Gavin had atrophied. They jolted his reception every ten minutes through the electrodes in each temple. He still couldn’t differentiate between dreams and waking. Couldn’t think. But his receptivity quotient registered green lights at every impulse and that was something. Nasty.
“I won’t atrophy,” he said.
“You haven’t used IT for weeks,” she snapped. “You’re half-comatose already.”
“I’m not!” He protested.
“Quite apart from that—there’s the bonus.”
She was right, of course. He had fallen well behind schedule and it was only eight weeks till Christmas. Forty shopping days. Forty thinking days.
“All right,” he said, “I’ll have an hour with IT this afternoon.”
“Start now!”
He was a little bit afraid of her. The only thing in life that meant very much to him. Positive impact. Standing there with tired eyes, but clear. Steady hands. Tranquil without tranquillizers. Stimulating without stimulants. Cold. Hostile. Scornful. Beautiful with her breasts bare and the white line of clavicle showing where her ribs ended and shoulder began.
“All right,” he said, as the water boiled and gurgled over the injected tea-bag. “A bowl of Munchies and I’ll give IT two hours.”
She tossed her head and turned on her heel in the coordinated impatience of departure.
“Meryl,” he asked, plaintively, “kiss me!”
She glanced at the dials of the sexometer. Her eyes were cold.
“There’s another two days yet!”
“I mean,” he said, “just—kiss me!”
She brushed his lips with hers in a fleeting sporadic condescension of nut-shell texture. He sighed. Two days before the sexometer buzzed. “Thursday-Friday” he counted on his fingers.
IT was a cool, green, pastel shade of dials and lights and buttons. There were no alpha rhythm relays. IT stimulated activity. IT’s buttons were manually depressed. Elvin checked the cards. 132 to qualify for standard bonus. 144 with a minimum of 24 IT-Approvals for 25% INCREMENT. All IT-Approvals over 48 qualified for bonus-and-half. The maximum. So far, he had 96 cards and 2 Approvals. Meryl was right. He must think. Now. Or atrophy. Puffing a cheroot as an aid to concentration, he sat between the chromium rails, donned the head-piece with encephalic sensors and activated the “On” button with a thin, white finger. IT’s green light glowed.
“No smoking! No narcotics! No stimulation!” IT ordered.
Elvin stubbed the cheroot. His hand trembled. Think! Stick to the formula! Choose a subject for thought— unrewarding. Unconnected with work or sex. Develop the unrewarding thought to its final conclusion. Look for IT-Approval.
“Damn the Unions,” he thought. “They should never have agreed to a minimum of 132 per annum for standard bonus. Ridiculously high. How many thinking days were there in a year? Not as many as all that.” A red light glowed and IT’s Thought-interruption registered as a “Phit! Phit! Phit!”
He depressed the “Correction” knob.
“Random thinking must be corrected. State proposition and articulate!” IT ordered.
“I haven’t started yet,” he protested.
‘Think!” IT ordered.
“Damn the Unions,” he thought. “And the management. They don’t have to do this. IT is only for the Workers.”
“Phit! Phit! Phit! A proposition containing an expletive is a random digression!”
“Give me a chance,” he complained. “I haven’t thought of a proposition yet!”
‘Think!” The red light glowed.
He was about to answer “Rats!” But this was probably an expletive and a double correction would automatically register non-Approval on this, his 97th card.
“Cats!” he said, in a moment of inspiration.
To his surprise, the red light transfused into green. It glowed brightly.
“Go ahead!”
“Cats” was as good a subject as any. Simple really.
“A cat,” he said, “is a small furry creature with four legs, a head at one end and a tail at the other.”
“Phit! Phit! Phit!”
“What is it now!” He depressed the “Correction” button. How many corrections was this? How many did IT allow? He had forgotten.
“Description is correct, but mode of expression borders on to the facetious. Generic term for four-legged creatures required.”
“Quadrupeds!”
