Colossus (24 page)

Colossus could have added that there was even less time than he knew—but then Colossus had no sense of irony.

Chapter 18

It was scarcely surprising that Forbin slept badly—a sleep shot through with dreams, near nightmares … He was crossing a wide tree-lined avenue at night, yet as he crossed, the roadway widened before and behind him, and he was walking in increasing darkness, the street lights growing dimmer and fewer. Then he was splashing through shallow water, like a wide gutter, but was suddenly aware, without seeing, that he was walking ankle-deep in the shallow edge of a leaf-filled lake. He knew he had lost all sense of direction and that if he did not guess correctly, he would suddenly step off into the deep choking mass of rotting leaves. The edge was fast receding, it was darker, and colder, soon there would be no light…

He awoke sweating with fear, and tossed uneasily for hours, willing himself to sleep, fighting his thoughts and the unaccustomed light. Now and then he dozed off, to wake with a start from an unremembered dream, but the lake did not return … In the early hours of the morning he finally fell into a deep sleep, to be wakened, far too soon, by the apologetic Joe.

“Sorry, Professor, but you said 0800—” “OK, OK,” snapped Forbin irritably.

Joe started to leave. “We’ll be back as soon as you’re dressed, sir.”

Forbin laughed derisively, and turned a bloodshot eye on the nearest camera. “I should worry about technicians, with that eye always—” He stopped short. “Never mind, skip it. Let me get out of this bed, and you can do whatever you like.”

He took off his sweat-soaked nightshirt, threw it in the wastebasket and went into the bathroom. For nearly fifteen minutes he lingered in the semi-obscurity of the steam, finally emerging almost lobster color. He dressed slowly, working out his plans for the day. A solitary breakfast did not appeal to him, and he decided that a little pre-breakfast exercise might do him good. For ten minutes he paced up and down the sidewalk, looking and feeling like a prisoner in the penitentiary yard. Some three-quarters of an hour after being called, Forbin was walking through the main entrance of the control block. He might have gone to his office—Angela would be on duty at 0900-but although he would not admit it, even to himself, he did not like to be too far from the teletype.

Air-conditioned it might be, but after the sparkling morning air the atmosphere in the CPO was stale and flat, with more than a hint of tobacco, coffee, frankfurters and humanity. Forbin walked to his desk, nodding his greetings to Johnson, who was still working on the simulator. He slumped down in his chair, tired before he started. He stared sightlessly at the desk for a time, then, without moving, said in a rasping voice, “Well, d’you want my fingerprints?”

NO

“Great!” he replied, sarcastically. “I’ll be able to eat my breakfast with clean fingers.” He called the commissary and ordered a full breakfast in the same hard voice, replacing the phone without waiting for an answer. Already his isolation had engendered a dislike and an envy of his fellow-men. “Johnson, have you got Cleo?”

“No, sir,” said Johnson. “This work is tough on her—she’s checking out our stock requisitions for the simulator over at the main store.”

Forbin grunted. Breakfast was brought by a messenger new to Forbin; he only just avoided asking the man where he had sprung from. But new messengers were not lightly taken on in the Zone, and Forbin realized this must be the CIA expert on undercover matters.

Forbin made a great show of eating, but in fact only played with his food. Finally he pushed the tray away, and called for a progress report from Johnson, who outlined the position. Barring unforeseen snags, the simulator would be working at the latest next morning.

Forbin managed a curt “Good.” He felt so tired, tired … Johnson was speaking.

“Do you want Cleo Markham, sir?”

Forbin did, but he had no desire to meet her in front of the staff as well as Colossus. “Yes. I’d like to see her outside—I’m going for a short walk. Ask her to join me, will you?”

Forbin paced up and down, alone with a variety of thoughts: Colossus, Kupri, Cleo, Siberia—and the memory of Prytzkammer as he had last seen him alive, clawing, screaming, mad with fear. Forbin stopped and contemplated his feet, his thoughts a thousand miles away … Then Cleo was beside him, flushed and breathless, taking his arm confidently, pressing her head on his chest.

“Ah, Cleo,” Forbin said, lamely.

“Who else, Charles?” She looked up at his face, laughing. “Do you have a harem, then?”

“Cleo, you know you’re the only one,” he replied earnestly. It was all so trivial, yet so important to him. He grabbed her shoulders and kissed her. It was not sweet oblivion, but there was immeasurable relief in her for him.

