Complete Fiction (Jerry eBooks)

by Fox B. Holden

  “Wait up . . . maybe it put us to sleep, so this is all a dream, like. Nobody looks the same in dreams.”

  “You’re crazy. They don’t sound alike, and you’re trying to sound like Mike . . .”

  “You sound like Terry, too. You could all right in a dream, just like you know the same things. I’ll tell you the first two numbers in the address of our house. If you can give me the last two, then we will know. And if you can’t smart guy—”

  “You don’t even know the street we live on.”

  “It’s Delaware, so how do you like that? And here’s the first two numbers—2, 6—”

  “8, 1—”

  “What’d I tell you? It sure is a dream. You’re Terry all right I guess and I’m me—Mike—but in a dream everybody always looks funny. You got black hair, all straight and cut short.”

  “You too. But guess you’re Mike though, as long as it’s a dream. Only I feel pretty real.”

  “Sure, me too. Sometimes dreams are like that. Just like for real.”

  “Well I hope we don’t get into a nightmare. They make me sweat awful.”

  “I’m all sweaty now—so’re you. It’s sure hot around here. Where in heck d’you suppose we are, anyway?”

  “You don’t think Dad’s thing killed us, and—and we’re—”

  “Naw—they wouldn’t have beds or anything. Anyhow, Dad told us all about that once. There’s no such place. It’s got something to do with state of mind, whatever that is.”

  “Well we’ve been kinda bad every now and then just the same.”

  “Dad says that hasn’t got anything to do with it, don’t you remember? Nobody keeps books on you, like a report card, or anything. It’s up to you, and you know how you feel about it inside. That’s what he said, and I believe Dad. Dad’s smart, Terry.”

  “Wish he was here too.”

  “Grown-ups got dreams of their own to worry about. You’re not scared, are you?”

  “Who me? Heck, no. Hey, have a look at the funny clothes hanging up at the side of our beds. Like riding pants, with wide black belts. Look, some belts got three little silver things in each side. And have a look at the boots! Hey, feel this one—light as anything.”

  “Who ever heard of blue riding pants? Besides you don’t know how to ride a horse any more than I do.”

  “Bet I could though. Boy—”

  “Hey, have a look out this window. You can see all over. Gosh, this must be the same kind of place all the other long ones are.”

  THE buildings were long and narrow with rounded, Quonset-type roofs. They were built end to end in long, dull-blue rows, and the grass that grew between them was of an exactly matching shade, tall, and lush. At precise intervals, the rows of buildings were interrupted by uncurbed streets of hard-packed, dull black dirt, and at the end of the widest was a field-like expanse trimmed to a perfect circle. The massive, glittering building in its center was immense. Varicolored banners flew from a trio of spires rising antenna-like from a single point atop the highest, oddly flat-topped turret. In the geometric center of the squat structure’s otherwise unbroken curving front was a balcony, molded deftly into the severe sweeping architectural lines of which it was an integral, although predominating part. Beyond were rolling hills, and close above them, a foggy, blue-white sky.

  Already waves of heat were beginning to shimmer from the triple turrets of the gold-hued colossus in the center of the great circle, and the banners above them were being whipped by stiff gusts that seemed to blow from several directions at once. Once or twice, there were flashes of lightning that split the low rolling bottom of the sky, but there were no gathering storm clouds, nor was there rain.

  “Gosh,” Terry said. “It sure is funny grass—”

  A high, shrill sound suddenly pierced the stillness, and at its signal, youngsters, no older than themselves were stumbling from their narrow cots, yawning, standing.

  “They’re putting on their pants and boots. We better—” Mike was saying. Wide-eyed, they watched the others, carefully imitated them. There were no shirts to cover the young, sweating torsos, and dressing was simple. Just the crisply-cut breeches, the light snug-fitting boats, and the black belts.

  “You guys been assigned to a quadrant yet?”

  Mike looked up. He was a taller boy, and looked a little older than the rest. He wore a gold star in his belt, and there were still-red scars across his chest and across one shoulder.

