Splintered loyalty, p.5
Ficiton Complete, page 5
The girl, when he found her. was not very receptive. “You’re wasting your time. P. P.,” she said. “There’s nothing we can do.”
“We can escape.”
“How? In your car? Even if they let us out, we couldn’t get ten miles before helicopter police found us.”
“On foot. We can walk across the desert to the mountains. They’d never spot us on foot, walking through the desert.”
“Do you really think my spindly legs would carry me across fifty miles of sand? There’s another group of observers who would spot me long before I got to the mountains. The vultures.”
Procyon looked at the emaciated girl, and could not argue.
“Say we did escape,” she went on, “what do you propose we should do? Live on in hiding, in our present condition, depleted of Vitality, until we starve to death, or the police catch up with us and bring us back?”
“Once we’re safely away, I have money. I have money from my father’s insurance, and I’ve not spent anything while I’ve been here. Between us we can work out how the Schlagle Process works. I had a good look at the equipment. I have a pretty good idea of it now. Other people will sell us their Vitality for money. We can buy our Vitality back.”
She worked hard on the raggedy forelock. “You always steal Vitality, P. P. You can never buy it. And I can never go with you across the desert.”
Her eyes clouded over and for a moment she seemed disoriented. She said, in a faltering voice: “There is something about the work I was doing before . . . if only I could remember . . .”
Procyon caught her arm. “Try, Schizzy. Try!”
Intense pain flickered across her face and her lips twitched frantically. “It was about the Essence of Vitality—the work I was doing—my own personal project . . . when I was a research scientist like you . . .”
Procyon gripped her arm harder. and looked away because he could not bear to look at her poor distorted face. He felt her grow suddenly tense, and he was compelled to turn toward her again. Her lips no longer twitched, her face was tranquil, and her eyes shone. “It was a synthesis procedure, P. P.! A method to synthesize the Essence of Vitality. A few more months of work, and I would have got it. But they drained me.” Her face went blank again, and she shuddered. “They drained me with their fines. I hadn’t the energy to go on with the work, and I made myself forget all about it so they would never find out.”
Excitement grew in Procyon as the implications of her words came home to him. If she could tell him the lines to work on, and he could get away, and complete her work, there would be no need for this laboratory in the desert, no reason for them to keep Schizzy. Anxiously he demanded, “Did you tell Hardwick about this?”
“Oh. I tried to. You can bet I tried to. But I’m afraid our dear director was much too busy to listen to the ramblings of a poor mad girl.”
Procyon remembered his own attempt to communicate with Hardwick, and believed her. She went on, her voice flat and colorless now, as if she had lost the direction of her thinking: “But of course I wasn’t mad then.”
He spoke sharply, hating to do it, but feeling it was essential to force her back to reality. “Could I complete your work?”
She inspected him closely, and a smile lit up her face. “Procyon, my dear, I’m sure you could do anything.”
“Do you have notes? Formulae?”
She shook her head. “I destroyed them all. But if I think very hard, I am sure I can remember—”
“Then all we have to do is get away.”
She looked down sadly. “However much I manage to remember, I still won’t be able to walk all that way through the desert. But I could write everything down. You could take it with you, get the work completed . . .”
“Schizzy, my dear, if it costs me all the strength I have, I swear I’ll come back for you!”
The vehemence of his words shook her into a completely rational state of mind. “You’ll have to have a sample of the Essence to help you develop the synthesis.”
“Is there any way I can get a sample?”
She stood very tall, completely calm now. “Yes. We can rob the storage vault. I know where one of the keys is kept, and I know how to get there. That knowledge is part of my job.”
They decided, that a Saturday night would be the best time for the robbery. Then on Sunday Procyon could merely walk through the gates as usual, his knapsack on his back, for his walk in the desert. With luck, no one would notice his absence until next day. By then he should be close to the mountains, and it would be impossible for them to find him and catch him.
