by John Shirley
Several levels below, pedestrians thronged the asphalt streets. They walked wherever they went, surfaceside, though in the sublevels, above their honeycomb-unit dwellings, subways carried them. Some of the pedestrians turned hard-bitten faces upward, and Ben detected an undertone of malign tension in their expressions. That could be useful.
There was no way for the pedestrian to ascend to privileged levels. From street level the only stairways went down.
Ben glanced at his head-dress, noted the time on the chronometric segment. He frowned. He had ten minutes to make the delegation. He glanced at Gloria, fretted, wondering if it had been a mistake, to bring her this far into it. In some ways she was far more capable than he. But she possessed little skill at subterfuge; or, perhaps she disliked it and deliberately avoided it. And that skill was a necessity here.
A man with four sets of grafted breasts and a crest of bone bisecting his cranium seemed to be watching them from the third-class level, shortly beneath them. Ben began to wonder if Fuller was on to him already. Then he reflected that even before the forever-revel incident, Chaldin had been watching him. Watching closely, for more than a year. So Chaldin would know about his aliases. He would have his apartments watched. By now he would know he was in Detroit. He might inform the Elite Command that there was an impostor among them. Though he was almost entirely weightless, Ben felt very heavy.
They arrived at the milky bubble of the Council dome and stepped onto the currents that carried them into one of the dozens of circular entrances sunk into its exterior. They passed guards who glanced incuriously at Ben’s head-dress, were satisfied, and returned their empty stares to the sky.
Inside were the one hundred delegates. The matriarchs and patriarchs of Detroit were hovering in concentric tiers in the central bubble, sitting in mid-air, cross-legged beside their aides, gazing with dour attention at the speaker hovering over the marble dais. The speaker was winding up an exhortation to fund the military for excursions into the countryside and less defensible city-states in search of more of the precious metal needed for the generation of nulgrav currents.
No one turned to look at Ben, to display inattention would be discourteous to the speaker. But the aides squinted at Ben and Gloria and whispered the identity of the latecomer to their employers. Ben looked for surprise in the delegation faces and found none. They were an impassive bunch, people of all races and, doubtless, despite appearances, they were surprised to see him returned one week before his term of office was to expire. He’d been assumed dead. He would have to do some generous bribing to secure the post for another year.
Ben and Gloria took their places, to the far right of the speaker, in the upper third of the assemblage.
Ben turned his thoughts inward and began to activate the exciter. Slowly, gradually, carefully. He hardly heard the speaker, a glum matronly general who was discussing her progress in mobilizing the new militia to move against Chicago.
Ben was concentrating. The exciter, a thing alive: a cusp of metal rapacity, vibrating in his chest. He closed his eyes, focused, reached out, questing. He smiled. The hostility was there. All he needed. More than enough.
He turned a tiny knob on his anklet, adjusting his head-dress to signal that he requested a hearing. And he waited.
In ten minutes he was on the speaker’s platform. The exciter throbbed in his chest, seemed to pulse harder with each carefully cadenced sentence he spoke.
Here follows a selection from Ben Rackey’s speech, recorded in the minutes as “The Address of Delegate Ladd.”
“Attack Chicago at this point and Detroit is as demeaned as a warrior who strikes a child; they are not worthy of our attentions, and to assault them now would mean an immoral waste of energy. They will be there, waiting to be plucked like ripe fruit when the time comes, when the resources of barbaric Europe and Asia are ours, when after conquering the animalistic outside world we have at our command the indentured forces of two continents. Then the nations beneath the Barrier will fall before us like whimpering sheep! There are many sheep but there can only be one wolf! With our armies swollen with trained barbarians we can rout them with hardly a fight and scarcely soil our hands. Let the animals scrape in obeisance! To lay siege to the walls of Chicago is self-abasement! Once we have completed the Fist and crushed the Barrier and taken the world—” He paused and let his eyes burn into every pair of eyes in the enthralled assemblage, conducting the exciter—“Chicago will whimper once, and surrender!”
