by E. C. Tubb
Aboard the lift, we all grabbed handrails as the habitat’s floor, and the pseudo-gravity of its rotation, fell away. Looking across the 1-kilometer distance to the northern cap, I saw people who had donned wings and were flying along the cylinder’s center. “That surprises me,” I muttered, and when Samuel tilted his head in a questioning look I pointed out the fliers.
“It’s simple tech,” Samuel said. “As natural as the flight of birds.”
Then it was off the lift, in zero-G conditions now, and into the passenger waiting area. Both Bishop Troyer and Samuel glided awkwardly through the broad tube that led from the revolving cylinder of New Lancaster to its stationary hub. I’d made sure we arrived only minutes before departure; I didn’t want to draw this out. I’d only allowed Bishop Troyer to come along because I thought her presence would help me deal with Samuel until I got him aboard the shuttle.
We reached the broad waiting area. About three dozen other passengers were also waiting to board the shuttle down to Earth. I’m sure my sigh of relief was audible. Gone were the organic smells and too-warm, too-moist air that had assaulted me when I first entered New Lancaster proper. I marveled at the small comforts I found in filtered air, smooth white surfaces, and decorative cube images of planets and galaxies that were the same in any such chamber.
Another flash of the shield, this time toward a customs officer. He said, “Don’t worry, Triage Officer, we’ll get you seated first, in just a moment.
As we all moved to one side and grabbed handrails, I sneaked a glance at Bishop Troyer. Her mouth had tightened into a narrow line that emphasized the wrinkles in her face. I’d seen similar expressions before, on dozens of frustrated parents’ faces—she was coming to grips with the reality that she was about to lose Samuel. She couldn’t prevent me physically from taking him, and they’d had no legal options or I wouldn’t have arrived at their doorstep. “I know this is difficult,” I said, “But look at the broader view—”
Bishop Troyer said, “I don’t have a broader view. I only know I’m losing my son.”
Samuel was grinning. “Let him spin his fairy tales, Mom.”
Bishop Troyer’s lips pursed and she looked at me. “Have your say.”
“Human history, from the 19th Century onward. Conflicts between empires give way to the superpowers, whose disputes dominate the 20th Century. Some of those disputes involve intermediaries, often on the Asian continent. But after two global conflicts, wars became localized or internal. The world’s countries were learning to live in peace. But in the very first year of this century, Humanity sees war waged by individuals.”
Bishop Troyer lowered her gaze. “We’re a sinful race.”
“This is where it starts. With a simple assault, and the most basic disrespect for another person.”
Bishop Troyer said, “You spout your theories of history and how Human society evolves as if they’re as certain as the laws of physics you worship.”
I said, “That’s a good analogy. The laws of physics have been called the ‘cold equations.’ My job is to make sure legal consequences approach that same certainty.”
“Then you, Mr. Bakri, are even colder than the laws of physics. Perhaps you embody the human equations. And if I refuse to let Samuel go?”
“I can take you into custody, too.”
Samuel said to me, “I’ll go to Earth.”
Bishop Troyer said, “Samuel, no!”
“Mom, what kind of choice do I have? I’m young, I can adapt.”
Like you adapted on Shosha? I thought, but wasn’t about to say aloud.
Bishop Troyer asked her son, “Do you know the danger’s you’ll face there?”
Samuel said, “Radiation. Marauders. Leftover nanoweapons.”
“We have to find you something somewhere else.”
I said, “Most countries aren’t interested in taking a Volatile. They don’t want our—”
“Castoffs? Rejects?”
“I believe you’re both good people. It’s just that Samuel did something that can’t be tolerated in this community.”
Bishop Troyer offered me a sad smile. “I have my own beliefs about what can be tolerated and what cannot. As does everyone who has received our undeserved gift—God’s love. We reciprocate that gift by building a community filled with Christ’s attributes. Forgiveness is one of those attributes.”
I didn’t have anything to say to that.