The week ticked on slowly. Procyon, so that he would not be too conspicuous on the Saturday evening, stayed late in his office every night, as he used to do before he’d been processed. After the first night, the prowling guards on night duty took no notice of him. To fill the time, he did a more thorough job than usual on his weekly reports, and had them submitted a few hours before they were due. He saw very little of Schizzy during the week—they felt that any unusual behavior just might be noticed and reported—but he could tell from her suppressed smile and the light in her eyes when they met by chance in the corridors that she was working on her part of their plan. With everything going well, and a definite end to his captivity in sight, Procyon felt something like his old self again. For the first time since his ordeal, he amused himself by adjusting his spectacle frames and his tie to illustrate the moods that flowed through him hour by hour. But the time passed desperately slowly.
On the Saturday, Procyon worked late as usual, and as usual was not noticed. Schizzy, with no such habit to justify her presence, squatted concealed behind Procyon’s desk. Without anyone seeing, she had already managed to slip him her notes on the Vitality synthesis, as far as she’d taken it, on the previous day. He’d read it, and had it hidden safely in his knapsack. There were a few minor questions he’d have liked to ask, but they were of small account, and they didn’t dare talk while the guards prowled. At midnight the guards would go off for their meal, and they could act. Meanwhile, Procyon worked on a stack of papers piled on his desk, and Schizzy sat still.
Midnight came, and when Schizzy had massaged the stiffness out of her cramped legs, they hurried along the silent corridors, their faces ghastly in the pale blue pilot lights. Schizzy led him directly to Dr. Hardwick’s office. The office door was not locked, but the drawer where she said the key was kept appeared at first to be. They couldn’t tug it open, and Procyon was almost ready to smash it. Schizzy stayed him, and prodded the gap between the top of the drawer and the desk with a nail file. Something solid had wedged in the gap, and made the drawer stick, but she was able to wiggle the wedge loose with the nail file, and they were able to pull it open. It was very heavy, crammed to the top with samples of metal strip and other oddments, but the key was easy to find, right at the front of the drawer, and not buried very deep in the samples.
They practically ran to the medical lab, where the vault was tucked away under the processing room, down a spiral staircase. They had to hurry, because Procyon knew that, although the guards had very little to do, they never dawdled over their meals. The steel door of the vault, which was very like the huge walk-in safes Procyon had seen in banks, opened easily. There were no alarms.
There was a single amber light inside the vault. At first, although their eyes had become accustomed to semidarkness in the corridors, it was too dim for them to see. As their vision grew more sensitive, they saw row on row of U-tube phials laid out on half a hundred shelves, each leg of each tube decorated with a small amber star, the reflection of the single light. The vault was not refrigerated, though it was cool. Schizzy had said the Essence would not deteriorate if it got warm, but Procyon was relieved to find it was not stored frozen just the same. All the phials appeared to be full, and he moved forward to grab the nearest. Schizzy tugged his arm and said: “No. There is a special one.”
She led him deep into the vault, and stopped before a particular shelf with a label attached to it. He screwed up his eyes and came close to read the label. It said: Reserved for Dr. Hardwick.
On Dr. Hardwick’s shelf there were three U-tubes of Essence, all of them larger than most in the vault. Procyon took one of the tubes in his hands, and saw that it. too, was labeled. The label said: Six years.
Schizzy was gone to the back of the vault. She returned with a styrofoam container, from which she took an empty tube. She had Procyon hold it, and replaced it in the container with the full tube he had in his hands. She gave him the closed container, and was putting the empty tube on the shelf when she had a thought.
“Do you want to fill this, Procyon?” she asked.
She took the stopper from one leg of the empty tube, and passed the tube to Procyon. He saw at once what was needed. She said, “As long as the tube is filled with golden fluid, they’ll not even suspect they’ve been robbed.”
He was not quite able to fill the tube, but it was probably good enough. The six-year label was already on it. The tube looked completely normal back on the shelf. There was no reason why anyone should suspect anything, even when they were injecting his annual bonus of eighteen extra and unearned years into the fat director.
