Sidney's Comet

by Brian Herbert

  Minutes later, he moto-shoed off an elevator at the entrance to the Sky Ballroom. A gold and blue wall banner above a long reception table carried this announcement:

  WELCOME NEW CITY HIGH GRADS! CLASS OF ’85.

  Sidney paused at the reception table, and in a moment was watching himself in the magik-mirror while a woman fastened a plastic nametag to his lapel. It was a full-length mirror, showing a reflection of the side of his body that was away from the glass. Sidney concealed his right hand from the mirror, held it behind his protruding stomach and wiggled the fingers. The image wiggled its fingers. When the woman finished fastening his nametag, Sidney faced the mirror and stuck out his tongue. It reflected only the back of his head and body, as if he were standing behind himself.

  Sidney became aware of a fair-haired man in a Space Patrol uniform who stood along a side wall. The man seemed to be watching Sidney with pale, unfocused eyes, and Sidney recognized the eagle pin of a full colonel on his lapel. A nametag below that read: “PEEBLES.”

  Is he really looking at me? Sidney wondered. Or at something else? Sidney turned his head the other way, saw only a bare wall.

  Sidney put the man out of his mind and rolled through double swinging doors into the main ballroom. There were happy crowd sounds in this room, and a band tuning its instruments. He searched for familiar faces.

  It was a crystal clear night, with twinkling stars and a crescent sliver of moon which shone through an overhead glassplex dome. People played talking video games, electronic dice and galactic pool along one wall. Sidney paused to watch as a man he did not recognize auto-shot a ball into one of the side pockets of the galactic pool table. A wallscreen above the table lit up with brilliant flashes and spades of orange and blue as the ball disappeared into the pocket.

  “The synthetic black hole pockets are clever, don’t you agree?” a man to Sidney’s left asked. “They consume matter almost as voraciously as real ones.”

  Sidney turned toward the voice, nodded to a tall, amber-haired man in a white, long-sleeved Greco tunic. Trimmed in gold braid, the tunic had military epaulets and a Space Patrol crest on each sleeve. “Tried to bring back a real black hole one time,” the man said, studying Sidney’s round face closely. “Damn near killed me!”

  “Is that right?’ Sidney said, interested.

  “Say,” the man said, looking down at Sidney with an eyelid flicker of recognition, “aren’t you Sidney Malloy?”

  “Yeah. I am.” Sidney noted the man had deeply-set blue eyes and a straight, sharp nose. The features were distantly familiar. Suddenly the identity jumped out at him. “Tom!” he said, half yelling with excitement. “You’re Tom Javik!”

  “How ya been, buddy?” Javik asked, embracing his old friend.

  “All right,” Sidney said as they pulled apart. “Who else is here tonight?’

  “Just got in. Let’s find a table.”

  They selected a window table. From his chair there, Sidney could see why this was called the Sky Ballroom. It “kissed the very boundary of the heavens,” just as the advertisements had promised. New City stretched out below in all directions, “a sea of lights beneath a universe of stars.”

  A dance floor and slightly elevated stage occupied the center of the room. Above the floor a delicate aquamarine crystal chandelier seemed sky-suspended. Fifty-one musicians onstage tuned their guitars and practiced the hip gyrations they were allowed to perform.

  “Whatcha been up to?” Javik asked. He rubbed an ingrown hair sore on the side of his neck.

  “Not much. I’m a G.W. seven-five-oh in the Presidential Bureau. Central Forms. You’re still in the Space Patrol, I see.”

  “Naw. I borrowed this tunic from a friend. I got in big trouble—had to take garbage shuttle duty in the Transport Corps.” Javik wrinkled his nose angrily.

  “At least you’re flying,” Sidney said, furrowing his dark eyebrows thoughtfully. “I’d trade places with you in a minute.” Sidney studied a swiveling song request panel mounted at the table center. “They’ve got old tunes here,” he said. “Remember the Space Boogie?”

  “Hey hey!” Sidney detected sadness in Javik’s tone. “How about the Gimme Gumbo Rock Waltz?” Javik asked.

  Sidney searched the list, pointed. “Yeah. It’s here.”

  Javik laughed and looked around. He squinted to look across the room, then pointed and said: “Near the wall. That guy in the blue tux is Jerry Sims!”

