by K. W. Jeter
The touch of claustrophobia that Deckard had fought off before now reasserted itself, stronger and tighter; he could feel the cold sweat of panic encasing his skin. Too many things, both dead and animated, pressing around him; with his forearm, he shoved away a tottering, slack-limbed Oz scarecrow that had thrust its idiot smile into his face. The rag-garbed creature fell onto its back, waving its arms around and shedding plastic straw. Deckard edged away from it and the other toys, his cop instincts driving him toward anyplace where he could see what was coming toward him.
"All right-" He held up his hands, palms outward, as though trying to ward off the chaos welling up in the room. "Okay, just settle down." His words were directed at Sebastian. The little bastard's doing all this. They were Sebastian's toys, his creations. "Just shut 'em off."
"Why? Don't you want to have any fun?" A malevolent delight suffused Sebastian's face. He no longer appeared childlike, a decrepit infant; his withered skin was that of an old man, a sexless, ageless being. "You're my guest. You should enjoy yourself."
For a second, Deckard had a flash of another wrinkled visage, another cruel, time-scorched entity. One that had gazed upon him from behind square-rimmed glasses, an owlish regard that had weighed and judged more keenly than any Voigt-Kampff machine. That had been in another high-ceilinged room, even emptier of any human presence...
The image of Eldon Tyrell's face vanished as Deckard forcibly pushed it out of his head. "That's it." The miniature elephant bumped against his shin, and he angrily kicked it away. "You can stop all this crap now. I've had enough."
"Oh, I don't think so. Not yet. We're just starting."
"Just! Starting!" Behind Deckard, the toy soldier had scrambled to its feet and marched out of the corner, followed by the uniformed teddy bear. The soldier's elongated nose quivered with a feverish excitement. "Fun!"
A sudden gust of wind blew out the nearest row of tall windows, scattering crystals of glass through the room; Deckard raised his arm, protecting his eyes from the razor-edged shards, blue-tinted in the luminous night that flooded past the tattered curtains. The candelabras and other wavering lights were extinguished, collapsing all the room's shadows into darkness.
The floor buckled, gaps splitting between the scarred wooden planks, carpets sliding into rumpled corrugations beneath the sideboards and high-backed chairs. Paintings framed in tarnished gilt fell from the walls, canvases ripped through as they were impaled upon the stiff-fingered hands of mannequins undergoing spasticlike seizures. A pegboard the length of an entire wall section, covered with soldering irons and needle-nose pliers, folded and tore loose from its mounting bolts. It toppled across a banquet table like a two-dimensional bat feasting on the silver bowls filled with dusty wax fruit.
Deckard stumbled back against the smallest table, feeling the chessboard skid beneath his hand, a knight piece digging into the palm; the room tilted as another seismic convulsion rocked the building. For a moment, as he was thrown toward the wall, he had a glimpse through a window ringed with broken-glass knives of the street below and the gaping chasm that had jagged down its center. The theater marquee burst into sparks, the neon curlicues snapping loose, raking blue tendrils across the sidewalk.
"Isn't this fun?" Sebastian's face had reddened into fury; he'd braced himself spread-legged in the middle of the room, riding out the successive impacts of the quake. "Come on- you got to admit it is!"
With the teddy bear wrapped around his leg, Deckard pushed himself away from the wall. He dove toward Sebastian as the bear's toothless mouth managed to chew a dry hole through the fabric of his trousers. The impact knocked Sebastian off his feet, sending him and Deckard skidding through the rubble of chess pieces and hand tools. Still-warm candle wax smeared across Deckard's cheek as he trapped Sebastian's arms against his chest. The smaller man grimaced and spat, writhing futilely.
Outside, the U.N. blimp had floated lower, the light beams from among the spiked antennae slashing through the broken windows, pulling sections of the room into bright illumination, then back to hard-edged shade. Deckard got his knee onto the other man's chest, pinning him to the floor.
Another light seeped through the room's walls. Enough plaster had fallen to reveal the skeletal understructure of the building; beyond the broken laths and support beams, the image of a smaller area, the confines of a hovel on Mars, began filtering into Deckard's perception. For a few disorienting seconds, he could see himself-his other self, the real one-sitting at the rickety table in the hovel's kitchen area, head nodding with eyes closed as though in sleep or drug stupor, the briefcase silent now, waiting for him to come back from wherever he had gone .