For a short while Cleo was wholeheartedly his, then she gently disentangled herself and spoke without thinking. “Charles! Not here—” She stopped.

“We might be seen?” He ended the sentence for her and laughed, a hairsbreadth from hysteria.

“Don’t!” she said sharply, then went on in a softer tone. “Have you any news—about us, I mean?”

“I hope you’ll be able to join me tonight.” His embarrassment returned, damping down the hysteria. “It all depends on how fast the work goes in my quarters. I must go now, but come and have lunch with me—please?”

“Just let anyone try to stop me!” She kept up the lighthearted tone, but tried to convey a deeper message of solidarity, warmth, love …

Forbin watched her go, took a deep breath of the clean warm air, and headed for his office.

He had been working steadily for some time when it occurred to him that he had not seen Fisher during the morning. He pressed the intercom.

“Angela—have you seen Doctor Fisher today?” “No—sir. Shall I get him for you?”

“No—no, it doesn’t matter.” Forbin stifled yet another uneasy feeling and got on with his work—routine, familiar things, not excessively demanding, even soothing. By lunchtime he was relatively happy, even a little hungry.

Cleo arrived promptly, and at first seemed strangely silent and pensive. Gradually she warmed up; by unspoken agreement they said nothing about work or themselves. Cleo, clearly making an effort, chattered about her last vacation spent at the Project ski resort in Greenland. Then the meal came, and there was silence until the messenger had left. Forbin decided to take the risk. “D’you want to tell me something, my dear?”

“No, Charles. Nothing. I’ve a slight headache, that’s all.” It was totally unconvincing.

“Is it that you don’t want to see me?” said Forbin, assailed with doubts.

“That’s ridiculous, and you know it,” replied Cleo in a militant tone. “No—I just didn’t sleep much last night. I don’t—alone.”

Forbin knew the last part was for the benefit of Colossus, but he also knew she had something she dare not tell him in front of the cameras and microphones. A gust of rage shook him. He sat motionless until the feeling ebbed away, leaving behind a faint queasiness, born of fear and the unknown. Cleo had gone, leaving Forbin sunk in thought, trying to evolve some way of evading Colossus as the first step to fighting his own creation. The risk of Russian—or other— agents reporting to their masters and thus to the machines bore down heavily on his mind. Yet no one dare stop. Naturally, some attrition would be accepted. Agents got caught, died naturally, even retired—these contingencies had been allowed for. But “spy rings” as such did not exist outside novels.

One agent might get caught and lead to the capture of a second, but it was very seldom that the trail was longer than that. In any case, Colossus would expect the lost men—or women— to be replaced fairly quickly. Even so, thought Forbin, it might be possible to gain some temporary respite that way. Perhaps they could do a deal with the USSR, sell out some of their own agents to the Russians who in return would allow some of their better—placed men to be swept into the bag. Forbin wondered what the Russian intelligence effort was in the Zone. He recalled Grauber’s delicate hint that the USSR might have been helped in building Guardian by a leak from the USNA … It might also be ominously significant that while Colossus demanded access to the hot line, there was no such demand for cover between the Zone and Washington or with CIA itself …

Forbin roused himself and threw the debris of lunch in the trash-bin. He reflected sourly that perhaps this was the only real advance of humanity in the past two decades—the abolition of washing-up.

Then Blake came in, and asked if Forbin could spare a few minutes. His manner struck Forbin as a shade too casual. The feeling of sickness grew stronger.

“I’m afraid Doctor Fisher’s unwell.” Blake paused and lit a cigar. The cloud of smoke obscured his face, and Forbin wondered if it was intentional. Blake went on. “Guess he’s been overdoing it lately—the medic has put him under sedation.”

Forbin could read fairly easily between those particular lines. He exhibited no surprise as he answered, “I’m sorry to hear that. I thought he had looked rough for some time. The rest will do him good—where is he, his quarters or the sanatorium?”

“The medic decided he must have a complete change, sir, and decided that he would recover more quickly in the Rockies rest camp.”

The “Rockies rest camp,” as Forbin knew very well, was a small recreation unit, miles from anywhere, set up in the mountains for the benefit of any Zone workers who fancied mountaineering. It was accessible only by helicopter.

“A fine place for a rest, I believe,” replied Forbin evenly. “When is he going?”

