Exit Alpha

by Clinton Smith

  Rhonda said, ‘Beautiful.’

  Vanqua shrugged. ‘I slept.’

  ‘We’re ready,’ Pohl said, eager to please. The last of his hair sheltered behind his ears but he sported a neat grey beard — cropped to give a decent air-seal on breathing gear for fire crew drills. In the extreme cold here, facial hair became caked with ice and dripped when you entered the warmth of heated vehicles or huts. Yet some of the Antarctic staff at Alpha still wore beards. And, at Vostok, according to the wags, even some of the women.

  Pohl and the base administrative officer escorted them to the table for the signing. She looked down at the three orders, each countersigned five times. The names at the top were famous. One of the men was from the Far East, one from eastern Europe, one an African.

  She signed at the bottom of all three sheets then handed the pen to Vanqua. But he had produced his own pen, a palladium-coated Lamy Swift. As he clicked the point down, the clip retreated until flush with the barrel. A reflection of himself, she thought. Form obsessed with function, function followed by fatality. She contemplated his face, the smooth skin, fair hair, muscled neck. He was a good-looking man with the attitude of a monk. His dismal, desiccated nature made him almost unapproachable.

  He signed the papers. Pohl and the AO witnessed the signatures. Then she walked with Vanqua and Pohl to the electrocution bay.

  It was in a converted container. No separate viewing room, no chair. Witnesses stood around the sides on a rubber mat. In the centre of the floor, raised on four ceramic insulators, was an unpadded wooden slab fitted with leg, arm, chest clamps and a head dome. On the wall was the edict: DEATH IS AN ASPECT OF LIFE.

  A shivering man with a lined face and neat moustache lay clamped to the slab. His face, the subject of photographs and video clips for twenty years, was sallow now. His head and calves were shaved and he was naked except for a diaper. The subjects were brought in unclothed because it made handling simpler for the vat. The diaper handled involuntary voiding. The electric current paralysed motor functions but sensory functions continued.

  The two surgeons fitted the copper-and-sponge-lined dome to the victim’s head. Some of the saline solution dripped down his cheek. They attached the electrodes to each of his calves. The 2400 volts would enter his skull and fork out his legs.

  Vanqua asked the man, ‘Are you comfortable?’

  She glanced at him sourly. The fastidious prick was funny as a bedsore. But perhaps it wasn’t intended as derision.

  The shackled man’s mouth turned down. He ignored it, teeth chattering. The attendants nodded to Pohl and left the room.

  There was a small metal box on the wall beside a lever with a rubber handle and gauges showing voltage and amperage. Pohl removed a stethoscope from the box, hung it around his neck and grasped the handle. ‘Is the original verified?’

  She muttered, ‘Verified.’

  Vanqua repeated it.

  Pohl pushed back his sleeve to see the second hand of his watch.

  The condemned man roared, ‘I’m cold.’

  You’ll be warm in a minute, she thought, you genocide-loving hyena.

  She nodded.

  Pohl closed the contact.

  The man’s brief scream was choked off as he went into spasm. Fists clenched, back arched, his body slammed against the straps. Steam drifted from beneath the metal cap and his face became a strictured mask. According to the manual, his brain would eventually cook at 60 degrees centigrade. But there was evidence that the skull was a bad conductor — that, while the body burnt, the brain still functioned.

  Barbaric, Rhonda thought. But the five powers considered this humane. Wolf had recommended that subjects be stripped and staked in the snow — a solution too sensible for the bureaucratic mind.

  The man’s face, hands and toes contorted and his sinews stood out against his quickly reddening flesh. His eyes bulged and vomit trickled from his mouth. The skin attached to the electrodes was burning.

  Pohl frowned at his gauges. ‘Stupid business. The voltage always drops ten per cent and the current goes up as the body gets saturated. Resistance is the problem.’

  Vanqua covered his nose with a monogrammed handkerchief. The room now stank.

  After two one-minute jolts, Pohl shut off the power and put the stethoscope to the man’s chest. He shook his head. The heart still pumped. The man’s spasm had relaxed. He shuddered and gasped in a breath.

