by James Axler
The unarmed combat had also confirmed what Ryan had suspected: the men of the sector viewed him with some disdain and contempt because of his eye. The defect, albeit one from combat rather than congenital, was viewed as a weakness. He had viewed unarmed combat exercises, and had seen the level of ferocity. When it came to his turn, the men went for him with a greater intent, as though willing one another to purge him from their perfect community. He had to fight harder than he would have liked, rendering opponents unconscious to negate their threat. The whitecoats were more than happy, seeing him as a way to push their programs further. All he could see was the resentment his actions would add to the hostility.
Krysty, on the other hand, was welcomed. Her physical perfection seeming to make her fit perfectly. Nothing was said to the people around her of her mutation. The whitecoats kept it quiet for reasons of their own. That suited her for the moment, as it put her in a position where she was more able than Ryan to wander freely. When it came out, as she was sure it had to eventually, then that would be another matter. For now, she was keen to take any advantage given to them.
Thus it was that she was able to wander the streets of the sector after the third day of training and orientation. She had been shown images and old vid clips to determine her sexual orientation and preferences. Ryan had been through a similar process, and she had been appalled by his description of how a whitecoat had prodded his prostrate to produce a sperm sample for fer tility analysis. It made her own experiences of the day seem mild. Yet she knew that this had just been the fore-taste for what was to come. It wouldn’t be long before they were sent to the coupling chambers. And they’d seen that on their arrival: there was no way she wanted that.
So it was that she made her way from their billet, headed toward the building where she knew their weapons were stored. Her aim wasn’t to take them back, but rather to recce the location to see how easy it would be. To take them now would be to risk discovery. Preparation was everything.
Ryan stayed behind. It was a mutual decision made in light of their respective profiles in the sector. Krysty could move pretty freely, already assumed to be one of the group. Ryan stood out and attracted attention. Krysty could be entering the building for any number of reasons to do with the program; Ryan would always be suspected of something. As a basic insight into the unchanging nature of the human psyche, Krysty would have been too pleased to ironically draw it to the attention of sector chief, Alex, if not for the fact that it would screw their plans completely.
The entrance to the building was, as ever, unguarded. She found it hard to accept that the people of the ville were so well indoctrinated that any form of dissent was unthinkable. There had to be someone, somewhere. Still, it served her well, now. There were few people around as twilight began to fall on the sector, and she was able to enter without notice. Inside, the main corridor was unlighted. There was evidently no timer system on the lights, and only the distant well of light around the stairs to upper levels bespoke of any habitation. The ground level had the silence of emptiness. Distant sounds, echoing the ghostly nature of the light, betrayed activity on the upper levels. Down here, though, all was quiet.
The door to the room in which she had seen their weapons stored was locked. She allowed herself a little smile. No sec, but they didn’t trust the people that much. It was a fairly flimsy wooden door, inset with frosted glass. Breaking it would be no problem, but would be too conspicuous. The lock was a simple one. There was space between the door itself and the lintel, so if she could just…
Krysty thought about it for a moment, then tried the door to the room opposite. It was unlocked. Obviously nothing of note in there. But it was used for administration, like the room opposite, and in the unlocked drawers of the cabinets containing files and documents from the whitecoats, she found what she wanted. The runners of the drawers housed folders containing the files, each tagged with a numbered card in a yellowed plastic holder. Thanking Gaia for the fact that not all of the predark materials had perished, she slipped the plastic off the folder, carefully unpicked it and split a piece off, leaving the face of the card covered, then replaced it. No one would notice, and if they did would probably think nothing of it.
Crossing back to the locked door and closing the other behind her, she checked that all was still quiet before slipping the plastic into the gap between door and lintel. Carefully rocking the door, she pushed the plastic. It seemed to take forever, but finally she felt it give under the pressure, slipping around the lock itself and into the bed, pushing the bolt back. She felt the door give with a soft click.
Another quick look around and she slipped into the room, closing the door behind her. She knew where she had seen the weapons stashed, so she started to head for the cabinet.
It was only then that, with a sinking feeling, she realized that she wasn’t alone. She stopped, then turned slowly.
Tod was sitting with his feet up on a desk, silent and unmoving. He remained as still as he said softly, “I wondered how many nights I’d have to wait here. I knew you’d come, though.”
Krysty felt her heart sink.
“So what are you going to do about it?” she said, trying to keep her voice level.
“There are a lot of things I could do about it,” he replied. “Depends on how far you’re prepared to go.”
“Meaning?”
He shrugged. She could see that, but not his face in the gloom of the shuttered room. His tone, however, told her all she needed to know.
“Alex runs this place, but he’s got tunnel vision so bad that he can’t see what happens right next to him. He’s not going to check those weapons. You could take them now, and as long as you could keep them concealed in your room, then no one need ever know.”
“Only you.”
“Only me. As you say.”
Krysty considered that. “Everything comes at a price. What’s yours?”
