Psi-High and Others (Ace G-730)

by Alan E Nourse

  The senator took a deep breath. “Not a man like Ken Armstrong. I used to worship him when I was a kid. You know, I was just ten years old when he came back to Earth for his second Retread.” He shook his head. “I wanted to go back to Mars with him. I actually packed up to run away, until dear brother Paul caught me and squealed to Dad. Imagine.”

  “I’m sorry, Dan."

  The car whizzed off the freeway and began weaving through the residential areas of Arlington. Jean swung under an arched gate, stopped in front of a large greystone house of the sort they hadn’t built for a hundred years. Dan Fowler stared out at the gray November afternoon. “Well, then we’re really on thin ice at the Hearings. Nothing really solid at all. If I can’t prove that Rinehart has corrupted his job, we’re in trouble. Well, we’ve slugged out some tough ones before, and won. This may take some steamrollering, but we can manage it.” He turned to the girl. “I’ll have to go over Carl’s report for anything I can find in it first. Meanwhile, get Dr. Schirmer on the line. Tell him I said if he wants his job as Chief Coordinator of the Hoffman Medical Center next year, he’d better have all the statistics there are on all rejuvenated persons, past and present, in my office by tomorrow morning at eight.”

  Jean Fowler avoided her father’s eyes. “Dr. Schirmer’s waiting for you inside right now. He’s been here over an hour.”

  “Here? What for?”

  “He wouldn’t say. Nothing to do with politics, he said. Something about Uncle PauL”

  IV

  Da. Nathan Schirmer, chubby and nervous, was waiting in the library, sipping a brandy and pretending without success to appear interested in a Congressional Record on the tape-reader. He looked up, birdlike, as Dan Fowler strode in. Dan shook his hand like an old friend. “Good to see you, Nathan. Sit down, sit down. Wanted to chew the fat with you anyway, but what’s this about my brother?”

  The doctor coughed into his hand. “Why—nothing, really. I mean nothing urgent. I just thought you’d want to know that Paul was in Washington this afternoon.”

  “Of course he was. He was scheduled to go to the center—” Dan broke off short, whirling on Schirmer. “Wait a minute! There wasn’t a slip-up on his permit somehow?”

  Dr. Schirmer looked blank. “Permit?”

  “For rejuvenation, you idiot! He’s on the Starship Project, coordinating engineer of the whole works out there. He’s got a fair place on the list coming to him three ways from Sunday. MacKenzie put the permit through months ago, and Paul has just been fooling around clearing the decks out in Vegas so he could come in—”

  The coordinator’s eyes widened. “Oh, there wasn’t anything wrong on our side if that’s what you mean. The permit was in perfect order, the doctors at the center were ready and waiting for him. That isn’t the trouble.”

  “Then what is?”

  The doctor flushed. “Well, I’ll be blunt. The trouble is, your brother refused. He flew all the way out here, right on schedule, just to laugh in our faces and tell us to go fly a late. Then he got on the next jet back to Nevada. All in one afternoon.”

  V

  The vibration of the jet engines hung just at perception level, nagging and nagging at Dan Fowler, until he threw his papers aside with a snarl of disgust and peered angrily out the window at nothing.

  The plane was high and moving fast. Far below was a tiny spot of light in the blackness. Pittsburgh, maybe, or Cleveland. Didn’t matter which. Jets went at such-and-such a speed; they left one place at such-and-such a time and arrived somewhere else so many hours or minutes later, and worrying didn’t move them any faster. He could worry, or not worry, it was all the same; he would be in Las Vegas at exactly the same time, to the second, either way. Then another half-hour taxi ride over dusty desert roads would bring him to the glorified Quonset hut his brother called home. And now X)an Fowler, that crafty old specialist in the art of getting the immovable to move when he wanted it to move, could not speed by one iota the process of getting there.

  Dean had tried to call Paul from Washington, and received no answer. He had talked to the Las Vegas authorities, and to Starship Project Headquarters; he’d even talked to Lijinsky, who was running Starship, but nobody knew anything. The police said yes, they would check at Dr. Fowler’s residence, if he wasn’t out at the ship, and then call right back, but they hadn’t called back, and that was two hours ago. Meanwhile, Carl had chartered Dan a plane.

