Prescription for Chaos

by Christopher Anvil

  Benning could now do any of a number of things, and Heyden sat on the edge of his chair, watching intently to see what came next.

  Benning looked at the pad, glanced at places where a "bug" might be hidden, and crossed his fingers to show he spoke for the benefit of uninvited listeners. "What we've got is a damn good gimmick to get us a government contract on this, boy. We've run into a little glimmer of pay dirt on this one. I can see just how to start the golden flood pouring in, and keep it flowing for years."

  He wrote rapidly on the pad, and shoved it across the desk. Heyden read:

  Not the Russians. I. I.

  Heyden winced and glanced around. "M'm," he said aloud. "Well, I don't know. I got quite a note from Stu Grossrad."

  Benning sat up. "No kidding."

  "No kidding."

  "What did Stu say?"

  "What does he ever say. It's either 'Full speed ahead!' or 'Emergency reverse!' The last time we were supposed to go all out, shoot the works. Naturally, this time we're supposed to chop off all the deadwood, shove everything we're working on now onto the back burner, and pull that toy kit idea off the back burner and put it onto the front burner. Whenever we're eager to do something, we're supposed to let it congeal on the back burner. When we couldn't care less about the thing, then we're supposed to work on it. How does this fit in with your bright new idea?"

  "Not so hot. What toy kit is that?"

  Heyden wrote I. I. You mean Interdisciplinary Intellectronetics? Or Interspatial Ionics?

  He shoved the pad across the desk, then handed over the note from Grossrad. "Read it. You'll remember."

  Benning crackled the paper, glanced at the pad, wrote briefly, looked back at the note, wrote some more, glanced at the note and groaned.

  "Ye gods. Hasn't somebody else got a Moon Krawler out by now? This thing was a bright idea when we thought of it. It's stale now." He slid the pad across, and Heyden read:

  I mean Interdis-, etc.-Jawbreaker Electronics, Inc.

  Heyden wrote, Where did you learn this? Aloud, he said, "Naturally, we'll be supposed to gimmick it up with flashing lights, clicking noises, and a recorded voice like a talking doll, only more mechanical. No doubt the thing should have claws that open and shut, a power scoop for, quote, taking samples of the lunar surface, end-quote, and maybe a guide-wire to control it with as it crawls across the living-room rug waving its claws."

  "Boy," said Benning. "From the sublime to the ridiculous in one easy jump." He shoved the pad back. "What's this business about the $29.95 item? What toy could we make that anyone would be crazy enough to buy at that price?"

  Heyden was reading: Right from the horse's mouth. Their Industrial Intelligence chief. They're in some kind of financial cramp, want to cut his salary and slash his staff, "temporarily."

  Heyden said, "Take a look through some recent toy catalog. You'll get a shock." He wrote, Is he reliable?

  Benning had been rapidly scanning Grossrad's note, but was now reading it more carefully. He glanced up in exasperation. "Listen to this: '. . . of course, it shouldn't fall apart before the holidays are over . . .' Isn't that nice?" He glanced at the pad, wrote rapidly, and said, "What kind of sleezy junk are we supposed to turn out, anyway?"

  "Just so it sells," grunted Heyden. He took the pad, and read: That guy is as reliable as a rusted-out two-buck hair-trigger Spanish automatic. He just figures I. I. is double-crossing him, and he never lets anybody get ahead of him in that game.

  "You realize," said Heyden, frowning, "we're going to have to let some people go and that we'll wish we'd kept them about eighteen months from now."

  "Agh," growled Benning, still reading the note. "Listen to this: 'Introduction of any new and revolutionary gimcrack at this time would, therefore, be most unwelcome and inexpedient.' Just suppose we should hit on something new and revolutionary?" He tipped his head toward the green-wrapped bundle. "Then what? Are we supposed to think you can actually put it in cold storage, and keep it like frozen fish? Suppose somebody else gets it? What's the point of this whole thing, anyway?"

  Heyden wrote: What's in that bundle? He slid the pad across the desk, and said, "Let's get back to the question of those people we're going to have to let go."

  Benning wrote on the pad, then said aloud, "This is crazy."

  "Do you think," said Heyden dryly, "that you're telling me something?" He glanced at the pad: Lift off the paper and see.

  Heyden felt a tightness in his chest. He said, "Let's have that note from Grossrad. I've been reading some of his previous stuff here—" He stood up, gently pulled off the green paper—"and nobody can tell me anything new about how crazy—" He stared at the short length of board with square box attached, and slide-wire rheostat beside the box. Beneath the rheostat was a penciled arrow pointing to the right, and marked "Up".

  Heyden felt a brief spasm of irritation. What was this supposed to be? Antigravity? He felt a brief wave of dizziness as he thought, Ye gods, what if it is?

  Belatedly, he finished his sentence: "—how crazy a thing like this really is."

