CHILLER

by Gregory Benford

  Kathryn blushed. “I didn’t mean—”

  “Oh, sure you did. That’s okay. Natural curiosity. Like pacing off the perimeter of a piece of land you’re fixing to buy.”

  “Maybe just rent,” she said, retreating into coquettishness.

  “The payments are easy but frequent,” he said sardonically.

  She opened her mouth to top that and stopped, aghast that they were bantering so soon. “God, listen to us, will you?”

  He gave an easygoing shrug. “Sex is the flip side of death. Susan would approve.”

  “She probably would. I keep thinking of her in the present tense, still.”

  “She’s still present, in a sense. Just shut down, really, awaiting repairs.”

  “Despite everything, I… think of her as off in heaven somewhere. Classic cartoon stuff, I’m afraid. Sitting on clouds, listening to harp music.”

  “Despite everything? What’s that mean?”

  So she told him about her mother. “I don’t really believe anymore, but somehow it builds up, and every year or so I go to church. Catholic. The whole thing, confession, the works.”

  “Whatever helps.”

  “Do you believe in… anything?”

  “Sure. Just because I think it’s smart to hang on to the structure of a person, the organization in the brain, doesn’t mean I’m an atheist. The good Reverend Montana would be shocked out of his boots to hear that.”

  “What’s a hard-line cryonicist like you actually believe, though?”

  “That it’s a big universe, with infinite possibility. That this little planet is an interesting experiment, still running. Maybe it’s a failure. Maybe it’s a success, so far. The nearest we get to something really big, I suppose, is when we open ourselves to possibility—embrace that infiniteness.”

  “Well, religion tries to do that.”

  “Sure it does. I just never liked those formal rituals, the rules and regs. It’s like”—he gave her a telling glance—“like learning love from a manual. Other people seem to need it. Fine. I just don’t take to the idea of marching lockstep into paradise.”

  “Ummm. I took a while to recover from my mother’s death. Finally I realized that it was dumb to blame God for disease. But by that time, church was just going through the motions, for me. When I go back, it’s beautiful and distant. Like paging through your high school annual. There’s a young woman back there—one who was serene and sure and sort of sweetly naive—and that’s the only way I can visit her, now.”

  He smiled warmly. “No, she’s still there. I can see her peeking out sometimes.”

  “She has a shell now.”

  “Don’t I know it. A very hip shell.”

  “The best kind. You have to keep it polished, though.”

  “Really hip people aren’t nostalgic for their earlier faiths.”

  She watched the neon consumer gumbo stream by outside. “I guess not. They don’t still fret over why there’s evil in the world, either. Why Susan should die from a simple misstep.”

  “If I was being a complete cynic, I’d say that evil is just our name for things we don’t like.”

  “Like weeds? They’re simply plants we don’t like.”

  He nodded, earnestly keeping his eyes on the road to make up for his fatigue. “Good analogy. And pornography is just erotica that some people don’t like.”

  “Why does this conversation keep straying back to sex?”

  He grinned devilishly, though on his haggard face it gave him a certain rogue boyish quality instead. “Guess.”

  She leaned over and kissed him. “Fine, but you have to stay over. Tonight I want to be held. Close.”

  “Try to get away.”

  After he parked in front of her apartment he immediately took her in his arms. His kiss was warm, soft, demanding. But even as she let him work his magic upon her, she peered over his shoulder at the street outside, which was dark with something more than night.

  5

  GEORGE

  Entering the Reverend Montana’s private quarters behind the Marble Cathedral was like returning to the warmhearted clasp of his dim childhood memories. The hushed, sprawling rooms, thick carpeting, a broad brick fireplace with gleaming brass fittings, aromas of walnut polished with linseed oil—all pierced George with a longing for permanence and solidity, for the certainties that lay behind this solid, almost achingly familiar place.