  Now, staring out at the blackness, Dan clenched his fist, drove it into his palm again and again. Ten thousand devils take Pauli Of all miserable times for him to start playing games, acting like an idiot child 1 And the work and sweat

  Dan had gone through to get that permit for him, to buy it, beg it, steal it, gold-plate it. Of course the odds were good that Paul would have gotten it anyway without so much as a nod from Dan—he was high on the committee’s priority list, a key man on the Starship Project, which certainly rated top national priority. But with Rinehart heading the committee Dan couldn’t take a chance. He’d personally gone out on a limb, way out—the senator clenched his teeth in helpless frustration and anger, and felt a twinge of pain blossom in his chest, spread to his shoulder and arm. He cursed, fumbled for the bottle in his vest pocket. Confounded heart and confounded brother and confounded Rinehart—why did everything have to break the wrong way now? Of all times in his fifty-six years of life, why now?

  All right, Dan. Cool off, boy. Relax. Shame on you. Why not quit being selfish just for a minute? Dan didn’t like the idea as it flickered through his mind, but then he didn’t like anything too much right then, so he hauled the thought back for a rerun. Big Dan Fowler, Senator Dan Fowler, Selfish Dan Fowler loves Dan Fowler, mosdy.

  Poor Paul.

  The words had been pounding in his mind like words in an echo-chamber ever since he had seen Dr. Schirmer and heard what he had to say. Poor Paul. Brother Dan did all right for himself, he did; made quite a name for himself down in Washington, you know, a fighter, a real fighter. The Boy with the Golden Touch (mocking laughter from the wings). Everything he ever did worked out with him on top, somehow. Not Paul though. Paul was different. Smart enough, plenty going for him, but he never had Dan’s drive, Dan’s persuasiveness, Dan’s ruthlessness. Nothing but bad breaks for brother Paul, right down the line. Kinda tough on a guy, with a fireball like Dan in the family. Poor Paul.

  Dan let his mind drift back, slowly, remembering little things, trying to pin down just when it was, what single instant in time, that he had stopped fighting Paul and started pitying him. It had been different, years before. Paul was always the smart one, then. He never had Dan’s build, or Dan’s daring, but he could think rings around him. Dan was always a little slow—never forgot anything he learned, but he was a slow study. Until he found out there were ways to get around that. Dad and Mom had always favored Paul, babied him and protected him, and that was tougher to get around, but there were ways.

  There was the night the prize money came from the lottery. How old was he then? Twelve? Thirteen? Paul was seventeen. Dan had grubbed up ten dollars polishing cars, and matched Paul’s ten to split a ticket down the middle. Never dreamed the thing would pay off, the National Tax Lottery was very new at that time. And then, to their stunned amazement, it did pay off, two thousand dollars cash, quite a pile for a pair of boys. Enough to buy the jet racer Dan had his heart set on. He’d been so excited tears had poured down his face, but Paul had said no. They would split the money fifty-fifty, just like the ticket, Paul had said. There were hot words, and pleading, and threats, and Paul had just laughed at him, until Dan got so mad he sailed into him with his fists. Bad mistake, that Paul was skinny, not much muscle, but he had five years on Dan, and a longer reach. Paul connected just once, a left jab that put Dan flat on his back with a concussion and a broken jaw, and that was that Or so it seemed, except that Dan had actually won the fight the moment Paul struck the blow. It was the broken jaw that did it, and then later the fight between Mom and Dad, with Dad sayin
g, “But Mary, he asked for itl” And Mom responding tearfully, “I don’t care, that big bully didn’t have to mutilate him.” Of course Dan won. A dirty way to win, both the boys knew, but Dan got his racer on the strength of that broken jaw. The bone never healed quite right the fracture damaged one of the centers of ossification, the doc had said, and later Dan became God’s gift to the political cartoonists with that heavy, angular jaw— a fighter’s jaw, they called it That fight started it From then on Dan knew he could beat PauL He didn’t feel good about the way he’d beaten him, but it was a good thing to know he could. Couldn’t ever be sure of it, of course, had to keep proving it, over and over, just to be sure. The successes came, and he always let Paul know about them, chuckling with glee, while Paul sat quietly, learning to take it.

