"Oh, that's not what's biting me. I admit the commercial angle irritates me, but Tensquare has always been a publicity spot, ever since the first time it sailed."

  "What, then?"

  "Five or six things, all added up. The main one being that I don't care any more. Once it meant more to me than anything else to hook that critter, and now it doesn't. I went broke on what started out as a lark and I wanted blood for what it cost me. Now I realize that maybe I had it coming. I'm beginning to feel sorry for Ikky."

  "And you don't want him now?"

  "I'll take him if he comes peacefully, but I don't feel like sticking out my neck to make him crawl into the Hopkins."

  "I'm inclined to think it's one of the four or five other things you said you added."

  "Such as?"

  He scrutinized the ceiling.

  I growled.

  "Okay, but I won't say it, not just to make you happy you guessed right."

  He, smirking: "That look she wears isn't just for Ikky."

  "No good, no good." I shook my head. "We're both fission chambers by nature. You can't have jets on both ends of the rocket and expect to go anywhere—what's in the middle just gets smashed."

  "That's how it was. None of my business, of course—"

  "Say that again and you'll say it without teeth."

  "Any day, big man"—he looked up—"any place ... "

  "So go ahead. Get it said!"

  "She doesn't care about that bloody reptile, she came here to drag you back where you belong. You're not the baitman this trip."

  "Five years is too long."

  "There must be something under that cruddy hide of yours that people like," he muttered, "or I wouldn't be talking like this. Maybe you remind us humans of some really ugly dog we felt sorry for when we were kids. Anyhow, someone wants to take you home and raise you—also, something about beggars not getting menus."

  "Buddy," I chuckled, "do you know what I'm going to do when I hit Lifeline?"

  "I can guess."

  "You're wrong. I'm torching it to Mars, and then I'll cruise back home, first class. Venus bankruptcy provisions do not apply to Martian trust funds, and I've still got a wad tucked away where moth and corruption enter not. I'm going to pick up a big old mansion on the Gulf and if you're ever looking for a job you can stop around and open bottles for me."

  "You are a yellowbellied fink," he commented.

  "Okay," I admitted, "but it's her I'm thinking of, too."

  "I've heard the stories about you both," he said. "So you're a heel and a goofoff and she's a bitch. That's called compatibility these days. I dare you, baitman, try keeping something you catch."

  I turned.

  "If you ever want that job, look me up."

  I closed the door quietly behind me and left him sitting there waiting for it to slam.

  The day of the beast dawned like any other. Two days after my gutless flight from empty waters I went down to rebait. Nothing on the scope. I was just making things ready for the routine attempt.

  I hollered a "good morning" from outside the Slider and received an answer from inside before I pushed off. I had reappraised Mike's words, sans sound, sans fury, and while I did not approve of their sentiment or significance, I had opted for civility anyhow.

  So down, under, and away. I followed a decent cast about two hundred-ninety meters out. The snaking cables burned black to my left and I paced their undulations from the yellowgreen down into the darkness. Soundless lay the wet night, and I bent my way through it like a cock-eyed comet, bright tail before.

  I caught the line, slick and smooth, and began baiting. An icy world swept by me then, ankles to head. It was a draft, as if someone had opened a big door beneath me. I wasn't drifting downwards that fast either.

  Which meant that something might be moving up, something big enough to displace a lot of water. I still didn't think it was Ikky. A freak current of some sort, but not Ikky. Ha!

  I had finished attaching the leads and pulled the first plug when a big, rugged, black island grew beneath me ...

  I flicked the beam downward. His mouth was opened.

  I was rabbit.

  Waves of the death-fear passed downward. My stomach imploded. I grew dizzy.

  Only one thing, and one thing only. Left to do. I managed it, finally. I pulled the rest of the plugs.

  I could count the scaly articulations ridging his eyes by then.

  The squiggler grew, pinked into phosphorescence ... squiggled!

  Then my lamp. I had to kill it, leaving just the bait before him.

  One glance back as I jammed the jatoes to life.

