Paradox Alley

by John Dechancie

  “Over three months,” she said.

  “It’s been that long? I guess it has. You’ve gained weight. You’re tall enough so it doesn’t show.”

  “It’s going to be a boy.”

  “Why not?”

  She laughed. I kissed her stomach, put my ear to it. “You can’t hear the heartbeat like that,” she said.

  “No. He has the the radio on.”

  She laughed again.

  I got up and kissed her mouth, then bent and kissed both breasts.

  “I love you,” she said.

  “I love you,” I told her. It was that simple. It had been that simple all along.

  I got dressed and went out into the cab. It was empty. I fed a signal to the trailer and yelled for Lori and Carl.

  “Jake, they went off with Arthur,” Bruce informed me.

  “What! Where?”

  “They commenced the inspection. Carl couldn’t sleep, and insisted on exploring the place. I am in constant touch with the foreman, and know exactly where they are. They are fine, and Carl is busy using the Product Ideation and Design Facility.”

  “The what? Never mind, just tell me how I get to where they are. Damn kids, running off. You should have got me up, Bruce.”

  “Jake, I did try. But you were apparently exhausted.”

  “What time is it? How long have they been gone?”

  “About six hours, Jake.”

  “Good God.”

  Darla came into the cab, dressed in khakis and one of John’s torn Militia surplus shirts. We were all getting short on clothes.

  “An attendant is being summoned to conduct you to the Product Ideation and Design Facility.”

  “An attendant?”

  “I think…”

  And there it was, a shining multiarmed robot coasting toward us across the glossy blue floor.

  We got out. The contraption pulled up to us and stopped. It was partly a conveyance of some sort, although the seats in the back hadn’t been built for humans. Lacking wheels, the thing floated a few centimeters off the floor. It buzzed softly at us.

  I said, “I guess that means ‘All aboard.’ ”

  We climbed into the back of it and perched ourselves on the impossible, mushroom-shaped seats. There weren’t any backrests, but there was a crossbar to hang onto.

  We were conducted on a very informative and educational tour of the plant. A long one, too, but I was politic enough not to complain. Everything was impressive, but we didn’t know what the hell we were looking at. Our guide kept buzzing at us, we kept nodding and smiling pleasantly. Oh, my. Fifty million units produced in one year? How admirable.

  But, by God, what a plant. A cool, quiet place of industrial and scientific sculpture. We could appreciate it on that level at least. We soared along high curving ramps looking down on silent gargantuan machines, labyrinths of pipeline, armies of tall bubble-topped cylinders, rack upon rack of instruments, giant antennalike assemblies, huge metal coils, and jungles of transparent tubing. Everything was silent, still. Color was everywhere—blue industrial light glinted off gold and silver spheres, orange and red conduits tangled with each other against overhead domes of bright pink and yellow, green rampways flew through the dry, still, blue-lit air.

  Finally, we arrived. The Product Ideation and Design Facility was a large wedge-shaped room stuffed floor to ceiling with instrument panels throbbing with electric life, glittering with lights and luminous screens and flashing dials. Arthur sat on a bench near Carl, who was hunched over what appeared to be some sort of computerized drafting board—a wide flat screen crawling with moving diagrams and charts.

  We got out of the robocart and walked over. Lori was lying on the soft carpeted floor, asleep, her head propped up with Carl’s bunched jacket. Carl didn’t even glance up. He was absorbed in whatever he was doing.

  I looked at Arthur. “What gives?”

  Arthur shrugged, grinning. “He’s having a dandy time.”

  “How the hell did he figure out how to work the equipment?”

  “Oh, it’s not as hard as you might expect.” Arthur rose, walked over, and peered over Carl’s shoulder. “In this plant, in its day, engineers were looked upon as artists. They really didn’t need to know much about engineering. Here, machine intelligences supply all the data, all the formulae, all the know-how. They do all the dirty work. The only thing that organic brains can supply is creativity. That’s what Carl’s doing. He’s telling the machines what he wants and what he wants it to do, and the machines are helping him design it. And if the design is judged a worthy work of art, they just might build a prototype model.”

