The Martian Viking

by Tim Sullivan

  Johnsmith was glad to know how Felicia felt, but he was beginning to wonder if things hadn't been better before she took the onee this morning. He had suspected for some time that she felt something for him, but her defensiveness had made life easier, in a way. Well, he supposed it was possible that she would calm down after a while. After all, it was only half an hour since she had clutched that mind-bending ball bearing in her perspiring hand. Maybe things would get better.

  As the day wore on, he tended not to worry so much. The constant training was distracting, and a new element had been added as well. He decided to take Felicia's declarations of love at face value. If she said she loved him, why should he doubt her? Maybe she would change her mind later. Who could tell? Nothing was permanent, so the thing to do was try and appreciate Felicia now. After all, he loved her, too, didn't he?

  Whenever he looked at her, she gazed adoringly at him. It was a bit unnerving, but he supposed that he would get used to it.

  The morning onees were archecoded with Viking imagery, and so were the evening onees. In fact, all the onees stamped out since the firefight seemed to be archecoded. Johnsmith pointed this out to the attentive Angel Torquemada.

  "Possibly," Torquemada said.

  "Does this mean that somebody inside is working with the Arkies?" Johnsmith asked.

  "I'd rather not get into that," Torquemada said.

  The answer seemed obvious, however. "The firefight must have been a diversion created by one of the prisoners," Johnsmith said. "While the battle raged, somebody archecoded the Viking stuff onto all the onees being processed. I imagine it's a simple enough thing to do, if you have the right gear."

  Torquemada said nothing.

  "Of course, it's also a simple matter to figure out who was inside the compound while the firefight was going on," Johnsmith went on. "That narrows down the suspects considerably."

  Johnsmith stopped talking, realizing that he had not been asked his opinion. In fact, Torquemada had not even admitted that he gave credence to Johnsmith's theory.

  "You may be right, Biberkopf," Torquemada finally said. "You just may be right. In fact, there is only one thing wrong with your thesis."

  "What's that?" Johnsmith asked, almost relieved to know that Torquemada disagreed with him. The alternative would have been mildly disturbing, as anomalies always are.

  "All the prisoners were outside the compound during the firefight."

  "That only leaves your people," Felicia said.

  Torquemada looked at her without expression. Behind her, Alderdice sat, his face gleaming with sweat.

  "None of our people could do such a thing," Torquemada said.

  "Why not?" Felicia asked.

  "Because of the obedience implants," Alderdice said, answering for him.

  Torquemada nodded smugly, picked up his notes, and left the room.

  Felicia turned excitedly to Johnsmith. "Don't you see what this means, Johnny?"

  "Huh?"

  "There's a revolutionist working inside the power structure here at Elysium."

  "You think so?"

  "How else can you explain it?"

  Johnsmith thought about that for a moment. "You may be right, Felicia, but there's one possibility you haven't considered."

  "What's that?"

  "Whoever this person is, he or she might not be doing this for the reasons you think. Maybe this isn't a revolutionist at all, but somebody working for some purpose we don't know."

  "Only a revolutionist would do such a thing," Felicia said with certainty. "There must be somebody working on the inside."

  Alderdice shook his head. "Forget all that. It had to be one of the prisoners who sabotaged these onees."

  "Why do you say that?"

  "Because all government workers have obedience implants, just as Torquemada said."

  "That's true," Johnsmith agreed. "Still, somebody must have done it. The onees didn't archecode themselves."

  Torquemada appeared, blowing the conch shell. Meal time was over. As they stacked their trays, and went back to martial arts training, Johnsmith though about his son for the first time in several days. Overcome with guilt, he realized that sleeping with Felicia kept his mind off Smitty, just as sex had eased the pain caused by Ronindella's affair with Ryan. At least he thought it was Ryan.

  He supposed that he'd never know for sure.

  ELEVEN

  RONDINDELLA WENT TO the phone to call Ryan. She hadn't seen him in two days, and it wasn't like him not to call when he couldn't see her. Smitty II sat on the floor, playing with his toy dinosaur. He always acted a little funny when he played with that thing, for some reason. She wondered if the church would approve of such a toy, since it implicitly supported the theory of evolution.

