The Last Hurrah of the Golden Horde Page 12

  He did a thing with his mind for which there are no words, and he was back once more in the featureless chamber…

  And was transported to even stranger othernesses… An infinity of places, dimensions and othernesses for which there are not even the ghosts of concepts.

  He felt a strangeness in his mind, a complexity beyond complexity, a revelation of new and unexpected textures in his psyche. Time was flux, space was flux, eternity was a variable.

  There came a time when he stood, naked, alone and homesick, on the surface of some far-off planet, looking up at a small star he knew was Sol. He remembered the spaces he had seen—spaces of no dimensions, an infinity of dimensions, spaces that were not spaces, but times.

  There was a way back to Earth.

  He did something with his mind, and the surface of the planet vanished like mist. His body floated in total blackness. He felt it expand and contract rhythmically, from the size of an electron to the size of the universe… He caught it in a phase where each of its atoms corresponded to a star in the Galaxy.

  Then he let his entire mass slide down the hill of space-time into one of the sun-atoms, the one called “Sol,” to one of its electrons called “Earth.”

  He was back in the chamber.

  And he knew the way out.

  General Brewster stood outside his tent, staring at the silver dome, and wondering whether it was time to try something else.

  “Lindstrom’s been in there two days,” he said to a nervous-looking colonel. “I think we can assume that whatever happened to the others happened to him.”

  “What now, sir?”

  “I don’t know… I just don’t know. I suppose we could try to blow the thing open, but—”

  A man suddenly appeared out of nowhere. He was standing just outside the dome. He was a wiry man, not short, not tall… “What—it’s Lindstrom.”

  The being that had been Bert Lindstrom began to walk slowly toward the tent. It had two arms, two legs, two eyes, a nose, a mouth. It was, in fact, the perfect image of the man who had entered the dome.

  But when Lindstrom was close enough for Brewster to see into his eyes, the general was dreadfully sure that the creature facing him was something other than human.

  Dead End

  Willy Carson woke up at nine o’clock for no particular reason. But then, there was no particular reason to wake up at any other time, either.

  He lay alone in bed for long minutes, feeling the familiar waking-up semi-nausea, feeling, as usual, unable to get up and unwilling to stay in bed. He sighed and reached for the blue pack of cigarettes on the night table. They were marijuana, not tobacco—the government had legalized marijuana in ’88, two years after they had legalized prostitution… or had prostitution been legalized in ’87? Well, what the hell did it matter?

  He smoked his usual one cigarette quickly. These days, one was just about enough to get him barely high, sort of hollow and resonant like the first stages of a good beer drunk. He knew that if he smoked much more, it would quickly make him maudlin, and he had had more than enough of that.

  But the one cigarette was enough to get him out of bed. Just barely.

  He dressed quickly, stumbling here and there over his easel, his photoenlarger, his potter’s wheel, the assorted odds and ends of dozens of abortive hobbies that littered the bedroom. The bachelor apartment had only three rooms: kitchen-dining room, living room and bedroom. There was no room for all the junk in the kitchen, for some reason he had a compulsion to keep the living room neat, and so the bedroom did double-duty as storeroom by default.

  Awakened fully by the motion of dressing, Willy went into the bathroom, rubbed Depilo on his stubble, washed the Depilo and beard off, and combed his thinning hair diffidently.

  He went into the kitchen and punched out his usual breakfast on the Autostove—grapefruit, three fried eggs, sausage, toast, coffee. As usual, he swore to go on a diet—next week.

  He ate quickly and joylessly, shoved the plastic dishes into the Disposall, and slumped torpidly back in his chair.

  Now what? he thought.

  For a whole year after he had lost his job, Willy had spent at least five mornings a week looking for work. After all, he had reasoned, I’m a Master Draftsman with a junior college degree, as good a draftsman as there is.

