The Prayer Machine

by Christopher Hodder-Williams

  Neil said irritably, ‘Yes, if that’s the name of your partner.’

  Krister said patiently, ‘We have a language problem. What’s “partner” mean?’

  ‘Colleague, then.’

  ‘Did you … see … this nurse?’

  ‘She wasn’t deformed, if that’s what you mean.’

  Krister looked at him sharply. ‘So you do know something about that?’

  Neil said, ‘And you evidently know something about me. You knew my name. How?’

  ‘Your book.’

  ‘How could you know? It’s still in typescript. And it’s not due to be published until 1977.’

  Krister said dryly, ‘1977 is well over a hundred years ago. We’ll have to sort our tenses out. So you’re a PONEM contact, in other words?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you know what that PONEM is?’

  Neil hesitated. ‘It’s a psychotic’s word for a means of communicating with people in the real world as against the imaginary people who exist in his own mind.’

  ‘So I’m a hallucination?’

  ‘Yes, technically.’

  ‘In your book, Mr Prentice, you wrote: The essence of interschizoid thinking is to regard the illusion of schizophrenics as totally valid’ Krister searched Neil’s eyes intensely. ‘Isn’t that in conflict with what you are saying?’

  ‘No. If you remembered the words in context they were followed by a sentence which read: Nevertheless, in treating and in understanding nations cannot be regarded —’

  ‘— as mutually exclusive; and indeed if they were, the psychotic would have no means of communicating his imagined experiences to the people treating him.

  ‘You’re quoting me word for word.’

  ‘I know. Deliberately. I could quote the next bit too. What I’m implying is that you must have an alternative definition of a PONEM.’

  ‘It’s a black hole.’

  ‘Right. But if you’ll accept that they certainly weren’t created as a means of getting people out-of-era, what do you think they’re really for?’

  Neil said, ‘Some kind of a prayer machine?’

  ‘Absolutely not. That’s the Phrenic argument.’

  ‘Phrenic?’

  The word “schizophrenic” is archaic. Don’t use it. It’ll show you up … But about PONEMs: what if I told you that we had an energy crisis?’

  ‘You’re short of power?’

  ‘On the contrary we have too much. Too late it was discovered that a vast number of nuclear reactors couldn’t be closed down.’

  Neil said, ‘But the world is getting colder, surely?’

  ‘But to what timescale? Only a little more than a hundred years separates you from … from what you regard as the people of your own environment. Maybe they did talk about a new ice age; and maybe they were right. But a hundred years is a fleeting period in the history of the world. Sure, the icepacks are advancing at a rate of some twenty miles a year; but England is still in a Heat Belt. There’s a heat surplus of some twenty million meganodes. We have to get rid of it … or at any rate, as much of it as we can. So we pump it into outer space — into Time, if you like — and kiss it goodbye. But it’s nothing like enough. Dartmoor — as you’ll see — is a desert. But to get back to you and the PONEM. Curiously enough, you don’t forecast them in your book, even though the concepts you put forward couldn’t work without PONEMs.’

  ‘Is my book … wellknown?’

  ‘Of course. It’s been suppressed, of course, but it’s regarded by most of us as a classic. Especially your notion of “alternative futures”. Unfortunately, Narbiton knows or guesses that you used the PONEM as an IO link.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘An “If Only” link. Your motives in coming here —’

  ‘— or for sinking into deep psychosis —’

  ‘Let’s take one logic at a time. Your motives for coming here, Mr Prentice, had to do with changing some course of events. Communicon?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’m not sure I should involve you in it.’

  ‘You mean you don’t want to commit yourself. It sounds as if you’ve had an overdose of psychiatrists. All right, I’ll take a raincheck on it. But you’d better learn modern syntax in the meanwhile, or you’ll talk yourself into a lot of trouble. In the first place, much of your vocabulary is outmoded. We call it “retrotalk”. Listen as I speak. When you come to a word you don’t know, think it down.’

