The Reproductive System (Gollancz SF Library)

by John Sladek

  ‘Oh no!’ she assured him, taking his hand. ‘You’re not the least bit scary, Dr. Smilax.’

  ‘Thank you, my dear. Yours is the first human warmth, the first human contact I have had these many years. I’m human, too—God, can’t they see I’m human? I may seem superhuman—I may seem a god in the operating room, because I must be, but I still have—’

  ‘A heart of clay?’ she asked seriously, almost swooning over the metaphor. Strangling a fiendish laugh that threatened to leap up in his throat, the doctor nodded.

  ‘An apt way of putting it, my dear, peculiarly so. The other day I performed open-heart surgery upon a little girl. When she had recovered, she thanked me, saying, “I’m so glad you fixed my heart up good, doctor. But why can’t you fix your own heart, too?” Yes, that child saw through me like an X-ray. Would you mind, by the way?’ As he spoke, he led her into the next room and pressed her out upon the X-ray table. ‘Yes, in effect, that child—’ He slid a plate in the drawer beneath her and swung the machine’s head into position, ‘—that innocent child said to me—Deep breath, now. Hold it! All right—said to me, “Physician, heal thyself!” Ah, would that I could take her excellent advice. But the scars are too deep, too deep on my—heart of clay!’ Again he fought down a snigger that brought tears to his eyes.

  ‘Was it some woman, doctor?’ she asked, as he led her back to the examining room. Without answering, the doctor palpated her firm, plump kidneys for a moment.

  ‘Not just “some woman”,’ he corrected. ‘Say rather Woman herself! The incarnation of fair womanhood! The sweetest, most perfect, most symm—most sympathetic creature ever to rejoice in youth and health! And she was mine! Ah, better far that I had never met her, than lose her to the black forces of Death!’

  Tears of sympathy boiled in Susie’s eyes. ‘Death?’ she whispered.

  ‘Yes, she died. Ironically enough, it was the work of a man known as a “great surgeon”. Oh, fool that I was to have ever

  believed in him! Though only a medical student at the time, even I could have performed the operation with more skill than he. “Great surgeon”—Nay, great butcher!

  ‘Ah, it is all over, all over,’ he said, kneading her kidneys savagely. ‘But I have ever since been fit for nothing else but this—a repairman of government equipment.’ Turning his head away, he fixed his gaze upon the polished toe of his shoe.

  ‘Please, I want to help,’ she said, moving closer and taking both his hands in hers.

  He squeezed them. ‘I know you do,’ he said, ‘and I appreciate it, but it is too late for me. Too late. I am old enough to be, for example, your father. Old enough—to be wise, and still a fool.’ His smile was pained.

  ‘Oh, you aren’t so old. There are lots of men older than you,’ she said earnestly. ‘Listen. I know I could never replace her in your heart—your heart of clay—that would be just impossible, for heaven’s sakes—but I would like to help in any way I can. Please tell me something I can do—anything.’

  ‘Very well, I’ll mention it, but I know you won’t want to do it.’

  ‘Just try me,’ she said bravely.

  ‘Very well. The woman I once loved used to—tell me, have you ever undergone surgery before?’

  ‘Golly, no. But if it’s like handing you instruments and wiping your forehead and giving you moral support, I could learn. I’d really try.’

  ‘Well, no, what I have in mind, Susie, was you becoming—shall we say—a patient?’

  ‘Do you mean—?’

  ‘Yes, I know it is much to ask. But I so long to know all of you; your kidneys, gall bladder, spleen, yes, every secret of your heart. What is your answer, my love?’

  For answer, Susie fell, suddenly sprawling across the table in perfect symmetry, unconscious.

  Aurora felt hypnotized, having watched almost nothing for the last 15 hours but the white skips of line down the middle of an ever-unreeling strip of black asphalt. She had stopped once or twice and dozed off, but something, some inner sense of emergency kept waking her, impelling her onward.

  Now, as the morning sun glared off the hood into his face, Grawk awakened. Bleary eyes regarded Aurora discourteously

  from a red, porous face. Rasping a hand over his beard, Grawk yawned wider than any dental chart, displaying each one of his yellow, blocky teeth. He closed them on a fresh cigar.

