by John Brunner
Well, so that was what a millionaire’s son looked like. Kind of ordinary.
But cute with it, she decided after a while. Handsome kid. Silly thin fuzz of beard showing on his cheeks. Hmm. Pussy cat.
Wake him?
Wait him out?
She sat down on the floor with her back to the wall and stared at him, not particularly thinking. She was adrift. She’d been floating already when she arrived, and that last extra charge from the joint Hugh and Carl were using had blown her way way up. Somehow it seemed like too much trouble to rouse him.
After a while, though, the sight of that open fly had its effect. She parted her legs and started fingering her crotch. It was good when she was as high as this, very slow, almost getting there and then not quite, but not getting lost either. Like climbing a snow-slope, slipping back a little at each step but never quite as far as where you’d been.
She almost failed to notice when his eyes opened and he realized she was in the room. She didn’t stop what she was doing when she did notice.
“Who are you?” he demanded in a thin voice.
She looked at his prick. It was filling out. He realized, and dragged a corner of the sheet over it. The bedding was all tangled.
“Kitty,” she said. “I guess it’s kind of boring for you in here, huh?”
“What?” Shakily, he was trying to sit up.
“I mean like is that all you got to pass the time?” Pointing with her unoccupied hand at the magazine poking out under the pillow.
He blinked at her several times, rapidly. Then he flushed bright pink.
“You’re cute,” she said. “Kind of good-looking, too. Say, I made myself pretty horny by now. You too?”
“What the hell’s keeping her?” Hugh said muzzily, a long while later.
“Probably screwing him,” Carl said indifferently. “Ever know Kitty to miss the chance? But what the hell? The poor kid deserves it. I mean like he’s been cooperative. It’s only his stinking old man who’s holding out.”
CHECK AND BALANCE
Petronella Page: Friday again, world, the night we break the regular rules and go clear around the planet. Later, we’ll be talking to a senior officer from the famed Special Branch at Scotland Yard, London, about the new British computerized system for control of subversion, widely praised as among the most modern in the world, and then we’re going to Paris to talk about the weird weather they’re having there, with snow in August, yet Right now, though, we’re going to tackle a subject closer to home. Waiting in the Chicago studios of ABS is a noted educational psychologist with strong views on a matter that concerns everyone with kids—or who’s intending to have kids. He prefers to remain anonymous because his views are controversial, so we’re going to bend our own standing orders and allow him to be called Dr. Doe. Are you there—?
Doe: Sure am, Miss Page.
Page: Fine. Well, let’s start with your explanation for the present nationwide shortage of technicians, high incidence of college dropouts, and so on. Most people assume it’s the result of distrust of industry and its effect on our lives, but you say it’s not that simple.
Doe: Not too complicated, though, despite the fact that a lot of factors are interacting. The pattern is really pretty clear. It’s not so much that kids today are more stupid than their parents. It’s that they’re more timid. More reluctant to take decisions, to commit themselves. They’d rather drift through life.
Page: Why?
Doe: Well, there have been a lot of studies—on rats, mainly—that demonstrate the crucial importance of prenatal environment. Litters born to harassed mothers, or poorly fed mothers, grow up to be easily frightened, afraid to leave an open cage, and what’s more their life expectancy is reduced.
Page: Can experiments with rats prove anything about humans?
Doe: We know a lot nowadays about how to extrapolate from rats to people, but we don’t only have to rely on that. In a sense we’ve made ourselves into experimental animals. There are too many of us, too crowded, in an environment we’ve poisoned with our own—uh—by-products. Now when this happens to a wild species, or to rats in a lab, the next generation turns out weaker and slower and more timid. This is a defense mechanism.
Page: I don’t believe many people will follow that.
Doe: Well, the weaker ones fall victim to predators more easily. That reduces population. Competition is diminished. And the fouling of the environment, too, of course.
Page: But our population isn’t diminishing. Are you saying we’re having too many children?
Doe: It wouldn’t be too many if we could guarantee adequate relaxation—freedom from anxiety—and plenty of nourishing food. We can’t. Our water is fouled, our food is contaminated with artificial substances our bodies can’t cope with, and all the time there’s this feeling that we’re in life-or-death competition with our fellow creatures.
Page: This strikes me as very sweeping. What evidence have you apart from rats and these wild creatures you haven’t specified?
Doe: The school records, the employment roster, the panic the big corporations are in this year because there’s close to a ninety per cent shortfall in graduate recruiting— isn’t there?
Page: I didn’t say anything. Go on.
Doe: Also, around the beginning of the year, a United Nations report was published which purported to show that intelligence was rising very markedly in the poor countries of the world, whereas by contrast in the wealthy countries—
Page: But that report was discredited. It was pointed out that you can’t apply the same criteria to kids in—
Doe: Wrong. Sorry. I know all about that, and about the argument that owing to our superior medical facilities we’re keeping alive sub-normal children who die in the underdeveloped countries instead of surviving to drag down the average. But that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m referring specifically to apparently normal children, without obvious physical or mental defects. I’m convinced people are subconsciously aware of what’s going on, and becoming alarmed by it. For example, there’s an ingrained distrust in our society of highly intelligent, highly trained, highly competent persons. One need only look at the last presidential election for proof of that. The public obviously wanted a figurehead, who’d look good and make comforting noises—
Page: Dr. Doe, you’re wandering from the point, aren’t you?
