Now Wait for Last Year (14 page)

How demented can you get? she asked herself. And it required only one exposure to JJ-180 to do this; what'll I be like when I've taken it repeatedly ... or even just twice.

The future, to her, was mercifully obscure. She frankly did not know.

'Your destination, miss.' The cab settled onto the rooftop landing field of a building. That will be one dollar and twenty cents US plus a twenty-five-cent tip.'

'Screw you and the tip,' Kathy said, opening her purse; her hands shook and she could barely get out the money.

'Yes, miss,' the autonomic cab said obediently.

She paid and then stepped out. A dull guide-light showed her descent. What a rundown building for 'Starmen to inhabit, she thought. It surely isn't good enough for them; they must be pretending to be Terrans. The only consolation was a bitter one: the 'Starmen, like Terra, were losing the war, would ultimately be defeated. Relishing that thought, she increased her pace, felt more confidence; she did not simply hate the 'Starmen: she could, for a moment, despise them.

In this fortified frame of mind she reached the conapt held by the 'Starmen, rang the bell, and waited.

It was Corning himself who answered; she saw, behind him, other 'Starmen, evidently in conference. In camera, she said to herself; I'm disturbing them. Too bad; he said to come.

'Mrs Sweetscent.' Corning turned to the people behind him. 'Isn't that a superb name? Come in Kathy.' He held the door wide.

'Give it to me out here.' She remained in the hall. 'I'm on my way to Cheyenne; you'll be glad to hear that. So don't waste my time.' She held out her hand.

An expression of pity – incredibly – passed over Coming's face; he masterfully suppressed it. But she had seen it, and this, more than anything else that had happened, even the addiction itself or her suffering when the drug had worn off – nothing shocked her so much as Coming's pity. If it could move a 'Starman. .. she cringed. Oh God, she thought; I really am in trouble. I must be on my way to death.

'Look,' she said reasonably. 'My addiction may not last forever. I've found out that you lied; the drug comes from Terra, not from the enemy, and sooner or later our subsidiary will be able to free me. So I'm not afraid.' She waited while Corning went to get the drug; at least she presumed that this was what he had gone for. He certainly had vanished somewhere.

One of the other 'Starmen, observing her leisurely, said, 'You could float that drug around Lilistar for a decade and never find anyone unstable enough to succumb.'

'Right,' Kathy agreed. That's the difference between you and us; we look alike but inside you're tough and we're weak. Gosh, I envy you. How long is it going to take Mr Corning?'

'He'll be back in a moment,' the 'Starman said. To a companion he said, 'She's pretty.'

'Yes, pretty as an animal,' the other 'Starman answered. 'So you like pretty animals? Is that why you were assigned to this?'

Corning returned. 'Kathy, I'm giving you three caps. Don't take more than one at a time. Otherwise its toxicity would probably be fatal to your heart action.'

'Okay.' She accepted the capsules. 'Do you have a cup or glass of water so I can take one right now?'

He brought her a glass, stood watching sympathetically as she swallowed the capsule. 'I'm doing this,' she explained, 'to clear my mind so that I can plan what to do. I've got friends helping me. But I will go to Cheyenne because a deal is a deal, even with you. Can you give me the name of someone there – you know, who can give me further supplies when I need them? If I need them, I mean.'

'We have no one in Cheyenne who can help you. I'm very much afraid you'll have to travel back here when your three caps are gone.'

'Your infiltration of Cheyenne doesn't consist of much, then.'

'I guess not.' Corning did not appear perturbed, however.

'Good-by,' Kathy said, starting away from the door. 'Look at you,' she said, addressing the group of 'Starmen within the apartment. 'God but you're detestable. So confident. What kind of victory is it to—' She broke off; what was the use? 'Virgil Ackerman knows about me. I'll bet he can do something; he's not afraid of you, he's too big a man.'

'All right,' Corning said, nodding. 'You cherish that comforting delusion, Kathy. Meanwhile be sure you don't tell anyone else, because if you do, then no more caps. You shouldn't have told the Ackermans but I'll let that pass; after all, you were dazed when the drug wore off – we expected that. You did it in a state of panic. Good luck, Kathy. And we'll hear from you shortly.'

