult to think clearly.
Perhaps that was the intention. Perhaps he wasn't intended to think clearly.
Half-formulated thoughts swam into focus. He had to pretend to believe that these—attacks—were purely subjective. He had to pretend that they were succeeding in their purpose—
But he knew that the psychic invasion was objective.
He knew that he was being persecuted. Others might not notice the things that had been happening to him. The persecutors were clever. They were determined to drive him mad—well, why? Because he possessed information of value? Because he was a valuable key man?
And that argument added up to one thing. Paranoia, with systematized delusions of persecution.
Cameron got up carefully. He winced. Once again it had happened. And, as usual, the unexpected.
He went downstairs, walking slowly and awkwardly, his face drawn and gray. Nela caught her breath at sight of him.
"Bob. What's wrong?"
"I'm flying to Low Manhattan," he said through stiff lips. "A doctor there I want to see—Fielding."
She came swiftly toward him. Her arms slipped around his neck.
"Darling, I won't ask any questions."
"Thanks, Nela," Cameron said. He kissed her.
Then he went out to the copter, walking unsteadily and remembering the fairy tale of the little mermaid who exchanged her fish-tail for human legs. There had been a price exacted. Ever after that, the little mermaid walked on sharp knives, no less painful because they were imaginary.
Wincing at every step, Cameron walked toward the copter's hangar.