I said, "The damn country's falling apart!"
"Not quite," Denis said. "It can cut its losses by abandoning the Central Asian republics and concentrating on regaining the really critical Azerbaidzhán region... It's only a matter of time, I'm afraid, before Moscow declares war on Iran and Pakistan." He glanced at Mitch Losier, who was still sitting in his straight chair, lost in the EE aether. "When Mitch gets back, he may have some information about that."
Lucille and Colette returned from dealing with the children, and Denis flashed them a detailed recap of his discoveries. We all found places to sit down. (I was on the floor in a corner, keeping my mouth and mind shut now as became one who was only an honorary member of the Coterie.) Eric Boutin deftly served coffee and tea from the Krupps unit built into the low table. The conversation fragmented.
Lucille told Denis that the children had been calmed and a redactive wipe-job performed upon their trauma, which was fortunately shallow. Ayeesha had taken a tranquilizer and was saying her worry beads. Tukwila Barnes declared that he was famished and brought in the basket of candy treats that had been left in the front hallway to serve the neighborhood urchins. Tater, Glenn, and Colette discussed the latest developments in the Coercer Flap, starring the black sheep of the Coterie, Gerard Tremblay. The Congressman from Massachusetts now stood charged with the crime of aggravated assault upon the President of the United States and interfering with a federal official in the performance of his official duties. Justice Department lawyers were wrangling over what other charges might apply in the case. Gerry had done the dirty deed on Monday. This was Wednesday. One might wonder what other surprises the week had in store ...
And one would not have long to wait before finding out.
Mitch Losier coughed, opened his eyes, and sighed. He was the most solid and comfortable-looking of the Coterie, which ran to ectomorphic cerebral types. His tonsure of graying hair gave him the air of a kindly pastor or a country doctor. With the attention of the group now riveted on him—for he had excursed to Moscow—he stood up, stretched, and went to the table to accept a cup of tea from Eric. He added sugar and then made his contribution to the roster of catastrophe.
"Moscow has declared war against each and every Islamic nation of the world. While reserving the right to retaliate in response to today's attacks, it will forbear force of arms temporarily and attempt to resolve the conflict through peaceful means, in consultation with the heads of state of Iran, Pakistan, Turkey, and the Kashmiri Republic."
"Thank God!" Lucille cried.
"That's the good news." Mitch stirred his tea and sipped. "The bad news is, that motherfucker Kumylzhensky has arrested every metapsychic operant in the Soviet Union. In the light of today's surprise strike, he feels their loyalty to the nation is deeply suspect. They are to be interrogated and held in custody until the state of internal emergency has passed, and then put on trial for treason."
***
In those dark days, when even persons of goodwill were soul-burdened with the malign aetheric resonances of hatred, fear, and suffering, there were many people in the United States who watched the disintegration of the Soviet Union with righteous triumphalism: the godless Commies had finally got what was coming to them. For the Sons of Earth movement, however, the Soviet misfortune had an ironic twist. To the Sons—who had very nearly become respectable among the American underclass by that time—all operants, including most especially the Soviets, were involved in a conspiracy to destroy religion, freedom, and the sovereign rights of individuals. Yet here was the Red military dictator himself denouncing the superminds as "the greatest menace the Communist Revolution has ever faced." As Kumylzhensky thundered on about the alleged misdeeds of the Twentieth Directorate, it became evident to world observers that the KGB as a whole had been acting to bring about the downfall of Party and military right-wingers, and restore the impetus toward an open society in the Soviet Union that had been so tragically reversed following the death of Kumylzhensky's predecessor. Excorporeal excursions by outsiders into the cells of the purged operants revealed their motivation to the world. The EE adepts of dozens of nations became witnesses for the defense—at least in the forum of public opinion. Even the most naive and fearful normals eventually came to believe that the imprisoned Soviet operants had been a force for good, not evil.
In America, the hard-core membership of the Sons of Earth would eventually talk their way around this ideological paradox; but the movement had lost much of its momentum, along with any semblance of a moral base for its antioperant position. All over the world religious leaders—even some Muslims—made resounding statements in favor of operant civil rights. The Pope finally got around to issuing an encyclical, Potestates Insolitae Mentis, affirming that human metapsychic powers are a part of the natural order, by no means devilish, and as "good" in the eyes of God as any other part of his creation—provided those powers are not abused.
It was a watershed time, even though we operants did not realize it. From then on, even in spite of the Coercer Flap and other operant high crimes and misdemeanors, the surge of blind antioperant prejudice began to decline. The reversal was not an overnight affair. Pockets of antioperant fanaticism remained in the United States and would be exploited on the very eve of the Intervention. But the majority of otherwise worthy people who had been infected by fear and the prejudice of ignorance slowly experienced a change of heart that would bear unexpected fruit just when the most valiant champions of operancy faced their darkest hour.
18
BAIE COMEAU, QUÉBEC, EARTH
5 FEBRUARY 2008
"WE HAVE ALL waited a long time for this!" Victor Remillard was speaking his Yankee version of Canuckois into a loud-hailer. "And it seemed as though the damned process was never going to work right, and some of us were tempted to abandon the project, and dump the holy bacteria and their dedicated keepers into the Saint-Laurent... I know I was tempted."
