A Billion Days of Earth

by Piserchia, Doris

  “I’m so sick of it all!”

  Sheen had been looking at the sky; now his gaze lowered. “Then why don’t you get away?”

  “How?”

  “Like this.” Sheen created a picture of zizzy-perfection in Bebe’s mind.

  “You’re a telepath!”

  “Just sensitive.”

  “But it’s all there! It’s so beautiful! Why can’t it really be like that?”

  “It can be. Don’t you know about love? It makes the world go around.”

  “What has love got to do with the picture in my head?”

  “I’m the strangest mutant you’ll ever meet. I exist to love others.”

  “Even me?” said Bebe, forgetting to be dishonest.

  “Especially you. What’s the use of lovable?”

  “That’s true. I’ve always believed that kind of …”

  “Crap?” Sheen said, gently.

  Bebe laughed somewhat hysterically. “We understand, don’t we? That’s all it is, every damned bit of it, but we have to go along because we know that without it the world would fall on its face. I feel persecuted when I think about it, especially today. I’m thinking about the most revolting human in the world. He looks like you.”

  Sheen smiled and said nothing.

  Bebe relaxed on the bench. He let his stomach bulge. He had gained a lot of weight. The sight disgusted him, and he remembered how his body had looked not so very long ago. An overwhelming sadness captured him. “Did you ever …” he began, and then his voice trailed off. He took a deep breath. “When you were little, did you ever look around you and get the most agonizing feeling of happiness?” His slanted eyes groped across the silver face.

  Sheen waved a human paw. “It doesn’t last. That feeling is the result of good circulation. It’s like a shot of adrenalin, no good beyond the moment.”

  “You must be right,” said Bebe. “It didn’t last. I thought it meant something, a signal that my life was waiting for me and that it would be full of greatness and that I was going to be equal to it. But one day the feeling wasn’t there anymore.”

  “And you never wondered why, which was only sensible. Who cares about a will-o’-the-wisp?”

  “I don’t know. It was nice, like, oh, like—”

  “What about the picture I’ve showed you? Want to live like that?”

  “As a spectator? I don’t—”

  “What is a person but a spectator? Everything worth making has already been made. Everything worth doing has been done a thousand times over. I ask you, person to person, if a person doesn’t do, what does he do?”

  Bebe had no answer.

  “Any intelligent organism was born to be an observer,” said Sheen. “At birth he’s an expert, otherwise he would never learn a thing. He needs to feel warm, feel loved, feel his conformity, feel good. After a while, he does everything by rote. He doesn’t feel as good as he would like, and he realizes that what he really wants is to get out of the scramble and watch other people knock heads. But he can’t. The consequence is that he goes around with a bellyache. He’s had it for centuries. He would go on having it, if it weren’t for my intervention.”

  Bebe was sitting on the ground, now. What he saw with his real eyes was so unpleasant that he switched over to the eyes in his soul. Everything became subtly rosy then, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

  “But what do you do for people?” he said.

  “I give them a nonexistent bellyache.”

  “What?”

  “I give them an overcure for their illnesses. But, my dear zizzy, it would take an IQ twice yours to see the beauty in that concept.”

  “Just a minute—”

  “It would take an IQ of approximately two hundred to see through me, which is what yours would be, after I made you over, but then there are things more important than IQ, as you well know.”

  “I … I …” stammered Bebe.

  “An illusion,” said Sheen. “Don’t try and fight it, don’t try and figure it out, just take my word for it, what seems to exist is only illusion. Real reality—the solid stuff—lies in what you see with the soul the Lord gave you. You think you see with those two eyes in your face? Whoever told you that deserves to be crucified.”

  “I don’t know what to think.” Sometimes Bebe’s rose-colored glasses didn’t set straight on him. At times they were askew, so that what he saw was half-Technicolor, half-gray. He didn’t like combinations of things. Hints, intimations, innuendos, suggestions and unbridled hypotheses offended him. In his tethered opinion, such things should be outlawed, and this creature said they already were. Bebe faltered, swayed, was inclined to surrender.