The Transmaniac energies of the exciter reached out and ignited their caches of emotional tinder. The delegates came alive in cheers and shouting. There were twenty-five nays and seventy-five yeas to his call for a preliminary vote on his New Plan. He would need ten more yeas to tip the balance into incontestable law, two months from now. He was close.
And now it was time for the Brothers of Proteus.
Afoot, disguised as pedestrians, they sauntered into a café and ordered wine. They sat at a table, blinking in the sun beside crowded, ribald Weep Street.
“Okay, now,” said Gloria. “I understand the Council of Delegates dupe the pedestrians and sell their crafts and the products of the munitions plants to other cities at fat, jacked-up prices. Right. I can believe that. But if, as you say, the delegates live fairly modestly—where does the money go?”
“It goes to build the Fist. The machine growing at the heart of the city. I’ve been meaning to tell you about the Fist...”
“It’s about time.”
“The Fist will destroy the Barrier. They began building it shortly after Detroit seceded, ninety-five years ago. They’ve been adding to it ever since. I believe I’m the only one—and now you—not actually a delegate, who knows what it is for. Oh, they tell the people it is a kinetic sculpture, a machine monument to Ford—”
Gloria looked startled. “Ford?”
“The God of Detroit. Avatar of Machine Manifestation. Anyway, they pawn the Fist off as a religious monument because the people are afraid to drop the Barrier. It’s security to them. For ninety-five years the Council has quietly planned to complete the machine and finish the job, the destruction of the Barrier, and the subsequent enslavement of what’s left of the outside world. They have a ridiculous, a thoroughly laughable, scheme to exploit the primitives beyond the Barrier, capture and train them, build up resources and so gain the power to overcome rival city-states within the Barrier. That’s the Traditionalist viewpoint. As far as they know, I’m a Traditionalist. I pretend to support their stupid, infeasible plan to use the outside world. Once the Barrier is down, once they see how big it is out there, what they’re up against, they’ll discard the idea. The Progressivist viewpoint demands we scrap the Fist and mount a campaign against the competitors—New York and Chicago, mainly—and take them immediately. The Progressivist view argues that the Traditionalist plan is excessively long-term, will not only take too long to complete but is entirely problematical. They say we must strike now, otherwise Chicago, who is supposedly arming itself for full-scale war, will hit us first.”
“Sounds reasonable, actually. If you have to go to war.”
“Oh, they do. These people have to go to war once a generation, at least. It’s like they’re relieving themselves. And they envision themselves as divine conquerors. Chicago, though, is not actually preparing for war. I’ve infiltrated them—”
“Is there any place you haven’t, infiltrated, Ben?”
Ben nodded solemnly. “The lands beyond the Barrier.” He paused and stared up into the screen of scaly clouds and squinted as if to stare the Barrier down.
Gloria followed his gaze. “It’s up there?”
“It’s up there.”
“Ben…how will you reinstate the…the Traditionalist plan?”
“I won’t have to reinstate it. I’ll simply release the reservoir of avarice and general paranoia that fuels it. I’ll play on their greed for the supposed riches just waiting to be looted outside the Barrier and I’ll spur them with the suspic
ion that the Progressivists are a criminal subversive element supported by terrorists. That—along with self-defense—is what I brought the Brothers of Proteus here for. But the full mobilization of the city to back the Traditionalist plan has to come soon. Or we’ll lose our momentum. I think the Fist is near completion. With total commitment it should take another three months. Those slow-witted engineers are all Fordians, they consult their astrologers before deciding which breakfast cereal to eat. They won’t add a single piece to the machine ’til the stars tell them to––the Master Blueprint, they call it. So I’ll have to get to their astrologers. Fortunately, I’ve got a lot of money to work with.”
“You going to bribe the stars, now, man?” she asked softly.
“Anyway, I made a sizable killing on the Renford account a few months back, and that’s what made me decide I could retire, take up my…hobby for good.”
“Hobby? You mean your jerk-off obsession with getting outside the Barrier?”
“You know, you’ve been caustic as all lately.”