“Don’t worry,” Bishop Troyer said. “I’m not a proselytizer. I’m willing to speak in the limited terms of everyday life. Did it ever occur to you that maybe Samuel thought he was in the right?”
“You’ve seen the vid?”
“I have. I don’t approve of what he did, but I don’t believe it’s worth banishment.”
Both of Samuel’s eyebrows raised and his jaw dropped open. “How did you see it?”
“The farm’s comp. It has HabNet access.”
“But you never allowed me to—”
“To fritter away your time on foolishness—games and useless knowledge disguised as revealed truths or wisdom? No, I never did. But this is different. I had to see for myself what happened.”
I kept quiet. I thought letting this little drama play out might be the best thing for me.
Samuel said, “You had no right—”
“I have every right to know about my son’s actions. It was foolish to let you go there. I can only ask the Lord’s forgiveness. If only your father had lived—”
Samuel wagged his finger before his mother’s face. “It always comes back to that, doesn’t it? The sacred Amos Troyer, who could do no wrong—”
Bishop Troyer knocked Samuel’s hand aside, and by his reaction, you would’ve thought she’d slapped him full in the face. “You will respect your father.”
Samuel recovered quickly, and his features hardened into an expression that belied his youth. “I’ve always respected my father. It’s your attitude toward him that wears me down.”
Bishop Troyer extended her hand toward Samuel’s face. He flinched, then seemed to realize his mother’s touch would be gentle this time. Anna Troyer caressed her son’s face. “I’ll always love you despite how you treat me.”
Samuel said, “I know, Mom. It’s just…I have to make my own decisions now.”
The customs officer caught my eye and waved me toward the embarcation sleeve. I told Bishop Troyer, “I have to accompany Samuel down to the surface.”
Bishop Troyer told me, “My son didn’t understand.”
“We don’t care whether he understood. We care only that he not repeat his actions, whether in Shosha or here in New Lancaster.”
“He wouldn’t have. I’d have made sure of it.”
“He’s a Volatile. We couldn’t be sure. Now we will be.”
Mother and son embraced, held on tight, cried. I started to touch Bishop Troyer on her shoulder but couldn’t bring myself to. I coughed softly. The Troyers took the hint and said their final goodbyes. Bishop Troyer told me, “I’ll pray for him. And for you, and those who create our laws.”
I thought it only appropriate to say, “Thank you.” Then Samuel and I left. I didn’t dare look back at the grieving mother.
* * * *
Samuel sat next to me quietly during the entire half-hour trip. I wondered how many of the other passengers might also be Volatiles, though I didn’t recognize any Triage Officers from other habitats.
We’d be landing in the desert linking the sloping plain that was once England’s Shakespeare Cliff to the ruins of the French village of Sangatte. It was only during the shuttle’s final approach that Samuel said, “Tell my mother everything will be all right. Even if it won’t.”
This Volatile’s concern for his mother stole at my heart in a way I hadn’t anticipated. I could almost forgive Samuel for attacking me back in the New Lancaster Habitat.
Almost. I didn’t respond to his request, and Samuel didn’t make it again.
The shuttle settled to the barren ground
and Samuel and I followed the other passengers, about six or seven, who were getting off.
Bright light and blowing dust made me squeeze my eyes to slits as I followed Samuel out of the shuttle and stepped onto dusty ground. Close to the horizon, I saw the reclamation facility that fought the losing battle to reclaim this strait as fertile ground. Nanotech conflicts had left the land full of unwanted surprises, from transformation mines to death-tech. The suggestion had already been made in some quarters to let it return to its “natural” state, to become the English Channel again. As if natural meant static, unchanging, safe.
A tall man in a crisp uniform and wearing a breathing mask walked up to us and introduced himself as StraitForce Lieutenant Phillipe Cassell. “I’ll take the boy now,” Cassell said, his voice stern and metallic through the mask.
“Where’s my mask?” Samuel demanded.
“You’ll get one when you earn one,” Cassell said. He pulled Samuel toward a waiting personnel carrier. Samuel looked back at me and said, “Goodbye.”
