“I’ll withdraw now and I won’t project again.”
I stepped back and waited.
After a moment, I repeated impatiently, “You’ll withdraw—now.”
She trembled and her image became indistinct, as though obscured by convection currents rising from a sun-scorched traffic lane.
But the illusion cleared and once more she appeared solid.
What if I couldn’t make her go back? Desperately, I reached for her gun. Perhaps another spraying of her volitional center—
But I hesitated. “Jinx! Withdraw! I’m ordering it!”
Her face writhed into an expression of protest and pleading.
“No, Doug,” she muttered weakly. “Don’t make—”
“Withdraw!” I shouted.
Her image appeared to be blurred by convection currents once again. Then she was gone.
I returned the gun to my pocket and dropped helplessly onto the edge of the bed. What now? Was there anything I could do except wait? How did one go about opposing an adversary who was omnipotent, an all-powerful megalomaniac?
When would it come? Would I be left at peace until that moment, or would he find time to play cat and mouse with me? Was my end to coincide with general deprogramming of everything? Or did he have something special in mind for me in advance of universal obliteration? Something similar to what he had prepared for Avery Collingsworth?
Disregarding the subjective approach for the moment, I wondered whether there was anything that could be done down here to make him change his mind about destroying his simulectronic creation.
I started going back over the facts. The usefulness of his machine was irrevocably threatened. Fuller had perfected a simulator within a simulator, the inner one intended to discharge the same function as the outer one. They were both meant to sound out public opinion by soliciting responses from analog human beings, rather than from actual persons.
In achieving its purpose, though, Fuller’s counterfeit machine would make it impossible for the greater simulator to operate. For when Reactions began supplying predictions for marketers and government and religious institutions and social workers and the like, the pollsters themselves would be squeezed out of the picture.
The solution was clear: Some way would have to be found to preserve the Association of Reaction Monitors so they would continue on as the greater simulator’s means of stimulating response among the reactional units down here.
But how?
There wasn’t an ID unit in existence, outside of the ARM organization, who wouldn’t rally to the defense of Fuller’s machine. That was because Siskin had promised them so much through it.
Oh, the Operator up there could have Fuller’s simulator destroyed outright. Another thermite bomb. Or even a bolt of lightning. But that would solve nothing. For not only would there be a universal move to rebuild it immediately, but the reactional units would hold the monitors responsible and would take their wrath out against ARM.
Any way you sliced it, the Association of Reaction Monitors was doomed. As a result, an entire world, a whole counterfeit universe had to be scratched off the books so a fresh start could be made.
At the window again, I watched the huge, orange disc of the sun slip into the sky, forcing back the haze of dawn before it. It was a sun that would never reach the opposite horizon.
Then I sensed that someone was in the room with me. It was no more than a subtle realization that there had been movement back there—an almost inaudible footfall.
Without betraying my awareness, I casually slipped my hand into my pocket. I drew the gun and spun around.
It was Jinx.
She glanced down at the laser weapon. “That wouldn’t solve anything, Doug.”
I paused with my finger on the firing stud. “Why not?”
“No matter how much you spray me, it won’t do any good. You might take away my will power. But each time I withdraw, that frees me from volitional paralysis. I’ll just keep coming back.”
Frustrated, I pocketed the gun. Force wouldn’t do it. I had to find some other way. An appeal to reason? Make her realize she mustn’t be caught down here when it happened?
She came over. “Doug—I love you. You love me. I saw that much through empathy coupling. I don’t need any other reason for being with you.”
She put her hand on my shoulder, but I turned away. “If we were coupled now, you’d know I don’t want you here.”
“I can understand that, darling. I suppose I might even feel the same way. But, regardless, I’m not going back.”
There was only determination in the set of her shoulders as she turned toward the window and stared out over the city.
“The Operator hasn’t cut in on you, has he?” she asked.
“No.” Then I saw what I would have to do if I wanted to get her out of this world—and keep her out—before universal deprogramming took effect.
“You were right about his coupling technique,” she said thoughtfully. “Normally the reactor doesn’t even know he’s being cut in on. But there’s a way to make the experience as painful as you want it for the subject. All you have to do is put the modulator slightly out of phase.”
She hadn’t been bluffing when she’d said that no matter how many times I paralyzed her volitional center, she would continue returning. The solution, then, was to order her back just before the final moment—when there would be no time for her to return.
I could catch her off guard, stun her, spray her volitional center—now. That would reduce her to a submissive automaton, of course. But she would be in my pocket. Then I could sit back and bank on the chance that there would be some indication when total deprogramming was imminent. Maybe the sun, or perhaps some other fundamental props, would start popping out of existence first. When that happened, I would merely direct her to withdraw and hope that it would be too late for reprojection.
But when I closed in on her with the laser gun in my hand, she must have seen my reflection in the window.
“Put that away, Doug,” she said calmly. “It’s empty.”
I glanced down at the meter. The indicator was on zero.