  "But," said Benning sourly, "we're stuck with it? Is that what you mean?"

  "Yeah." Heyden pulled the board toward him, noting its weird lightness, despite the fact that it felt solid enough to the fingers. "We're stuck with it, and we better figure out who to let go."

  "I should think," said Benning, "that would be your job."

  Heyden shoved the rheostat slider in the direction of the arrow. The board drifted up out of his hands, and started accelerating toward the ceiling. A hasty grab brought it down, but it continued to tug toward the sky.

  "My responsibility," said Heyden, eyeing the board, "but I need your suggestions."

  "As to who to fire?"

  "Say, as to who to keep." He slid the rheostat slider in the opposite direction, and the board sagged so heavily that it seemed to Heyden that it must be made out of solid lead. Frowning, he said, "Take Magnusson, for instance. We could unload him to start with, I suppose."

  "He's had a lot of expenses. His bank balance is pretty feeble."

  Heyden was experimenting with the slider. He got the impression that as he approached either end, the weight or lift of the concealed device went off toward infinity. He paused to glance at the connections to the rheostat.

  "Not our fault," he grunted.

  "No, but—"

  "The point is, that's his worry."

  The board was headed for the ceiling again, and it felt as if it would tear Heyden's arm out by the roots. Scowling, he pulled the slider back toward the center.

  Benning said, "I think we ought to be decent enough to give Magnusson enough time to get back on his feet."

  "How about Simms?"

  The board was so heavy Heyden had to rest it on the corner of his desk. As he pushed the slider further, the board settled immovably in place, as if spiked down.

  "Well," said Benning evasively, "Simms has had a little streak of bad luck, too."

  "What have we got," said Heyden, carefully pulling the slider back, "nothing but hard-luck cases?"

  "Well, you know how it is"

  "We've got to start somewhere."

  "Sure, but poor Simms."

  "We aren't going to get anywhere this way. Make out a list of the people you think are essential. I want them in groups, the most essential at the top of the list." He wrote on the pad: Did I. I.'s spy-chief say there was a visual pickup anywhere in here?

  Benning glanced at the pad. "What the heck, Jim. I can't know which men are essential till I know what we'll have to do later."

  "Just assume it's the usual thing, Ben. We've been through this before." He pulled the pad over, and read:

  He didn't say. Personally, I doubt it.

  Heyden wrote: We better explain this package, in case there's something outside.

  Benning read it, and nodded.

  Heyden said, "Well, forget that for now. What have you got over there in that paper?"

  Benning shrugged.
"A little promotion gizmo." He rattled the paper. "See, you look in these portholes, and you're inside the spaceship. Shows our control panel, amongst other things, for the Genie Project."

  "Cute," conceded Heyden, smiling wryly. "Well that's down the drain now. Wrap it up and forget it."

  "Based on the old-time stereoscope," said Benning, putting the actual board with its box and rheostat inside the paper wrapper. "Too bad. It seemed like a good—"

  Heyden wrote on the pad, Let's go somewhere where we can talk. Aloud, he said sourly, "Put it on the back burner. Now, I've had enough of this for a while. Where are you headed?"

  Benning glanced at the pad. "Back to my lab. You want to come along?"

  Heyden put Grossrad's latest note in his pocket. "Sure."

  III

  They went out, walked down a lengthy corridor, went into a big airy structure built on the general lines of a hangar for dirigibles, walked along the wall to the right, and finally arrived at a door marked, "Private—Danger—Keep Out."

  Heyden followed Benning inside, and down a short hall. Benning did something complicated at the door, then they stepped in. Benning snapped on the lights, then flipped another switch, and the room filled with sounds of laughing voices, the clink of glasses, cars starting up somewhere in the background, and a close-at-hand murmur and mumble that seemed to include every tone of voice conceivable.

  "Okay," murmured Benning, "I think this room is safe enough, but if they have got anything in here, they're welcome to try and filter it out from this mess. You did see what we've got, plainly enough, back in your office?"

  "I saw it. But did you see what we're going to run into when we try to convince Grossrad?"

  "He couldn't be so stupid he wouldn't catch on to this."

  "That's not the point. He says new gadgets aren't wanted. This means somebody higher up figures we've now settled down to a nice international stalemate, with us ahead of the opposition. This device, it strikes me, is going to make a lot of expensive equipment obsolete in a hurry."

  "You're not just kidding. With this, we could put a man on the moon in a few weeks, not years from now. And that's just the start."

  "What the Sam Hill is it, anyway?"

  Benning frowned. "Did you ever hear the comparison of gravitational fields with the bending of frictionless surfaces?"

  "I think I know what you mean. If you had a flat frictionless surface, flexible enough to bend when objects were placed on it, and if this whole frictionless surface were accelerating uniformly at right angles to the plane of the surface—"

  Benning nodded. "That's it."

