Blink can't think blink rhythm I think blink trick think blink sink blink wink--CAN'T THINK!
He slammed his hands up against his face, covering his eyes.
He held them there for a few choked moments. Then he opened two fingers in a thin slit, like a little boy playing peek- a-boo with his mother.
The light struck his eye again. This time there was no getting away. The trigger of the picture tube's flicker chipped at each attempt to think, interrupting each beat of his brain as it tried to bring its attention on anything but the stimulus of that blink. He had no chance of even telling his hands to cover his eyes again.
His body collapsed like a marionette, and his face dropped below the flickering beam. His head hanging, he got to his hands and knees like a young boy getting up to face the schoolyard bully again.
The blink reflected off the floor and snapped his head up like a kick.The blink reflected off the floor and snapped his head up like a kick. The beam struck him full in the eyes.
It was even impossible for him to tell his throat to scream. He swayed on his knees, and the blink went into his brain like a sewing machine.
Eventually he fell again, and by now he was beginning to realize what the machine was doing to him. Like an Air Force cadet feeling the controls of his first trainer, he began to realize that there was a logic to this--that certain actions produced a certain response--that the machine could predict the rhythm of his thoughts and throttle each one as it tried to leave his brain and translate itself into coherent thought.
He looked up deliberately, planning to snatch his face to one side the moment he felt it grip him again.
This time he was dimly aware of his arms, flailing upward and trying to find his face in a hopelessly uncoordinated effort.
He discovered he could sidestep the blink. If he upset the machine's mechanical prediction, he could think. His mind rolled its thought processes along well-worn grooves. As simple a thought as knowing he was afraid had to search out its correlations in a welter of skin temperature data, respiration and heartbeat notations, and an army of remembered precedents.
If he could reshuffle that procedure, using data first that would ordinarily claim his attention last, he could think. The blink couldn't stop him.
Like a man flying cross-country for the first time, he learned that railroads and highways are snakes, not arrows. Like a pilot teaching his instincts to push the nose down in a stall, abrogating the falling-response that made him ache to pull back on the stick, he learned. He had to, or crash.
To do that, he had to change the way he thought.
The blink turned into a flashing light that winked on and off at pre-set intervals. He reached up and decided which knob was logically the master switch. He turned it off, feeling the muscles move, his skin stretch, and his bones roll to the motion. He felt the delicate nerves in his fingertips tell him how much pressure was on his capillaries, and the nerves under his fingernails corroborate their reading against the pressure there. His fingers told him when the switch was off, not the click of it. There was no click. The man who'd put that switch in hadn't intended it for human use.
Most of all, he felt his silent brother smile within him.
The three uniformed men stopped in the doorway and stared at him.
"Harvey Cable?" one of them finally asked. He blinked his eyes in the bright sunshine, peering through the doorway.
Cable smiled. "That's right. Come on in."
The man who'd spoken wore an Air Force major's insignia and uniform. The other two were United Nations inspectors. They stepped in gingerly, looking around them curiously.
"I refurnished the place," Cable said pleasantly. "I've got a pretty good assortment of wood-working tools in the cellar."
The major was pale, and the inspectors were nervous. They exchanged glances. "Typical case," one of them muttered, as though it had to be put in words.
"We understood you were crippled," the major stated.
"I was, Major--?"
"Paulson. Inspector Lee, and Inspector Carveth." Paulson took a deep breath. "Well, we're exposed, now. May we sit down?"
"Sure. Help yourselves. Exposed to the disease, you mean?"
The major dropped bitterly into a chair, an expression of surprise flickering over his face as he realized how comfortable it was. "Whatever it is. Contagious psychosis, they're saying now. No cure," he added bluntly.
"No disease," Cable said, but made little impression. All three men had their mouths clamped in thin, desperate lines. Apparently the most superficial contact with the "disease" had proved sufficient for "infection."
"Well," Cable said, "what can I do for you? Would you like a drink first?"
Paulson shook his head, and the inspectors followed suit. Cable shrugged politely.
"We came here to do a job," Paulson said doggedly. "We might as well do it." He took an envelope out of his blouse pocket. "We had quite a battle with the Postmaster General about this. But we got it. It's a letter to you from Thomas Penn."
Cable took it with a wordless tilt of one eyebrow. It had been opened. Reaching into the envelope, he pulled out a short note:
Harv--
Chances are, this is the only way we'll have time to get in touch with yaz. Even so, you may not get it. Don't worry about us, no matter what you hear. We're fine. You won't know how fine until you get acquainted with the friend we're sending you.
Good luck,
Tommy
He smiled, feeling his silent brother smile, too. For a moment they shared the warmth of feeling between them. Then he turned his attention back to the three men. "Yes?"
Paulson glared at him. "Well, what about it? What friend? Where is he?"