  The screen flickered on, and there was Ryan. He wasn't alone.

  "Hi, Ronnie," he said cheerfully.

  Ronindella didn't reply for a moment. She stood gaping, astonished at the sight of Ryan lying in bed with two strange women. His casual demeanor was even more disturbing. Didn't he even know that he was doing something wrong?

  "Did you have some reason to call me?" Ryan asked. "I don't mean to be rude, honey, but I'm kind of busy."

  "Kind of busy!" Ronindella exploded. "Ryan, what do you think you're doing?"

  "I'm worshipping through my newfound religion."

  "Religion? What the hell are you talking about?"

  "I'm not talking about hell," Ryan said patiently, "but about heaven."

  Ronindella was so shocked and enraged that she couldn't speak. Ryan, however, had no such compunctions.

  "I've joined the No-God Sect," he said. "I thought it was about time I got religion, just as you've been saying."

  "That—that heathen cult is no religion!" Ronindella screamed. "It's nothing more than an excuse for wild debauchery and indiscriminate sex."

  "That's not true, Ronnie. The worship of the human body is an ancient form of religion. I learned all about its cultural and mystical significance in my first, preorgiastic seminar."

  One of the naked women kissed him on the cheek and snuggled against him. The other woman just sort of stared off into the middle distance, as if she were drugged, or enjoying the afterglow of orgasm. Ronindella couldn't stand it.

  "Get rid of those two whores!" she shrieked. "Right now!"

  Ryan looked offended. "Ronnie, why are you calling these fine ladies such awful names? They happen to be deacons of the No-God Sect."

  Ronindella shut off the transmission. She trembled with rage and indignation. How could that son of a bitch do this to her? What was he trying to prove? All that horseshit about religion . . .

  "Mom, can I have something to eat?" Smitty entered the kitchenette.

  "Not now." Was Ryan trying to punish her in some way? What for? Did he feel as if she were controlling him, as if she were running their relationship? Or maybe she didn't satisfy him. Whatever the case, she had to straighten this out. She was depending on Ryan—which might turn out to be one of the biggest mistakes of her life.

  "I'm hungry," Smitty said.

  "I said not now." Maybe she was a jinx. First Johnny, and now Ryan. But Johnny had never done anything like this. And neither had Ryan, up to now. If somebody had told her this was going to happen just a half hour ago, she wouldn't have believed it. She must have been out of her mind to take up with someone like Ryan Effner.

  Smitty hadn't seen his Mom act like this since before she kicked Dad out. She didn't pay any more attention to him than she would a cockroach—less, come to think of it—when she got into this state of mind. He'd thought that this would never happen again, but here she was, looking right past him, pacing and smoking a cigarette. It probably wasn't a good idea to bother her right now, but he really wanted something to eat.

  "Please, Mom," he said.

  "Fix something for yourself," she said. "I'm going out."

  "Huh?"

  "Make yourself a sandwich, or something." Ronindella snuffed her cigarette ou
t in an ashtray. She went to the closet to get out her head gear, and was out the door a few seconds later.

  Smitty stood in the silent apt for a full minute before he fully realized that he now had the place completely to himself. This was a rare occurrence, since his Mom usually did her work for the Church here at home.

  What should he do, now that he could do anything he wanted for a while? First, a sandwich, then maybe the dinosaur . . .or even Vikings. He played Vikings a lot, ever since he had picked up that onee. He'd told some of the kids at school that he'd touched an onee. Some of them hadn't believed him, and some of them had been jealous. But everybody paid attention to him for a few days. Even now, a big kid named Benetton called him, "Smittonee," whenever he ran into Smitty. It was cool to have a reputation for something like that.

  He only wished that he had an onee now. But he didn't, so he better do something else. He started to ward the bedroom, when he noticed the mail light flashing on the phone.

