The sweet young thing, whose knee he was resting his hand on, went pale at that. He patted her gently, but otherwise ignored her. He continued looking at me. "All of a sudden, there are a lot of things out there that can kill human beings. And there isn't a lot left to stop them. You know, we've had our way on this planet far too long. Nature is always willing to take advantage of our weaknesses. Remember, Mom's a bitch. We've spent centuries building a technology to isolate us from the real world. That isolation has left most of us survival-illiterate and vulnerable. But the machine has stopped—is stopping now—and most people are going to be at the mercy of the contents of their stomachs. Nature doesn't care; she'll finish the job the plagues started and never miss us. Humans weren't always the hunter at the top of the food chain—we were just a passing fad. Now we're going to be prey again, like in the old days. Ever seen a wolf pack?"

  "No . . ."

  "We've got them running loose in the streets of Denver. They're called poodles, terriers, retrievers, Dobermans, shepherds, collies, St. Bernards and mutts—but they're still wolf packs. They're hungry and they can kill. We could lose another thirty million people to animals, formerly domestic and otherwise, right there. Probably more. I'm talking about worldwide, of course. And I'm including people packs in that estimate too—those are animals of another sort. We'll probably lose a hundred million people who would not have died otherwise, but there's no longer the medical care to take care of the injuries and illnesses that they'll incur in the next twelve months. Did you know that appendicitis can be fatal? And so on . . ." He stopped, looked at me and smiled. I was beginning to understand his charm. He never intended anything personally. "So, my young friend—much as I respect your indignation and the emotions on which it is based—what we are doing here tonight is quite probably the most rational thing we can be doing. I notice you haven't tried to excuse your presence here; perhaps you're quite rational too. In fact, there is only one thing more rational for a person to do that I can think of."

  "What's that?"

  He went soft for a moment, gentle. "Make love to someone you care about. You're not immortal, you know. If you don't take the opportunity to tell someone you love them tonight, you may never get another chance."

  He was right. I thought about a whole bunch of someones.

  Foreman stood up and offered his arm to the girl. She and another woman both tried to take it. Foreman smiled and offered his other arm. He smiled at me again, knowingly, and then the three of them moved off and away.

  Yes, just like Whitlaw. He got the last word too.

  "Funeral Groupies" Addicted

  to Death

  BERKELEY—Social researchers Stavro Volcker and Susan Three-Martin say that "funeral groupies" are not simply guilt-ridden survivors, but are actually caught up in a gleeful addiction.

  In a report released last week to the Medi-Net Forum, Volcker and Martin describe the average "funeral groupie" as a woman between the ages of 25 and 45, caught by a sudden, traumatic, total emotional dependency. "Typically, she has lost one or more people close to her, and has no remaining relationships of significance. Just as other survivors have become addicted to eating, thrill-seeking, or recordings of pre-plague television shows and films, the groupie becomes dependent on that thing that most evokes the experience of her pre-plague life. A funeral allows her to relive a piece of her last intense relationship."

  The prevailing medical view is that a funeral groupie is incapable of accepting the fact of her own survival and attends every funeral she can, sometimes as many as five or six a day, as a way of working off her guilt. Volcker and Martin now assert that this assessment is erroneous and superficial.

  Says Three-Martin, "It's a very common misconception. We all want to believe that the compulsive need to attend other people's funerals is really just a harmless eccentricity. People want to say, 'Forgive her, it could be worse.' It's become very easy these days to excuse behavior that doesn't (on the surface) seem to hurt anyone. In return, we expect to be excused for our own eccentricities and compensations.

  "Perhaps if we hadn't had the scouring plagues, this kind of behavior would be harmless. The truth is that these women do not attend funerals to apologize to the dead. They attend funerals to gloat—like Madame de Farge sitting at the foot of the guillotine. For many groupies, a funeral is an occasion for celebration; they identify with death and rejoice in its victories."

