Star Spring

by David Bischoff

  Todd Spigot didn’t care. He wanted to be pacified.

  The Doctor walked toward him. Her stockings swished against her stiff beige skirt. Her long blonde hair kissed the sides of her perfect face like angel’s breath. Her faint erotic scent touched Todd just above the harsh aroma of the coffee.

  Somewhere on the computer boards, a needle quivered.

  “Thank you,” Todd said, taking the coffee.

  “Thank you,” the Doctor said as she glanced at the readout screen. PATIENT SENSUALLY AROUSED, it stated in bold letters.

  Uneasily, Todd said, “Uhm, is this part of the treatment?”

  “I’ve a license to do whatever makes the patient happy.”

  Todd looked away.

  AMBIVALENCE TOWARD SEXUAL SUGGESTION, the screen read. PATIENT SEXUALLY INHIBITED. NEOFREUDIAN/HARSHORN ANALYSIS SUGGESTED FOR PRESENT. MONITOR FOR POSSIBLE TANGENTAL POSTROLFING, OR SHOCK SEDUCTION.

  The Doctor rubbed a wristband, wiping the screen.

  “I don’t know,” Todd Spigot said. “Everything seems so . . . borderless now. I’ve no boundaries. I’ve never felt so free in my life, yet never so upset.”

  FREE-FLOATING ANXIETY, the screen lettered. CONTEXT?

  The Doctor paged through the brief Todd had filled out. “You’ve ample reward credit, Mr. Spigot. You requested an—uhm—accounting job of all things. You got it. Jobs are scarce. An indication of Earth’s sincere gratefulness for your role in preventing its—ah—detonation.” A half-smile touched her bright lips. “Surely you have exceeded the human SCQ.”

  “Pardon?”

  STANDARD CONTENTMENT QUOTA, the screen announced. It commenced to supply a treatise on the subject, which both Todd and the Doctor ignored.

  Todd placed his coffee on a table. He sat down in the form-fit lounge beside it. He folded his hands. “I’ve got no bases to touch down on. No security. Oh, financial, perhaps, but in a society where there’s no such thing as financial insecurity, any gratification excess money lends soon evaporates. I’ve no real desire to return to Deadrock. I don’t want to see my mother now that I realize what kind of person she is. My relationship with Angharad Shepherd is in complete ruins . . .”

  ROMANTIC DEPRESSION, the screen spelled out. PRESCRIPTION: HEAVY DRUG USE AND SELECTIVE MEMWIPE.

  Todd waved that notion away. “No, no. I want to remember her.” He stared at her shoes. “Philip Amber is off in a monastery someplace. And God knows where Cog is. I haven’t seen him all year.” He picked up the cup of coffee, staring at the issuing steam.

  Keeping her eyes trained on him, the Doctor picked up a sheet of paper. “Ah yes. The artificial Intelligence Unit located in the leg of Philip Amber’s MacGuffin. Not much is said about this ‘Cog’ in the summary here. Would you care to elaborate, Mr. Spigot?”

  “No.”

  The Doctor’s features grew stern. “How can I help you, Mr. Spigot, if you do not supply me with the information I request?”

  GALVANIC MONITORS INDICATE TENSION LEVELS PEAKING IN SUBJECT, the screen flashed. STRONG PROBE UNNECESSARY.

  “Shut up,” the Doctor barked at the readout screen on her desk. “I apologize, Mr. Spigot,” she said, recovering her aplomb. The machines and I can be occasionally demanding. You need say only what you wish. Now, would you judge that these paragraphs highlight the events somewhat over a year Earthtime ago that resulted in your presence here now? Then we can go over your present feelings, mindful of all the possible causes for your deep dissatisfaction.”

  Todd put down the coffee. He took the sheet of paper.

  After leaving the Star Fall with no wish to ever set foot inside it again, he’d refused to give interviews to the news media. The myriad offers to sell rights to the story of his life were promptly squashed. The three-dee-pack people talked about a movie. The notion had been promptly rejected. Todd had seen fit to tell his story only to the Intelligence Authority which Angharad Shepherd represented. He’d left out most of the business concerning the true nature of the creature who called himself Cogito Ergo Sum, allowing the high muckymucks to keep their assumptions that Cog was merely a benevolent AI brought into play by Angharad, known to them as Agent Tracy Marshack.