  Pohl went back and threw the switch again.

  The body bucked and yellow flame shot from the side of the head. The skin was stretching, the figure swelling as it started to cook.

  Rhonda endured the stench by composing a liturgy for electrocutions. How would it go? ‘Peace on earthing and good connections to all primary stakes’?

  Pohl still stared at his watch.

  Blood now spurted from the nose, the skin of the head smoked and began to peel from the skull.

  The power was turned off and Pohl checked the heart again. This time it seemed successful but you could never be sure. They’d had two subjects revive before going into the vat. Pohl nodded, shrugged, and they filed from the room. The corpse had to cool before they could move it.

  Vanqua refolded his handkerchief. He seemed subdued. Had the events on the carrier sobered him?

  After the three originals were done, they had dinner in the mess where Pohl entertained them with a fund of excellent jokes, all clean. He never offended good taste. Despite the nature of their work, EXIT had many decent people.

  Well fed, she went to see the ‘acid drops’.

  The room was a dismal space, bare except for the vat, a chain hoist on an overhead rail and two metal chairs. Two of the originals, hideous in death, were chin-strapped and ready for the hook. The third, neck stretched by his weight, was pulled along the rail until he dangled over the tall alloy tank.

  Rhonda sat uncomfortably, sticky-date pudding heavy on her stomach. She knew she ate too much. But with diets, knowledge wasn’t power.

  Vanqua sat beside her, looking glum. Both department heads had to witness the dissolving and confirm all physical trace had gone.

  She nodded and the attendant surgeon pressed a button on the control stalk. He wore protective overalls, acid-resistant boots and a helmet with a visor.

  The body was lowered very slowly. A splash would eat through the floor. The air was pervaded by a sharpness that attacked the back of the nose.

  As the feet went in, steam rose from the vat. The angled convex mirror attached to the ceiling was clouded now but later would show nothing but the ends of the corroded harness.

  As she watched the body go in, she mused on the events of the year. The Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, the ferment in eastern Europe, even China. Developments in Nicaragua, Tunisia, Iran, Iraq. In Angola, Cuba, South Africa, Palestine, Yugoslavia. George Bush now certain to make it in America. An astonishingly volatile time with huge implications for the future. And EXIT, despite internal problems, had done extremely well.

  Berlin was her great hope. She wanted the rotten wall down and they were so close now. So close.

  Except that EXIT itself was threatened. By the man on her left? She didn’t know. Perhaps Cain was right. Perhaps the morose surgeon CO was behind it, destabilising things enough to damage her but not enough to destroy EXIT itself.

  Why?

  The motive was missing.

  Damn it. She still couldn’t see it.

  The second bloated, charred body was hoisted. She didn’t find it disgusting. Here, death wasn’t life’s conclusion but its salve. She came to this place to excise the rotten tissue of society, just as a doctor might view a necrotic wound seething with sterilised maggots as therapy. She glanced across at Vanqua. He continued to look ahead, nostrils narrowed against the smell.

  Minimalist, she thought. For her, few censures were worse.

  It was before time, she decided. That meant she had to move now. In this business, timely moves were tardy. What was Zurich Axiom Two? Always sell
too soon?

  Time to activate the countermeasure — the one she’d hoped, prayed, never to use.

  CULT

  SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA, FEBRUARY 1990

  Cain entered the wind tunnel of Walker Street, North Sydney, his tape in his briefcase, his mind half a world away. He’d been in Australia three months, his first time back in sixteen years.

  Compared to the subcontinent, it was heaven — although the place had changed. The competition was greater, the traffic a car park, the people sourer, more hounded. And with the increasing depletion of ozone, the sun burnt you in minutes.

  He’d begun with a Barrier Reef holiday that made him feel he was spinning his wheels. Although he had money and a life to himself, exile hurt. He felt suspended at the fringe of events. Worse, he was lonely — which he considered adolescent.

  As he waited to cross at the lights, he noticed a poster taped to a window.

  THE SQUARE.

  ABUNDANT LIFE AND THE

  SECRET OF SUCCESS.