  “Oh yeah,” Sidney said, unenthused. “I didn’t know him as well as you did.” Sidney looked back at the song request panel, mentoed it to see another reader-card.

  “Excuse me a minute, Sid,” Javik said, rising to his feet. “I just want to say ‘hello.’” He moto-shoed to the table and spoke with his friend for several minutes.

  When Javik returned, he asked about Carla. Sidney thought of his pleasie-meckie which resembled Carla, and he smiled with some difficulty. “We’re still datemates,” he said. “She was supposed to be here tonight, but called and said she wasn’t feeling well. Had a new dress picked out, too.”

  “Too bad.” Javik’s deeply-set blue eyes flashed mischievously. “Hey, we should have bought renta-dates for the night!”

  “Naw,” Sidney said, laughing. “Those girls giggle too much.”

  “Know what you mean.”

  Just then, a waitress in a striped black and yellow tigress outfit rolled over, flopping her pointed mechanical ears joyfully. “Good evening, gentlemen,” she purred. “What would you like to have?”

  Javik glanced at Sidney and winked, then replied, “Raspberry fizzle.”

  “Make it two,” Sidney said. He studied her figure when she was not looking, then glanced at Javik and saw him wink back. They watched the waitress’s long slinky tail drag behind her as she left.

  “Know what I wanted to say to ask her for,” Javik said, smiling as he locked gazes with Sidney.

  Sidney smiled uneasily in return, watched Colonel Peebles slide into a seat several tables away. Peebles stared at Sidney with unfocused, glazed eyes.

  “That guy over there,” Sidney said, nodding his head to one side. “He seems to be staring at me.”

  Javik turned in the direction Sidney had designated, then quickly snapped back to look at Sidney. “Peebles,” he hissed. “What’s that bastard doing here? He wasn’t in our class!”

  Sidney shrugged, stared at the song request panel. “Where do you know him from?” he asked.

  “The a-hole testified at my discharge proceedings. Made the Space Patrol toss me out on my butt. He’s a fairy, you know, like the pretty-boy Major I punched out.” Javik glanced around nervously.

  Sidney did not ask for further details. The two men fell silent, then looked up at the stage where a man in a white tuxedo spoke into a microphone: “We are about to begin your program, grads! Make your song requests now. Keep in mind that musical performance is a Job-Support profession, and as such is exempt from the Conservation of Motion Doctrine. . . . ”

  As Sidney and Javik watched the program, Carla stood at her vanity mirror, thinking of Billie Birdbright.

  Birdbright would arrive in a few minutes, and she pictured his handsome, bronzed face in her mind . . . the strong, dimpled chin and wavy, bright yellow hair . . . those playful, smoke-grey eyes. She used a small brush to paint a tiny black beauty mark on her left cheek, turned her face slightly to admire it from a different angle.

  I have a right to be happy, Carla thought, thinking for a fleeting moment of Sidney as she placed the brush on her makeup table. I couldn’t be expected to pass this chance up.

  She sprayed perfume on her neck and practiced smiling in the vanity mirror. Carla saw moist lavender lips that matched the color of her eyes, bun-swirled golden-brown hair with a godiva fall and a black ruby clasp to one side. The evening dress was lavender mache, with the bodice cut in a long narrow vee, exposing portions of her bust and midriff. She pulled some of the fall hairs forward over each shoulder, and they cascaded over her breasts.r />
  Carla moto-spun approvingly before the mirror. She knew she would be Birdbright’s bedmate that evening just as the other girls had been. With this in mind, she selected every article of clothing and toiletry with care. A quiet time in the videodome watching a roller rock concert along with vi-do dinners and wine capsules would start the evening off well—

  The doorchime rang.

  Oh! Carla thought with a start. I’d better start dinner!

  She moto-hurried into the kitchen module and took two ceramic vi-do trays of porkchops with applesauce and synthetic baby peas from the freezer. She popped them into the microwave oven.

  Sidney mentoed nine song request buttons, with instructions to run a tab in his name. The bandmembers began to perform, gyrating their hips wildly as they did a hard-driving rock song with an oboe lead.

  “It’s Space Boogie time!” Sidney exclaimed, thinking of Peebles but forcing himself not to look in that direction.

