by John Varley
Well, you've probably guessed I'm a Type B writer. It was always easy enough to find an excuse not to write... and the Mac made it even easier! Now winter is coming on, I've missed a dozen deadlines, my family is starving, and bill collectors are pounding on the door.
Thank God for the people at VarleyYarns®!
When they heard of my plight they rushed over with a typewriter, reams of paper, and a package of pencils.
I know it will be a long hard path back to sanity...... but with the help of VarleyYarns®, I think I can lick it!
"DT" Oakland, California Born Again!
That's what I told my friends when I finally "made the switch" to a word processor. The ease, the speed, the versatility... I began buying new programs as quickly as they came out. I even got to
"road-test" a few of them, developed by friends in the industry, before they were available to the general public. I really liked the MacPlot at first. When you "Booted it up," MacPlot would suggest alternate story lines... while at the same time conducting a global search of all stories written by anyone, anywhere, at any time, to see if an idea was "old hat." Soon all my friends had copied it and were using it, too. Then came MacClimax!, which analyzed your prose for the "high points," and added words and phrases here and there to "punch it up." You've all heard how a word processor can aid you if you decide to change a character's name in the course of a story. With MacCharacter, I was able to change a whimp into a hero, a Presbyterian into an alien suffering from existential despair, or a fourteenth century warlord into a Mexican grape-picker... all with only a few keys... all without lapses in story logic! Before long I had them all: MacConflict, MacDialogue, MacMystery, MacWestern, Adverb-Away. VisiTheme, MacDeal-With-The-Devil...
Then I noticed a strange thing.
I'm a Type A writer, like Mr. "SK/Bachman/Goldman/ETC." I'm not happy unless I'm writing most of the day. And now, writing was so easy I could simply write a first line, punch a few keys, and sit back and watch the story write itself. It was so easy, I was miserable. Now, in today's mail, comes MacFirstline, but I don't think I'll run it. I think I'll kill myself instead.
Now where's the MacHara-Kiri suicide-note-writing program...?
Sad, isn't it? And there isn't even enough time to tell you of the incalculable amounts of money squandered by writers on expensive systems that were obsolete within a few weeks' time, or to print the countless other testimonials that have been pouring into VarleyYarns® since this crusade of salvation began.
We're trying to help. Won't you? Only with your support can we stamp out this dread killer, this hidden disease called Computaholism. Write your Congress-person today. Form a committee. Give generously. Be sure to vote.
And don't forget... to buy and read Berkley's VarleyYarns®.
Dear John, All right, enough is enough. I don't think you realize it, but I put my career on the line over your last insane request. If you think I'm going to publish and mail that diatribe, you've got another think coming.
I went so far as to show it to our lawyers. You said you disguised the names, but how many writers do you think there are in Halifax, Nova Scotia? Or in Maine, for that matter. And do you have any idea how much money that guy has? Enough to keep you in court for the next twenty years.
Maybe I'll regret this later, but there are a few things I've been dying to get off my chest, so here goes. First... was that some kind of crack, back in your first ad? Something like ''as fine a book as the economic climate will allow''? Let me tell you, we editors work hard and we do the best job we can. So we don't usually have much of an advertising budget. So DEMON was printed on newsprint. So sue me, okay?
As for your horror stories about excessively prolific authors... boy, don't I wish! I could say a thing or two about missed deadlines, that's for sure. And did you read what Norman Spinrad and Algis Budrys had to say about your last two epics?
So much for the inherent superiority of the typewriter.
TITAN parts four, five, and six are due at the end of the month, don't forget. You may not find the editors here at Berkley quite so forgiving the next time you ask for a deadline extension.
Yours, Susan SUSAN ALLISON
BERKLEY PUBLISHING
NEW YORK
DEAR SUSAN, HOLD EVERYTHING! NO NEED TO GET UPSET. HELL, YOU
DIDN'T THINK I WAS SERIOUS, DID YOU? THE THING
IS, SEE, I WAS TALKING TO HARLAN ELLISON THE
OTHER DAY, AND WHILE HE AGREED WITH MY STAND
AGAINST THE WORD PROCESSOR, HE FELT THE WHOLE
VARLEYYARNS BUSINESS SMACKED OF TOO MUCH SELFPROMOTION.