  “You will enhance that which is already beautiful, if you come to me,” said Sheen. “Haven’t I showed you exactly the kind of world you desire?”

  “Do it to me again,” said Bebe, and then, for no accountable reason, he blushed.

  Sheen loaned him the picture once more. In the world envisioned there, the only important thing was IQ, and Bebe had one that no man or zizzy could better. Everybody recognized Bebe’s superiority and provided him with throne, scepter and a license to do as he pleased. What he liked to do most was to make decisions for others. He sat on his throne and people came to him with their problems and he consulted his IQ and told them what to do. They always took his advice and their lives always improved. He had a palace to live in, a staff of stupid servants and a harem of virgins.

  “Will the world really be like this?” he said.

  “For you it will.”

  “But how can I actually do those things if I’m doing them only in my mind?”

  “All kidding aside, the thinking mind does have a place in reality. As a matter of fact, if it isn’t involved, its owner is either asleep or dead. The greatest joy, the highest pleasure, has to have its roots in a thinking mind.”

  “What are you saying?” blurted the zizzy.

  “Lie down, lie down and pillow your head in my lap. I want to tell you secrets.”

  Bebe frowned, kept frowning as the low voice of Sheen penetrated the fog of hatred in his brain. He listened for a long time as the voice opened his soul like a too-ripe fruit. At last he abandoned his relaxed position, hopped onto the park bench.

  “I don’t want to hear anymore,” he said. “I hate everything you’ve told me. You knew I would. That’s why you said it. I’ve never loved goodness. What I love is you, Sheen. We’re alike. We belong together.”

  Sheen stood. “Of course we do.”

  “Evil,” said Bebe. “Power. You can’t have one without the other and power is what I want. Goodness and reason will never plague me again.”

  Sheen looked at him sadly. “How can you believe that?”

  “Because of my ace in the hole. You’re a perfect example of a reasonable mind deliberately defying reason. You’re omniscient, yet you made the illogical choice and got away with it. That’s why I know I’m safe.”

  Sheen bent down.

  “Hold on,” Bebe said roughly. “I’m a hog. Don’t think I’ll pass up an opportunity like this one.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Bebe grinned. “I want to have my cake and eat it, too. I want to get even with the world. I’m going to be your pimp.”

  “Ahhh!”

  “I’ll bring you legions.”

  “And when they’re all gone?”

  “Then it’ll be just you and me. We’ll have it all. I’ll reign with you.”

  “You will be their Judas?”

  “Eh?”

  “Never mind,” said Sheen. “Go ahead. Get them and bring them to me.”

  “They’ll be good ones,” said Bebe, and flew away.

  Sheen watched his flight. “I forgot to mention the most important thing,” he murmured. “If there’s one thing a mind can’t avoid, it is its automatic aversion to evil. The moment he lets it into himself, he places his feet on the road to demolition.”

  The God climbed off the cloud at the same
time that Rik stepped from behind the tree.

  “You’re quiet,” said Vennavora.

  “The better to sneak up on you.” Rik had met only a handful of beautiful women in his life, and he had desired every one of them. Now he stood and enjoyed the glow of warmth and life emanating from the great brown person beside him. He felt the trembling in his own body and knew it wasn’t inspired by fear. The mind determined how a man responded to his world. He wanted Vennavora, and he accepted the fact as calmly as he accepted his own existence.

  “Shall I get down on my knees?” he said.

  “Only if you’ve come begging.” The forehead of Vennavora creased as he knelt. As quickly, her frown blanked to smoothness. There was no curiosity in her expression as she looked down at him and said, “The answer is no.”

  For a crazy instant, Rik had the feeling she was giving him an answer to two questions. “A rare response these days, wouldn’t you say?” His eyes searched hers for some sign of relenting.

  “I never say the obvious.”

  “You just did.”

