Analog SFF, March 2010

by Dell Magazine Authors

  She looked through her change purse again. She hadn't needed cash the last eight months, and a good thing too: she wasn't carrying any when she was scooped up.

  That was almost literally true. She had a dollar coin, two quarters, and a few nickels and pennies. It might be enough, though.

  She reached the phone and read its front plate. Local Calls: $1.50 (3 min) Long-Distance: $2.50 (2 min)

  Lucinda cursed her luck. No local call could help her. She checked the change slot, then stalked away. She wandered around the lot, trying to think of a new plan, her eyes on the dirt and scattered gravel underfoot, just in case.

  And her luck turned. She caught a glint of dull brass, reached down, and found a dollar coin in the dust. She started racing back to the phone, checking her momentum when she saw people walking out of the diner.

  She put in the two dollars and two quarters, and heard the click interrupt the dial tone. She hoped she remembered his cell phone number correctly and punched it in.

  * * * *

  It probably had no official name, but everyone called it the Memorial Room. Dozens of photographs hung on the oak-paneled walls, framed images of the White House, the Capitol Building, the Washington Monument, the Supreme Court Building, the Mall, all those places that had been destroyed. Even landmarks that still stood, like the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, had their places, though with perhaps less black crepe adorning the frames.

  Lucinda didn't see most of the images any longer. The conference room was familiar enough that everything there receded into the background. She quickly found the placard with her name and sat down, managing not to groan when she found Dr. LaPierre's name next to hers.

  Other people filed in over a few minutes. LaPierre sat down briskly, a bit surprised to find Lucinda there. O'Doul walked in with a colleague whose thin, patchy hair showed he'd been one of the Johns Hopkins doctors who rushed into Washington that day. To Lucinda's regret, they sat far from her. So did Ms. Madsen and Dr. Garritty, two of her freshly graduated students making a foreboding appearance.

  When Donna Laskey, nominal chief of the overlay program, arrived, she took a seat one down from the unoccupied head of the table. Lucinda knew what this meant and got ready to rise. A moment later, everyone stood as President Lewis Burleigh entered the room.

  He looked better than the first time Lucinda had met him. His suit was perfect, his sparse gray hair well groomed, and some of the pallor had gone from his face. Ten guards, four in civilian suits, six in Army uniform, spread across the room.

  Burleigh went to his seat, then past it. “Curtis,” he said, reaching for Dr. Garritty's hand, “glad to see you."

  "Likewise, Lew—uh, Mr. President,” said Garritty, and Lucinda's stomach went into freefall. All those looks from him finally came into focus.

  "Sorry to be keeping you at the Mount for now,” said Burleigh, “but I own I'll make it easier on you. Oh, sit down, everyone."

  They all did. Even though the president had appointed Laskey to supervise overlay matters, he still sat in on the majority of these weekly meetings. The program was his creation, his tool. Even as Laskey opened the meeting with a mass of technical items, she did it as a subordinate.

  Lucinda took her minimal part in proceedings, giving the information requested of her and no more. She had made cautious proposals at the first few meetings, recommending they leave a light footprint, both in numbers of overlay patients and breadth of alterations made to their brains. Those meetings taught her not to waste her time, or to expose her dissent, however guardedly. The others obliged her by noticing her as little as possible.

  New business eventually came up, and Burleigh took the reins. “Everyone probably knows by now that the special House elections are done,” he said, an unwitting smile showing he approved of the results. “They'll be joining the Senate here in a few days, and that's going to stretch lodgings here pretty thin. Some people are going to be doubling up on their bedding. ‘Hot-cots,’ they call them: sleeping in shifts."

  He named nobody, but Lucinda was sure she'd be getting the short end. Living under the Mount had bred pessimism, mostly because it was so often correct. She began winding a stray wisp of hair around her finger.

  "Fortunately, that will be temporary,” Burleigh continued, “because in several weeks we'll be opening up our first auxiliary location for the overlay program and transferring part of your operations over to it. It's still a secure location, of course, but it will be more comfortable, with room to grow."

