“Human shit gotta be composted at leas’ a year, meat-brain.”
“Hold it,” I cut in. “You’re both right. Jordan, those methane converters have big slop-slopes. The stuff that comes out the bottom is a year old or better. Krish, we do need greenhouses, and soon—unless you want scurvy again this winter. Rose hips won’t grow in snow.”
“But we can’t do both,” Krishnamurti complained. “We can’t spare more than twenty people, and either project would take that many.”
“Seems like Technos’d be the last choice to build a greenhouse program. Jordan, why don’t you recruit some of your Agros? The employment rate for guerrillas is terrible these days.”
“Where they gon’ live? Winter comin’ on, dammit.”
“I know where you could house twenty men right now, with a day’s work or so.”
“Where?”
“The hot-shot factory.”
“Oh.” Both men got thoughtful looks. After a minute they started, looked at each other and headed for the big map on the conference table. “How much prime shit can you deliver?” Jordan asked.
“Well…” Krishnamurti began, and I grinned. They wouldn’t be at each other’s throats for at least an hour now. I’m a good mayor. Far out.
“Father,” Alia said, speaking for the first time.
“Yes, Alia?” He pulled his attention from the map.
“I’ve got a problem for you two Planners. You too, Isham.”
“What’s that?”
“Collaci.”
No one asked what problem she meant. Within a very few days of the Battle of Fresh Start, Teach’ had begun to mope. I’d gotten drunk with him once and stoned with him twice without effect, and two days ago he’d gotten up from his desk, locked the empty and obsolete Security headquarters, and taken to the woods. His house still stood empty.
“I confess I have no solution,” Krishnamurti said, his eyes pained. “What use is a general in peacetime?”
“That Collaci is a lot of man,” Jordan declared. “Seem like they ought to be some kinda work for him. He need to be useful.”
“I love Teach’,” I said sadly, “but I’m goddamned if I can see how we can use him efficiently. I offered him a job teaching philosophy while Mike’s away, but he said he’d probably find himself kicking the shit out of his students out of pure reflex. He’s no good at chaperoning drunks and wife beaters either—what he is, he’s the best killer in the world, and we just don’t need one.”
“He could boss the hunting crew,” Jordan suggested, rubbing a hand across his mouth. “We be needin’ lotsa meat when the cold come.”
“Mmmm—close. But it feels like a Band-Aid on a slashed artery, like that teaching job. Teach’ needs challenge, not makework.”
“Isham,” Alia said suddenly, “he’s not what you said.”
“Eh?”
“He’s not the world’s best killer. That’s what the times required him to be. Collaci is the world’s best survivor.”
I blinked.
“By God, you’re right,” Krishnamurti said.
“And where does Fresh Start need a survivor-type?” she went on.
“Where?” Jordan asked.
“Out there,” said Krishnamurti, waving at the window, and his daughter smiled.
“Huh?”
“What do we know about the world?” Krish asked. “There’s no one on the airwaves but us—all we know about anything more than a hundred miles in any direction is hearsay and rumor from occasional wandering travelers, and the stories they tell are wildly inconsistent. It appears that there may be a kingdom of some sort growing in the Deep South somewhere, and we know virtually nothing about it. We need another Balboa, another Lewis and Clark, another Livingston. We need a survivor.”
“That’s not all we need,” Alia said. “We need a missionary. Someone has to spread the news that the War is over—that men can and must live with Muskies.”
“She’s right,” I told Krish. “It’s all very well to Save Lower New York State. But sooner or later we’re just going to have to up and Save the World. And we can’t do that if we don’t know a damned thing about it. Old Buddhist notion, hiniyana and mahayana: small boat and big boat. You either become a hermit and try to get enlightened, or you go out and try to get everybody enlightened. We’ve spent the eighteen years since the world sank in perfecting and tightening up our lifeboat—now it’s time to look around for other lifeboats, and for drowning men in need of one.”
“Of course,” Krishnamurti said wonderingly. “For eighteen years I’ve been certain that India survived, perhaps better than we, but there never seemed to be time to…but there is time, now.” His eyes went far away.
“China survived,” Jordan asserted. “Bet they could teach us plenty.”
“We don’t know if California survived,” I said dryly. “But it’s time we found out. Teach’ ain’t superfluous—he’s our Most Valuable Player. Okay, as Acting Mayor of Fresh Start I order myself to take a couple days off and go offer Teach’ an explorer’s commission, give him a…uh…missionary position. I hate like hell to start my administration by cutting school, but I don’t believe anyone else could track Teach’ but me. Will you two cover for me?” I put just the least shade of emphasis on the “you two.”