“Two questions and I’ll shut up. For a while. First, how will you use the Brothers of Proteus to mobilize the city? Second, how will you accomplish all this when Chaldin spills the beans about your double life?”
“Chaldin.” Ben drained his glass and leaned back in his chair. He looked again at the sky. He could almost see the Barrier, up there, like a killer fog. “I’ll have to head off Chaldin’s agents somehow. One by one. He is not liked in Detroit. But…he could send the information in anonymously. The films. So, I’ll have to expand my network and try to capture his messenger before he gets through. I’ve already got the Council switchboard in my pocket. Any radio messages from outside the city are cancelled—as if there are technical difficulties—at the first reference to Ben Rackey or Delegate Ladd. This is going to take all my resources, all my credit. I’m going to have most of my accounts in the other cities liquidated into tradable metals and sent here and sold. But that will take time. Of course, if I provide a ship—”
“You’re thinking out loud.”
He glared at her, annoyed. Then he smiled, seeing the look on her face. Her dark eyes caught and held the shadows, but her smile flashed, open and bright.
She asked, “How many people do you have working for you here, anyway? I mean, you left this morning and you were gone just six hours. How could you hire enough in that time?”
“The Brothers of Proteus will act as my messengers between cities. There are three hundred of them to do my bidding in the city. But this morning I renewed old contacts and bribed fifty new ones.”
“Nothing’s changed,” she said, shaking her head. “Money still talks.”
They ordered two more glasses of wine and regarded the street, letting the riotous colors and the bouquets of scents sink in.
“Don’t the patriarchs and matriarchs ever descend to pedestrian levels?” Gloria asked. Her eyes were troubled.
“No, not unless they have urgent business. There are no nulgrav currents down here. They’d have to walk or be carried—they despise contact with things physical, with the ground. The Ephemeralist cult originated amongst the Detroit aristocracy. The police come down here, of course. In nulgrav boats. And they are fourth class aristos. But the pedestrians aren’t so badly off. They aren’t starving.” Ben gestured at the streaming crowd filling the avenues. They wore clean suits of crude weave, with large colorful ties, wide lapels, and polished, black plastic shoes. Women and men sharing the same style of dress and all with braided hair.
“Looks like they’re wearing dyed burlap sacks cut to resemble twentieth-century business suits,” Gloria murmured.
Their faces were somber. There was chatter and animated conversation, there was explicit sexual posturing, and there was pairing––but there was no laughter. Their energy had the tint of desperation. “They’re on Third Break now,” Ben explained. “They’re in a hurry to find companionship for the evening.”
“What about their families?”
“Are none. Children are separated from parents shortly after birth and raised in dormitories. Marriages are illegal. Liaisons are for one night only, be they for sex or conversation or gambling. If two people meet and recognize, they are forbidden to acknowledge it, for other than business transactions. This is the law. It makes conspiracies and subversion almost impossible.” Gloria shook her head, staring oddly at Ben. He suddenly felt defensive and sat back in his chair as if by adding distance he could lessen the impact of her accusing look.
“And you support this?” she asked softly.
“I must. Not...in principle. But I have to work with the system to use it, to insure the end of the Barrier. It’s the only way I know.”
“You could foster a revolution and free these people and they would probably elect you leader. Then you could order the completion of the machine.”
“No. Too many people involved, too many variables that way. There have been rumbles, lately, intimating impending rebellion. The delegation, you can be sure, has prepared well against revolution. It might take too long. Possibly, if I need a rebellion for a foil, I will incite one. But if I move hard, working within the delegation, I can accomplish this thing soon. I know what I’m doing, Gloria. I’ve spent years in preparation. But I needed something like the exciter. It can’t be an accident that it came into my hands. I mean—it was put there by someone other than Chaldin. I am the agent of those forces that compel a people to explore. I am in the hands of forces that will the destruction of the Barrier—”
He stopped, amused at himself, at his own snarling intensity. Gloria stood up, shaking her head. Ben stood and put his arms around her and was relieved when she didn’t resist his embrace. “You don’t have to stay with me, Gloria. You could be right. I know that. But I can’t see my way out of this thing.”