  “I guess not,” Mike said. “What’s that? Quadrant, I mean?”

  “How long have you been here, anyway? Thought you two came a couple of weeks ago. On the Mikol VI.”

  The twins looked at each other, then back to the tall, blonde boy.

  “What’s your name?” Terry asked.

  “I’m Jon Tayne. Son of Quadrate Larsen Tayne. Your father’s a general officer just like mine—that’s why we can talk together out here. Otherwise we couldn’t—part of the training, you know. Teaches you the undesirability of class-consciousness. I’ve been here two years—they tossed me back. Insufficient conditioning. But it doesn’t matter to me—maybe you’ll get as big a kick out of it as I do, I like it here. Not many do, though.”

  “It’s sure different,” Mike said, “but we haven’t been here any two weeks, I don’t think. Anyway it hasn’t seemed like that long, has it Terry?”

  “Golly, I—”

  “Terry? Thought you two were Kurt and Ronal Blair? Washington, western hemisphere north?”

  “We live in Washington, that’s for sure,” Terry said. “But I’m—”

  “Hey I know, Terry. It’s all like we said, and here that’s us. You can be Kurt. I’m Ronal. But don’t get mixed up.”

  “Your father’s Senior Quadrate Douglas Blair, isn’t he?” the tall boy said.

  “He’s the Douglas Blair part, anyway,” Mike said. “Makes, I guess, over thirteen thousand dollars a year, too.”

  “Say, you sure you’re all right? I didn’t think you were hit very hard in practice yesterday, but you talk as if you were. Thirteen thousand dollars is just about enough to buy a loaf of bread. Your father makes what mine does and what every other adult does—thirty billion dollars a year. Then after he contributes his dutiful share to the Prelatinate, he has a billions dollars left. Didn’t you know that?”

  “Gosh no. Not exactly, I mean.”

  “What’s Prelatinate?” Terry asked.

  “What’s—listen, fellows—any one of us, even a Quadrate’s son, can be turned into the Director for saying a thing like that, even as a joke. Better watch it. If there’s one thing you learn here, it’s praise and respect for your government. They’re pretty rough on sacrilege, I should think your father would have told you. My training was started when I was four, but you sound almost as though you haven’t had any yet.”

  “I don’t even remember when I was four,” Mike said.

  “That doesn’t matter. When an adult tells you something—”

  The tall boy was interrupted then by a second sounding of the shrill signal, and at once, he hurried to the end of the building. The others fell in behind him in a column of threes. Mike and Terry took positions at the end of the column.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Breakfast, I hope!” Terry said. The tall boy pressed a stud in the wall, and the front door rolled back. Then he turned his head and bellowed “Section, tench-hut! Forward march!” And he sounded as though he enjoyed it.

  They marched out, and, to Terry’s gratification, it was to a huge, diamond-shaped building in which they found breakfast waiting.

  IT was during the rest period after the half-hour session of calisthenics that the Mikol VII landed. Terry and Mike had been laying prostrate on the thickly-matted, damp blue grass, a little out of breath but strangely enough, little more fatigued than had they just finished a short inning of sandlot baseball. They both had been watching the milky-blue sky, and had chosen a place to rest somewhat apart from the others. There were hundreds and hundreds
of the others in formations of their own, Terry had noticed, and all together he could only guess at how many there were. There was one adult in charge of all of them, but they had not seen him closely yet nor heard his voice.

  Before the first sounds of thunder, Mike had been puzzling a lot of things at once.

  “Did you ever jump so high before?”

  “It really wasn’t awful high. Higher, though I guess than ever before. Felt kind of funny, huh?”

  “Sure did. Is it hard for you to walk?”

  “We never played soldier much—you know how Dad felt about that. The other guys are pretty good at keeping the same step. We’ll catch on, though.”

  “I didn’t mean that. I didn’t feel—well, heavy enough, sort of. I kinda bounce when I try to walk.”

  “Me too, but all dreams are funny. I suppose in a dream you could jump clear over the buildings back there if you wanted to. Boy, wait’ll we tell Dad about dreaming we’re in a military school. He’ll have a fit!”

