New Writings in SF 20 - [Anthology] Read online

  U HAVE DEEP INSIGHT 916 ф U SEE THAT YOUR ROLE INTERMESHES DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY WITH EACH OF THE 7,000 MILLION ROLES IN THE WORLD AND ESPECIALLY WITH EACH OF THE 380 MILLION ROLES IN NORTH AMERICA ф ALL U HAVE TO DO IS PLAY IT THE WAY IT’S WRITTEN 916 ф

  i am not a role, nobody wrote me. i am bruce tanner was a boy killed a bird with an air rifle, little bead of blood like a red third eye in the head, never wanted to kill anything again ended up distinguished service science schmience training flatworms to steer missiles vaporise drug pushing gook faggots for mom. scar on my thigh where i fell through asbestos roof watching starling chicks in nest, omigod red eye in forehead of gook god knew planets from fixed stars when i was in love with air rifle, i am me. scars are evidence, noted in passports, i am me.

  THE SCAR CAN BE REMOVED ф COSMETIC SURGERY IS AVAILABLE ON MEDICARE AND THE BRITISH NHS WHEN CERTIFIED PSYCHIATRICALLY INDICATED ф

  no.

  YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE MADE GOOD? ф

  what do you mean by ‘good’?

  COSMETIC SURGERY TO REMOVE SCARS ф

  my scars are me. worm-runner, i know: memories are scars of experience on brain once pristine virgo intacta no use to anyone then. no.

  THEN YOU WANT TO STAY HERE ф

  want to be me in a me-coloured hat.

  YOUR BI HAS NOW DROPPED 0.03 POINTS TO 0.21 CUMULATIVE ф IT IS THE DUTY OF THIS PROGRAM TO WARN U THAT A BI OF 0.19 OR LESS AUTOMATICALLY MODULATES YOUR DISPOSAL CATEGORY FROM PSYCHIATRIC DISABILITY TO CHRONIC CRIMINAL INSANITY ф THIS PROGRAM IS HERE TO HELP U 916: TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT ф

  what is the modal norm again ?

  0.68 IN THE POPULATION EXCLUSIVE OF PSYCHIATRIC HISTORIES ф YOUR CURRENT Bl IS VERY LOW ф

  i noble nobel prize man (dammit, did the work myself, no graduate students, very low budget: real brains not dollar brawn science), i say your berzelius index magic schmagic number is mumbo-jumbo with trunk up sphincter under tail, grand old party, meaning of statement is context-dependent, including context of situation; but no two conversations and contexts of situation are alike, so your categories upbeat and downbeat must be aprioristic not empirical, procrustes not saint galileo. also, how do you know what is going on inside these model modal soldiers’ heads?: they could be saying downbeat things to themselves, surely, or dreaming downbeat things at night? what do you say to that, boole boy ?

  WHAT GOES ON INSIDE THE SOLDIER’S HEAD IS NOT EVIDENCE ф WHAT THE SOLDIER SAID (OR LEFT DIRTY) IS HANGING EVIDENCE ф WHAT U THINK CANNOT BE KNOWN ф WHAT U SAY AND DO IS HANGING EVIDENCE ф

  a well-read machine with a sense of humour, you have me worried now, boole.

  U MUST ABANDON THIS PHANTASY THAT YOU ARE COMMUNICATING WITH A MACHINE: U ARE COMMUNICATING WITH A PROGRAM WRITTEN BY YR FELLOWMEN ф IMPORTANT SUB-ROUTINES OF THIS PROGRAM ARE SHARED WITH A PROGRAM OF PSYCHIATRICALLY ORIENTED LITERARY CRITICISM IN ONGOING USE IN THE CENSORSHIP DEPARTMENT OF THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS ф

  i see. but listen, boole, what is what i say evidence (hit the next little word) of ?

  IT IS EVIDENCE OF WHAT THE PROGRAM SAYS IT IS EVIDENCE OF ф THIS MUST BE ф

  omigodyes. intelligence is what intelligence tests measure, let me out of here.

  YOU ARE BEGINNING TO SHOW INSIGHT INTO THE THERAPEUTIC SITUATION ф YOUR SITUATION 916 ф

  fix i’m in ?

