by Anthology
And Lanroyd and Cleve beamed at each other and broached the bourbon.
From the journal of Peter Lanroyd, Ph. D.:
Sun Oct 20 85: Exactly 9 mos. Obstetrical symbolism yet?
Maybe I shd’ve seen it then, at this other inauguration. Read between the lines, seen the meaning, the true inevitable meaning. Realized that the Judge was simply saying, in better words (or did they sound better because I thought he was on My Side?), what the Senator said in the inaugural we escaped: “I have a commission to wipe out the opposition.”
Maybe I shd’ve seen it when the Senator was arrested for inciting to riot. Instead I cheered. Served the sonofabitch right. (And it did, too. That’s the hell of it. It’s all confused . . . )
He still hasn’t been tried. They’re holding him until they can nail him for treason. Mere matter of 2 constitutional amendments: Revise Art III Sec 3 Par 1 so “treason” no longer needs direet-witness proof of an overt act of war against the U S or adhering to their enemies, but can be anything yr Star Chamber wants to call it; revise Art I Sec 9 Par 3 so you can pass an ex post facto law. All very simple; the Judge’s arguments sound as good as his dissent in U S v Feinbaum. (I shd’ve seen, even in the inaug, that he’s not the same man in this world—the same mind turned to other ends. My ends? My end . . . ) The const ams’ll pass all right . . . except maybe in Maine.
I shd’ve seen it last year when the press began to veer, when the dullest and most honest columnist in the country began to blether about the “measure of toleration”—when the liberal Chronicle and the Hearst Examiner, for the ist time in history, took the same stand on the Supervisors’ refusal of the Civic Aud to a pro-Senator rally—when the NYer satirized the ACLU as something damned close to traitors . . .
I began to see it when the County Central Committee started to raise hell about a review I wrote in the QPH. (God knows how a Committeeman happened to read that learned journal.) Speaking of the great old 2-party era, I praised both the DAR and the FDR as bulwarks of democracy. Very unwise. Seems as a good Party man I shd’ve restricted my praise to the FDR. Cd’ve fought it through, of course, stood on my rights—hell, a County Committeeman’s an elected representative of the people. But I resigned because . . . well, because that was when I began to see it.
Today was what did it, though. 1st a gentle phone call fr the Provost—in person, no secty—wd I drop by his office tomorrow? Certain questions have arisen as to some of the political opinions I have been expressing in my lectures . . .
That blonde in the front row with the teeth and the busy notebook and the D’s and F’s . . .
So Cleve comes by and I think I’ve got troubles . . . !
He’s finally published his 1st paper on the theory of CK and PK-induced alternates. It’s been formally denounced as “dangerous” because it implies the existence of better worlds. And guess who denounced it? Prof Daniels of Psych.
Sure, the solid backer of # 13, the strong American Party boy. He’s a strong FDR man now. He knows. And he’s back on the faculty.
Cleve makes it all come out theological somehow. He says that by forcibly setting mankind on the alternate i/-fork that we wanted, we denied man’s free will. Impose “democracy” against or without man’s choice, and you have totalitarianism. Our only hope is what he calls “abnegation of our own desire”—surrender to, going along with, the will of man. We must CK and PK ourselves back to where we started.
The hell with the theology; it makes sense politically too. I was wrong. Jesus! I was wrong. Look back at every major election, every major boner the electorate’s pulled. So a boner to me is a triumph of reason to you, sir. But let’s not argue which dates were the major boners. 1932 or 1952, take your pick.
It’s always worked out, hasn’t it? Even 1920. It all straightens out, in time. Democracy’s the craziest, most erratic system ever devised . . . and the closest to perfection. At least it keeps coming closer. Democratic man makes his mistakes—and he corrects them in time.
Cleve’s going back to make his peace with his ideas of God and free will. I’m going back to show I’ve learned that a politician doesn’t clear the hell and gone out of politics because he’s lost. Nor does he jump over on the winning side.
He works and sweats as a Loyal Opposition—hell, as an Underground if necessary, if things get as bad as that—but he holds on and works to make men make their own betterment.