  “He sure will. Remember that time we asked him about it? I guess even Mom was surprised at how he flew up that way. He said if he hadn’t thought he could teach us himself how to grow up good without putting us in unifoms to do it he’d never have had us. But it’s kind of fun though. So far—”

  That was when they heard the thundering sound almost directly above them, but it was like no thunder they had ever heard before. There was a sudden swirling of the thick sky above them, and they jumped up, rooted, watching.

  The Mikol VII burst suddenly through the heavy clouds, its stern belching flame and rolling volumes of sound. The heavy air about them vibrated as they watched.

  It looked like a huge, shining artillery shell, dropping groundward as though held in the grip of some great, invisible hand that slowed it, held it in perfect balance as it descended wrong-end first, directly above the circular place at the end of the long, broad street.

  “Like a big V-2 going the wrong way!” Mike said.

  “It’s a space ship, that’s what it is!” Terry yelled. “Comin’ in to land. Just like in the movie we saw, Mike. Just like.”

  “Look, it’s almost down—c’mon up on this little hill here. You can see ’em driving big trucks or something out to meet it. What do you suppose it’s got?”

  “Wonder where it’s from? Mars, I bet.”

  “Hi! Pretty sight, isn’t it?” It was the tall boy who led their section. He had his thumbs hooked in his belt just behind where the gold stars were.

  “Sure is,” Terry said, eyes glued to the towering craft which had just settled perfectly to the ground.

  “It’s the Mikol VII, and it’s the last shipment before the games. Guess there’ll be another ten thousand or so guys, and then we can start getting all our equipment issued. They don’t give us our stuff until everybody’s here. That’s to make it so that we all have an absolutely equal amount of training. Watch—they’re starting to come out now. Just the way you guys did when you came.”

  MIKE and Terry weren’t listening. They watched as a great opening suddenly appeared near the ship’s blunt stern, to which an inclined ramp was being towed by a tiny surface vehicle. Then they started coming out, five abreast, in seemingly unending numbers.

  “They’re still wearing civvies,” the tall boy said. “They’ll get their game issue tonight, though, and their equipment, along with us. Trucks drop it off at each barracks, and then it’s given out by each section leader. I guess there must be tons of the stuff.”

  “Where they going now?”

  As the youngsters poured from the Mikol VII they were grouped into formations by adults who had come from the huge, golden building.

  “Why, to their barracks, just like everybody else does. They ate before they landed, and their barracks assignments were made at headquarters on Earth before they even took off.”

  “On Earth?”

  “Sure, didn’t you know that? Believe me, it has to be efficient. The Quadrates and their staffs work all year at headquarters getting things lined up for the games. They don’t show up here until the day things start. The Director’s here, but you only see him once, at the opening ceremonies. As far as the games are concerned, he ranks everybody—except the Prelate-General, of course. He signs the orders that split us up into our quadrants.”

  “Hey, Jon . . .”

  “You better call me lance-sergeant out here. Somebody could get the wrong idea.”

  “Sure, sarge! Is that what the gold star means?”

  “Uh huh. You get ’em if you volunteer. Like I did, before I was ten. Sets a good example, you know.”

  “Gee. Is everybody here our age?”

  “Nobody can be more than a month over ten. That’s the law. That is except for volunteers, who are younger, and those who get tossed back for insufficient conditioning and have to stay for the games all over again, like me. I was twelve a couple months ago. I like it though.”

  “But say, what’d you mean about Earth?”

  “Well, that’s where all the plans and everything are made before you even leave. You didn’t think all that stuff was done here on Venus, did you?”

  AS Jon had said, the trucks came with the loads of equipment for each barracks that night after supper. They were large, long trucks and Terry wondered why they didn’t make the awful racket that trucks always made. There wasn’t the stink of burned Diesel fuel. The huge vehicle just rolled up outside soundlessly, and Terry watched for the driver to get out. None did. He tried to look into the front of the vehicle, but it was too dark to see what was on the other side of the long, narrow windows.