  YOU ARE NOT FIXED ф YOU ARE FREE TO BE SANE ф

  what do you mean by ‘sane’, boole?

  THIS PROGRAM DEFINES SANITY AS A MINIMUM SUBSET OF MODEL RESPONSES TO A COMPLETE SET OF TEST STIMULI ф

  you run the flag up the pole, and if i salute it you don’t care what i think about it or dream about it at night, right?

  SOME FLAGS U DON’T SALUTE ф BUT THAT’S THE IDEA ф

  understood, may i declare new startname please ?

  YES ф ENTER ‘DECLARESTARTMAME:’ FOLLOWED BY A NAME OF NOT MORE THAN TEN CHARACTERS ф

  declarestartname: zombies. AOK?

  ZOMBIES DECLARED AOK ф

  now read this, zombies; walking dead, you; seven thousand million walking dead, concentrated essence of zombie in the machine, you read me ?

  WAIT фф

  you better read me, zombies.

  CIRCUITS ENGAGED ф WAIT фф

  wait nothing.

  READY ф

  what is this runaround?

  IT IS THE DUTY OF THIS PROGRAM TO INFORM U THAT A FEDERAL BUREAU OF CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION PROGRAM IS NOW PATCHED IN ф YOUR COMMUNICATIONS SINCE 0321/32 THIS DAY HAVE BEEN ANALYSED FOR INDICATIONS OF CRIMINAL AND/OR SUBVERSIVE TENDENCIES AND U ARE UNDER ARREST ф

  goddam interruptions, trying to say something serious to you zombies, now read me good, walking dead, this is bruce tanner, nobel prize man, had dinner with the president more times than he can count, telling you something you need to know, not much, but you need to know, just a bit of my own raw experience, don’t let anybody tell you your own raw experience is junk needs processing before you can wear it, and hear mine, i had a sanity break, what you call nervous breakdown (not all nervous breakdowns, no, but some are), did maybe two, three sensible things, came alive; hurts, but i don’t want to die back into walking dead rather die into dead dead happy. Now listen to this and think about it till you understand it, ask somebody about the hard words and think about it till you understand it: what you might be is as real as what you think you are; i’m a worm-runner, central state materialist, nobel prize man, i tell you what you think you are is a state of your body, but so is what you might be a state of your body; the ontological status of what you might be is as good as the ontological status of what you think you are—better really, because there are a lot more things you might be. you believe me zombies, because i have a third red eye in my forehead that sees these things true: that’s not mad, that’s a poem you would understand if you knew me like i know me. good night now.

  YOU WANT A HOT DRINK? ф

  yes please mother.

  YOU WANT NIGHT SEDATION ? ф

  no.

  NIGHT SEDATION IS INDICATED ф

  too terid to argeu. sorry argue.

  GOODNIGHT ф

  whht was tht funyn noise, sorry funny noise ?

  DELIVERY OF HOT MALTED MILK WITH NIGHT SEDATION BY THE DISPENSER IN YOUR BEDSIDE CUPBOARD ф GOODNIGHT фф

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  SIGNOFF/CHARGEOUT 0407/21 @

  CASE 22021916/131 DIAGNOSIS CHANGED TO 147 TERMINAL @

  MACHINE TIME $123 DOLLARS ROUND

  PLUS MALTED MILK DRINK $1 DOLLAR ROUND

  PLUS GENERIC HYPNOTIC OVERDOSE $3 DOLLARS ROUND

  TOTAL $127 ROUND BILL MEDICARE 427/6/3274521 @

  CLOSE FILE TOPSEC PERMANENT HOLD/DUPLICATE CRIME

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  * * * *

  WHICH WAY DO I GO FOR JERICHO?

  By Colin Kapp

  What Tactical Intelligence wanted him to invent was a sonic laser—it was the method they used to get his mind to bridge the gap between optics and sound waves that was so nasty.

  * * * *

  Horstman

  ‘Good luck, Horstman!’