  THE ASTONISHING

  GUSTAVE RAUL

  IN PERSON

  Exhibition Centre, Darling Harbour

  Two nights only

  Raul — the cult leader? Here?

  The lights changed. He walked across. Women glanced at him, eyes lingering. He appraised the pert arses of younger ones ahead. Since coming here he’d been celibate, first happily, now uneasily.

  He’d cadged two jobs — corporate videos slung at him by mates who’d once been well paid to train him. These had scored an assignment with the advertising agency he was visiting today. He couldn’t show his Pakistan footage. It was irrelevant and would place him. In this hard-bitten industry, florid foreign-language footage would be bizarre. With no show-reel of recent commercials, he was starting almost from scratch. Videos weren’t commercials but they were work.

  He’d learned film techniques in this city — started as grip, then gaffer’s assistant, worked with an editor, done focus-pulling, assistant directing. Now he was back. Funny how things went — not in straight lines but circles. Which explained the disasters of businesses, relationships and nations. He had to stop being philosophical. Today’s meeting called for shallowness profound. Get with it, kid, he told himself. Be light, bright and trite.

  The lift swished him to the creative floor where he was met by Jojo, their producer, a tall trendoid woman who looked nothing until she smiled.

  ‘Hi. Pre-prod’s in Gary’s room.’ Her superwide mouth peeled back to display racks of teeth. If she’d played pro tennis, she could have swallowed difficult balls. The Associate CD, a copywriter, head shaved and shirt-sleeves rolled high, rose and shook Cain’s hand with what he supposed to be a vice-like grip. He was the standard truculent arsehole with self-image invested in his body — a type he’d been taught to disable in seconds. ‘It’s below-the-line crud. We’re in hand-holding mode with the client and he has this subsidiary. You with it? Here’s the hardware.’ He slung across brochures for a range of mobile towers.

  Cain scanned them. Four lever operation at pivot frame with overriding foot-operated dead-man switch. Maximum working height — 40 metres . . .

  ‘We’re right for crane shots.’ Jojo flashed teeth. ‘I see it as perspective shots and great low-angle stuff.’

  The writer glared at Cain for assent.

  He said what they wanted to hear, lukewarm about the job.

  The woman dealt papers around. ‘Working call sheet and rough agenda. Talent. Location. Gear . . .’

  After the session, he waited in her cubbyhole while she went to copy papers for him. Pinned to her partition was a poster for the Gustave Raul circus.

  She returned, saw him looking at it. ‘You into that?’ She produced a paperback from her drawer. ‘One of his books. It’s great.’

  He glanced at the title: Live Selfishly and Love It.

  ‘I’m going tonight. Want to come?’

  The impulsive type, he wondered, or did it mean she was available? She looked flat as a board but he had the drive of a nail gun. ‘Sure.’

  There were no booked seats and the car park was a trial but she was impressed with his leased BMW. By the time they entered the cavernous place and found the open section, the only seats left were high up from the stage. Once they sat, she turned to him.

  ‘It’s so nice to go out with someone.’

  ‘No current attachment?’

  ‘Been a bit of a desert. You?’

  ‘No one at the moment.’

  Her flicker of delight.

  He took her hand which felt like a collection of small screwdrivers and applied his matinee-idol smile. She chattered happily, her letterbox mouth an intriguing gash. ‘. . . most have gone freelance or got jobs in production houses. So I’m one of the few in-house producers. Now tell me about you.’

  The houselights faded, sparing her his cover story.

  A synthesised dirge began as they projected starscapes on a black expanse. Three women in flowing costumes came on, entwined in a languorous gymnastic display. He wondered if Karen Hunt was here — and if she’d replaced Raul with his duplicate yet.

  As the tempo increased, a floating throne slowly moved forward bearing a man in a golden tunic with compelling eyes emphasised by make-up. It was an excellent illusion. Some in the audience gasped. A pale youth in the next row clasped his hands and sobbed.

  The chair reached the front of the stage, hovered over the dancers. They raised supplicant arms then retreated as it lowered to the floor. The man rose from the chair, walked forward, bowing, and the faithful erupted with acclaim.