  ‘Think it down?’

  ‘Sorry. I forgot. You don’t have intermesh. That’s going to be dangerous … Let’s go back to the IO link. You can see, no doubt, that the present Regime would hardly welcome an attempt to change the whole environment — even change their identities — as long as they enjoy so much political power?’

  Neil said, ‘Does that mean they suspect what could be done via a PONEM?’

  Krister thought a bit. ‘Let’s put it thiswise: They have a fear of them which is rather like a superstition. They don’t quite understand why plant which is there to suck out heat should have some entirely different properties. You see, your Institute of Metapsychology is still allowed to exist — bristling with fono bugs of course — in the hope that the Regime might understand what could happen. Furthermore, the Regime know of the existence of your book. They try and make out it’s a lot of green leaves but they have just that one per cent doubt which scares them … We’ll talk about that later. Meanwhile since you can’t Motivate your bed into the check room I’ll have to have your bed switched in.’

  ‘What’s the “check room” and why do I have to be “switched in”?’

  ‘The check room is where I’m about to give you a physical. Switching you in is a manual process that will simply steer your bed nextdoor because you don’t have intermesh.’

  Neil said, ‘I still don’t begin to understand. I mean, what is intermesh and what is Motivating?’ — He spoke as the mobile bed trundled itself nextdoor.

  ‘It’s the normal means of … how shall I put it? I’ve never had to explain it before! It’s rather like trying to communicon to a blind man what it must be like to be able to see! … I guess I can put it this way: we don’t use our hands and feet in this modern world like you used to. Instead, when a child is born, it undergoes routine brainops during which a chip of microcircuitry is inserted into the cerabellum … at the back of your head — there. It controls direct everything you do.’

  ‘Like opening doors?’

  ‘For doorthroughs and all the rest of it, yes. But fitting out an adult is a major operation — mostly because of the shock to the brain. Sometimes, if the original chip goes wrong, we send patients to Central Pool, where surgeons replace it. But seldom do they get a case where there has never been an insertion and of course even if I tried to arrange it, a great deal of unwanted attention would be drawn to your presence here. We’ll have to have a careful thinkup about what we do in the ultimate; in the meanwhile I shall try and get you issued with pseudo-intermesh — that’s a black box you have to carry about with you. It’s worked by a keyboard and after a bit of practice you can almost live a normal life. But at present you haven’t even the means of thinking the water on! So I’ll have to have you washed and so forth. After that I’ll be asking you some questions.’

  *

  ‘Okay. I’ve checked the place through and I guarantee there is no fono. We can’t be absolutely certain about beam-fono but as yet they have little reason for suspecting us. I’m going to ask you a series of questions before I decide what to do. Then you must choose between two simple courses: for either you must come out of your catatonia — I mean from the viewpoint of Dr Schuber, to whom you are merely a breathing body lying on an operating table — or you must stay out-of-era at least until the PONEM can be stepped up to full power again. For technical reasons this cannot be done very often and you certainly can’t get back until it is.’

  Neil said, ‘So it’s a choice between deep insanity and to
tal recovery?’

  Krister nodded. ‘I validate. That is — of course — as seen from Dr Schuber’s point of view. When I’ve taken you through these questions I shall then attempt to get Dr Wels Narbiton’s cooperation. If I can’t then we’re going to have to be careful, to say the least. Are you ready for the questions? I shall ask them rapidly and I don’t want you to think about the answers. Give them immediately, whatever the brain dictates. Ready?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do I seem real?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who is most real? Me or Dr Schuber?’

  ‘Equal. Both seem real.’

  ‘What made you write your original paper — The one you wrote before you founded the IoM?’

  ‘The voices.’

  ‘Would you call these voices aural hallucinations?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Because you believe it or because that is classical theory?’

  ‘Because it is classical theory.’

  ‘What was your principal interest in this place?’

  ‘What place?’

  ‘Norton.’

