The Minority Report and Other Classic Stories (42 page)

The turbines hummed, but Anderson did not seem to hear them; he was engrossed in staring at the controls, his eyes wide.

“Gosh,” he said.

The time-dredge passed back to the present, with Anderson still lost in his scrutiny of the controls.

Fermeti met them. “Mr. Anderson,” he said, “this is an incredible honor.” He held out his hand, but now Anderson was peering through the open hatch past him, at the city beyond; he did not notice the offered hand.

“Say,” Anderson said, his face twitching. “Um, what’s, uh, this?”

He was staring at the monorail system primarily, Tozzo decided. And this was odd, because at least in Seattle there had been monorails back in Anderson’s time… or had there been? Had that come later? In any case, Anderson now wore a massively perplexed expression.

“Individual cars,” Tozzo said, standing close beside him. “Your monorails had only group cars. Later on, after your time, it was made possible for each citizen’s house to have a monorail outlet; the individual brought his car out of its garage and onto the rail-terminal, from which point he joined the collective structure. Do you see?”

But Anderson remained perplexed; his expression in fact had deepened.

“Um,” he said, “what do you mean ‘my time’? Am I dead?” He looked morose now. “I thought it would be more along the lines of Valhalla, with Vikings and such. Not futuristic.”

“You’re not dead, Mr. Anderson,” Fermeti said. “What you’re facing is the culture-syndrome of the mid twenty-first century. I must tell you, sir, that you’ve been napped. But you will be returned; I give you both my personal and official word.”

Andersen’s jaw dropped, but he said nothing; he continued to stare.

Donald Nils, notorious murderer, sat at the single table in the reference room of the Emigration Bureau’s interstellar speed-of-light ship and computed that he was, in Earth figures, an inch high. Bitterly, he cursed. “It’s cruel and unusual punishment,” he grated aloud. “It’s against the Constitution.” And then he remembered that he had volunteered, in order to get out of Nachbaren Slager. That goddam hole, he said to himself. Anyhow, I’m out of there.

And, he said to himself, even if I’m only an inch high I’ve still made myself captain of this lousy ship, and if it ever gets to Proxima I’ll be captain of the entire lousy Proxima System. I didn’t study with Gutman himself for nothing. And if that don’t beat Nachbaren Slager, I don’t know what does…

His second-in-command, Pete Bailly, stuck his head into the reference room. “Hey, Nils, I have been looking over the micro-repro of this particular old pre-cog journal
Astounding
like you told me, this Venus Equilateral article about matter transmission, and I mean even though I was the top vid repairman in New York City that don’t mean I can build one of
these
things.” He glared at Nils. “That’s asking a lot.”

Nils said tightly, “We’ve got to get back to Earth.”

“You’re out of luck,” Bailly told him. “Better settle for Prox.”

Furiously, Nils swept the micro-reproductions from the table, onto the floor of the ship. “That damn Bureau of Emigration! They tricked us!”

Bailly shrugged. “Anyhow we got plenty to eat and a good reference library and 3-D movies every night.”

“By the time we get to Prox,” Nils snarled, “we’ll have seen every movie—” He calculated. “Two thousand times.”

“Well, then don’t watch. Or we can run them backwards. How’s your research coming?”

“I got going the micro of an article in
Space Science Fiction”
Nils said thoughtfully, “called
The Variable Man.
It tells about faster-than-light transmission. You disappear and then reappear. Sonic guy named Cole is going to perfect it, according to the old-time pre-cog who wrote it.” He brooded about that. “If we could build a faster-than-light ship we could return to Earth. We could take over.”

“That’s crazy talk,” Bailly said.

Nils regarded him. “I’m in command.”

“Then,” Bailly said, “we got a nut in command. There’s no returning to Terra; we better build our lives on Proxima’s planets and forget forever about our home. Thank God we got women aboard. My God, even if we did get back… what could one-inch high people accomplish? We’d be jeered at.”

“Nobody jeers at me,” Nils said quietly.

But he knew Bailly was right. They’d be lucky if they could research the micros of the old pre-cog journals in the ship’s reference room and develop for themselves a way of landing safely on Proxima’s planets… even
that
was asking a lot.

We’ll succeed, Nils said to himself. As long as everyone obeys me, does exactly as I tell them, with no dumb questions.