The bundled-up audience of refinery workers and gaugers and tanker crew members yelled and whistled their appreciative unbelief, and their thoughts were plain to read: You, boss? Give up? Tu te fiches de nous! Don't try to kid us!
Victor gave a comical shrug and joined in the laughter. He was wearing an old mangy raccoon coat and a long knitted muffler and a white hard hat like those of the workers—only dirtier and more dented. Standing beside him, Shannon O'Connor could not have been more of a contrast, swathed in ankle-length arctic fox and holding an empty silver champagne bucket. It was her tanker waiting at dockside to take on the cargo.
"When we conquered the production problems, we discovered we had distribution problems," Victor declaimed. "And we solved that, too. And today this refinery of ours is ready to ship its first batch of lignin-derived gasohol fuel to energy-starved Europe!"
Everybody cheered.
"I know you're wondering why we're standing out here freezing our pétards off, while inside the plant all those pampered germs are gobbling pulpwood in nice warm vats and shitting liquid gold. So I'll cut the speechmaking short and show you just what we've been waiting for—and what Mme. Tremblay's tanker's been waiting for!"
There were more cheers while Shannon handed him the silver bucket in exchange for the hailer. Victor positioned the container under a huge flexible hose that had been jury-rigged for the occasion and yelled, "Dupuis—open 'er up! But easy, for the love of God!"
The Chief Chemical Engineer of the facility, who was stationed at a redundant manual valve manifold outside the control shed, gripped a big wheel. He turned it a fraction of a centimeter and pinkish liquid dribbled into the champagne cooler. An acrid organic odor spread through the frigid air.
"Yo!" Victor hollered, and the flow ceased. He carried the bucket over to a venerable black Mercedes, his official vehicle during his supervisory visits to the Baie Comeau plant of Remco International. The car had been decorated in honor of the day's festivities with Canadian and American flags and bunches of multicolored balloons. The manager of the refinery slipp
ed a plastic funnel into the fuel tank. Victor poured the liquid to loud applause.
"And now, my friends—we come to the moment of truth! Have we really manufactured a revolutionary new fuel... or is it only bug pee after all?"
While the workers were laughing he slipped behind the wheel. The engine started up with a roar, and the renewed cheers were drowned out when the tanker that towered above the pumping station sounded its great diaphone horn.
Everybody knew that the car had been all warmed up and primed to go, but the symbolism was all that counted. Victor jumped out, leaving the engine running, opened the other door for Shannon, and bowed her in during a final bout of clapping. Then they drove off the quay and the ceremony was over. The crowd dispersed and the hose-handling derrick on the ship lowered its cable to begin the cargo-loading process.
***
They drove out of town toward the new airport, for she would have to go directly to Washington to confer with the eminent criminal lawyers who were preparing Gerry's case. Victor slowed the Mercedes and pulled off the road into a deserted log-scaling yard where trees hid them from passing traffic. He stripped the decorations off the car, dumping the flags into the trunk and letting the helium-filled balloons waft away into the leaden sky. Then he got back in and they sat there.
"Why did your father let you do it?" he asked.
"He thinks he's fattening you for acquisition. He's been watching your situation very keenly in spite of the fireworks in Washington. The way you weathered the capital crunch—squeaked through without losing control of the process—impressed him no end. Beware of sharks trolling bait."
"Just let him try... Is this scandal of your husband's some of your doing? Are you using him to set your father up?"
Shannon laughed, a throaty, appetite-laden sound. "Why don't you read my mind?"
"I've done that already."
He pulled her toward him and his icy lips and tongue possessed her hot mouth. Her white fox toque fell from her head and the long auburn hair flamed against the pale fur of her coat. His hand tightened, cupping her skull, and she moaned, her mind crying her need. Victor's other hand nearly encircled her neck. The fingertips against her upper spine seemed to be drawing energy from her supercharged pelvic nerves, draining—
No please Vic not that way damn you not that way let's try it for once my way please please!
No.
It's not love you fool there's no real loss no bonding why won't you there's nothing of him only me why not please oh do it—
I'll give you your pleasure I owe you that but in my own way...
Bastard!... Oh God how I hate you how I hate you...
Hold on to that. Guard it very carefully until you're ready to exchange him for me.
"At least he's human," she wept aloud. "But you..." She screamed then as the orgasms began, and was lost to warmth.
19
FROM THE MEMOIRS OF ROGATIEN REMILLARD
NOW I SHALL have to tell you about Gerry Tremblay, once a valued member of Denis's Coterie, whose spectacular disgrace was one of those backhanded blessings that seem to prove God's sense of humor.
