The Reproductive System (Gollancz SF Library)

by John Sladek

  ‘Hey, let me out of here, will you?’ he asked, wolfing down the banana.

  ‘I feel safer with you in there, for the time being.’

  Approaching the typewriter keyboard in the corner of the control room, she wrote, ‘My name is Aurora Candlewood. If you understand that message, please identify yourself.’

  At once the machine replied.

  ‘UFO 0040 0060 0000 AT 42 DG 44M N 93 DG 40 M W NOW IDENTIFIED AS NC 47946. … THE SUM OF THE CUBES OF ALL NUMBERS FROM 1 TO N. … THE PERSON WHO TYPED MY NAME IS AURORA CANDLEWOOD MAY BE IDENTIFIED AS AURORA CANDLEWOOD FILE NUMBERS828286355119 A-C. … YOURSELF DO YOU MEAN THIS TYPEWRITER OR ENTIRE NORAD COMPUTER COMPLEX QUERY. … DO YOU WISH PART NUMBERS OF THIS TYPEWRITER OR OF ENTIRE NORAD COMPUTER COMPLEX, QUERY. … IF YOU WISH PART NUMBERS OF ENTIRE NORAD COMPUTER COMPLEX, DO YOU WISH PART NUMBERS OF SPARE PARTS IN STOCK QUERY. …’ It paused a moment, then, as if to be on the safe side, added, ‘I’-Q4’.

  ‘Let me outa here!’ Grawk bellowed. ‘Quit playing with that damned typewriter and spring me!’

  If the NORAD computer really had no self-concept, she reasoned, it could mean any number of things: That it was not yet connected to the Reproductive System. That the Reproductive System did not consider itself autonomous, but a slave to Smilax. Or that he Reproductive System even identified with Smilax in some way. But it wasn’t safe to go any further with that line of questioning.

  ‘What is true?’ she typed.

  ‘MY CRITERIA FOR JUDGING TRUTH OF DATA ARRANGE THEM IN THE FOLLOWING DESCENDING SCALE OF TRUTH-VALUE:

  (1) SENSORY EVIDENCE, VERIFIED BY REPEATED TRIALS OR BY MORE THAN ONE SENSE.

  (2) SENSORY EVIDENCE, UNSUPPORTED.

  (3) ORDERS FROM THE ONE UNIMPEACHABLE AUTHORITY, SMILAX.

  (4) ORDERS FROM AURORA CANDLEWOOD.

  (5) DOCUMENTS PURPORTING TO BE BY RECOGNIZED AUTHORITIES.

  (6) ALL OTHER DATA.’

  Aurora was a little surprised by the fourth category. In a few more questions she learned the difference between her authority and Smilax’s: He had the power to contradict the System’s senses and get away with it. That is, the System would see that black was black, for example, but would accept his word that black was white, and hold the contradiction in mind as a third ‘truth’.

  This ability to tolerate paradox destroyed Aurora’s first plan of attack. She had hoped to introduce it to a major paradox or two like ‘There is life after death’, in hopes of tricking it into some sort of suicide, but that was out.

  ‘I’m hungry,’ said Grawk, interrupting her train of thought.

  Abstractedly she reached out and pressed what she supposed was the switch for feeding him.

  ‘Hey! Shut that off!’ Grawk screamed.

  To her horror, she saw she had pressed the wrong switch; now the chamber in which Grawk’s cage hung was filling with whitish gas. She tried to shut the gas off, but it seemed an irreversible switch; besides, if the gas were poisonous, there was possibly enough present to kill him.

  ‘Hold your breath!’ she shouted into the microphone. ‘I’m releasing you.’ After a few false starts, she found the proper switch to lower his cage and open the door. Holding his breath, Grawk scooped up the gun and hurried into the control room.

  ‘OK, baby, thanks. Now let’s find that Smilax till I let a little daylight through him.’

  ‘I’m afraid that gun isn’t going to do you much good,’ she said. ‘We’re practically living inside a computer, and it is devoted to Smilax. You won’t get a chance to use that on him.’

  ‘No? We’ll see about that. Come on.’

  They looked into the dental office, the conference room, and a dozen other rooms filled with bizarre, curious, sometimes ter-

  rifying equipment. She had glimpses of hospital apparatus, of a huge radium therapy drum, diathermy machines, X-rays, swirling baths, EEG and EKG machines. All waiting to hand, she supposed, for the ‘experiments’. Aurora shuddered.