  Appreciative murmurs trickled across the room. Lucinda felt briefly better herself, until she saw the implication of how big this undertaking was becoming.

  "For those who'll be moving, the restrictions you've had to live with here will be noticeably loosened.” The sounds of gratitude were stronger this time. Lucinda let herself smile on their behalf. “For those remaining here, we'll be able to ease the restrictions for some of you as well. For others, well, some issues will finally have to be resolved."

  Burleigh's eyes were right on her. To other observers, it was a casual glance, without hostility, without plain intent. Lucinda knew better.

  "From the beginning, we've needed every single expert we could gather here, to perform the therapies, refine techniques, and train a new cohort so we can expand our capabilities closer to what's needed long-term. Now that those new specialists are ready—” Burleigh gave a nod toward Garritty and Madsen. “—we can undo that necessary compromise.

  "In purging the evils of extremism and violence from our country, we must be vigilant not only about whose brain templates are used, but about who does the work. This undertaking is about finding and fixing people who are dangers to the survival of humankind. Letting such people have shelter here, in positions of power over the work itself, is an intolerable contradiction. I own the responsibility for letting it go this far, but that's over.

  "Every member of the overlay project will be undergoing MEG scans to check for destructive, intolerant, primitive mindsets that make them unfit for work here. There will be only a few exceptions, where the subject is known to be beyond suspicion.” Burleigh gave another of his looks to Dr. Garritty, who smiled back. “Everyone else, though, must undergo it, if only to alleviate any suspicion."

  Lucinda knew she was finished here, and it brought a strange relief. Her powerlessness here would be over. Outside, she might have a better chance to affect matters, to join with others to fight Burleigh, somehow. And she could let all the pain flow out, heedless of whether some guard or camera spied her.

  O'Doul put his hand up. “Mr. President, what becomes of someone who fails this test? Is he just sent home?” he wondered, a tone of hopefulness peeking through.

  "Out of the question,” Burleigh said. “We'd have to detain any such individual—or in certain cases adjust him, or her."

  Burleigh's rough words were like a door slamming in Lucinda's head. She barely heard someone else ask, “Could you define ‘certain,’ sir?"

  "Simply a judgment call on how threatening to our safety that person is.” His eyes were right back on her, the veil cast aside from his intent. “Or if that person has enough enlightenment to own up to the truth and request a therapeutic overlay, no indefinite detention would be necessary.” The president smiled, so reasonably. “Donna, you have the schedule and question checklists, right?"

  "Right here, Mr. President.” Laskey produced them from an attaché.

  "Thank you,” Burleigh said, taking the schedule. “Torrance, O'Doul, Murcia. Yes, that's good, but we need to start with you, Ms. Peale."

  Those few who hadn't noticed his meaningful looks turned to Lucinda. She held herself steady and, matching his brashness, said, “Fine. When?"

  "Oh, now. Curt, are you checked out on the Penn State lie-detection methodology?"

  Dr. Garritty looked positively eager. “Yes, sir. I did some extra studying the last month. The Penn State method's always interested me."

  "Excellent. This meeting's all but o
ver, so take one of Director Laskey's checklists, get Peale to a scanning room, and do the job.” He looked almost disinterestedly back at Lucinda. “This is a formality, of course. I'm sure there's no reason to doubt the result."

  Two of the soldiers had moved to flank Lucinda. She stood, summoning up the last of her brazenness. “I don't see why there would be, Mr. President."

  * * * *

  The cart drove through narrow streets toward the medical complex. Added lamps on the cavern ceiling had alleviated Mount Weather's permanent twilight, but Lucinda saw only darkness.

  Her head had been buzzing since she left the Memorial Room, as she struggled to find some escape from her predicament. The soldiers close by, even in the cart, made flight hopeless, even if she had known how to get out of the Mount. As for fooling the brain scans, that was impossible. They detected signs of prevarication within the mind even before a subject could speak. Only pathological liars wouldn't be caught by the Penn State method, and readings in other areas gave that condition away. Refusing to answer would only confirm the president's conclusion by different means.