  He was so near that the squiggler reflected on his teeth, in his eyes. Four meters, and I kissed his lambent jowls with two jets of backwash as I soared. Then I didn't know whether he was following or had halted. I began to black out as I waited to be eaten.

  The jatoes died and I kicked weakly.

  Too fast, I felt a cramp coming on. One flick of the beam, cried rabbit. One second, to know ...

  Or end things up, I answered. No, rabbit, we don't dart before hunters. Stay dark.

  Green waters finally, to yellowgreen, then top.

  Doubling, I beat off toward Tensquare. The waves from the explosion behind pushed me on ahead. The world closed in, and a screamed, "He's alive!" in the distance.

  A giant shadow and a shock wave. The line was alive, too. Happy Fishing Grounds. Maybe I did something wrong ...

  Somewhere Hand was clenched. What's bait?

  A few million years. I remember starting out as a one-celled organism and painfully becoming an amphibian, then an air-breather. From somewhere high in the treetops I heard a voice.

  "He's coming around."

  I evolved back into homosapience, then a step further into a hangover.

  "Don't try to get up yet."

  "Have we got him?" I slurred.

  "Still fighting, but he's hooked. We thought he took you for an appetizer."

  "So did I."

  "Breathe some of this and shut up."

  A funnel over my face. Good. Lift your cups and drink ...

  "He was awfully deep. Below scope range. We didn't catch him till he started up. Too late, then."

  I began to yawn.

  "We'll get you inside now."

  I managed to uncase my ankle knife.

  "Try it and you'll be minus a thumb."

  "You need rest."

  "Then bring me a couple more blankets. I'm staying."

  I fell back and closed my eyes.

  Someone was shaking me. Gloom and cold. Spotlights bled yellow on the deck. I was in a jury-rigged bunk, bulked against the center blister. Swaddled in wool, I still shivered.

  "It's been eleven hours. You're not going to see anything now."

  I tasted blood.

  "Drink this."

  Water. I had a remark but I couldn't mouth it.

  "Don't ask how I feel," I croaked. "I know that comes next, but don't ask me. Okay?"

  "Okay. Want to go below now?"

  "No. Just get me my jacket."

  "Right here."

  "What's he doing?"

  "Nothing. He's deep, he's doped but he's staying down."

  "How long since last time he showed?"

  "Two hours, about."

  "Jean?"

  "She won't let anyone in the Slider. Listen, Mike says come on in. He's right behind you in the blister."

  I sat up and turned. Mike was watching. He gestured; I gestured back.

  I swung my feet over the edge and took a couple of deep breaths. Pains in my stomach. I got to my feet and made it into the blister.

  "Howza gut?" queried Mike.

  I checked the scope. No Ikky. Too deep.

  "You buying?"

  "Yeah, coffee."

  "Not coffee."

  "You're ill. Also, coffee is all that's allowed in here."

  "Coffee is a brownish liquid that burns your stomach. You have some in the bottom drawer."

  "No cups. You'll have to use a glass."

  "Tough."

  He poured.

  "You do that well. Been practicing for that job?"

  "What job?"

  "The one I offered you—"

  A blot on the scope!

  "Rising, ma'am! Rising!" he yelled into the box.

  "Thanks, Mike. I've got it in here," she crackled.

  "Jean!"

  "Shut up! She's busy!"

  "Was that Carl?"

  "Yeah," I called. "Talk later," and I cut it.

  Why did I do that?

  "Why did you do that?"

  I didn't know.

  "I don't know."

  Damned echoes! I got up and walked outside.

  Nothing. Nothing.

  Something?

  Tensquare actually rocked! He must have turned when he saw the hull and started downward again. White water to my left, and boiling. An endless spaghetti of cable roared hotly into the belly of the deep.

  I stood awhile, then turned and went back inside.

  Two hours sick. Four, and better.

  "The dope's getting to him."

  "Yeah."

  "What about Miss Luharich?"

  "What about her?"

  "She must be half dead."

  "Probably."

  "What are you going to do about it?"

  "She signed the contract for this. She knew what might happen. It did."

  "I think you could land him."

  "So do I."