  “Come right on in,” the Reverend said in his slight country accent, leading George into the shadowed stillness of his personal study. Montana seated him in an ample chair near the study’s fireplace. Logs snapped and popped. A prickly heat soothed the air, a caressing glow that freed George of his swooping, skating anxieties. He was back in the reassuring embrace of the church, and he felt himself easing into the simple pleasure of giving over to something greater than himself.

  The Reverend stood for a moment, one hand resting on his polished rosewood desk, as though he knew what a striking figure he cut there. His mane of hair caught the firelight. A hand-painted red tie, obviously made by a parishioner, fit in well with his dark blue suit and diamond cuff links. Through the tall stained-glass windows distant lights gave a sheen of blues and yellows to the flat planes of his face.

  “I’m overjoyed with your success, my friend,” he said. “The news has been tragic, of course, and yet I know it is God’s will. The woman was the key to their misguided so-called science.”

  “You know?”

  “Of course. I keep close watch on all my flock, George. I knew that you were carrying out your mission in your own way, under divine guidance.”

  “Believe me, sir, I have given it all my attention. I’m not a well-educated man, but I’ve studied them. That’s how I knew what to do.”

  “But of course you’re educated, in the ways that matter. You are a scholar, George, a student for the Lord.”

  “It was your sermons that told me what to do, Reverend. I—”

  “Please, call me Carl. And which sermon was that? I give so many, both in the cathedral and on the airwaves, that I—”

  “The one about transgressions.”

  “Ah, yes. Violating the conventions of the secular abyss, the fallen world, in order to uphold the holy.”

  “The way you put it, sir, about hewing to a finer, a higher word—that was beautiful.”

  “The truth was written for us by God, if we can but see how to read it.”

  “I do read it, I do. But the way you say things, that’s what makes it all so clear.”

  “I am most humble for whatever I can do, my friend. You have plainly harassed these Godless people who profiteer from the grief of others, and for that I owe you great thanks. I am sure your efforts contributed to this woman’s end.”

  “You… know?”

  “I understand your nature.”

  “I’m so relieved. I’ve prayed and searched, wondered if I was wrong to do it…”

  Montana’s brow glistened with perspiration, and George saw that the man was frightened. Yet Montana’s jaw clenched with resolution, as though an inner battle had been waged and won in George’s favor.

  “I can see the hand of God in many events. The good professors of the University of California have done the lion’s share, of course, by ferreting out this woman’s illegal acts. There’s been plenty about that in the papers, background on her. But your own works have helped, of that I am sure.”

  George had not known how to tell the Reverend what he had done, or of the troubling dreams he had, the plans, the shooting hot desperation he felt in his dark moments of depression. Now he saw that he did not need to tell him at all. The Reverend understood. Deeply, without being told, those profoundly wise eyes could see into George’s soul with a searing gaze of piercing love.

  “The Lord’s soldiers must keep their own counsel,” George said automatically. The words rolling forth into the scented air sounded strange, for though he had repeated them thousands of times since his first interview with the
Reverend, he had not spoken them aloud. They were his mantra, the resolute code that calmed his inner storms.

  “Amen, brother. I—”

  “Their bones shall be dry and white. ‘And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves.’ So their bones must be cleansed by holy rot.”

  “You are a true student of Scripture, George. I do hope the Lord gives you the strength and courage to continue on with your works.”

  “I am full of His joy.”

  “Harrying the un-Godly is a thankless task, as I hope you realize.”

  George was aghast. “Reverend, I will never seek credit for this.”

  “Your silence shall place you even higher among the exalted, brother. There shall be no public touting of your struggle, for a minister such as myself cannot embrace it before the cameras of our benighted world.”

  “I understand, I know.”

  “This woman—do you believe what my friends tell me? That she was forced to commit suicide?”

  “What?” George blinked, the sudden question pulling him back from a gossamer realm of quicksilver images.

  “That is what a friend tells me.”

  “Suicide?” Troubling emotions struggled in George. He could feel them flicker in his face. Tried to control them. Could not.

