Writers of the Future Volume 27: The Best New Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year

by L. Ron Hubbard

  “Whatever he’s doing, he’s doing it fast,” she said.

  “Keep away from him. Don’t touch anyone showing red,” Shamus growled.

  Was this her first day as a Vector? She knew how to handle herself, and she didn’t need to be protected like a child. She knew better than to touch the forest of green hosts buzzing through the courtyard, as well as the new red ones who erupted like mini volcanoes, blazing briefly with infection and then dying out.

  “Who is this guy?” she asked again. Shamus knew, she could tell. He just wasn’t saying.

  “Come on,” Shamus said suddenly. “We’ve got to go.”

  He started back toward her, and for a moment she thought he was going to grab her by the hand and drag her physically out of the pellet station.

  “Wait!” she shouted, forgetting to use the button phone’s sub-vocals. A few of the closer tourists glanced over.

  The unknown Vector jerked in surprise, noticing Shamus. Victoria watched the man’s round face as he casually swept the platform with his eyes, maybe checking to see if there were others. Shamus had frozen beside a young couple pushing a covered stroller, blending in. But the stranger had locked onto him.

  The tone in Victoria’s ear changed to indicate a connection had been added to her button.

  “I am the fluoride in your water. . . . I am your polio vaccine. . . .”

  Victoria heard the man’s smooth high voice recite the familiar words as if they were poisonous, spreading like smoke from his fingertips, and she knew who he was. He had to be a government man, a Vector from the FIT program. He was the source of the problem, the plague rat.

  If the program had been out in the public eye, it might have been given a motto, and those words would be it, like the “to protect and serve” of the police, or the “through driving wind and pouring rain” of the post office. She knew the words, and she didn’t believe them for a moment. The government may have started out on the right side, but they never stayed there long. Power corrupts.

  “Who are you?” Shamus sub-vocalized as he pretended to be interested in the child shaded beneath the blue-striped awning that covered a small wheeled cart. “What do you want?”

  “Don’t you know me? I know you, Shamus.”

  “I do not.” Shamus, suddenly unsure, moved swiftly through the crowd away from the stranger.

  The man laughed loudly. He began shaking hands with everyone around him, clapping people on the back, breathing out his red smoke. Crimson flashed in waves of all sizes, cascading rapidly through the crowd as people jostled each other in a hundred different ways. Victoria had never realized before becoming a Vector how much unconscious intimacy occurred among humans as they shuffled through life, unaware of each other, but in constant contact.

  “I’ve seen your picture a hundred times,” the stranger said. “You’re famous, or should I say infamous.”

  “Know thy enemy. . . .”

  The man chuckled. “You’re on a lot of watch lists. You’ve been causing trouble for a long time.”

  It was Shamus’ turn to laugh. “Glad I’m getting through to you.”

  “You are, really,” the man said as he moved closer. “In fact, I’d be happy if you would come with me. We can debate points of view if you’d like. I have a car on the way.”

  Victoria gasped. She hadn’t realized that she’d been holding her breath. When the stranger had said car, he really meant police car. Were they going to be arrested? Shamus claimed that they’d never do it, that they wouldn’t want the publicity. Thoughts of that tiny cell in Beijing returned. She couldn’t do that again.

  “I don’t want to go to jail,” she whispered.

  Shamus spun around, waving her down, trying to tell her without words to shut up and keep out of it. But it was too late.

  The unknown Vector had noticed her. He began moving through the crowd as if he hadn’t a care in the world, but his casual saunter had altered. He strode almost directly toward Victoria now.

  “And who might this be?” The man’s tenor had turned icy, almost mechanical. He staggered a bit as he walked, feigning drunkenness in order to jostle and infect more people as he came toward her.

  “Nobody you need worry about, Attie,” Shamus replied.

  The man hesitated, off guard. Then he smiled. “Character profiling software is illegal, my friend. I could have you brought in just for that.”

  “But you won’t,” Shamus replied. He motioned for Victoria to work her way around the wedge-shaped park opposite.

  “Can he see what we see?” she asked.

  “No, he can’t,” Attie said as if the question were meant for him. “But I can tell that you’re different somehow, and I know you’re involved in something you can’t possibly understand.”

  Victoria danced away, laughing and tumbling like a clown—pretending to be a shimmy girl playing the platform, performing for attention—but inside she trembled, more afraid than she’d been since that day in China. Distraction would make her sloppy, so she took her time, calculating her way through the crowd. A chance contact now would be deadly.

  She’d spent so much of her time trying to find clever ways of putting her skin next to the skin of others that it took concentration not to simply wade into the passing bodies like a dolphin plunging through pristine waters. Her heart fluttered, beating swiftly. Her knees threatened to buckle and dump her on her ass at every turn, and when a fat woman dressed in a bright yellow snow parka (in July? in Las Vegas?) nearly collided with her, she lost it. She actually squeaked in panic and ran the other way.

  “He can’t really take us in, Shamus?” she stammered as she found an island of empty space in the sea of bodies. “Can he?”