  “That’s really something,” I said. And it was, it was.

  “No! Not that way,” Carl said sharply. “It opens from the left. Yeah.”

  “Satisfactory?” a soft voice asked.

  “Satisfactory.”

  I looked at Arthur, who said, “I think Bruce is responsible for the plant learning English.”

  I nodded.

  “Now the engine is all yours, pal,” Carl was saying, eyes still riveted to the drafting board. “I don’t have a clue how that works.”

  “Very well. Requires advanced propulsion principle-high efficiency, low maintenance…”

  “How about no maintenance? Can you do that? I’ll never find someone to fix it.”

  “A challenge for time periods longer than quarter revolution of average galaxy.”

  “Huh? Quarter revolution of a—That’s millions of years. Hey, I’m not going to live anywhere near that long.”

  “Then no maintenance is no challenge.”

  “All ri-i-ght!”

  “Weapons systems?”

  This went on for another hour. Carl eventually acknowledged our presence, then insisted that he had to finish. I didn’t ask what he was doing. Lori woke out of a troubled sleep, and needed some attention. She had had the dream too. Afterward, we hung about and looked around. We were extremely hungry. At last, Carl was done.

  “Very unusual, extremely idiosyncratic,” the design chief pronounced. “But of surpassing elegance and simplicity. May we go ahead with fabrication of prototype?”

  “Sure!” Carl said, getting up. He swayed slightly, and put a hand to his forehead. “Man, am I bushed. Terrific headache, too. But it was a hell of a lot of fun.”

  “Lunch time!” Arthur said.

  “Lunch?” I was ready to gnaw on some lab equipment.

  A detail of robots brought us lunch. The food was very good, not quite the haute cuisine of Emerald City, but far more than adequate. Bruce had done a good job feeding biochemical information to the plant’s protein synthesizers. The flavorings were top-notch. Textures were a little off here and there, especially in the steak. A little too mushy. But the bread was terrific. You’d never know there wasn’t one grain of wheat in it.

  After lunch, the plant foreman spoke to us. “We have begun production of prototype. Would you like to observe?” He sounded a lot like the design chief, and I suspected that the latter was merely a subsystem of the former.

  Would like to observe, yes.

  We all boarded another robocart and swung out into the plant.

  The place had come to life. We rode for an hour through the throbbing heart of technological wizardry. What had been hulks of dead machinery now flashed and sparked, whirred and hummed, chimed and beeped and thrummed and sang, while pink and violet electrical discharges leaped between giant coils, translucent tubing glowed and pulsed, luminescent motes swam inside huge transparent spheres, and veils of energy fluttered in the air overhead like aurora displays. “Goddamn Frankenstein movie,” was Carl’s reaction.

  At last we came to a large, quiet empty chamber. We got off and waited. Before long, the far wall retracted, and two robots hauled the prototype out onto the showroom floor.

  It was Carl’s 1957 Chevrolet Impala, chrome glinting in the track lighting, a lambent sheen soft upon its coat of candy-apple red, metal-flake paint.

  �
�My car!” Carl shouted ecstatically, throwing open the driver’s door and hopping in. He sniffed. “Hey, they got that new car smell just right!”

  “Satisfactory?” the plant foreman asked hopefully.

  “Satisfactory!” Carl enthused.

  There was a note of pride in the foreman’s voice. “May we then begin field testing and evaluation?”

  “Uh-yeah. Well, maybe not. I know it’s gonna work!”

  “Intuitive evaluation? Perhaps empirical data are needed as well?”

  “Huh? Um …”

  I was smiling at Carl. He noticed and returned a sheepish grin. “Hell, I couldn’t resist.”

  “What’re you going to do when they present you with the bill?”

  “The bill. Oh.”

  I chuckled.

  The foreman spoke delicately. “Remuneration can be forgone. We compliment designer on high esthetic factor of overall concept. Inspired, and truly beautiful in result. Congratulations. When may we begin production?”

  “Yeah, Carl,” I said. “When can these nice people turn out fifty million units for you?”

