“See those dogs, Hewitt? Over to your right.”
Hewitt glanced around his raised arm. Three mottled mongrels stood grouped, watching him attentively.
“Over on your left.”
Six dogs were stepping out of the woods and onto the grassy area.
Jack was still lying on his back, head on his jacket. He hadn't moved. “Hewitt, do you ever have second thoughts?”
The nine dogs sat or stood on the edge of their range and waited.
“What do you mean? You think I'm afraid of your mutts?”
“I do, yes.”
Hewitt was stuck. Arm up with the machete, intended victim already on his back, and nine dogs appraising him....
“Okay okay. How do I get out of here? You're the nice guy, remember?” He lowered the machete.
Jack stood up, pulled the finger bones out of his pocket and rolled them in his hands. He wasn't at all good at reading them, but he could read a little bit.
“Since the time I took your shoes, you've killed six people. I let you live because I was a nice guy, but those six people wouldn't have much good to say about that. I was thinking too much about my own innocence and not enough about other people.”
Hewitt screamed and launched himself at Jack. Jack tossed the finger bones at him as he rolled aside and Hewitt dropped like a bag of meat. The dogs were all on their feet, ears forward, but they held their twenty-yard distance.
Jack rolled Hewitt onto his back. His eyes were enormous and he seemed to have trouble breathing.
As Jack collected the finger bones from the grass, he said, “I tried for the longest time to be a nice guy, even to you. I left you with water. But it was pearls before swine, Hewitt. I offered you a shred of kindness and you walked five hundred miles to split me with your machete.” He folded the bones in a handkerchief and carefully pocketed them.
Hewitt whimpered pathetically.
Jack brushed out his clothes. “Thanks for being on time. I have to go — someone to meet. Hewitt, the dogs are going to take you as soon as I leave, but I wanted you to know they're not going to be cruel about it. They don't 'doodle' anybody.”
Hewitt would have been screaming if he could have opened his mouth.
When Jack left Hewitt, moving toward one pack of dogs, they flowed away, always keeping their certain distance and then moving that much closer to their object of attraction. Artie followed Jack, skirting wide of Hewitt and the dogs, which paid him no attention at all.
Jack was gone from the clearing when the dogs took him. This time, the dogs' competitive snarls were muted. Hewitt had been a good-sized person.
....
A deer path led Jack obliquely toward his cottage. As he walked he took out the handkerchief of finger bones, unfolded it, and rolled them in his hands. He smiled. This was good.
“Looks like she's here, Arthur. Time to do the deal.”
He walked on another minute, then slowed and walked quietly, scanning the narrow trail ahead.
The woman, somewhere between twenty and thirty, stood picking blackberries off the briars. Extremely thin, raggedly dressed, with her stringy hair tied back, she intently pulled them off and ate them and didn't see him till he spoke.
“Excuse me?”
She jumped and recoiled, her face rigid with fear.
Jack backed up two slow steps. Artie strolled between them and looked up at the woman. He then departed.
“My cat,” Jack said.
The woman now looked concerned, but not terrified.
“If you're hungry,” Jack said, “I have this.” From his pocket he pulled a plastic bag of dried fruit. He held it up for her to see and then gave it a slow toss for her to catch.
She had it in an instant, had it pulled open, and put a piece in her mouth. She kept glancing between him and the food in her hands. She seemed embarrassed.
“What's your name?”
She backed off a step, still eating. When she coughed, choking on a piece, Jack took a bottle of water out of his other jacket pocket and gave it an easy toss. She drank coughed, got herself together, looked at him, and said, “Why are you feeding me? What do you want?”
Artie wandered out of the briars, looked at the woman, and sat down. He began licking his damaged paw.
“His name's Artie. He lost some toes in Nevada. He came with me from Indiana.”
The woman had calmed a bit more. “What do you want?”
“Most of all, I'd like some conversation. That's what I'd really like. I haven't talked to anyone but Artie for two weeks. Well, I just had a few words with a guy who was going to kill me, but that wasn't anything to enjoy.”