  “Wouldja look at that!” Javik said excitedly, pointing at a man with short-cropped saffron yellow hair who was moto-shoeing down a nearby aisle. “Hey Bob!” Javik called out, waving his hands. “Over here!”

  Javik turned to Sidney. “It’s Bob Maxwell!”

  Maxwell smiled as he saw them and rolled to their table. “Well!” he said in the old familiar husky voice. “You fellows are a welcome sight!” He pulled a chair from an adjacent unoccupied table and sat down.

  They stack-clasped hands like school chums. It came naturally, as if there had not been twenty intervening years.

  Sidney looked at Maxwell, noted a big man with tiny metallic blue eyes, a small mouth and a weak chin. A few lines around the mouth, but otherwise he had not changed much. “You look to be in pretty fair shape, Bob,” Sidney said. “Been working out?”

  “Some. Maybe a couple of kilos heavier than in high school.” Maxwell paused and touched a belt button to auto-clap with the crowd as they did a New City High yell. Sidney and Javik joined in too.

  “We are tops. . . . Class of eighty-five!” the partyers chanted. “We are tops. . . . ”

  “Remember the pranks we used to pull?” Maxwell asked as the chanting died down. He looked across the table at Javik. “Like the time I dropped a dehydrated sponge in your glass of milk?”

  Javik sat back and belly-laughed. “Scared the hell out of me when it puffed up! I was madder’n hell!”

  Sidney laughed too, adding, “And the time we went to Liberty High with buckets of Markesian slime. . . . ” He nudged the table in his mirth, causing it to rock.

  “The funniest damn thing!” Javik said, beginning to gasp as he laughed. “We greased . . . the hallways while they were in class, then . . . ha! . . . watched as they fell all over the place!” He broke down laughing.

  “No way for ’em to catch us,” Maxwell recalled, revealing small, even teeth as he smiled. “The harder those Liberty High punks tried, the more they fell! Your idea, wasn’t it, Sid?”

  “Guess it was,” Sidney said.

  “Sid always had the imagination,” Javik recalled. “How about those stories he made up to scare the girls when we parked at Lookout Rim?’

  Presently, the waitress arrived with a tray containing two red drinks in tall glasses. She placed the drinks in front of Sidney and Javik, then turned to Maxwell.

  “Nothing for me,” Maxwell said. He waved a hand to send her away.

  They listened to wailing band music for several minutes while Javik and Sidney sipped their drinks. After a while, Sidney tapped his foot to the music unconsciously.

  “What’s that tapping noise?” Maxwell asked.

  Sidney stopped tapping, felt hot in the face.

  Maxwell leaned over to look under the table, then straightened and glared at Sidney with unfriendly little blue eyes. “Was that you?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” Sidney admitted sheepishly. “Guess it was.”

  “Energy conservation,” Maxwell said officiously. “Do it in the gym, man, not here!”

  Javik swallowed a sip of his drink, wrinkled his nose in anger. “Criminy,” he said. “Ease up, Bob. We can relax the rules a little tonight!”

  Maxwell flashed a cool look at Javik, then turned to watch the band as it began to play a rock waltz. The lights dimmed for the number, and couples took to the dance floor, where they short-stepped onto disco spinners. Each couple grabbed an invisible force field pole at the center of their spinner, causing the device to start slowly into motion . . . whirling one way and then the other in time to the music. Some dancers wore lighted disco shoes in various colors, and soon the floor became a blur of lights.

  Javik asked a woman at another table to dance. Sidney watched Javik roll by Peebles’s table, saw Peebles’s expression turn to hatred as Javik passed. Then Peebles’s cool, emotionless eyes took over once more as Javik and his partner reached the dance floor.

  Sidney heard Maxwell say something, turned to face him. “What?”

  “Tom’s the same old operator,” Maxwell said.

  Sidney sipped his drink through a straw, tasted the sharp bite of iced raspberry liqueur. “Yeah,” he said. “Say, what line of work you in?”

  Maxwell stiffened. “Spent some time as a shredding machine operator in Bu-Cops. Then I volunteered for another assignment . . . in cooperation with Bu-Med.”

  “Oh yeah?” Sidney said casually, watching the disco dancers perform. “What’s that?”

  “Can’t say, really. It’s classified.” Sidney noticed that Maxwell’s facial muscles were tight.