'Can't you give her further instructions now?' a 'Starman said from behind Corning, sleepy-eyed and toadlike, drawling his question.

'She wouldn't be able to retain anything more,' Corning said. 'It's asking a lot of her already; can't you see how overtaxed she is?'

'Kiss her good-by,' the 'Starman behind him suggested. He strolled forward. 'Or if that doesn't cheer her up—'

The apartment door shut in Kathy's face.

She stood a moment and then started back down the hall, toward the ascent ramp. Dizzy, she thought; I'm beginning to become disoriented – I hope I can make it to a cab. Once I'm in the cab I'll be okay. Jesus, she thought, they treated me badly; I should care but I really don't. Not as long as I have these two remaining capsules of JJ-180. And can get more.

The capsules were like a contracted form of life itself and yet at the same time everything they contained was fabricated from absolute delusion. What a mess, she thought drably as she emerged on the roof field and glanced about for the red, winking light of an autonomic cab. A – mess.

She had found a cab, was seated in it and on her way to Cheyenne, when she experienced the drug beginning to take effect.

Its initial manifestation was baffling. She wondered if perhaps a clue to its true action could be inferred from this; it seemed to her terribly important and she tried with every bit of mental energy she had to comprehend it. So simple and yet so meaningful.

The cut on her finger had disappeared.

She sat examining the spot, touching the smooth, perfect skin. No break. No scar. Her finger, exactly as before ... as if time had been rolled back. The Band-Aid, too, was gone, and that seemed to clinch it, make it thoroughly comprehensible, even to her swiftly deteriorating faculties.

'Look at my hand,' she instructed the cab, holding her hand up. 'Do you see any sign of an injury? Would you believe that I slashed myself badly, just half an hour ago?'

'No, miss,' the cab said as it passed out over the flat desert of Arizona, heading north toward Utah. 'You appear uninjured.'

Now I understand what the drug does, she thought. Why it causes objects and people to become insubstantial. It's not so magical, and it's not merely hallucinogenic; my cut is really gone – this is no illusion. Will I remember this later on? Maybe, because of the drug, I'll forget; there never will have been a cut, after a little while longer, as the action of the drug spreads out, engulfs more and more of me.

'Do you have a pencil?' she asked the cab.

'Here miss.' From a slot in the seat-back ahead of her a tablet of paper with attached writing stylus appeared.

Carefully Kathy wrote: JJ-180 took me back to before I had a severe cut on finger. 'What day is this?' she asked the cab.

'May 18, miss.'

She tried to recall if that was correct, but now she felt muddled; it was already slipping away from her? Good thing she had written the note. Or had she written the note? On her lap the tablet lay with its stylus.

The note read: JJ-180 took me.

And that was all; the remainder dwindled into mere laboured convolutions without meaning.

And yet she knew that she had completed the sentence, whatever it had been; now she could recall it. As if by reflex she examined her hand. But how was her hand involved? 'Cab,' she said hurriedly, as she felt the balance of her personality ebbing away, 'what did I ask you just a moment ago?'

The date.'

'Before that.'

'You requested a writing implement and paper, miss.'

'Anything before that?'

The cab seemed to hesitate. But perhaps that was her imagination. 'No, miss; nothing before that.'

'Nothing about my hand?'

Now there was no doubt about it; the circuits of the cab did stall. At last it said creakily, 'No, miss.'

Thank you,' Kathy said, and sat back against the seat, rubbing her forehead and thinking. So it's confused, too. Then this is not merely subjective; there's been a genuine snarl in time, involving both me and my surroundings.

The cab said, as if in apology for its inability to assist her, 'Since the trip will be several hours, miss, would you enjoy to watch TV? It, the screen, is placed directly before you; only touch the pedal.'

Reflexively she lit the screen with the tip of her toe; it came to life at once and Kathy found herself facing a familiar image, that of their leader, Gino Molinari, in the middle of a speech.

'Is that channel satisfactory?' the cab asked, still apologetic.

'Oh sure,' she said. 'Anyhow when he gets up and rants it's on all channels. "That was the law.