  Pressing the red button to show the mail, he watched as bills, the monthly tax forms, and church information showed up. There didn't seem to be anything of interest at all. And then he noticed something odd about what he at first took to be a bill.

  It had a familiar purple and gold label on it, just like on the napkins at the Kwikkee-Kwizeen restaurants.

  And it had his name on it! It said:

  MR. SMITTY II BIBERKOPF—you are our second prize winner in the annual Kwikkee-Kwizeen™ Gigundo Giveaway. You have won an all-expenses-paid TRIP TO MARS FOR TWO!!!!!

  "Wow!" Smitty said. He was going to see his Dad! Mom had told him that he would never be with him again, but now he had won this trip, and he would see his Dad again. He could hardly believe his good luck.

  He was going to Mars!

  At least Ryan had left the flyby. She piled in and slammed the driver's door shut with such fury that a piece of plastic molding fell and glanced off her shoulder.

  "Good workmanship," she said. They didn't make cars like they used to. In fact, they didn't make anything like they used to. The world was falling to pieces, because of the decline in morals. Ever since the cure for the AIDS IV virus had been announced, the weak willed had been falling back into the licentiousness of the last century. If the hand of God hadn't guided the multinationals to merge, the Conglom would not have been able to restore order to the Earth. A world government and strong morals were good for the world's business, as the multinational sloganeers said. But somehow the No-God Sect had slipped through the law, under the rubric of religion.

  "Damn that filthy No-God Sect," she said. They had seduced the man she had pinned all her hopes on, just as they had seduced the Conglom. All she could do now was go to the church for succor.

  "Wait a minute . . . ." Maybe there was someplace else to go that made more sense. It might be sacrilegious, but it also just might work.

  She banked the car abruptly, nearly colliding with the side of a building, and pointed it toward the New Age Building. She was going to see Ryan's cybershrink. That was one way to find out just what the hell he thought he was doing.

  Five minutes later, she landed on the top level of a parking garage across the street from the New Age Building. Her license plate was scanned as she pulled into a space. One more expense on her credit at the end of the month, but so what? She had to do something. She couldn't just let another man slip through her fingers. She didn't care if it was a sin to see a cybershrink. In fact, it was a venial sin just to enter the New Age Building, that den of Satan located, not in hell, but downtown. Still, it was not strictly forbidden, not a mortal sin.

  She crossed the street with grim determination and entered the fancy front door of that wicked place. She scanned the directory to see where the cybershrink was located.

  There it was: on the thirteenth floor, of course—where else? Madame Psychosis. What a sinister, mysterious name. She couldn't help feeling a little intimidated, despite her anger. After all, the Video Church disapproved of entering this place in no uncertain terms. She didn't care, though. If necessary, she would publicly humiliate herself later. Right now, she had to talk to this shrink and find out just what the hell Ryan thought he was doing.

  She got out on the thirteenth floor, and started looking for Madame Psychosis's office. She found it three doors down and across the hall. With some trepidation, she opened the door and stepped inside.

  For a fraction of a second, she had the impression of a dingy little room. And then a projectogram threw images of whirling planets and galaxies in her face. The sense of infinite depth was complete; clearly, this was a very sophisticated 'gram system. In the middle of it all sat a serene Gypsy woman. Well, not exactly a Gypsy, but a sort of old fashioned, dark-complected woman wearing a loose dress.

  "Please insert your credit card into the slot," she said.

  "I don't want a session," Ronindella said. "I just want to ask you something about one of your . . .patients."

  The cybershrink said nothing. Instead, a curved metal object emerged from the starfields. Its serpentine shape ended not in a scaly head, but a machined slot.

  "Please insert your card into the slot," Madame Psychosis repeated.

  Ronindella sighed. She reached into her bag and rummaged around until she found a credit card, and slipped it into the slot. Obviously, she wasn't going to get anything out of this unless she paid through the nose. She had seen Ryan's bills, and could extrapolate the cost pretty well. She gritted her teeth, as Madame Psychosis gestured for her to sit on a pew that emerged from the depths of the Horsehead Nebula.