  “Jesus. I don’t know.”

  “Production is not contemplated?” the foreman asked sadly.

  “Well … Jake, what do I tell them?”

  I said, “The artist would like time to ponder the philosophical ramifications of his creation before considering sharing it with the universe at large.”

  “Of course. Commendable. Please contact us when time is proper.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Carl said, nodding emphatically. “Sure. And thanks a lot.”

  “Extreme pleasure has been taken in assisting a consummate artist such as yourself.” Carl looked embarrassed.

  We got back to the receiving bay as the robots were delivering the Chevy. We had taken the long route—the foreman had insisted that we see the Submicron Fractionating Assembly. Whatever it was, it was pretty.

  I didn’t see Prime’s arrival. I was inspecting what was left of the starboard stabilizer foil when I happened to glance up at Darla, who was staring open-mouthed at something out on the floor. I straightened up, walked around her…

  And there was Prime, standing near our miniature spaceship, conversing with Arthur.

  He turned a smiled at me. “Hello, Jake,” he called.

  “You’re hard to get hold of,” I said, walking over. “But you seem to get around.”

  Prime glanced around. “Wonderful facility. Have you toured the place?”

  “Endlessly.”

  He laughed. “Odd that you should wind up here.”

  “Actually, we never intended to leave Emerald City.”

  “Really?” He seemed pleased to hear it. “I assumed that you were on your way home.”

  “Without Sam? Hardly.”

  “No, I suppose not. But it was my intention to give your father some voice in the matter.”

  “He’s not my father. He’s an Artificial Intelligence program.”

  Prime nodded. “And a remarkable one. His Entelechy Thatrix was manufactured by the Vlathu, was it not?”

  “Yes.”

  “We know of the Vlathu. They possessed techniques unknown even in the time of the Culmination. The Vlathu attained a very high degree of spirituality for a primitive race.”

  I thought about that for a moment before saying, “If you consider the Vlathu primitive, what does that make us? We humans, I mean?”

  “Humans are one of the ancestral races of the Culmination itself. One of the tributary races. I have told you many times that I am partly human. I meant by that, that the Culmination is in some part composed of human elements.”

  “I’m not sure I understand,” I said. “You may be descended from human beings, but after ten billion years of evolution…”

  He laughed. “Evolution. Odd concept. The process isn’t automatic, you know. If there is no good reason for a species to evolve, it won’t. But let’s set that aside. The elements I referred to aren’t genetic remnants, but the minds of actual living human beings. Their very soul and substance. They are a vital part of the Culmination. Some of them are your friends.”

  Darla, Carl, and Lori had gathered behind me. I turned my head toward them, and Darla looked at me gravely. I turned back to Prime.

  “What do you mean? Who?”

  “Well, Susan D’Archangelo, for one. She has consented to contribute to the project. So has Yuri Voloshin, Sean Fitzgore, Roland Yee, and Liam Flaherty.”

  “I can’t believe you.”

  “I’ll leave it to them to convince you. There has been no coercion. None, Jake. You must believe that.”

  I was silent for a moment, my mind churning and churning. Then: “I still can’t believe it.”

  Prime’s hands went out in a helpless shrug. “I’m sorry.”

  “What about the others? Zoya, Oni, Ragna, John …?”

  “They have declined. They will join you on your journey home.” Prime chuckled. “Incidentally, you’ve forgotten one person. Sam has declined as well.”

  “Sam never went to church.”

  Prime laughed. “I dare say he didn’t.”

  Darla asked, “Aren’t you forgetting Winnie and George?”

  “My dear, they are part of the Culmination. They always were. They are members of one of the Guide Races. Think of how you got here.”

  “We were kidnapped,” I said.

  “Your case was special, of course. But what prompted all these quests to find the end of the Skyway?”

  He was right. Winnie’s map lay behind it all. “About Sam,” I said. “You’ll return him to me?”

  “He will return. Everything will be returned to you.”

  I stared at him. What was this form I saw? What? What did it represent? I shook my head. “Maybe I’m just slow, but there are a hell of a lot of things I don’t understand about all this.”

