New Writings in SF 20 - [Anthology] Page 8
The robocop moved forward, paused almost imperceptibly as it sifted from programme to central control, and spoke. ‘Jason Berkley, TOR2712 ONT37643, no A.P. Card at apprehension. Updated and recycled duplicate from Missing Persons is now in your file. Charge, a 291. Apprehended 13:25 Central Daylight; tried 14:30 Toronto General Court. Delivered into your custody 21:10 Mountain Standard.’ The double doors moved smoothly open as the robocop left, then closed with a solid chunk which belied their simple elegance. The two stood alone, seconds lengthening as they looked one another over carefully, the boy with intense hostility and the young man with haunted compassion. ‘Jason Berkley,’ he murmured. ‘Jason, I’m Orest Lenchuk, and this is Diamond Willow School. We’ll be together for a long time, so you might as well learn to get along with me.’
Jason made a vicious chopping gesture and turned towards the door, but stiffened as Orest barked, ‘Don’t be stupid! There’s no way out of here but acceptance. Turn around!’ The boy glared over his shoulder, and Orest went on in a more reasonable tone. ‘Roll up your right sleeve,’ he directed, ‘before you try anything that can get you in trouble.’ Jason turned back reluctantly and looked down, noting with surprise that he was wearing a grey utility suit. He unsnapped the cuff, pushed the sleeve up jerkily and gasped as a bright metal oval flashed in the diffuse light. He-saw with horror that the metal was embedded in his flesh. Even as he watched the surface seemed to shimmer, and a word appeared beneath. Lips moving, he spelled it out. Dependence. With uncomprehending shock, he pulled his eyes from the terrible object and gazed at Orest, questioning without words.
Deliberately matter-of-fact, Orest explained. ‘Takes the Stab about two hours to plant it. Then wherever you are, they can find you. Get close to any stricted area, any tron-lock like the ones on all the doors here, they know. They can freeze you anywhere—you’ve felt it! Until they change it, you live with me and do what I say. We share the same room, go everywhere together, even share a dual AP Card. Only difference is, I can eat on it alone—you can’t. You get nothing without me. I Teach you. How to get along, to behave. I even run your RehabEd programme. You depend on me. Dependence! Get it?’ He paused to let it sink in, then finished. ‘Come on, let’s go to the Stab and get you briefed.’ Firmly, but not roughly, he placed a hand on the boy’s bony shoulder, and steered him towards a smaller door at the side of the hall.
Still bewildered and belligerent, Jason moved into the indoctrination chamber. He slouched uneasily before a Tri-Vid cubicle, trying desperately to remember how he had got here, what had happened earlier in the day, but barely able to picture the robocruiser that had dropped him here. Then the cubicle sprang to life, revealing three stern men facing him. Confused as he was, Jason was alert enough to catch slight differences in the background, The three were in different places. He knew too that this was the first time he’d actually seen TriVid. The oldest, on his left, fixed him with a cold, probing stare from under bushy brows and began.
‘Jason Berkley, AmeriCanadian, vagrant, fifteen. You have been charged, tried and found guilty of a capital offence, committed in the megalopolis of Toronto. Because you are three years under statute you have been given into our custody, pending sentence. Because you have been assessed as rehabitable and potentially productive, we have accepted you: Had you been genetically criminal you would have been permanently isolated. Had you been low productive, you would have received permanent memory erasure and been restrained for base labour. Despite your previous environment, however, you have high potential and your case contains extenuating circumstances. You will be punished, nevertheless. The law is exact and impartial.’
The centre man continued. ‘You have been brought halfway across the continent to this school in Alberta, with the memory of your crime and any events related to it under block. There will be no perceptible amount of brain damage. We will attempt to develop your social adaptability and intellectual potential to the fullest, in order to utilise your productivity. Society is practical.’
There was silence while Jason tried to understand what had been said. A few words were too big, but he was beginning to grasp his situation. Then the last man, on the right, spoke in a soft but powerful voice. ‘Jason Berkley, we have vested our custody in Orest Lenchuk, your guardian and teacher. He will administer examinations to assess your previous education and to decide where your talents may best be exercised, for society and yourself. Justice tempers the law and guards the individual from society’s exploitation. Until you yourself deny it, Justice is humane. You may now proceed to Phase One.’