And yet here, too, in this familiar spectacle, something strange absorbed her; peering at the screen, she thought, He looks younger. The way I remember him when I was a child. Ebullient, full of animation and shouting excitement, his eyes alive with that old intensity: his original self that no one has forgotten, although long since gone. However, obviously it was not long since gone; she witnessed it now with her own eyes, and was more bewildered than ever.

Is JJ-180 doing this to me? she asked herself, and got no answer.

'You enjoy to watch Mr Molinari?' the cab inquired.

'Yes,' Kathy said, 'I enjoy to watch.'

'May I hazard,' the cab said, 'that he will obtain the office for which he is running, that of UN Secretary?'

'You stupid autonomic robant machine,' Kathy said wither-ingly. 'He's been in office years now.' Running? she thought. Yes, the Mole had looked like this during his campaign, decades ago....erhaps that was what had confused the circuits of the cab. 'I apologize,' she said. 'But where the hell have you been? Parked in an autofac repair garage for twenty-two years?'

'No, miss. In active service. Your own wits, if I may say so, seem scrambled. Do you request medical assistance? We are at this moment over desert land but soon we will pass St George, Utah.'

She felt violently irritable. 'Of course I don't need medical assistance; I'm healthy.' But the cab was right. The influence of the drug was upon her full force now. She felt sick and she shut her eyes, pressing her fingers against her forehead as if to push back the expanding zone of her psychological reality, her private, subjective self. I'm scared, she realized. I feel as if my womb is about to fall out; this time it's hitting me much harder than before, it's not the same, maybe because I'm alone instead of with a group. But I'll just have to endure it. If I can.

'Miss,' the cab said suddenly, 'would you repeat my destination? I have forgotten it.' Its circuits clicked in rapid succession as if it were in mechanical distress. 'Assist me, please.'

'I don't know where you're going,' she said. That's your business; you figure it out. Just fly around, if you can't remember.' What did she care where it went? What did it have to do with her?

'It began with a C,' the cab said hopefully.

'Chicago.'

'I feel otherwise. However, if you're sure—' Its mechanism throbbed as it altered course.

You and I are both in this, Kathy realized. This drug-induced fugue. You made a mistake, Mr Corning, to give me the drug without supervision. Corning? Who was Corning?

'I know where we were going,' she said aloud. 'To Corning.'

'There is no such place,' the cab said flatly.

'There must be.' She felt panic. 'Check your data again.'

'Honestly, there isn't!'

'Then we're lost,' Kathy said, and felt resigned. 'God, this is awful. I have to be in Corning tonight, and there's no such place; what'll I do? Suggest something. I depend on you; please don't leave me to flounder like this – I feel as if I'm losing my mind.'

'I'll request administrative assistance,' the cab said. 'From top-level dispatching service at New York. Just a moment.' It was silent for a time. 'Miss, there is no top-level dispatching service at New York, or if there is, I can't raise them.'

'Is there anything at New York?'

'Radio stations, lots of them. But no TV transmissions or anything on the FM or ultra-high frequency; nothing on the band we use. Currently I am picking up a radio station which is broadcasting something entitled "Mary Marlin." A piano piece by Debussy is being played as theme.'

She knew her history; after all she was an antique collector and it was her job. 'Put it on your audio system so I can hear it,' she instructed.

A moment later she heard a female voice, retailing a wretched tale of suffering to some other female, a dreary account at best. And yet it filled Kathy with frantic excitement.

They're wrong, she thought, her mind working at its peak pitch. This won't destroy me. They forgot this era is my specialty – I know it as well as the present. There's nothing threatening or disintegrative about this experience for me; in fact it's an opportunity.

'Leave the radio on,' she told the cab. 'And just keep flying.' Attentively, she listened to the soap opera as the cab continued on.

It had – against nature and reason – become daytime. And the autonomic cab knew the impossibility of this; its voice was screechy with pain as it exclaimed to Kathy, 'On the highway below, miss! An ancient car that can't possibly exist!' It sank lower. 'See for yourself! Look!'

Gazing down, Kathy agreed, 'Yes. A 1932 Model A Ford. And I agree with you; there haven't been any Model A Fords for generations.' Rapidly and with precision she reflected, then said, 'I want you to land.'