"If you're the police," the man demanded in a voice as shrill as a woman's, "why aren't you doing something about this?"

  "Sir, I am doing what I can."

  "I don't like it."

  Harrington shrugged. The man was evidently a tourist, and the detective obviously felt as if he had more important people, like the natives, to be answerable to. "I'm sorry you feel that way, sir, but unless we can—"

  "I want some protection!" the man said loudly and was instantly echoed by several of the crowd who had paused to listen.

  Harrington smiled wryly. "Now how do you expect me to manage that with the force I have here? Did you know the man?"

  "Of course not. I only arrived yesterday."

  "Then what exactly are you worried about?"

  "Well, that killer's obviously a maniac. He could kill anyone next."

  The detective stared at him, then glanced at me. "No," he said quietly. "I don't think so."

  "Well, what about that andy." someone else demanded. "Why the hell don't you lock it up? It's dangerous."

  With that bit of melodramatic tripe, Harrington's patience finally reached its end. "Lady," he said with exaggerated calm, "if you can give me the proof, I'll snap that kid's tape faster than you can blink. But he belongs to someone, and there isn't anything I can do without proof. So why don't you, and all the rest of you, why don't you just go about your business and leave us alone. You want me to catch this man, boy, woman, whatever, I can't stand around here answering your hysterical, stupid questions."

  For a moment I was tempted to applaud. In fact, one or two people did. But I just stood aside while the crowd dispersed, far more rapidly than I thought it would. Most of the people disappeared into the hotel, muttering loudly. The rest scattered and were gone within a minute's time. When it was quiet, Harrington signaled the ambulance driver, then slid into his own car. He rolled down the window, chewing his tobacco slowly. He spat. "Middle-class backbone of the race," he said to me and drove off. The ambulance followed, and I was alone on the sidewalk. I don't remember how long I stood there, but staring passersby reminded me that I was dressed only in my bathing trunks and still carrying my beach paraphernalia. Embarrassed, I darted inside and rushed up to my room. In the bathroom was a first-aid kit, and after many painful contortions, I managed to empty the can of aerosol sunburn medication onto my back.

  I felt flushed.

  Feverish, nearly groggy as if in a nightmare.

  Despite the air-conditioning, the room felt warm, but I didn't want to go out again. Not for a while. A long while. In spite of some of the other hotel guests' fears, I realized I hadn't once felt as though I were in the slightest danger, and when that fact sunk in, I was horrified. I didn't believe I was in danger because I knew I had never been anything more than polite to the Carrutherses and their son. Guilty. Jesus Christ, I thought they were guilty.

  You son of a bitch, I told myself. You're as bad as the rest of them. Would a grown man murder for an insult as common as the ones Carruthers must have been getting for as long as he'd had the android? To strike back so drastically was too immature for the owner of a simulacrum—he would be too vulnerable.

  Hell! It was not a pleasant day. It had not been a pleasant vacation. I hesitated and finally tossed my things into my bag. I decided to wait until after dinner to leave. Until then, I lay on my bed, and it wasn't long before I fell asleep.

  I dreamt, but I'd just as soon not remember what it was I saw in those dreams.

  In Starburst, the dark is not quite the same as in the rest of the world. Because of the mist on the hills, the slate and stone roofs, the moonlight and starlight glinted off more than just water, and the result was a peculiar shimmer that slightly distorted one's vision. When I awoke to that unnatural light, I had a splitting headache. Groping around on the nightstand, I found my watch and saw it was close to ten o'clock. Hurriedly I swung off the bed, thinking that if I were as good a patron as the hotel led me to believe, I might be able to squeeze in a meal before the kitchen closed for the night. The clothes I was going to wear home were laid out on a chair, and without turning on the lamp, I dressed, standing in front of the window. The moon was hazed, and what stars there were challenged my schoolboy knowledge of constellations. I was staring out over the building at the bay when I caught movement on the beach. All I could see was a group of shadows. Struggling.