Cable grinned at him. Paulson would never believe him if he told him. So there was no good in telling him. He'd have to find out for himself.
Just as everybody would. There was no logic in telling. Telling proved nothing, and who would welcome a "parasitic" alien into his body and mind, even if that "parasite" was a gentle, intelligent being who kept watch over the host, repairing his health, seeing to his well-being? Even if that "parasite" gave you sanity and rest, tranquillity and peace, because he needed it in order to fully be your brother? Who wants symbiosis until he's felt it? Not you, Major. Not Harvey Cable, either, fighting his battles on the edge of the world, proud, able--but alone.
Who wants to know any human being can go where he wants to, do what he wants to, now? Who wants to know disease is finished, age is calm, and death is always a falling asleep, now? Not the medical quacks, not the lonely hearts bureaus, not the burial insurance companies. Not the people who live on fear. Who wants a brother who doesn't hesitate to slap you down if you need it while you're growing up?
Should the Endeavor have brought riot and war back with it? Better a little panic now, damping itself out before it even gets out of the Southwest.
No, you don't tell people about this. You simply give it.
"Well?" Paulson demanded again.
Cable smiled at him. "Relax, Major. There's all the time in the world. My friend's where you can't ever get him unless I let you. What's going on up around the base?"
Paulson grunted his anger. "I don't know," he said harshly. "We were all in the outer quarantine circle."
"The outer circle. It's getting to one circle after another, is it?"
"Yes!"
"What's it like? The disease. What does it do?"
"You know better than I do."
"Men walking in their sleep? Doing things? Getting past guards and sentries, getting out of locked rooms? Some of them building funny kinds of electronic rigs?"
"What do you think?" Paulson was picturing himself doing it. It was plain on his face.
"I think so. Frighten you?"
Paulson didn't answer.
"It shouldn't. It's a little rough, going it alone, but with others around you, I don't imagine you'll have any trouble."
It wasn't the man who momentarily disorg
anized his body and passed under a door who was frightened. Not after he could do it of his own volition instead of unconsciously, at his brother's direction. It was the man who watched him do it, just as it was the men on the ground who were terrified for the Wright brothers. Paulson was remembering what he'd seen. He had no idea of how it felt to be free.
Cable thought of the stars he'd seen glimmering as he rode Endeavor's prototype, and the curtains and clouds of galaxies beyond them. He'd wanted to go to them all, and stand on every one of their planets.
Well, he couldn't quite have that. There wasn't time enough in a man's life. But his brother, too, had been a member of a race chained to one planet. The two of them could see quite a bit before they grew too old.
So we were born in a Solar System with one habitable planet, and we developed the star drive. And on Alpha's planet, a race hung on, waiting for someone to come along and give it hands and bodies.
What price the final plan of the universe? Will my brother and I find the next piece of the ultimate jigsaw puzzle?
Cable looked at the three men, grinning at the thought of the first time one of them discovered a missing tooth was growing back in.
Starting with Paulson, he sent them each a part of his brother.
<
* * * *
STRANGER STATION
by Damon Knight
In the evolution of science-fantasy through thirty years of existence as popular magazine fiction, one of the most noticeable changes has been in the treatment and characterization of e-t’s (extraterrestrials). At one time, all “aliens” were either implacable enemies of mankind, bent on invading and destroying Earth, or subjugated slave-”natives” of a Glorious Earth Empire.
This year, the theme of contact between Terrestrials and Others was a favorite one, but the old-fashioned bug-eyed monster was hardly to be found in print, although the species still appears to be extant in Hollywood.
Mr. Knight’s e-t is the exception—a traditional monster-type, horrifically described herein with that gleeful attention to unpleasant detail for which Knight (as writer and critic) is deservedly well-known.
* * * *
The clang of metal echoed hollowly down through the Station’s many vaulted corridors and rooms. Paul Wesson stood listening for a moment as the rolling echoes died away. The maintenance rocket was gone, heading back to Home; they had left him alone in Stranger Station.
Stranger Station! The name itself quickened his imagination. Wesson knew that both orbital stations had been named a century ago by the then-British administration of the satellite service; “Home” because the larger, inner station handled the traffic of Earth and its colonies; “Stranger” because the outer station was designed specifically for dealings with foreigners-beings from outside the solar system. But even that could not diminish the wonder of Stranger Station, whirling out here alone in the dark-waiting for its once-in-two-decades visitor…
One man, out of all Sol’s billions, had the task and privilege of enduring the alien’s presence when it came. The two races, according to Wesson’s understanding of the subject, were so fundamentally different that it was painful for them to meet. Well, he had volunteered for the job, and he thought he could handle it-the rewards were big enough.
He had gone through all the tests, and against his own expectations he had been chosen. The maintenance crew had brought him up as dead weight, drugged in a survival hamper; they had kept him the same way while they did their work and then had brought him back to consciousness. Now they were gone. He was alone.