Doe: If you say so. But I’d claim that this illustrates the fundamental anxiety which is now coloring our social attitudes. I’d say we’ve subconsciously noticed that our kids are less clever, more timid, and begun to worry that we may be less able than our parents were, and in consequence we’re running away from anything that might tend to show that was true. When the politicians claim that the public isn’t interested any longer in environmental conservation, they’re half right. People are actually afraid to be interested, because they suspect—I think rightly—that we’ll find if we dig deep enough that we’ve gone so far beyond the limits of what the planet will tolerate that only a major catastrophe which cuts back both our population and our ability to interfere with the natural biocycle would offer a chance of survival. And it can’t be a war which does it, because that would screw up even more of our farmland.
Page: Thank you for talking to us, Dr. Doe, but I must say I feel most people will regard your theory as farfetched. Now after this break for station identification ...
THE END OF A LONG DARK TUNNEL
Christ, Oakland had been bad. But New York was awful. Even indoors, even in the lobby of this hotel with its revolving door and the air-conditioning blasting so hard it almost shook the walls, Austin Train’s eyes were smarting and the back of his throat hurt. He thought of losing his voice. Also of losing his mind. He had done that once and sometimes he suspected he’d been happier without it. Like those kids who’d testified before the inquiry into the riot at Bamberley Hydroponics, one after another stating in dull flat tones that they wanted most of all to be insane.
But
he was here, anyway.
Many times on the journey he’d feared he might not reach his destination. Naturally, with a faked ID in the name of “Fred Smith,” he dared not risk flying to New York, so it was a matter of taking a roundabout route on buses and by rail. Felice had offered him one of her cars, but that too was out of the question, because cars were the favorite means employed by saboteurs to deliver bombs, and they stole, or rented in a false name, so security was tight. Not that a car would have been much faster anyway, what with the police posts at state lines, the searches, the restricted zones not merely in cities—one expected that during August—but right out in the country, in agricultural areas. Because of hijackers after food trucks, of course.
Problems like that had been among the many reasons why he had postponed his decision to re-emerge into the open. All summer long he had prevaricated, half made up his mind, changed it again and gone back to toting garbage, driving a dumper truck, loading the endless succession of wagons that carted imperishable plastic up the mountains to be jammed into abandoned mine-shafts, baling kitchen refuse to be sold as compost for the desert-reclamation projects, tramping in huge tough sweat-saturated boots over mounds of glass and piles of squashed cans. In its way the job was fascinating. A thousand years from now these scraps that he was helping to bury might be seen on display in a museum.
If there were any museums.
It had been the attack on the Denver wat which settled the matter. When he learned that Zena had taken refuge at Felice’s home, only a few miles from where he was staying, he had had to call up and talk to her. And from that it had just all followed logically. Like a flower opening.
And here she came, after he’d been waiting only an hour. It had started to rain during that time—not that rain in New York cleared the air any longer, merely moistened the dirt—and she pushed through the revolving door in a shapeless bundle: plastic coat, plastic one-piece brooties which combined boots and breeches and were on show in every other clothing-store window, and of course a filtermask. She didn’t even glance in his direction, but went directly to the desk to collect her room-key.
He saw the clerk lean over to inform her in hushed tones that a Mr. Smith was waiting to see her.
She turned to survey the lobby, and the first time she looked his way failed to recognize him. That was hardly surprising. The infection which had turned his scalp to yellow scurf had killed most of his hair; now he was three-quarters bald and on the bare patches there were irregular smears of granular scar-tissue. It had spread to his eyebrows as well, and he’d lost the outer half of the right one. Since they had constituted his most recognizable feature, he’d shaved the other to match. And his eyes had grown weak, so he had arranged for Felice to take him and get glasses made. Altogether he looked very unlike the Austin Train who had been in the spotlight a few years ago.
Then, all of a sudden, she reacted. Came running to throw her arms around him. Christ, what’s happened to Peg Mankiewicz, the Ice Princess?
She’s crying!
Eventually she regained control of herself and drew back with a gasp.
“Oh, lord, I didn’t mean to do that! I am sorry!”
“Do what?”
“Spoil your clothes. Look!” She raised her plastic-swathed arm and pointed here, here, here, to the big dirty wet marks she’d left all over his new suit.
“Oh, forget it,” Austin said, in a tone that brooked no contradiction. Standing back, he looked her over, and added after a moment, “Peg, baby, I think something’s changed.”
“Yes.” She smiled. It was a nice smile; it went deep into her dark eyes. “The world broke me into little bits. And when I was being put back together, I had a chance to decide which bit would go where this time around. I like myself better than I used to.”