My mouth was dry and I choked back words. By the time I raised my hand to wave, it was to Samuel’s retreating back.
That’s when a sharp crack came from overhead and I was knocked to the ground. I lifted my head from the dust just in time to see the rear of the personnel carrier blasted away. Armed men and women were popping up from beneath the ground. They were aiming weapons and squeezing triggers, but I didn’t hear discharges and didn’t see flashes of light.
I got up and ran toward Samuel Troyer and Lieutenant Cassell, who were lying next to the carrier’s wreckage. I pulled my stunner and got off a few shots, without hitting anyone.
Samuel pulled me down next to him, clearly glad to see a familiar face, even mine. He seemed unhurt; Cassell’s chest and face were ruins. Before we could say anything to each other, Samuel slumped to the ground. Whether unconscious or dead, I didn’t know.
A scuffling sound to my right, and I raised my weapon at a gunner advancing toward me.
Some New Human I was. The gunner was quicker and even though I still didn’t hear a discharge or see a flash I slumped to the ground next to Samuel.
* * * *
I found out what happened when I woke up in the reclamation facility’s hospital. A Channel Separatist raid on the reclamation facility had ended with nine raiders dead, but 52 workers killed and 142 others, including Samuel, suffering nano-infestation.
The Separatists had sprayed destructive nanotech over much of the facility. I was lucky; being a New Human gave me some resistance to such intruders, and my status as a Triage Officer meant I was one of the first attended to. Yes, I’m aware of the irony. The doctors flushed out my system successfully, and I was out of the hospital within hours.
Samuel, though, wasn’t so lucky. The tiny disassemblers roamed through his bloodstream and throughout his nervous system, altering his body with an excruciating slowness.
I went to see him every few hours over a period of three days after the attack. Samuel’s body was literally turning to dust. His feet crumbled away within hours of the infestation, and his legs were gone in a day. The nanotech made sure Samuel’s skin closed around the parts of his body that remained, but did nothing to relieve his pain. “I’m bearing it,” he told me through gritted teeth, “because I want to live.” Once when I found him sobbing uncontrollably, he said, “I’m not crying for myself. It’s my mother. I have to get better. I don’t want her to know I’m suffering.”
Doctors pumped him full of reconstruction nanotech and implanted temporary artificial organs as his intestines, liver, kidneys, heart, lungs, and other organs failed, then became dust.
69 hours into his agony, doctors had given up on saving Samuel and were issuing frantic petitions to London and Paris for permission to euthenize him. The reply never came. He was, after all, only a Volatile.
The separatist attack told me no one was safe, and that it didn’t matter who you were. Lieutenant Cassell had only been doing his duty. Samuel Troyer was a mixed-up young man who hadn’t done anything that deserved a death sentence—something I’d realized in the final moments of Samuel’s life.
All that remained of him was a head and an upper torso. He was breathing through artificial lungs and could still manage halting speech. Moments before he died, Samuel said he felt a comforting presence nearby, someone other than myself or the doctors. I knew he was a spiritual man, and I was glad that he’d received this vision in his final moments. But then Samuel’s demeanor changed. His face contorted, and not from pain; his nerves couldn’t transmit pain anymore. He forced one word out before he died: “Abandoned.”
I couldn’t speculate on what it was Samuel saw or heard, or who had abandoned him, though I had my own ideas.
* * * *
Within a day of Samuel’s death I was standing on Bishop Troyer’s porch on another sweltering morning, knocking on her door again. I considered it a mercy that she hadn’t been allowed down to the Strait to see her son, because of the continuing separatist danger. I peered through the door’s wire mesh, and saw a long wooden table set up in the living room, with plates and casserole dishes full of food spread across it.
The door opened halfway, and Bishop Troyer stood there, dressed in a white dress with a white cape. I’d expected her to look withered and worn, but she stood upright and sturdy. I wondered how long her newfound energy would last once the other mourners were gone. I wondered how long she might live.
The soft background conversations filtering through the doorway stopped one by one as guests noticed my presence.
