Second Variety and Other Stories (20 page)

"Erickson and I talked a long time. 'For God's sake!' I told him. 'I was just up.' 'I know that,
Bob,' he said, 'I'm sorry as hell about it but there's nothing I can do. We're all in the same boat. Anyhow,
it won't last long. Might as well get it over with. It's the Martian situation. They're all hot and bothered
about it.' That's what he said. He was nice about it. Erickson's a pretty good guy for a Sector Organizer."

Bob looked at his watch. "I have to get down to the field by noon. Gives me three hours."

"When will you be back?"

"Oh, I should be back in a couple of days -- if everything goes all right. You know how these
things are. It varies. Remember last October when I was gone a whole week? But that's unusual. They
rotate the groups so fast now you're practically back before you start."

Tommy came strolling in from the kitchen. "What's up, Dad?" He noticed the uniform. "Say, your
group up again?"

"That's right."

Tommy grinned from ear to ear, a delighted teenage grin. "You going to get in on the Martian
business? I was following it over the vidscreen. Those Martians look like a bunch of dry weeds tied
together in a bundle. You guys sure ought to be able to blow them apart."

Bob laughed, whacking his son on the back. "You tell 'em, Tommy."

"I sure wish I was coming."

Bob's expression changed. His eyes became hard like gray flint. "No, you don't, kid. Don't say
that."

There was an uncomfortable silence.

"I didn't mean anything," Tommy muttered.

Bob laughed easily. "Forget it. Now all of you clear out so I can change."

Joan and Tommy left the room. The door slid shut. Bob dressed swiftly, tossing his robe and
pajamas on the bed and pulling his dark green uniform around him. He laced his boots up and then
opened the door.

Joan had got his suitcase from the hall closet. "You'll want this, won't you?" she asked.

"Thanks." Bob picked up the suitcase. "Let's go out to the car." Tommy was already absorbed at
the vidscreen, beginning his schoolwork for the day. A biology lesson moved slowly across the screen.

Bob and Joan walked down the front steps and along the path to their surface car, parked at the
edge of the road. The door opened as they approached. Bob threw his suitcase inside and sat down
behind the wheel.

"Why do we have to fight the Martians?" Joan asked suddenly. "Tell me, Bob. Tell me why."

Bob lit a cigarette. He let the gray smoke drift around the cabin of the car. "Why? You know as
well as I do." He reached out a big hand and thumped the handsome control board of the car. "Because
of this."

"What do you mean?"

"The control mechanism needs rexeroid. And the only rexeroid deposits in the whole system are
on Mars. If we lose Mars we lose this." He ran his hand over the gleaming control board. "And if we lose
this how are we going to get around? Answer me that."

"Can't we go back to manual steering?"

"We could ten years ago. But ten years ago we were driving less than a hundred miles per hour.
No human being could steer at the speeds these days. We couldn't go back to manual steering without
slowing down our pace."

"Can't we do that?"

Bob laughed. "Sweetheart, it's ninety miles from here to town. You really think I could keep my
job if I had to drive the whole way at thirty-five miles an hour? I'd be on the road all my life."

Joan was silent.

"You see, we must have the darn stuff -- the rexeroid. It makes our control equipment possible.
We depend on it. We need it. We must keep mining operations going on Mars. We can't afford to let the

Martians get the rexeroid deposits away from us. See?"

Martians get the rexeroid deposits away from us. See?"

"Darling, the walls of our houses wouldn't maintain an even temperature without kyron. Kryon is
the only non-living substance in the system that adjusts itself to temperature changes. Why, we'd -- we'd
all have to go back to floor furnaces again. Like my grandfather had."

"And the year before it was lonolite from Pluto."

"Lonolite is the only substance known that can be used in constructing the memory banks of the
calculators. It's the only metal with true retentive ability. Without lonolite we'd lose all our big computing
machines. And you know how far we'd get without them."

"All right."

"Sweetheart, you know I don't want to go. But I have to. We all have to." Bob waved toward
the house. "Do you want to give that up? You want to go back to the old ways?"

