by James Axler
“I should have warned you, I know,” the whitecoat said conversationally, “but I wanted you to experience the full force of our experiment. When it reaches its conclusion, then we’ll have a method through which anyone who is recidivist enough not to see the benefit of our systems will soon be able to see sense.”
Doc, frankly, felt that the poor man they had just left was nothing more than a vegetable. But he held his tongue.
“Now, Dr. Tanner, that has demonstrated to you the psychological side of our work in this sector. The next example you will see is a reasonable demonstration of how far we have come with the physical side of our work.”
Doc felt a wave of panic rise. What foul imagining was this insane man going to show him next? Doc had long since figured Arcadian for a maniac who hid his insanity behind a mask of pseudo-intellectual reasoning. But even he would surely quail at what was happening here?
“Do the other sectors you spoke of operate in such a manner?”
Andower frowned. “I’m not sure I follow you, Doctor.”
“This…” Doc waved his free hand, indicating the building around him. Words were hard as his body tried to recover swiftly from the buffeting it had taken in the previous room.
“You mean, our med facilities? No, none of them have anything like this. Only the required standard for any well-maintained ville. Or what we consider to be well maintained, at least. No, Doctor, we’re unique among the sectors in that we have little to do with them. Because of the nature of our work, it is necessary that we maintain some isolation.”
“Then the others are not so…radical?”
Andower smiled. Given the nature of the work under discussion, there was something dark and unwholesome about his grin. “Radical…yes, I like that. I suppose we are. Certainly, of all the sectors, we’re the ones who I feel are the most forward thinking. Perhaps I should have explained a little better. Each sector is devoted to a particular set of social ideas, theories and experiments. Arcadian has collected these, and when his father was alive he could only discuss them with those of us who were of a like mind. But we all soon realized that discussion wasn’t enough. So when he became baron, he decided to divide the greater part of the ville into the eight sectors. The central section would continue as before. The other sectors would each be put under the command of a man best suited to the pursuance of the particular branch of social theory that we wished to explore. Thus, we have sectors that have vastly differing ways of exploring how people live together, and how civilization can be brought to them. We also look at selective breeding in different environments. As you suggested earlier yourself, the problem of small genetic pools and mutation are problems that will take some time and experiment to eradicate.”
“How do you keep the sectors apart? And how in the name of the Three Kennedys did he get the people to agree?”
Andower’s smile broadened. “Doctor, you should know yourself that people are easily bought if their comfort is assured. Food and shelter are more than many have in these lands. And if there were dissenters, they were soon reeducated. As for the separation of the sectors, why, that’s the simple part. The only time they meet is when work details have to be made up of large numbers. Even then they are kept as apart as possible. Each sector is led to believe that theirs is the safest, and to mix would invite nothing but trouble.”
“Each sector except this. Here, your people don’t mix at all,” Doc said flatly.
“No. That wouldn’t be possible, given the nature of our work. But now I think we’re here.”
While they had been talking, and Doc had been struggling to keep up with Andower, they had traversed corridors and climbed stairs so that, by Doc’s reckoning, they were on the top floor of one of the buildings. But the plain and winding corridors, with no windows to provide landmarks, were disorientating, and he had no idea if they had traveled into the heart of a complex, or merely doubled back on themselves several times.
Was this deliberate? To keep him from escape? The grim humor of the situation amused him. He was barely able to stand, let alone make any kind of bid for freedom. No, it was more likely to be nothing more than Andower knowing these corridors intimately, and assuming the same from anyone with him.
Typical arrogant whitecoat.
As if to ram home that the type didn’t buy the farm with skydark, Andower clapped his hands gleefully, and said, “Now, Dr. Tanner, for the most advanced part of our experimentation. You will be impressed, oh, yes, you will be impressed.”
He opened the door in front of which they now stood. Doc winced involuntarily, expecting the brilliant white of the previous room.
Instead, he was greeted with a darkened room. Subdued, almost opaque light filtered through a heavy shade. It was akin to being in a permanent state of twilight.
“Come, Doctor. There is nothing to be afraid of,” Andower said softly, taking Doc by the arm and leading him into the room. Once again, the sec man stayed outside.
The interior of the room was so gloomy that it took Doc a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the low level of light. Once they had, he was able to see that the walls, ceiling and floor of the particular room were painted in the same muted hessian color as that of the shade, keeping the room cool. There had to be some kind of air-conditioning unit in operation, as the temperature was several degrees lower than that of the corridor.
Pushed over into the corner of the room, at the farthest angle from the door, a bed was visible. In it was a huddled form. Blankets and sheeting covered it up to the neck, and these trembled slightly as the figure beneath shook.
“This is a remarkable result,” Andower said, leading Doc to the bed. Doc held back, some sixth sense telling him to beware. Yet when he looked closely, the man in the bed didn’t have the staring eyes and sagging jaw of the previous room’s occupant. His eyes were open, it was true; but they weren’t staring blankly. Rather, they flickered around, seeming to take in everything. His hair was slicked back from his forehead, and his nose twitched. He seemed to recognize Andower, and for a moment Doc saw pain and fear cloud his vision. He craned his head back slightly, and then caught sight of Doc.
