by Mike Resnick
“I don’t remember reading or hearing about anything like that,” I say. “Where was this?”
He stares unblinking at me for a long moment before he answers. “Right here, in the wards.”
Felicia looks up from her plate. “His name’s Bernard Goldmeier?” she says.
“That’s right.”
“I don’t have any Bernards,” she says. “It’s not the kind of name they give to flowers.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
Suddenly her face brightens. “I do have a gold flower, though—a Mesembryanthemum criniflorum. I can call it Goldie, or even Goldmeier.”
“It’s not important.”
“But it is,” she insists. “For years it’s been how we compare our days.” She smiles. “It makes me feel closer to you, caring for flowers with the same names.”
“Fine,” I say. “Call it whatever you want.”
“You seem”—she searches for the word—“upset.”
“He troubles me.”
“Oh? Why?”
“I love my work,” I begin.
“I know you do.”
“And it’s meaningful work,” I continue, trying to keep the resentment from my voice. “Maybe I’m not a doctor, but I stand guard over them and hold Death at bay. That’s important, isn’t it?”
“Of course it is,” she says soothingly.
“He belittles it.”
“That doesn’t mean a thing,” says Felicia, reaching across the table and taking my hand. “You know how they get when they’re that old.”
Yes, I know how they get. But he’s not like them. He sounds—I don’t know—normal, like me; that’s the upsetting part.
“He doesn’t seem irrational,” I say aloud. “Just bitter.”
“Enough bitterness will make anyone irrational.”
“I know,” I say. “But…”
“But what?”
“Well, it’s going to sound juvenile and selfish…”
“You’re the least selfish man I know,” says Felicia. “Tell me what’s bothering you.”
“It’s just that…well, I always thought that if my charges could speak to me, they’d tell me how grateful they were, how much my efforts meant to them.” I pause and think about it. “Does that make me selfish?”
“Certainly not,” she replies. “I think they ought to be grateful.” She pats my hand. “A lot of people in that place are just earning salaries; you’re there because you care.”
“Anyway, here I’ve finally got someone who could thank me, could tell me that I’m appreciated, and instead he’s furious because I’m going to do everything within my power to keep him alive.”
She coos and purrs and making soothing noises, but she doesn’t actually say anything, and finally I change the subject and ask her about her garden. A moment later she is rapturously describing the new buds on the Aphelandra squarrosa, and telling me that she thinks she will have to divide the Scilla sibirica, and I listen gratefully and do not think about Mr. Goldmeier, lying motionless in his bed and cursing the darkness, until I arrive at work in the morning.
“Are you feeling any better today?” I ask as I approach Mr. Goldmeier’s life station.
“No, I’m not feeling better today,” he says nastily. “God’s fresh out of miracles.”
“Are you at least adjusting to your new surroundings?”
“Hell, no.”
“You will.”
“I damned well better not!”
I stare at him. “You’re not leaving here.”
“I know.”
“Then you might as well get used to the place.”
“Never!”
“I don’t understand you at all,” I say.
“That’s because you’re a fool!” he snaps. “Look at me! I have no money and no family. I can’t feed myself or even sit up.”
“That’s no reason to be so hostile,” I say placatingly. I am about to tell him that his condition is no different from most of my charges, but he speaks first.
“All I have left is my rage. I won’t let you take it away; it’s all that separates me from the vegetables here.”
I look at him and shake my head sadly. “I don’t know what made you like this.”
“153 years made me like this,” he says.
I continue staring at him, at the atrophied legs that will never walk again, at the shriveled arms and skeletal fingers, at the deathmask skull with its burning, sunken eyes, and I think: Maybe—just maybe—senility is Nature’s way of making life in such a body tolerable. Maybe you’re not as lucky as I thought.
The Major’s chin is wet with drool, and I walk over to him and wipe it off.
“There,” I say. “Clean as a whistle.”
Okay, I think, staring down at him. You’re not grateful, but at least you don’t hate me for doing what you can no longer do for yourself. Why can’t they all be like you?
“Why don’t you ask for a transfer to another ward if he’s bothering you that much?” asks Felicia.
“What would I say?” I reply. “That this old man who can’t even roll over without help is driving me away?”
“Just tell them you want a change.”
I shake my head. “My work is important to me. My charges are important to me. I can’t turn my back on them just because he makes my life miserable.”
“Maybe you should sit down and figure out why he upsets you.”
“He makes me think uncomfortable thoughts.”
“What kind of uncomfortable thoughts?”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I reply. But what I really mean is: I don’t want to think about it.
I just wish I could get my brain to listen to me.
Superintendent Bailey enters the ward and approaches me.
“I’m going to need you to work a little overtime today,” he informs me.
“Oh?” I reply. “What’s the problem?”
“There must be some virus going around,” he says. “A third of the staff has called in sick.”
“All right. I’ll just have to let Felicia know I’ll be late for dinner. Where do you want me to go when I’m through here?”
“Ward 87.”
“Isn’t that a woman’s ward?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“I’d rather have a different assignment, sir.”
“And I’d rather have a full staff!” he snaps. “We’re both doomed to be disappointed today.”