  Ø1111Ø111Ø (condensation)

  SUBJECT: Todd Spigot. Age: 31 Earth Standard. World of Birth: Deadrock. Key element in defeat of Morapn Commander of Interstellar Luxury Liner Star Fall (see Subject: Ort Eath) in his attempt to destroy the center of the human Empire, Earth, thus forcing the more advanced Morapn Race into galactic war with the humans.

  Todd looked up from the sheet. “Did you see the three-dee rip-off that came out last month?” He grinned. “Terrible.”

  The Doctor nodded. “Is the fact sheet consistent with your experience, Mr. Spigot?”

  Pointing his nose back toward the words, Todd continued reading.

  Subject Spigot set out as a tourist aboard the Star Fall on its maiden voyage from the Morapn Worlds to Earth, its mission presumably representing a new state of peace between the Morapns and the humans. Dissatisfied with his body, the naive Spigot chose to rent a different one from a shady Body Parlour in his home city, Portown. By accident he received the MacGuffin battle body belonging to assassin Philip Amber, in town for a hit. Upon his return to the Parlour, the body he’d used for his job in shambles, pursued by local authorities, Amber had his brain transferred to Spigot’s real body and boarded the Star Fall. In a complex series of occurrences, Spigot and Amber encountered agent Angharad Shepherd/Tracy Marshack and, with the help of the Auxiliary Artificial Intelligence operating in the battle body, they discovered and foiled the half-human, half-Morapn Ort Eath’s attempt to destroy Earth.

  Looking up, Todd said, “Much too simplistic. But that’s the essential stuff. It doesn’t touch on the psychological aspects, though, the reasons for my present—how can I term it . . . ?”

  The word was promptly supplied by the psychotherapy machine: ANGST.

  “Yes. Thank you. That’s it. Angst.”

  The Doctor picked up her cup and sipped. “Your coffee’s getting cold, Mr. Spigot.”

  “Oh. Yes. Thank you. Might I have some cream?”

  * * *

  Angharad Shepherd set her floater down by the old hotel. Her windshield wipers slapped away rain swiftly, in vague rhythm with her pounding heart.

  They were chasing her. They’d found out.

  Nervously, she picked up the folder from the passenger seat and stuffed it into her suitcase on the floor.

  She had to get back to Central with the proof. Otherwise nobody’d ever believe her.

  She stared through the runneling water, the drumming of raindrops that put the hotel into drizzly off-focus. Neo-gothic, the structure was festooned with gables, widow-walks, spires, even a lightning rod. Half a century ago, the style had been all the rage. Now there were precious few of these kind of structures left, except here in the West of the Northern United Americas. Somewhere, a blown-loose shutter applauded her safe arrival.

  She shuddered. She was exhausted. She was sure she’d lost the pursuit by diving into the cloud bank which had been the ceiling of this storm, jetting into evasive maneuvers while punching up the damper shield. Drained, she needed to find a phone, dial Central, then hole up in a room and wait for the cavalry to charge over the hill.

  Still, preparations had to be made. Carefully, she demagnetized the skin flap to her neck cavity. By feel, she adjusted her Aura Disguise. A quick touch tinted her blonde hair dark, her green eyes blue. Delicate servo-motors in her face restructured her features, widening the lips a bit, pushing out the brow, broadening the nose.

  She performed similar masking operations upon the floater and picked a force screen umbrella from the glove compartment. Suitcase tucked under her arm, she dashed to shelter.

  The old-fashioned neon sign above an awning flashed HOTEL with crimson urgency. Angharad le
aped a puddle. The wooden steps resonated beneath her feet. Light leaked through the venetian blinds of a room, presumably the office. The damp brought out the rare smell of old wood.

  A bell tinkled as she pushed the door open. She walked into a plushly appointed room. A faded Indian rug stretched upon the floor, supporting neo-Victorian furniture and lamps with tassled shades. Dour patriarchs looked out from the past through the cracked windows of their portraits. A stuffed owl, wings outstretched as though about to swoop down upon a mouse, hovered behind the check-in desk. Here a balding, pudgy man was painstakingly snipping something.

  Blandly, the man raised his head. “Scissors are the best.”