  “They don’t want the publicity,” Shamus replied. “There’s nothing to fear.”

  The man laughed, his voice echoed like the sound of a dog barking in her ears.

  “Ignore him. Come my way, Vic,” Shamus whispered through the button. She could almost hear the “calm down and relax” he should have added.

  He was right, whether he said it or not. She needed to slow down and get a grip. They weren’t technically doing anything illegal—at least not anything that hurt anybody.

  She glanced through the middle level of the pellet platform, at the trains coming and going. The small capsules rested on magnetically charged plates that would slingshot them away on spiral trajectories through underground channels, like pills delivering vital medicine through the arteries of the city. People meandered, going about their business unaware. None of them had suddenly dropped dead or even looked ill. In fact, they should be getting better. After all, Victoria and those like her were correcting a wrong, fixing the problem that this man represented.

  “You’re the bad guy here,” she said abruptly. “You’re the evil representative of a government that can’t stop meddling in the lives of its citizens.”

  “Where do you get this stuff from? Who’s writing your propaganda these days?” Attie replied calmly. “I’m not evil, and FIT isn’t a new program.”

  “But its Vector component is,” Shamus said.

  “True.” Attie had moved in, passing the raised gravel at the edge of the neatly manicured park, stalking them. The small rocks bubbled, a thin mist rising from beneath them as sprinklers below the surface struggled to keep the foliage lush in Nevada’s one-hundred-and-nine-degree summer.

  “But we are doing the good work,” he said, his voice becoming more forceful. “It’s FIT who prevents the flu, stops the flareups of random HIV strains and pushes polio and tuberculosis back to mere memories. We do it, not you. You protestors do nothing but complain, and when nobody listens to your whining, you start sabotaging things.”

  “It’s our right to protest,” Victoria said.

  “But not your right to spread this killing filth,�
�� Attie spat back. “It’s only because the law is two steps behind technology that you’re not in prison right now!”

  Victoria snorted. “I’ve listened to guys like you at a hundred rallies. You come, but not to talk or express real opinions. You only come to incite trouble. Then, when some poor bastard takes the bait, you point and say how irrational we are. The status quo is always correct. The government will always save us. God bless America. . . .”

  She stepped back, away from the park and closer to the broad coal-colored pavement. Foot traffic was heavier here, but it was farther from Attie. She couldn’t even stand to look at him.

  “You’re all the same,” he said as he vanished behind the wide trunk of a palm tree at the other end of the park. “Authority is always wrong, always out to hurt you. Why? Why would the government deliberately try to poison its own people?”

  She sputtered. She didn’t have to know why; she just knew it was happening. The red tinge in the distance proved he was doing it right now.

  “Control,” Shamus said.

  “Yes.” She was losing control of herself, speaking out loud when she meant to use the sub-vocals. Attie had gotten under her skin.

  “A sick population depends on socialized medicine,” Shamus explained. “The larger the demographic, the more the government gets involved. An involved government is a big government.

  “Didn’t Thomas Jefferson say that ‘a government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have?’”

  Attie laughed. A harsh cackle filled his voice. “Yes, I’ve heard the quotes, Shamus. I know you don’t really believe them. You’re too smart. But does she?”

  “Hey!” she shouted, drawing a few looks. She turned with a self-conscious smile and walked the curved sloping ramp to the upper platform. “I believe that you’re poisoning people, that’s what I believe.”

  “Just saying it over and over doesn’t make it true,” Attie said as he casually followed her up the ramp. “Do you even know what’s in the Vector we spread? Do you know what’s in yours?”

  “It’s RNA based, with proteins and . . .” And she felt very, very stupid as she said it. She wasn’t dumb, damn it. She may not know the details or the science behind the Vector, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t understand what was going on. He was twisting her around with his words, and it was making her flustered.

  “He’s messing with you, Vic,” Shamus said. “That’s what they do. They work you with their political skills until you begin to doubt yourself. Come on, come to me. We’re getting out of here.”

  “Wait!” Attie lurched forward. He was still a good hundred yards away from Victoria, but in this crowd she couldn’t run. If he chased her, he’d catch her.

  “You really don’t know what you’re doing?” he asked. His tone was unexpectedly urgent, his face suddenly concerned.

  “I know more than I need to,” she replied. She reached up to her temple and tapped the button phone stitched into her skin. It sounded a double low tone. She tapped it again.

  “Shamus, I can’t get him off my line,” she said nervously.

  “No, you can’t,” Attie said. “I have you locked in. I want you to hear me.”

  His voice slid over her like snow sliding down a mountainside, leaving her feeling cold and exposed. Shamus had moved casually up the ramp, swinging around to put himself between Victoria and the other man.

  “Do you know where your Vector comes from?” Attie asked unexpectedly. “It comes from China. Their government builds it, and they build it exclusively for protest groups. They don’t use it on their own people. They don’t offer it to the United States government. They don’t mention it to the press. They make it solely to distribute to the troublemakers and the discontented in this country.”

  He sauntered a little closer. She could see the gleam in his brown eyes now. “Why do you think they would do that?”