“When you sent me up there I could have returned sooner,” she explained. “But I took time to program the charge out of that gun.” She dropped onto the couch, folding her legs beneath her.
Crestfallen, I paused by the window. Outside, the belts were becoming clogged with people. Most of them were pedistripping in the direction of Reactions, Inc. The public demonstration Siskin had arranged was like a four-star attraction.
I turned sharply. “But, Jinx—I’m nothing!”
She smiled. “So am I—now.”
“But you’re real. You have a whole physical life before you!”
She motioned me over to the couch. “How do we know that even the realest of realities wouldn’t be subjective, in the final analysis? Nobody can prove his existence, can he?”
“Hang philosophy!” I plopped beside her. “I’m talking about something direct, meaningful. You have a body, a soul. I don’t!”
Still smiling, she dug a fingernail into the back of my hand. “There. That ought to convince anyone he has a body.”
I caught her arm and twisted her toward me. “For God’s sake, Jinx!” I pleaded, realizing I was losing ground in my attempt to get her back to her own world. “This is serious!”
“No, Doug,” she said pensively. “There’s no assurance whatever, not even in my own physical existence, that material things are actually material, substantial.
“And as for a soul, who ever said the spirit of a person had to be associated, in degree, with something physical? If that were the case, then an amputee dwarf would have to have less of a soul than a thyroid giant—in anybody’s world.”
I only stared at her.
“Don’t you see?” she went on earnestly. “Just because we’re down here, we don’t have to replace our concept of God with that of an omnipotent, megalomaniac Operator of an environmental
simulator.”
Beginning to understand, I nodded.
“It’s the intellect that counts,” she said with conviction. “And if there is an afterlife, it won’t be denied reactors in this world any more than it would be held out of the reach of ID units in Fuller’s simulator or real people in my own existence.”
She leaned her cheek against my shoulder. “There’s no hope that this world will be saved, Doug. But I don’t mind. Not really. You see, I lost you up there. But I’ve found you down here. If our roles were reversed, you’d feel the same way and I’d understand.”
I kissed her then, as though the very next moment would be the last one before universal deprogramming.
Contentedly, she said, “If it appears that he’s going to let this world drag on for a few more days, I will go back up there—but only to preset the modulator for surge voltage. Then I’ll return. A few seconds later, the coupling between my projection down here and my physical self up there will be broken—completely. And I’ll be an integral part of this simulectronic world.”
I could say nothing. I had tried to convince her. But, instead, she had convinced me.
The sun climbed up even with the window and cast its warming rays across us.
“He hasn’t—cut in again yet, has he?” she asked.
“No. Why?”
“I’m afraid, Doug. He might decide to have another session with you before he switches off the simulator.”
I felt the quiver in her shoulders and put my arm about her.
“You’ll let me know when you’re being coupled?” she asked.
I nodded, but again I wanted to know why.
“Because it might just possibly have some effect on him when he learns that I’m down here—for good.”
I considered the Douglas Hall in that upper existence. In a sense, he and I were merely different facets of the same person. The phrase “in his image” swam into my thoughts, but I avoided the false theological overtones. He was a person; I was a person. He enjoyed an infinite advantage over me, of course. But beyond that, all that separated us was a simulectronic barrier—a barrier that had perverted his perspective, warped his mind, fed him delusions of grandeur, and turned him into a megalomaniac.
He had tortured and murdered ruthlessly, manipulated reactional entities with brutal indifference. But, morally, was he guilty of anything? He had taken lives—Fuller’s and Collingsworth’s. But they had never really existed. Their only reality, their only sense of being, had been the subjective awareness he had imparted to them through the intricate circuitry of his simulator.
Then I clamped down on my submissive reasoning. I would be no apologist for the upper Hall. He had murdered—viciously. There had been no trace of compassion in his disposal of those analogs who had seen through the illusion of reality. And he had not slain mere reactional units. He had savagely killed human beings. For self-awareness is the only true measure of existence.
Cogito ergo sum, I reminded myself. I think, therefore I am.
That had to be it.
I rose and walked back to the window, stared outside at the crowded pedistrips. I could even see a portion of the Reactions building. The scene over there seemed to be generating its own electric excitement. Hundreds of anxious persons, impatient for Siskin’s promised demonstration of his simulator, were jamming traffic lanes, stalling pedistrips by their sheer weight and number.
“Nothing from the Operator yet?” Jinx asked.
I shook my head without looking away from the growing crowd. It was the people—the reactors—themselves, I reflected, who had stymied the Operator. They had made their own destruction inevitable.
The press of public opinion was like a solid shield protecting Fuller’s simulator, which would have to be permanently destroyed if this world was to continue in existence.
Somehow it was ironic. Siskin himself was responsible for the mass attitude. He had manipulated the people out there even more effectively, through psychological appeal, than the Operator could through simulectronic processes.
For in order to change that overwhelming bulwark of public opinion, the simulectronicists would have to reprogram almost every reactor. It was too enormous a job. It would be easier to wipe all circuits clean and start over.
