A World Between

by Norman Spinrad

  Despite himself, Royce smiled. Somehow, under the present circumstances, the very up-front weirdness of this place was a fresh breath of sanity. The whackers might be crazy in their own way, obsessive even, but they didn’t take any of it seriously, not the way the rest of the planet was becoming humorlessly and pathologically obsessed. A pity there aren’t enough of them to form a real political base, he thought.

  “Well, I guess I’d better go check out the Institute and get it over with,” Royce said, rising.

  “Yeah, sure, but what about Godzillas in Space? I tell you, the export market will—”

  “Too expensive, Lauren, you’re out of your mind,” Royce said genially. He grinned. “Tell you what, though, if I don’t like what I see up at the Institute, I’ll give you the place to play with. Take twenty effing godzillas and really demolish it. I’m not sure about the export market, but I have a feeling it’d be a big hit on Pacifica.”

  “No, no,” Bates said excitedly, “the Femocrat planets will eat it up, we can crack the market at last! Flasho, Royce! Revenge of the Godzillas, we can call it.” He peered at Royce owlishly. “Are you serious?” he asked. “Should I put a writer on it?”

  Nervously, somberly, Roger Falkenstein found himself trailing Lindblad around the Institute like a junior officer tagging along behind some auditor from the Council. He had known from the net announcements that this was going to happen, but he had not known when, and Lindblad had simply dropped in from nowhere, announced in no uncertain terms that he was going to inspect the place starting now, and that even the slightest hint of noncooperation would be taken as proof of the Femocrat charges.

  Lindblad stuck his nose in everywhere and asked questions that seemed both sharply pointed and crafted to establish an almost paramilitary authority. In the records office, he had compared the student rosters to some documents he had brought which might have been the list the Femocrats had had. In the pharmacy, he demanded an explanation of the brain-eptifiers and their effects on human consciousness. When Blatski responded with a technical explanation obviously far over Lindblad’s head, he had peremptorily ordered a complete report sent to the Ministry of Science within ten hours.

  Lindblad sat in on classes in psychesomics and psychohistory without venturing a word in response. He cornered random students and asked them disconnected cryptic questions. Who is your Delegate? What’s your love-life been like? What are your favorite entertainment programs? Why did you apply for admission?

  Clearly this is no political cosmetic job, Falkenstein thought as he followed Lindblad into one of the viewing balconies. He’s really serious about this, he’s really sharp, and if he finds out the real truth, we’re in deep trouble. Although Lindblad had never gone quite so far as to support the Institute, he had more or less openly opposed those who sought to impede its operation, including, perhaps, Carlotta Madigan herself. Moreover, he does seem to have a basic sympathy with our ultimate goals, and I do believe he wants to be with us in spirit. An overtly negative report from Lindblad would be a political disaster.

  Now Lindblad was approaching Anne Marshak, a psychomolder from the Heisenberg masquerading as one of the female students. Falkenstein’s stomach sank. If she doesn’t convince him that she’s a Pacifican…

  “Hello, I’m—”

  “I know, you’re Royce Lindblad, and you’re inspecting the Institute,” Anne said ingenuously. “How can I help you?”

  “Just a few simple questions,” Lindblad said. “What’s your name and where are you from?”

  “Anne Marshak, from Salo. That’s an island about sixty kilometers from—”

  “Know the area very well,” Lindblad said brusquely. “Used to sail there to watch the marinerdyles breed. Dozens of them at a time rising to the surface and battering each other with their sails. You can hear them going at it clear across the lagoon. You ever sail out and watch them getting it off?”

  Anne managed a slight blush. “Well…”

  “Oh, come on, everyone on Salo does it…”

  “Well, once or twice when I was still a teenager…” Anne admitted with an engaging show of shyness.

  “That’s all,” Lindblad snapped.

  “That’s all?” she said.

  Lindblad shot a sidelong glance at Falkenstein. “That’s quite enough,” he said.