“I…want to see it through.”
“Why?” he asked, looking into her eyes, knowing she’d never say quite what he wanted her to say.
“Because.” She licked her lips and looked away. “I’ve got nothing better to do.”
Ben laughed and hugged her.
Whispering in his ear she asked, “Ben, the army they’re mobilizing—it’s mostly pedestrians, isn’t it?” He didn’t need to nod. His silence was answer. He could feel her shudder.
***
And the game played out...
Delegate Ladd offered support, trading for Traditionalist votes.
Delegate Ladd paid poets to compose songs glorifying the Fist.
Delegate Ladd pointed to the anti-Traditionalist propaganda, left on the scene in leaflet form, accompanying the recent upsurge of terrorist bombings.
Delegate Ladd spread rumors of evidence of large stores of nulgrav metal easily accessible in the lands beyond the Barrier.
Delegate Ladd published a detailed report of the lesser-known activities of ardent Progressivists. Three of them were investigated and subsequently jailed.
Ben Rackey paid an unlicensed pedestrian printer to produce terrorist, anti-Traditionalist leaflets.
Ben Rackey arranged for a leading Traditionalist to be wounded by a sniper—evidence was planted on the scene that the sniper had been a violently anti-Fist Progressivist.
Ben Rackey blocked four attempts by Chaldin to expose him.
Ben Rackey searched for Chaldin’s stronghold without success.
Ben Rackey directed the Brothers of Proteus in their terrorist bombing operations, and schooled them in Progressivist rhetoric and spurious Detroit history, should they be caught.
Ben Rackey staged several deliberately unsuccessful sabotage attempts against the Fist, careful to leave evidence that implied pedestrian responsibility––thus shoring up the delegation’s determination to complete the Fist.
Ben Rackey smiled.
Delegate Ladd nodded in arrogant satisfaction.
* * *
In Ben’s penthouse suite Gloria frowned over the sheets of street-maps and transit courses, working out an escape str
ategy for the Brothers of Proteus to use on the latest terrorist operation. They planned to sabotage the Mattel Works, the largest munitions factory in Detroit. It wouldn’t be easy—it was the city-state’s most prized edifice and it was well-guarded. Ben glanced at her, saw her rubbing her eyes. “You’re tired,” he said. “Let’s take a break at six. I’m done in, too.” Gloria grunted and squinted at the maps.
On impulse, Ben reached out and stabbed the button for the viewscreen. He spoke a code number, and the screen set into the desk-top flashed into the grim features of Kibo, Grand Marshall of the Brothers of Proteus.
“Is it done?” Ben asked.
Kibo began a reply, then stopped short, staring at the upper right-hand corner of the screen. His face went stony. He shot his right hand to something out of range of Ben’s camera and seemed to be operating an unseen instrument. Then he looked up and spoke with machine-gun rapidity. “Lord Ladd—this line is tapped. According to my homer, the offender is in your building, probably on the same floor. He will be aware that we are onto him, even now he runs. If we act quickly, however...”
“I’ll take care of it,” Ben snapped, flicking the screen off. He ran to the nearest window, threw it wide, and leapt head first into space. He heard the tail-end of a startled shriek from Gloria and then he was falling, the world a metallic vortex. He reached out, turned the tiny knob on his anklet, and hit the nulgrav current.
His reactant web stopped his fall, but he was jarred by the sudden arresting of momentum. He bobbed in the current, floating in mid-air without conscious direction, a hundred feet over the ground. In seconds he recovered himself and negotiated the currents, spiraling down to the back door of the Towers.
He was waiting in the alley when the spy came rushing out.
He didn’t have to tackle him; the man was halted by pure astonishment. Ben’s needler was ready. “Back up the way you came, friend,” said Ben.
The spy was a man older then he would have expected, cherubically plump, bald but for a thin halo of white hair, a sunburnt head, double chin, bespectacled eyes. He wore the white robes of a Fordian.