The woman looked at Artie, then up at him. “I don't... I haven't... I don't do much... conversation.”
“Maybe if you weren't so hungry you could think straight.”
“Maybe.”
Jack pointed along the trail behind the woman. “If you walk that way about a quarter of a mile, you'll come to a cabin where Artie and I live. I know you don't have any reason to trust me, but I'm going to have dinner on the table in about an hour. I'll put a plate out for you, in case you come by. And you can sit by the open door to eat, or even take the food with you, if you want. Although I have a table and cloth napkins.”
“Cloth napkins.” She almost smiled. “My name's Ariane. I named myself. I don't know what my given name was.”
Jack started down the trail toward his cabin. She let him get well ahead before she followed. “Where are you from?” he called back.
“Oregon. Where are you from?”
As they traded simple information, Jack slowed a little and Ariane walked closer behind him. “I used to have a kitty. When I was a little girl. Hi, Artie. Does he bite?”
“Only once that I know of.”
“Do you really have house and food?”
“Cheese, bread, grapes — I know an old guy I trade with who brews beer. And I have a basket of blueberries I picked yesterday.”
She was almost walking with him now.
“How did you find me? Did you just walk up on me?”
“I've been watching you for a couple of hours.”
“Really? I didn't see you at all.”
“I didn't want to frighten you.”
They walked through a stand of redwoods, between fields of sword ferns. Above the trees, a wispy thread of smoke rose from the chimney of Jack's cabin, on the edge of a vast forest, beside the vaster ocean, beneath the perfect arc of the blue atmosphere of the earth.
In this edition, two stories are included from the series Matter Is Mostly Space.
“Acrolithia” — from Mutants (vol. 3)
“Those To Be Destroyed Are First Shown Love” — from The Arrival Of The Overlords (vol. 1)
Acrolithia
(from Mutants: vol. 3 of Matter Is Mostly Space)
Lloyd sweltered inside his clothes. This test was harder than he remembered. Way harder in a brand new way. But what could he do? Why wasn't he born with a few more brain cells? In fear of being expelled for stupidity, his guts heaved and twisted. He didn't want to puke again.
“—Mr. Lennerd, do you find your degree of general tenseness is in any way related to matters of personal hygiene?”
Why did they have to ask him that right now? Lloyd touched the 5 button, indicating that maybe it did and maybe it didn't. He felt even more nervous at the thought of how many 5's he'd given the last bunch of questions — he knew they'd think he was concealing something. In all the other parts of the test, he at least knew some kind of ballpark answer — but this personality stuff scared him. The ballpark was all over the place.
“—Thank you, Mr. Lennerd. Compared to your friends, how would you rate yourself in the number of hours you vid?”
He could relax a little. Everybody knew the answer should be the highest number, like he vidded forty or fifty hours a week. It was more like thirty, embarrassing. He touched the 9 and took a breath. At least he was lying about something he understood.
“—Thank you. Mr. Lennerd, this is your last question.”
He didn't care how he answered. Last question. He tried to clear his thoughts. Last question.
“—Mr. Lennerd, if you were expelled from the acro, how long do you think you would survive in the wilderness, in days?”
Even the mention of being expelled made his head hum with high-pitched fear, and inside his humming head, his tongue lay in an ash-dry mouth. Lloyd started to touch the 8, to indicate he thought he could handle himself pretty well, but then they might think he was being cocky and if they were going to expel someone, maybe it would be more humane to expel a stupid guy who thought he could handle himself. Or 2, confessing his helplessness, but also expressing a deeper need for the shelter and civilization and the vid-system of the acro. Then all his thoughts slipped away like a false memory. He choked up, forgetful, hopeless. He almost knew the answer.... With dread, he stabbed the 1.
“—Thank you Mr. Lennerd. We appreciate your being so forthcoming with us.
He wanted to die to stop the anxiety and humiliation of being expelled for being human refuse, beyond help, a walking tube, a moron who knew it.