  Without knowing how or why, Falkenstein was convinced that some disaster had just occurred. Something had to be done to counteract whatever mistakes had been made, and it had to be done now. I’ve got to assume the worst, Falkenstein decided. I can’t afford to underestimate his intelligence. I’ve got to win him over now despite what he apparently knows. I’ve got to finally convince him that what Transcendental Science has to offer completely transcends the limited imperatives of local politics.

  “As long as you’re here, Royce, perhaps you’d like to see some of our really advanced work,” Falkenstein said. “Once you’ve completed your own evaluation, of course.”

  Lindblad looked him squarely in the eyes. “Sure, Roger,” he said. “Why not? My evaluation is now completed. You might as well do your damndest. You’re going to have to, after what I’ve seen today.”

  Falkenstein blanched. “Don’t draw any hasty conclusions on incomplete data,” he said.

  “Wouldn’t dream of it,” Lindblad said, continuing to stare at him with an unwavering gaze. “You’ll take me on your grand tour, and then we’ll have dinner, and once we’ve digested everything, we’ll talk deal.” Lindblad grinned ironically and bowed from the waist with a beckoning flourish of his arm. “Lead on, Potemkin,” he said.

  Royce Lindblad took a final sip of wine, leaned back in his chair, steepled his hands in front of his face, and peered over them across the table at Roger Falkenstein. A sense of power flowed through him, both Falkenstein’s and his own.

  I could close this place down instantly, he thought, and Falkenstein knows it, though maybe not how or why. Lauren Bates, the utter lack of net consoles, and the electronic perimeter fence verified that the students were cut off from the outside world as a matter of policy. The classes had been more or less as Carstairs had described, and the Ministry of Science would soon tell the full tale on the brain-eptifiers. The male students seemed like definite Bucko Power types, and a thorough checkout through the parliamentary computer would probably prove it.

  But the so-called female student from Salo had been the clincher. Anyone from anywhere near Salo knew that there was no marinerdyle breeding ground there, and every Islander knew that marinerdyles bred under water, not on the surface. Therefore “Anne Marshak” was a ringer from the Heisenberg, and so, no doubt, were all the other “female students,” and that would be pretty easy to prove, too.

  But the legalistic strength of the case is almost beside the point, Royce thought. If I support Carstairs’s charges, the Institute is finished, because it will be tried not in a court of law, but politically before Parliament. I’ve got the power of life or death over the Institute now, and Falkenstein knows it.

  The little VIP tour that Falkenstein had favored him with had been an obvious acknowledgment of that power, an attempt to balance out the new equation by revealing more of the science behind the technology and the further technology that such knowledge implied.

  The inertia-screen wasn’t just portable airconditioning; it was based on the total mass-energy isolation of a closed system, which implied gravity control, inertialess propulsion, and who knew what else. In its obvious form, the “matter transformer” was a mere parlor-trick, but what possibilities it opened up in areas as diverse as dirt-cheap instantaneous construction and tachyon transmission! Even “psychesomics,” perverted here into a sophisticated form of brainwashing, implied the total conscious control of the parameters of human consciousness itself, the ability of the mind to lift itself by its own mental bootstraps. And the “genetic design” they used as a catchword phrase was based on the ability to synthesize DNA molecules perfectly to order, to custom-tailor existing orga
nisms, or create new life itself off chemicals on the lab shelf—let alone the apparently very real prospect of physical immortality!

  For the first time, Royce felt he understood what Transcendental Science implied, as opposed to mere advanced technology. They had opened up so many arcane areas that even they might take centuries to fully exploit what they already knew. And knowledge increased exponentially—the more you had, the easier it was to get more.

  If Falkenstein had sought to impress him with the utter insanity of Pacifica’s turning its back on all this, he had succeeded admirably. To isolate ourselves from Transcendental Science would be to turn ourselves into a planet of backward primitives within a generation, Royce thought. A historical park in which a frozen moment of the past was preserved, quaint and intact forever, for the delectation of tourists from the ongoing real human civilization. And that’s the source of your power, Roger, he thought.

  “All right,” Lindblad said finally, “let’s talk about reality.”

  Falkenstein cocked an innocently inquisitive eyebrow at him. His wife Maria, who had said almost nothing during the generally silent meal, frowned and began to rise as if to leave.