Now we’re going up to Cleve’s, where the field’s set up . . . were going back to the true world.
Stuart Cleve was weeping, for the first time in his adult life. All the beautifully intricate machinery which created the temporomagnetic field was smashed as thoroughly as a hydrogen atom over Novosibirsk.
“That was Winograd leading them, wasn’t it?” Lanroyd’s voice came out oddly through split lips and missing teeth.
Cleve nodded.
“Best damn coffin-comer punter I ever saw . . . Wondered why our friend Daniels was taking such an interest in athletes recently.”
“Don’t oversimplify, old boy. Not all athletes. Recognized a couple of my best honor students . . .
“Fine representative group of youth on the march . . . and all wearing great big FDR buttons!”
Cleve picked up a shard of what had once been a chrono-static field generator and fondled it tenderly. “When they smash machines and research projects,” he said tonelessly, “the next step is smashing men.”
“Did a fair job on us when we tried to stop them. Well . . . These fragments we have shored against our madness . . . And now, to skip some three and a half centuries of theater for our next quote, it’s back to work we go! Hi-Ho! Hi-Ho! Need a busbar-boy, previous experience guaranteed?”
“It took us ten weeks of uninterrupted work,” Cleve said hesitantly. “You think those vandals will let us alone that long? But we have to try, I know.” He bent over a snarled mess of wiring which Lanroyd knew was called a magnetostat and performed some incomprehensibly vital function. “Now this looks almost servicea—” He jerked upright again, shaking his head worriedly.
“Matter?” Lanroyd asked.
“My head. Feels funny . . . One of our young sportsmen landed a solid kick when I was down.”
“Winograd, no doubt. Hasn’t missed a boot all season.” Perturbedly Cleve pulled out of his pocket the small dice-case which seemed to be standard equipment for all psionicists. He shook a pair in his fist and rolled them out in a clear space on the rubbage-littered floor.
“Seven!” he called.
A six turned up, and then another six.
“Sometimes,” Cleve was muttering ten unsuccessful rolls later, “even slight head injuries have wiped out all psionic potential. There’s a remote possibility of redevelopment; it has happened . . .”
“And,” said Lanroyd, “it takes both of us to generate enough PK to rotate.” He picked up the dice. “Might as well check mine.” He hesitated then let them fall. “I don’t think I want to know . . .”
They stared at each other over the ruins of the machinery that would never be rebuilt.
“ ‘I, a stranger and afraid . . .’ ” Cleve began to quote.
“In a world,” Lanroyd finished, “I damned well made.”
THE POWER AND THE GLORY
Robert E. Vardeman
Other workers leaned on their shovels, taking a break from the stifling heat. But Nikolai Tesla did not. He continued moving dirt from the trench to the pile beside it, in spite of being the slightest of the men. Tall, whipcord thin, his black hair glued itself to his head with sweat. Now and then he tossed his head to keep the sweat from burning his fever-bright dark eyes.
“Nikolai,” complained the man next to him, “you’re showing us up. Slow down. The foreman’ll want us all to work as hard as you—and he still won’t pay us shit.”
The Austro-Hungarian looked up. A slight sneer came to his thin lips.
“We are near Pearl Street, aren’t we?”
“Suppose so. What’s the di
fference? This is still just a hole in the ground no matter where we put it.” Anotoly Berzgi edged closer and looked at Tesla. He shook his head. The man worked like a machine, but no machine ever had such an intense look or produced such a torrent of ideas. Twice Tesla had tinkered with construction equipment and increased the amount of work they could do. And with a shovel in his hand, he worked tirelessly, in spite of the humid New York summer.
“That’s Edison’s headquarters. Where he has his direct current generators.”
“What? Oh, the electricity?”
“He cheated me,” Tesla said, his voice crackling with emotion. “I worked for a year improving his generator designs, and he cheated me out of fifty thousand.”
“How much?”