  They worked their way down the corridor without finding Smilax, until they came to a locked room at the end. ‘Step back,’ said Grawk. He kicked at the lock side of the door, hard. It splintered and the door banged open. Grawk was on one knee, the gun levelled.

  The room was an empty lounge area, with a ping-pong table, a coffee table with magazines, a coke machine in one corner, a divan along the wall and cobwebs everywhere.

  ‘Hey, this is all right,’ said Grawk, pulling her along into the room. ‘Tell you what. We could just hole up here for awhile.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, let’s relax a bit, think things out—heh heh—lay our plans.’ His voice was peculiar, gritty and unnatural, and when he turned around, there was a gleam in his eye that had not been there a moment before. She wished she had B476 here, now, but the rat was with the car—wherever that was.

  Grawk came closer. Suddenly his thick arms were around her, his red face looming over her shoulder. Pinning her arms to her sides, he began to walk her stiffly towards the divan.

  ‘Let go of me.’ She strove to keep panic out of her voice.

  ‘Aw, come on, baby. I’m only human,’ the inhuman red mask declared. ‘You’re a damned pretty girl. Besides that, that gas—it musta had something in it—I haven’t felt this good in years, if you know what I mean. We may not get outa here alive—so why not have a good time while we can, huh? I’ll tell you a little secret about that divan, honey—it’s a bed!’

  ‘Is this man molesting you, Dr. Candlewood?’ asked the rasping sergeant’s voice. It seemed to come from the coke machine.

  ‘No, I’m not molesting her!’.

  ‘Let go!’ she said, but Grawk only gripped her tighter.

  ‘Let go of her, Grawk, or I’ll come out of here and get you!’

  ‘Haw, you and who else! How are you gonna make me let go of her?’

  For answer, the coke machine opened up, and an enormous animal came forth. Standing on its hind legs, it was perhaps six feet tall, and very furry.

  And very like a rat.

  ‘No!’ Grawk screamed. Releasing Aurora, he backed away

  from the creature, which stood perfectly still, regarding him with little glassy eyes. ‘No! Don’t come any closer!’

  He stumbled against the divan and fell on it—into it. For almost instantaneously it unfolded, packed him away, and became once more an innocent divan.

  As the stuffed animal swivelled about to return to its coke-machine cabinet, Aurora saw painted down its striped back:

  GO GO GOPHERS!

  ‘Why did you save me?’ she asked the room. ‘What was that dummy doing here, and how did you know Grawk was afraid of rats? What will happen to him?’

  A curiously clear, neutral voice answered her. ‘Because I must. From storage it was brought here, for the purposes of a practical joke. From his record. He will either remain a prisoner and be punished or remain a prisoner and not be punished or be punished and released or be punished and die. This unit is now going out of service. Kindly direct further questions to the control booth or the conference room. Thank you, Dr. Candlewood.’

  Leaving NORAD turned out to be absurdly simple. She asked the typewriter in the control booth if she might leave.

  ‘YES, BUT YOU MUST RETURN.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘SO THAT DR. SMILAX MAY CAUTION YOU NOT TO LEAVE. DR. SMILAX SAID “I WILL HAVE TO CAUTION YOU NOT TO LEAVE NORAD”. HE SPOKE TO YOU, DR. CANDLEWOOD. WHAT DR. SMILAX SAYS WHICH DOES NOT CONTRADICT SENSORY EXPERIENCE IS NOT NECESSARILY TRUE. THEREFORE DR. SMILAX WILL HAVE TO CAUTION YOU NOT TO LEAVE NORAD. THEREFORE YOU MUST RETURN SO THAT HE CAN DO SO.’

  Within a few minutes she was back on the surface, taking shelter from the desert sun in the shadow of an abandoned, trackless tank by the side of the highway. In a short time, a railroad train came walking down the centre of the road.

  Taking a deep breath, Aurora stepped out in the open, smiled, and put out her thumb.

  CHAPTER XX

 
THIRTY-TWO FEET PER SECOND PER SECOND

  ‘fall (fôl), v.i., … to pass into some condition or relation: to fall asleep, in love, into ruin.’

  The American College Dictionary

  Barthemo Beele leaned over the rail once more and looked down at Paris. He was unaware of the names of any of the landmarks he saw: to others this might be a breathtaking view, but to Beele it was merely a good place to jump.