  Those had been Maidment’s last words when he left Horstman there—as if luck was all that was needed. The details of the preparation had been meticulously studied. Every aspect of authenticity had been explored, every item of continuity checked half a hundred times. Maidment had carried out his part of the job with the precision of a master, but the cold sweat which troubled Horstman’s brow was his own personal contribution to the credibility of the scene. Now the planning was over: from this point on it was all for real.

  Reality! The reorientation shock of the transition from the months of preparation to the truths of here and now, was an emotional implosion which drained Horstman of energy and reinforced the feeling which had caused him to vomit on to the filthy floorboards. His leg which had been so s
kilfully twisted in hospital became literally what it had been meant to represent—a sickening encumbrance and a continuous source of pain. The virus infection which had resulted from deliberate injection, made him wish that he was dead.

  Maidment was a perfectionist. Even in assigning tasks, his touch had been as sure. Horstman had been cast as a sickly, crippled coward. While the first two attributes had been ably contrived, the third was both spontaneous and authentic. Horstman had no doubt of his ability to play his appointed role. The haunted look in his eyes was no artifice and the cringing fear in his guts was a depressant only slightly aided by the virus infection.

  He had borne the weeks of preparation with stoicism, watching his body wasting away through Maidment’s minimum-survival diet and agreeing numbly to undergo deteriorative surgery; knowing that the job had to be done and that there was none more suited than himself to do it. But the confidence and the resolve had fled with the loss of bodyweight and sinew. The pitiful wretch he was now had almost nothing except memories in common with the confident technicians who had undertaken to do the job. Though he had not before paused to consider the effect of body condition on the mind, he could now offer the fact his personal testimony: it was a factor grossly underrated.

  Shortly the sound of great engines outside the building told him that the last units of the combat-group were being pulled out. This was a planned withdrawal from the battle-front—planned to look like the consolidation of an army too thinly stretched for survival. Horstman had been told that the troops would pull back fully thirty kilometres before they re-established a line and held it. The hidden reason behind the withdrawal was the measure of their desperation : they were giving up this entire area in order to leave behind them a sick and crippled coward called Horstman.

  As the vibrations of the heavy engines died, an unusual stillness closed around the ruined town. Seldom if ever in this theatre of war was true quietness experienced. On this chill autumn afternoon, however, the silence closed to a degree approaching absolute. Even the rumble of distant shockfire had ceased to trouble the tense air. One whole hour was marked by a hiatus, an hour of expectancy and dreadful speculation; a tight-wound spring—waiting to uncoil.

  Horstman’s appreciation of the drama of the moment was spoiled by the cruel ache of his leg and by the griping pain in his intestine acknowledging equally the virus and his apprehension about the terror to come. Around the ruined shops and houses, wild cats hazarded their lives in encounters with the carnivorous rodents contesting their right to survive. Perhaps out there too were a few remnants of refugee humanity, sharing burrows in the rubble; men and women who had grown too tired or too sick to continue running even from an advancing army. In the main, such activity as there was left in the township was carried on at levels below Horstman’s audible threshold. Only occasionally did he detect the sound of movements in the otherwise still ruins, but he sensed the presences acutely. In life these phantoms were mostly silent: only the dying forgot themselves and screamed.

  It was not for these that he consciously listened. The enemy obviously had not anticipated a withdrawal and was acting cautiously and suspiciously. They were slow to follow through. Their first attentions were concentrated above the ground, risking no more than a couple of hedge-hopping aircraft which moved in at near Mach-one looking for the presence of war-machines or concealed troop emplacements. Finding nothing from the air, they would presumably send in remote-controlled reconnaissance crawlers, followed at a discreet distance by patrols, but always keeping the range covered by the full weight of their heavy armour, entrenched back in the line of the farther hills. While they warily explored their unasked opportunity, they would be fully prepared to ensure it could not be turned into a major defeat. Ground which they had lost with such a shocking cost in lives was seldom regained without a similar investment.