More than vision: the quake rolling through the fabric of Sebastian's private universe seemed to shake the dim outlines of the hovel on Mars. The empty beaker rolled from the table and shattered on the floor; shards of glass nicked across the back of Deckard's hand. Blood welled between his fingers and onto the shoulder of the figure struggling beneath him.
The distraction had been enough for Sebastian to work one arm free; the butt of his palm shoved up against Deckard's chin with a hysteric's strength. Head pushed back, Deckard could just glimpse the infused life draining out of the toys and mannequins. The clown froze, paralyzed, laughter choked in its rubber-swaddled throat; the ballerina doll collapsed, the sequins across its meager breasts dulling to flakes of lead. Into the floor's dark lightning cracks, the chess pieces rolled and disappeared, like crumbs swept from one of the overturned tables.
"Don't fade out on me, you little sonuvabitch-" Deckard knocked Sebastian's hand away from his face; with the same fist, he clouted the smaller man on the side of the head. "I'm not done . . . with you yet." His own breath came panting with exertion; around him, he could feel the planes and corners of the room growing even less substantial, the illusion of their existence dissipating along with Sebastian's will to maintain them. "Came here ... to find out something..." Deckard gritted his teeth, aiming another blow with the flat of his hand. "Not leaving ... until I do..."
"I don't care," sobbed the other man. Sebastian's eyes squeezed shut, his wrinkled face looking even more like an aging infant's. "Go ahead and kill me-I don't care."
"If I could, I would. Don't tempt me into trying, though." The uniformed teddy bear had let go of Deckard's leg, toppling onto its back, button eyes staring lifelessly up at what remained of the ceiling. A few yards away, the bear's comrade-in-arms had fallen face-downward, long nose skewed to one side, the point of its helmet broken off. "Just shut up and listen." His brain raced in desperation, trying to figure out what to tell the weeping figure. "Look. Just because Pris isn't here . . . that doesn't mean she isn't anywhere at all. Maybe you just haven't looked for her in the right places."
"Huh?" Sebastian rubbed his wet face with his free hand. As Deckard let go of him, he scooted back and sat up. "What do you mean?"
"Come on. Figure it out." Deckard knew he was talking crap, but managed to conceal it. "This is where she was killed, right? I mean, right here in this building. I should know; I'm the one who did it, who blew her away. Out in the real world. You think if you put this place back together here, she's going to want to hang around it? Get real."
"Huh." With his sleeve, Sebastian wiped his reddened nose. "Never thought of that."
"Only natural." Deckard wasn't sure if that word applied in a private universe like this. Raising his knees, he rested his forearms on them. From the corner of his eye, he could see that the room's accelerating dissolve had been halted, perhaps even reversed; the walls, while still cracked and flaking plaster, appeared less nebulous. He could no longer see the other room, the one where his real body was sitting at a table with a briefcase on it. "Maybe you haven't put the place back together yet where Pris would be." He gestured toward one of the broken windows and the night sky beyond. "How far does this go?"
"How far ... you mean the city? L.A.?"
Deckard nodded. "Everything. All the stuff you put together for yourse
lf here. Did you just do the street outside this building, or does it go beyond that?"
"Gosh. I don't really know." Sebastian gazed up to the cracked ceiling, sorting through his thoughts. "I never really go outside anymore. Not since the rep-symps put me here. It's netlike I go out walking around or anything. I just made the stuff come back that I could see from the windows-you know, what I saw when I was back in the real world and I looked out and there was the street and everything." He got up and walked over to the nearest window. With one hand, Sebastian pushed away the rags of the curtain. "Well it's hard to tell from here. I mean, just how far things go. All the other buildings on this street are so much taller. There's just kind of one angle over there where you can see some more of the city." He pointed out to the night. "Doesn't look too ... you know, real or anything. Kinda fakey." Sebastian shrugged in embarrassment. "Guess I sorta skimped on that part. I wasn't really paying attention."
"You ought to get out more," said Deckard dryly. "Do you good."
The room looked as if a storm had passed through it, scattering the contents. Deckard stood up, then reached down to set upright one of the little tables and the candelabra that had been on it. In the rubble on the floor was a scuffed Second World War-vintage Zippo lighter; he flicked on its thin flame and lit the half-burnt candles. The wavering light drove the shadows back to the corners.