  “Then lay yourself open to the dream-teaching. You need not join the project to do that. You will learn.”

  I was suddenly irked. “To hear you talk, everything’s just going along swimmingly. But it isn’t. The Goddess has other ideas. Doesn’t she?”

  He turned and stepped away, halted, then slowly wheeled about, his eyes on the floor, his lips drawn into a wry smile. “Other ideas. No. There is only One Idea, with variations.”

  “But she’s opposed in some fundamental way.”

  “No.”

  “Then the dream last night … what was all that about?”

  “Dream and find out. Don’t fight it. Don’t be afraid.”

  I considered it. “Maybe I will.”

  “Good. And keep this in mind. Conflict is part of the warp and woof of existence: That which contains no tension is static. If this is true, can any attempt to reach the ultimate be free of conflict? Do not think that the Culmination must be a success from the start. That was a fundamental error of those who conceived it. Yet that mistake did not necessarily lead to a fundamental flaw. The question is, what ultimately happened? Since the Culmination is outside of time, that question can be answered. And you will find the answer if you choose to seek it.”

  “Doesn’t the Goddess know it, too?”

  “Of course.”

  “It doesn’t make sense,” I said.

  He turned and walked away a few steps, stopped, turned about. “I must leave you now. Jake, I have a sense that you must suffer further. I can help to some degree, but I am inhibited by circumstances you might find difficult to understand.” He smiled again. “I shouldn’t worry. You are well suited to overcoming adversity. I think that is why whatever forces are at work behind you chose you as their instrument. You are the archetypal hero, Jake.” He raised his right hand. “Be well.”

  And he vanished, leaving behind the smell of ozone. The Goddess’ exit had had more panache, but his showed real class.

  14

  WHAT NOW, Arthur?” I said wearily.

  “I’m supposed to go fetch Sam and the rest of the washouts when Prime gives me the a
ll clear.”

  “When will that be?”

  “I don’t know, dearie. When the current flap has subsided. It won’t be safe until then.”

  “Okay, say you go and get them,” I said. “Then what?”

  “I take you to the egress portal and show you what cylinders to shoot in order to get back where you belong.”

  For which there was no need, since I had the Roadmap. I looked around, throwing up my arms. “What do we do till then? Fill out a time card and punch in?”

  “Make something,” Arthur said, “like Carl did.”

  “Do you need any ashtrays?”

  “How about a hand-tooled leather wallet, monogrammed?”

  “You only have one initial,” I told him.

  “And I don’t have any pockets, either. Well, then, I’m stumped.”

  So was I. But there was nothing to do. We couldn’t leave for the master portal, and we couldn’t very well drive all the way to the other side of the world, back to Emerald City. We were at Arthur’s mercy.

  There was sleep to catch up on, though, and thinking to do. Lay yourself open to the dream-teaching, Prime had advised. I wasn’t sure I was ready for that yet. I thought about it. I needed answers, but falling into a swoon and getting infused with divine enlightenment wasn’t my style. Besides, didn’t you have to fast for forty days and nights in the desert first? I had left my hairshirt at the cleaners back in T-Maze.

  I was tired of searching for ever-elusive answers. Damn tired of it. As Darla said, we keep getting pushed around by unseen forces. A phrase Prime had used kept echoing: “whatever forces are at work behind you.” Indeed, what forces? If neither Prime nor the White Lady were really calling the shots, who was? Were there other aspects of the Culmination? Was it something outside the Culmination entirely? More whispers in the darkness, more missing pieces of a puzzle I had grown weary of fumbling with.

  I lay in the bunk, Darla asleep beside me. No dreams for her. It seemed that if you didn’t want to hear the propaganda, you simply turned off your receiver.

  I listened. The plant was quiet except for a faint background hum. Now and then came a faraway thump or bang—maintenance attendants about their chores, perhaps. Perhaps not. Were we safe here? Of course not. But Arthur had his funnel-ears pricked for any intruders—and whatever other sensors he had were tuned in, too.