“I know I’m probably not welcome here,” I said.
Bishop Troyer’s eyes seemed to perceive every wrong I’d ever perpetuated in my life, every broken promise, every petty insult. Every time I thought of myself as morally superior to a Volatile, because I was a New Human.
Never mind taking her only child to his undeserved death.
“Of course you’re welcome here, Triage Officer.”
“I’m not a Triage Officer any longer.” At Bishop Troyer’s questioning look, I said, “I’ve resigned. I won’t be banishing any more Vol…any more citizens.”
Bishop Troyer opened the door further. “Enter in the spirit of forgiveness.”
I stepped inside, aware of all the eyes upon me. Mourners, most of whom would have known Samuel Troyer at his best as well as his worst. Bishop Troyer and I moved into one corner of the room and spoke quietly as other conversations rose again.
I told her, “I realized being a Triage Officer had only been my way of dealing with my own fears. I told myself others were responsible for them. Eliminate those others from my life, and I’d be secure. The fact that I operated with the habitats’ laws on my side was only an excuse.”
“And your new job?”
“Within a month, I’ll be joining the Earth Alliance exploratory craft Laika as Chief security officer.”
“Are you so eager to explore? Or are you leaving your past behind?”
“I don’t think I’ll know for awhile.”
Bishop Troyer looked thoughtful, not as haunted. “Then my son’s death served some small purpose. Tell me how he died.”
I hesitated, and Bishop Troyer said, “I’m sure he asked you to spare me the details. He always wanted to protect me.”
I felt the corners of my mouth turn up just a little. “It was all he said to me on the way down to Earth. Tell you everything was all right, even if it wasn’t.”
“And as he was dying?”
“He didn’t want you to know he was suffering.”
“His suffering has ended, and he’s with the Lord. You know you failed him.”
I lowered my head. “Yes, I do.”
I started at the touch of Bishop Troyer’s fingers beneath my chin. “Then you mustn’t fail me. I want to believe that the more he suffered, the more heroic he became.”
“He did.”
“Then don’t give me the peaceful, sanitized version of his death.”
So I told her, and she listened and didn’t say anything, but her eyes closed tightly halfway through my description of Samuel’s suffering and death. By the time I’d finished my tale she had one hand over her eyes and her chin was quivering. When she started to sob, her hand moved to cover her mouth, and she turned her back toward the friends and relatives who’d come to grieve with her.
Eventually Bishop Troyer composed herself. “I can’t provide your forgiveness, Leo Bakri, and you won’t find it out among the stars. It’ll only be within your own heart. A lesson I’ve learned.” Her mouth quivered, and she raised her hand to it again. I could hear her muffled voice. “Oh, Samuel, why was I so foolish?” Anna Troyer looked at me. “He promised he’d be a better, more respectful son. Just let him do this one thing, he said. It’s all I’d ever wanted. That’s why I let him go. Because of what I wanted.”
She turned away from me then, and joined the other mourners. As I was leaving I paused in the doorway, aware that Bishop Troyer and I were embarking on a shared journey.
THE GUN, by Philip K. Dick
The Captain peered into the eyepiece of the telescope. He adjusted the focus quickly.
“It was an atomic fission we saw, all right,” he said presently. He sighed and pushed the eyepiece away. “Any of you who wants to look may do so. But it’s not a pretty sight.”
“Let me look,” Tance the archeologist said. He bent down to look, squinting. “Good Lord!” He leaped violently back, knocking against Dorle, the Chief Navigator.
“Why did we come all this way, then?” Dorle asked, looking around at the other men. “There’s no point even in landing. Let’s go back at once.”
“Perhaps he’s right,” the biologist murmured. “But I’d like to look for myself, if I may.” He pushed past Tance and peered into the sight.
He saw a vast expanse, an endless surface of gray, stretching to the edge of the planet. At first he thought it was water but after a moment he realized that it was slag, pitted, fused slag, broken only by hills of rock jutting up at intervals. Nothing moved or stirred. Everything was silent, dead.