  The report goes on to say that in its most extreme form, compulsive attendance of funerals is actually a pernicious addiction to a specific kind of intense emotional experience. "A funeral is the only experience these women have that validates the fact they're still alive."

  Volcker and Martin interviewed nearly 150 women over a six-month period. One groupie quoted in the report bragged that she had attended over 300 funerals in that same period of time.

  The report also notes that funeral groupies in large cities usually form covens. Membership in a funeral coven involves baroque rituals and initiations, and often sexual relationships with one or more of the dominant members. Unfortunately, membership in a coven does not alleviate the emotional needs which produced the original addiction.

  Because the driving motivation in the coven is an emotional investment in the loss of all close relationships, it tends to produce bizarre cult-like behavior, almost always self-destructive. Members compete for opportunities to dominate, manipulate and control each other. The greatest victory is "dying spitefully so that others will have to attend a funeral where you are guest of honor." Three-Martin describes one such coven as "a frantic dance of desolation and despair."

  Volcker and Three-Martin conclude by noting, "On the surface, most of these women appear to be quite calm. The truth is, they're dangerously unstable. The suicide rate among funeral groupies is 13 times higher than normal, even allowing for other post-plague suicide syndromes. Murder-suicide pacts are not uncommon."

  The full text of the report can be downloaded from DL:PSY. Request file: FUNERAL GROUPIES. 2J097. Cost: kc5.00.

  25

  Jillana

  "Dogs are always loyal. They've never learned better."

  —SOLOMON SHORT

  I turned to go and almost bumped into a dream. "Oops, excuse me!" I caught her to keep from stumbling, then forgot to let go.

  "Hello!" she said, laughing.

  I flustered, unable to speak. I was mesmerized—her eyes were soft and shiny gray, and I was lost in them. Her skin was fair, with just the faintest hint of freckling. Her face was framed by auburn curls that fell in silk cascades down to her shoulders. Her mouth was moist and red.

  I wanted to kiss her. Who wouldn't?

  She laughed again. "Before you ask," she said, "the answer is yes."

  "Huh?"

  "You are going to proposition me, aren't you?" Her voice was dusky velvet, with just the slightest hint of Alabama in it.

  "Uhh . . ." I took a step back. My feet stayed where they were, but I took a step back.

  "Are you shy?" Yes, Alabama. Definitely. She spoke each word so slowly I could taste it. And she smelled of honeysuckle and lilac—and musk.

  I found my voice. "Um, I used to be . . ."

  "I'm glad to see you got over it," she said, laughing. She put her arm through mine and started walking me toward the elevators to the garage levels. "What's your name?"

  "Jim. Uh, what's yours?"

  "Jillanna. Everyone calls me Jilly."

  I felt suddenly embarrassed. I started to speak—"Um . . ."—and then shut up.

  She looked at me, her head slightly tilted. "Yes?"

  "Nothing."

  "No, tell me."

  "Well, I . . . uh, I guess I'm just a little startled."

  "Why?"

  "I've never been picked up like this before."

  "Oh. How do you usually get picked up?"

  "Um. I don't," I admitted.

  "Goodness. You are shy!"

  "Um. Only around women."

  "Oh, I see," she said. "Are you gay?"

  "I don't think so. I mean, uh—" I wasn't going to try to explain.

  She patted my arm. Did she mean that as reassurance? I didn't ask.

  "Uh, I'm here on research," I offered. "I mean, I'm with the army. That is, I'm doing research for them."

  "Everyone is," she said. "Everyone in Denver is working on Chtorrans."

  "Yeah," I thought about it. "I guess so."

  "Have you ever seen one?" She said it casually.

  "I . . . burned one . . . once."

  "Burned?"

  "With a flame-thrower."

  She looked at me with new respect. "Were you scared?"

  "No, not at the time. It just happened so fast . . . I don't know—it was kind of sad, in a way. I mean, if the Chtorrans weren't so hostile, they could be beautiful . . ."

  "You're sorry you burned it?"

  "It was awfully big. And dangerous."