  “You don’t amuse me.”

  “I think that if I didn’t, you wouldn’t let me speak at all. You wouldn’t stand here listening.”

  “I can’t destroy Sheen. You’ve wasted your time coming here, and you’re wasting my time now.”

  Rik glanced away. “If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s having someone accuse me of not caring. Now I’m doing it. You don’t care.”

  “If that accusation arouses no response of guilt in you, why should it in me?”

  “I didn’t think it would.”

  Vennavora stretched her splendid legs and glanced at the sky. She looked down at Rik who still knelt before her and again there was a slight creasing of her forehead. “Don’t come again, don’t seek me, don’t stalk me.”

  “I will.”

  “You’ll gain nothing.”

  “I have to try.”

  “Why?”

  “A man can’t sit back and hope destruction will pass him by.”

  Vennavora’s gaze became intent. “Your nature is to struggle in the face of defeat.”

  “And yours isn’t?”

  “Illogic can be carried too far.”

  Rik sat back on his heels. His strength seemed to ebb from him like water. “Maybe it isn’t illogic. It could be fear.”

  “Whose?”

  “Yours?”

  Vennavora laughed, and the sound was so clear and so free of compromise that Rik winced. He had never heard the sound of pure laughter before, and he wanted to imprison it so he could continue to hear it.

  “Insults amuse you,” he said. “The gnat’s buzzing may become annoying, though, and in another moment you might slap it.”

  This time she spoke with emotion, and he knew it was anger. “Then why aren’t you afraid?”

  He turned his head and looked into the distance at his world, at the place where he lived or died, the only place there was for him. “I’m on my knees,” he said in a low voice. “I’m begging. Help us.”

  “Begging? I have no such impression.”

  “I have.”

  “How do you like it?” Why didn’t her eyes light with malice? Wasn’t it a malicious question, intended to hurt?

  “In the old days men threw crumbs to the beasts. Most of them didn’t, but there were a few who recognized that life was an absolute no matter what its form.”

  “Get off your knees, rat,” commanded the God.

  “No.”

  “Then remain in that position.”

  Rik leaped to his feet.

  Now the crease in Vennavora’s forehead was deep. “I’ll tell you once. We have no hatred for you or your kind. We hate only the stupidity in some minds. If we could help you, we would. You are doomed. There is nothing we can do.”

  She made as if to leave.

  “Wait. I brought something for you.” Rik walked to a nearby tree and picked up the toy from behind it. He came back and extended it to her.

  “I hope you don’t consider this a bribe,” she said as she took it.

  “I consider that keeping it will do me no good. I believe the only thing a God fears is the contempt of his own kind. Tontondely’s friends would make fun of him if they knew I had the toy. Give it to him and tell him I hope he rots.”

  “You don’t understand all of it.”

  “I don’t want to.” He watched her ride aloft on a cloud, and the taste of failure was bitter in his mouth, but there was a stronger feeling in him and he decided it was admiration. If a mind could find nothing to admire, if it searched in vain for external glory, if it had to acknowledge that the best in the world resided within its own person, how did that mind survive? Wouldn’t it brood until its strength was snuffed out? Wouldn’t longing become indifference? At least he and his kind had the Gods. The monarchs didn’t travel in circles. Did they? Their course was straight and their integrity unassailable. They wore their happiness as casually as they wore their skin, which meant that the holy grail was real and within reach of everyone. A man built his vault of integrity by finding and matching that which he admired. What had the Gods admired in their youth? Three million years ago they had been alone in their reign.

  The Gods could save the world. Rik had to believe it. If the greatest achievers were impotent, then A was anything but A.

  Sign on Rik’s front lawn:

  SHEEN IS TRANSCENDENCE. HE IS TV, HEROIN, CRUSADES AND ORGASM. HE IS THE HIGH. THE PIECE OF YOUR BRAIN THAT PROVIDES EUPHORIA IS HIS TARGET. HOW BIG IS YOUR “EUPHORT?” BIGGER THAN YOU ARE? INSIDE IS THE I-HATE-SHEEN CLUB. COME IN AND JOIN.