  ‘We must be just about there, huh, babe? Can’t you get a little more speed out of this old buggy?’

  ‘You might have helped drive,’ she said. ‘We’d have made better time.’

  ‘Oh, you’re doing fine,’ he said cheerily, rubbing yellow grit from his eyes with the hairy back of one fist. ‘But see if you can’t step on it a little.’

  Aurora congratulated herself on not losing her temper. She managed not to speak to him—for speaking to Grawk could never be other than an exchange of insults—until they came to the NORAD outer gate. The guard post seemed deserted.

  ‘Are you sure this is wise?’ she asked, slowing. ‘There must have been some reason for the guard to leave his post like that.’

  ‘You just keep driving,’ muttered Grawk, crushing down his cap over his ears. ‘Leave the thinking to me. We got two more checkpoints to pass before we get to the elevators.’

  ‘Do you know this place that well?’

  ‘Like I know women.’ He looked at her slyly through the grey mist of his cigar smoke.

  They found the second gate likewise deserted, and Aurora’s anxiety increased. It was as if some grave, unknown disaster had swept the place clean of personnel. Still, Grawk seemed unperturbed, and for all his faults he was a military planner. Surely he could make a more intelligent assessment of this plainly military situation than she. Or could he?

  The third checkpoint was just inside the opening of a steel-lined tunnel. One pair of iron doors slid closed behind the car as it entered, and another closed ahead of it. Electronic eyes and ears were trained on the car, and Grawk, with an amused wave of his hand, pointed out a crossfire arrangement of large-bore gun barrels protruding from the wall. ‘Just in case we get any ideas about messing up the place.’

  A loudspeaker spluttered, then the voice of a telephone operator spoke. ‘Switch off your engine and get out of your vehicle, please,’ it said. ‘Stand on the red platform.’

  They obeyed, Grawk seeming to enjoy the attention even of a security device, Aurora moving her stiff limbs warily. The red platform on which they stood remained motionless, while the

  yellow-and-black section supporting the car was lowered away by humming machinery, out of sight. In a moment the section returned empty.

  ‘Please give your full names and state your business at NORAD,’ invited the operator’s voice. She was no ordinary voice, but the smooth, warm one who sells coloured extension phones.

  ‘I’m General Grawk, US Air Force, Jupiter Grawk, and I got important business to transact with Washington, so I’d like to get at my office. Now.’

  ‘I’m Dr. Aurora Candlewood, psychological consultant to Project 32. My business is confidential.’

  The machine hummed and crackled for a minute. ‘I’m sorry, sir, but there is no Air Force General Jupiter Grawk listed in our records. Are you an employee of NORAD?’

  ‘Hell, I run the goddamned place!’ Grawk exploded. ‘I’m in command here, and I damn well better get to my office!’

  ‘There is no General Jupiter Grawk listed in our records,’ the voice said sweetly. ‘Have I received your identification correctly? If so, please press your fingers against the glass plate to your left, and hold them there until the light goes off. Thank you.’

  ‘I think you got your wires crossed, baby!’ Grawk stormed. ‘I’m the head of this outfit, and you ain’t nothing but a machine!’

  ‘Have I received your identification correctly? If so, please press your fingers against the glass plate to your left and hold them there until the light goes off. Thank you.’

  Grawk strode to the plate and held his ring
ers against it. A bar of light moved across the plate.

  The loudspeaker hummed and crackled. A different voice came on now, the rasping, angry voice of a sergeant. ‘All right, Grawk, just what are you trying to pull?’ it snarled. ‘You know damn well you been busted to Airman Third Class. That was automatic when you loused up Operation Hot Seat. What is all this crap about posing as an officer, huh?’

  The cigar drooped. ‘Well, sure, I knew it, but I thought—usually it takes a few weeks for a demotion, and—’

  ‘And you just figured you’d sneak back here, grab a few Top Secret files and light out for Mexico, didn’t you? Well now, Grawk, you and your girl friend just sit down and wait, till the brass decide what to do with you.’

  ‘I’d like to leave,’ Aurora said in a hushed, frightened voice.

  ‘You stay put, Miss!’ roared the invisible sergeant. ‘You wanted in and you’ll get in—maybe! But you sure won’t get out until I get the sayso from the higherups. Sit down!’