  Cain wondered how anyone could take this nonsense seriously and hoped his companion despised mass psychosis. But her engaging teeth were sheathed, her eyes transfixed. Not, he decided, a critical companion.

  After the tumult subsided, Raul began to speak in a deep, convincing voice, augmented by throat mike. His stock in trade was a fixed smile and Wagnerian body language. ‘So things will never get better? Never change? Don’t be so sure. Did any of you suspect the Berlin Wall would come down? That Mandela would be freed? Life — can — change.’

  With help from EXIT it can, he thought. The man went on with his sales pitch. Interest, motivate, authenticate. He was gaining acceptance by hooking onto the international bandwagon. ‘Everyone here is able to control their lives. Even as you sit there, you’re making your future. Your thoughts, moods, attitudes are creating what will happen. You’ — pregnant pause — ‘are your destiny.’

  ‘That’s one of his themes,’ Jojo whispered and squeezed his hand.

  ‘Because,’ Raul continued, ‘there’s no time. The sense of time lies in the mind itself. We live either in memory or anticipation. But we can make our world right now. As you are — so you become.’ Another stagy pause. ‘Do you realise what this means? You are either your greatest friend or your most implacable enemy. You.’

  Raul was starting to sound like another health-and-wealth heretic. He wondered if Hunt was in the audience and scanned heads in the front rows. Then a three-quarter profile of a bearded man caught his eye. No jug ears. And the hair wasn’t straight, but something in the cast of cheek and brow . . .

  Murchison, the other surgeon shadowing them in Chartres — now written-off as missing in action? If it was, they’d fixed the ears.

  No, he thought. Too far-fetched. But he pinpointed the silhouetted head.

  Raul had the audience hanging. ‘The secret of supra-personal work is unconditional surrender. It’s the connection with the overmind that brings us what we need.’

  Predictable, Cain thought. Concepts borrowed by a hollow man.

  ‘But all traditions say you have to destroy yourself. Why should I destroy myself? Aren’t my wants, wishes important? If not for myself, who for then?’

  Sighs from the rows. No, this wasn’t health and wealth. More like fame and power. The man was pitching his distortions at the aggrandisement of the personal self. Feeding personal indulgence. It worked every time.


  As he talked, barely clad women filed onto the stage behind him, began to chant as their mentor added an amplified stage whisper. ‘Do you hear where that sound is coming from? Yes. Yes. The overmind is none other than yourself.’

  The chanting ended. As the women exited stage left Hunt entered, carrying a scroll. She looked virginal, dramatic, gorgeous. Some in the audience clapped.

  Raul said, ‘I’ve asked one of my senior assistants to read from transcripts transmitted to me. Listen carefully.’ He stood aside.

  She read in her impersonal voice: ‘There is no empty space in the universe — simply a vastness of vibrating energy. We are manifested foci in this vastness. But, more truly, we are repositories of energy connected with each other as towns are connected by roads, as muscles are connected with nerves, as planets are connected by gravity. So you — YOU — can control your destiny absolutely.’

  She had some assignment, he thought — the obscuring of truth with facts. Raul knew his stuff. Propaganda was best at catching geese.

  ‘That’s Karen,’ his companion whispered. ‘The most accomplished of the young ones. He’s grooming her. Isn’t she stunning? I’d kill for her figure.’

  Cain was still assessing Raul. Had she done the job on him? He doubted it.

  When the lights came up at interval, he rechecked the Murchison lookalike who was now waiting to join the crowd of uncriticals jamming the aisle.

  The fuzz disguised it and the ears. But it was the same surly expression, the same hulking body movement. Christ. Had Vanqua been feeding them a line?

  Did Hunt know the surgeon was here? If not, she was in trouble.

  Then he remembered.

  It wasn’t his war any more.

  TEETH AND BONE

  After the show, as they crossed the road to a bistro, he watched how her coathanger body moved — then watched her intriguing mouth sip cappuccino. She asked him what he thought of Raul.

  ‘As far as I can see, most people can only assimilate truth as a lie. So only distortions of great teachings became popular. Raul’s a huckster.’

  ‘But what he says works.’