Suddenly the cubicle was empty. Jason shook his head and looked frantically for a way out, but there was only the one door and Orest, big and cautious, stood waiting. With the cold, sure knowledge of the trapped animal, he drew into himself as he was led from the room and down the great hall. Orest was talking as he took the boy into a wide corridor lined with doors. Jason half-listened while he tried to piece it all together and some essential core of his being waited for the place, the second, of escape. Labs and group rooms, Orest was explaining, and then they were out into the open. His breath caught as Jason saw overhead a sweeping, unbelievable multitude of stars through a transparent roof. Even crouched on a rooftop he had never seen anything like this. Not even a faint haze of smog between him and this vast, overwhelming sight. He shuddered, more and more aware of how pitifully small and alone he was, shrunk to nothing as he looked into infinity.
Then they were back inside and he saw that they had crossed a walkway, only there was no moving belt. And before he could think about that they had entered an autoteria, or something like what he had glimpsed at times, huddled on the servo side. Here there were long tables, and incredibly the place was empty. Sweet pickings, he thought, and then remembered that he was on this side of the serving windows. His first impulse was to grab a chair and shove its legs through the little doors, as his stomach convulsed at the sight of food. But Orest was already moving to them, All Purpose Card in his hand, asking what he would like. Sheer instinct kept him from gorging, and he chose steak, potatoes, rich cake and coffee—more than enough to satisfy but not enough to cut his speed. Even as he ate, he took in every inch of the autoteria with quick, furtive glances, seeking, probing, storing for future reference. Knife and fork were clumsy; he hadn’t often used them before, except when he swapped pickings for food with Crazy Almann.
When Jason had swallowed his last, noisy gulp of coffee and wiped greasy fingers on his tunic, Orest straightened from his patient slouch and rose. ‘Time to sack,’ he grunted, and more sharply, as Jason pushed back his chair and stepped away, ‘the dishes go on that belt by the door.’ For an instant Jason tensed, then shrugged and moved back to put his things on a tray. ‘Mine too,’ Orest added, and the boy bit his lip to keep from replying, storing this away too for the future. Together they moved into another corridor, across a dimly lit room with heavy furniture, a thick rug, scattering of wall pictures and shaped objects, and cabinets of real books. His fingers itched as Jason thought of what those would bring in swaps from the Syndies, but now they were climbing a flight of stairs. Yet another corridor, a stop in a large common bathroom, and they were in front of an open door. ‘This is it,’ Orest sighed, and drew him in to stand gaping. Behind them the door slid silently shut and there was a faint buzz and click. Instantly Jason was there, palming the lock, fingers running up and down the frame. He finally slumped back and turned to Orest, panic barely under control. ‘Not until 06:00, Jason,’ Orest said gently. ‘Not until breakfast. Now why don’t you relax and get some sleep?’
The room was smaller than it looked, with closet, bunk and desk lining opposite sides and two lounging chairs and a small table in front of a large window. The drawers in one desk and under one bunk were open and a pile of clothing and blankets was on the desk-seat. Orest had already unzipped his utility suit and was slipping into a sleepsuit. He waved an arm at the pile and smiled. Two of everything you need. One change a day; wash your own. Show y
ou the launderit tomorrow. Keep your side neat and clean. Get your sleepsuit on, make your bed and flake.’ He slipped into his bunk, flipped open a small head panel and thumbed a switch. His side of the room went black, as if a wall had cut one third from the whole. Jason, crushed by fatigue now, snapped a blanket from the pile, wrapped it carelessly around him and huddled into a corner of the bunk. With leaden fingers he pried open his panel, stared at a row of switches and pushed the yellow one set off by itself. There was nothing but a faint shimmer of light from floor to ceiling, down the centre of the room, and he lay in the dark, mind nearly numb. Finally he gave up to the tremendous need for rest. Restlessly, fitfully, he backed into sleep, until only that extra sense of the hunted remained alert.
