by Tim Sullivan
He screamed incoherently. It was a long, full, nasty scream from down deep inside. It felt good. It felt better than anything he'd experienced in days, weeks. He screamed again, with even more passion.
"Mr. Effner, please," Madame Psychosis said sternly. "This is no time for primal scream therapy."
"Oh, yeah?" Ryan looked around for something to strike back with. The only thing he saw besides immaterial images was the credit card slot on its serpentine stand.
Reaching down, he grabbed it. Feeling it sliding out of his grasp, as it retreated back into the floor, he wrenched it with all his strength.
Grunting, he felt it come free in his hands with a crack. And he had though it was metal. Bits of plastic fell, sparks ignited and fell into the gaseous void. He stepped forward into the vertiginous artificial cosmos surrounding Madame Psychosis, and bellowed: "I'm gonna get my money's worth out of you, bitch—one way or another!"
Madame Psychosis went dead. Obviously the threat of violence had bugged her programming.
Ryan laughed. He lunged forward, only to feel a sharp pain in his shin. He fell, clutching at his leg, but not letting go of the credit stand.
He saw what he had run into, now that he was on his hands and knees on the floor. It was a projectogram, sending up 3-D images of whirling galaxies and nebulae. He got up on his knees, and, winding up like a baseball player, he smacked the 'gram as hard as he could.
The Horsehead Nebula winked out of existence as the 'gram crashed to the floor.
"Wow!" Ryan loved it. He had never felt so powerful, so in control of his destiny. He sucked in more of the gas, and went looking for more 'grams. Prodding ahead at ankle level with his makeshift club, he found another one and demolished it with a single clean stroke.
He found six altogether. When he had smashed the last one, he marveled at what he saw. It was nothing but a dimly lit room, maybe twenty by eight feet, with a weirdly dressed robot sitting in the middle on a chair with cables running from the back. Vents issued the psychedelic gas through louvers, obscuring the carpeted floor. The sensation of floating in space had been nothing but slick New Age talk, drugs, and 'grams. He had always known that, of course, but he had never really known it.
There wasn't much left of his splintered, plastic club, but he would use what he had to finish off Madame Psychosis.
"This is a felony," she said, suddenly active again. "Do you realize what you are getting yourself into?"
"Fucking right I do," he said, bringing the credit stand down on Madame Psychosis' head as hard as he could.
The head did not fly off, as he had hoped. Instead, it canted to one side and lolled there, a big patch of pliable pink plastic hanging down, exposing part of a titanium skull.
"This is a felony," Madame Psychosis repeated.
Ryan lifted the credit stand again, but it crumbled in his hands. There was nothing left of it at all.
He looked around for some other weapon. The pew he always sat in was nowhere to be seen. He remembered that it came up from the floor, and looked for some kind of trap door or something. He didn't see it, so he turned back to the cybershrink with the intention of dismantling her with his bare hands, if he had to.
"You'll have to live with the consequences of your actions," said Madame Psychosis, holding a hand out to him commandingly.
Grasping her wrist and forearm, he yanked the arm off. Another spray of sparks illuminated the room for a moment, and then flickered into dying embers. He hefted the arm carefully. Perfect weight for him, if he choked up a little.
He swatted Madame Psychosis in the head again, as if he were one of Beeb's Vikings swinging a broadsword. This time he had the satisfaction of seeing the jaw fly off, while the head moved up and down as if it were pleased with him. Madame Psychosis no longer lectured him on the legal punishments in store for him. In fact, as he continued to flail away at her, she ceased speaking altogether, and soon ceased moving altogether. Nevertheless, he kept on beating the cybershrink until she was nothing but a pile of plastic, metal, memory droplets, and cables scattered on the carpet.
Exhausted, he took one final poke at the pile of mechanical debris at his feet and threw the arm down.
"I could use that pew now," he panted. But the pew still didn't appear. He sat on the floor in the lotus position, just as he had learned it from Madame Psychosis.