“Mine?” He paused. It seemed to her that he was weighing every syllable carefully. “I think you know. Alex sticks to the program and makes sure we all do. Coupling and mating are done to a strict rota. Not because we want to, not when we want to, and not with who we want to. Sometimes you yearn for something a little different.”
“I thought as much,” she said coldly. “I could break your neck if you try anything. Before you even had a chance to yell. I’ve watched you. Not like you’ve watched me,” she added meaningly, “but I have. And you’re soft. Not like a lot of the others here.”
He smiled, although she couldn’t see it, only hear it in his voice.
“Soft? Yeah, that’s probably about right. In the way you mean, too. But not just that. There’s more to human experience than just the mechanics. That’s what we do here. Some of us don’t like it, but we just have to go along with it. You’re right. I would. But not try to make you. What would be the point? No, a world where there’s the choice, and mebbe someone like you.”
Krysty frowned. He was rambling like a man on jolt, but unless she was badly mistaken…
“You know about the way this ville is made?”
“I know that the strips between the sectors aren’t defended. We only think they are. All you have to do is avoid the sec, and you can link up with your friends. I can help you to do that. I can make the weapons available to you.”
“And you want what from me in return?”
The air was heavy with her expectation, still and tense. Finally he spoke. “You know what I’d like. But I’ve seen you look at Ryan like I look at you, and I know it wouldn’t happen unless under duress. And that’s not what I want. Duress is every day here. I’m not alone. You help me and those like me, and I’ll help you and Ryan. All we have to do is be a little… Krysty, do you know what circumspect is?”
She laughed, the relief obvious in her voice. “I should do. We’ve just spent the last ten minutes acting it out.”
FOR MILDRED AND Doc, it was also a matter of three days before the reality of the situation began to bit
e. In their case, given the mind games that were an integral part of the sector in which they had been housed, the unreality of a situation was very much the norm.
For two days they had been shown the way in which the sector worked—group experiments in psychodynamics and the modification of behavior through group therapy and one-on-one experimentation. For Doc, who had been brought up and then trawled before Freud had come to prominence, and to whom psychobabble was a tongue heard from whitecoats and distrusted for that very reason, it had been merely bizarre to see the way in which those leading the sector conducted their business. But to Mildred, part of whose medical schooling had taken in psychiatric medicine, it was recognizable as a strange parody of what she had learned, as though the information had been partially preserved through the nukecaust and then interpreted in a way that seemed to turn it inside out and examine it from an obtuse angle.
When she had remarked to Doc that the lunatics had taken over the asylum, she had been joking. Yet now she wasn’t sure that she hadn’t inadvertently hit upon the truth. The people who were, presumably, the whitecoats and leaders of the sector lived and worked side-by-side with those who were the subjects. Who was there to perform Arcadian’s wishes, and who were the performers dancing to the tune they played, was a matter of conjecture. It was only during a musical game, which brought the analogy to her mind, that Mildred realized from their behavior that the fat woman who had been in the party meeting them wasn’t, as she had assumed, one of the sector leaders, but was a subject who was being allowed to act in that role as a way of making her see her own behavior as being disruptive, and thus brought into line. The thin woman and the man were definitely whitecoats, but who was senior was a mystery to her.
The scenario had made her think of a therapist whose theories had grabbed her at medical school, partly because he was an outsider in the field whose work was being hotly disputed. From a conventional early career, she recalled, he had evolved his theories about there being no psychological disorders as such, merely breakdowns in the way that people communicated and interacted. To that end, he had set up a house where the “doctors” and “patients” lived on equal terms. Of course, with boundaries blurred and no conventional structure in place, results weren’t easily defined, and hotly disputed. The music class, where a variety of predark and homemade instruments wailed a cacophony that gradually evolved into a pattern that was certainly not harmonious, but perhaps signaled a level of behavior modification through cooperation that could be extended beyond the room and into the rest of life, made her realize that this was, at least in part, how they evolved. The way in which the fat woman lost her way, became frustrated, then broke down and cried before being comforted by the others made her see the distinctions.
It was certainly contrary to the way that life was lived outside of the ville. How it would fit with some of the villes they had fought their way out of was something that was hard to contemplate. Unless it was just that this was in isolation, and when applied to other practices in the ville it would gain teeth. She discussed this with Doc.
“Your therapist was certainly taking chances,” Doc mused. “A lunatic may be a lost soul, but is still a loose canon for all that. And I should know. This cannot be all there is.”
“It’s all they’re showing us.” Mildred shrugged. “Maybe they just deal with this tiny detail.”
Doc grinned crookedly. “I sincerely doubt that anyone is that benign these days. Would it not be a working hypothesis to state that, as much as we are observing them, they are using this to observe us? To see how we react, how much we take at face value? Perhaps to assess how much, ah, adjustment we may need?”
“Or to see how open we may be to those practices of theirs that aren’t so harmless?”
Doc nodded. “I am no judge of their judgment, my dear Dr. Wyeth, but I do know myself. And, I pride myself, I know you well enough to make a guess that they will see you are more likely to respond…if not positively, then perhaps without such vehemence to procedures that may not be so palatable. I think you should beware. I also think we will be separated soon. We must maintain contact when this happens.”