The Pope's encyclical dealt frankly with the great sources of temptation that must accompany powerful operancy—a sinister fact of life that the American metapsychic establishment, in particular, had long tried to sweep under the rug. This ostrich attitude, a tendency to discount the possibility of disaster until it smacks you in the teeth, was probably quintessentially American. Even in the worst of times, we were a people who hoped for the best and believed that good intentions covered a multitude of sins. Because we were a young nation, because we skimmed the cream of the planetary Mind, and because our land was unarguably the richest and most fortunate on Earth, Americans had the arrogance of the golden adolescent upon whom fate smiles. We thought we were invincible as well as stronger and smarter than everyone else. We suffered a periodic comeuppance but bounced back as triumphalistic as ever. Even today, citizens of the Human Polity of the Galactic Milieu who are of American extraction tend to display a tiresome smugness about their heritage.
At the turn of the twenty-first century, the American metapsychic establishment shared the national flaw. It had deplored the Nigel Weinstein affair, but explained it away as a piece of temporary insanity. The atrocities of the Flaming Assassin were more patently criminal—but they, too, could be attributed to a madman. In other parts of the world, where there were fewer cultural inhibitions against the public avowal of operancy, there had been crimes committed in which metapsychic powers were used with obvious malice aforethought. In America—for reasons that became clear only after the Intervention—few such crimes were ever prosecuted; and none of them, until Tremblay's, had the aspect of a cause célèbre. American operant leaders had tended to sidestep the ethical aspects of their gifts and concentrate instead on the scientific and social applications of them. The few persons, such as Denis, who knew of the existence of evil and exploitative operants found themselves hamstrung by gaps in our legal system. American law, with its reverence for individual rights, makes no provision for the mental examination of suspected criminals. The very idea is contrary to the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution, which says that no person shall be compelled in a criminal case to be a witness against himself. However, if this principle holds, certain types of operant criminal activity can never be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. The Scottish jurors had come to this conclusion in the Weinstein case. It seems likely that Kieran O'Connor and Representative Gerard Tremblay (D-Mass.) counted upon escaping retribution in a similar manner when they conspired to coerce the President. O'Connor's role in the affair was never proved. Poor Gerry got what was coming to him—and forced a fundamental revision of operant ethics at the same time that he became the ultimate cause of Kieran O'Connor's undoing.
As I have stated earlier, I never really liked Gerry Tremblay. One might credit prescience or redactive insight—or perhaps just the old Franco instinct for smelling a rat. Psychoanalysts would doubtless point out that it was Gerry's deep-seated insecurity and envy that laid him wide open to O'Connor's peculiar brand of sorcery. He was certainly besotted with his wife Shannon, who pretended to mold Gerry to her father's specifications at the same time that she was planning the ruination of both of them.
After Gerry was elected to his first two-year term in 2004, he served on the House Special Committee on Metapsychic Affairs, where his unique position as the only operant congressman assured him of continuing publicity and growing influence. The stance he took was surprisingly conservative, dismaying the operant establishment. He helped kill a measure that would have set up federally funded training schools for operant children. In a speech that was widely televised, he pointed out that this very sort of program—which was being followed in a number of liberal countries such as Japan, West Germany, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and the Scandinavian nations—was leading to the formation of elite groups of operant children, the same kind of group that had tried and failed to take political control of the Soviet Union. While the Soviet operants had evidently worked on the side of the angels, could one assume that all operants would inevitably be so high-minded? Representative Tremblay, an operant himself, counseled great caution. He declared that Americans should remain aloof from any schemes that would distance operant youngsters from normals and foster unhealthy illusions of superiority. While he was not in favor of having obstacles put in the way of operant training per se, he hoped that it would always be seen as an adjunct to regular public or private schooling—with operant and normal children educated together. This was the American way, avouched the Gentleman from Massachusetts, and the best way—for the sake of the young operants themselves and the nation as a whole.
Gerry's speech was a smash, and he was well on the road to the big time. Progressive operants tried in vain to point out that federal funding of their programs was vital. In those depressed times, the states had no tax revenues to spare for operant training; private facilities for opera
nts, except at institutions such as Dartmouth, MIT, Stanford, and the Universities of Texas, Virginia, and California-Davis, where there were long-standing Departments of Metapsychology—were too expensive for the majority of gifted children. Minds would be wasted, the operants warned.
Not so, replied Tremblay. In time, when the nation could afford it, Congress would reconsider funding a generalized operant education program. But these were perilous days. America was threatened not only by unemployment, inflation, and shortages, but also by the escalating Holy War of the fundamentalist Muslims, which now had spread further into Africa, India, and the East Indies; and China had taken a mysterious turn toward isolationism that alarmed both its neighbors and the United States. Tremblay told his fellow operants to be patient—and to ask not what their country could do for them, but what they could do for their country.
As the agent of Kieran O'Connor, Gerry Tremblay was given two important assignments. The first was to influence both the President and Democratic members of Congress in favor of O'Connor's military-industrial contractors, especially those connected to the Zap-Star satellite defense system, the new ON-i Space Habitat, and the proposed Lunar Base. Gerry was successful in this area because Baumgartner was committed to a strong military posture and to the American space program, and liberal Democrats who favored the latter could rather easily be made to see the high-tech side benefits of the former.
Gerry's second assignment was to discourage Baumgartner from granting special privileges to operants, thus denying a power base to the operant establishment. The defeat of the Operant Education Bill was a great start for Gerry... but immediately after that he realized that O'Connor's second mandate was a no-hoper.
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