  It took him a whole year to finally accept what he had known from the beginning—there just were no more jobs for draftsmen, Master or otherwise. The Draftmaster was just too good; it could do anything a human draftsman could do, it could do it quicker, cheaper, and with no errors. Draftsman had joined ditchdigger, machinist, longshoreman, telephone operator, bookkeeper, accountant, pilot, and God-knows-what-else in the ever-growing list of extinct occupations.

  Willy had joined the burgeoning ranks of the unemployed and unemployable.

  Permanently.

  Now what?

  He dragged himself out of the kitchen and into the living room. He stared bleakly for a moment at the hi-fi, at the huge cabinet full of records that he hardly ever listened to any more. Resignedly, he flopped down on the couch in front of the huge television screen that was one entire wall of the living room.

  “On,” he muttered at the T.V.

  Instantly, the television screen came to huge, full-colored, jabbering life. It was the morning news.

  “… this increase in the suicide rate is not statistically significant, President Michaelson declared,” said the bland, optimistic, not-quite-smiling announcer.

  “And now, turning to the world of sports. Only one midweek football game yesterday: New York swamped Cleveland, thirty-eight to fourteen. At the Municipal Arena, up-and-coming young Jackson Davis scored a smashing victory over the veteran Blackie Munroe, two hundred forty-three to one hundred seven. Davis swept boxing, wrestling, judo, medieval swordsmanship, knives and free-for-all. Davis’ manager, Lefty Paccelli, is now talking about a shot at the champion. The champion’s manager was interviewed after the match by Bill Faber, WKA-TV Arena reporter—”

  “Four,” grunted Willy Carson.

  Obediently, the television set changed channels.

  Picture of a man staggering out of bed, gulping a pill. Then a cut to the same man turning up his nose at a mouth-watering breakfast.

  “Friend,” cooed a syrupy voice, “is your present wake-up pill ruining your appetite? Do you find yourself turning up your nose at breakfast? Then you need Dexayum, the only wake-up pill with an appetite arouser—”

  “Drop dead!” grunted Willy.

  “… guaranteed to keep you awake for twelve hours, without loss of appetite, or your—”

  “Off! Off! Off!” Willy shouted the keyword.

  The television set shut itself off.

  “Five lousy years…” Willy muttered. “Five lousy years…”

  Five years, he thought. Five years of collecting $175 a week in Basic Citizen’s Stipend. “B.C.S.” Born, collect, stagnate.

  How many people were living off B.C.S. now? Willy wondered. Last figure he remembered hearing was eighty-nine million. By now, it was probably over a hundred million. Who knew? Who bothered with the news? What was the point?

  Christ! he thought, I’d do anything to be working again. Dig ditches. Shovel manure. Clean toilets.

  Fat chance.

  When you were automated out of your job, you were out of the work force. Period. The only conceivable direction you could go to get another job was up. You couldn’t settle for a less-skilled job, because such jobs just didn’t exist anymore.

  And while there were dozens of retraining programs, they were really just a bunch of sick jokes. Because everyone got as much education as he could take before he was permitted to add himself to the Potential Work Force in the first place. You only got a job, if you qualified for one, after you had reached your education limit. Which meant that when your job was automated out, you really couldn’t retrain, because you had already had all the training you could possibly absorb.

  So you went on B.C.
S. Nobody ever got off B.C.S. It was a dead end. Born. Collect. Stagnate. The world was full of dead ends.

  Oh, you were taken care of, and royally. Rent was free. Food was free. Medical care was free. Most of the $175 a week went for entertainment, hobbies, liquor, drugs… anything to fill the emptiness, eat up the hours.

  But nothing could.

  Your marriage blew up in your face. How could two people live together, twenty-four hours every single day, with nothing at all to do but stare stupidly at each other?

  Love turned to boredom. Boredom turned to disgust. Disgust turned to hate.

  And then you were alone.

  Alone with your whole life in front of you. Your whole stupid, empty, meaningless life…

  “Damn!” Willy muttered. “Damn! Damn! Damn!”

  There were no more idiotic hobbies left to try. There were no drugs that could give life meaning. Television was meaningless images and sounds. Food tasted like sawdust. All the psychoanalysts in the world couldn’t adjust a man to living in a vacuum.