“—Mr. Lennerd, you are hereby certified for six months. You have a wonderful day.
Not! Not expelled!
Staggering from exhaustion and relief, Lloyd put his right hand on the shoulder of an angelic testing attendant who walked him to the main concourse. She smelled like a flower. It was a good moment.
But he couldn't wait to get off Floor 253 and back to 237, where he lived — to have a drink, to tell Loris, to see if she cared that he wasn't going to be expelled from the acrolith. Or if she had to think about her answer.
....
Sometimes, Quentin Denmore just couldn't help himself. He was mostly good, and never did anything completely illegal, but once in a while his brain turned off its monitoring functions. For example: After only three months, he had to take the test again, blew through it, and then, for the thrill of it, he pretended faintness in order to get the shapely attendant to assist him, which she came over to do. When he stood up, he slid his front upwards against hers and caused those two arching creases to appear, one above each of her vases de joi, and then he asked her if she was free after work. Many of his internal parts twitched with anticipation.
The attendant looked up into his face, her eyes wide and watery, and said coyly, “You can kiss me if you can spell 'dog.'” She closed her eyes and pooched out her lips before he could spell anything.
“D-r-g,” he said.
“Oopy!” she squeaked.
What did he expect.
Like a thief trying not to run, Quentin walked evenly back to his condo and came to his senses somewhere along the way, horrified to cringing at his behavior. That woman on 253 was an acro employee and she could report him. But was sliding up against her an expellable offense? At the very least it would draw attention to his name. Anonymity was best, always best. Drab clothes, drab interests. He called Loris. Yes, she was free. Yes, she said, she would come over and “help him wash windows.” The word wash was their code for meeting at his place for sex and chitchat.
Three-quarters of an hour later, having finished their pre- and post-coital routines, their minds had cleared and they talked. Quentin turned on his side so he could look at her profile.
“Lloyd is helpless,” she said, “with anything beyond kids' arithmetic — easy kid's arithmetic — but he passed anyway. He said one question was how many days did he think he could live outside the acro. How long do you think you could?”
The white corner of her eyeball was the whitest he could imagine, and her skin looked as smooth as fine plastic. He loved every part of her face.
“It looks pretty dangerous on the vid,” he said. “Not much to eat. Three days if one of those animals didn't kill me.”
“I was thinking three or four days for myself. Lloyd said he answered three days.”
It seemed to Quentin that words coming from such a lovely face sounded lovelier than words from an ordinary face, such as Noreen's, his former partner who had an ordinary face to mask her absence of personality.
Loris said, “I searched the vid for where different kinds of plants grow, and the plants on those Outside the Acro vids don't grow anywhere near this latitude. Last night they showed jungle plants and jungle animals. That was somewhere else, not around here.”
He was right: her words were a sumptuous weave of rhythms, lingering vowels, and honied intonations. He thought of her lovely tongue sliding inside her mouth... inside his mouth.
“When will you move in here? I have more room than you and Lloyd.”
She turned her head enough to see him. “He's a genuinely decent man. I helped him study for the test but he's just clueless. He can't remember anything detailed for more than fifteen minutes. I wouldn't be surprised if they expelled him. But if I stay with him, maybe I can prevent that.”
“Maybe you could find someone to replace you.”
“I should. I don't know how I got matched with him. Obviously some glitch. But waiting out the six months will be quicker than dealing with the appeals. In four months, ask me again.”
“I love your lips. You look like artwork.”
“Bethina says hi.”
“I don't care if Bethina breathes.”
“She stood over my desk and shook that chest of hers and said to me — ” (Loris raised her voice to a lisping squeak) “'Be sure to tell Quentin hiee.' I said, 'Do you want me to say it like that?' and sweet Bethina said, 'Oh, if you only cooould.'”
“Bethina is makeup and clothes hung on soft food. I saw a dog stand in front of her and vomit. Strickman still trying to snake her?”