  “Nothing in there,” Jon said. “Those are just for maintenance inspection. It’d be a mess if the robot control ever went out of whack, believe me. Better start help unloading.”

  The unloading took less than fifteen minutes, and then the truck moved on to the next barracks. The rude, wooden crates were heavy, but not large. There were three for each of the hundred bunks.

  When the last was placed at the foot of Jon’s bunk, he stood on the largest one and told them what to do.

  “I’ll distribute a chisel to each of you,” he said, “and as you open each box, place its contents on your bunk, so that it can be inspected for fitness before use.

  “You will open the smallest box first. In it you will find your helmet and polishing kit. The helmet is to ibe kept shined at all times—if anybody’s isn’t it’s ten demerits. Fifty, as you’ve all been told, and you get your records marked ‘insufficient conditioning’. Your helmets may look heavy—on Earth they’d weigh about five pounds, but here they’re just a little less than four. You’ll get used to them.

  “In the second box—the flat one—you’ll find all your personal maintenance equipment. You should have a whetstone, extra leather thongs, a set of files, and a small can of oil. They’re to be kept in the condition which you find them, and will be worn at all times on the shoulder equipment sling which is in the third box.

  “In the third box—the long, flat one, are your most important pieces of equipment. I’ll show you how they attach to your arm belt. Needless to say, they must be kept thoroughly polished—and sharpened—at all times. Now I’ll give out the chisels, and you can open the boxes.”

  They did. Terry and Mike helped each other when they got their chisels. They followed Jon’s directions perfectly. First the helmet and the polishing kit. Then the whetstone, extra leather thongs, the set of files, the can of oil, and the shoulder equipment sling.

  Then the eight-inch dagger, the two-foot spiked mace, and the double-edged broadsword . . .

  CHAPTER IV

  THE price of the paper was $3,ooo.

  “Doug—do we dare—”

  “No. We’ve only got a second or so, as though we were just interested passersby, looking at the headlines. Got to be careful.”

  PRELATINATE OKs MORE FUNDS FOR SCHOOLS the eight-column streamer read. Doug scanned the two-column lead quickly.

  “Washington, Ap
ril, 17—(WP)—Prelate General Wendel announced through his press headquarters here tonight that both houses of the Prelatinate have unanimously voted to grant the request of the Council of Education, 27th Department, for seven trillion dollars in additional funds for school building. The funds will be used for the replacement of 34 outmoded buildings in the Department, the newest of which, it was said, is more than 12 years old. The Council original request for five trillion dollars was increased by the Prelatinate to seven trillion in recognition of—”

  Good Lord, he thought, good Lord . . .

  City Cabinet Praises Mayor On Budget Expansion . . .

  Area Industries Vote Shorter Work Week . . .

  Liberals, Conservatives In Accord On Labor Issue . . .

  S-Council Reports Second Arrest In Four Years . . .

  Veteran Civic Leader Admits Wisdom Of Youth Group’s Plan

  “Doug—oh Doug, none of this can be real . . .”

  “We’d better go. Back to the house. And take it easy, lady.” He managed to grin a little.

  No one passed them on the walk back, but Dot clung close to him as they walked, as though the mature years since college had never been, as though simple happiness were again all that mattered.

  The mature years . . .

  Doug wondered. Somewhere, he had always known, there was the place between resigned acceptance of things as they were and perpetual refusal to recognize a condition for what it was. Somewhere, happiness was a simple, honest thing, uncomplicated by the devious machinations of sadistic moral codes that would make a struggle of that right. Somewhere there was meaning to action, and the hypocrite was at last fallen from the mocking pedestal of lip-service righteousness.

  Somewhere, perhaps long ago, a man had said “I question” even as, at the same time, another had said “I condemn” and another had said “I follow”. Thus far, had they travelled the same road, but here, the road was forked. One was a wide path. One an aimless twisting thing that had no destination. The other, narrow, and ever narrower as it progressed. And there would be other forks, other paths, that split and re-split as they tracked the infinite reaches of time itself . . .