The green light glowed brightly. He was pleased that IT approved. Must do better.
“A cat is a quadruped, furry and with a tail. It catches mice.”
The green light did not waver. What else did cats do ?
“It drinks milk and sleeps by the fire.”
“Phit! Phit! Phit!”
“Bother!” He depressed the button.
“A cat cannot drink milk while it is asleep by the fire. Define the intervals!”
“When it is hungry it feeds. When it is thirsty it drinks milk. It sleeps a great deal when it is neither hungry nor thirsty.”
Green. Who would have thought that there was so much to think about cats ? But was there enough to say ? Barely twenty seconds had elapsed and the thought process must last for ten minutes to qualify for the “completion” stamp, Bra with Approval. What else?
“They are cuddly things.” The green was less bright. Probably the mode of expression had earned distaste. Was there a better word for “cuddly” ? He wanted IT to think well of him. Quite apart from the bonus.
“They accept affection!” Much brighter.
“The ancient Egyptians worshipped them as gods.” Interruption.
“All cats, or some cats?”
“Tabbies, I think.” Green. Twenty-five per cent Approval.
“Cats were originally wild. They lived by hunting. They were fierce. Modern cats have a much better life.”
“Phit! Phit! Phit!”
“Why?”
IT was being really cantankerous today. Just when he was getting into his stride and really thinking about cats IT interrupted him with this unnecessary interrogative. “Why ? Well, why did they have a better life?”
“They are happier,” he said.
“Why?”
Must avoid expletives. Must avoid non-Approval. Argue with IT, by all means but never let IT rile you. That was emotional disturbance and non-approved.
“A wild cat was sometimes hungry. It hunted in all weathers, in rain and snow, to bring back to its litter raw, uncooked game, mice and moor-hen chicks and moles. A modern cat sits by the warm-air vent and has good processed food fed to it.”
“Well?” IT asked.
“So the modern cat is happier.”
“Phit! Phit! Phit!”
“Isn’t it ?” he asked, plaintively.
“Think!” IT ordered.
His thought-train had reached a dead end. Of course it was happier if things were done for it. It was self-evident. Why do when one can have done? True? Wasn’t it? Stick to the formula. If in doubt, dismiss preconceived ideas from the mind and live in the thought train. It said so in the instructions. Get inside your subject. Imagine yourself a cat.
“A cat is a hunter. It is happier hunting!”
That was it. Green light glowing. Of course. Odd that to do should be more happiness provoking than to be done to.
“In the wild state, it felt pleasure and satisfaction in the achievement of killing and feeding. In the modern state it sleeps. Why? Because it is bored.”
An electronic note. Spring! IT-Approval. Pleasure and satisfaction in achievement. A stamped card. Ninety-seven cards and 3 Approvals. He felt like a hunting cat.
“Meryl! Meryl! I’ve got an Approval!”
“About time too!”
If only she had shared his elation, lived with him, thought with him. If only she had said “That was good, Elvin!” Why should she ? It wasn’t much really. Nothing to hoist a flag about. Just 3 Approvals in a year.
“I wish,” he thought, “I wish she would help
me.”
* * * *
The week-end passed slowly. One ate. One drank. One went to the Sensories. A mildly erotic adventure story set among potted palms with a south sea island back-cloth. The sensory fear of the hunted, bullets whining down the companionway, cold water splash of a ship-wreck, tired hands blistered on the oars. The salty, warm breath of the south seas’ sun-ray and brine-exuder. Meryl had hardly spoken as they hovered to the doors, found their seats and set the suction pads tingling around their navels. His soft, white fingers curled around the image of the oar, grasping, pulling in time to the back-bending of the seamen before and behind. Splash! Tug! Out! Heave!
