Year's Best Science Fiction 01 # 1984

by Gardner Dozois (ed)

  “Been in town long?” the boy asks.

  Wrong move, buddy, Roger thinks. A good barkeep should be able to tell when his customers want to be left alone. “Not long. But frequently.”

  “You look kinda familiar. I been workin’ here six months; you see a hell of a lot of faces in six months.”

  “Six months is a long time to work in one place down here,” says Roger.

  “No shit. Bill, the owner? He says the turnover at the Casa Marina’s one person out of three every six months. What do ya expect? Key West is a dead-end town.”

  “We must take the current when it serves,” murmurs Roger-Prime, “or lose our ventures.”

  “Hey, Phil.” A hand comes down on the blond’s shoulder. It is the murdered man, now moustachioed, and somewhat disheveled. “Sorry I’m late. Some faggot took my parking spot.”

  “No problem,” says Phil. “It’s been slow.” He leaves, glancing at the two of them so as to catch some spark of recognition jump between them; but Carl is busying himself about the bar and Roger is busying himself with his drink. Did I talk like that? he thinks. “Some faggot?” He studies his new self. Like Roj, Carl is deeply tanned, competently muscular, confident in his movements. Nevertheless, he has a disturbing arrogance that Roj did not have. Carl glances Roger’s way and smiles professionally. Roger smiles back. What are you made of, my man? he wonders.

  CONFIRMED, reports the base. THIS IS YOUR PERSONA, ROGER.

  No kidding, returns Roger. I thought I’d been cloned in the crapper.

  On the TV, a film critic whom Roger-Prime does not recognize is discussing a new Paramount offering. The star’s picture is flashed; it is the woman from New Jersey. The clock on the wall says 10:15. A couple of French sailors come in with women hanging to them. They are followed by some young men in T-shirts; the shirts bear the legend: EAT IT RAW—KEY WEST OYSTER BAR. They are shaved almost bald, American Marines on leave from Trumbo Point. They giggle at the red pompoms of the sailors. The bar fills slowly at first, then rapidly. He sees a great many military persons. Carl is kept busy, and by the time he has a moment free, it is nearly 10:28. “That was sudden,” says Roger-Prime, because he must say something, do something.

  “No fooling.” Carl lights a cigarette, head cocked like the man in the Marlboro ads. “It’s the base. The duty rosters are all screwy these days. Guys get off at weird hours.”

  No murderer yet. “Something up at Trumbo?”

  “Falklands shit.”

  Roger hazards it: “I thought Thatcher had things pretty much under control.”

  “Thatcher? Where’ve you been, buddy? Maggie has gone home to that great brassiere factory in the sky.”

  “What?”

  “Last week. Argentinian terrorists blew up her car. There’ve been rumors of British retaliation ever since. With Fidel backing Argentina and Uncle Sam backing England, a lot of kinds of shit could hit the fan. Excuse me.”

  The bartender wades away into dimness. Ten-thirty, observes Roger. The military people are drinking hard, as though they have things they want to forget. He is feeling very detached. He does not like Carl. Where’s our rogue? he asks the base.

  SCANNING, ROGER, they reply.

  There are two minutes to go before Carl will be dead. He is shocked by his own thought: No great loss, this one. The wedge of lime lies belly-up at the bottom of his glass. The napkin says BIG RED’S on it. Where is he? he thinks.

  EMERGENCY, PRIME. EMERGENCY. IMMEDIATE TRANSFER NECESSARY.

  What’s happened?

  IT SEEMS TO BE OUR DAY FOR MISCALCULATIONS. HURRY, PRIME.

  He forgets Carl. He slips from his stool and pushes his way through the crowd toward the men’s room. There are some people by the urinals. All the stalls are filled. He waits, fretting. A man comes out of the middle stall. He rushes into it and locks the door. There is a window high up; through it he can see the branches of the royal poinciana swaying, showing off their vermilion under the street lamps. Ready, he says. Ready, base.

  The building shudders. The lights in the bathroom go out. Men curse, and in the next room, glass shatters. People are screaming, but he knows that this time they are not screaming because of Carl. Hurry up, base, he thinks. He presses his palm repeatedly. “Hurry up, base, goddam it, it’s something bad.” He remembers the screen image of the ruined city. British retaliation? he thinks. Cuba’s only eighty miles away. “Base, what in Hell have you gotten me into?” He looks out the window. The sky is full of sea.