  Heyden went on. "If you had such a frictionless surface, an object would slide across it in a straight line until it neared another object, when the dip in the surface caused by these objects would pull them toward each other. There would be, apparently, a 'gravitational field' around each object, the strength of the 'field' depending on the mass of the object."

  "Exactly. This would cause the effect of attraction. Now, how would you create repulsion?"

  "Well—" Heyden frowned. "There would have to be a hill—a ridge, or rise, in the frictionless surface. You could do it only if the surface had some other property—if it were made of the right metal, for instance, you could position magnets toward the stern of a properly shaped object resting on the surface, and this might create enough slope to cause the object to slide forward."

  Benning was nodding and smiling broadly. "That's one idea. And how much power would it take?"

  "It would depend on the properties of the surface."

  "Yes. Well, we started this project without much hope that there was any physical counterpart to this comparison. But after tracking down some previously unexplained discrepancies, we found it. The effect can be made comparatively large, the power consumption is small, and by proper manipulation, we can create either a positive or negative deflection of the 'surface'. The result is, we've got a space drive."

  Heyden sat back, and thought it over. "This just could be a nightmare. How complicated is it?"

  "Mathematically, it's very complicated. Physically, it's not bad."

  "This might make life very exasperating for everybody concerned with it."

  Benning frowned. "Of course, it's bound to be highly classified. They'll doubtless bury it under a ton of regulations, but—Oh." Benning was silent. "Naturally, we discovered it. We shouldn't be running around at loose ends, ready to spill the works in the nearest bar."

  "Naturally. That's one aspect. But there are others. Now, how much leverage do you get with this thing? How much advantage over a rocket, for instance?"

  "Agh. Ye gods, a rocket."

  "Could it beat a rocket for speed?"

  "Easy. Weight for weight—I mean weight at rest with the device turned off—there's no comparison."

  "How about for lifting a payload?"

  "There's still no comparison. You don't have to lift a lot of cargo you're just going to fire out the tail end anyway."

  "Could you put a warhead in one of these and hit within five miles a thousand miles away?"

  Benning hesitated. "Not yet."

  "But eventually?"

  After a long silence, Benning said, "For accuracy, used as a missile power source, I fail to see any advantage in this. But you could knock one of your opponent's missiles off course with it. You might even smash it up in mid-air."

  "How would you do that?"

  "Make one big enough, with enough power back of it, make a strong enough mount and screw the thing down to a solid base—What do you think you've got? It's a tractor-repulsor unit. You can make a steep 'hill' in the 'frictionless surface' the missile is sliding along. What does that interpret as in physical reality? A violent repulsion. Then you can make a trough. Subject anything to sudden yanks and shoves, and what happens to it?"

  Heyden nodded slowly.

  Benning said, "Didn't I see you pick up Grossrad's note before we left?"

  "Yes, you want it?"

  "I'd like to look it over again."

  Heyden felt through his pockets, and handed the note to Benning. Benning read the note amidst gales of hurrying girlish laughter that grew loud and faded, with male curses, mumbling, a variety of audible conversations, and a weird varying note in the background.

  Benning grunted and looked up. "He sure doesn't leave any doubt about this 'no new advances wanted at this time'."

  Heyden nodded. "That's what bothers me."

  "But," said Benning, "Any good business man can see the potential in this."

  "What potential? Where's the profit in something you can never put on the market because it's sure to be classified?"

  "Well, the defense contracts, then."

  Heyden shook his head gloomily. "Remember: 'we are now so far ahead of the international competition, defensewise, that no large new government orders can be expected.'"

  Benning said angrily, "Can't you convince that guy—"

  "Probably, but so what? Grossrad doesn't write contracts with himself. Suppose I convince him? Then he's got to convince somebody else. That guy has to convince the next one. At some point in there, someone conceivably may have to convince the defense secretary, and he may have to convince Congress. This is assuming it goes through all those offices and ever comes out again. Each of those guys is going to be hard to convince, precisely because he knows how hard it's going to be to convince the next man. Meanwhile, all we can do is chew our nails and wait for their decision."

  Benning said, "While we're waiting, what if somebody else, say in some foreign laboratory, maybe even where they've got pictures of Big Brother hanging on the wall—What if they should come up with this?"

  "Is that conceivable?"

  "Sure, it's conceivable. I told you, physically, this thing is not too bad." He frowned. "Well, what then?"

  Heyden frowned. "As soon as they make it public, count on us to get a contract so big we couldn't fill it if we were General Motors, U.S. Steel, and A.T. and T. combin
ed. We'll have to kidnap every scientist and technician we can lay our hands on."

  Benning said angrily, "We're missing something here. What if they don't make it public? What if they quietly build up a fleet of these things while we're sitting around waiting for the go-ahead? They could seal off outer space so tight we'd never get out there." An intense look appeared on Benning's face. "Think, Jim—what if they're building them right now?"