  “Now, I don’t say you are to blame. Dr. Hagerty was sick in her soul and ended her personal pain without accepting the Lord.”

  “But, I mean, it came over me, did I have the right—”

  “The pressure you exerted was righteous.”

  “I—I see.”

  “And it shall be rewarded.”

  The Reverend pushed a button on his desk. George’s mind spun. Montana had seemed to know that he had killed the Hagerty woman, but never said so, exactly. Deniability—that was it. The Reverend had to always be able to say that George had not told him, that he had not known.

  George sat back, accepting the principle, letting his gaze drift to the Wall of Respect, where past presidents beamed vacantly out at the camera while shaking hands with the Reverend. Purpose, gravity, destiny. The Reverend said something, quoted Scripture, his powerful baritone booming up into the shadowy recesses of the steepled study ceiling, and George did not register the massive oak door as it squeaked open. He caught the swish of a long skirt on the carpet and looked into the pool of orange light thrown by a tall lamp, and there she was—the woman who had first led him to this study, a few weeks ago, on a rainy night.

  “I want you to meet Karen Bocelin, George. I have told her of your devotion, your works.”

  He shot to his feet. “I—I’m awfully proud to meet you.”

  “I admire you. Brother George,” she said in a soothing, soft voice. She did not accept his hand to shake—which made him grateful, because he could feel his fingers trembling—but instead grasped both his hands, bringing them together with her own soft touch. Skin like silky promises. Something in the gesture carried a moist, clasping intimacy, warming his face.

  “I wanted you two to meet. Karen here is a student at Chapman College.”

  George groped for something to say. “That’s a good school, I hear.”

  “She is one of our scholarship students, as well. Vitality Corporation pays her tuition and a stipend.”

  “Oh, good.” George rummaged for words but could think of nothing. He looked to the Reverend for some clue of what this was about. “Vitality…?”

  Karen said enthusiastically, “It’s a wonderful company that does research in many areas. It’s run by a genius, and I get to work with him sometimes.”

  “George is a man of intellect as well,” Montana said. “In fact, I wanted you to be here, Karen, when I present him with this.” The Reverend held out to George a small cut-glass cross on a gold necklace.

  “Ooohh. A crystal cross!” Karen exclaimed. “How lovely.”

  George took it wonderingly. Only the elders of the Marble Cathedral and prominent members of the congregation sported these. He was touched. Karen fastened the thread around his neck, and George felt a rush of pride, washing away all doubt. He thanked the Reverend profusely, and conversation went on for several minutes without his really paying attention, until Montana said, “Like you, George, Karen was brought up in a foster home.”

  Karen smiled, her teeth perfect, brilliant. “Except that I had only one set of foster parents. You had a much harder life, the Reverend tells me.”

  “The Church saved me,” George said, which was for him the simple truth of it.

  “He is a man of resources,” Reverend Montana said.

  Karen still held his hands between her own, slightly uplifted, as if the two of them shared a private prayer. She went on for a while about foster homes and how much she had loved hers, but George was acutely conscious only of the heady fragrance that blossomed outward from her, enveloping him. Her high-necked white linen blouse did not conceal the ample swell of her breasts, and her full-length black skirt, severe in the Marble Cathedral manner, nonetheless hinted strongly at the flare and curve of her hips. The room pressed in thickly around him, the crackling fire talking like a separate brittle voice. He was acutely sure that she knew the thoughts that rose up in him, making his face hot, his eyes dart.

  “—do you believe?” Karen finished, and looked at him. George blinked and tried to recall what she had said. His mind whirled, stubbornly blank.

  “Oh yes, oh yes,” he said helplessly. This seemed to answer her question, and Karen rewarded him with a demure smile.

  “I believe George here works a bit too hard. He could do with a bit of feminine company, Karen,” the Reverend said. “Perhaps you two will stay for the cathedral supper this evening? There’ll be a choir performance, too.”