  “Why don’t you stay, Mrs. Falkenstein?” Royce said. “Secrecy and jellybelly oil time is finished, and you might as well hear this.”

  “I’m not sure I want to hear it,” Maria Falkenstein said, looking at her husband.

  “At least it might help refute the charge of a male faschochauvinist cabal deciding the fate of the Institute and Pacifica,” Royce said half-seriously. Because we are going to deal here, and I think we both know it.

  “Do stay, Maria,” Falkenstein said, the mock innocence gone now, his eyes hard and observing. “Your council may prove useful.”

  Maria Falkenstein sank back into her chair. Outside the window of the Falkensteins’ private dining room, the Institute seemed to float in the darkness; a silvery disc, self-contained and isolated from the jungle backdrop like a spaceship under the starry skies. The image seemed to neatly sum up the situation—a self-contained alien presence orbiting the planet silently, pregnant with both promise and menace.

  “Charges have been made,” Royce said, “and now we both know that they’re true.”

  Falkenstein inhaled deeply. Maria’s face was cold and unreadable. “You mean the Carstairs charges?” Falkenstein said. He smiled thinly. “Aren’t they self-invalidating? Obviously, he wasn’t chosen for loyalty to the Bucko Power movement, and he could hardly serve as an example of our successful brainwashing!”

  Maria Falkenstein frowned, as if in disgust. Could it be that even she is sick of this crap? Royce wondered. “Forget it, Roger,” he said. “I’ve verified that your so-called female students are plants from the Heisenberg. I’ve observed your teaching procedure, and I’m a media pro, remember? I’ve gotten a feel for the political bent of your real students. Tomorrow I’ll have a report from the Ministry of Science on the drugs you’ve been feeding them. Do you really want to wait for definitive proof in the form of a Ministry of Justice indictment? The game’s up, Roger; I’m on to you.”

  Falkenstein exhaled. “You’re mistaken, Royce,” he said calmly. “Like the Femocrats, like poor Carstairs himself, you’ve misinterpreted some isolated data into—”

  “Enough, Roger!” Maria Falkenstein suddenly snapped. “Can’t you see that you’re just insulting the man’s intelligence? No one is fooling anyone any more!”

  Falkenstein goggled at his wife in shocked bewilderment. Well, well, well! Royce thought. Finally a crack in their façade! “Listen to the lady,” he said. “You’ve got nothing to gain by trying to lie to me further.”

  Falkenstein sat there, stunned. For the first time, Royce saw the man out of control of a situation; confused, ambivalent, uncertain. Human.

  “Oh, good lord, Roger, enough of this!” Maria Falkenstein said. “If you’re not willing to admit the truth, I am. It’s all true, there are no female students, the—”

  “Maria!” Falkenstein yelled, his face flushing with anger, outrage, and something very much like bucko indignation.

  Maria Falkenstein seemed to retreat into a cool shell in the face of her husband’s anger. “Think what you like, Roger,” she said calmly. “It’s been said, the moment is past, and the situation is altered. You said my counsel might prove useful, and I believe it just has. But you’re still Managing Director of the Heisenberg, you can order me to leave…”

  Royce watched Falkenstein fighting to calm himself, tom by conflicting emotions. Maria Falkenstein had given him a tactical victory, injected the necessary reality into the dialog, and he was grateful for her good sense. Yet there was also something quite unseemly in her open defiance of her husband in the face of an adversary. It made Royce sympathize with Falkenstein, it made him admire the man as he reached for self-control, calmed himself, and found it.

  “Very well,” Falkenstein said coldly. “As Maria has said, the moment is past, and the situation is altered. But I ask you to consider why we’ve done what we’ve done, Royce.”

  “All right, Roger—why?”

  “You’ve seen the potential power—”

  “I know, I know,” Royce interrupted. “You can’t afford to risk having your knowledge diffused to the Femocrats. Spare me the repetition. I agree.”