  ‘I didn’t realize I was still in Norton.’

  ‘You have moved in time, not in space. What was your principal interest?’

  ‘Genetics.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I felt that scientists were playing about with things they couldn’t possibly understand until the longterm effects were known.’

  ‘What did you imagine those longterm effects to be?’

  ‘I had no idea.’

  ‘But you underwent TNA therapy at your own request, did you not?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘To test Metapsychological theory.’

  ‘It didn’t strike you that there might be some link between Metapsychology and Genetics?’

  ‘I was almost certain that there must be a link between the two.’

  ‘And you wanted to find out what it was?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The biographical notes written about you after you’d completed your book are curiously scant. But if I recall it correctly, you went down for this treatment on the very day that Dr Schuber’s patients ran wild. Is that right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did that strike you as pure chance?’

  ‘No. There seemed to be a pattern. I had in any case experienced contact during a trans-Atlantic flight. I knew somebody was trying to make contact at that point.’

  ‘Was this midair experience validated by anyone?’

  ‘You mean corroborated?’

  ‘Yes. Archaic retrotalk again. Careful.’

  ‘It was at the time. There was also a flight deck tape. Later the same pilot disappeared together with his aircraft. There was no wreckage. Of the first episode there is no record.’

  ‘It didn’t strike you that this might have been a deliberate act, to remove the evidence?’

  ‘I thought it faintly possible.’

  ‘Now we come to the first session. I believe a nun attended?’

  ‘Yes. But …’

  ‘But what?’

  ‘She left her Order the following day.’

  ‘The biographies don’t mention that. Anyway, you remember her name?’

  ‘Of course. Ann Marie.’

  ‘And then you were given TNA-1 and you went into a trance state and eventually you got quite close to the PONEM though not actually through it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who did you meet there?’

  ‘A girl. She was dreadfully mutilated.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘By premature aging.’

  ‘Did you associate this state of Forenthoris with anything else?’

  ‘You call it Forenthoris?’

  ‘Yes; it’s a widespread disease.’

  ‘I associated it with the work being done in G Block.’

  ‘The Genetics Block. What else did you notice?’

  ‘I noticed that the girl had the same voice and the same personality as the nun Ann Marie.’

  ‘They were interchangeable, in fact?’

  ‘Virtually. Except for —’

  ‘— except for the disease. Communicon. What was the girl’s name? — The one in the PONEM?’

  ‘Clare.’

  ‘Did it strike you as inconsistent with your theories that two versions of apparently the same person could be in two different states?’

  ‘I’ve been thinking about it. It fits both classical psychiatric theory and my own. It was a truly schizoid experience on my part.’

  ‘But doesn’t detract from the reality of either. — Then what happened?’

  ‘I told Dr Schuber that if she gave me another session with TNA I could probably find out what had happened to the stolen cobalt-sixty.’

  ‘I remember reading that bit. Her patients had invaded G Block and you tried to convince Dr Schuber that you could find out whether the patients had opened the cannister if you had the session.’

  ‘As I said.’

  ‘Did she believe you?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so.’

  ‘Then why did she go ahead with the therapy nonetheless?’

  ‘I have a feeling she thought I was so obsessed with it that I’d better get it out of my system.’

  ‘Who did you think you could ask who would throw light on the radioactive isotope which was stolen?’

  ‘Someone like you.’

  ‘So you suspected that when you went to the PONEM you were in some kind of time gate?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you would get from the future something that would throw light on the events of the past?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘And then you intended to communicon the answer back to her?’

  ‘That’s correct.’

  ‘Was Forenthoris — premature aging — the only side-effect you thought had some connection with G Block?’

  ‘It was until the next day.’

  ‘What happened the next day?’

  ‘Ann Marie and I went up on Dartmoor. We discovered a garbage dump. I don’t want to talk about what we found there.’

  ‘Was this dump largely PVC — plastics of various kinds?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then I don’t need to ask you what you witnessed. But you saw some connection between Plastic Cancer and genetic engineering?’