  I leaned forward, straining to make out details, curious as to who would be playing games this time of night, since Starburst was definitely not noted for its evening festivities. As I clipped on my tie, the shadows merged into a single black patch, then separated and merged again. But not fast enough to prevent me from spotting one of them lying on the ground. The figure didn't move, and for no reason other than an unpleasant hunch, I dashed from the room and, not wanting to wait for the elevators, ran down the fire stairs and outside.

  Once on the sidewalk, I hesitated for the first time, realizing I could very likely be making a complete ass of myself. There were no sounds but the evening wind in the park trees. As I crossed the street, my heels sounded like nails driven into wood and I self-consciously lightened my step. I became more cautious, though feeling no less silly, when I entered an alley and could see the beach and bay beyond. By the time I reached the far end, I was almost on hands and knees, and now I could hear: grunting, and the dull slap of body blows, struggling feet scraping against the sand. It didn't take a mastermind to figure out what was happening, and, for all my professed cowardice, I burst from the alley shouting, just a split second before I heard someone gasp, "Oh my God, look at that!"

  The group of people were close to fifty meters from me, and when they heard my racket, they scattered, leaving me behind, motionless on the beach.

  I vacillated, then ran to the fallen body. Closer, and in the dim moonlight I could see it was the boy.

  Standing next to him, I could see he was bleeding.

  And kneeling, I knew he was dead.

  A boy.

  I panted, my breath shuddering.

  A boy.

  I'm not sure exactly what I felt at the moment. Shock, anger, sorrow. Anger, I suppose, the greatest of these. Not so much for the shadows who had killed him, but for the ruse he had perpetrated on us all. Callously I stared at his bloodied face and thought: you tricked me. Damnit, you tricked me.

  Slowly I rose. I brushed the sand from my knees and walked swiftly back to the hotel. Just before I stepped into the lobby, I saw the whirling red light on a squad car, and I was glad I wasn't the one who had made the call.

  The fourth floor, like the lobby and elevator, was deserted. I walked to the end of the hall and knocked on the Carrutherses' door. When there was no answer, I knocked again and turned the knob. The door opened to a darkened room, and I stepped in.

  The man and woman were sitting motionless in identical chairs facing the room's only window.

  "Mr. Carruthers?" I didn't expect an answer, and I received none.

  I moved closer and gathered what nerve I had left to reach down and touch the woman's cheek, poised to snap my hand back should she flinch. The skin was cold. She didn't move, didn't react. She and the man stared directly into the moonlight without blinking. Carefully I rolled up her sleeve, and though the light was dim, I found the markings easily. There was no need to do the same to the man.

  I was still standing there when the lights flicked on and Harrington lumbered in, followed by a covey of police photographers and fingerprint men. The detective waited until my eyes adjusted to the bright light, then pulled me to one side, away from the strangely silent activities. It was as if they were investigating a morgue. Harrington watched for a while, pulling out his handkerchief and again wiping his hands. I never did learn how he'd picked up that habit, but at that particular time it seemed more than apropos.

  "You, uh, saw the boy, I take it?" he said.

  I nodded dumbly.

  "Didn't happen to see who did it, I suppose."

  "Only some shadows, Harrington. They were gone before I got close enough to identify them. Any of them."

  One of the men coughed and immediately apologized.

  "Would it be too much to ask who called you?" I said.

  "What call? I was coming over here to question the kid." He pulled a slip of wrinkled paper from his jacket pocket and squinted at some writing. "I checked on the, uh, parents, just for the hell of it, just to keep those people off my back. Seems he was fairly well off—the kid, I mean. He is, was, eighteen, and from the time he was six was shunted back and forth between aunts and uncles like a busted ping-pong ball." He shook his head and pointed a stubby finger at some line on the paper. "When he reached majority and claimed his money, he bought himself some guardians. Parents, I guess they were supposed to be. According to some relative of his, this was the first place he brought them. Trial run." He shoved the paper back into his pocket as though it were filth. "I'm surprised nobody noticed."

  I had nothing to say. And Harrington didn't stop me when I left.

  My people.