Mildred nodded. “We need to look out for each other as much as for a way out. Don’t worry, Doc, when it comes, we’ll be ready.”
So it was that when the time came upon them during the following morning, both were prepared. The fat woman, now restored in temperament after the breakdown they had witnessed the previous day, came to their quarters with a man Doc didn’t recognize. Lugubrious in a manner that seemed absurd on his short, squat frame he requested that Doc accompany him to take part in a chess tournament. It was time for him to stop spectating and start participating. Mildred started to join him, but was stopped by the fat woman.
“No. It’s perhaps better if you take part in another of our activities.” There was an undertone in her voice that mixed fear with aggression, as though she expected an argument. Thus, she was a little bemused if pleased when Mildred agreed with alacrity. If she and the lugubrious man noticed the brief glance that passed between Doc and Mildred as they parted, then they showed no sign.
Doc and the lugubrious man—who didn’t reveal his name—made small talk as they progressed to the grassed area where the chess tables were gathered. Doc, unsure as to whether he was a whitecoat, was unwilling to talk too much and too deeply in case he give something away. It struck him that it was going to be a tricky situation for Mildred and himself to extract them selves. Who could they trust, and who could they build alliances with when they were unsure of sides?
Any further such thoughts were expunged as they arrived to find that a draw was being made. The tournament would be a timed elimination, with two groups of players being pitched against each other to find a final pairing that would contest for the grand prize: a passage back into the first sector of Arcady. Freedom by any other name.
Freedom of sorts, Doc thought. Freedom on Arcadian’s terms. But he let that pass, observing instead the buzz of excitement it caused. He was expected to join in, no doubt, and he attempted to make a display of such. Whether he was successful he very much doubted. He was, however, taken by a similarly false display that came from a woman standing a hundred yards from him. Even through the milling throng, he could see the cynicism and ennui in her eyes. He hoped he would be drawn to play against her. The chance to talk as privately as was possible, across a table while others were engaged in their own matches, was intriguing.
Of course, it wasn’t that simple. They drew other opponents. All Doc could do was to set out to win his matches and hope that she was a good chess player. He doubted she was that bothered about winning, but trusted to a fate that would decree the least willing could snatch the prize.
While Doc set about his task, in another part of the sector, Mildred was coming face-to-face with a practice she thought long gone. A practice that was all the more shocking in its barbarism for being so opposed to what she had seen so far.
The dark side of the sector revealed itself to her as she was taken by the fat woman into a building that was located between two vacant lots. The windows, she noticed, were of opaque glass, all of them closed. And, unlike the other buildings she had passed in the past two days, there was no feeling of life within. Even given the strange air of quiet that pervaded the sector as a whole, there was always the sense—perhaps the faint, almost inaudible sounds of movement within—of life behind the brick.
Not here. The building felt empty. As she approached with the fat woman, who remained silent, Mildred felt an anxiety creep over her. There was no reason she would be taken to an empty building, though sense and the practices of this sector might sometimes seem only distantly related. No, it wasn’t lack of life that her gut sensed; rather, it was the negation of life.
As soon as they crossed the threshold of the building, and the doors closed with a hiss behind them, she realized that the reason for the silence on the outside was that the building was soundproofed. Inside, there was a caco
phony of noise, the sudden burst of which made her wince with pain and, perhaps, a quiver of fear. For here were voices raised in screams of agony that went beyond the physical, souls who were truly in torment.
“This is what we want you to see,” the fat woman said, raising her voice and gesturing expansively toward the corridor in front of her. “There are some who do not respond to the behavioral modification we advocate through mutual learning. They are, sadly, beyond the rational. The only way to try to bring them back to that path is by a neurological adjustment.”
“Such as?” Mildred asked slowly, not sure if she wanted to know, but certain that she was about to find out.
“Let us see,” the fat woman intoned, moving off and gesturing for Mildred to follow her. They paused at a number of rooms on the ground and second stories. Each was like a padded cell. From some of these the howling had emanated. Looking through the sliding observation panels, she could see that some of these people were pacing, screaming. Some were scraping at the padding with nails bloodied and to the bone, their faces etched with lines of pain that went deeper than the flesh. Some sat motionless, mouths agape in a long scream. But by far the most terrifying were those who just sat, blank of expression and eye, motionless and silent as though waiting patiently for eternity to claim them.
None of these modifications had been successful. Whatever they were doing in this building, it seemed as pointless and barbarous as the activities of Andower that Doc had spoken of. Mildred was glad that Doc couldn’t see this.
Even more so when she saw how the people in the building had gotten this way. On the top story there were three rooms, doors flung wide, cacophonous to the point of white noise. Static bursts and the loud, low frequency hum of electric generators mixed with screams and laughter. People were strapped to tables in the center of each room, giggling, drooling fools administering electric shock treatment. By the look of the burns on their own heads, the victims and subjects here were also the same. The principle followed through to an il logical conclusion. The fat woman was mouthing something at her that she couldn’t hear.