The gas was no longer pouring from the vents. Only the acrid smoke and stench of burning plastic and his own perspiration remained. Ryan wiped his dripping face with the back of his hand, and realized that the gas had made him crazy. He had been angry and upset, and the gas had driven him insane. He had just wrecked millions of dollars worth of machinery, and Madame Psychosis had reported him to the police before he did her in.
He was a shoo-in for the Triple-S.
"Kind of funny when you think about it," he said aloud. His voice echoed through the room. He watched a spark fizzle out amid the wreckage of Madame Psychosis, and laughed. "Beeb would have said it's ironic."
Ryan Effner chuckled. He suddenly thought of himself as an asshole, for the first time in his life. A loser. He had thrown his whole life away. That woman had jinxed him, just as she had jinxed his old buddy. Now she would go back to Johnsmith and leave him to rot. He was pretty sure that he wouldn't luck out and get sent to Mars. No, this violent episode would doom him to the harshest duty in the solar system—the lunar pits.
He threw back his head and laughed. He laughed for a long, long time, until the tears came to his eyes. Until his gut ached.
Until they came to get him.
SIXTEEN
JOHNSMITH AND FRANKIE Lee were working together today. They hadn't had an opportunity to talk much recently, not since the incident a few days ago, when an Arkie had been captured. Only when they were outside, separated from the others, with a direct communication helmet-to-helmet channel, could they converse safely. The cold penetrated their supposedly seamless, heated pressure suits, making them uncomfortable enough to keep them working steadily, even though they were unsupervised. As team leader, Johnsmith was nominally in charge.
"Is that Arkie prisoner a plant?" he asked. "I mean, did they want him to get caught?"
"Sure," Frankie said, handling a wieldo. She manipulated it as though it were a marionette, and a thirty-meter long section of prefabricated sheet was delicately picked up by its extensors and set in place on the orange sand. Only a wieldo could hold the sheet steady against the powerful wind. "How do you think we communicate? We can't always wait for the Conglom to order an attack, you know."
"I see," Johnsmith said, admiring her dexterity. "So this guy has been sent out to be captured, just so he could be here to give us a message or something?"
"Most likely. We'll get a chance to talk to him sooner or later, I hope."
"Well, it's not as though he could just wander off somewhere, now that they've got him."
"True, but they might use a probe to get information out of him, or they might brain slice him. If that happens, not only does he end up a vegetable, but we're both in a lot of trouble, too."
"You and me, you mean?"
"Do you see anybody else working for the bad guys around here?"
"The bad guys?" Johnsmith was confused—how could she be loyal to the Arkies if she thought they were the bad guys?—until he saw Frankie grinning through her face mask. "Oh, you were joking, huh?"
"Yeah." She grinned even more broadly. "You take everything so seriously, Johnsmith. You're pretty cute, you know."
He tried unsuccessfully to manipulate his own wieldo, watching the sheet thud to the ground. He managed to pick it up again, thinking that he liked Frankie a lot, but that he was a little afraid of her at the same time. She was so worldly . . .and so dedicated, too. She had risked her life twice on the Olympus raid (as it had come to be known), once against the Conglom forces, and once against the Arkies, who easily could have mistaken her for one of their enemies.
He liked Frankie, all right, but he felt
that he had a certain duty toward Felicia. Still, his espionage activity might get him in a lot of trouble, so he hadn't told Felicia about what had really happened on the Olympus raid. If she ever escaped, then she would learn the truth.
The wind felt strong enough to push over their wieldos, but they remained seated in them. Johnsmith used the wieldo to reposition the sheet, which served as a windblock, as it conjoined the section Frankie had just put into place. Johnsmith was pleased with himself for getting it right this time.
At that moment it occurred to him that the reason he had come back, rather than staying with the Arkies, was Felicia. He had really been unable to face the prospect of leaving her in misery, allowing her to believe that he was dead. It seemed odd and egomaniacal, but nobody had ever loved him as fully and as selflessly as Felicia. He could hardly believe the intensity of her passion sometimes. And yet she seemed to be completely sincere.
That's what had finally won him over. How could he give up something as sweet as that?