There was something behind him, following at a distance : he could sense it without seeing or hearing, and he quickened his pace to the access hatch of the robofreight track. As he cracked the hatch he saw that he was in luck, that a truck was shunting off the main line. The pick-up caught its undercarriage and it moved towards him, rubber wheels whispering. Deftly he swung up over the end rail, balanced and pushed out flat on a packing crate. The truck moved steadily past two block sidings, past the third hatch where Jason would normally have dropped off, past the third siding, and he slipped easily to the side at the fourth hatch. Far down the gloomy tunnel he saw another truck shunt in and—was it?—he knew a figure flitted from the hatch he had used. The muscles across his chest tightened slightly and he felt the quickening; the sharpening that always came with pursuit. Ducking out the hatch, he raced down the narrow corridor, doubling twice through cross-passages and finally knelt above a grill, prying carefully at two corner screws. The square lifted and he slid under, to land crouching on a junction cube in a service tunnel. Cautiously he lowered the grill, making sure the screws fell into place, then flipped down on to the curved conduit and ran again. He threw himself up and across several cubes until, at last, he squirmed off one at right angles and crawled, straddling the smaller conduit, to the end where the distribution panel stood; a bank of seven-foot boxes stretching to either side. He stood up and moved to the last one, fishing in his tattered coverall for a strip of plastic which he slipped behind the catch. The door sprang ajar and he stepped into the empty box and closed it after him. Then he waited.
Unmoving as a figurine, breath slowing to nearly nothing, he waited. Time spun out and he was able to think, though still aware of a questing presence somewhere outside. What had he been doing? He had made a real pick from the storeroom under the autoteria on the thirty-eighth level, used the elevator just like a Mark, got off at sub-three and used the watermain ladder to sub-five. He’d stowed some in his own hole behind the loose panel over the block heater units and taken the rest to Almann. It was vivid now but jumbled, somehow disjointed. Almann had stopped work on some new gadget and they’d eaten a hot meal for a change. The old man was more normal than usual, talking a lot and most of it sense.
The new power pile was working and Almann said craftily that now there was no chance that They would find him. Jason had never been sure who They were. Not the Stab, or at least not the part of the Stab he himself feared. Almann was quite different from the Pickers, like Arnie the tronman and himself. The old guy had been big up top, Versity, Jason was sure, but he thought something he knew was too much for the Marks, and he’d disappeared down here. First Jason had known of him was when he’d pounded open a meat can on an old rusted cut-off valve. The end had swung out of a battered tank sticking out of the wall and knocked him flat. Almann had dragged him in and threatened to kill him if he messed with the water supply again. The valve looked dead, rusted shut, but it had no guts and Almann drew gallons for his ‘work’ which the boy had never fully understood. He had joined three old boiler shells, walled in and totally forgotten and rebuilt them into a first-class ‘lab’, as he called it. It housed masses of stuff that the old man had swapped for special hand-made tools just for Pickers. Hadn’t been so bad for Jason after that. He’d learned a lot when Almann was willing, some of his own when the old guy was lost in his work. He’d made it to where most tronlocks couldn’t keep him from good pickings and he could even build some as good for pastime. What had they been doing, though ? It blurred on him, and anyway enough time had gone by to let him take a look.
He barely cracked the door and listened. Nothing. A fraction more and he could see down the panel. Nothing! Yet apprehension was still with him. Whatever it was, it was somewhere out there waiting. He stepped out and moved to the metal door, palmed the lock with his ‘key’, and slipped into the corridor. Something flickered at the right-angle half a block away and he was running again. This time he could hear footsteps behind him. He dodged through cross-passages and still it was there, a little closer. Down a ladder and across another corridor and he was almost home. He skidded to a halt alongside the unit and there was no panel. But this was his hole! He knew it! And there was no panel! The footsteps were louder again and panic took him. He ran blindly this time, but with the desperate cunning of the hunter hunted, in, out, up, down, doubling. Yet the pursuer drew closer and slowly, clearly, he began to hear the muted roar of the motorway. He turned parallel but found himself forced back. Nearer and inevitably nearer until, at last, before him was a small emergency exit off the motorway. Through it he could see the blurred stream of traffic, twelve lanes across, compelling, drawing, sucking him in. With his breath coming in huge, sobbing gasps, he forced himself to turn and look back, to face his nemesis. It was a huge figure, looming closer over him, but he couldn’t seem to make out the features. In the naked fluoros an arm rose and from the clawed hand a belt swung, studded buckle flashing. Nick the Vert! Jason’s heart pounded against his chest as the belt swung overhead.