Bending, he activated the spool of the December 1962
If.
There was an article in it that particularly interested him ... and he had four years ahead of him in which to read, understand, and finally apply it.

Fermeti said, “Surely your pre-cog ability helped prepare you for this, Mr. Anderson.” His voice faltered with nervous strain, despite his efforts to control it.

“How about taking me back now?” Anderson said. He sounded almost calm.

Fermeti, after shooting a swift glance at Tozzo and Gilly, said to Anderson, “We have a technical problem, you see. That’s why we brought you here to our own time-continuum. You see—”

“I think you had better, um, take me back,” Anderson broke in. “Karen’ll get worried.” He craned his neck, peering in all directions. “I knew it would be somewhat on this order,” he murmured. His face twitched. “Not too different from what I expected… what’s that tall thing over there? Looks like what the old blimps used to catch onto.”

“That,” Tozzo said, “is a prayer tower.”

“Our problem,” Fermeti said patiently, “is dealt with in your article
Night Flight
in the August 1955
If.
We’ve been able to deprive an interstellar vehicle of its mass, but so far restoration of mass has—”

“Uh, oh, yes,” Anderson said, in a preoccupied way. “I’m working on that yarn right now. Should have that off to Scott in another couple of weeks.” He explained, “My agent.”

Fermeti considered a moment and then said, “Can you give us the formula for mass-restoration, Mr. Anderson?”

“Um,” Poul Anderson said slowly, “Yes, I guess that would be the correct term. Mass-restoration… I could go along with that.” He nodded. “I haven’t worked out any formula; I didn’t want to make the yarn too technical. I guess I could make one up, if that’s what they wanted.” He was silent, then, apparently having withdrawn into a world of his own; the three men waited, but Anderson said nothing more.

“Your pre-cog ability,” Fermeti said.

“Pardon?” Anderson said, cupping his ear. “Pre-cog?” He smiled shyly. “Oh, uh, I wouldn’t go so far as to say that. I know John believes in all that, but I can’t say as I consider a few experiments at Duke University as proof.”

Fermeti stared at Anderson a long time. “Take the first article in the January 1953
Galaxy”
he said quietly.
“The Defenders
… about the people living beneath the surface and the robots up above, pretending to fight the war but actually not, actually faking the reports so interestingly that the people—”

“I read that,” Poul Anderson agreed. “Very good, I thought, except for the ending. I didn’t care too much for the ending.”

Fermeti said, “You understand, don’t you, that those exact conditions came to pass in 1996, during World War Three? That by means of the article we were able to penetrate the deception carried on by our surface robots? That virtually every word of that article was exactly prophetic—”

“Phil Dick wrote that,” Anderson said.
“The Defenders?’

“Do you know him?” Tozzo inquired.

“Met him yesterday at the Convention,” Anderson said. “For the first time. Very nervous fellow, was almost afraid to come in.”

Fermeti said, “Am I to understand that
none of you are aware that you are pre-cogs?”
His voice shook, completely out of control now.

“Well,” Anderson said slowly, “some sf writers believe in it. I think Alf Van Vogt does,” He smiled at Fermeti.

“But don’t you understand?” Fermeti demanded. “You described
us
in an article—you accurately described our Bureau and its interstellar Project!”

After a pause, Anderson murmured, “Gosh, I’ll be darned. No, I didn’t know that. Um, thanks a lot for telling me.”

Turning to Tozzo, Fermeti said, “Obviously we’ll have to recast our entire concept of the mid twentieth century.” He looked weary.

Tozzo said, “For our purposes their ignorance doesn’t matter. Because the pre-cognitive ability was there anyhow, whether they recognized it or not.” That, to him, was perfectly clear.

Anderson, meanwhile, had wandered off a little and stood now inspecting the display window of a nearby gift store. “Interesting bric-a-brac in there. I ought to pick up something for Karen while I’m here. Would it be all right—” He turned questioningly to Fermeti. “Could I step in there for a moment and look around?”

“Yes, yes,” Fermeti said irritably.

Poul Anderson disappeared inside the gift shop, leaving the three of them to argue the meaning of their discovery.