He turns and leaves the ward.
“What have you got against women?” croaks Mr. Goldmeier. I had thought he was asleep, but he’s been lying there, motionless, with his eyes (and his ears) wide open.
“Nothing,” I answer. “I just don’t think I should bathe them.”
“Why the hell not?”
“It’s a matter of respecting their dignity.”
“Their dignity?” he snorts derisively.
“Their modesty, if you prefer.”
“Dignity? Modesty? What the fuck are you talking about?”
“They’re human beings,” I answer with dignity of my own.
“Not any more,” he replies contemptuously. “They’re a bunch of vegetables that don’t give a damn who bathes them.” He closes his eyes. “You’re a blind, sentimental fool.”
I hate it when he says things like that, because I want to explain that I am not a blind, sentimental fool. But that requires me to prove he is wrong, and I can’t—I’ve tried.
All human beings have modesty and dignity. If they haven’t any, then they’re not human beings any more—and if they’re not human beings, why are we keeping them alive? Therefore, they must have modesty and dignity.
Then I think of those shriveled bodies and atrophied limbs and uncomprehending eyes, and I start getting another migraine.
Two days have passed, and I am not eating or sleeping any better than Mr. Goldmeier.
“What did he say this time?” says Felicia wearily, staring across the dining room table
at me.
“I’m not sure,” I answer. “He kept talking about youth in Asia, so finally I looked them up in the encyclopedia. All it says is that there are a lot of them and they’re starving.” I pause, frowning. “But as far as I can tell, he’s never been to Asia. I don’t know why he kept talking about them.”
“Who knows?” says Felicia with a shrug. “He’s an old man. They don’t always make sense.”
“He makes too goddamned much sense,” I mutter bitterly.
“Could you have misunderstood the words?” she asks. “Old men mumble a lot.”
“I doubt it. I understand everything else he says, so why not this?”
“Let’s find out for sure,” she says, activating the dining room computer. It glows with life. “Computer, find synonyms for the term ‘youth in Asia.’”
The computer begins rattling them off. “Young people in Asia. Adolescents in Asia. Children in Asia. Teenagers in—”
“Stop!” commands Felicia. “Synonym was the wrong term. Computer, are there any homonyms for the term youth in Asia?”
“A homonym is an exact match,” answers the computer, “and there is no exact match.”
“Are there any close approximations?”
“One. The word euthanasia.”
“Ah,” says Felicia triumphantly. “And what does it mean?”
“It is an archaic word, no longer in use. I can find no definition of it in my memory bank.”
“Eu-tha-na-sia,” says Mr. Goldmeier, articulating each syllable. “How the hell can the dictionaries and encyclopedias not list it any longer?”
“They list it,” I explain. “They just don’t define it.”
“Figures,” he says disgustedly. As I wait patiently for him to tell me what the word means, he changes the subject. “How long have you worked here?”
“Almost fourteen years.”
“Seen a lot of patients come and go?”
“Of course I have.”
“Where do they go when they leave here?”
“They don’t, except when they’re transferred to another ward.”
“So they come to this place, and then they die?”
“You make it sound like it happens overnight,” I reply. “We’ve kept some of them alive for more than a century,” I add proudly. “A lot of them, in fact.”
He stares at me. I recognize that particular stare; it means I’m not going to like what he says next.
“You could save a lot of time and effort by killing them right away.”
“That would be contrary to civil and moral law!” I reply angrily. “It’s our job to keep every patient alive.”
“Have you ever asked them if they want to be kept alive?”
“No one wants to die.”
“Right. It’s against all civil and moral law.” He coughs and tries to clear his lungs. “Well, that’s why you won’t find it in the dictionary.”
“Find what?” I ask, confused.
“Euthanasia,” he says.
“I don’t understand you.”
“That’s what we were talking about, isn’t it?” he says. “It means mercy killing.”
“Mercy killing?”
“You’ve heard both words before. Figure it out.”
I am still wondering why anyone would think it was merciful to kill another human being when my shift ends and I go home.
“Why would someone want to die?” I ask Felicia.
She rolls her eyes. “Goldmeier again?”
“Yes.”
“Somehow I’m not surprised,” she says in annoyed tones. She shakes her head sadly. “I don’t know where that man gets his ideas. No one wants to die.” She paused. “Look at it logically. If someone’s in pain, he can go on medication. If he’s lost a limb, he can get a prosthesis. If he’s too feeble even to feed himself—well, that’s what trained people like you are there for.”
“What if he’s just tired of living?”
“You know better than that,” replied Felicia with unshakeable certainty. “Every living organism fights to stay alive. That’s the first law of Nature.”
“Yes, I suppose so,” I agree.
“He’s a nasty old man. Did he say anything else?”
“No, not really.” I toy with my food. Somehow my appetite has vanished. “How were things at the greenhouse?”
“They finally got exactly the shade of phosphorescent silver they want for the Aglaonema crispum,” she says. “I think they’re going to call it the ‘Silver Charm.’”
“Cute name.”
“Yes, I rather like it. They tell me there was once a famous racehorse, centuries ago, with that name.” She pauses. “Of course, it means some extra work for me.”