  TRANSFERRING, says the wink-blink cheerfully. It is 10:33.

  The wall is back to spotless green. The lights are back, and the building is quiet. What happened? he manages to ask. On the floor of the stall, a tract that was not there a moment previously says, CHRIST IS THE ANSWER. “What happened?”

  SORRY, PRIME: WE PROJECTED YOU INTO A CATACLYSM LINE.

  He sits down on the toilet and laughs weakly. Taken at the flood, he thinks. No wonder our rogue never showed up. Little Carl gets zapped by the commies. He has drunk too much Perrier and he finds he must urinate. The wall, he notices, is the only fixture of the stall that is spotless. There is no paper in the toilet roll, and the floor around the tract is littered with cigarette butts. Where am I now?

  ON TARGET, UH, A LITTLE LATE. It is already 10:20. WE SCAN YOUR PERSONA NOT FAR. ALSO THE ROGUE.

  I don’t want to see another killing. Can’t 1 wait out this one?

  WE’RE HAVING TOO MUCH TROUBLE TRACKING HIM. YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE TO SLAP A TRACER ON HIM.

  Swell. How?

  WE’VE BEEN THROUGH THAT.

  I do get murdered in this one, don’t I? Not swallowed up in an earthquake, or kidnapped by aliens?

  YOU KNOW WE CAN’T VIEW A PROBABILITY WHEN YOU’RE IN IT, SAVE THROUGH YOUR TELEMETRY. THE ROGUE IS, HOWEVER, AT INTERFACE.

  Where’s your sense of humor, folks? says Roger-Prime. He exits the stall. A man stands in front of him, combing his dark hair in the mirror. Roger moves past him; for an instant their reflections hang side by side. The man lowers his comb. It is the bartender. “Jesus Christ,” he says. They are identical. There can be no mistake. Down to their beards, they are identical. The bartender faces Roger-Prime. He is high on something, and his skin is not deeply tanned. “Jesus, do you see that?”

  “Sorry?”

  “We could be twins.” Roger-Prime does not know how to react. He affects mild interest.

  “Huh. I guess. Didn’t think anybody could match my mug for ugly.” He starts to leave. The man will not let it go this easily.

  “Wait.” The bartender sticks out his hand. “This is like what they used to call a cosmic experience. You know, back in the sixties, when we all believed in that stuff? I’m Shep.”

  “Uh, Shifter. Charlie Shifter.” They shake hands. Shep’s grip is firm. Shep from Shapiro, thinks Roger. All of a sudden he longs to know this man. “It is pretty amazing, isn’t it?”

  “So it’s not just me. I mean, it was good Colombian, but it wasn’t that good.” He laughs. “I can’t get over it. They say everyone’s got a double somewhere. Doppelgänger. When you meet him, you die.” He raises his eyebrows in mock terror. My God, the rogue, thinks Roger. I can’t let him see us together. “Wait till Bill sees this. You want a drink?”

  “I was just leaving, actually.”

  “Damn. I mean, I am definitely up there, but this. Even our beards. You in town long?”

  “Not long.” says Roger Carl Shapiro. He goes to the sink and turns on the water. His heart is pounding. Doppelgänger, shit!”

  “I’ll bet you’re a writer, aren’t you? Shep?”

  “Jesus. Yeah. Trying, trying.” Delight. “How’d you know?”

  “You have the look. And you talk like one. I hear Key West is good for writers.”

  “I used to live here right after I got out of college.” The words pour out. “I worked bar here, right in this place, and I tried to write, you know, in my spare time. Couldn’t hack it. Woman troubles and shit. I
hadn’t set foot in the Keys till last October. Thought I’d give it another try.” He is combing his hair again, unnecessarily.

  “And how’s it going?” Roger washes and washes.

  “Well.” His twin grins at him. Roger can just make out the tiny scar below Shep’s left eye, where a dog bit both of them when they were four. “I just sold a story.”

  Envy. Excitement. “No shit?”

  “Just sold one. God damn, brother; it’s better than orgasm! I’ve been trying for years. Giving up. Maybe it’ll never happen again, but it happened once. Shit.” Shep peers at him. “Come on in and have a drink. Business is shit.”

  “Uh.” He imagines the people at the base, chewing their nails. It is 10:26. “Uh, Shep, actually, there’s somebody in the bar I’m trying to avoid.”