"Maybe ... maybe you're right." Still standing at the window, Sebastian leaned toward the darkness, gaze searching across the close urban vista. "About Pris. You're right, she wouldn't be here!" His voice grew more excited; he turned back toward Deckard. "If she came back-and she must've; I wanted her to-she would've run away from someplace like this. Where she got hurt so bad and all. She might've gotten away before I even got a chance to see her again."
Deckard kept his silence. There was nothing more to be said to the little man, to sell the point to him. He'd lied to Sebastian, raised his hopes, just to keep him from totally dissolving his private universe. There's no Pris out there, thought Deckard. There's not even an out there.
Beyond the building's walls, the U.N. blimp drifted slowly overhead. The enormous viewscreen on the blimp's side was reflected in the rows of intact window glass across the empty street. Deckard saw a fragmented image of the screen's geisha face, the smile replaced by a somber, knowing pity.
"I've got to go looking for her!" Sebastian appeared ready to immediately rush out of the building and onto the street below. "Maybe she's waiting for me-" His manner became even more frantic and agitated. "She might be all alone somewhere, and wondering why I haven't come to be with her-"
"Hold on." Deckard grabbed hold of the other man's shoulder as he started for the door. "Wait a minute. We've still got things to talk about."
The room and the surrounding building, the fabric of the pocket universe, had resolidified. Or the illusion of it had- Deckard had to remind himself that the place wasn't real. He wondered how much time he had left here; at some point the effects of the activated colloidal suspension would wear off, flushed out of his percept system by the constant, slow percolation of his own biochemistry. For all he knew, the spoonful of the Sebastian packet that he'd ingested had already worked its way through his kidneys and was, along with its various breakdown components, ready to be pissed out. At some other time, the notion that one deity or another could reside in his bladder might have wryly amused him; right now, he was in a hurry.
"Let's go! Let's go!" The toy soldier, its nose still bent at an angle, tugged at Sebastian's coveralls. "Right now!" At the other side of the room, the reanimated teddy bear had started rooting through the objects that had been knocked loose and scattered during the quake, as though it were assembling provisions for the journey. "Come on!"
"No, no, Squeaker-Mr. Decker's right." Sebastian patted the soldier on the top of its helmet. "He came all this way to talk with me; he's our guest, so we should treat him right." He glanced up with an embarrassed smile. "I'm real sorry for what happened just now. I got kinda carried away."
"That's all right. I understand." The twinge of guilt sharpened underneath Deckard's breastbone, though he was careful not to let any sign show on his face. Maybe-a small trace of hope moved inside his thoughts-maybe he will find Pris out there. Or something like her. "I know what it's like."
"Well, yeah ... I suppose so." Sebastian tilted his head, his wet gaze narrowing as he studied the figure in front of him. "You know, though ... maybe it wasn't Pris I got all wrong. Maybe it's you."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You shouldn't have been able to just come in here and push me around like that." Sebastian spoke without rancor- he had obviously gotten used to being pushed around, one way or another. "This is my world, remember; my little private universe. I'm supposed to be the deity here. If I'd wanted to bring the whole thing crashing down, I shoulda been able to do that. And you wouldn't have been able to stop me. At least, that's the way it's supposed to work. No . . . something funny's going on." He raised an eyebrow. "When we were wrassling around and all, I was trying to make you disappear-well, I was losing, wasn't I?-and you just wouldn't. You're still here. That's really strange, don't you think?"
Deckard shrugged. "I'm not an expert on these places. This is the first time I've even been in one."
"Yeah, well, I live here now. This is the only place I exist. So I should know what the deal is on 'em." He slowly shook his head. "I don't get it. What are you, Deckard?"
"I don't know." What the hell's that supposed to mean? The question didn't even make sense. "Is it important?"
"Maybe not." Sebastian brushed his hands off on the front of his coveralls. "Whatever." All around him, the cracks in the walls' plaster were slowly disappearing, the edges stitching themselves back together. He leaned down and pulled the ballerina doll clear of the crevice in the floor before it could close up on her leg. "So ... what is it you came here for? What'd you want to find out?"