  A pair of seats unfolded from the wall. Aurora and Grawk sat on them gingerly. There was nothing to look at but the silent loudspeaker and the grim, emissile gun barrels.

  Dr. Toto Smilax was too nervous to wait for Susie to recover consciousness. Tense as a bridegroom he withdrew, leaving her with a hospital gown and a note: ‘My dear, if you decide as I pray you will, put on this little gown and ring for me. If not, you are free to go. The door is not locked.’

  He then locked her in and went to his own office to wait. Here, as in any office he occupied, Smilax had installed an elegant, completely-equipped dentist’s chair. It was his favourite relaxation to fill or extract his own teeth.

  Today, however, he only drilled at a molar in a desultory fashion for a short time, then in a fit of petulance broke off the drill. If only she would consent! He would have her in any case; but how sweeter far the prize that awards itself freely! He developed her X-ray and examined it. Not once in a lifetime did most surgeons get their meat-hooks on such as this, he reflected. It increased his impatience.

  The bell sounded then.

  As he arranged her on the operating table, Dr. Smilax saw the girl’s cheeks were wet.

  ‘What is it, my dear? Are you afraid that what you are doing is—wrong?’

  ‘I’m not—sure.’ She sighed, then smiled through her tears. ‘I’m a little afraid. You see—’ she flushed prettily, and would have hidden her face in her hands, had they been free, ‘you see, I’ve never had surgery before. This is my first time.’

  ‘I understand,’ he said, fastening the leather straps.

  ‘Promise me,’ she said, ‘promise me you’ll be gentle.’

  He was bending to kiss her smooth, childlike forehead when far in the distance an alarm sounded. ‘I must leave you for a brief moment,’ he whispered huskily. ‘But I shall hurry back.’

  ‘You may now proceed,’ droned the loudspeaker in a third voice, neutral and official. ‘Use elevators four and five, please.’

  The gate before them swung open, and Grawk and Aurora

  walked through it to the elevator bank.

  ‘Why do we have to use two elevators?’ she asked.

  Grawk’s explanation was as authoritative as ever, but his manner was more subdued. ‘These are all one-man elevators,’ he said. ‘They only handle 275 pounds and under. That’s to keep any of the help from getting the idea of bringing in a bomb—or taking home a computer. You take four, I’ll take five.’

  Feeling some misgivings, Aurora stepped into the tiny chamber and closed the gate. The overhead light went on, and the cage plummetted down a silver-sided shaft. There was nothing else, and after a time she lost the sensation of motion; it seemed as if the wall beyond the bars was rising while she stood still.

  Then deceleration began, and suddenly the light went out. The cage stopped. When Aurora tried opening the gate she found it still locked, and she found out something else.

  Her hand fumbled through the bars and encountered no steel wall beyond, no wall at all. Seemingly she was suspended in a void.

  ‘Hey!’ shouted Grawk’s voice so near at hand it made her jump. ‘Hey, let me out of this!’

  ‘Throw down that gun, Grawk!’ commanded a voice that echoed from all directions. Something clattered on stone or concrete somewhere below.

  A long amber window lighted, showing what seemed to be the control room of a television studio. There was no one inside. At the same time, a pair of powerful spotlights picked out the two cages, lighting every detail of their interiors.

  ‘You are not General Grawk,’ the voice went on, heavy with sarcasm. ‘You the Airman Third Class Grawk, and you are impersonating an officer. Throw down all the badges of your rank, and make it fast.’

  Grawk did so, shrinking in the process from an ugly little man to a hideous, tearful dwarf. ‘Can’t I keep the cap for a souvenir?’ he whined. ‘I like to wear it. I wear it all the time, even when I’m—’

  ‘Throw it down! It is a federal offence for you, an enlisted man, to even think of wearing a cap with silver leaves on the brim.’

  Sighing, he sailed the cap off into the darkness. He was so short that Aurora, in her parallel cage twenty feet away, could clearly see his bald spot, red with shame. ‘Is the Chief here?’

  he asked dazedly. ‘I thought he’d be in Washington by now.’

  ‘General Ickers is in Washington, but you are under the authority of Dr. Smilax.’