They glared at each other like rival tomcats, and Alia and I burst out laughing. They glared at us, and then at each other again, and then they broke up too. “We try to keep it together,” Jordan said, laughing, and gathered the three of us in his great arms.
“Now design me a solar power plant and a couple greenhouses,” I said awhile later. “We’ve got to go say goodbye to the road company.” We left the two Planning Chiefs bent over the map, and got as far as the hallway. I paused then, sent Alia on ahead, and went back to the Planning Office, opening the door quietly. “Jordan?”
He looked up. “Yes, brother?”
I inclined my head. He left Krishnamurti and stepped out into the corridor. “Yeah?”
I tried to say it just right. “Been meaning to ask you. What made you decide to stop wearing that mask?”
He looked startled, ran a finger across his big smashed nose.
“None of my business, of course, but…well, I may be stupid, but I’m just beginning to put two and two together about my woman.”
He did what I know he thought was smiling, and nodded. “You got it, man. After the Muskies took you from my cave, I got into it with yo’ old lady a few times. Couldn’t figure why she stop’ you from killing me when you had the chance. We talked some. Whoo-ee, she said a lot of words I didn’t wanna hear. Made me some mad. I got to thinkin’, after High Mistral hit me thataway, thinkin’ on things she said. I figured the thing she say that make me maddest mus’ be the truest.” His voice deepened. “Was she say, ‘You don’t need to hide behind that handkerchief.’ Was, ‘You should be as proud of that face as you always was of the black skin that was given you by the same Lord Pan.’ She got a way of humblin’ you an’ makin’ you proud all at the same time.”
“I know what you mean.”
“You know, all that time we was talkin’ in that cave, I never thought I knew where she was at one time. But I believe it hadn’t been for her, that High Mistral never coulda got to me. You know?”
I put my meat hand on his shoulder. “I know. The same goes for me. I’m just beginning to realize what I married.”
“Man, you got lucky. Be worthy.” He squeezed my arm.
“It’s a challenge, all right. Later.”
“Peace.”
I hurried outside. A coffee urn squatted on a folding table beside the heavily loaded truck, and Mrs. Wilson was passing out steaming cups. I traded Alia a kiss for one and turned to face Dad, Helen, Wendell and Mike. As usual, Helen looked away. “So you mugs are our ambassadors, huh?”
“So you’re our mayor, huh?” Mike asked.
“I stand foursquare for chickenshit in every pot patch. Seriously, Mike, how’s your undermind? You
sure you and Wendell can link up with Dad?”
“Yep. High Mistral introduced me to a colleague whose name doesn’t translate, and we have excellent rapport. With the aid of the Infernal Gadget, it’s a sure thing.”
“What’s the new Musky like?”
“Reminds me of music a lot. I call him ‘Gershwind.’”
I winced. “High-ra Gershwind, no doubt.”
Wendell spoke up diffidently. “No, actually—‘George.’ The Rhapsody in Blew.”
“Get thee behind me,” I groaned. “Alia, have you told Helen yet?”
“No. I thought perhaps you should.”
I studied her a moment in admiration. “Just can’t help it, can you? Pure instinct.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” she lied.
“Nor I,” Helen said. “Tell me what?”
“Well,” I said, turning to face her and Dad, “first I have to tell you what Alia and I did last night.”
Mike cut in. “Three to one you haven’t discovered anything I hadn’t tried by your age.” Helen blushed.
“You’re on,” I said, “for an ounce of hash. We spent the night in the undermind, linked with High Mistral, and by the end of the trip it was a five-way hookup.”
“I don’t follow,” Dad said. “Who were the others?”
“Alia found us the first one. A little squirt named Wendell Jacob Stone.” Gasps and other exclamations. “It wasn’t exactly what you’d call a dialogue—he seems to be just now growing a central nervous system. But we felt him. Felt his struggle to live and grow.”
“My God,” Dad said. Wendell’s jaw hung down.
“I’m impressed,” Mike said soberly. “What was it like?”
“Like meeting High Mistral for the first time, cubed, and then cubed again. Like looking on the face of God.”
“You said ‘five-way,’” Helen spoke up, meeting my eyes for the first time.
“It was Isham’s idea,” Alia said quietly. “Since I’d brought us into that plane, he suggested we step up our reception. So we did.”
“And…?”