Oddly enough, as the torrid kiss of palm-filtered moonlight enchantment was answered by the trembling soft lip parting of desire’s response, he was conscious of a mental rejection. Rejection, not of satiation, addiction, boredom, but a strange dissatisfaction with subjectivity and a desire to do. To tear off the pads and clasp Meryl to him, then and there. Useless, of course. Her lips would not part and respond and tremble with a warm quiver of fulsome surrender. They would freeze into a thin line of dry, coriaceous rejection. Better far the subjective. The warm wind from the sea rippling the filmy texture of the diaphanous sari-like garment slipping from the south-sea shoulder. The lash of the southern moon on a coruscating safety-pin. He slipped back into subjection.
Thursday. Friday. The buzz of the sexometer in the early hours. Co-incidental with the cyclic rhythms. Electronics infallible. The maker’s guarantee was proof incontrovertible of infallibility. There was no other proof. The inert, submissive, unresponsive compliance of the body gave no indication of its rhythm apices. Meryl yawned.
He was almost glad when it was again Monday. Three sessions with IT and 2 more IT-Approvals over the weekend had elated him with a half-formed wish to do. Even the brain rhythm twiddle round the starter relay, three-beat-four, was action. The motors hummed, the Aeolus 125 rose on its cushion of dust-laying mist ejection and swept down the wide service road into the arterial air-stream. In ten minutes he was parked on the third tier of the No. 19 hangar and was gliding through the travelator tunnel into No. 1 control. Work again. An anxiety surge. A tranquillizer. Why? There was no cause for concern. The control looked the same as ever. Little lights flashing. Batteries of buttons twinkling in the fluorescent lighting. Igor yawning and ready to go. Amphetamine mist emission.
“Morning,” he said. An attempt at animation. Igor’s dull eyes met his for a moment, uncomprehending. Opaque. He nodded slightly. Put on his hat. Tossed back a stimulator, collected his iron ration dispenser and disappeared, drooping like a tired peony, down the travelator. Elvin took his place at the panels. The two lines of lights flickering on the semi-circular half cartridge from arm length left to arm length right and arm length above and below.
A 1,2,3,4. A 4,5,6,7. A 11,10,9,8. Miss one. A 19,18,17. Bs synchronous. 1005 hours. They should reverse in a moment or two. A 4,3,2,1. An inspiration to alertness. Bs still synchronous thank goodness. A 16,17,18,19. A 2,3.4.
Where was A 1 ? A 1 had not functioned. A red light over A 1. Reactor chamber. Reactor wild. Check Foreman informed. Check reactor doors closed—A 2. Hose nozzles functioning. Alarm. Fire brigade. Radiation disposal squad. Military. Police. Defence organizations alerted. He glanced at the Foreman. All under control. The “Foreman Activated” light glowing. All systems responding. Alert! The videophone buzzed. Waldorf, the fire chief, of course.
“Say!” he shouted. “This an A or a B?”
“It’s all right,” Elvin told him. “It’s an A.”
“You might have let me know,” Waldorf grumbled. “No sense in us all breaking our necks, is there?”
“Sorry,” Elvin apologized, “I was just going to see you up.” Physicists contacted. Management informed. Evacuation under way. Radiation quotient—10 milliPennies.
For ten minutes Elvin sat in an agony of concentration, checking the light sequences against the Foreman’s indicators. There would be an intentional error somewhere. There always was. A 18 dead. Foreman checked. 19,20,21-— still activated. Foreman approved. 35 - 35. 36 - 36. 37 - 37. 41 dead. He had it! He had it! Foreman checked 41 live. He stabbed his finger on the “Management alert” button. Dubois, the Personnel Director, pale and podgy-faced, appeared on the screen.
“Faulty Foreman, sir!” Elvin stammered. “A41 dead. Foreman checked live. Ackled on full sequence but no ackle on 41.”
“OK, Elvin, good work! Re-activate!” The image faded and Dubois settled comfortably back on the couch under a dome of lights and knobs and micro-screens. To concentrate. To Personnel Control. Dubois was a Thinker.