  He hated clubs. No, that wasn’t the right word. He had been too bored by the idea to ever join one. Now he was the president of one, the beginner, the spirit behind. If everyone had as much enthusiasm as he, the club would be a colossal bomb. It didn’t matter. He was the only member.

  He didn’t know whether to swear or sweat as he walked into his living room and confronted the two men sitting there. Clearing his throat, he said, “First come, first served,” and one of the men stood.

  He was big and muscular and gray-haired. It had been a month or so since he had last shaved. His clothes were dirty. He mumbled his name and it forever remained a secret. He said he came from a suburb of Osfar.

  “I hate Sheen,” he said. “I want to join the club.”

  Rik sat down in a chair and frowned at the rug. “You can’t join unless I say so. I’m the president.”

  The man nodded. “I realize that.”

  “You can’t just join a club because you want to.”

  The man gave a weak smile. “No, I suppose not.”

  “There are rules. Without them, nobody gets anywhere.”

  “I’ve never been arrested. You can check.”

  Rik looked at the ceiling. “I don’t know what kind of club this is going to be.”

  “You put that sign out there, didn’t you?”

  “Did you read it?”

  “Yes.”

  “What does it say?”

  “It says this is an I-Hate-Sheen club. I want to be in. Why don’t you write my name on a list or something?”

  Lowering his gaze from the ceiling, Rik said, “Because you can’t join.”

  The exhausted eyes came alive for a moment. “I don’t understand.”

  “You’re too eager.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know.” Rik met the man’s stare. “You’re not right for it. Your reasons aren’t right.”

  The man’s eyes jammed shut. “You don’t know my reasons.”

  “You lost someone to him. The person meant a lot to you and what you have in mind now is revenge. Please pick up your hat and walk out of here without breaking the furniture or taking a swing at me. I haven’t anything to offer you.”

  The man left without a word. He stumbled as he went out the door, caught his balance, walked slowly, almost blindly.

  Rik didn’t look a
t the other man in the room. “I don’t know what I want, but I know what I don’t want.”

  “Maybe that last part describes me, and maybe I ought to just take off without wasting my time.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Race.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “I don’t hate Sheen,” said the man named Race. “I don’t know what to think of him. I haven’t lost anyone dear to me, but I’ve seen some acquaintances stroll into his loving arms. They seemed to enjoy it. There’s something wrong with a society that ignores a creature they don’t understand, and I don’t think people understand him. I’ve watched him but I haven’t learned much about him and that makes me worry.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “People are getting to be like robots. They take more pleasure out of being spectators to life than in participating. Maybe that’s why Sheen appeals to them. He can make them pure spectators. But if he takes their souls, what will there be to look at and who will be doing the looking?”

  “Ah,” said Rik.

  His gaunt face earnest, Race leaned forward in his chair. “Men are faced with something they either have to take or leave completely alone. With Sheen we can’t stand in the middle of the road. He won’t let us, or we won’t let ourselves. I don’t know what kind of pictures he puts in peoples’ minds, but they must be powerful or no one would be interested.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Don’t be cynical. Everybody wants something. Does Sheen turn the imagination inward and make a person see only what he wants to see? There would be no fun in winning a contest like that. He’s vain, he wants a battle, and it’s real to him. He doesn’t lie about what he offers. Too many intelligent people have gone over to his side. You can’t fool that many brains with fancy pictures.”

  “Hmmm,” said Rik.

  “Another thing—he doesn’t take anyone who hasn’t got all his faculties.” As Rik started in surprise, Race nodded. “I saw a mental incompetent named Irn go to him. He turned her away. She begged but he wouldn’t take her. I was there. I saw. I don’t know what it means.”

  “What if there was an animal that ate up all the people with brains? What would happen to the rest?”