Hastily she peeled off her street gear, shaking it regardless of what might become of the carpet—it was shabby anyhow—then folded it over one arm and took Austin’s with the other. A gesture that hadn’t been in the repertoire of the old Peg.
“Christ, it’s marvelous to see you! Let’s go have a—”
And broke off in mid-sentence, her face clouding. “Shit, I forgot. This time of the afternoon the bar’s probably shut. Half the staff has gone sick again. Mono, I think. Well, let’s go look anyway; we might be lucky. We can’t go up to my room—it’s full of bugs.”
“Which kind?”
“Both.” She gave a wry grin. “Also I’m followed on the street pretty often. But they don’t generally bother me in the hotel. They have the desk clerks in their pocket, paid to report my movements.”
“Is this the same hotel where—?”
“Where they killed Arriegas and Lucy Ramage? Sure it is.”
“But why did you come back to the same place?”
“Because I’m sick and tired of being cowed all the time, looking for a corner to hide in. I’ve decided to stand my ground, and the hell with them all.”
“Is that going to get you very far? Think of the people who’ve tried before. Lucas Quarrey—Gerry Thorne—Decimus!”
“And what are they going to do to you?” Peg said, looking levelly into his eyes.
There was an absolute, dead, terrifying pause, during which his face was as impassive as a stone mask, all life drained except from his eyes. And they blazed. She felt her mouth open a little and a chill down her spine made her tremble. In his gaze she could read judgment.
When he spoke, it was like lightning striking.
“Crucify me.”
Then they were installed at a dark table in a corner and a resentful man in a white jacket was bringing them drinks. The air was perfumed with something disgustingly artificial, but one had to endure that everywhere.
She was frightened. It was not until their order had been delivered that she was able to frame words again, and instead of asking about him—she sensed that she had learned too much too quickly a moment ago—she said, “How did you trace me?”
He explained, in a normal enough tone, seeming relaxed.
“I see. How did Zena take the loss of the kids?”
“Very hard—how else? But Felice is being very kind to her, and so’s her husband.”
“Have you spoken to anyone else from the wat? Are they going to make a fresh start somewhere else?”
“No, they’re just scattering to the other wats,” Austin sighed. “I phoned Ralph, and apparently everyone was already so tired, so frustrated ... The attack was the last straw. Chances were they couldn’t have got through the winter. The jigras ruined so many of their crops and what they did have in store was soaked with fire-fighting chemicals. And do you know what the worst blow of all was?”
She shook her head wordlessly.
“They’d just had a conference about their findings on Puritan. Drew Henker was there, Tony Whitefeather, Rose Shattock. And the only complete copy of the report was burned. Of course, they’ll try and do it over, but ...”
“Oh, Christ!” Peg clenched her fists. “So it was another Syndicate job, was it? Like Thorne and Quarrey? I’d been wondering.”
Austin hesitated. “The grapevine says,” he murmured at length, “that the plane was hired by a guy who works for Roland Bamberley.”
Peg’s mouth rounded into an O. “But it can’t be true! He’s not that crazy, is he? I mean, I know he’s convinced his son was kidnapped by Trainites, but surely if he really believed his son was at the wat—”
“Oh, the grapevine carries a lot of garbage,” Austin cut in. “It may very well not be true. If it is, he must have meant it as a warning, I guess.”
“On the other hand ...” Peg stirred her drink absently; the swizzle stick had a fleur-de-lys on the top. “Have you ever met that stinking mother? I did once. Interviewed him. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d rather lose his son than give in to the ransom demand. Afterwards he’d excuse it to himself by saying the boy died for the sake of his country.”
“Meaning he’d rather have the profit on the wate
r-purifiers than his son.”
“That’s right. He’s proud of being a businessman, isn’t he?” Peg gave a thin sour smile. “Still, there’s nothing much we can do about that. Say, do you know who does have the kid?”
Austin spread his hands. “All kinds of crazy rumors in Oakland. I don’t believe a one of them.”
There was another pause. During it, she plucked up the courage to put a direct question about his own plans. By now, seeing him so much changed yet in some indefinable way so much more like himself than he had been for the past three years—perhaps because his confidence was back—she had almost convinced herself that that fearful instant by the door of the bar had been imaginary.
Still, her voice was unfirm as she said, “Why have you come here, Austin?”
“I guess I’ve come to the same decision as you. Or not so much come to it. Been driven to it. I have a mission, Peg. I don’t want it But who the hell else is there?”
“Nobody,” Peg said instantly and positively. “And there are millions of people all over the country who’d agree.”
He gave a brief bitter chuckle. “But that’s the irony of it, Peg. Remember you once asked me whether it bothered me to have my name taken in vain? Well, it does. My God, it does! It was the thing I finally found I couldn’t stand any longer. I’m not a Trainite!”
Peg waited for him to continue. She was trembling again, but this time from excitement. She’d hoped and prayed for this for so long. He was looking past her, into infinity.
“But then,” he said, “Jesus wasn’t a Christian, was he?”