Elvin lit a cheroot, vastly pleased with himself. “Good work!” Personnel had said. He, Elvin, had done good work. Dubois had said so. A very fine face, had Dubois. What was the rest of him like? Short and tubby probably. Curved back, shaped to the couch. Great responsibility. Dubois was a Thinker.
Elvin pressed the “Re-activate” and the lights travelled in their usual sequence. Buzz! Waldorf appeared on the video.
“All over?” he asked, amiably enough.
“All over!” Elvin told him.
“Lot of flapdoodle!” Waldorf grumbled. “One of these days, you chaps will have a B and we shall forget to come. Then you’ll all look silly.”
“I don’t dream these things up,” Elvin explained, wearily. “They happen to me just the same as to you. I only work here.”
“You know it’s an A.” Waldorf complained. “Why not reactivate and leave us in peace?”
“And lose my bonus?” Elvin asked sarcastically.
“What do you make in that fortress, anyway?” Waldorf was curious.
“Make?”
“Well, you must make something!”
Elvin supposed that they did. After all, everyone made something or other. Or did something. Like despatch along the residence supply tubes. Or broke things down. What did they make? Someone had told him once, long ago, at his first interview. Fresh from Tech and with some interest outside the Specialities. Zirconium something. What did one make with zirconium?
“Well?” Waldorf probed.
“Zirconiums,” he said.
“Oh!” Waldorf was satisfied Obviously, if they made zirconiums, zirconiums were used for something or other. His interest faded and he returned to his fire-floats.
No more As. Thank goodness, no Bs. He had read of Bs. In the headlines. No one ever read farther than the headlines. There was a B every now and again in the headlines. Once there had been a B 1. Somewhere. A reactor wild. It had sounded quite frightening. An operator running over the routine formulae, but knowing that it was really it. A B! Imagine a B 1 and a faulty Foreman. A non-ackle like the A 41. What exactly would happen ? What in fact was a wild reactor? He shuddered. He had no idea. Only the routine light sequences. Foreman checks and the knowledge that the rescue services were automatically contacted, even on an A. Only the warning news flash on the public screens was withheld until the B. Contact was made, but the vocal tape was non-ackled. Panic avoidance.
It had been quite a day. He was glad when Gallen, his relief appeared promptly at 1600 on the travelator, yawning, puppet-like, half comatose.
“We had an A!”
Gallen nodded abstractedly and settled at the panels, his eyes blinking in synchronous relation to the nictating lights. Elvin left. Poor old Gallen! He would certainly atrophy. Even constant sequence change and A alarms could not hold his attention much longer. Had Dubois noticed? On the Workers’ Welfare Monitor? Probably. Oh, well! None of his business, anyway. Home and tell Meryl about the A. Excited. Animated for once. Surely that would please Meryl. It was what she had always wanted. Life. A flicker of interest in the eyes. Conversation. About something.
* * * *
The lift swept him up to the 27th floor. Home. The pad. Empty. The positive emptiness of nothing that had been something. Or very nearly.
My dear Elvin [he read]. I cannot stand it any longer. The daze. Th
e monotony. The dreary waiting for the sexometer to buzz. I don’t suppose you will notice I have gone. Not for some days at least. It buzzes again tomorrow at 1815 hours. But when your disinterested eyes finally, by accident, light upon this note, I shall be far away. I hope happier. As happy as anyone can be in this dead, weary world. I have left you for a Thinker.
He had never felt such emotion before. Only once, vaguely, long ago, with Carmine. He had responded dutifully to the buzz. With animation almost. He had been younger then. He had kissed her quite passionately and there had been a dead thing beneath him. Carmine had atrophied. He sat, rocking his body, his face in his hands. A strange wetness oozed between his fingers. He looked at his hands. They were wet. Tears. Streaming down his cheeks. He had forgotten tears. Even the motion of the sensors had never triggered such a response. The simulation of sensor weeping was subjective. You felt the weeping but the tears were dry and latent in their ducts.
New Writings in SF 6 - [Anthology] Page 14