  “Yeah?” Shep says, with sympathy.

  “Uh, money matters. I’ll tell you what. When do you get off?”

  “Not till three, man.”

  “I’d, uh, really like to sit down with you some time. Do you have a number where I can get a hold of you?”

  “Hey, yeah.” The bartender searches his apron. Roger-Prime remembers the pad and pen that the grim woman has given him, and digs them out of his back pocket. Shep takes them and opens the book. Roger watches his eye strike the first page. “Fantastic. Richard the Third.”

  “I wondered which one it was from.”

  Shep writes down his address and phone number. “Higgs Lane. It’s right off Elizabeth between Eaton and Caroline. I work nights, but if I’m out when you call, my old lady’ll take a message.”

  “Old lady, huh?”

  He grins again. “Either feast or famine, isn’t it? I knew her before; her name’s Rita. You’ll like her” They shake hands. “You can get out without going through the bar; just make a right just outside here. There’s a phone by the storeroom and the back exit’s marked.”

  “Just like a spy movie.”

  “Hey, man. This is Key West. Anything can happen in Key West.” Shep leaves. “Give me a call,” he tosses over his shoulder. The lavatory door swings shut. Alone in front of the mirror, Roger-Prime takes out his burner. It is light in his palm, toy-like; the very very latest thing from Dow, of all places. PRIME, says the wink-blink. YOU MUST NOT INTERFERE.

  “The Hell I mustn’t.”

  WE MUST TRACK THE ROGUE TO HIS BASE SEQUENCE. MORE THAN A FEW LIVES ARE AT STAKE.

  “We don’t know that.”

  YOU HAVE FOUR MINUTES TO ATTACH THE TRACER. ROGER-PRIME?

  “All right!” he yells, mind and voice together.

  He hurls himself through the door. The bar has been remodeled and it takes him a moment to recognize the old lines beneath the ugly new. The cleanliness of the bathroom is echoed in the bar. The game room is a disco, at the moment silent. The Pac-Man and the pool tables line the Duval Street wall. Lucille Ball is nowhere in evidence. The drinks counter has been moved against the far wall, which means that anyone sitting there has their back to the lavatory. He spots the rogue almost immediately. The fat man has not changed clothing. He is sitting pensive in the row of vacant stools. The Michiganian tourist is shooting pool with the retiree, who has exchanged his hibiscuses for palm trees.

  Base, says Roger. There’s no way I’m going to be able to tag this pig without his seeing me. And once he sees me, he’ll know what’s what. Shep wipes the bartop, moving around his killer so as not to disturb him.

  WE MUST HAVE A TAG.

  Not by me. Or do you want a universe of malevolent interfacers crawling up your asses?

  There is silence for some time, for which Roger is grateful. He has put his gun back in his pocket, but as he watches Shep work, that foolish smile on his hairy face, he struggles once more with the temptation to kill the rogue. The fat man stirs in his seat; Roger ducks right, through an open door that has always been closed before, to the telephone and the EXIT sign. It is 10:30. He thinks, If the rogue has a base backing him, why haven’t they picked up on my presence yet? He looks at the phone. A notion strikes him: a way he can interfere without giving away the game. Our voices are the same, he thinks. If I call the cops and say it’s him, they’ll never know it isn’t. He picks up the receiver.

  “There’s no time,” says a voice. “Besides, cops don’t intimidate him. He can shoot in a second and interface as quickly.” So Roger turns. She has come out of the men’s room; she lets the door swing shut and approaches him quickly. She wears a gray jumpsuit; her dark hair is thickly looped about her head. Uh, base, he thinks. “They can’t read you,” she tells him. “Your telemetry is somewhat limited; a convergence of four personas is a little much for it.”

  “You’re the woman I saw in the screen. Sitting at a console.”

  “Quite possibly. I’ve been following you, I’m afraid.”

  “You’re me, then, too.” His palms sweat.

  “My name is Catherine. My mother’s name. Catherine Shapiro.” It is his mother’s name, too. “I’m here to help. Our base has been monitoring him for a long time. I’m supposed to impress upon you the historicity of this occasion: the first meeting of representatives from the two benign, interfacing cultures.”

  “Is that what we are? Benign?”

  There is concern in her face, but it is controlled.

  He feels instinctively that he is in the presence of power. “We have to stop him. He’s going to kill one of us in two minutes. And this one of us is a particularly nice guy. We have to stop him.”