  Dead end. Dead, dead, dead end.

  Once again, Willy found himself thinking about joining a Gang. But the thought only filled him with self-loathing. Once, two years ago, he had even gone so far as to try it…

  Most of the men and women in the Gangs had never had a job in their lives. They joined a Gang as kids, and with nothing to take its place, they stayed in the Gang. Middle-aged juvenile delinquents. Just last week, they had arrested twenty people for stomping a man to death.

  Eight of them were “students.” Seven were middle-aged men collecting B.C.S.

  And the other five were collecting Senior Citizen’s Stipend. Kill-crazy kids at sixty-plus.

  Willy knew that killing had no meaning for him. Just another stupid dead end.

  Willy got up. He stood there, immobile, in the middle of the living room, not wanting to stay in the apartment for another moment, but not having anyplace to go, either.

  Once again, he toyed with the idea of suicide. Certainly, it was becoming more and more popular. But suicide was just another dead end. Death… well, what was death? Only more of the same… more nothing. Complete nothing. Not very much different, really, from the life he was living. Death was an escape from suffering, but there was no suffering on B.C.S. No pleasure, no pain, no change, no nothing…

  He suddenly realized that he might welcome a little suffering. Pain was at least feeling something. If you felt pain, at least you had something to look forward to—the time when your suffering would end.

  But pain had been abolished, too…

  Willy grimaced bleakly. Pain… maybe that was it? Maybe if I could just feel a little suffering, he thought despairingly. Maybe then I’d have something to look forward to. Yeah, maybe if I could find a way to suffer…

  It wasn’t much, but at least it was a purpose. Forlorn, but determined, Willy Carson went forth in search of suffering.

  As Willy Carson stood uncertainly on a midtown street, he dully realized that suffering, other than sheer self-torture, was a mighty scarce commodity. Hunger was impossible—food was universally free. You couldn’t give your worldly possessions to the poor, for there were no poor. You couldn’t lead a life of self-sacrifice; there was no one who needed your sacrifice…

  Hordes of well-fed, well-clothed, well-housed people swirled slowly about Willy. There was no hustle, no rushing, for no one had anything very urgent to do. A benign sun shone down on the spotless city through the illusive shimmer of the Climatescreen. Climate control had eliminated even unpleasant weather.

  Willy did not have the faintest idea of where to find suffering. Unless…

  The Wilderness! The Middle American Wilderness Area… A hundred square miles of carefully preserved natural terrain. No Autostoves there. No Climatescreen. No rent-free apartments. No nothing.

  Feeling an approximation of excitement for the first time in years, Willy raced to the nearest stripway. He boarded the moving strip and made his way to the middle express lane.

  The border of the Wilderness Area was less than an hour away by express stripway. In an hour, he would be in the Wilderness Area, away from B.C.S., away from civilization, away from everything…

  The border of the Middle American Wilderness Area was a steel wall ten feet high and stretching beyond the horizon in either direction.

  The stripway deposited Willy by an entrance to the Wilderness Area. The entrance was a plain metal door in the wall. On the left side of the door was a speaker-grill; on the right was a small slot in the wall.

  Willy walked up to the door and tried to open it. It was shut tight.

  “Welcome to the Middle American Wilderness Area,” said a flat mechanical voice coming from the speaker-grill. “One hundred square miles of pure natural countryside provided by your government for the enjoyment of the citizen.”

  There was a metallic click, and something dropped into the slot to the right of the door. Willy went over and picked it up. It was a small metal bracelet with a red button set in its center like a jewel. It was hinged in two places so that it could be clamped over the wrist and fastened by a handcuff-like clasp at the bottom.

  “You will find your Safetybracelet in the right-hand slot,” said the speaker-grill. “Put it around your wrist and close it. It will remain locked around your wrist until you leave the Middle American Wilderness Area. It contains a small radio transmitter. This safety device insures that the citizen will suffer no discomfort in the Wilderness Area. Should you suffer discomfort, or should you become lost, merely press the red button on the Safety-bracelet, and a Retrieval Robot will immediately be summoned to your aid.”