  “I don’t know,” she stammered softly, lowering her eyes. The mention of China had thrown her. Did Attie know who she was? Was he using her memories of Beijing, her fear of that episode, to make her crumble?

  “Shamus?” Attie asked.

  “It has to be made somewhere,” Shamus replied quickly, closing the gap between Attie and himself. “Science has come a long way since bacteria were first isolated, but you don’t suppose we can produce something like our Vector at home, do you? As far as I know, the assembly can’t be done without some really expensive equipment. You need a big lab, something capable of churning out tailor-made viruses, producing cultures, extracting and mixing DNA or RNA.”

  Attie had retreated at Shamus’ approach. He chose to spread his infection among a group of school children playing some game with colored chalk on the dark pavement. Nearby, grizzled cabbies hawked rides in foot-propelled carts, trying to lure fares away from the main streets to back-alley casinos and amusements.

  “I don’t know what to think,” she said. She didn’t know how they’d gotten into a debate, but she already felt like the loser. Why was she suddenly so confused?

  She moved west, slowly heading for the Fremont Street ramp. That was the quickest way to get lost if she needed to.

  “Why didn’t you tell me where it came from?” she asked.

  “Would it have made a difference?” Shamus replied. “Nobody ever asks where the posters and pamphlets come from. Nobody cares where the websites are programmed or from what computer they originate. It’s incidental, unnecessary information. Stuff just happens.”

  “But . . .”

  “No buts,” he said. His voice held a thick quality, a hardness she had never heard before. “We’re still doing the right thing.”

  “No, you’re not,” Attie whispered.

  “Are you?” Victoria said. Her voice sounded so much calmer than she felt. She was perspiring. Her tan flesh glistened with moisture, roiling with an olive-colored combination of her Vector and sweat.

  “Yes.”

  “Then why do you do this in secret?” she asked.

  “We don’t,” Attie replied. “FIT is a registered and publicly available government agency. My rank is the same as a GS-7. I make as much as your average letter carrier for the post office, and let me tell you that’s not a whole lot.”

  “You’re not delivering mail, buddy,” Shamus cut in.

  “But I am doing a valid service for the citizens of this country, and that’s more than I can say of you!”

  Victoria glanced around. People strolled through the parks and across the platform. Most looked like tourists, and they were either enjoying the sunshine or excitedly on their way to one of the ubiquitous casinos. A young couple ambled by, both wearing huge smiles and holding each other tightly. The man grasped one of those purple buckets from the Rio, and Victoria could hear the coins sliding musically around inside. Everything seemed so tranquil.

  When she glanced back, she stared at a collection of jeweled dolls, mannequins dressed in churning films of disease, some sparkling green, others flaring red before evaporating back into the normal spectrum. The words they were throwing back and forth were something like that. On the surface they sounded so rational, but when seen though the filter of lies and deception, they mutated into something else entirely.

  “Why isn’t the press here?” Attie interrupted her thoughts, apparently changing the subject.

  “Who?” He’d lost her. What was he asking?

  “The press,” he said. “The news trucks, the reporters, the cameras . . . Where are they?”

  “I don’t understand,” she said.

  “If FIT is doing something dirty, something deadly, shouldn’t the public know?” Attie made a show of spinning around, arms wide, as if searching.

  “Where are they?” he asked. “You people and your protest groups, you’re like actors. You’re alwa
ys in front of a camera somewhere. And if something as terrible as you say is being perpetrated, then you can bet that Shamus or someone just like him would be at Channel 7 in a heartbeat spilling his guts. But, no. How come?”

  Actually, that had occurred to her. She’d asked and been given a reasonable answer.

  “Publicity would lead to panic,” she replied. “If the public only knew what you were doing to them . . .”

  “Enough!” Attie shouted. “What you’re doing should be called murder, and you know it,”

  His voice became low and frosty. “You two are doing more harm in this pellet station than a battalion of soldiers could.”

  “Lives are saved here,” Victoria said. “We’re shielding these people from future infections. How can that be bad?”

  Attie chuckled, an evil sound. He shook his head as if she had suddenly told a joke.

  “We’re still doing more good than harm,” Shamus replied. “Come on, Vic. Let’s go.”

  “Wait a minute,” she said. “More good than harm? What kind of harm?”

  Somehow the conversation had gotten away from her. Was there something wrong with their Vector, something she hadn’t been told about? Or was Attie twisting them both around, trying to play one against the other?

  “She doesn’t know, does she?” Attie circled, shaking hands and patting backs as he moved, like a politician whoring for votes. Unsuspecting people lit up like fireworks under the man’s skillful fingers, bright streamers of red that flared and multiplied, and then faded in an instant.

  One woman, a thin Caucasian with tight, pinched features, shone like a newly polished apple as she bumped an elderly gentleman. He began to glow like a freshly cut ruby, and then accidentally leaned on the shoulder of the man beside him. It went on from there, like a rising tide in cotton-candy colors, as people bumped, jostled and breathed crimson fumes all over each other.