“Potting them?”
“They’re all potted. No, the problem is making room for them. I think we’ll have to get rid of the Browallia specios majorus.”
“But those are your Majors!” I protest. “I know how you love them!”
“I do,” she admits. “They have exquisite blossoms. But they’ve got some kind of exotic root rot disease.” She sighs deeply. “I saw some miscoloration, some slimy residue…but I didn’t identify it in time. It’s my fault they’re dying.”
“Why not bring them home?” I suggest.
“If you want Majors, I’ll bring some young, healthy ones that will flower in the spring. But I’m just going to dump the old ones in the garbage. The disease won.”
I’m grasping for something, but I’m not quite sure what. “Didn’t you just tell me that every living thing fights to stay alive?”
“The Majors don’t want to die,” said Felicia. “They’re infected, so I’m taking that decision out of their hands before the disease can spread to other plants.”
“But if—”
“Don’t go getting philosophical with me,” she says. “They’re only flowers. It’s not as if they feel any pain.”
Later that night I find myself wondering when was the last time Rex or the Major or Mr. Spinoza or any of the others felt any pain.
50 years? 75? 100? More?
Then I realize that that’s what Mr. Goldmeier wants me to think. He sees the weak and he wants them dead.
But they’re not his targets at all. They never were.
I finally know who he is trying to infect.
I show up early for work and enter my ward. Everyone is sleeping.
I look at my charges, and a warm glow comes over me. We are a team, you and I. I give you life and you give me satisfaction and a sense of purpose. I pledge to you that I will never let anyone destroy the bond between us.
When I think about it, there is really very little difference between Felicia’s job and my own. She has to protect her flowers; I have to protect mine.
I fill a syringe and walk silently over to Mr. Goldmeier’s life station.
It is time to start weeding my garden.
INTRODUCTION TO “HUNTING THE SNARK”
David Brin
Mike Resnick would have been at home in the Athens of Sophocles, or the taverns where Shakespeare glowered into his cups during the writing of Macbeth. Dickens, he would have accused of being a softy. Tragedy is one of the core motifs of human existence. The inescapable cruelty; the deserved comeuppance; the well-meant but pathological “altruism” that wreaks havoc all around; the implacable unfairness of fate. It can be found in the ultimate parting that concludes even lives of joy and accomplishment—a truth that takes up half of all existence, the half that makes for powerful storytelling.
Mike Resnick knows this. He shows how the happy ending—even when it isn’t a cop-out—cannot be anything but misleading. Even if Prince Charming becomes a good king, he’ll have ulcers. Cinderella will take lovers. Their son will blow it all, in some foolish, prideful battle. We are playthings—not of “gods” but of the most powerful force in the universe. So potent and mysterious that it cannot even be defined.
Irony.
Which brings us to Lewis Carroll
, who was irony’s jester. Mike Resnick—a prolific collaborator—would naturally feel drawn toward the Godfather of Wonderland, and seek a way to co-author something cool with him…and hang Death if that old spectre tries to stand in the way! Hunting the Snark combines so many of Mike’s passions—the safari-era of Olde Africa, the tragic potential of First Contact, and any chance to play so-called “eternal verities” against the backdrop of new worlds of tomorrow.
I am the sort of writer who looks at change (the essential grist of science fiction) as a way to show how we might transform into something new. Mike Resnick reminds us that the old troubles and torments may follow us, wherever we go, and however high we rise. Plus ςα change…
There’s a little Macbeth in all of us. And Mike Resnick would make a better time traveler than I.
It began at a party, when my editor at Asimov’s, Gardner Dozois, who knew I’d been to Africa half a dozen times and was editing a series of African hunting classics, challenged me to write “the ultimate science fiction hunting story.” Of course I accepted the challenge, and then did nothing about it for a year, because I didn’t want to write a story in which the protagonist just killed a bunch of bug-eyed monsters, each more hideous than the last.
And one day, I can’t remember why, I found myself with a copy of Lewis Carroll’s “The Hunting of the Snark” in my hands, and I realized there was a hell of a science fiction hunting story to be told, something that paralleled Carroll but with an ending that was 100% Resnick. Most enjoyable collaboration I ever did; for once, my collaborator didn’t ask for half of the money. “Hunting the Snark” was a Hugo and Nebula nominee for Best Novella in 2000, won the Homer Award, and topped the Asimov’s poll.
HUNTING THE SNARK
BELIEVE ME, THE LAST THING we ever expected to find was a Snark.
And I’m just as sure we were the last thing he ever expected to meet. I wish I could tell you we responded to the situation half as well as he did. But maybe I should start at the beginning. Trust me: I’ll get to the Snark soon enough.
My name’s Karamojo Bell. (Well, actually it’s Daniel Mathias Bellman. I’ve never been within five thousand light years of the Karamojo district back on Earth. But when I found out I was a distant descendant of the legendary hunter, I decided to appropriate his name, since I’m in the same business and I thought it might impress the clients. Turned out I was wrong; in my entire career, I met three people who had heard of him, and none of them went on safari with me. But I kept it anyway. There are a lot of Daniels walking around; at least I’m the only Karamojo.)