"You tell me. I was sent here. To see you."
Sebastian nodded. "Yeah, like I said ... I knew you were coming. The rep-symps told me you'd show up eventually. That was all part of the plan. With the Batty box and all."
"The briefcase," said Deckard. "If that's what you mean."
"That's the one. You know that's Batty in there, don't you? Of course you do-it's not like he's ever exactly quiet about it. Not the one I first met-the replicant who came here-but the other one. The original, the human templant."
"He was the one who told me to come here. He gave me the packet with your name on it; it was inside him, inside the briefcase." Deckard glanced toward one of the windows as though some change in the night's darkness might have indicated the passage of time. "And to get the stuff to mix it up. He had all the instructions. They must have briefed him pretty well."
"In a lot of ways," agreed Sebastian. "Those rep-symp guys they're pretty sharp. Psychologically, I mean. They knew you'd take some convincing."
"I still do."
"They thought you'd trust me." Sebastian's guileless, ingratiating smile appeared again. "Do you?"
Deckard shrugged. "I don't know that, either. Depends on what you tell me."
"All I can do is tell you the truth. Or at least as much of it as I know about."
"That'd be a novelty." Deckard didn't bother to smile. "The truth, I mean."
"Well..." Sebastian fiddled nervously with one of the screwdrivers he took from his coveralls pocket. "You can start with this. Batty wasn't lying-the Batty box, I mean; the briefcase-when he was telling you what the deal is. Whatever he told you about . . . what was the fella's name? Something Holder?"
"Holden. Dave Holden."
"Yeah, that's the guy. He's probably dead now, huh?"
Deckard gave a short nod. "Pretty much."
"It was kind of a risky job they stuck him with. Taking the Batty box out to you. He must've known what the chances were." A troubled expression shaded Sebastian's face. "I don't think the rep-symps would've lied to him about th
at."
"If that's who he was working for."
"Oh, no..." The teary eyes went round. "You don't need to have any doubts about that. That's one of the true things I'm supposed to tell you about. Convince you and everything. That's what you came here for, isn't it? For me to tell you that, so you'd know it's true-you believe me, don't you?"
"I'm not sure." He wasn't going to admit any more than that. "You could be telling the truth. I just don't know."
"But you've got to believe me!" Sebastian's voice went up in both pitch and anxious trembling. "Your old partner, that Mr. Holden-he'd gone over to the side of the rep-symps, and the insurgents out in the colonies, and all those people. He'd decided that was the right thing to do. Just like you did, when you quit the police department. When you stopped being a blade runner."
Deckard barked a quick laugh. "When I quit the department, I didn't exactly go out and sign up with a bunch of psychotics and traitors who're all out looking to get themselves iced by the U.N. security squads."
"Maybe you would've, if you had the chance then."
A shrug. "I'm past caring about that. So what about Batty?"
"What about him?" Sebastian looked puzzled.
"He's with the rep-symps as well, I take it."
"Well, yeah, obviously. I mean, we all are. Your old partner David Holden certainly was-and that's the truth." Both of Sebastian's hands rose in an appeal. "Why would I lie to you about something like that? Jeez, Mr. Decker, I'm way out of the loop now. I don't even exist anymore, at least not in the world you do. So it's not like I've got something at stake in getting you to believe this. I'm, like, a disinterested party. Sort of, anyway. I mean, I care what happens and all. So you could say I'm on the rep-symp side, too."
"You know Deckard laughed again, softer and more ruefully. "The funny thing is, I'd really like to believe you."
"You should! I'm telling you the truth!" Sebastian's hands quivered. "Look, you did me a favor just now. When you told me about why Pris wasn't here, and about where she might be. That . . . that gives me hope, Mr. Decker. That I didn't have before. I was going to give up, just let this whole place disappear. And me with it-I can do that if I want to. I don't have to exist. Here or anywhere else. But I've decided to stick around-because of what you told me." He stepped forward and grasped Deckard's arm. "So I owe you one. I do, really. I wouldn't lie to you, especially not about the stuff you came here to find out. David Holden brought the Batty box out to you because he believed in the rep-symps' cause; he died for it. Now it's up to you-it's your decision-about whether you should find a way to get the briefcase, and the information that's inside it, to the replicant insurgents out in the colonies."