“The medic thought there was no point in delay—he left by air-car for the heliport about a half-hour ago, sir.”

Forbin tried to look as if whisking senior members of the staff off at thirty minutes’ notice were the most normal thing in the world. “Good,” he said. “But this will mean some slight rearrangement of schedules.”

“It may be a little difficult for a day or so, but with the rundown in staff, now the Colossus is completed, I don’t reckon on much trouble.”

It was the first Forbin had heard about reducing the staff, but he followed the lead. “Yes— Fisher had talked to me about leaving. Is there anything else?”

Blake, in the same easy tone, described the work on the simulator, which wouldn’t be completed before the next morning. He added that it could only be done in that time by working exactly to Colossus’ specification, and without any testing as the work proceeded. It would be built as ordered, and if it didn’t work it would not be due to human error.

“I don’t think there is much chance of it failing,” said Forbin.

Blake didn’t think so, either. Soon after he left, Forbin set off for the CPO passing by his quarters to see how the work progressed.

Secretary of State Forbin, Professor of Cybernetics, Doctor of Philosophy, Master of Science, found his cage practically finished. The large square mesh wire had been neatly fixed to walls, floor and ceiling, and the ends welded to form a continuous net. Only the door allowed access, and mesh was also screwed to that, so that when the door was shut the cage was complete. Forbin looked at the mesh extending over the window. “Well, I hope I don’t have a fire during the night.”

It may have looked like a cage, but to Forbin it looked very good indeed. He regarded it not so much as a prison to keep him in as a fortress to keep Colossus out.

The technicians were making the final row of welds along a skirting; there was a faint sputter and a metallic smell as their low-power laser torches bonded the metal. All Forbin’s furniture, what there was of it, had been dumped in the living room, leaving the room bare down to the floor boards. It appeared smaller, surprisingly enough, with the steel mesh over walls and ceiling; the walls were grubby, the overall air of the place was dingy. The cameras and microphones had been refixed, and a switch inserted in the microphone circuit, clearly marked ON and OFF. Home, reflected Forbin bitterly.

The relentless pressure of the surveillance was far worse than he had expected—and it had not yet been operating for a full twenty-four hours! All Forbin could think of at that moment was to get in that room away from it all. His rendezvous with Cleo, even the vital plans to overthrow the giants, were both subordinate to his desire to escape. He stood still, his legs trembling with weakness, yet he wanted to run …

The workmen emerged from his bedroom, carrying their tool bags. One said, “We’ll be testing from the control block sir, then come back to finish off.”

For all that the Director appeared to hear, they might well have not existed. He walked past them into the bedroom and slammed the door behind him, turned and faced a camera.

“OK, Colossus, we’re alone. I don’t want to go through my private affairs out there or in the CPO.” As on earlier occasions, Forbin found that when he was actually talking to Colossus his mind was cool and clear. It was only when engaged in contemplation of the whole picture that it tended to slip. “You’ve seen my mistress, Cleo Markham, and I want her here tonight, and I don’t want any last minute foul-ups—I can’t stand much more. I want you to let me know what conditions you will impose on our occupation of this room. For instance, do you want the furniture taken apart? If so, let me get it organized now—give me an answer when I return to the CPO. I’m going back there now. Give me a chance to reach the teletype first before you give your answer. You may not understand our need for privacy, and I’m not at all sure I could give a logical answer—but it’s very real.”

He jerked the door open and left.

Colossus played it his way. Forbin walked into the CPO and straight to the teletype, and almost immediately the machine began to hammer out:

CONDITIONS

I—NO TRANSMITTER OR TELEPHONE TO BE FITTED

2—CAMERAS REMAIN ALIVE AT ALL TIMES 3—MICROPHONE CIRCUIT MAY BE BROKEN ONLY WHEN DOOR IS SHUT

4—LIGHTS MAY BE SWITCHED OFF ONLY WHEN DOOR IS SHUT

5—NOTHING IS TO BE TAKEN IN WITHOUT INSPECTION BY CAMERA

6—PERMISSIBLE ARTICLES ARE BED—CLOTHES CONTAINER—FLOOR COVER AFTER INSPECTION NOTHING MORE

Forbin read the conditions carefully. In the weird circumstances it was not an unreasonable list. There was one point Forbin was sure Colossus would not overlook …