Then I drew erect and turned toward Jinx, my mouth hanging open in sudden realization.
She gripped my arm. “Doug! Is it—him?”
“No. Jinx, I think I have a plan!”
“For what?”
“Maybe we can save this world!”
She sighed hopelessly. “There’s nothing we can do down here.”
“Maybe there is. It’s a slim chance. But it’s something. This world—the Operator’s simulator—is beyond salvation because the people, the reactors, insist on having their own simulator at any cost. Right?”
She nodded. “He can’t change their convictions and attitudes short of complete reprogramming.”
“He can’t. But maybe I can! Those people out there are all for Siskin because they believe his simulator is going to transform their world.
“But suppose they learn what his real motives are. Suppose they find out he only wants to become their absolute ruler. That he and the party are conspiring against them. That he doesn’t plan to use Simulacron-3 at all as a means of lighting the way to social progress!”
She frowned and I couldn’t tell whether she was confused by my suggestion or whether she was preparing to offer an argument.
“Don’t you see?” I went on. “They would destroy the simulator themselves! They would be so disillusioned that they would even turn on Siskin! They might bring about the end of the party too!”
Still, she showed no enthusiasm.
“They would create an atmosphere in which Fuller’s simulator could never be reintroduced. It would be simple, then, for the Operator up there to reorient a few reactional units like Siskin and Heath and Whitney. He could rechannel their interests away from simulectronics altogether.”
“But that wouldn’t free you, Doug. Don’t you see? Even if you did save this world, you’d only be giving the Operator an unlimited future to apply all the simulectronic torture he can— ”
“We can’t be concerned with what happens to me! There are thousands of people out there who don’t even suspect what’s about to happen to them!”
But I could understand her viewpoint. My sympathy for the reactional units must certainly run deeper than hers. I was one of them.
Soberly, she asked, “How are you going to orient them to the facts about Siskin? There can’t be much time left.”
“I’ll just go out there and tell them. Maybe the Operator will see what’s happening. Then he’ll realize he doesn’t have to destroy this creation after all.”
She folded her arms and leaned against the wall, uninspired.
“You won’t have a chance to tell them anything,” she said. “Siskin has the whole police force looking for you. They’ll spray you down the moment they see you!” I seized her wrist and headed for the door. But she pulled back, almost desperately. “Even if you succeed, darling—even if you aren’t sprayed down and do convince everybody out there—they’ll only look on you as part of Siskin’s plot. They’ll tear you apart!”
I drew her across the room. “Come on. I’ll need you anyway.”
18
Outside, the belts were packed with persons pedistripping in the direction of REIN as I mounted the low-speed conveyor and tugged Jinx aboard. Before we reached the end of the block we had crossed over to the medium-paced strip. There was no room for us on the express belt.
Up ahead, a rumble of cheering voices rose like a wave. It was punctuated by the staccato of applause. In the next minute, Siskin’s private car soared powerfully from the landing island in front of Reactions and headed for Babel Central.
Eventually I recognized the inconsistency in the crowd about me: There were no reaction monitors. Their absence, I realized, signified that ARM had abandoned its
function—and that, consequently, the upper world’s simulator was left without its response-seeking system.
Jinx rode the belt silently beside me, her eyes trained straight ahead, her face severe in detachment from the things about us.
I, too, was preoccupied with distant thoughts—thoughts that reached beyond the constricted infinity of my existence. I tried to imagine what the Operator was doing. Since our worlds were on a time-equivalent basis, he would certainly be awake by now.
He might be meeting with his advisory council at this very minute. That he had not yet coupled himself with me indicated as much. I had no doubt, however, that he would eagerly forge his simulectronic bond between us as soon as the formality of that session was over. And that would signify the end was near.
Under the great weight of their burdens, the pedistrips had slowed to a snail’s pace. To my right, riders were stepping without difficulty off the express belt and pouring into the clogged traffic lanes to continue converging on REIN, two blocks away.
Jinx gripped my hand more firmly. “Any sign of him?”
“Not yet. I suppose he’s still with the council.”
But even as I denied it, I realized that he was coupled empathically with me. I could sense his presence now, much more subtly than it had ever been before, however.
The coupling this time was not generating the piercing, mocking pain that it had on previous occasions. Somehow I knew that for once he was merely observing impassively. If he intended torment, he was delaying it for some reason.
I glanced to the left, bringing Jinx into my field of vision. And I could sense his tenseness on intercepting that visual impression. Then I knew he was boring into my recent experiences, filling himself in on what had happened.
There was no mistaking his amused reaction, his sadistic surprise on learning that Jinx had committed herself fatally to his simulectronic rack.
Puzzled, I wondered why he hadn’t started torturing me yet, why he hadn’t thrown the coupling modulator out of phase. Then the answer became clear: One of the most pernicious forms of torment is letting the victim know anguish is imminent but forestalling it.
Counterfeit World Page 17