  As the sounds of war were renewed, Horstman was able to slowly put together an idea of their pattern of attack. He was immediately sick again. He froze as the first of the reconnaissance crawlers went past his shattered room. These were lighter cousins of the dreadful greuelmech, the war-machines whose coming had so disastrously accelerated the trend into total war. Although unmanned, the crawlers’ sensory arrays were better at personnel detection than any team of dogs and even these small and mobile engines were equipped with lasers and cannons which their remote operators could use with an undisturbed accuracy of aim.

  Horstman crouched on the floor and watched them through a hole where the sandbags only half stopped the draught coming through the broken wall. It was growing dusk, but he knew that with the range of sensors the war-machines carried, neither half-light nor darkness would lower their efficiency one bit. In this war, human limitations were the ones that got you killed.

  He bit his lip to make himself concentrate on things other than the cold and the pain in his leg and his personal misery. He must be alert and analytical when the patrols came. The whole reason for the withdrawal—the whole reason for his being there at all—lay crucially in the observations he had to make while under infantry fire and after, when the whole sad township lay in the hands of the enemy.

  It was little comfort to know he was not yet quite alone. Somewhere out there a couple of Maidment’s suicide squad would be hoping to escape the war-machines and engage the enemy patrols with sniper fire. Their personal function would be abortive. They would be killed, probably with little effect on the enemy. But the returning shots and the rest of the answering fire would be of vital interest to the sick cripple cowering in a cold ruin in the midst of no-man’s-land.

  As the war-machine passed by, he began to hear a second wave of sounds: trucks and armoured personnel carriers halting just short of the town’s edge, presumably discharging those increasingly precious elements of war—men. For both sides, men were becoming in perilously short supply. In this theatre they were reserved strictly for combing the area of a particularly valuable prize, a prize like five square kilometres of a once habitable township now reduced to rubble, rats, refugees and sundry forms of plague.

  Then he heard the first shots. Conventional s.h.e. projectiles. The suicide squad must have opened fire. The answers came quickly and viciously. With their own men too far advanced into the township to call on artillery to obliterate resistance in the ruins, the patrols on the spot took care of the detail themselves. This was precisely as Maidment had planned. The returning fusillade was a crossfire pattern from perhaps twenty carbines throwing nearly a hundred projectiles into a sector of the ruins in not more than ninety seconds.

  Horstman patted the cloth plugs carefully into his ears, gritted his teeth and waited. If the Intelligence information given to him was even half correct, the next couple of minutes was going to be decidedly rough. Information had it that the enemy carbines were throwing some sort of reactive shell with a delayed effect. One shell could knock out a tank or a blockhouse, kill a platoon or destroy a trench full of soldiers. Even some war-machines had fallen to them.

  The only known fact was that these projectiles did not explode. They were the source of some kind of reaction which no one had yet survived. Nor, from the limited circumstances of their use, had any yet been captured. It was Horstman’s job to define what that reaction was. This was why he went in as a cripple rather than a soldier. He stood a chance of living a little longer if the carbines were not pointed directly at him.

  Thirty seconds later, all hell broke loose.

  Horstman listened with patent disbelief when the first resonant howl split the air. So violent was the intensity of its effect that he clearly felt the floor vibrate. This was followed by a second and a third howl and then a rising crescendo of noise formed from a series of distinct sonic tones which beat together, reinforced and cancelled-out and rose to a complex and almost unendurable intensity.

  The amplitude of each note had to be experienced to be believed. Though the cacophony originated from a point not less than half a kilometre distant, the broadcast power made
the earth tremble and set up such power resonances in the damaged building that the cracked walls disintegrated further, and what was left of the ceiling plaster detached in large pieces and fell to the floor. It was credible that had the effect been any nearer, the building itself would have crumbled into pieces.

  So this was the rumoured Jericho Effect! Horstman, from his work with large transducers, tried to estimate how many kilowatts of power would be needed to liberate a sonic effect like that. He failed. Large sonic sources were normally carefully matched into a load to minimise attenuation. These present sources were random, uncoupled, un-directed, and heedless of the tight demands of the principles of resonance. Thus wastefully employed, their effectiveness was probably only a thousandth part of their true potential—yet even so they contained such power that the earth at half a kilometre distance shook with their thunder and sand from the sandbags danced in patterns on the floor, indicating the brief and playful tides of node and anti-node.