Well, he'd have to if they probed the new prisoner's brain. There was no way he could cover up for them if Torquemada got the okay from the Conglom to brain slice. It was an unpleasant thought, but he had to face the possibility.
"One thing I've been wondering," Johnsmith said, eager to take his mind off probes and brain slicing. "How did you imprint those onees the night of the Arkie raid? I mean, you were outside with the rest of us."
"I programmed one of the robots that was on line that night. Of course, I knew when the raid was coming, so I instructed the robot to slip the archecoded onee into the matrix while Torquemada was busy, and set the machines to imprint every single onee that way until further notice."
Johnsmith thought that was very clever, and his enjoyment of Frankie's story lasted until their break.
They went back inside and removed their pressure suits. Inside the mess hall, Johnsmith joined Felicia and Alderdice. Frankie went to sit with someone else.
"You're with her all the time," Felicia said.
"Who?" Johnsmith dabbed at his vegetable paste and compcarbs with a fork.
"Don't play dumb with me, Johnsmith Biberkopf," said Felicia. "I'm talking about Wisbar."
"But I've been assigned to a work detail with her," Johnsmith protested. "What else could I do?"
"You've been enjoying it a little too much," Felicia said. "I see you smiling and talking with her."
"What do you want me to do? Spit in her eye?"
Alderdice chortled, causing Felicia to glare at him until he sobered. "Sorry," he murmured.
Felicia turned her anger back on Johnsmith. "Well, what do you have to say for yourself? Why have you been so attentive to Wisbar?"
"Honey, you're the only one who thinks there's anything going on between Fr—between Wisbar and me."
"Frankie," Felicia said, making a sneering face. "That's what you were going to say, wasn't it?"
"Well, you're the only one I know who calls her by her last name," Johnsmith said with annoyance.
"Oh, am I?" Felicia stuck out her chin like a prizefighter, daring him to strike back.
"Yes. Look, Felicia, I'm not going to stop being friends with Frankie or anyone else just because you're jealous."
"I am not jealous!" Her eyes widened dramatically.
"What do you call it, then?" Johnsmith looked down at his tray.
Felicia's angry expression turned sad. She began to cry. "I can't help it if I love you!" she wailed.
"Felicia . . ." But what could he say now? She was upset, and she would blame him for it. If only she knew the truth, about how he and Frankie were working against Torquemada and the Conglom. But he could't say a word about it.
"You don't love me!" she sobbed.
The other prisoners were turning to watch. God, how he hated such scenes. He was so embarrassed that he wished he could go crawl into a hole someplace and die.
"Felicia," he said, "please."
She sniffed, tears rolling down her face. Then, just when he thought she was about to calm down, she swept all three of their trays from the table. Plates and cutlery clattered onto the floor resoundingly.
"Hey!" Alderdice cried, as hot coffee spattered onto his pants.
Felicia paid him no heed, getting up so abruptly that her chair fell over. She stormed out of the mess hall, crying, without saying another word.
A long silence followed. At last Alderdice spoke: "I wish we had robots to clean this up."
But, of course, they had no cleaning robots, which were so common back on Earth. The prisoners did all the cleaning at Elysium. And Johnsmith was pretty sure he knew who would be assigned mess hall duty today. Torquemada had ridden Felicia pretty hard lately. That was part of the reason for her outburst, he was certain of it. But he was tired of her jealousy, just the same.
As he had anticipated, Felicia was assigned to spruce up the mess. Torquemada assigned him to a training detail, however. And when he got to the gymnasium, he found that there was only one prisoner waiting for him.
He had never seen this man before, a stout fellow with a shaved head. There was no doubt that this was the new prisoner, who had been sent from Olympus. "What's your name, soldier?" Johnsmith asked him.
"Jethro Pease."
"I'm the team leader who's been assigned to train you," Johnsmith said.
"I've already been trained," said the sullen Pease, in a thick New England accent.
"Well, then I'll retrain you. My name is Johnsmith Biberkopf. Where were you imprisoned originally?"
"Polar Base Four." Now that he had heard Johnsmith's name, his manner seemed to change subtly. He seemed more cooperative, but it was nothing an observer would have noticed. Johnsmith wasn't sure if it had really happened, in fact. It might have been wishful thinking.