  “That will be difficult. I’ve tried.”

  He starts.

  “Oh, yes. I’ve tracked him through eleven sequences, personally.”

  “Does he work alone?”

  “Yes. We’re in contact with his base sequence. He’s a genius, Roger. He’s responsible for most of their breakthroughs in probability research. What he’s got is an experimental, portable interface-unit, something we’ve never even begun to develop. He stole it on its test-run. His people want him back.”

  No rogue base. A weight lifts from him, and he is freed. He takes out the burner. “What are you doing?” she whispers.

  “I won’t let him kill Shep.”

  “I won’t let you kill him.” Her weapon is pointed at his chest. “Be reasonable, Roger. His people want him back alive. They’re prepared to exchange technical data for him.”

  “I thought you said you’d never met anyone from an interfacing culture before.”

  “We haven’t. You can’t enter a probability that your persona has vacated. But we’ve learned to communicate with them. As we’re communicating with your base, now.”

  “There has to be a way to save Shep. There has to be a way.” He has to finish, he thinks. He’s going somewhere. He’s off the shoals.

  “There is. Put your weapon away.”

  He believes her. He pockets the burner. One minute. A few new customers have entered. They hear the woman from New Jersey and Shep’s delighted greeting.

  “Does he know you’re after him?”

  She nods. “He’s seen me several times. But he has no monitoring capability. All he can do is shift. Now listen.” She lowers her gun, but does not put it down. “This is the first good chance I’ve had to get at him when the bar wasn’t crowded. I’m going to shoot for his weapon-arm. I think I’m a better shot than you are, from what I’ve seen. When I hit him, he’s going to interface. Don’t let him see you. Follow him.”

  “How? On foot?”

  “Your base will regain control when he interfaces. They’ll want you going after him whether or not they believe my people.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’ll meet you. Between us, we may be able to trap him.”

  It is 10:321/2.

  It has all happened too quickly, and what happens next he is not prepared for. She races into the bar. He cannot keep himself from pursuing. She falls into a crouch and fires, all at once. The rogue is on his feet, raising his burner. Shep is out from behind the counter, facing the woman from
New Jersey, his left side exposed. He is grinning from ear to ear. His shoulder is three feet from the rogue’s muzzle. Catherine’s beam strikes the fat man’s wrists; he vanishes with a scream, like a sentient balloon when pricked. His burner clatters on the filthy wood floor. Instantly, Roger’s head is full of chatter. Catherine starts forward, toward the gun. Something warns her; she flings herself backwards, ripples, and fades out.

  “What in hell?” says Shep. He bends down to the spot where the rogue’s weapon lies glowing. It blows up in his face.

  TRANSFERRING, says the wink-blink happily.

  He wails in darkness. He is in a box of a room with dust and skeletons. TRANSFERRING. He is in an open meadow, and people are flying kites. TRANSFERRING. He is buried, earth pressing. TRANSFERRING, TRANSFERRING! He is up to his ears in mud, surrounded by curious, long-necked animals with eyes like dinner plates. TRANSFERRING, GODDAMIT! He is in a bar with blue walls, a bar with gray walls, a bar full of naked men gyrating to music, a bar thick with sweet pot smoke, a bar of slime and ancient rot. He wails for Shep, whom he loves. TRANSFERRING, they say.

  The shadow settles and stays. He is kneeling in a deserted room. There is no furniture, not even a drinks counter. The street windows have been boarded up. A few cracks admit anemic moonlight: no electric Duval glow. Wind whines outside. The only other creature in the room is a pregnant cat. With no place to hide, she stands with feet rigid and back arched in the center of the room, bristling with every night-fear. His watch has stopped.

  The smell of the pot still clings to his clothing. He wonders who he is. Roger Carl Shapiro, comes the reply, but he seems to remember other names as well. He sits down, and a discomfort at his buttocks makes him rise. He draws the pen and notebook from the back of his jeans. There is a tide, he reads.

  “Roger?”

  She has materialized in the gloom. Her features are ashen, like her clothing. “Hello, Catherine,” he says. “It took off his—it took—” He stops. On the second page, the name is written, in Roger’s own sprawling loops, R. C. Shapiro, and the rest: #8 Higgs Lane Key West Fla 33040 (Shep) Call me buddy!!! 66403. He puts the book away. “What now?” he asks.