“Helen,” I told her, “I’m very glad you decided to leave the sunpower specs with George and go to New York. Dad’ll be a lot of comfort to you when the morning sickness starts.”
“No!” She started, and then her face went so utterly smooth that fifty years’ worth of wrinkles disappeared. Dad dropped his coffee on his feet, looking like a man who’d been kicked in the head by an ox. Mike had a grin a half-meter wide, and Wendell had the other half.
“Yup. There’s a little blastula in your belly.”
Mike caught the feminine suffix. “A girl, eh?”
“I didn’t grok any Y chromosomes. Always wanted a sister.”
“Isham…oh, Isham! I…” Helen was saying. She seemed to have something else to say, but she couldn’t get it out. Dad was speechless. “Oh, Isham!” Alia caught my eye, gestured with hers.
“Want to step inside a minute, Helen?” I nodded toward the door of the Ad building.
She thought about it. “No.” She gulped her coffee as though it were raw whiskey, and placed the cup carefully on the urn-table. “No, I want to say this in front of Jacob. He’s been asking me for two weeks now why I still seem to hold a grudge against you. He says it doesn’t make sense to forgive him for what he did to the world if I can’t forgive you for what you tried to do to him.” She took a deep breath. “He’s right, Isham. I’ve cordially despised you for over fifteen years, now—attempted murder had nothing to do with it.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Your wife does—don’t you, dear?” Alia said nothing. “It’s your face, Isham. Your face.” She got stuck then.
I must have looked stupid.
“You look like her,” Helen cried, and Dad jumped again.
“Oh, holy shit,” I breathed, and Alia smiled.
“You looked like Barbara,” Helen repeated, “You reminded me of what she had had, what I thought I could never have. Even when the War ended I despised you, because I thought I could never have Jacob’s child. I thought it was too late.” She burst into noisy tears, and Dad snapped out of his trance and took her in his arms. His eyes met mine over her shoulder, and I ran to embrace them both. “It’s all right, Mother,” I said gently, “It’s all right. It’s over now.”
She pulled away from Dad and threw her arms around me, and as I hugged her back I gave Alia a thumb-and-forefinger circle.
Finally all the hugs were over with and the congratulations had all been said and the sun was climbing high in the sky. It was time, as Lightin’ Sam says, to bottle it up and go. Mrs. Wilson took her coffee-urn inside. Workers began passing by on their way to Southtown, singly and in groups. Most called out cheery farewells to Dad and Helen and Mike, and Dad thanked them all by name. One or two even said good-bye to Wendell, which pleased me. Won’t be such an insuperable PR problem after all. History can be rewritten. Wendell acknowledged the few farewells with dignity, not in the least disturbed by their rarity.
I took him by the shoulder with my meat hand, Dad with the metal one. “Okay, you two. Off you go. Listen to your teacher Docta Mike, and do your homework. I don’t want to have to boss this burg forever, you know.”
“This is the first vacation I’ve had in eighteen years,” Dad said placidly, “and my first honeymoon in twenty-five. I’ll be back when I’m damned good and ready.” Helen and Mike guffawed.
“That’s telling him,” Wendell agreed. “I haven’t shared a laboratory with your father in a long time, Isham. I haven’t shared a lab with anyone in a long time. I might get to like it.”
“You’d better come back with this crew when they’re done,” Alia threatened, “or I’ll come after you. I want you at my birthing, dammit.”
“That I’ll return for,” Wendell promised. “Isham, you listen to your teacher too.”
“I do,” I said, grinning at Alia.
“Let’s roll,” Mike said, and got into the truck. The other three walked around the front and boarded too, and the big engine roared into life. “Mighty crowded cab,” I observed, and Dad, Helen, and Wendell said “No it isn’t” in chorus and then laughed together.
“Give my regards to Broadway,” I said, and they were gone. The commuters walking along West Avenue cheered as the truck went by. Alia and I watched until it was out of sight, and then linked arms and headed for the Linkin’ Tunnel and her smithy.
“You handled that business with Helen pretty smoothly,” I told her as we entered the tunnel.
“I just like to see people be happy,” she said, a bit defensively.
“I’m not mocking, Madonna, I’m applauding. You can’t help being an empath, and you wouldn’t if you could. Hell, right now I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re trying to figure out a way to fix Wendell up with a girlfriend.”
“What do you think of Mrs. Wilson?” she asked seriously.
SPIDER ROBINSON was the winner of the John W. Campbell award for the best young science fiction writer. He is the author of numerous short stories. TELEMPATH is his first novel.
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