New Writings in SF 19 - [Anthology]

by Edited By John Carnell

  David spoke seriously. ‘Don’t get carried away, Jillie. Because no counts have been taken, it doesn’t mean there is no radiation.’

  ‘David, we must have been exposed to minor radiation for a very long time now, ever since Festive began to build above the ground level shields. Isn’t it possible we’ve adapted to it?’

  ‘It’s possible.’

  ‘Then ...’ Suddenly she stood and took his hand. ‘In spite of all this, in spite of the fact that almost, you believe Jeremiah and you think that the Council could be hoodwinking us all, you’re still scared to go Outside?’

  He refused to meet her eyes. ‘Yes...” he said at last. ‘I can’t help it, Jillie. I’m scared. Scared of the Atmosphere. I know I couldn’t breathe it. It’s not just radiation. I don’t trust it...’

  * * * *

  Jillie crept quietly behind the banks of horizontal cooling pipes and waited for the workmen to pass. They strolled along on the other side of the pipes, silently in a group of five on some obscure mechanical mission, carrying wrenches. She caught sight of their faces through the narrow slit between conduits; their expressions were blank, almost moronic. It was easy to imagine this group running amok; their eyes betrayed a permanent condition of dull shock one step removed from hysteria. She waited ...

  Yesterday evening she had visited Jeremiah and they had spoken at length into the night and he had told her of the layout Down Below, of the things he had seen and heard during his lifetime. And his description which had interested her most was that of the One House; the single construction above ground level built at the same time, so it was said, as the original underground Festive. Her curiosity was aroused. Why one above-ground building, when everything else was hidden underground? What was the purpose of the One House?

  Jeremiah had never seen the interior but he knew that the One House could only be reached from Down Below; there was no ground level or upper level entrances. As Festive had expanded upwards, the One House had been surrounded on three sides by new buildings and had eventually been submerged beneath the upthrust of the soaring city.

  But the fourth wall of the One House was bounded by the sea ...

  The workmen had passed; they shambled through a scarlet door at the far end of the large room, pulling it shut behind them. Jillie rose from her concealment and looked around. She was in the middle levels of Down Below, close to the ponic fields. Now she had to make her way in an easterly direction from room to room, avoiding the exposed corridors. She began to wish she had brought David.

  To her left lay the huge areas of the generating plant; according to Jeremiah’s description she must keep straight on through the workshops until she reached the eastern extremity of Festive: the rock wall which marked the boundary of Down Below. There, so the old man said, she would find the entrance to the One House.

  The room was empty. She moved quickly to the green door in the wall adjacent to that through which the workmen had passed and eased it open. Beyond was a large area, brightly lit, the floor arrayed with benches, lathes, presses and other machinery. A number of men were working; some moved from bench to bench observing and directing. Gusts of hot, oily-metallic air wafted past her and the mechanical clatter was deafening.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  She whirled round, startled. A tall man was regarding her curiously. The beginnings of fear which had constricted her chest eased; he looked harmless.

  ‘Oh ... I was just looking around,’ she said lamely.

  ‘Funny place for a young woman to be looking around, all alone,’ he observed after a thoughtful pause. ‘Let me show you. It’s as well for you to have a companion, Down Below. My name’s Andrew Shaw,’ he added.

  ‘Jillie ... Jillie Adams.’ She clasped his proffered hand, conscious of a feeling of unreality. For the past hour she had been creeping Down Below from one point of concealment to the next in fear of her life, only to be welcomed in the friendliest fashion by the first man who saw her.

  ‘I’m the Overseer here,’ he explained, ‘and you were just spying on the Maintenance Department.’ His grin took the sting out of the words; she found herself liking him, and more.

  In the humid atmosphere her dress was clinging intimately to her body and, as Andrew Shaw took her arm to pilot her into the Maintenance Department, she made an effort to rid her mind of wayward emotions and concentrate on the one fact: she had come Down Below with the specific purpose of examining the One House and for no other reason.

  For the next half hour Shaw explained to her the workings of the Department, leading her from bench to bench, introducing her to welders and turners, drillers and cutters, all of whom acknowledged her presence with the utmost politeness before returning to their tasks; none of whom, to her infinite chagrin, acknowledged her unique womanhood in a community of men.

  At last Shaw took her to his office, a small cubicle with large glass windows commanding a view of the area. She sat down, hitching her skirt around her thighs.

  Shaw leaned against the wall, regarding her with some amusement. ‘Don’t sell yourself short, Jillie,’ he remarked. ‘You’re an intelligent girl. Now perhaps you’ll credit me with some intelligence and tell me the real reason you came Down Below.’

  Abashed, she dropped what she had intended to be a frank and appraising stare. ‘I’d heard stories,’ she muttered at last. ‘I wanted to find out what went on down here. I was curious. I wanted to find out how you lived—all you men, I mean.’

  He laughed openly. ‘Just like a woman. You can’t believe men can exist without you ... I can assure you that we conduct ourselves with the utmost propriety. We immerse ourselves completely in our work which, basically, is to keep you people Up Top alive.’