  What was left? Feigning illness to avoid the session? Transparent and ignominious. Pleading to Dr. Garritty for mercy? Pointless and ignominious. She had one option remaining, and it felt better to her with every passing moment.

  The cart stopped, and her escorts saw her out of the vehicle. Garritty led the way inside. A few people in the corridors stared as the procession passed them. Lucinda saw them, and kept her head high. She hoped they would remember that.

  An examination room awaited them, the same one usually reserved for people connected to the Washington attack. “Help her into the bed, please,” Garritty asked the guards. As they strapped her down, he worked on the computer, presumably calling up the Penn State protocols. Lucinda winced when her keepers cinched the bonds too snugly, but said nothing. Once finished, one of the guards stepped out of the room. The other took position by the shut door at something like parade rest.

  Garritty touched a button, and Lucinda began sliding into the scanning tube. “Actually,” she heard him say over the hum of the sliding bed, “could you stand watch outside, Corporal? I'll get a cleaner scan with fewer people diverting the subject's attention. I'll call if I need you."

  Lucinda was inside the tube now, but she could hear the door, the footsteps, and the door. That left only Dr. Garritty's shufflings and her own breath. She waited.

  "Please state your name,” she heard over the speaker installed in the interior of the scanner. Truth scans didn't really need this calibration, but it did provide a little useful precision.

  "Lucinda Dolores Peale,” she said. Other questions came. “Forty-six. Nogales, Arizona. UCLA, undergrad through doctorate.” It didn't shift her composure. She was ready for the real questions.

  She heard more shuffling and tapping at a keyboard. “Dr. Peale, do you harbor any moral or ethical doubts about the work you, and others, are doing here?"

  "No, Dr. Garritty, no doubts whatsoever.” She took a deep breath. “I am quite certain that this project is a perversion of everything I hoped neural overlay would be."

  "What—umm, wait a minute."

  Lucinda didn't wait. This felt too good. “Not only is this the apotheosis of government power-grabbing—something I'd almost expect under the circumstances—but it's the biggest bait-and-switch I've ever witnessed. Burleigh is using the cover of investigating Black Friday to conduct an assault on an entirely different group. I remember a time when you people didn't approve of that."

  "Dr. Peale, we need to stop for a moment."

  She heard his confusion and almost laughed. “No, I don't think so. I need to voice my beliefs before I'm brainwashed out of them. Treating dissent as a mental illness has its precedents, you know. The Soviet Union comes to mind. So does Orwell: you can't escape thinking about him here."

  The bed began sliding out of the scanner. “Then think about him quietly,” Garritty hissed.

  "What, you don't like hearing that you're everything you've ever accused your political opponents of being and more?” Her voice started rising. “You mean that, in the words of the famous actor, you can't handle the truth?"

  Hands reached inside, clamping over her mouth. “I'm fine with the truth, Lucinda,” said Garritty, his face now becoming visible. “I had just expected you to lie. Now I have to start all over."

  Before she could absorb this, someone knocked at the door. “Doctor?"

  Garritty turned. “No problems here, Corporal."

  "All right."

  Garritty sighed with a shudder Lucinda could feel through the hands he still had over her mouth. “I was planning on falsifying the readings,” he whispered, “letting you pass this little inquisition, so I could have someone inside here to work with. If you'll go along, I can still do that."

  He must have taken her look of disbelief as a plea to speak, because he lifted his hands. “You mean ... you're not ...?"

  "I'm not on Lew's side, if that's what you mean. He may trust me, but—well, it's a long story. So, are you with me, or were you looking forward to going out in a blaze?"

  Lucinda almost got mad, until she realized that she had been enjoying her Joan of Arc performance. Now she had another alternative—if she could trust Dr. Garritty. This seemed too great a stroke of luck, but on the flip side, she couldn't see what stringing her along this way could gain Burleigh and company.

  And she hadn't had a friend within two thousand miles for a long time.