  ‘I saw that it couldn’t occur unless the tissue of the body could combine with the molecules of PVC. As I knew it was quite impossible for this to occur naturally, I made the assumption that some alteration in the DNA/RNA process must have introduced a new sort of possibility for bonding.’

  ‘And this appalled you?’

  ‘Yes. I took the sample animal —’ He choked on the sentence.

  ‘This upsets you more than Forenthoris. Why?’

  ‘Because, I suppose, I saw the change take place before my own eyes.’

  ‘And the nun’s eyes?’

  ‘Except by then she wasn’t a nun.’

  Dr Krister said, ‘I wouldn’t get too technical about her status. Anyway, you took the specimen where?’

  ‘To the biology lab.’

  ‘And what did they say?’

  ‘They thought it was a joke. By the time they got around to examining the animal it was just like a plastic toy.’

  ‘So in each case — first the midair incident with the tape-fono voices, second with the specimen animal that became a toy — in each case fate or your timing or something you couldn’t control prevented anyone else from validating what you found?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What did you make of that?’

  ‘I took it to mean that I was a genuine case of schizophrenia in that no proof of my discoveries was available and that therefore these “discoveries” could be delusions.’

  ‘But the nun saw the animal?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And other people on the plane heard the voices?’

  ‘Ab
solutely so but collective schizoid delusions are common. That’s why so many people claim to see UFOs at the same time yet still can’t find sufficient proof to make it believable.’

  ‘Is this interview with me real?’

  ‘Yes — on this side of the Möbius surface.’

  ‘And your experiences in the 1970s?’

  ‘Equally real for the other side.’

  ‘— which of course was the basis of your classic theory. Mr Prentice, I won’t keep you long. I propose to have a thinkup with Narbiton. He might have cooled his heels by this time. Otherwise we’re in for trouble.’

  *

  Narbiton said, ‘Kin, I know what you’re thinking. And the answer is No.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because we both have our careers to consider.’

  ‘Wels, I’m talking about mine, not yours.’

  ‘What do you consider your career to be — talking mumbo-jumbo with Phrenics?’

  ‘I consider it to be the matter of probing the unknown. Solving problems. Researching where research is badly needed.’

  ‘And inviting trouble from the BMA, not to mention the police?’ The edge on Narbiton’s voice hardened. ‘And what about Penta?’

  ‘She needn’t know.’

  ‘They’ll assume she does.’

  ‘Without proof? You know as well as I do they’ve got to have either concrete evidence or fact-validation from the Puter.’

  Narbiton lit a harmfree and gazed at Krister through the smoke. ‘Are you going senile on me? They don’t need either, and you know it. They’ve faked Puter printouts before. And they wouldn’t hesitate to do it in your case if you indulged a flagrant heresy. Phrenia is phrenia, Kin, and that’s the end of it as far as either of us is concerned.’

  Krister said, ‘We have a duty to society.’

  ‘Against that society’s will? — Aren’t you being a bit pompous? Duty begins at home.’

  ‘It’s never that simple. If Penta heard you talking —’

  ‘I’m glad to say she can’t. The only person who can hear you talking is me.’

  ‘Do I detect … threats?’ Krister couldn’t genuinely feel angry, for Narbiton was a tired-looking man. He always conducted himself as if he were within an ace of personal defeat by some hidden enemy. At the same time he was too dull to describe as even paranoid. Nor did he belong to the late twenty-first century; he had none of the mental agility that was demanded of any human being who seriously wished to live a life under the Regime. When he did bend the rules, he bent the wrong ones, showing poor judgement and a tendency to vascillate at the last moment. His imprecise personality went with his scraggy hair … One of the few people who still parted his hair, he couldn’t even get that in a straight line. Now, his threat was equally cumbersome, as if he’d watched too many re-runs of old teleflickers about cheap blackmailers. He was too shambling to play the part.