“He tries. If that man could manage to be indecent, he'd be too shocked at himself to finish the job. Between his clenched sphincters and Bethina's once-a-day screaming fit, I don't know how the office functions. I just don't.”
“I meant to tell you,” Quentin said. “I had another impulse. It was one of the assistants at the testing center. I rubbed against her a little bit. I don't know what's going on with me.”
“I'll hope it was anticipation to see me,” Loris said. Then, “I have to go.” She looked fully at him with her Mona Lisa smile. “I have to leave in ten minutes. Is there time to wash the furniture.”
Eight minutes forty-eight seconds.
....
“Mr. Strickman? Mr. Strickman? I know you're in a meeting, but—” Bethina hurried across the office, waving a single paper, letter-sized, in front of her face. “Sir? The food product delivery? It's going to be three hours laaate!”
Mr. Strickman stepped out of his office and frowned. He put his hands behind his back. He tilted his head down a little while still looking at her. He'd learned these moves from a vid. “And why might that tardiness be?” Good word, tardiness. Made him look sharp. He loved this: an issue to attack, decisions to be made. It would make him look good to Mr. Roeg.
“Sir? Loris yesterday told me it would be on time.” She spun pointed at Loris, even though Loris's desk was four rows back. “Didn't you tell me that? You did.” Then a slow turn back to Mr. Strickman. “Three hours late, sir.” Every part of her face was indignant.
“It shall be dealt with.” He turned, actually on a heel, hands behind his back, returned to his office, and closed himself in.
Mr. Roeg awaited as Mr. Strickman had left him a few moments earlier, in the failed attempt to forestall Bethina. “Food product delivery,” he said. “It's late. People gotta eat, Mr. Roeg, as you well know.”
Mr. Roeg nodded, as much as his small twisted body would allow. He wore oversized, specially fitted police-blue shirts which were draped around his body and the top of his electrical conveyance. Nothing but his head had ever been seen, although everyone had seen what appeared to be knees or elbows or something jabbing around inside the loosely fitted shirt.
Mr. Roeg rarely said anything beyond his several grunts, periodic snorts, a
nd a kind of nasal groan in a rising pitch which sounded like a questioning whine, so whenever he did that, Mr. Strickman rambled on at length about whatever he was mentioning at that moment. That, as far as Mr. Strickman knew, was Roeg's purpose — to listen to him randomly discourse about the overall operations of Acro D's food product processing. Roeg was checking on him, as he'd heard by rumor that he also did at the other acros.
Sometimes a message arrived advising Mr. Strickman to discuss subject x, y, and/or z. Today the note said, “1. Fooprod quality. 2. Office help.” And Mr. Strickman had made some notes, on which he had already begun to elaborate. Then Bethina interrupted.
He now continued: “Respectfully, late is not our fault. But once we get the fooprod here, we're very efficient. We can process almost a ton an hour, sir, and we produce the whole line of fooprod variations. Two kinds of meat, each with variations. Five lookalike root vegetables — the carrots are highly authentic, and orange. Fooprod pastas, and our fooprod bread recipe is getting better, sir.”
Grunt.
“Office help. Yes, sir, if we could step... uh, roll....”
Mr. Roeg's conveyance zipped forward. The office door opened in advance for him.
“...out here, Mr. Roeg. Yes. Well, there's Bethina, who you heard. She's the office manager, and the office works pretty good. That's Loris Clare she was talking to. She's quiet. Gets a lot done. Quiet.” He went on through Wallace Roscoe, Vera Kham, and Olson Dolor, and then interrupted himself. “You know, I don't think Loris over there has ever spoken to me. Loris?”
“Sir?” She didn't look startled. She looked ready.
“Could I speak to you?” He gestured for her to come over.
She crossed the office and stood in front of him at office attention.
Mr. Roeg hummed dully.
“Well?” Mr. Strickman said pleasantly to Loris.
“Well what?”
“Well... how are you doing today? Do you like it here?”
Loris looked from Mr. Strickman to Mr. Roeg and back. “Fine and yes,” she said.
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