In haste, they locked the vault, and ran through the corridors to return the key. There were no guards in sight when they entered Hardwick’s office. When they cautiously opened the door to leave, they saw one returning from his meal, far-off, a puppet man in the long perspective of the corridor. Procyon pulled Schizzy back into the office, and closed the door. Fortunately they’d already turned off the office light before opening it. There was no place to hide except under the massive mahogany desk where the director kept his fat feet. The two of them squeezed in there, and it was very pleasant for Procyon, despite the approaching danger of exposure, to feel Schizzy so close to him.
They heard the door of the office open. They heard no feet scuffing toward them on the carpet. The door closed. They waited. After five minutes or so. Procyon peeped over the edge of the desk. There was no guard to be seen. They again opened the door of the office, this time still more cautiously, but there were no guards in the corridor. Procyon knew their prowl times, and it was not difficult from there on. No one saw them leave the building. Outside, the night air of the desert was very cold. At midnight, the street lights of the City of Long Life were turned off to save money for the company, but it was not too dark. In the cloudless sky a myriad of twinkling stars brightened themselves to light their way. Procyon reached for Schizzy to draw her close so that she would not get too cold, and wondered what words he should use to ask her to stay the night with him. She shook him off, and said, her voice very tense, “Goodbye, Procyon. I’ve done all I can. I must hurry home now. Don’t forget to come back for me. Please?” Then she was running from him, the calves of her spindly legs twinkling in the starlight.
Procyon stood still and watched her until she faded into the darkness, and only when he could no longer see her did he truly realize that he would be leaving her behind, alone. He cursed himself for an idiot. All week long he had taken it for granted that Schizzy would not be coming with him. That was part of their plan, and he’d just accepted it, never considering for a minute what it truly meant for Schizzy, what it meant for him. He moved to go after her, angry that he had not spent every second of the last week working out some plan by which she could have come with him. But if he chased after her, what could they do? The carton containing the Essence was heavy and conspicuous under his arm. It was certain that Schizzy had not the physical strength to go with him. even if he could think of some way to smuggle her out with him in the morning. If he went after her now, and was seen, and was questioned about the carton, that would be the end. He would never be in a position to help her then. Reluctantly he turned his back on the place where she had vanished, and headed slowly toward his own apartment. As he went he vowed that he would use every hour of every day and night, and every ounce of creative power that existed in him to finish Schizzy’s work, and when it was done, would set off without rest to come back and set her free.
Morning came, and he woke refreshed, and considerably surprised that he’d been able to fall asleep. He cooked himself a light breakfast, ate quickly, searching his mind the whole time for a glimmer of an idea for a new plan that would allow him to take Schizzy with him. but could not find one. He checked his knapsack to be sure he’d not overlooked anything, and glanced for the last time around his apartment. He was leaving most of his personal belongings behind, and preoccupied though he was with thoughts of the girl, he noticed that he did not regret leaving them. Material things were always a burden to a creative man. He hoisted his knapsack, and left.
The guards, used to his Sunday excursions, gave him no problems at the gate. In half an hour he’d put two miles of sand and scrub growth between himself and the city. At the top of a small hillock, the mountainwards companion of that on which he’d stopped his car for his first view of the City of Long Life, he paused and looked back. He saw. as he had on that first morning, the fine buildings of the city transmuted to gold by the sun. He saw, something he had overlooked then, the sinister line of the black wall encircling the city, and for an instant he thought he saw the puckered face of the usherette, also gilded, superimposed on the golden buildings, and it seemed to him that the imprisoning wall was a wall around her, her only. With his right hand he reached behind him and tapped his knapsack, where he had his sample of Essence, and the girl’s notes, and he vowed, “By God Schizzy, I’m going to make your process work, and I’m coming back for you.”