  “But I don’t want this thing!” Willy shouted at the speaker-grill. “I want to be on my own. Open the door!”

  But of course, the entrance was pre-programmed and deaf.

  “The entrance to the Wilderness Area will be opened as soon as the clasp of the Safetybracelet is locked around your wrist. This is to insure that no citizen wanders into the Wilderness Area unprotected. Have a pleasant stay!”

  Willy cursed the unhearing mechanism. What the hell, he finally thought, nobody says I have to press the button, do they?

  He put on the Safetybracelet. Instantly, the door opened.

  Willy Carson stepped through into the Middle American Wilderness Area. The door closed behind him.

  Rolling green hills studded with woods stretched before him as far as the eye could see. The only visible metal was the wall behind him and the bracelet on his wrist.

  Willy inhaled the open country air. All the old books had promised that the wild, free country air would somehow be cleaner, tastier than the air of the cities. But Willy was disappointed. There just was no difference in the air of the Wilderness Area. Those books had been written in the days before Climate control, in the days when cities were filled with smog, industrial wastes and gasoline fumes. Now the air in the cities was as fresh and pure as any country air, which of course meant that the country air was no more zestful than the air of the cities.

  Willy suddenly had a vision of a man running carefree and laughing through green fields. Even though he recognized it as part of a television commercial, here he was, and there was the green open countryside…

  He began to run. He ran about twenty yards into the Wilderness Area, stumbling over roots, little rocks, clumps of weeds. Thirty yards, and he was panting heavily. Forty, and his legs began to feel leaden and disembodied. Fifty, and a sharp pain began in his lungs.

  He flopped down heavily in the grass, lying on his back and panting.

  Boy, am I out of shape! he thought. He tried to remember a time when he had been in shape, but he could not. Well, what the hell, who was in shape these days? Only a few professional athletes. What was the point in physical strength when there was no such thing as manual labor anymore, when there were strip-ways to take you anywhere you wanted to go?

  Now that he was catching his breath, Willy became aware of the myriad little pebbles, lump
s and indentations in the ground he was lying on. It was not very comfortable, certainly not as comfortable as the couch in his apartment.

  He scrambled to his feet, brushing himself off. He noticed in annoyance that his shirt was marked with green grass stains, his pants soiled with brown earth.

  “Damn!” he muttered. “There goes a good shirt and a good pair of pants!”

  Still annoyed at his soiled clothing, he began walking farther away from the wall towards the nearest clump of woods.

  It was dark and damp and rather cool in the woods. In fact, it was downright chilly. Willy wished he had thought to bring a jacket along. But then, who ever bothered with jackets in Climate-screened cities?

  Shivering slightly, he looked about. There were trees and bushes and a little half-dried-up stream. There were rocks sweating moisture, and there were rocks with green moss growing on them. There was damp brown earth and patches of rotting dead leaves. A few birds sang in the trees. There was silence, lots and lots of silence, more silence than Willy ever remembered experiencing. It was so quiet you could hear it.

  So this is a wilderness… Willy thought. Woods… grass… quiet…

  Now what?

  There was no ready answer to the question. He was alone in the woods. No television, no hi-fi, no Arena to go to, no nothing.

  So what do you do in the woods? Willy thought awkwardly.

  Idly, he began to walk, aimlessly, deeper into the woods. It really was chilly. Best to keep moving.

  Willy just kept walking. What else was there to do, really? He walked on and on, listening to the birds, looking at trees and rocks and bushes, bushes, rocks and trees. He found that he could really feel nothing but boredom.

  He remembered some of the books he had read, that month or so when he had decided that the thing to do was read. Those jerks had written all kinds of stuff about the beauty of nature, how wonderful it was to be alone with the trees and the grass and the animals. Come to think of it, he thought, I haven’t seen any animals at all, except for a few lousy birds.