  ‘Sorry ...’ She gazed through the window at the workers; they seemed happy enough. And at least they had a purpose; their work was demonstrably useful unlike so many of those Up Top. ‘Do you ever get ... Runners, in your department?’ she asked.

  ‘It happens,’ he admitted. ‘I’ve never been able to figure out why.’

  ‘Maybe living a useful life isn’t enough,’ she suggested. ‘Maybe they want something else, without knowing what it is.’

  ‘Women, you mean?’ Shaw frowned. ‘I don’t see any sign of it, do you?’

  ‘I don’t mean women. I mean ... well...’ she hesitated. ‘How do you feel, cooped up Down Below all the time?’

  ‘I feel fine.’ Shaw regarded her, puzzled. ‘I was born here, I’ve always lived here. I don’t feel cooped up. How do you feel, Jillie?’

  She looked away. Suddenly, she wanted to confide in someone, in someone younger than Jeremiah; someone who might understand the problem from her own standpoint. ‘I want to get out,’ she muttered. ‘I want to go Outside, into the Atmosphere.’ Her voice rose. ‘I want to stand on the roof without a suit, with no clothes at all and feel the rain on me with no walls and no ceiling ...’ She felt, dimly and too late that she was losing control and the tears began to fall. ‘I want to marry David and have lots of children and go away from Festive to a big place, a ... continent, and lie down in the Atmosphere and sleep under the sky and I can’t, because I’m shut in here and I can’t get out-’ Her voice had risen to an incoherent wail but she couldn’t stop.

  A huge pain exploded in her head; the shock checked her outburst. Shaw was standing over her; he had slapped her face violently. She gazed at him, horrified, through a veil of tears.

  ‘You asked about Runners,’ he said. ‘Well, that’s how they start. I’m sorry I had to do that, Jillie.’ And he bent down and kissed her gently on the lips.

  * * * *

  And afterwards, it seemed perfectly reasonable that she should ask him to take her to the One House, and that he should agree without hesitation. It appeared that there was nothing secret about the place; but its existence was not generally known. He confessed that he was intrigued by her interest in the House and by the fact that she was unable to explain, exactly, what she hoped to find there. He described
it as being apparently some kind of museum.

  So they climbed the narrow spiral staircase against the rough rock wall which marked the subterranean limit of Festive, opened the unlocked doors and, hand in hand in the glowing aftermath of physical love, they examined the ancient wonders of the One House.

  There were machines, many of them, huge and incomprehensible, reminding Jillie of nothing so much as the cockroaches which infested the eating areas Up Top, but in their great mechanical perfection infinitely less repulsive. In fact, she thought as she stood beneath a wheeled monster of sleek proportions capped by long slender blades, they were beautiful. Their purpose she could only guess at, but it was obvious that they were not a fixed part of the Festive equipment. They were individual, mobile machines, built to be operated in an environment other than the large room in which they now stood; built, obviously, to be operated Outside, in the Atmosphere.

  They wandered among the machines and speculated as to their use, then, at the very limit of the room where tall steel doors protected the One House from the sea and the Atmosphere, they encountered a long, low object.

  ‘That,’ said Jillie definitely, in the certainty of past learning, ‘is a boat. For going on the sea,’ she explained further.

  ‘Why?’ asked Andrew Shaw.

  She looked at him sadly. He just was not attuned to her way of thinking. In short, he would not do.

  Half an hour later they parted at the foot of the stairs to the ground level. Jillie held out her hand formally. ‘Bye, Andrew,’ she said.

  ‘Goodbye, Jillie. Anytime, you know ...’ he replied awkwardly.

  ‘Thanks a lot,’ she said. ‘I might need your help again some time. Maybe soon,’ she added hopefully.

  ‘It’s possible ... that I might be in trouble before long. What we did in the office ... we did in full view of the men. I don’t know what got into me. I’m a Stabiliser, you know. I’m supposed to set an example ...’ His voice trailed off.

  ‘Resign from the Party, Andrew,’ said Jillie brightly. ‘You’re not the type.’

  * * * *

  It took a very long time to convince David, but Jillie persevered, pointing out yet again the logic of Jeremiah’s theories which appeared to be verified by her observations and the significant cessation of Council radiation records.

  ‘I tell you it’s safe, David,’ she repeated yet again. ‘It’s just like breathing Festive air.’

  The lights flickered as the room trembled to another quake. Over the past week the tremors had been the most serious yet recorded and Jillie was possessed with a sense of urgency; she had to convince David and through him pressurise the Council, before the widespread recent power failures caused the population to panic. Or, if everything else failed, maybe she could set an example ...

  She had observed the change in her sector during the last week. People glanced apprehensively at the walls as they walked, wincing with each tremor and, on the corridors being plunged into temporary darkness, there had been outbursts of hysteria. She had been conscripted into a temporary position as a nurse working alongside qualified doctors in the Medicentre, and she had been alarmed at the recent increase in admittances for sedation and psychiatric care.

  ‘But how do you know it’s safe?’ David was asking again. It was apparent that he wanted to believe her, but the concept of breathing untreated, unpurified air into his lungs represented a mental barrier he could not surmount.

