New Writings in SF 20 - [Anthology] Page 10

  ‘It took a long time, Jase, longer than most, but it came.’ Orest paused, hoping the boy would understand, it always does, they say. Even with a genius.’ He sighed heavily, i don’t think you need the medic. And you’re going to learn to skate. You’ll play hockey if it kills both of us.’ He rose and stripped off Jason’s suit, not roughly, pulled the sheet and blanket from under the boy and covered him. Jason, crushed and humiliated, retreated somewhere deep within himself to nurse a cold, steely hate. He lay awake for a long time that night, thinking, planning, and finally slept.

  * * * *

  Three

  He did learn to skate. His fine balance and sinewy leanness made it surprisingly easy and good skating enabled him to play passable hockey with the others, most of whom had had a stick and puck before they could walk. Nevertheless, he played with a singleness of purpose which kept it from being sport with him. His lightness made him vulnerable too, and no matter what team he played with, his opponents seemed to relish catching him with a bruising check or a shoulder along the boards. Still, he didn’t retaliate. You don’t score in the penalty box. And at least Orest and the other men were scrupulously fair about refereeing the games.

  He was careful to do everything he was told, now, and seemed completely indifferent to changes in his programme. Orest had an uncanny ability to spot his growing enthusiasm for a subject and several times thwarted him again, but he was determined not to let his frustrations show. Commonsense had told him that sooner or later he must return to some things, that very few subjects had been more than opened up for him. Just after Christmas, a meaningless respite, he got his chance to return to the tron-lab. It was the one thing he had been waiting for, not merely because he had an all-consuming interest in it, but because he had a long-considered plan in mind.

  To even a sharp-eyed observer it would have appeared that Jason was following out reasonably circumscribed projects; constructing model trontraffic controls, authorised computer circuits, standard test equipment, at times playing with his own refinements and demonstrating them to Orest, who clearly had other specialisations. That in itself gave him a sadistic satisfaction, having a labtech praise his work while Orest looked on, not quite following. But in the brief time he allowed himself after completing a project, before checking out, he stole a moment for the all-important thing. First it was a casual touch of screwdriver to the face of that detestable plate in his arm, with its shimmering dependence. He’d never seen Orest’s clearly, but it surely didn’t say that! On the first try he got only a tingle. Next day, with a ‘slip’, he numbed his whole arm. What was the difference? Touching the centre gave the least effect, but closer to the edges he could nearly put himself out. Adding it up, he recognised a peripheral force field. The cruddy Stab probably had it rigged to destruct if anyone tried to remove it for you.

  The plate itself, he had long since deduced, was a combination sensor and transceiver. Just from the advanced equipment he was using here, he knew they could monitor and control as many circuits as they wanted in a unit that size. He’d seen a beauty almost as small in a tape on the Mars landing team, grafted between the shoulder-blades. And what did it amount to, after all, but a sophisticated version of something he had worked over often enough. He could visualise the circuitry closely enough for his purpose. His concern was not with the device itself, but with a counter-device. And here he had experience to draw on. It had been a long time since he first sat in a corner at Almann’s, cannibalising an old, useless ‘key’. Painfully drawing out the schematic, he had rebuilt it, with a minor modification of his own that Almann had absent-mindedly Ok’d. He’d built more than one since then, each one better than the last, until he was able to open most regular tron-locks he’d run up against. A key was, essentially, a jammer, and that was what he wanted now—a jammer to cut him off completely from the Stab when the time finally came. Yet this one had to be different, had to invert rather than broadcast, or they could spot him just as easily. It was a problem that occupied every free moment until he achieved a breakthrough, for it had to be right the first time.

  So the months passed into March, while he carefully slipped in the occasional experiment with micro-circuitry. He secured and re-used a small oval watchcase, left it lying in the drawer of his bench, and each time carried a tiny submodule back to his room in the toe of his utility suit. Piece by piece, crafted with jeweller’s perfection, the unit was designed and constructed, until nothing but the power seed was missing from the pile just inside the bottom of Jason’s scanner frame. Finally he got that too, when he turned in a ‘defective’ and retrieved it with a wet fingertip as he held the new one up to the light to hold the stockman’s eye. Orest had been right behind him, and it filled Jason with unholy glee as the two men searched for the missing seed. They’d find it all right, on the floor in front of the counter, but it was a useless grain of graphite strung on a hairwire, identical in appearance to the real thing.

  * * * *

  Three days later he assembled the jammer, every part fitting perfectly into the case and wired the stem to the seed. On the bench was a minituway receiver showing a steady output. Three types of sensitive detector were on in the bank of test equipment, covering the whole communication spectrum. He took a deep breath and pulled out the stem. Not a needle trembled. Casually he cupped the case under his palm and placed it over the tuway. The output meter dropped to zero. With his free hand he switched to transmit, flipped the dial of the meter and watched. Still nothing. He depressed the watchstem. The meter jumped to full output. Shakily, Jason put both fists to the neck of his suit and pushed his elbows back, stretching. The case slipped down his chest, across his twitching stomach muscles, down his leg and against the arch of his foot. An hour later he turned in his project and sauntered back to his room with Orest, innocently chewing at a scrap length of plastic.