  "Are you comfortable?" the cybershrink asked in a Bela Lugosi accent.

  "I'm okay," Ronindella said, sitting rather than kneeling. Soothing music seemed to ooze out of the air; ethereal choirs and unidentifiable instruments sang sweetly.

  "Good," Madame Psychosis said, smiling beatifically. "It is important for us to communicate in a way that is beneficial to both of us."

  "Right," Ronindella replied. She shook her head, realizing that she had almost forgotten why she had come here. For the first time she began to see the attraction in all this New Age stuff. It was so peaceful here, so . . .cosmie.

  Still, it was not something she could really believe in. The Video Church was her life. And she wasn't going to let a few audio-visual, holographic tricks fool her into submission.

  "I need to know something," she said.

  "We all need to know something," Madame Psychosis replied in a profoundly understanding tone. "Life is an endless quest, leading us from the womb to the tomb, and on to the great karmic cycle that joyously and eternally repeats itself as we become one with the Universe."

  Ronindella didn't want to admit it, but what the cybershrink was saying made a lot of sense. And the 'gram was a lot better than what they had at the Video Church . . .not to mention the music. It was almost as if she were hearing a heavenly host singing on high.

  She seemed to be floating herself, a celestial spirit casting off all her worldly cares, high above the entire cosmos, the galaxies spinning around her. She felt giddy, almost bodiless. When she glanced down, she felt detached from herself. The entire universe revolved with her at the center. She felt so real, so . . .so true to herself. It was glorious.

  "Are you happy?" Madame Psychosis asked in a gentle voice.

  "Yes . . .no . . .I mean, I don't know." Ronindella felt very far away from this conversation, almost as if somebody else were speaking for her, and yet she knew that this was her voice, coming from her mouth, her vocal chords, her mind and soul.

  She was very confused.

  "Please tell me what's troubling you," Madame Psychosis said from somewhere out in space. "Perhaps I can help. It's always better to have someone to talk to, to confide in. Your secrets are safe with me."

  "But doesn't the . . .government . . .?"

  "There is no government here, only friendship, only love."

  Ronindella wanted desperately to believe that. She felt loved, but she didn't know exa
ctly where she was anymore. It was just like before, with Ryan. But that had gone bad. Ryan had made her feel loved, and now he was . . .

  "Ryan," she said.

  "What did you say?" Madame Psychosis asked in a way that suggested there was nothing more important to her in the entire universe than hearing Ronindella repeat herself.

  "Ryan."

  "Ryan?"

  "Ryan Effner. He's . . .one of your patients."

  "Yes."

  "I need to know . . ." It was a tremendous struggle to talk about this, for some reason. " . . .I need to know why he's . . ."

  "All information about my patients is private," Madame Psychosis admonished her.

  "Well, if you could just give me . . ." Hosts of angels drifted by, playing harps and blowing sonorous trumpets. The tips of their gossamer wings almost brushed against her face, they were so close to her.

  "What do you want me to give you, Ronindella?"

  "But I didn't tell you my name," Ronindella said, suddenly frightened. "How did you . . ."

  Madame Psychosis seemed to be everywhere, smiling down at Ronindella like the mother of all creation. "It's all right, dear," she said. "Don't be alarmed. What difference does it make?"

  Ronindella's panic subsided as if it were the ocean at low tide. Of course, it was the credit card. That was how she knew. But what difference did it make? For that matter, what was it that she had thought made a difference?

  Her confusion melted away.

  "You're beginning to see clearly now," Madame Psychosis said. "I can sense it."

  "Yes." It was absolutely true. Her vision was focusing, becoming crystalline. It was wonderful, as if she were seeing for the first time in her life. And yet it was also as if she were beyond using the optic nerves, the retina, and the vision centers of the brain. She had seen as precisely as this before once upon a time, perhaps before she was born, and it was only the limitations of her flawed human flesh that had prevented her from such clarity of vision for all these years, a lifetime.

  God, she had been missing so much!