  To take it? Or to fight back, ineffectually, and slowly come to hate him? Hard to say. There was the night Dan broke with the Universalist Party in New Chicago, at that hundred-dollar-a-plate dinner. He’d told them all, that night. The big boys in the party had cold-shouldered him and put Jack Libby up to run for mayor instead of Dan. Oh, he’d raised a glorious stink that night—he’d never enjoyed himself so much in his life, turning their whole lousy twisted machine over to the public on a silver platter. Cutting loose from the old crowd, appointing himself a committee of one to nominate himself on an Independent Reform ticket, campaign for himself, and elect himself. A whippersnapper of thirty-two. Paul had laughed at the blistering speech he’d given before he stomped out of the banquet hall. “You do get melodramatic, don’t you, Dan? Well, if you want to cut your own throat, that’s your affair.” Dan had exploded in rage, told Paul to watch what happened before he shot off his mouth, he might see a thing or two—and he saw a thing or two, all right. He remembered Paul’s face a few months later, when Libby conceded his defeat at 11:45 on election night, and Dan rode into office with a new crowd of people ready to help him clean up New Chicago as it hadn’t been cleaned up since the Two Weeks’ War. The sweetest bite of the whole victory pie had been the look on Paul’s face that night.

  So they’d fought, and Dan had won and rubbed it in, and Paul had lost and hated him for it, until slowly, Dan’s attitude had subtly changed from “Okay, you wise guy, I’ll show you” to “Come on, Paul, quit floundering around and start doing somethingl Who needs engineers? You’ll starve to death,” and then finally, to “Poor Paul.”

  How had it happened? Why?

  Dan wondered, suddenly, if he had ever really forgiven Paul that blow to the jaw.

  He shook himself, scowling into the blackness outside the plane. Okay, they’d fought it out, a game between brothers, only it never was a game, really. He knew how much he owed to Paul. He’d known it with growing concern for many years. And now if he had to drag Paul back to Washington by the hair, he’d drag the silly fool.

  VI

  They didn't look very much alike. There was a spareness about Paul, a tall, lean man, with large soft eyes that concealed their anger and a face lined with tiredness and resignation. A year ago, when Dan had seen him last, he had looked a young sixty, closer to forty-five. Now he looked an old, old sixty-one. How much of this was his illness Dan didn’t know. The pathologist at the Hoffman Center had said: “It’s not very malignant right now, but you can never tell when it’ll blow up, and it’s one of the new viral tumors that we can’t deal with just yet He’d better be scheduled for his Retread as soon as possible, if he’s got a permit.’'

  That was doubtless part of it, but part of it was fust Paul. The house was exactly as Dan had expected (though he had never been inside this house since Paul had come to Starship Project fifteen years ago), stuffy, severe, rather gloomy; rooms packed with bookshelves, drawing boards, odds and ends of papers and blueprints and inks; thick, ugly furniture from the early 2000’s; a cluttered, improvised, helter-skelter bam of a testing lab, with modem equipment that looked lost and alien scattered among the mouldering junk of two centuries.

  “Get your coat,” said Dan to his brother. “It’s cold outside. We’re going back to Washington."

  “Have a drink." Paul waved him toward the sideboard. “Relax. Your pilot needs a rest."

  “Paul, I didn’t come here to play games. The games are over now.”

  Paul poured brandy with deliberation, one for Dan, one for himself. “Good brandy," he said. “Wish I could afford more of it”

  “Paul. You’re going with me.”

  “Sony, Dan.”

  “Do you know what you’re saying?"

  “Perfectly."

  “Paul, you don’t fust say “Thanks, but I don’t think I'll have any’ when they give you a rejuvenation permit. Nobody refuses rejuvenation. There are a million people out there begging for a place on the list. It’s life, Paul. You can’t just turn it down.”