  "If we're going to do this,” Lucinda said, “we'll need it to be plausible. Burleigh won't believe I'm four-square on his side, no matter what your scans say. I've got a cover story in mind to explain away my antagonism. Just follow my lead with the questions."

  "All right.” He didn't sound sure, but didn't question her further. He took a step away, then turned back. “The president really mistrusts you that much?"

  "Yes, and I almost consider it an honor."

  His mouth slowly turned upward, and his face seemed to shed years. “My kind of gal.” He was still smiling as he slid Lucinda back inside the scanner.

  * * * *

  She heard nothing the rest of the day. She couldn't read anything into that, but it made the waiting no easier. When she lay down on her cot that evening, she wondered whether somebody would arrive in the middle of the night to take her away. She fell asleep eventually, waiting.

  The next day passed twice as slowly. She had a new partner in O'Doul's place and never thought to wonder whether his absence was temporary or permanent. She worked on autopilot, worry always roiling in the back of her mind. She never gave a thought to the two men whose brains she analyzed: her mind was more on whether she should have written her parents last night, when it might have been her last chance. Eventually she comforted herself: if she was going to be fixed, they probably wouldn't let her say anything to the outside before they came for her.

  Lucinda went without lunch, and by dinnertime still had no appetite. She went to the canteen because she knew she needed food even if she didn't want it. A couple of people seemed surprised to see her. She found this darkly humorous: had they expected her to disappear that quickly? And why shouldn't they have?

  She sat at the table next to the Johns Hopkins group and noticed that O'Doul wasn't there. She began thinking about him, as she worked at whatever chicken dish was on her plate.

  "I think he wanted it. Ed wanted them to take him away."

  Lucinda perked up, but didn't turn. That was Dr. Rory Singer, a colleague of O'Doul she had met a few times, who sounded like he was in mourning.

  "He was feeling so hopeless and couldn't talk about it. It was grief, of course—” Singer's voice dropped. “—but there was a strain of hatred, too. A need for vengeance he just couldn't master."

  "That's just intolerable,” Dr. Mara Bournazian said.

  "Of course, of course. He had to know that, but he couldn't rid himself of it. That's why he gave himself over: so they co
uld make him better."

  "Well. That was the right choice then. I'm glad he was that wise. So how do we adjust our schedule so—"

  Lucinda didn't listen anymore. She fought down nausea, while one hand twitched, wanted to clutch at her hair. Edwin was gone. Even if he returned to duty, it wouldn't be the same man. It was as though he had committed suicide. In a sense, perhaps he had.

  She forced down more food, until her stomach would take nothing else. She tried to look casual as she disposed of the remnants and left, but they had to see it, the horror and pity and disgust emanating in waves from her. She walked toward her dormitory as fast as she dared.

  Someone swung around in his tracks, aiming for her. Lucinda seized up inside, as her feet kept carrying her. The figure came up right beside her, and she relaxed only a little to see it was Garritty.

  "You're clear, Lucinda,” he said softly. “The president accepted the result, though I can't say he trusts you yet."

  Her viscera unwound a quarter turn. “All right."

  "He'll still wants someone keeping an eye on you, and I think I persuaded him to make me that someone."

  "All right."

  Garritty took a quick look at her. “Okay. I'll contact you later, when you're feeling safer.” He began to peel away, then swerved back. “I'll try to match your resourcefulness, Lucinda.” He turned and was gone in an instant.

  She kept going a few hundred feet before she dared to sigh. A twinge of shame came upon her for driving him off, but her relief was greater. In a day or two, she could absorb this. Not now.

  She resumed course for her dormitory. Maybe it was time to write Josh again, even if she hadn't gotten a response to her most recent letter. Maybe some of her relief would show through the self-censorship and make things better between them.

  Then she remembered her new bunkmate. She would still be on her first shift of sleeping for another half hour at least. Lucinda couldn't write at her bunk without risking making a fresh enemy, the last thing she needed, and she had no illusion that the common area wasn't watched.

  Lucinda slowed, then turned away. She'd go look at that miserable little fountain running in the center of the compound and write there. For a half hour at least.