BUT BEYOND THAT, AS YOU MIGHT HAVE GUESSED FROM
THE HOLES ALONG THE SIDE OF THE PAPER, I'VE
BOUGHT A WORD PROCESSOR. (SORRY ABOUT THIS
TYPEFACE: MY LETTER-QUALITY PRINTER IS ''DOWN''
AGAIN. I'M USING AN OLD ''WORDSPITTER'' PRINTER
I BORROWED FROM THE ESTATE OF ''DT'' IN
OAKLAND.)
I'M WRITING THIS ON AN EXXON OFFICE SYSTEMS
''ANNIE'' COMPUTER. AS YOU MAY HAVE HEARD, EXXON
GOT OUT OF THE COMPUTER BUSINESS AFTER A FEW
YEARS OF POOR SALES, SO I GOT THIS MACHINE AT A
BARGAIN-BASEMENT PRICE! FOR ONLY $5000 I GOT A
MAINFRAME MORE POWERFUL. THAN THE ONE NASA USED
TO SEND MEN TO THE MOON IN 1969, A DISK DRIVE, A
''SANDY'' PRINTER, A ''PUNJAB'S CRYSTAL''
MONITOR SCREEN, AND A LITTLE DEVICE SIMILAR TO
THE APPLE MOUSE, WHICH EXXON CALLS AN ''ASP.''
I'VE BEEN TOLD THIS IS WHAT IS KNOWN AS AN
ORPHAN COMPUTER, BUT IT SHOULDN'T MATTER, AS IT
WILL RUN SOME OF THE APPLE SOFTWARE, AND THE
SALESMAN--A MR. PANGLOSS--ASSURES ME EXXON WILL
CONTINUE TO SERVICE IT AND PRODUCE MORE
PROGRAMS.
SO FAR HE'S BEEN AS GOOD AS HIS WORD. THE LASERDRIVEN
HYPERSPEED WHIRL-WRITE ''SANDY'' PRINTER
HAS BROKEN DOWN EIGHT TIMES SO FAR, AND THE
SERVICE MANAGER, MR. GOLDBERG, IS ALWAYS HERE
WITHIN A WEEK OR TWO. (HE'S HERE RIGHT NOW--HEY, RUBE!--SO PRETTY SOON I CAN PUT THE PRINTER ''ONLINE''
AGAIN. HE SAYS IT'S JUST RUN OUT OF
PHOTONS AGAIN.)
I'VE BEEN HAVING A BALL. I'VE USED THE
MACWARBUCKS PROGRAM TO BALANCE MY CHECKBOOK AND
PLAN MY FINANCIAL FUTURE. MY OUTPUT OF FICTION
HAS REALLY INCREASED. YOU'LL RECEIVE SHORTLY, UNDER SEPARATE COVER, TWO TRILOGIES AND FIVE
OTHER NOVELS. JUST THIS MORNING I TRIED PHONING
ANOTHER NOVEL TO YOUR OFFICE VIA MODEM, BUT
EITHER MY MACHINE OR YOUR COMPUTER ROOM OR POOR
OLD MA BELL SEEM TO HAVE LOST IT. OH, WELL, NO
BIG DEAL, THERE'S PLENTY MORE WHERE THAT ONE
CAME FROM!
TO FACILITATE YOUR ACCOUNTING DEPARTMENT'S
WRITING OF MY CHECKS, IN THE FUTURE I SHALL SIGN
MYSELF WITH THE UNIVERSAL WRITERS CODE (UWC)
SYMBOL YOU SEE BELOW, RECENTLY APPROVED BY THE
WRITERS GUILD. SO IT'S GOODBYE, JOHN VARLEY, HELLO 2100061161... BUT YOU CAN CALL ME 210, IF
WE'RE STILL FRIENDS.
barcode
Press ENTER
"This is a recording. Please do not hang up until—"
I slammed the phone down so hard it fell onto the floor. Then I stood there, dripping wet and shaking with anger. Eventually, the phone started to make that buzzing noise they make when a receiver is off the hook. It's twenty times as loud as any sound a phone can normally make, and I always wondered why. As though it was such a terrible disaster: "Emergency! Your telephone is off the hook!!!"
Phone answering machines are one of the small annoyances of life. Confess, do you really like to talk to a machine? But what had just happened to me was more than a petty irritation. I had just been called by an automatic dialing machine.