  He had deliberately exposed the false identification on his arm and had never once looked me straight in the eye. It was all there, but who would have thought to look for it? He had been challenging me and everyone else, using the simulacra to strike back at the world. Maybe he wanted to be exposed; maybe he was looking for someone as real as I to stop the charade and give him a flesh-and-blood hand to shake. Maybe—but when I think of going back to a city filled with androids and angry people, I get afraid.

  And worse … my own so-called liberal, humanitarian, live-and-let-live armor had been stripped away, and I don't like what I see. As much as I feel sorry for the boy, I hate him for what he's done to me.

  That crowd of shadows could have easily held one more.

  TRI-CENTENNIAL

  Joe Haldeman

  December 1975

  Scientists pointed out that the Sun could be part of a double star system. For its companion to have gone undetected, of course, it would have to be small and dim, and thousands of astronomical units distant.

  They would find it eventually; "it" would turn out to be "them"; they would come in handy.

  January 2075

  The office was opulent even by the extravagant standards of twenty-first-century Washington. Senator Connors had a passion for antiques. One wall was lined with leather-bound books; a large brass telescope symbolized his role as Liaison to the Science Guild. An intricately woven Navajo rug from his home state covered most of the parquet floor. A grandfather clock. Paintings, old maps.

  The computer terminal was discreetly hidden in the top drawer of his heavy teak desk. On the desk: a blotter, a precisely centered fountain pen set, and a century-old sound-only black Bell telephone. It chimed.

  His secretary said that Dr. Leventhal was waiting to see him. "Keep answering me for thirty seconds," the Senator said. "Then hang it and send him right in."

  He cradled the phone and went to a wall mirror. Straightened his tie and cape; then with a fingernail evened out the bottom line of his lip pomade. Ran a hand through long, thinning white hair and returned to stand by the desk, one hand on the phone.

  The heavy door whispered open. A short thin man bowed slightly. "Sire."

  The Senator crossed to him with both hands out. "Oh, blow that, Charlie. Give ten." The man took both his hands, only for an instant. "When was I ever 'Sire' to you, you fool?"

  "Since last week," Leventhal said, "Guild members have been calling you worse names than 'Sire.'"

  The Senator bobbed his head twice. "True, and true. And I sympathize. Will of the people, though."

  "Sure." Leventhal pronounced it as one word: "Willathapeeble."

  Connors went to the bookcase and opened a chased panel. "Drink?".

  "Yeah, Bo." Charlie sighed and lowered himself into a deep sofa. "Hit me. Sherry or something."

  The Senator brought the drinks and sat down beside Charlie. "You should of listened to me. Shoulda got the Ad Guild to write your proposal."

  "We have good writers."

  "Begging to differ. Less than two percent of the electorate bothered to vote: most of them for the administration advocate. Now you take the Engineering Guild—"

  "You take the engineers. And—"

  "They used the Ad Guild." Connors shrugged. "They got their budget."

  "It's easy to sell bridges and power plants and shuttles. Hard to sell pure science."

  "The more reason for you to—"

  "Yeah, sure. Ask for double and give half to the Ad boys. Maybe next year. That's not what I came to talk about."

  "That radio stuff?"

  "Right. Did you read the report?"

  Connors looked into his glass. "Charlie, you know I don't have time to—"

  "Somebody read it, though."

  "Oh, righty-o. Good astronomy boy on my staff: he gave me a boil-down. Mighty interesting, that."

  "There's an intelligent civilization eleven light-years away—that's `mighty interesting'?"

  "Sure. Real breakthrough." Uncomfortable silence."Uh, what are you going to do about it?"

  "Two things. First, we're trying to figure out what they're saying. That's hard. Second, we want to send a message back. That's easy. And that's where you come in."

  The Senator nodded and looked somewhat wary.

  "Let me explain. We've sent messages to this star, 61 Cygni, before. It's a double star, actually, with a dark companion."

  "Like us."

  "Sort of. Anyhow, they never answered. They aren't listening, evidently: they aren't sending."