He screamed endlessly, until his eyes suddenly snapped open and began to focus. The figure changed, grew smaller, and he realised it was Orest, holding him against the wall, yelling, ‘It’s all right, Jason, it’s all right.’ The room was bathed in light and he was standing pressed into a corner, feet braced into his mattress. Drawing a great, convulsive breath, he sagged down, out of Orest’s grasp and shrank against his pillow, aware that it had been a nightmare, but shaking and drenched with sweat.
* * * *
Two
Morning brought Jason out of a still-troubled sleep, groggily trying to sift the shreds of frightening dreams from the reality of the past. Already the events of a mere yesterday seemed remote and fading. He made a strong effort to piece things together, slowly forming a more certain picture of the life he had known. People remained indistinct, but then, apart from Crazy Almann, he knew that he had dealt with them wearily, briefly; intent on concealing his own hunting spots, patterns, hole, everything about himself, while he picked up information about techniques, Marks, the Stab, anything that was useful. Painfully, he reassembled the complex network of routes, layovers and hideaways that had been his territory in the sub-subjungle of Tor—Toronto. The name itself was an unimportant item. He forced himself to think back, trying to find some beginning, but events became hazy as he worked through a hodge-podge of similar days. Had he always known the hunt? Back before Almann it was even more indistinct, and he could feel a growing apprehension, sweat starting again as he probed. And there, finally, was one clear picture of a sobbing child, crouched at the end of a service conduit. Before that— something like a blank viewer screen. Shaken, he pushed the memory out of his mind, feeling all to vividly the utter loneliness of the child.
He was somewhat more alert now, though fatigue seemed to press him down. Through slitted eyes he noted that the shimmer of light still ran down the centre of the room, even with bright sunlight edging around his half of the curtained window. He returned to memory, testing for more recent events. Two days ago had been the same. He had bypassed two tronlocks and lifted a double handful of modules for Almann. The evening was clear too. The old man muttering to himself as he soldered with patient precision, Jason playing with the pirate micro-scanne
r, bored by the slowly passing lists of names under Econo-o-mics, Economics! He had turned instead to a sheaf of schematics. Yesterday was no different either, at least its beginning. He had dipped bread into a tin of strawberry, raspberry?, jam, planning a lift. Cable! He had been going to lift cable from, an open struction ramp over the motorway. And there, with a sharp sense of relief, he ran into the same blankness, shivering from unexplained dread.
There was a finality about those blanknesses which told him that it was useless to waste time and with the abruptness of those who move on the fringe of wipe-out, he turned to the present. Only what he needed today would be retrieved from the past and he faced his new situation with neither joy nor sorrow, only a deep-rooted will to live. He rolled stiffly off the bed and began to examine his room.
Suddenly, behind him the light wall was gone and he spun to face Orest, standing over his crumpled sleepsuit and scratching absently at his solid, hairy chest. Jason took in the heavy, smooth-muscled body, the athletic ease with which the young man moved and erased one possibility from the back of his mind. Orest draped a towel loosely about his hips and plucked a toilet kit from his cabinet, motioning Jason to do the same. ‘Guess we shouldn’t push the schedule today,’ he said. ‘You’ll want to flake early and catch up on your sleep. Good day for exams, though.’ He smiled reassuringly. ‘They go better when you’re not too sharp. Keeps you from second-guessing, so your responses are true.’ He palmed open the door and threw back, ‘You want the best skill placement, so they’ll be happy and you’ll be happy with your progress. Besides, skill credits are nice.’ He cut off abruptly and Jason followed him down the corridor. Orest was surely saying more than he should, had caught himself, but to the boy very little of the whole made much sense.