"And how did you escape?"
"It was easy. I could have done it anytime. But this one day, I'd had enough. I just walked out onto the ice to die. I sat there with frost forming on my pressure suit. And I was beginning to feel pretty good. It's true what they say about freezing to death. You start to feel all warm and cozy."
"Oh, yeah?"
"Yeah. Anyway, as soon as I got used to the idea that I'm dead, this dilapidated minicarrier comes drifting out of the snow. I'd never seen anything like it. It had these weird symbols painted on the side of it in bright colors. I thought I was hallucinating, but I wasn't."
"What were the symbols?" Johnsmith asked.
"I didn't know it at the time, but they were runes."
"Runes, as in the ancient form of writing?"
"Runes, that's all I know. That's what they called it."
Well, well, well, Johnsmith thought. The Arkies even used the same writing as Vikings.
"Mr. Biberkopf," Jethro Pease asked, "are you interrogating me?"
That was probably for the benefit of anyone who was listening. Or was it? Johnsmith couldn't tell if this guy knew who he was talking to or not. Maybe he was just a good actor. In any event, Johnsmith hoped that Torquemada saw his questions as an interrogation. As team leader, he had the right to ask any questions he wanted, of course. But he really was searching for a way to get the information Pease had been sent to give Johnsmith and Frankie Lee Wisbar. It would come in due time, he suspected. Just now, it was probably best to start Pease's training.
"You look like you're a bit out of shape," Johnsmith said. "I think we'd better start with a few laps around the gym."
Pease groaned, but he didn't protest.
They started off jogging easily. After a couple of laps, Johnsmith quickened the pace, actually enjoying himself. He would never have believed this, if he had seen himself at this moment a year ago.
Pease wheezed and fell back. Turning, Johnsmith ran backwards as the Arkie tried in vain to keep up.
"We'll have you fit in no time," Johnsmith shouted back to him. "I'll work with you every day, until you're ready for some martial arts training."
Pease couldn't run any farther. He stopped, putting his h
ands down on his thighs as he bent over to catch his breath.
Johnsmith, who had barely broken a sweat, slapped him on the back. For the benefit of anyone who was listening, he said: "We believe in discipline around here, unlike the Arkies."
Pease turned his red face and glanced over his shoulder at Johnsmith with something like contempt. It occurred to Johnsmith that the Arkie didn't realize this display was designed to preempt any suspicion, and was nothing personal. Or perhaps Pease was acting, too. Perhaps he understood exactly what Johnsmith was doing, and was playing along for the benefit of their Conglom jailers.
"Okay, you rested long enough," Johnsmith said in his best Sergeant Daiv manner. "Let's do some calisthenics now. Get down and give me twenty pushups."
Pease slowly did as he was told, although he only made it to sixteen.
"All right," Johnsmith said after about thirty seconds. "Let's pick 'em up and go."
As they ran around the gym, Johnsmith wondered why—if the Conglom forces were in such good shape and were so well disciplined—they had been so badly beaten by the Arkies in the Olympus raid. Frankie claimed that she had been unable to warn the Arkies, so how come they had been ready?
Maybe they were just smarter than the government forces. In spite of Torquemada's hawklike appearance, he really wasn't very intelligent, as far as Johnsmith could see. He had led his troops right into a slaughter, and he had never even shown any remorse. What harm would it have done to express a bit of sadness about the people who had died on the raid?
Johnsmith went to the showers without any hint that Jethro even knew he was an Arkie spy. Of course, Pease might have just been waiting for a time when he was certain they wouldn't be overheard, which could take forever. Or maybe he was waiting for Johnsmith to bring it up . . . . Well, the time would come, sooner or later.
Pease was sent to an isolated room underground, where he would be interviewed by Angel Torquemada later. Perhaps the decision to use the mind probe was still pending . . .or perhaps Torquemada already had permission. That was doubtful, though, if he had to hear from a Conglom panel on Earth.
Most likely, there was still a little time to find out what he wanted.