  ‘Smilax!’

  ‘Did I hear my name mentioned?’ said the doctor, who entered the control room at that moment. ‘Speak of the devil, eh? Actually, Airman Grawk, you are now attached to my staff—as an experimental subject.’

  ‘But how—?’

  ‘I won you, let us say, from General Ickers. That is, after we finished our all-night session of Go-to-the-Dump, he owed me thirty-five cents. Well, rather than break a dollar bill … You see?’

  ‘And me, doctor?’ asked Aurora acidly. ‘Have you bought me, too?’

  ‘Ah, no, Dr. Candlewood. I am truly sorry to have to greet you like this, but you arrived in not very choice company. Let me help you down.’ He pressed a switch, and the cage lowered slowly to the concrete. As it touched down, the gate opened. Smilax beckoned her into the control room, and held the door as she entered.

  The room was filled with electronic gadgetry, none of which Aurora recognized. In these surroundings the mild-looking middle-aged man who called himself Smilax seemed almost an alchemist among his magical paraphernalia.

  ‘May I ask what you are doing here?’ She spoke stiffly. ‘I had expected to find you in Millford, doctor. Is work on Project 32 being carried on here as well?’

  ‘You might say that, yes. But let me ask you the same question. What brings you to NORAD?’

  ‘An accidental meeting with him,’ she said, gesturing out the window towards Grawk’s cage. ‘I was lost at the time, and he convinced me it was urgent that he reached NORAD. Is it really necessary to keep him caged up like that?’

  ‘For the time being. Well, it is fortunate that you appeared, in any case. Yes, fortunate. There is much work for a person of your capabilities—much work. Do you understand what has gone on thus far? How much do you know about the project?’

  ‘I understood the operations of the Reproductive System some time ago, as soon as I had read the report. My job is to educate the System and study its learning processes.

  ‘That’s as much as I’m sure of. I can guess at a good deal more. The System got out of control some way; it’s too wily and too rapidly-multiplying for the military to cope with. Grawk says he tried something like “electrocuting” it, and it evidently did not work. What exactly has happened? Has the System mutated faster than expected? And, by the way, what has happened to the personnel at NORAD?’

  ‘My, you are intelligent for one so young—and so beautiful,’ said Smilax, beaming. Aurora could see two little images of herself in the rimless lenses of his glasses.

  ‘I’m old enough to be annoyed
by senseless flattery, doctor,’ she said coldly. ‘Are you going to answer my questions or not?’

  He continued to beam as he said, ‘I may as well tell you, since you’ll guess it anyway. The Reproductive System not only was not hurt by Grawk’s attack, it was helped. It now has stored up vast power capabilities, including even sources like Hoover Dam.

  ‘In addition, the Reproductive System has reached NORAD, and it has taken over, lock, stock and missile retaliation system.’

  Aurora gasped. ‘Then the fate of the human race is in the control of the Reproductive System! I assume you’re here to try to stop it?’

  ‘Oh no,’ he said, his smile broadening. ‘You see, the Reproductive System is—and has been all along—in my control.’

  CHAPTER XVII

  NEWS NOTES FROM ALL OVER

  ‘Sufficient for the day is the newspaper thereof.

  JAMES JOYCE

  (From Newstime magazine):

  THE US

  What’s Eating Las Vegas?

  ‘Something wrong.’ It all began when ‘something went wrong’ at hush-hush Project 32 in Millford, Utah, the top-sneakret operation reputedly manufacturing a new type of

  computer. Then Nevada counted her towns and came up two short. When you’re as small a state as Nevada (47th, with an estimated population of 454,000), the loss of even a city as small as Altoona (1,158) can be noticed. But it was the other city that was sorely missed: Las Vegas.

  Boffishly termed ‘the entertainment capital of Hollywood’, this gambler’s eden of dine-and-dance palaces had long been considered, by reformers, ripe to become a paradise lost—but not all in one night. Then, before you could stack a deck …

  SCIENCE

  The Big Blackout

  Avoidable and costly. Towns as far apart as Keewatin, Minnesota and Keen Camp, California were gloomed by the most massive power failure in history. Powerless were 18 states comprising 145,013 communities, and at least a million miles of wire were without current. What were the causes?