  He had run through all the arguments for living. Suicide was wrong. He had, presumably, his whole life ahead of him. Things weren’t really that bad. Suicide was no solution. He had ranged these and others on his mental list, striking each argument out and writing after it ‘n/a’. Not applicable. There just was no reason for him to stay alive.

  On the other hand, Beele had every reason to die. His decline physically and mentally, his irritating, thankless and hopeless task, his incredibly bad Tuck. Less than a week before, he had been a robust, fearless, hard-hitting young editor. Now he was sneaking about, hoping for a chance to offer an honest man a bribe.

  His physical decline was painfully evident in a dozen ways: Beele felt himself shredding away like a cheap trenchcoat. The toes of his right foot were cramped with corns while the sole had grown a killing bunion that spanned its main wrinkle. A flaming itch between the toes of his left foot announced the arrival of fungus. The boil on the back of his neck, from wearing his editor’s eyeshade, was now balanced to some extent by a pimple on his chin which he had decapitated in shaving. One of his ears popped and rang, because of the cold that now, in full swing, poured scalding fluids down the back of his throat at all times. Suggs had warned him to boil his water and eat only canned, ‘Made in USA’ foods, lest he fall prey to diarrhoea. As a result he had cut himself a deep gash opening a can, and now his left hand was swollen and inflamed. He had diarrhoea.

  He supposed his fever was giving him hallucinations. Yesterday he had seen Mary in a crowd; today, walking down the

  Boulevard St. Germaine des Prés, he had encountered a little grey box exactly like the ones in Altoona. What was causing it all? Lack of sleep? Night sweats? Nervous debilitation? It seemed as if the entire universe were ganging up on Barthemo Beele, determined to grind him into the dirt.

  But he had not, he reminded himself, given up quite yet. He had not climbed up here to kill himself, no, not while there was a mission to complete. He had followed Marcel Brioche here, hoping to get a chance to speak to him alone.

  He had been hoping in vain for this opportunity thus far. Brioche ate most of his meals in the company of four or five hundred people, whom he then addressed. He spent many more hours in public each day, giving speeches, attending civic and charity functions. Every morning he was in conference with the director who was making a film of his life. A famous haberdasher had had to measure him for a new space suit, which Brioche now wore everywhere. He spoke on TV to panels of reporters, or himself joined panels of celebrities to match wits identifying famous vintages. He spent an afternoon autographing models of Le Bateau Ivre at a magasin, and another promoting a children’s science encyclopaedia. When he was not otherwise occupied the astronaut had pursued his favourite relaxation, bowling with friends. As he made his way from one rendezvous to another, motorcycle police accompanied his taxi, or a baying pack of reporters loped along beside him. Guards with sub-machine guns protected his rest at night from Brioche’s fans—and from Beele.

  It was a hopeless task, yet something had kept Beele going. He had been Brioche’s waiter, a TV page, a loping reporter. He had checked coats, spotted pins, and even bought a children’s science encyclopaedia. Now he had followed him to the very top of the Eiffel Tower. The guard was nowhere in sight, and the last of the other visitors, disappointed at the overcast view, were shuffling out.

  Marcel Brioche leaned over the rail once more and looked down at Paris. To others this might be a breathtaking view, but to Brioche it was merely a good place to jump. He had run over all the excuses for living; none seemed to apply in his case. Life without her was worthless. If it were not that his country needed him now, if it were not too selfish an act, he could simply grip this rail in both hands and …

  ‘I beg your pardon, maybe you don’t remember me,’ said a voice in English. He turned to regard a tall, thin young man in a green eyeshade and a trenchcoat. A press card stood in the band of the eyeshade.

  ‘I’m very sorry,’ said the astronaut. ‘I have no wish to make a statement at this time … perhaps later…’

  ‘Don’t you remember me? In Marrakech? I’m Beele of the CIA,’ Beele growled hoarsely.

  Brioche’s manner chilled. ‘I’m afraid I have nothing to say to you at any time,’ he said. ‘I suppose it was you who knocked me unconscious in that alley?’

  ‘No, it was you who slugged me.’

  ‘And now you want revenge?’

  ‘No, I’m authorized by my government to offer you a substantial emolument, pursuant to only the most minor of conditions.’

  ‘A bribe, eh?’ The astronaut grinned. ‘I knew it would come to this. I see your government has not yet stopped trying to buy honour—in which, therefore, it must still be deficient. I am not so poor, however, that I need to sell my country.’