  "So does she."

  "Then let her ask me."

  Ikky was drifting lethargically, at thirty fathoms.

  I took another walk and happened to pass behind the Slider. She wasn't looking my way.

  "Carl, come in here!"

  Eyes of Picasso, that's what, and a conspiracy to make me Slide ...

  "Is that an order?"

  "Yes-No! Please."

  I dashed inside and monitored. He was rising.

  "Push or pull?"

  I slammed the "wind" and he came like a kitten.

  "Make up your own mind now."

  He balked at ten fathoms.

  "Play him?"

  "No!"

  She wound him upwards—five fathoms, four ...

  She hit the extensors at two, and they caught him. Then the graffles.

  Cries without and a heat lightning of flashbulbs.

  The crew saw Ikky.

  He began to struggle. She kept the cables tight, raised the graffles ...

  Up.

  Another two feet and the graffles began pushing.

  Screams and fast footfalls.

  Giant beanstalk in the wind, his neck, waving. The green hills of his shoulders grew.

  "He's big, Carl!" she cried.

  And he grew, and grew, and grew uneasy ...

  "Now!"

  He looked down.

  He looked down, as the god of our most ancient ancestors might have looked down. Fear, shame, and mocking laughter rang in my head. Her head, too?

  "Now!"

  She looked up at the nascent earthquake.

  "I can't!"

  It was going to be so damnably simple this time, now the rabbit had died. I reached out.

  I stopped.

  "Push it yourself."

  "I can't. You do it. Land him, Carl!"

  "No. If I do, you'll wonder for the rest of your life whether you could have. You'll throw away your soul finding out. I know you will, because we're alike, and I did it that way. Find out now!"

  She stared.

  I gripped her shoulders.

  "Could be that's me out there," I offered. "I am a green sea serpent, a hateful, monstrous beast, and out to destroy you. I am answerable to no one. Push the Inject."

  Her hand moved to the button, jerked back.

  "Now!"

  She pushed it.

  I lowered her still form to the floor and finished things up with Ikky.

  It was a good seven hours before I awakened to the steady, sea-chewing grind of Tensquare's blades.

  "You're sick," commented Mike.

  "How's Jean?"

  "The same."

  "Where's the beast?"

  "Here."

  "Good." I rolled over. " ... Didn't get away this time."

  So that's the way it was. No one is born a baitman, I don't think, but the rings of Saturn sing epithalamium the sea-beast's dower.

  “REPENT, HARLEQUIN!”

  SAID THE TICKTOCKMAN

  Harlan Ellison

  There are always those who ask, what is it all about? For those who need to ask, for those who need points sharply made, who need to know “where it’s at,” this:

  “The mass of men serve the state thus, not as men mainly, hut as machines, with their bodies. They are the standing army, and the militia, jailors, constables, posse comitatus, etc. In most cases there is no free exercise whatever of the judgment or of the moral sense; but they put themselves on a level with wood and earth and stones; and wooden men can perhaps be manufactured that will serve the purposes as well. Such command no more respect than men of straw or a lump of dirt. They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs. Yet such as these even are commonly esteemed good citizens. Others—as most legislators, politicians, lawyers, ministers, and officeholders—serve the state chiefly with their heads; and, as they rarely make any moral distinctions, they are as likely to serve the Devil, without intending it, as God. A very few, as heroes, patriots, martyrs, reformers in the great sense, and men, serve the state with their consciences also, and so necessarily resist it for the most part; and they are commonly treated as enemies by it.”

  Henry David Thoreau,

  Civil Disobedience

  That is the heart of it. Now begin in the middle, and later learn the beginning; the end will take care of itself.

  But because it was the very world it was, the very world they had allowed it to become, for months his activities did not come to the alarmed attention of The Ones Who Kept The Machine Functioning Smoothly, the ones who poured the very best butter over the cams and mainsprings of the culture. Not until it had become obvious that somehow, someway, he had become a notoriety, a celebrity, perhaps even a hero for (what Officialdom inescapably tagged) “an emotionally disturbed segment of the populace,” did they turn it over to the Ticktockman and his legal machinery. But by then, because it was the very world it was, and they had no way to predict he would happen—possibly a strain of disease long-defunct, now, suddenly, reborn in a system where immunity had been forgotten, had lapsed—he had been allowed to become too real. Now he had form and substance.