  This place would cost. No question. Clearly, it was an exclusive resort for people with a taste for rotting atmosphere or the need to be depressed. Still, thought Angharad Shepherd, a bed’s a bed, and Central would foot the bill.

  “I’d like a single for the night,” she said, looking around for telltale signs of monitoring equipment. The room was marred by no machinery older than Twentieth Century. “I’d like a room with a phone.”

  The man casually glanced at a list of available accommodations. “I’ve a single with an excellent rear view. Looks out over the bog. You can see the old mansion on the cliff.”

  “Fine, fine.” It was early afternoon; all Angharad wanted was a place to rest while she waited for reinforcements.

  “Very well,” said the man, reaching back to lift a set of old-fashioned metal keys from a peg. “Two hundred credits.”

  “Will you take a marker?”

  “Gladly.” The financial arrangements were quickly settled. “We have an excellent library of two-dee celluloid films. I was just re-editing one of my favorites at the moment.”

  “No, no. It’s been a frenzy of a day. I need some rest.” The man shrugged. He pushed a registry book across the desk. Angharad signed “Mamie Crane” beneath the previous entry, “Mr. and Mrs. Smith.”

  “Just up the stairs to the right, madam,” said the man. “Have a pleasant rest.”

  The room had a plush rug, intricately patterned wallpaper and a soft, thick-mattressed bed, the kind they didn’t make anymore. Exhausted, Angharad fell into the bed’s faint lavender scent. Even with the nerve-prop medication Central supplied, her emotions were on edge. Weariness rasped within. Anxiety and worry gnawed her mind like predatory birds.

  To think that she had believed it all ended a year ago, when Ort Eath had come to his grisly end, when Amber had broken through to the stoical Morapns with a burst of emotion and they had defused the antimatter bomb. The Star Fall saga was only beginning. Far from dimming, the importance of the gigantic Space Liner had increased.

  PROJECT COUNTER CONSCIOUSNESS

  FUSED IDENTITY MATRICES

  MORAPN MINDFIELD DISPLACEMENT

  Dizzily, the terms swirled in her head. She felt spellbound by the concepts she had just begun to understand during the weeks she had spent undercover, successfully serving with the computer maintenance team in an Arizona desert research complex.

  Somehow the man had bought a controlling share of the Star Fall. Earnest Evers Hurt, fabled mystery trillionaire of the galaxy, said to be the oldest man alive. Owner of planets. A tentacle deep into every financial concern of the human-occupied star system. Deeply involved in exploration outwards—and apparently inwards—for the destiny of mankind.

  Simple enough, that. Straight intrigue. After the business with her half-brother Ort Eath, she knew that she’d been bitten by the bug. No other kind of life—not even an existence steeped in real-fics—could satisfy her like the life of an intelligence agent.

  However, the hints, the implications, the shadows of him, the memories twined with the possibilities . . . Angharad Shepherd shuddered violently. Gasping, she sat up and tried to get ahold of herself.

  Anxiety attack.

  Shaking, she was barely able to thumb the combination impulses into her suitcase. A few pills later, she felt better. Lying on top of the clothes was the folder filled with apparently innocent computer readout sheets. However, with the aid of the code she’d devised, a cryptoanalysis unit would be able to spew forth information about Earnest Evers Hurt’s activities that would increase the patronage of Galactic Central’s Booze Bar for a long time to come.

  She heaved a sigh. The phone was by the bed. Following instructions, she dialed nine to get out, then tapped in the first of a sequence of flow-codes to obtain Central’s latest report number. Number achieved, she unsnapped an upper left molar from her bridgework and coded out her present location, using spurts of her unique identity frequency through the wireless airwaves. She bracketed the longitude and latitude with a strong signal of urgency.

  HELP!

  A moment later, the molar glowed red. Message received.

  She breathed relief, stuck the tooth back in her mouth. Suddenly, she felt itchy. Her hair, despite its recent color change, felt limp and dirty. A shower. She realized uncomfortably that she’d not taken one in a few days. Too busy.

  The bathroom was clean and Spartan. She noted with pleasure that the shower wasn’t molecular-wash. Real hot water would gush over her, soothing, massaging her aches.