  At last Jillie’s patience was exhausted. ‘I’ll prove it to you!’ she snapped. ‘And I’ll tell you this—I don’t know why I bother. I could find a man who would be pleased to come with me if he knew what you know about the Council. You’re yellow, David. But just to prove I’m right, I’m going on to the roof without a suit. And you’re going to watch me do it!’

  ‘I can’t let you do that,’ he muttered.

  ‘Just try to stop me ... And then, when I’ve walked on the roof before as big an audience I can get, I’m going Down Below and take that boat away and if you won’t come with me, someone else will!’ Frustrated, she was close to tears. She ran from the room abruptly, slamming the door behind her and hating the uncertain look on David’s face.

  He caught her two floors below the roof. At this point the stone corridor was broken by one of the few windows in Festive; she paused to look out, craning her neck and seeing a stormy sky above the wall close opposite. Looking down, she saw Jeremiah’s skylight and could make out, dimly, the figure of the old man pottering about his room. This was the square well in the otherwise flat Festive roof down which the pigeons came; the well about which there had been so much controversy. A hand gripped her arm.

  ‘Now don’t do anything stupid, Jillie.’ David’s voice was intended to be soothing, but held a hint of helpless alarm.

  She tried to pull herself away but he held tight. A crowd was gathering, grinning men and women pressing close and curious.

  ‘We’re making ourselves ridiculous,’ she hissed, struggling. ‘Let me go, David!’

  ‘I don’t care!’ he shouted recklessly, staring pugnaciously at the faces around. ‘I’m not letting you kill yourself.’

  Jillie was thrown off her feet and for an instant thought that David had gone berserk. Then, as she fell heavily, she felt the floor heave beneath her, and the screaming began.

  Someone was lying on top of her; the weight pressed her to the tossing floor and, twisting away, she found David’s face next to hers.

  ‘It’s a quake!’ he shouted unnecessarily. ‘A big one!’ His eyes were bright with fear.

  Jillie tried to rise but fell back as another tremor rocked Festive to its ocean roots. She lay quietly then, her head embraced by her arms, hearing the shouting and wailing and the heavy thumping in her throat as the community screamed with one voice, as though by screaming it might frighten away the monster Earth which was destroying it.

  Then, in a sudden silence, the patter of falling plaster and stones from the ceiling sounded loud. The floor was still; she climbed to her feet, looked around for David and saw him rising also, rubbing his head.

  He was not looking at her; she felt a flush of annoyance at his lack of concern for her safety, then she caught sight of the expression on his face. Naked fear was there; he was staring at the window and, as she followed his gaze, she saw the shattered glass falling away ...

  Great, rolling white clouds surged about the corridor in an instant. Jillie saw men and women clutching at their throats, eyes distended as they struggled to breathe. Hoarse shouts and strangled coughing rose in tumult. She stumbled away from the gap, holding her breath, dragging David with her. An alarm bell jangled belatedly as they reached a rest room and flung themselves inside, slamming the door behind. They heard the pounding feet of the suited Rescue Squad racing past to seal the gap and evacuate the victims.

  In the sudden quiet of the room David eyed her grimly. ‘So much for your theories,’ he said harshly, coughing. His face was flushed and his cheeks wet with tears.

  His comment did not call for a reply and Jillie remained silent, Wondering about the people in the corridor and whether the Rescue Squad had been able to get them out in time. She said: ‘I must get along to the Medicentre, David. They’re going to be busy for a while.’

  ‘Just wait a moment. Give the Squad a chance to plug the gap and clear the air. Then you can go to the Medicentre and I’ll evict Jeremiah and get the building team in. None of this would have happened if you hadn’t persuaded me to leave him alone. My God, we were lucky the wall didn’t crack. The whole structure of the Sector is unstable in this area.’

  Then they sat in silence, not looking at each other, and after a while the All Clear bell sounded.

  * * * *

  Later Jillie tapped on Jeremiah’s door and entered on hearing David’s voice. The room was a mess; broken plaster was everywhere. Jeremiah sat slumped in a chair. David stood, irresolute following her arrival; apparently he had been about to leave.

  ‘How many died ?’ he ask
ed stonily, with a glance at the old man.

  She hesitated. ‘Two,’ she admitted at last. ‘But-’

  ‘Two,’ he repeated. ‘Two people died needlessly because of the Committee’s sentimentality about one old man. There’s not very much more to say, is there, Jillie? Anyway, I’ve told him to pack his things and he’ll have to move into temporary quarters while building is going on; then he can move back here. It’s the best I can do. I’m not blaming him. I’m blaming the Committee and myself.’

  Jeremiah had dragged himself to his feet and donned his mask; he climbed to the hatch and threw it open to admit the returning pigeons; it was noticeable that a few wisps of white Atmosphere accompanied the electronic birds into the room.

  ‘Look at that!’ David observed grimly. ‘I reckon he knew all along. He must have seen that muck coming in every day, but he didn’t tell us. He was too wrapped up in his damned hobby to bother about Festive.’