  "But we got—"

  "What we're picking up is about what you'd pick up eleven light-years from Earth. A confused jumble of broadcasts, eleven years old. Very faint. But obviously not generated by any sort of natural source."

  "Then we're already sending a message back. The same kind they're sending us."

  "That's right, but—"

  "So what does all this have to do with me?"

  "Bo, we don't want to whisper at them — we want to shout! Get their attention." Leventhal sipped his wine and leaned back. "For that, we'll need one hell of a lot of power."

  "Uh, righty-o. Charlie, power's money. How much are you talking about?"

  "The whole show. I want to shut down Death Valley for twelve hours."

  The Senator's mouth made a silent O. "Charlie, you've been working too hard. Another Blackout? On purpose?"

  "There won't be any Blackout. Death Valley has emergency storage for fourteen hours."

  "At half capacity." He drained his glass and walked back to the bar, shaking his head. "First you say you want power. Then you say you want to turn off the power." He came back with the burlap-covered bottle. "You aren't making sense, boy."

  "Not turn it off, really. Turn it around."

  "Is that a riddle?"

  "No, look. You know the power doesn't really come from the Death Valley grid; it's just a way station and accumulator. Power comes from the orbital—"

  "I know all that, Charlie. I've got a Science Certificate.".

  "Sure. So what we've got is a big microwave laser in orbit, that shoots down a tight beam of power. Enough to keep North America running. Enough—"

  "That's what I mean. You can't just—"

  "So we turn it around and shoot it at a power grid on the Moon. Relay the power around to the big radio dish at Farside. Turn it into radio waves and point it at 61 Cygni. Give 'em a blast that'll fry their fillings."

  "Doesn't sound neighborly."

  "It wouldn't actually be that powerful — but it would be a hell of a lot more powerful than any natural 21 centimeter source."

  "I don't know, boy." He rubbed his eyes and grimaced. "I could maybe do it on the sly, only tell a few people what's on. But that'd only work for a few minutes… what do you need twelve hours for, anyway?"

  "Well, the thing won't aim itself at the Moon automatically, the way it does at Death Valley. Figure as much as an hour to get the thing turned around and aimed.

  "Then, we don't want to just send a blast of radio waves at them. We've got a five-hour program, that first builds up a mutual language, then tells them about us, and finally asks them some questions. We want to send it twice."

  Connors refilled both glasses. "How old were you in '47, Charlie?"

  "I was born in '45."

  "You don't remember the Blackout. Ten thousand people died… and you want me to suggest—"

  "Come on, Bo, it's not the same thing. We know the accumulators work now besides, the ones who died, most of them had faulty failsafes on their cars. If we warn them the power's going to drop, they'll check their failsafes or damn well stay out of the air."

  "And the media? They'd have to take turns broadcasting. Are you going to tell the People what they can watch?"

  "Fuzz the media. They'll be getting the biggest story since the Crucifixion."

  "Maybe." Connors took a cigarette and pushed the box toward Charlie. "You don't remember what happened to the Senators from California in '47, do you?"

  "Nothing good, I suppose."

  "No, indeed. They were impeached. Lucky they weren't lynched. Even though the real trouble was 'way up in orbit."

  "Like you say: people pay a grid tax to California. They think the power comes from California. If something fuzzes up, they get pissed at California. I'm the Lib Senator from California, Charlie; ask me for the Moon, maybe I can do something. Don't ask me to fuzz around with Death Valley."

  "All right, all right. It's not like I was asking you to wire it for me, Bo. Just get it on the ballot. We'll do everything we can to educate—"

  "Won't work. You barely got the Scylla probe voted in — and that was no skin off nobody, not with L-5 picking up the tab."

  "Just get it on the ballot."

  "We'll see. I've got a quota, you know that. And the Tricentennial coming up, hell, everybody wants on the ballot."

  "Please, Bo. This is bigger than that. This is bigger than anything. Get it on the ballot."

  "Maybe as a rider. No promises."

  March 1992:

  From Fax & Pix, 12 March 1992:

 

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