  “Sounds interesting, Bob.”

  Moments later, Javik returned to the table. It was break time for the band, and the ballroom lights brightened. “Nikki Johnson,” Javik said. “Says she’s been permied and divorced four times.”

  Sidney swallowed a sip of liqueur, looked over the top of his drink at Javik. “You got her life story in five minutes,” he said, laughing. “See what you can get out of Bob here. Says his job is classified.”

  “Is that right?” Javik asked, his curiosity peaked. He reached across the table, patted Maxwell on the shoulder and said, “You can confide in us, Bob. We’re old pals, remember?”

  “Well,” Maxwell said, wriggling uncomfortably. He chewed at his upper lip, looked around. “It’s the reason I don’t drink anymore.” Maxwell thought for a moment, then removed a tiny brass-plated computer from his jacket pocket. “Carry this everywhere,” he said nervously, leaning forward and dropping his voice to a whisper.

  “What is it?” Javik asked, reaching out in an attempt to touch the unit.

  Maxwell pulled it away, said flatly: “A bio-medical surveillance monitor.”

  Javik rested his hand for a moment on top of the song request panel at the center of the table, then pulled it back as he asked, “What the hell is that?”

  “In fisherman’s English, it’s a cappy-finder.”

  Sidney swallowed hard, listened as Javik said, “A cappy-finder?”

  “Yeah. I could turn it on right here and walk around until the yellow light starts blinking. That would indicate we have a shirker on our hands, someone with a medical problem he isn’t revealing . . . or a person with a problem he doesn’t know about himself.”

  Sidney’s blood ran cold with fear. He coughed, felt a shiver run down the center of his back.

  “You okay, Sid?’ Javik asked.

  “Yeah.” Sidney coughed again. “Got a little swizzle down the wrong pipe.”

  “Turn it on,” Javik urged, looking back at the little brass computer.

  Sidney stood up hurriedly, felt himself becoming unglued. “Excuse me,” he said, his voice faltering. “I’ll be right back.” He scurried away, consumed with the necessity to flee.

  But Maxwell flipped the device on before Sidney got away. A yellow light on the unit blinked rapidly, then stopped as Sidney escaped down the aisle. Maxwell’s gaze followed Sidney.

  “What does it mean?” Javik asked.

  “Our Friend has a problem,” Maxwell said, risin
g to his feet. “And he acts like he knows about it.”

  “Sid looks healthy enough to me. Maybe your monitor needs adjustment.”

  “Just calibrated it,” Maxwell said, replacing the unit in his jacket pocket. “Can’t let this rest, you know. The man needs therapy.” He watched Sidney slip into the restroom.

  Javik jumped to his feet, said in a low. angry tone: “Why? He’s not hurting anyone!”

  Maxwell rolled away from the table in the direction Sidney had taken. Javik was close behind. “He’s hurting employment,” Maxwell said, glancing over his shoulder. “Each therapy client supports seven point-three-two-five Bu-Med employees. I’ve seen the figures.”

  “Hang the figures!” Javik rasped in Maxwell’s ear. “We’re talking about Sid Malloy. He’s a friend, not a god-damned statistic!”

  “Friendship has nothing to do with it,” Maxwell said coldly, turning a corner and rolling to a stop outside the restroom. “It’s my sworn duty to take him in. Look, Tom, I had no idea this was going to happen.”

  “Then forget it.”

  “Can’t. Rules are rules.”

  Presently, Sidney rolled out of the restroom. When he saw Maxwell waiting for him with an all-knowing expression, Sidney thought, Now I’ve had it. His legs began to shake. Quickly, the knees seemed ready to give way.

  An attack, Sidney thought. I’m having a breakdown!

  “Malloy,” Maxwell said in an authoritative tone. “I’m going to have to . . .”

  But Sidney grew woozy and did not hear the ensuing words. His knees folded, and he leaned against the wall for support.

  Javik rolled to Sidney’s side and held him up by the right arm. “You’ll be all right,” Javik said. He pulled at Sidney’s arm. “C’mon, buddy. Let’s get out—”

  Maxwell pushed Javik in the shoulder. “Can’t let you do that,” he said.

  Javik shook him off angrily, shoved past and went toward the elevator bank with Sidney.