"No." Joan moved away from the car. "All right, Bob. I'll see you in a day or two then?"

"I hope so. This trouble should be over soon. Most of the New York groups are being called.
The Berlin and Oslo groups are already there. It shouldn't take long."

"Good luck."

"Thanks." Bob closed the door. The motor started up automatically. "Say goodbye to Tommy for
me."

The car drove off, gaining speed, the automatic control board guiding it expertly into the main
stream of traffic flowing down the highway. Joan watched until the car blended with the endless tide of
flashing metal hulls, racing across the countryside in a bright ribbon toward the distant city. Then she went
slowly back inside the house.

Bob never came back from Mars, so in a manner of speaking, Tommy became the man of the
house. Joan got a release from school for him and after a while he began work as a lab technician at the
Government Research Project a few miles down the road.

Bryan Erickson, the Sector Organizer, stopped one evening to see how they were getting along.
"Nice little place you have here," Erickson said, wandering around.

Tommy swelled with pride. "Sure is, isn't it? Sit down and make yourself comfortable."

"Thanks." Erickson peered into the kitchen. The kitchen was in the process of putting out a meal
for the evening dinner. "Quite a kitchen."

Tommy came up beside him. "See that unit there on top of the stove?"

"What's it do?"

"It's a selector on the kitchen. It sets up a new combination every day. We don't have to figure
out what to eat."

"Amazing." Erickson glanced at Tommy. "You seem to be doing all right."

Joan looked up from the vidscreen. "As well as could be expected." Her voice was toneless, flat.

Erickson grunted. He walked back into the living-room. "Well, I guess I'll be running along."

"What did you come for?" Joan asked.

"Nothing in particular, Mrs Clarke." Erickson hesitated by the door, a big man, red-faced, in his
late thirties. "Oh, there was one thing."

"What is it?" Her voice was emotionless.

"Tom, have you made out your Sector Unit card?"

"My Sector Unit card!"

"According to law you're supposed to be registered as part of this sector --my sector." He
reached in his pocket. "I have a few blank cards with me."

"Gee!" Tommy said, a little frightened. "So soon? I thought it wasn't until I got to be eighteen."

"They've changed the ruling. We took quite a beating on Mars. Some of the sectors can't fill their
quotas. Have to dig deeper from now on." Erickson grinned good-naturedly. "This is a good sector, you
know. We have a lot of fun drilling and trying out the new equipment. I finally got Washington to consign
us a whole squadron of the new double-jet small fighters. Each man in my sector gets the use of a

us a whole squadron of the new double-jet small fighters. Each man in my sector gets the use of a

Tommy's eyes lit up. "Really?"

"In fact the user gets to bring the fighter home over the weekend. You can park it on your lawn."

"No kidding?" Tommy sat down at the desk. He filled the Unit card out happily.

"Yes, we have a pretty good time," Erickson murmured.

"Between wars," Joan said quietly.

"What's that, Mrs Clarke?"

"Nothing."

Erickson accepted the filled-out card. He put it away in his wallet. "By the way," he said.

Tommy and Joan turned toward him.

"I guess you've been seeing the gleco-war on the vidscreen. I guess you know all about that."

"The gleco-war?"

"We get all our gleco from Callisto. It's made from the hides of some kind of animal. Well, there's
been a little trouble with the natives. They claim --"

"What is a gleco?" Joan said tightly.

"That's the stuff that makes your front door open for you only. It's sensitive to your pressure
pattern. Gleco is made from these animals."

There was silence, the kind you can cut with a knife.

"I guess I'll be going." Erickson moved toward the door. "We'll see you the next training session,
Tom. Right?" He opened the door.

"Right," Tommy murmured.

"Goodnight." Erickson left, closing the door after him.

"But I have to go!" Tommy exclaimed.

"Why?"

"The whole sector is going. It's required."

Joan stared out the window. "It isn't right."

"But if I don't go we'll lose Callisto. And if we lose Callisto..."