They're fairly new. I'd been
getting about two or three such calls a month. Most of them come from insurance companies. They give you a two-minute spiel and then a number to call if you are interested. (I called back, once, to give them a piece of my mind, and was put on hold, complete with Muzak.) They use lists. I don't know where they get them.
I went back to the bathroom, wiped water droplets from the plastic cover of the library book, and carefully lowered myself back into the water. It was too cool. I ran more hot water and was just getting my blood pressure back to normal when the phone rang again.
So I sat through fifteen rings, trying to ignore it.
Did you ever try to read with the phone ringing?
On the sixteenth ring I got up. I dried off, put on a robe, walked slowly and deliberately into the living room. I stared at the phone for a while.
On the fiftieth ring I picked it up.
"This is a recording. Please do not hang up until the message has been completed. This calls originates from the house of your nextdoor neighbor, Charles Kluge. It will repeat every ten minutes.
Mr. Kluge knows he has not been the best of neighbors, and apologizes in advance for the inconvenience. He requests that you go immediately to his house. The key is under the mat. Go inside and do what needs to be done. There will be a reward for your services. Thank you." Click.
Dial tone.
I'm not a hasty man. Ten minutes later, when the phone rang again, I was still sitting there thinking it over. I picked up the receiver and listened carefully.
It was the same message. As before, it was not Kluge's voice. It was something synthesized, with all the human warmth of a Speak'n'Spell.
I heard it out again, and cradled the receiver when it was done.
I thought about calling the police. Charles Kluge had lived next door to me for ten years. In that time I may have had a dozen conversations with him, none lasting longer than a minute. I owed him nothing.
I thought about ignoring it. I was still thinking about that when the phone rang again. I glanced at my watch. Ten minutes. I lifted the receiver and put it right back down.
I could disconnect the phone. It wouldn't change my life radically.
But in the end I got dressed and went out the front door, turned left, and walked toward Kluge's property.
My neighbor across the street, Hal Lanier, was out mowing the lawn. He waved to me, and I waved back. It was about seven in the evening of a wonderful August day. The shadows were long. There was the smell of cut grass in the air. I've always liked that smell. About time to cut my own lawn, I thought.
It was a thought Kluge had never entertained. His lawn was brown and knee-high and choked with weeds.
I rang the bell. When nobody came I knocked. Then I sighed, looked under the mat, and used the key I found there to open the door.
"Kluge?" I called out as I stuck my head in.
I went along the short hallway, tentatively, as people do when unsure of their welcome. The drapes were drawn, as always, so it was dark in there, but in what had once been the living room ten television screens gave more than enough light for me to see Kluge. He sat in a chair in front of a table, with his face pressed into a computer keyboard and the side of his head blown away.
Hal Lanier operates a computer for the LAPD, so I told him what I had found and he called the police. We waited together for the first car to arrive. Hal kept asking if I'd touched anything, and I kept telling him no, except for the front door knob.
An ambulance arrived without the siren. Soon there were police all over, and neighbors standing out in their yards or talking in front of Kluge's house. Crews from some of the television stations arrived in time to get pictures of the body, wrapped in a plastic sheet, being carried out. Men and women came and went. I assumed they were doing all the standard police things, taking fingerprints, collecting evidence. I would have gone home, but had been told to stick around.
Finally I was brought in to see Detective Osborne, who was in charge of the case. I was led into Kluge's living room. All the television screens were still turned on. I shook hands with Osborne. He looked me over before he said anything. He was a short guy, balding. He seemed very tired until he looked at me. Then, though nothing really changed in his face, he didn't look tired at all.
"You're Victor Apfel?" he asked. I told him I was. He gestured at the room. "Mr. Apfel, can you tell if anything has been taken from this room?"
I took another look around, approaching it as a puzzle.
There was a fireplace and there were curtains over the windows. There was a rug on the floor. Other than those items, there was nothing else you would expect to find in a living room.
All the walls were lined with tables, leaving a narrow aisle down the middle. On the tables were monitor screens, keyboards, disc drives—all the glossy bric-a-brac of the new age. They were interconnected by thick cables and cords. Beneath the tables were still more computers, and boxes full of electronic items. Above the tables were shelves that reached the ceiling and were stuffed with boxes of tapes, discs, cartridges... there was a word for it which I couldn't recall just then. It was software.