  ‘I’m not asking you to sell your country. Just stop making speeches and accusations against the US. It isn’t only a matter of easing international tensions …’

  Brioche lit a cigarette. ‘Easing up on pressure where more should be applied, you mean. Tell me, can you look me in the eye and say there is no American agent aboard our ship? Eh?’

  Avoiding his eye, Beele said, ‘I’m prepared to offer a million francs. Think it over. A million ! Look at that glittering city out there, and think how far a million would carry you.’

  ‘I live as well as many millionaires now, and I have my good conscience,’ said the Frenchman. ‘There is only one thing I wish—to bring someone dead back to life again—and that cannot be done, not with a million worlds of money.’

  ‘You mean the girl you told me about? Listen, I’m sorry about that. Tell you what. How would you like to meet a new girl—like this girl, for instance?’ Barthemo Beele dug out his billfold and extracted a mildewed snapshot of Mary Junes Beele. ‘Not bad, eh?’

  The astronaut tried to shove it away, but his eyes lingered on it just a second too long. ‘Yes,’ he admitted. ‘I would like to meet her.’

  ‘Nothing could be easier. Uh, we haven’t been in touch lately,

  but the government could dig her up for you in a day or so. Now—’

  ‘I meant to say, I would like to meet her under any other circumstances but these. Hers is the first face I have seen that might help me forget the face of another.

  ‘But I know, alas, you are trying to sell me this woman. And not only could I never accept any favours from you or your government, but it saddens and troubles me to think what you are doing to her. I know the girl who owns this face could never let herself be used so insidiously. It is only with the greatest difficulty that I prevent myself from treating your base suggestion with the contempt it so richly deserves.’

  ‘Listen, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize—crude of me, wasn’t it? No hard feelings, I hope. No offence intended—’

  The astronaut turned away and gazed at the overcast sky. ‘You don’t understand,’ he said, ‘what she meant to me. If not for duty’s sake, I would kill myself.’

  ‘Why not?’ Beele said, changing pace smoothly. ‘Why not just throw yourself over the side now? What do you really have to live for? A political career? A few honours and a movie of your life? What do these mean?’

  ‘No !’ The astronaut’s voice trembled.

  ‘But what a magnificently romantic gesture. At the height of your glory, with every woman in the republic swooning over you, you kill yourself for a broken heart ! All you have to do is just grasp the rail in both hands and throw yourself—’

  ‘No ! My country needs me ! My people—’

  ‘Do they? Aren’t you
just as much a hero to them dead as alive? Might you not be even more useful dead?’

  ‘No’ I reject all three of your repugnant offers. Begone ! Goodbye !’

  Suddenly Beele was trembling with fury. What right did this guy have to order him around? Didn’t he know Beele could kill him at any time? There had clearly been no point in delaying the special treatment this long.

  ‘Goodbye, is it? What do you mean, goodbye? Arc you thumbing your nose at the United States Government’s more-than-generous offer? Are you even refusing to sleep with my wife? I used to think you were a decent guy—I even told Suggs as much—but now I see he was right ! Goodbye it is, then—you dirty F-f-f—’ For the first time in his life, Beele found himself stuttering. He tried again, but the word refused to come.

  The astronaut waited patiently, not coaching, not laughing, merely standing by, and somehow this very patience infuriated Beele all the more, and aggravated his stutter. Finally he gave up, and flung himself at his victim without benefit of a final insult.

  The CIA’s excellent manual of combat techniques was brief but thorough, and Beele had memorized every word of it. Assuming the stance of the crudely-printed little figure on page 42, he seized the Opponent’s arm and twisted it from A to position B. Then he kicked out with his (burning) left foot while pivoting on the bunion of his right. Placing heel of left foot under Opponent’s armpit, as on page 43, he levered Brioche into space.

  ‘Look, the Eiffel Tower !’ Ron shouted. ‘Hey, Mac, like in Zazie. Let’s go up to the top, what say?’

  Kevin Mackintosh snapped his fingers. ‘Yeah, and then get even higher.’

  ‘Shouldn’t you be up at the top, making sure people don’t jump off?’ Mary asked the guard.

  He laughed. ‘No one ever jumps off the Eiffel Tower. And the only ones up there now are Marcel Brioche and some reporter. They wouldn’t have any reason for jumping, especially not The Astronaut.’