"I know. Then we'll have to go back to carrying door keys. Like our grandfathers did."

"That's right." Tommy stuck out his chest, turning from side to side. "How do I look?"

Joan said nothing.

"How do I look? Do I look all right?"

Tommy looked fine in his deep green uniform. He was slim and straight, much better looking than
Bob. Bob had been gaining weight. His hair had been thinning. Tommy's hair was thick and black. His
cheeks were flushed with excitement, his blue eyes flashing. He pulled his helmet in place, snapping the
strap.

"Okay?" he demanded.

Joan nodded. "Fine."

"Kiss me goodbye. I'm off to Callisto. I'll be back in a couple of days."

"Goodbye."

"You don't sound very happy."

"I'm not," Joan said. "I'm not very happy."

Tommy came back from Callisto all right but during the trektone-war on Europa something went
wrong with his double-jet small fighter and the Sector Unit came back without him.

"Trektone," Bryan Erickson explained, "is used in vidscreen tubes. It's very important, Joan."

"I see."

"You know what the vidscreen means. Our whole education and information come over it. The
kids learn from it. They get their schooling. And in the evening we use the pleasure-channels for
entertainment. You don't want us to have to go back to --"

"No, no -- of course not. I'm sorry." Joan waved a signal and the coffee table slid into the
living-room, bearing a pot of steaming coffee. "Cream? Sugar?"

"No, no -- of course not. I'm sorry." Joan waved a signal and the coffee table slid into the
living-room, bearing a pot of steaming coffee. "Cream? Sugar?"

"Any news from the various fronts?" Joan asked after a while, leaning back and smoothing down
her skirt.

"The fronts?" Erickson considered. "Well, some new developments in the iderium-war."

"Where is that?"

"Neptune. We get our iderium from Neptune."

"What is iderium used for?" Joan's voice was thin and remote as if she were a long way off. Her
face had a pinched look, a kind of strained whiteness. As if a mask had settled into place and remained,
a mask through which she looked from a great distance.

"All the newspaper machines require iderium," Erickson explained. "Iderium lining makes it
possible for them to detect events as they occur and flash them over the vidscreen. Without iderium we'd
have to go back to reporting news and writing it up by hand. That would introduce the personal bias.
Slanted news. The iderium news machines are impartial."

Joan nodded. "Any other news?"

"Not much more. They say some trouble might be going to break out on Mercury."

"What do we get from Mercury?"

"That's where our ambroline comes from. We use ambroline in all kinds of selector units. In your
kitchen -- the selector you have in there. The meal selector that sets up the food combinations. That's an
ambroline unit."

Joan gazed vacantly into her coffee cup. "The natives on Mercury -- they're attacking us?"

"There's been some riots, agitation, that sort of thing. Some Sector Units have been called out
already. The Paris unit and the Moscow unit. Big units, I believe."

After a time, Joan said, "You know, Bryan, I can tell you came here with something on your
mind."

"Oh, no. Why do you say that?"

"I can tell. What is it?"

Erickson flushed, his good-natured face red. "You're pretty acute, Joan. As a matter of fact I did
come for something."

"What is it?"

Erickson reached into his coat and brought out a folded mimeographed paper. He passed it to
Joan. "It isn't my idea, understand. I'm just a cog in a big machine." He chewed his lip nervously. "It's
because of the heavy losses in the trektone-war. They need to close ranks. They're up against it, so I
hear."

"What does all this mean?" Joan passed the paper back. "I can't make out all this legal wording."

"Well, it means women are going to be admitted into Sector Units in the -- in the absence of male
members of the family."

"Oh. I see."

Erickson got up quickly, relieved that his duty had been done. "I guess I'll have to run along now.
I wanted to bring this over and show it to you. They're handing them out all along the line." He stuck the
paper away in his coat again. He looked very tired.

"It doesn't leave very many people, does it?"

"How do you mean?"

"Men first. Then children. Now women. It seems to take in everybody, just about."