"There's no furniture, is there? Other than that..."
He was looking confused.
"You mean there was furniture here before?"
"How would I know?" Then I realized what the misunderstanding was. "Oh. You thought I'd been here before. The first time I ever set foot in this room was about an hour ago."
He frowned, and I didn't like that much.
"The medical examiner says the guy had been dead about three hours. How come you came over when you did, Victor?"
I didn't like him using my first name, but didn't see what I could do about it. And I knew I had to tell him about the phone call.
He looked dubious. But there was one easy way to check it out, and we did that. Hal and Osborne and I and several others trooped over to my house. My phone was ringing as we entered.
Osborne picked it up and listened. He got a very sour expression on his face. As the night wore on, it just got worse and worse.
We waited ten minutes for the phone to ring again. Osborne spent the time examining everything in my living room. I was glad when the phone rang again. They made a recording of the message, and we went back to Kluge's house.
Osborne went into the backyard to see Kluge's forest of antennas. He looked impressed.
"Mrs. Madison down the street thinks he was trying to contact Martians," Hal said, with a laugh.
"Me, I just thought he was stealing HBO." There were three parabolic dishes. There were six tall masts, and some of those things you see on telephone company buildings for transmitting microwaves.
Osborne took me to the living room again. He asked me to describe what I had seen. I didn't know what good that would do, but I tried.
"He was sitting in that chair, which was here in front of this table. I saw the gun on the floor. His hand was hanging down toward it."
"You think it was suicide?"
"Yes, I guess I did think that." I waited for him to comment, but he didn't. "Is that what you think?"
He sighed. "There wasn't any note."
"They don't always leave notes," Hal pointed out.
"No, but they do often enough that my nose starts to twitch when they don't." He shrugged. "It's probably nothing."
"That phone call," I said. "That might be a kind of suicide note."
Osborne nodded. "Was there anything else you noticed?"
I went to the table and looked at the keyboard. It was made by Texas Instruments, model TI-99/4A.
There was a large bloodstain on the right side of it, where his head had been resting.
"Just that he was sitting in front of this machine." I touched a key, and the monitor screen behind the keyboard immediately filled with words. I quickly drew my hand back, then stared at the message there.
PROGRAM NAME: GOODBYE REAL WORLD
DATE: 8/20
CONTENTS: LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT; MISC FEATUR
ES
PROGRAMMER: "CHARLES KLUGE"
TO RUN PRESS ENTER _
The black square at the end flashed on and off. Later I learned it was called a cursor.
Everyone gathered around. Hal, the computer expert, explained how many computers went blank after ten minutes of no activity, so the words wouldn't be burned into the television screen. This one had been green until I touched it, then displayed black letters on a blue background.
"Has this console been checked for prints?" Osborne asked. Nobody seemed to know, so Osborne took a pencil and used the eraser to press the ENTER key.
The screen cleared, stayed blue for a moment, then filled with little ovoid shapes that started at the top of the screen and descended like rain. There were hundreds of them in many colors.
"Those are pills," one of the cops said, in amazement. "Look, that's gotta be a Quaalude. There's a Nembutal." Other cops pointed out other pills. I recognized the distinctive red stripe around the center of a white capsule that had to be a Dilantin. I had been taking them every day for years.
Finally the pills stopped falling, and the damn thing started to play music at us. "Nearer My God to Thee," in three-part harmony.
A couple people laughed. I don't think any of us thought it was funny—it was creepy as hell listening to that eerie dirge—but it sounded like it had been scored for penny-whistle, calliope, and kazoo. What could you do but laugh?
As the music played a little figure composed entirely of squares entered from the left of the screen and jerked spastically toward the center. It was like one of those human figures from a video game, but not as detailed. You had to use your imagination to believe it was a man.
A shape appeared in the middle of the screen. The "man" stopped in front of it. He bent in the middle, and something that might have been a chair appeared under him.
"What's that supposed to be?"
"A computer. Isn't it?"
It must have been, because the little man extended his arms, which jerked up and down like Liberace at the piano. He was typing. The words appeared above him.
SOMEWHERE ALONG THE LINE I MISSED SOMETHING. I SIT
HERE, NIGHT AND DAY, A SPIDER IN THE CENTER OF A
COAXIAL WEB, MASTER OF ALL I SURVEY... AND IT IS