  It should have made up for the growing friction between himself and the other boys, the gnawing rebelliousness over Orest’s constant meddling with his programme, his demands for absolute obedience. He had held all his frustrations at arm’s length, curiously like a disinterested spectator. But in the early morning, wide awake, he tossed in his bunk as the full measure of his grievances closed in. Instead of peace, in the certain knowledge that he now possessed the means of escape, resentment and half-thoughts of vengeance raised in him the torments of the persecuted. The next morning he refused to study the material set out for him. Orest, patience long exhausted, snapped out ‘No study, no food! Bread and milk until you smarten up!’ Jason all but radiated white heat as he turned to the scanner and balefully stared at the unrolling pages of gibberish.

  Orest watched in grim silence, slammed his scriber across the desk and stalked out to the bathroom. Jason waited, stiff-backed, counting seconds. At fifteen he rose quietly, slipped across and opened Orest’s cabinet. Quickly he reached in and unzipped the toilet kit, thumbed a razor blade out of the dispenser, replaced everything as before and sat down in front of his scanner again. The blade went with the plastic and watchcase, inside the scanner frame. For the rest of the day he was docile, to the point where Orest seemed to be suspicious, so he made a point of arguing with the other over chess in the lounge that evening. It nearly backfired, as the boiling emotions he had submerged for so long threatened to erupt, but he managed to hold on to himself. He made a familiar enough picture, standing white-faced and hollow-eyed over the scattered pieces, slowly buckling to submission under the authority of his custodian. Others shrugged off the common occurrence and Orest seemed to accept it as a return to the hateful norm. Later, behind the light wall, Jason sat at his desk again, scanner humming at normal speed and cut a strap for his watchcase from the length of plastic. Then, with deft care, he sliced through half the thickness of the remaining plastic at one end, almost to the width of the blade. There he left it embedded. He slipped the short piece of plastic between third and fourth fingers and clenched his fist, noting with grim satisfaction the edge of the blade ran the leng
th of fingers from knuckle to first joint. It was a nasty weapon, deadly if used precisely. Watching and listening to the other Pickers had taught him many things.

  He was ready. And small comfort it seemed to bring. In the morning, with quiet confidence, he had taped a ‘blister’ on his heel and furtively slipped his small weapon into the foot of his suit. The feeling of smug pleasure had lasted through study session and lab, but somehow he felt all the more vulnerable in the late afternoon, when he stripped and put on his hockey equipment. Skating by himself at one end of the rink, while the others went through stupid drills and skull sessions with the men, he whipped the puck at the boards, but could not capture his usual savage pride at the pin-point accuracy. He found himself wondering why he was always with the older, heavier boys when there were others his own age. He seemed to take more and more physical punishment lately: everyone seemed to enjoy racking him up. Well, he could take it and sometimes made them look like stupid Marks when he got away for a clean shot on goal.

  But today it seemed harder than ever and it began to get to him. To make matters worse, twice he took what should have been obvious fouls and no one called them. During a shift when his line was on the bench, he suddenly realised that it had been Mel, dumb Mel, who had got him both times. Back on the ice again he concentrated on getting the puck and when at last it came sliding out of a mixup near his own goal, he hooked it under his blade and picked up speed. Flashing down the right wing he finessed the defenceman and closed on the goalie. From the corner of his eye he caught movement, but the shot was there to be made. Wrists cocked, he feinted towards the lower stick-side, saw the goalie commit himself, had the whole upper glove side of the net to aim at. And incredibly, a knee came up into his groin, a heavy body smashed into his left side, and he was spinning through the air. He lay at a grotesque angle, watched as there was a minute pause among his teammates and gaped as play went on. A grinning, taunting Mel arced by him and moved out, as his forwards carried a three-man break to the far end. Jason somehow made it to the bench, tears stinging in the cold at the injustice of it. Grossly unfair! That he had never held the concept before meant nothing. He was washed by a mind-sapping wave of rage.

  The game was over before he could get back on the ice again, but this time he could not set it to one side. In the dressing room he stopped before his locker and waited for Mel to come by. Around him, the happy buzz of after-game razzing began, while he dropped stick and gloves, drew off his shirt and unlaced hip-pads. Mel came alone, between the benches, a superior sneer aimed just for Jason and the boy stuck a hand out at his chest. ‘You fouled me,’ he hissed. ‘Three times!’ The other stopped, sturdy on his skates, and smiled innocently at the rest. ‘Me?’ he asked. ‘I didn’t hear any whistles. Did you guys?’ There were mutters, some agreeing and a few non-committal. Reassured, Mel grinned again. ‘Besides,’ he snickered, ‘what could you do about it, star?’ Without thinking, without warning, Jason caught Mel flush on the nose, staggering him for a second. The youngster’s eyes widened as he grabbed his nose and found blood on his hands, and with a strangled bellow he charged forward, skates thumping. By sheer weight he knocked Jason back into the open locker and all reason fled. Groping under him, the boy reached into the foot of his suit and clutched his plastic strap. He came up swinging as the group of players fell back. Once, twice, the wicked blade sliced, opening up Mel’s shirt, baring the stuffing in his shoulder-pad, and as numbness struck, turning his bones to jelly, Jason found himself lifted off the floor in a crushing embrace. A babble of excited voices rose round him as Orest, holding him with one arm, plucked the blade out of his loose fingers and then flung him down on the bench. Everything came back into focus with chilling clarity, as one thought pounded through Jason’s brain. Blown! He had blown it!