  Falkenstein looked at him peculiarly. “If you agree, then why do you object to—”

  “Because we’re not the effing Femocrats!” Royce snapped. “You’ve been using the damn Femocrats to justify every lousy thing you’ve done on this planet. You’re fighting them so hard that you’ve become exactly what they’ve always claimed you were in the process. Well, that’s your business. When you start treating Pacificans like enemies, it becomes mine.”

  “We’re not your enemies, Royce.”

  “Maybe not,” Royce conceded. “Maybe you’ve just become so paranoid that you’ve forgotten how to act any other way. But you and the Femocrats have inflicted your paranoias on my planet, and it’s got to stop. And I tell you right now, the way you’re running this Institute is not acceptable to me.”

  “You have specific objections, Royce?”

  “Yeah, I have specific objections. First of all, you’ve politically screened your student body, and that’s tantamount to interference in internal Pacifican affairs, and that’s illegal. Second, you’ve outright lied about the female students, and that comes close to violating the news access laws. Third, the way you’re mind-molding the students comes close to being an act of war. Fourth, what you’ve done has precipitated the present crisis which jeopardizes the Madigan Plan, makes Carlotta and me look like idiots, and imperils your own position. And that’s just plain stupid, Roger.”

  Royce paused, waiting for some reaction, realizing now just where this was going to go. I’ve got to control the student body, he thought, or at least get some Pacifican scientists into this place. We’ve got to have people in here who are Pacificans first and Transcendental Scientists second. That’s the nonnegotiable bottom line.

  Roger Falkenstein studied him silently, and it was Maria Falkenstein who finally spoke. “He’s right, Roger. We’ve made a political mess of things. We’ve grossly underestimated the political sophistication of these people, and now we’re paying for it.”

  “What do you suggest, Maria?” Falkenstein said icily.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “But I think Mr. Lindblad is ready to make some suggestions of his own, and I think we should weigh them very carefully.”

  “Very well,” Falkenstein said harshly, making an obvious effort to choke back his anger. “You’re doing the talking now, Royce…”

  “First of all, if I don’t leave here with an agreement that satisfies me, I’ll report the facts as I see them now,” Royce said. “I’ll publicly call for the closing of the Institute myself, and I’ll use the Ministry of Media to make damn sure it gets through Parliament. Do you doubt that I can do that?”

  “I don’t doubt that you could, but
I’m not so sure you would,” Falkenstein said. “I think you realize that the importance of the Transcendental Sciences to your planet transcends transitory political considerations. I think you may be bluffing.”

  “If you really believe that, your so-called science of psychohistory is just so much jellybelly oil because you just don’t understand Pacifica,” Royce said. “You’re so effing caught up in your own self-importance that you don’t see that Pacifican electronic democracy is as important an advance in the art of politics as any advance you’ve made in science. Maybe you can’t see that because politically you haven’t evolved to our level. Any scientific discovery can be made again. But what we’ve built here is unique and complex and fragile, and if we let you destroy it, it could be gone forever. And believe me, Roger, nothing you have to offer is worth that.”

  “And if I say that we’ll leave here unless the Institute is allowed to continue on our chosen basis?”

  Royce grinned crookedly. “And leave the Femocrats to work their will uncontested on the media hub of the human galaxy? Now who’s bluffing, Roger?”

  Falkenstein managed to laugh, which sent a flash of admiration for the man through Royce. “Very well,” he said. “Let’s talk terms.”

  This is it, Royce thought. I’ve got to play this just right, not too much, and not too little. “The present student body must be dismissed and replaced by a new one chosen by the Ministry of Science,” he said.

  “Out of the question!” Falkenstein snapped. “You expect me to give you total control over admissions?”

  “Okay, there’s room for compromise,” Royce said. “The Ministry will give you a list of approved applicants by number, not name; you can screen them however you like and reject anyone you find unsuitable. But since you won’t know their names, you won’t be able to apply any political parameters.”

  Falkenstein stroked his chin reflectively. “We might be able to live with that,” he said.

  “It’s to your advantage. Taking admission out of your hands will defuse most of the charges against you and make it one hell of a lot easier for me to preserve the Madigan Plan.”