Almost a treachery, the thought slipped into his mind unbidden, Even if her process won’t work, I’m getting away with six years’ Essence in my knapsack, and I’ll at least get my own three rears back. Then he thought of Hardwick’s stored bonus of eighteen years, and for that, and for the other, treacherous, thought, he was suddenly very angry, and he yelled aloud to the dry, unheeding air and the unconcerned blueness of the sky: “Piss on Dr. Hardwick!”
After that, he adjusted the straps of his knapsack to be more comfortable. turned his back on the city, and strode off eastward across the desert toward the distant mountains.
Johnnie Wong’s Tantagraphs
What becomes of an idea can depend on its intrinsic merits, sweeping historical forces—or much smaller, more personal things.
Like any other great Corporation, G.B.I. (General Business, Inc., or, more colloquially, Great Big Industries) exists to make money. It’s our primary duty, we dedicated servants of the Company, to suppress any personal considerations that interfere, and see that happens. Once in a while a servant screws up (like me with the Johnnie Wong patent). Money that should have been made, isn’t.
What reminds me of my screwup, and has made me feel guilty, is a paragraph in today’s Times saying one of Johnnie Wong’s tantagraphs has just sold for seventeen million dollars. If I’d been a bit smarter, or more courageous a few years back, a lot of that money would have landed in our Corporate coffers.
Thoroughly uncomfortable (you see what a hold Mother Company has on me!), I tell myself it’s just plain stupid to worry about what might have been if I’d done something different. Suppose I’d been cleverer, or a bit more dedicated. or whatever it took. It’s just as likely Johnnie would then have stayed on the payroll, would have focused on his technical work, and never have become anything more than a dabbling amateur artist. Then there wouldn’t have been any seventeen million dollars for G.B.I. to claim a share in. Perhaps, I tell myself to soothe my conscience, my lack of assertiveness at the time did mankind a service. Maybe I played an important part in the growth of a great artist.
The pesky guilt feeling persists. I run my eye over the rest of the Times paragraph. “The high-priced tantagraph is one of Wong’s early works, created during that tragic phase of the artist’s life known as his Purple Pity Period.” Another feeling, almost as unpleasant, comes up. Frustration. Back then, when I had a chance to interface with Wong to G.B.I.’s benefit, I was too much into the business I was paid to do to pay much attention to the peculiar human interactions that were going on. Oh, I couldn’t help noticing they existed. But I suppressed my natural curiosity, then and later, and never investigated, except superficially. It’s a sign of advancing age, I suppose, when we want to understand everything, and feel frustrated if we can’t. Potted biographies of Wong I’ve read over the years haven’t helped. Precisely what happened within the triangle, Johnnie Wong-Joelani Lauanui-Jeffrey Grieves I’ve never discovered, though, holding the Times up in front of me, I am sure it had a lot to do with the artist’s “Purple Pity Period.”
I try to persuade myself that it also had a lot to do with my own part in the affair. What went wrong back at Johnnie Wong’s patent time almost surely was a result of good, old-fashioned, complex human nature, not of any shortcomings of mine.
But I can’t convince myself of that. Maybe my mood will improve if I write down what I do know of the affair. Worth a try anyway.
I’ve the honor to serve G.B.I. as corporate patent attorney, and have done so for so long, it’s embarrassing to think of it. It’s all of fifteen years ago that Johnnie Wong’s invention disclosure reached my desk. In mid-winter, I remember. I was delighted to get it. Wong, whom I’d never met, was then a junior engineer in the capacitor section of Electronics Division. Electronics is on the West Coast, thirty miles south of San Francisco. During any ice-bound winter in Connecticut it’s pleasant to hear from an inventor in a warmer clime, not for the surrogate warmth, but because any attorney (such as myself) with a strong sense of duty, recognizes that, at whatever personal inconvenience, he really should visit and talk with an inventor before writing up his patent application. Particularly if he’s located near San Francisco, a favorite city of mine.