  What he had expected, Jason couldn’t say, but in retrospect it looked not too bad. He and Orest had sat for hours in the great hall, waiting silently until they were summoned to the indoctrination chamber. There the same three men had appeared, looking and sounding more severe than before. ‘Jason Berkley,’ the first said harshly, ‘consider the seriousness of these charges. Carrying a concealed weapon. Armed assault. Deadly intent. Do you deny any of these?’ Jason was bursting with the urge to shout out the injustice of it, to tell how he had been provoked. But he knew that appearances were against him and he remained silent, looking downward. ‘You are at present not under civil jurisdiction,’ the voice continued, ‘or major punishment would be exacted. Instead, you are barred from the environs, rights and privileges of this school until such time as you are found fit to return.’ The second man addressed Jason. ‘In the eight months that you have enjoyed the unique opportunities afforded by this institution,’ he said in an even more grave tone, ‘you have made astonishing progress in your programme. We have twice revised your productivity potential upward. Your usefulness to society is unquestionable. However, you have shown no progress in social adaptability. If this does not improve radically, since you have nearly exhausted the tolerance factor, it will be economically unfeasible to allow you more resources.’

  Mumbo-jumbo, Jason thought, but he could grasp the threat. It meant that they would erase him; give him a wipe-out. Then the last spoke. ‘As with all human relations,’ he said sadly, ‘there is much under the surface to explain your actions. We are aware of circumstances beyond your violence. Nevertheless, you cannot remain as a disturbing influence. You will be sent to seclusion, to pursue a more rigorous programme under absolute supervision. Stand back!’ Jason shuffled towards the door as Orest stepped forward. ‘Orest Lenchuk!’ the last man continued. ‘You have not performed your duties. Parts of your programme should have been more scrupulously researched. You are not a skilled psychologist, yet sections of your bibliography should have been attended with care. Note those on sibling association and particularly the complications of rising Oedipus manifestation. I need not stress the consequences of failure..’ He closed a small scanner and snapped out the cassette, as the TriVid cubicle went dead.

  April first! ‘You’re sixteen today,’ Orest had commented bitterly as they slung their meagre possessions into the roboflit. ‘Sixteen, and you’re a disaster looking for a place to happen.’ They had settled into silence, bundled in parkas against the sharp cold. From his side, Jason watched the country change beneath them as they raced westward, parallelling a barely discernable roadbed to the north. They had left even the vast ranchlands behind and were moving bumpily across unbroken forest, through air currents roughed by the foothills ranging north and south. In the distance the mountains grew taller until it seemed that they should reach them any moment. Finally they towered over the craft in awesome, naked splendour, threatening to spill down the masses of snow from their upper reaches. Yet for all their intimidation Jason ignored them and as they descended towards a narrow, flat strip in a shallow valley he tasted a fraction of triumph. In his toilet kit, at the bottom of the duffel bag they shared, was the watchcase that Orest had missed when he searched Jason’s side of the room back at school.

  They dumped the bag into waist-deep snow and stood gasping in biting wind until the roboflit took off. Then, with Orest breaking a path, they made their way to a crude, solid cabin. If Jason had begun to see his early life in Toronto as bare survival, this was calculated to make it seem like luxury. There was a startling contrast between the two small, remote scanners and the split-pole desks they sat on, between the vidscreen in the wall and the huge woodstove next to it, between the shelves of compact foodpacks and the metal bucket and pan beneath them. Leaving the bag on the floor, Orest took a ring of flat metal keys and fitted one into a door. It opened into a small room containing hand tools, shovels, a locked rack of guns and a sealed power unit. Hefting a broad axe, Orest locked the door and headed outside, calling curtly to Jason to follow. If they were ever to warm up they must cut wood for the stove. It was a gentle introduction to New Eden.

  Actually, the basic chores proved almost a joy to Jason, no
matter how they taxed his strength and endurance. Anything was better than the battle that evolved inside. Day after day, Jason was subjected to a constant stream of commands, corrections, abuse. Nothing he did pleased Orest and he found himself repeating simple exercises, re-reading endless amounts of social history, ferreting out the smallest details of literature until, sometime in the early morning hours, the relentless figure would point and he would drag himself to his bunk. The only consolation was that if it was tearing him to pieces it was nearly as hard on Orest, who was looking gaunt and hollow-cheeked. Jason knew that he was doing his own studying too, had even wakened briefly to hear him talking indistinctly at the vidscreen and wondered if he might yet win, if Orest were slowly losing his grip. He had to win! If he lost, a soul-destroying chasm yawned at his feet.