  "Go on," she said. Her hand tightened around mine.

  I shrugged. "There isn't much to tell. It came out of the hut and I burned it." I didn't want to tell her about Shorty, I don't know why. I said, "It all happened so fast. I wish I'd seen it better. It was just a big pink blur."

  "They have one here, you know." Her grip was very intense.

  "I know. I heard from the Lizard."

  "You. Know. Her?"

  "No, not really. She was just the pilot who flew us in. Me and Ted."

  "Oh." Her grip relaxed.

  "She told us about the Chtorran they have. She flew it in too."

  We took the elevator down to the third level of the garage, where she had a custom floater waiting in one of the private pads. I was impressed, but I didn't say anything. I climbed in silently beside her.

  The drive whined to life, cycled up into the inaudible range, and we eased out onto the road. The light bar on the front spread a yellow-pink swath ahead. The bars of the incoming traffic were dim behind the polarized windshield.

  "I didn't know any of these had actually hit the market," I said.

  "Oh, none of them did. Not really. But several hundred of them did come off the assembly line before Detroit folded up."

  "How did you get this one?"

  "I pulled strings. Well, Daddy did."

  "Daddy?"

  "Well . . . he's like a daddy."

  "Oh."

  Abruptly she said, "Do you want to see the Chtorran?"

  I sputtered. "Huh? Yes!" Then, "—But it's locked up. Isn't it?"

  "I have a key." She said it without taking her eyes off the road. As if she were telling me what time it was. "It's in a special lab. One that used to be a sterile room. If we hurry, we can watch them feeding it."

  "Feeding? It?"

  She didn't notice the way I'd said it. "Oh, yes. Sometimes it's pigs or lambs. Mostly it's heifers. Once they fed it a pony, but I didn't see that."

  "Oh."

  She went on babbling. "They're trying to duplicate what it eats in the wild. They're hunters, you know."

  "I'd . . . heard something like that."

  "They don't kill their prey—that's what I find interesting. They just bring it down and start eating. Dr. Mm'bele thinks there's a kill reflex involved. This one won't eat dead meat unless it's very, very hungry, and even then only when it's being moved around so he can attack it."

  "That's interesting."

  "They say that sometimes they eat human beings. Do you think that's true? I mean, doesn't that seem atypical to you?"

  "Well—"

  She wasn't waiting to hear. "Dr. Mm'bele doesn't believe it. There aren't any reported cases. At least, none that have been verified. That's what the UN Bureau says. Did you know that?"

  "No, I didn't." Show Low, Arizona. "Um—"

  "There was supposed to be one once," she said, "but—well, it turned out to be just another hoax. They even had pictures, I heard."

  "A hoax, huh?"

  "Yep. You didn't know that, did you?"

  "Uh, how did you hear about it?" I don't think she noticed, but I was riding at least three lanes away from her.

  "I work here. I'm permanently stationed. Didn't you know?"

  "Oh. What do you do, exactly?"

  "Executive Vice-Chairperson, Extraterrestrial Genetic Research Coordination Center."

  "Oh," I said. Then, "Oh!" Then I shut up.

  We turned off the main highway onto the approach road. There had been very little traffic going either way.

  "Is there anything interesting about the Chtorrans? I mean, genetically?"

  "Oh, lots. Most of it is beyond the lay person, but there is a lot to know. They have fifty-six chromosomes. Isn't that odd? Why so many? I mean, what is all that genetic information for? Most of the genes we've analyzed seem to be inactive anyway. So far, we've been unable to synthesize a computer model of the way the whole system works, but we're working on it. It's just a matter of time, but it would help if we had some of their eggs."

  "I—uh, never mind. I'm just amazed that they, have chromosomes and genes."

  "Oh, well, that's universal. Dr. Hackley proved it almost twenty years ago—carbon-based life will always be built on DNA. Something about the basic molecular structure. DNA is the most likely form of organic chain—almost to the point of inevitability. Because it's so efficient. DNA is almost always there first—and if other types of organic chains are possible, DNA will not only outgrow them, it'll use them as food. It's really quite voracious."