“What we’ve got to do,” Fermeti said, “is sit him down in the situation familiar to him:
before a typewriter.
We must persuade him to compose an article on deprivation of mass and its subsequent restoration. Whether he himself takes the article to be factual or not has no bearing; it still will be. The Smithsonian must have a workable twentieth century typewriter and 8 1/2 by 11 white sheets of paper. Do you agree?”

Tozzo, meditating, said, “I’ll tell you what I think. It was a cardinal error to permit him to go into that gift shop.”

“Why is that?” Fermeti said.

“I see his point,” Gilly said excitedly. “We’ll never see Anderson again; he’s skipped out on us through the pretext of gift-shopping for his wife.”

Ashen-faced, Fermeti turned and raced into the gift ship. Tozzo and Gilly followed.

The store was empty. Anderson had eluded them; he was gone.

As he loped silently out the back door of the gift shop, Poul Anderson thought to himself, I don’t believe they’ll get me. At least not right away. I’ve got too much to do while I’m here, he realized. What an opportunity! When I’m an old man I can tell Astrid’s children about this.

Thinking of his daughter Astrid reminded him of one very simple fact, however. Eventually he had to go back to 1954. Because of Karen and the baby. No matter what he found here—for him it was temporary.

But meanwhile… first I’ll go to the library,
any
library, he decided. And get a good look at history books that’ll tell me what took place in the intervening years between 1954 and now.

I’d like to know, he said to himself, about the Cold War, how the U.S. and Russia came out. And—space explorations. I’ll bet they put a man on Luna by 1975. Certainly, they’re exploring space now; heck, they even have a time-dredge so they must have
that.

Ahead Poul Anderson saw a doorway. It was open and without hesitation he plunged into it. Another shop of some kind, but this one larger than the gift shop.

“Yes sir,” a voice said, and a bald-headed man—they all seemed to be bald-headed here—approached him. The man glanced at Anderson’s hair, his clothes… however the clerk was polite; he made no comment. “May I help you?” he asked.

“Um,” Anderson said, stalling. What did this place sell, anyhow? He glanced around. Gleaming electronic objects of some sort. But what did they do?

The clerk said, “Haven’t you been nuzzled lately, sir?”

“What’s that?” Anderson said.
Nuzzled?

“The new spring nuzzlers have arrived, you know,” the clerk said, moving toward the gleaming spherical machine nearest him. “Yes,” he said to Poul, “you do strike me as very, very faintly introve—no offense meant, sir, I mean, it’s legal to be introved.” The clerk chuckled. “For instance, your rather odd clothing… made it yourself, I take it? I must say, sir, to make your own clothing is highly introve. Did you weave it?” The clerk grimaced as if tasting something bad.

“No,” Poul said, “as a matter of fact it’s my best suit.”

“Heh, heh,” the clerk said. “I share the joke, sir; quite witty. But what about your head? You haven’t shaved your head in
weeks.”

“Nope,” Anderson admitted. “Well, maybe I do need a nuzzler.” Evidently everyone in this century had one; like a TV set in his own time, it was a necessity, in order for one to be part of the culture.

“How many in your family?” the clerk said. Bringing out a measuring tape, he measured the length of Poul’s sleeve.

“Three,” Poul answered, baffled.

“How old is the youngest?”

“Just born,” Poul said.

The clerk’s face lost all its color. “Get out of here,” he said quietly. “Before I call for the polpol.”

“Um, what’s that? Pardon?” Poul said, cupping his ear and trying to hear, not certain he had understood.

“You’re a criminal,” the clerk mumbled. “You ought to be in Nachbaren Slager.”

“Well, thanks anyhow,” Poul said, and backed out of the store, onto the sidewalk; his last glimpse was of the clerk still staring at him.

“Are you a foreigner?” a voice asked, a woman’s voice. At the curb she had halted her vehicle. It looked to Poul like a bed; in fact, he realized, it was a bed. The woman regarded him with astute calm, her eyes dark and intense. Although her glistening shaved head somewhat upset him, he could see that she was attractive.

“I’m from another culture,” Poul said, finding himself unable to keep his eyes from her figure. Did all the women dress like this here in this society? Bare shoulders, he could understand. But not—

And the bed. The combination of the two was too much for him. What kind of business was she in, anyhow? And in public. What a society this was… morals had changed since his own time.