  “This is good brandy,” said Paul. “Care to take a look at my lab, by the way? Not too well equipped, but sometimes I can work here better than—”

  Dan turned on his brother viciously. “I will tell you what I’m going to do,” he said, hitting each syllable. “I’m going to take you to the plane. If you won’t come, my pilot and I will drag you. When we get to Washington, we’ll take you to the Hoffman Center. If you won’t sign the necessary releases, I’ll forge them. 1*11 bribe two witnesses who will swear in the face of death by torture that they saw you signing. I’ll buy the doctors that can do the job, and if they don’t do it, I’ll sweat them down until they will do it.”

  He slammed the glass down on the table, heart pounding in his throat, pain creeping up his chest. “I’ve got lots of things on lots of people, and I can get things done when I want them done. People don’t fool with me in Washington any more, because when they do they get their fingers burned off at the knuckles. Paul, I knew you were stubborn but I didn’t think you were blockheaded stupid!”

  Paul shrugged.

  “You don’t think I could do it?” Dan roared.

  “Oh, I suppose you could. But it’s a lot of trouble for such an unwilling victim. And I’m your brother, Dan, Remember?” Dan Fowler spread his hands in defeat, sank down in the chair. “Paul, tell me why.”

  "I don’t want to be rejuvenated.” As though he were say-inj* "I don’t want any sugar in my coffee.”

  Why not? If I could only see why, if I knew what was going through your mind, maybe I could understand. But I can’t.” Dan looked up at Paul, pleading. “You’re needed, Paul. I had a tape from Lijinsky last month. Do you knpw what he said? He said he wished you’d come to Starship ten years sooner. Nobody knows that ship the way you do, you’re making it go. That ship can take men to the stars, now, with rejuvenation, and the same men can come back again to find the same people waiting for them when they get here. They can live that long, now. We’ve been tied down to seventy years of life, to a tight little universe of one sun and nine planets for thousands of years. Well, we can change that now. We can go out That’s what your work can do for us.” He stared helplessly at his brother. “You could go out on that ship you’re building, Paul. You’ve always wanted to. Why not?

  Paul looked across at him for a long moment. There was pity in his eyes. There was also bitterness there, and victory, long awaited, painfully won. “Do you really want me to tell you?”

  “I want you to tell me.”

  Then Paul told him. It took about ten minutes. It was not tempered with mercy.

  It split Dan Fowler’s world wide open at the seams.

  “You’ve been talking about the Starship,” said Paul Fowler. "All right, that’s a good place to start. I came to Starship Project, what was it, fifteen years ago? Sixteen, I guess. This was my meat. I didn’t work well with people, I worked with things, processes, ideas. I dug in hard on Starship. I loved it, dreamed it lived with it I had dreams in those days. Work hard, make myself invaluable here, maybe Td get rejuvenation, so that I could go on working. I believed everything you just said then. Alpha Centauri, Arcturus, Vega, anywhere we wanted to go, and I could go alon
gl It wouldn’t be long, either. We had Lijinsky back with us after his rejuvenation, directing the project, we had Keller and Stark and Eddie Cochran—great men, the men who had pounded Starship Project into reality, took it out of the storybooks and made the people of this country want it badly enough to pay for it. Those men were back now, new men, rebuilt bodies, with all their knowledge and experience preserved. Only now they had something even more precious than life: time. And I was part of it, and I too could have time.”

  Paul shook his head, slowly, and sank back into the chair. His eyes were very tired. “A dream, nothing more. A fantasy. It took me fifteen years to learn what a dream it was. Nothing at first just a vague puzzlement, things happening that I couldn't quite grasp. Easy to shrug off, until it got too obvious. Not a matter of wrong decisions, really. The decisions were right, but they were in the wrong places. Something about Starship Project shifting, changing somehow. Something being lost. Slowly. Nothing you could nail down, at first, but growing month by month.

  “Then one night I saw what it was. That was when I equipped the lab here, and proved to myself that Starship Project was a dream.”

  He spread his hands and smiled at Dan like a benign old schoolmaster at a third-grade schoolboy. “That starship isn’t going to Alpha Centauri or anywhere else. It’s never going to leave the ground. I thought I'd live long enough to launch that ship and be one of its crew. Well, I won’t. That ship wouldn’t leave the ground if I lived a million years."