  He had become a personality, something they had filtered out of the system many decades ago. But there it was, and there he was, a very definitely imposing personality. In certain circles—middle-class circles —it was thought disgusting. Vulgar ostentation. Anarchistic. Shameful. In others, there was only sniggering, those strata where thought is subjugated to form and ritual, niceties, proprieties. But down below, ah, down below, where the people always needed their saints and sinners, their bread and circuses, their heroes and villains, he was considered a Bolivar; a Napoleon; a Robin Hood; a Dick Bong (Ace of Aces); a Jesus; a Jomo Kenyatta.

  And at the top—where, like socially-attuned Shipwreck Kellys, even tremor and vibration threatens to dislodge the wealthy, powerful and titled from their flagpoles—he was considered a menace; a heretic; a rebel; a disgrace; a peril. He was known down the line, to the very heartmeat core, but the important reactions were high above and far below. At the very top, at the very bottom.

  So his file was turned over, along with his time-card and his cardio-plate, to the office of the Ticktockman.

  The Ticktockman: very much over six feet tall, often silent, a soft purring man when things went timewise. The Ticktockman.

  Even in the cubicles of the hierarchy, where fear was generated, seldom suffered, he was called the Ticktockman. But no one called him that to his mask.

  You don’t call a man a hated name, not when that man, behind his mask, is capable of revoking the minutes, the hours, the days and nights, the years of your life. He was called the Master Timekeeper to his mask. It was safer that way.

  “This is what he is,” said the Ticktockman with genuine softness, “but not who he is? This time-card I’m. holding in my left hand has a name on it, but it is the name of what he is, not who he is. This cardio-plate here in my right hand is also named, but not whom named, merely what named. Before I can exercise proper revocation, I have to know who this what is.“

  To his staff, all the ferrets, all the loggers, all the finks, all the commex, even the mineez, he said, “Who is this Harlequin?”

  He was not purring smoothly. Timewise, it was jangle.

  However, it was the longest speech they had ever heard him utter at one time, the staff, the ferrets, the loggers, the finks, the commex, but not the mineez, who usually weren’t around to know, in any case. But even they scurried to find out.

  Who is the Harlequin?

  High above the third level of the city, he crouched on the humming aluminum-frame platform of the air-boat (foof! air-boat, indeed! swizzleskid is what it was, with a tow-rack jerry-rigged) and stared down at the neat Mondrian arrangement of the buildings.

  Somewhere nearby, he could hear the metronomic left-right-left of the 2:47 p.m. shift, entering the Timkin roller-bearing plant in their sneakers. A minute later, precisely, he heard the softer right-left-right of the 5:00 a.m. formation, going home.

  An elfish grin spread across his tanned features, and his dimples appeared for a moment. Then, scratching at his thatch of auburn hair, he shrugged within his motley, as though girding himself for what came next, and threw the joystick forward, and bent into the wind as the air-boat dropped. He skimmed over a slidewalk, purposely dropping a few feet to crease the tassels of the ladies of fashion, and—inserting thumbs in large ears—he stuck out his tongue, rolled his eyes and went wugga-wugga-wugga. It was a minor diversion. One pedestrian skittered and tumbled, sending parcels everywhichway, another wet herself, a third keeled slantwise and the walk was stopped automatically by the servitors till she could be resuscitated. It was a minor diversion.

  Then he swirled away on a vagrant breeze, and was gone. Hi-ho.

  As he rounded the cornice of the Time-Motion Study Building, he saw the shift, just boarding the slidewalk. With practiced motion and an absolute conservation of movement, they side-stepped up onto the slowstrip and (in a chorus line reminiscent of a Busby Berkeley film of the antediluvian 1930’s) advanced across the strips ostrich-walking till they were lined up on the expresstrip.

 

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