  "Um," I said. "How appropriate."

  She burbled on. "It's really amazing, isn't it? How much we have in common with the Chtorrans?"

  "Um, yeah. Amazing."

  "I mean socio-biologically. We both represent different answers to the same question—how can life know itself? What forms give rise to intelligence? And what . . . structures do these forms have in common? That would tell us what intelligence is a response to, or a product of. That's what Dr. Mm'bele says."

  "I've, uh, heard good things about him."

  "Anyway, we're trying to put together a program to extrapolate the physiology of the Chtorran animal from its genes, but we don't have anyone who can write a program for it yet. You're not a programmer, are you? The lack of a good hacker will probably add anywhere from two to three years to our research schedule. And it's a very important problem—and a double-edged one. We don't know what the genes are supposed to do because we don't know the creature, at least not very well. And we can't figure out the creature because we don't understand the genes. Some really peculiar things." She took a breath. "Like, for instance, half the chromosomes seem to be duplicates of each other. Like a premitosis condition. Why is that? We have more questions than answers."

  "I'm sure," I said, trying to assimilate what she was telling me. "What about the millipedes? Didn't they give you any clues?"

  "You mean the insectoids? They're another whole puzzle. For one thing, they all seem to be the same sex—did you know that? No sex at all."

  "Huh?"

  "We haven't found any evidence—nobody has—that there's any sexuality in them at all. Not physically, not genetically; no sex organs, no sexual differentiation, no secondary sex characteristics, no markings and not even any way to reproduce."

  "Well, they must . . ."

  "Of course they must, but the best we've found are some immature structures that might—just might, mind you—be undeveloped ovaries or testes—we're not sure which—and a vestigial reproductive tract, but they've been inoperative in every specimen we've dissected. Maybe they're just growth glands. But even if they were sexual structures, why are they buried so high up in the abdomen with no apparent connection to any outlet?"

  She stopped at the main gate just long enough to flash her clearance at the scanner, then zoomed forward, turning sharply right and cutting across a lot toward a distant L-shaped building.

  "The Chtorrans have some sexuality, don't they?"

  "Oh, yes. Quite a bit. We're just not sure how it works. The one we have—we thought it was a female. Now we're not sure. Now we're guessing it's a male. At least I think it is, but . . . we don't have anything to compare it with. We've been able to dissect some dead ones in the past couple months—two we think were females, one pretty definite male and two we're still not sure of. The big one was definitely male," she repeated. Her voice went funny then. "I wish I could have seen that one alive. He must have been magnificent. Two and a half meters thick, maybe five meters long. We only got the front half. The back half was . . . lost. But he must have been magnificent. What a warrior he must have been. I'll bet he ate full-sized cattle."

  "Um," I said. I didn't know what else to say. I was beginning to wonder—was this part of getting laid? Or what? I wasn't sure I wanted to any more.

  The floater slid to a stop before the building. It wasn't L-shaped, but X-shaped. We had parked in one of the corners. Bright lights illuminated the whole area. As I got out, I paused to look up at the poles. Just as I thought, there were snoops on every tower; that's what the lights were for. Security. Nothing was going to get in—or out—without being recorded.

  I wondered if anyone was looking at the recordings.

  And then I wondered if it mattered.

  There were eleven other people already in the room. It was long and narrow and dimly lit. Two rows of chairs ran the length of the room, facing a wall of glass. I could make out five women, six men. The men all seemed to be civilian types, but I couldn't be sure. I didn't know if the women were their colleagues or their companions for the evening. If the latter, I couldn't help but wonder at their choice of entertainment. The men waved to Jillanna and looked curiously at me. I waved back, half-heartedly.

  Jillanna's eyes were wide with excitement. "Hi, guys. Have we started yet?"

  "Smitty's just getting ready."

  "What's on for tonight?"

 

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