To Doc’s amazement, the man moved his head forward, lifting it from the bed. His mouth twitched and formed shapes: words, perhaps. His eyes glittered, were insistent. Yet all that emerged from the open mouth were strange vowel sounds, mangled and garbled.
“Why can he not speak?” Doc asked.
Andower chewed his lip thoughtfully. “We’re not sure. The operation was successful, and he has been alive much longer than any others who have undergone the procedure. My personal opinion is that if he progresses as he has been, then the trauma will pass, and he will once more be able to shape words.”
“Procedure…” Doc didn’t want to ask—dreaded it—but knew he had to. “What kind of procedure?”
“Hmm?” Andower seemed for a moment to be lost in thought. “Well, it’s part of an ongoing program into surgical transplantation. Many good people now die because of rad sickness, damaged limbs, mutations that shorten lifespan. If we can find a way to circumvent this—”
“How?” Doc demanded, his voice firmer, louder now, with an edge to it that required an answer.
“By the transplantation of the healthy parts to a new host. This man had stunted arms, one leg and a flipper, and a lung capacity that was diminished by mutated tissues. He has a brilliant mind, and to lose him for the sake of a healthy host body would have been—”
“I doubt that his mind is brilliant anymore,” Doc murmured. “I fear that you have, as you say, traumatized him to an extent that he has retreated to a place from where there is no return.”
“I beg to differ. Time will tell.”
“Will it, indeed? And this host that you speak of. What, in the name of all that was once holy, do you mean by that?”
Andower smiled. “Ah, there is the beauty of the process. The host has to be something willing to give up its own life, as such, or at least be unabl
e to register that it is to lose its life. Such things—”
“Things?” Doc spit. “Do you speak of people in this way?”
Andower’s smile widened. “People, Doctor?”
Doc’s mind was racing. He wasn’t sure what to expect. Any number of images and ideas spun through his mind as he reached out—thrusting Andower away from him—and reached for the hessian blankets, pulling them off the trembling figure.
In a sense, what he saw was mundane compared to some of his imaginings, yet the banal obscenity of seeing it in the flesh was somehow far worse than the foulest dream.
The head craned around and stared at him. Was it shame he could see in those eyes? Perhaps a plea to end the suffering? And why not? For the neck was severed at a point just below the Adam’s apple, the flesh stitched crudely but well, and ran into the coarser skin and fur of the body to which it was attached. That body was lying on its side, the twitching, rippling the muscles that ran beneath the fur, the hooves jumping in involuntary spasm as the host body tried to meld with the brain that now fed it impulses. Strapping bound it to the mattress so that it couldn’t fall, move or injure itself in any manner.
And perhaps to stop the poor enraged half-creature from chilling itself?
Doc would have been violently sick if there was anything left in his gut to spew. Instead, he felt the nausea make his head spin.
“A goat. That is your solution? Rather than let the poor man live out his natural span—because you feel it would be best for you and your baron—this?”
He placed the blanket back carefully, shaking his head, trembling as much as the poor, quivering creature that still stared up at him.
“I am sorry, my friend,” he whispered, “I am powerless. Would that I could end your suffering.”
“Really, Doctor, I’m surprised at your attitude…” Andower took Doc by the arm and pulled him away from the bed. “Think about what you’re saying, the effect it might have on a traumatized patient.”
Doc was astounded. Andower really couldn’t see the pain in the eyes of his experiment. He truly thought that his actions were for the best. How could Doc argue with that? Mutely, he allowed himself to be led from the room and into the corridor beyond. The sec man closed the door behind them. Once in the corridor, Andower turned to face Doc.
“I’m astounded by your attitude, Dr. Tanner. I would have thought a man such as yourself would know that the road of scientific advancement is littered by signposts leading to the distasteful. Sometimes it is necessary, if we’re to find the way forward to a greater future for all. The end—”
“—justifies the means,” Doc concluded. “Perhaps that is what you really think. I am not so sure, Dr. Andower, but I am in no position to argue, as you well know.” Doc shook his head and sighed. The anger had drained from him, replaced by a despair at what he had seen. “Tell me, Doctor, to what end is this butchery and torture? For that is how it seems to me. Tell me why it is necessary.”
Andower looked at Doc as though it was the stupidest question he had ever heard. “Because all the data we build and process, all the failure and all the success, go toward the fulfillment of Arcadian’s plans. It’s the same with every sector. All experiments, of whatever type, are there to test the theories that have been passed down. From them, Arcadian will synthesize the great answer. The plan, the system that will incorporate the best of the past to forge the best for the future.”
“Yes,” Doc said, exasperated, “but what is that? What will this plan be?”
Andower answered in a tone of equal exasperation. “That, Dr. Tanner, isn’t for me to question. Not for me to think about. I don’t have the overall picture. The only one who has that picture, and who can build it, is Arcadian himself. It’s only he who can rebuild the world with the perfect social system.”