  Anticipation hurried her disrobing. She shucked blouse and pants with practiced ease. Panties and gauzy breast supports were off in a flash. A few selective twists of her wrist later, hot water streamed into the ceramic basin, pattering the plastic curtain. Plumes of steam breathed out to caress her lithe body, gently warming her. She inhaled with pleasure at the delicate texture of the water vapor against her skin. She was glad she was a female. Although if it were necessary, she knew she’d assume a man’s frame again, she preferred to stay this way. So much more sensitive to the nuances of sensation and emotion, this female form.

  To think she’d spent a good portion of her life as a man. How odd.

  She admired her supple lines a moment, wondering if the starchy research center chow had put on a pound or two, then stepped into the coursing water.

  Immediately, she felt better. She lost herself in the droning splash, the steady plat-plat pressure of hot water on reddening back, the warmth streaming down her abdomen, between her thighs.

  She lathered herself thoroughly with soap smelling of roses, then began to sing, a habit of her male days not yet broken.

  She did not hear the bathroom door click open.

  If she had looked, she would have seen a dark form through the semitranslucent curtain, drifting toward her. She would have seen the muted gleams of squatting machinery just outside the door.

  The curtain was suddenly opened. Shock preventing any other response, Angharad whipped around to stare into the face of the desk clerk. He wore a dress and a wig. In his hand was something that looked like a kitchen knife.

  “Good evening,” he said, although it was still afternoon.

  * * *

  “I’m losing my friends,” Todd Spigot said. “I’m disoriented, I’m just kind of drifting through life. I’ve done everything I ever wanted to do, I have my freedom now, and yet I’m confused. I don’t think the way I used to, I don’t believe in what I used to believe in. God’s no longer in his Heaven, and things are just so fantastic, they’re rotten. Who am I, anyway? A fleshy bag of bones and blood, jouncing through life with no other objective than to end up dead? It’s funny. I’ve not only fulfilled my desires, I understand why they were desires, why I had the motivations, the personality I had. But as frustrated, as encumbered as I was back then, by God, my problems were familiar problems. They gave me definition.

  “I knew that Todd Spigot was a fat mother’s-boy. I knew that you could list my beliefs about reality by simply excerpting them from the dogma and doctrine of the Holston Christian Separatist Church. So I get my particular reality bubble popped. Fine. But what’s going to replace it? Real-fics? Disbelief Suspenders? Uh-uh. They’ll just put my brain throu
gh the grinder a little further. I need to stop, take evaluation. I need your help, Doctor. I need that damned machine, as annoying as it’s getting. I need boundaries. I need parameters. I’m feeling angry and violent for no reason, and it frightens me.”

  NEUROSES LEVEL 6A. INFORMATION INSUFFICIENT FOR FULL PROGNOSIS, the screen spelled reluctantly. COMPLETE PROGRAM NECESSARY. PATIENT COOPERATION ENCOURAGING.

  The Doctor rounded the desk with airy grace, smile lighting her beauty a little hotter. “Of course it frightens you, poor Mr. Spigot. And I want you to immediately consider us—your machine and I—as your friends.”

  Made uneasy by this rush of friendliness, Todd stood. His mug of coffee was still in his left hand. Looking at the Doctor’s attractive breasts loosely moving beneath her shirt, he felt a need for oral gratification.

  He lifted the mug to his lips.

  The Doctor nodded encouragingly as she approached. “That’s right, Todd. Drink up. It will make you feel better.”

  “You must forgive me. I’ve been going on and on,” he said, feeling embarrassed by his outpouring of emotion, feeling a little unsettled by the presence of a lovely woman. Todd Spigot had not changed all that much. “I’ve probably gone way over the time limit. I’ll just check.” With his natural obsequiousness and exuberance, he twisted his right wrist to glance at his watch, forgetting that the hand attached to selfsame wrist was holding a cup.

  Contents of said cup spilled in a great brown splash over the Doctor’s blouse. The Doctor’s smile froze around gritted teeth.

  Horrified, Todd took off his jacket and made clumsy attempts to mop the mess off the Doctor as delicately as possible.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mention it, but I’m a bit of a klutz.”

  “You seem to have clung well enough to that particular personality quality, Mr. Spigot,” the Doctor said, gently resisting Todd’s cleaning efforts. “Pardon me. I’ve a change of clothing in my bathroom.”