“Fifty thousand dollars. I came to America because the French subsidiary of an Edison company cheated me. I thought it would be different here. But it is not. Edison cheats, no matter what continent his company occupies.”
“What could you do for the great Edison that would be worth so much?” Berzgi stared at Tesla. The amount was incredible, more than a man could earn in a lifetime of digging ditches.
“He hired me to improve his DC equipment. I tried to convince him that alternating current was better, but he scoffed,” Tesla said, his tone clipped and precise. “He goes on to electrocute animals when I have a chance to sell my AC generators to Westinghouse.”
“Westinghouse?” said Berzgi.
“The inventor who died in the air brake accident,” said Tesla. He wiped away sweat and shook his head sadly. “Westinghouse had vision and saw the elegance of my designs. Together, we were going to harness Niagara Falls and send power throughout the entire state of New York!”
Berzgi tried not to snicker. Such a thing was impossible. The great Edison had to place his generators every mile to keep the electricity flowing. He sighed. How nice it would be to read his letters from the old country by electric bulb rather than the guttering candle he had bought for a penny from old Grania. He could not afford coal oil, and with what he was being paid for digging trenches he never would.
“A great man, Westinghouse. I went to his funeral,” Tesla said. “He left this world too soon.” Tesla hesitated and Berzgi thought a tear formed at the corner of one dark eye. “Like my brother Dane. He, too, was a genius, unlike me. I work hard every hour of the day to come to even half of those men’s brilliance.”
Berzgi saw a change come over Tesla. He somehow grew in stature, though slight, as if coming to a momentous decision.
“I cannot develop alternating current without the money Westinghouse offered me, and with his death, his company has been sold.” Tesla spat. “To Edison.”
“Git off yer shovels. I ain’t payin’ ya to lollygag!” The foreman bustled up and down the line, hounding his tired, sweaty laborers back to work.
“Tonight,” Berzgi said. “Come with me. We will have a drink and talk.”
“Of the old country?” scoffed Tesla. “I have work to do.”
“Work? What do you do? I have a second job in a laundry.”
“I invent,” Tesla said, drawing himself up even more and looking down his roman nose at his comrade, dark black eyes intense. “And I have found an even more effective way of powering the world. I tap into the magnetic field of the planet itself!”
Berzgi shook his head and shrugged. He didn’t know what Tesla meant, but it intrigued him.
“Can you show me?”
“You do not want a drink?” Tesla grinned as he joshed his coworker. It was the first time all day Berzgi had seen the serious man smile.
“I do.”
“Then bring what you drink to my laboratory and I will show you how I intend to give everyone free power—and without Edison’s disagreeable power lines dangling everywhere you look!”
Tesla lifted his shovel and stabbed at the thick, waxy black cables running overhead to the Pearl Street generator. He dropped the blade to the dirt and began digging as furiously as a badger, a dust cloud rising from his industry to obscure him and his work.
Berzgi heard sizzling and hissing, followed by a cry that sounded as if someone had been seriously injured. He pushed open the heavy steel door to Tesla’s laboratory in the abandoned building and peered inside. He threw up his arm to protect his face from the leaping bolts of actinic fire.
“Nikolai, are you well?” Berzgi fought down his fear and entered the huge room, littered with broken crates, dusty furniture and electrical equipment unlike anything he had ever seen in his life. His eyes widened when he saw Tesla, standing like a god, outlined in dancing electricity. Tesla wore a long, immaculate white linen lab coat and had thick black rubber gloves on, but it was the thick-lensed goggles that made him seem something more than human.
“Close the door,” Tesla called. “I must not allow any of my precious power to seep out!”
“It can escape?” Berzgi considered running through the door before slamming it behind him. This place was too dangerous. Tesla’s mocking laughter caused him to reconsider.
“I joke. Close the door to prevent the rats from leaving.”
“You are joking again, aren’t you?”
Tesla waved him forward. Berzgi had to smile when he saw how the young man’s lank black hair stood on end, the ends twisting about like a living Medusa. When he reached out to point out a safe spot in the laboratory, a five-foot-long white arc of electricity leaped forth from his hand. Berzgi hesitated, then saw Tesla held a knobbed wand. This was nothing more than arcane magic—scientific magic.