Doc shook his head. In the distance he could hear footsteps. Heavy boots. Had his absence finally been noticed? Had Andower’s men notified Arcadian of his presence? Knowing time was now short, he felt compelled to ask one last question, while there was still time.
“The propositions for these experiments—not just yours, but all of them—where has Arcadian got them from? For surely he must know that the ideas of the past were also tested in many cases, and found wanting—”
“No,” Andower yelled, anger rising in him, “you don’t understand. The baron is a genius, the greatest brain among us, and certainly the greatest in this wasteland we have inherited. He will lead us out of the darkness and into a new age of light. That is the whole point, to take the best of the past and synthesize it into a new whole.”
Doc was about to tell Andower that the idea of “best” was a mutable one, even though he knew that it would be of little use, when the doors at the far end of the corridor burst open and four sec men marched toward them. From Andower’s expression, Doc could see that their arrival was as unexpected and unwelcome to the sector chief as it was to himself.
“What are you doing in this sector without permission?” Andower questioned angrily. “You know that no one from outside enters unless I have—”
“The baron’s direct command,” the leading sec man snapped, “countermands everything. You want to take it up with him?”
“No. I—” Andower was at a loss.
“So the baron himself requires me to be returned, eh?” Doc said mildly. “Well, I suppose I should be honored. I know the good doctor here was hoping to pick my brain. Perhaps literally.”
The sec leader frowned.
“No matter,” Doc said with a wave of the hand. “I daresay I shall be back here soon enough if I am not careful. Now get me out of here before I feel compelled to vomit once again.”
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Eleven
Doc was glad to see the last of Andower—or at least, what he hoped would be the last—but was less than pleased when the sec patrol that had come for him took him straight to the baron. He should have figured that this would happen, but in his relief to be free of the horrors he had seen, he didn’t think beyond getting out of this sector as quickly as possible.
The clean lines and tidy surrounds of the buildings took on a sinister mien when considering what went on behind those blank windows, and it was with a shudder that Doc allowed himself to be led away. The sec party surrounded him, so that he was enclosed on all sides by black-clad men armed with blasters.
The sector in which he had found himself was one that was unnaturally quiet. Distant sounds echoed across the early morning skies, but the area in which they walked was silent. “As the grave” was a phrase that popped unbidden into Doc’s head as he walked. The sec men had resisted all attempts at conversation, leaving him with nothing but his thoughts. And they were poor company, returning as they did to the things he had seen. The bland facades of the buildings in this sector now resembled nothing so much as mausoleums to his troubled vision.
They reached a boundary line. Fencing, and a small patch of clear ground between the two. It wasn’t long past dawn, and the regularly spaced and freestanding lamps that lit this no-man’s land had now been extinguished. The low-level buildings beyond were still sleeping, with only the bare minimum of sound coming from their midst. It was too early for the day’s work to have truly begun, and too late for the sounds of night. Yet the noise was still in stark contrast to the sector he left behind.
It was hard to tell which of the social models was used in this sector. The buildings gave away no secrets, and there were only a few people to be seen. They eyed Doc and his sec guard with some suspicion, only too glad to slink into shadows until he had passed.
The same was true of the next sector into which they passed, only now—as time was progressing—there was more activity. The people here seemed to move freely, and apart from the fact they were a little more poorly dressed than those in the central sector dealing with trade and ville administration, there seemed to be nothing to distinguish them.
Andower’s sector was set apart by the extreme na
ture of the experimentation, and its clinical nature. That was fairly obvious. Yet for the life of him, Doc could see little in the way of obvious differences between the two sectors he had just traversed, and the one in which the baron lived. And how, indeed, could he reconcile this with the sector in which he and his companions had entered the ville?
Doc had hoped to get some answers with his little recce, yet all he had done was pose a number of further questions for which he was no nearer to any answers. It wasn’t much to return with, for all his troubles.
The central sector was awake to the day as they reached the baron’s domicile, and Doc’s progress elicited some curiosity from those now going about their business. He was relived when they entered the old library. As he was escorted across the lobby of the building and bustled up the staircase, he was amused to note that the door he had used just a few hours earlier had not only had the lamp replaced, but was now secured with a stout padlock to reinforce the lock he had picked with such ease.
That route out was now closed, that was for sure.
Doc had half expected to be returned to his friends, and also to find that they had been taken to more secure quarters. Indeed, he was already preparing himself for Ryan’s wrath, and to explain his actions.
So it was with some surprise that he found himself being led directly into the baron’s quarters, where Arcadian was waiting for him.
The baron was seated on one of the old chesterfields, seemingly relaxed. He indicated that Doc be seated on the chesterfield opposite. A coffee service stood on a table between them. He dismissed the sec with a gesture, and bade Doc to partake of the beverage. It was only when Doc had drunk half a cup—the baron pouring a cup and taking a sip to prove to Doc that it hadn’t been tampered with—that Arcadian began.
“So, Doctor, I understand that you have spoken to my old colleague Andower, and that you weren’t impressed with that aspect of my research.”
Doc chose his words with care. “I was surprised— shocked, perhaps—by the nature of the experiments. But I suppose such things have to be carried out if progress is to be made.”