But not quite.
“Welcome to Stranger Station, Sergeant Wesson,” said a pleasant voice. ‘This is your alpha network speaking. I’m here to protect and serve you in every way. If there’s anything you want, just ask me.” It was a neutral voice, with a kind of professional friendliness in it, like that of a good schoolteacher or rec supervisor.
Wesson had been warned, but he was still shocked at the human quality of it. The alpha networks were-the last word in robot brains-computers, safety devices, personal servants, libraries, all wrapped up in one, with something so close to “personality” and “free will” that experts were still arguing the question. They were rare and fantastically expensive; Wesson had never met one before.
“Thanks,” he said now, to the empty air. “Uh-what do I call you, by the way? I can’t keep saying, ‘Hey, alpha network.’”
“One of your recent predecessors called me Aunt Nettie,” was the response.
Wesson grimaced. Alpha network-Aunt Nettie. He hated puns; that wouldn’t do. “The aunt part is all right,” he said. “Suppose I call you Aunt Jane. That was my mother’s sister; you sound like her, a little bit.”
“I am honored,” said the invisible mechanism politely. “Can I serve you any refreshments now? Sandwiches? A drink?”
“Not just yet,” said Wesson. “I think I’ll look the place over first.”
He turned away. That seemed to end the conversation as far as the network was concerned. A good thing; it was all right to have it for company, speaking when spoken to, but if it got talkative…
The human part of the Station was in four segments: bedroom, living room, dining room, bath. The living room was comfortably large and pleasantly furnished in greens and tans; the only mechanical note in it was the big instrument console in one corner. The other rooms, arranged in a ring around the living room, were tiny; just space enough for Wesson, a narrow encircling corridor, and the mechanisms that would serve him. The whole place was spotlessly clean, gleaming and efficient in spite of its twenty-year layoff.
This is the gravy part of the run, Wesson told himself. The month before the alien came-good food, no work, and an alpha network for conversation. “Aunt Jane, I’ll have a small steak now,” he said to the network. “Medium rare, with hashed brown potatoes, onions and mushrooms, and a glass of lager. Call me when it’s ready.”
“Right,” said the voice pleasantly. Out in the dining room, the autochef began to hum and cluck self-importantly. Wesson wandered over and inspected the instrument console. Air locks were sealed and tight, said the dials; the air was cycling. The station was in orbit and rotating on its axis with a force at the perimeter, where Wesson was, of one g. The internal temperature of this part of the Station was an even 73°.
The other side of the board told a different story; all the dials were dark and dead. Sector Two, occupying a volume some eighty-eight thousand tunes as great as this one, was not yet functioning.
Wesson had a vivid mental image of the Station, from photographs and diagrams-a five-hundred-foot Duralumin sphere, onto which the shallow thirty-foot disk of the human section had been stuck apparently as an afterthought. The whole cavity of the sphere, very nearly-except for a honeycomb of supply and maintenance rooms and the all-important, recently enlarged vats-was one cramped chamber for the alien…
“Steak’s ready!” said Aunt Jane.
The steak was good, bubbling crisp outside the way he liked it, tender and pink inside. “Aunt Jane,” he said with his mouth full, “this is pretty soft, isn’t it?”
“The steak?” asked the voice, with a family anxious note.
Wesson grinned. “Never mind,” he said. “Listen, Aunt Jane, you’ve been through this routine-how many times? Were you installed with the Station, or what?”
“I was not installed with the Station,” said Aunt Jane primly. “I have assisted at three contacts.”
“Um. Cigarette,” said Wesson, slapping his pockets. The autochef hummed for a moment, and popped a pack of G. I.’s out of a vent. Wesson lighted up. “All right,” he said, “you’ve been through this three times. There are a lot of things you can tell me, right?”
“Oh, yes, certainly. What would you like to know?”
Wesson smoked, leaning back reflectively, green eyes narrowed. “First,” he said, “read me the Pigeon report-you know, from the Brief History. I want to see if I remember it right.”
“Chapter Two,” said the voice promptly. “First contact with a non-Solar intelligence was made by Commander Ralph C. Pigeon on July 1, 1987, during an emergency landing on Titan. The following is an excerpt from his official report:
“‘While searching for a possible cause for our mental disturbance, we discovered what appeared to be a gigantic construction of metal on the far side of the ridge. Our distress grew stronger with the approach to this construction, which was polyhedral and approximately five times the length of the Cologne.
“‘Some of those present expressed a wish to retire, but Lt. Acuff and myself had a strong sense of being called or summoned in some indefinable way. Although our uneasiness was not lessened, we therefore agreed to go forward and keep radio contact with the rest of the party while they returned to the ship.
The Year's Greatest Science Fiction & Fantasy 2 - [Anthology] Page 13