“You are impressive,” Berzgi said. He went to the spot on the bare concrete where Tesla had built up a low platform piled with rubber mats. He stood on them and tried not to show any fear.
“You are insulated there. Do not leave and you will be quite safe.”
“What of the rats who have remained inside?” Berzgi asked.
“I often fry them for dinner,” Tesla said. Berzgi wasn’t able to tell if the man was still joking. “When I was much younger, I built a small windmill powered by June bugs.”
“June bugs?”
“May bugs. They call them June bugs in America and I must follow my fellow citizens in this.” Tesla cleared his throat as he spoke, a distant look of fond memory in his eyes. “Sixteen June bugs. All glued to the windmill to give motive power. They were remarkably efficient, working for hours to turn the rotor. The hotter it became, the harder they worked.”
“A bug-powered windmill,” muttered Berzgi, wondering at the man’s sanity.
“It ultimately failed when a strange boy came and ate the bugs. It was then I realized we can eat anything with relish given adequate hunger. And that it is not good to power equipment with bugs.”
Turning back to the vast gray metal panel studded with meters, dials and heavy switches, Tesla began to touch a control here and adjust a rheostat there like some sinister, goggled musician playing a demented concert. Berzgi felt his inner organs begin to vibrate, then what few windows remained in the old warehouse exploded. The earthquake threw him to his knees. He clung fiercely to the rubber mats, remembering what Tesla had said. Safety. Here. In spite of the rusted beams overhead beginning to buckle and plaster and dust cascade down, Berzgi stayed put.
Tesla stumbled from the temblor, braced himself against the panel, and grasped a huge power switch with both hands. Putting his back into it, he pulled the switch and plunged the warehouse into utter darkness.
“I am sorry,” Tesla said, through the murk and dust now filling the warehouse. “I miscalculated the resonant frequency.”
“What? What’s that?” Berzgi shouted. Only then did he realize he was partially deafened from the roar caused by Tesla’s equipment.
“The resonant frequency of Manhattan,” Tesla said. “I fear I might have created quite a lot of damage as a result.”
“You destroyed the entire island?” Berzgi dusted himself off and stood on the pillar of mats. He knew there was no longer any danger but still had to force
himself to leave this island of insulated safety. He walked to stand beside Tesla.
“Don’t be absurd. All I did was shake the buildings. I haven’t enough power to destroy the entire island.” Tesla grinned sheepishly. “Though if I had a larger generator, I might find the resonant frequency of the world and crack it open.”
“The whole world?”
“It is possible, but not what I was attempting to do,” Tesla said.
“What were you doing?”
“Broadcast power,” the inventor said, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “I haven’t the money to build my alternating current generator—Westinghouse’s death guaranteed that failure. So I went on.”
“On?”
“To the next step. Radiometric power. I will do away with power cables entirely. Everyone will receive my power from a broadcast unit.”
“I don’t understand,” Berzgi said.
“It is quite simple. I tap the magnetic power of the world itself, then broadcast it through my antenna.” Tesla pointed to a heavily insulated column rising more than twenty feet that ended in a smooth copper-colored ball almost ten feet in diameter. “From here I can send my power to anyone who wants it. There will be no need for ships to carry heavy fuel. All that will be needed is a simple receiving unit and my broadcast power unit.”
“No need for fuel aboard a ship? No coal? Or oil?”
“None. That space can be given over to cargo or passengers. I even envision flying machines powered by my radiometry broadcasts. My radio broadcasts,” Tesla said, looking smug. “Yes, my radio waves will fill the skies and allow machines to fly and ships to sail. Why, even small conveyances like horseless carriages can be powered easily with my broadcast power.”
“Who would give up their horse and buggy?” asked Berzgi.
“My radio-powered horseless conveyance would not need to be fed or groomed. If it breaks, a mechanic could fix it and no veterinarian would be required. And it would never tire. It could drive forever!”