  “Oh, I’d love that,” she said.

  “Uh, sure,” George stuttered out. In the Reverend’s glance he saw a silent exchange. George had earned this introduction, the Reverend’s eyes seemed to say. This reward. This benediction.

  George pressed the woman’s hands with sudden fervor. Images swarmed in his mind, black fears, fiery impulses. No, no, a part of him cried, but he forced that part of him down and put on a mask he had learned long ago, a stiff and bland smile. He would do as the Reverend guided, despite his fears. A man conquered fear, or else it stood final victor over him.

  He took her hand. She squeezed it. The Reverend and Karen led him from the shadowy study and out into the majesty of the cathedral, their talk flitting around him like darting, artful birds. Words were light, quick, hard to catch. And all the while something new had entered him, a sullen weight that pulsed in his belly, a midnight-black foreboding.

  6

  KATHRYN

  She woke up while making love. Drifting from fuzzy sleep, into slow, sliding rhythms. Her legs entwined his shoulders, and her fingers found two tight bands of muscle in his neck. She rubbed there as he brought heat into her, and she felt the tenseness dissolve in him as well. She sighed and caught his pungent musk. Moist. Urgent. The valley formed by the muscle ridges of his neck resisted and then flowed away. His mouth was quick, impossibly fluid. Her own knotted confusions focused in a silky thrusting, and then he was all over her, huge in the morning radiance.

  Here was the true center of them both. So soon, they had found an almost courtly cadence. He acknowledged the sweetness and slumbering strength of her with tender kisses, a kind of long knowing and dwelling on the tiniest crevices of her, and on the sounds this called forth. He knew her, meditated on her ample territories and secret dominions, all without rushing anywhere else. And after their slow turn-taking symmetries, there came the time when he displayed his power and deep force. Not aggressive, vicious and dominating—unless she summoned that herself, as sometimes she did—but showing his fervor and even ferocity, displayed for her appreciation. Beast in the jungle, lion-fierce and growling, biting, he rolled over her with his protective vigor. Then she answered with her own savagery, with snarls,
scratches, hisses, fierce nips—showing, too, her capacity to contain and finally tame his vitality, by giving him hers. It all had a magic momentum, an inevitable tide that swept both before it.

  Then she was waking up again, fuzzily free of time, and she dimly realized that she had drifted down from orgasm to woolly sleep. Alex was sitting up next to her, studying the play of morning light on the window shade. A memory flickered, of a shadow looming across a window in the night. The image yanked her up from warm lassitude and then dwindled, trickled away, leaving a troubled, skittering echo of fear.

  Alex whispered, “You asleep?”

  “That’s high on my list of classic dumb questions.” She rolled over and buried her head in her pillow, banishing the thin wedge of dread.

  “Oh yeah. Like, ‘Where’d you lose it?’”

  She tossed about again. “My favorite is, ‘Promise not to be mad if I tell you something?’ I always say no and watch them struggle with it.”

  “Cruel woman.”

  “I try to be.”

  “Interesting philosophy of life.”

  “What’s yours?”

  He arched his eyebrows ruefully, rubbed at his beard stubble, and she saw he took her lazy question seriously. After a moment he said, “Don’t take sides.” He paused, mouth tightening. “But keep score.”

  “Ha. ‘Don’t take sides’? For a man who works untold hours on cryonics, a belief that most people think is repulsively wacko, that’s a little odd.”

  “Oh, I left out part: ‘Never be consistent.’”

  “Now it makes perfect sense.”

  “Cynic.”

  “I just love this postcoital sweet talk.”

  She did. Somehow she felt that she knew this man better than she had any of the others in the long legion of Mr. Mightabeens. It felt so right. Sometimes we were just nets of nerves, she thought, snatching up the zinging call of our pheromones on the first ring, while our professed sensitivities and fastidious morals cooled like an unread novel on the nightstand.