The Tomorrow File (81 page)

“Who made the take?” he asked.

“I did,” the red zipsuited lieutenant said. “Object’s name: Nicholas Bennington Flair.” She slapped down the warrant. “On authority of the Chief Prosecutor.”

The yellow em behind the grille turned to a data processing machine and began to type. Talking as he served.

“Flair, Nicholas Bennington. Warrant BPS-91641-99G. BIN card and ID, please.”

I fished them out again, handed them over. He slid them into an electronic verifier, then typed out the numbers on his report.

“Personal property?” he asked.

One of the black zipsuits handed over my attache case. It was unlocked. The yellow pawed through it swiftly.

“One attache case of papers, reports, magazines. Empty your pockets, please.”

I dumped everything onto the counter. He began to sort it.

“One ring of keys. One pigskin wallet containing forty-six dollars in bills, three credit cards, and assorted membership cards. One handkerchief, white. Thirty-eight cents in change. One digiwatch, silver finish, marked ‘Loxa.’ One black comb, pocket size. One container of white spansules. Correct?”

“Correct,” I said.

“Dentures or prosthetic devices?” he asked.

“None,” I said.

“Object is assigned number 4 dash 618 dash 99,” he said.

“Sign the receipt, please,” the ef lieutenant asked the yellow.

They exchanged and countersigned papers. She waited until he had typed up an inventory of my personal possessions in quadruplicate. I signed all copies. She signed all copies. He signed all copies.

The BPS servers waited patiently until two objects appeared in the corridor. Coming toward us. Heels clicking. Their images were distorted by the stainless steel walls and polished floor. Two big ems. White hospital garb.

“Right,” the red zipsuit said. When they had taken their places on each side of me. “That does it.”

“Thank you, lieutenant,” I said.

“Thank
you,
sir,” she said.

I was taken to a room in the back of the ward, on the ground floor. White desk, chair, metal detector, electronic monitors. The obso ef behind the desk, wearing a nurse’s uniform, looked up when I entered with my guards.

“Flair,” one of them said. “Nicholas Bennington: 4 dash 618 dash 99.”

“Undress, please,” she said to me. “Everything. Including shoes.” I stripped naked. All my clothing was folded neatly, put into a white metal box labeled with my number. A receipt was typed out in quadruplicate. We all signed all copies.

I was given a cursory medical examination. Blood pressure, heart, temperature.

“Step through the frame, please,” she said.

I stepped through. Nothing buzzed. She moved an electronic wand around my head, back, legs, arms. She looked into my ears with a lighted probe. Examined my armpits. Tapped my teeth lightly with a little hammer. Felt my scalp and beard, fingers prying under the hair.

“Bend over and spread your buttocks, please,” she said.

I did so. She explored my rectum with a rubbered finger.

“Shower,” she said.

They took me through a clear glass door into an adjoining room. I stepped into a tiled shower stall. No projections inside. No curtain. One of the guards turned a knob. A hot germicidal spray.

“Scrub your hair,” one of the guards shouted. “On your head, chest, armpits, nuts, and ass.”

I did as directed.

The water was finally turned off. They motioned me out onto a plastirub mat before a panel of infrared lamps. By the time I was reasonably dry, beginning to sweat, they had ready a pair of paper slippers and a one-piece paper suit. Styled like a zipsuit but closed with strips of paper tape.

They took me out into the corridor again. I shuffled along, trying to keep the heelless slippers on my feet. Trying not to trip on the long cuffs of the paper suit. They stopped me before a bank of elevators.

One of them pressed a button and leaned forward to speak into a small microphone inset in the tile wall.

“Pearson and Fleming,” he said loudly. “Coming up. We have one: 4 dash 618 dash 99.”

Then both guards turned and stared at a small closed-circuit TV camera mounted near the ceiling.

A loudspeaker clicked on.

“You are cleared to Three. Room 317.”

An elevator door opened. We stepped inside. Another TV camera. The door closed. We went up. Door opened. We stepped out to face a white-clad guard sitting in the corridor behind a desk surmounted by a battery of TV monitor screens.

"Pearson and Fleming, " one of the guards reported: "4 dash 618 dash 99 to Room 317.”

The seated guard looked at his teleprinter.

“All correct,” he said.

We moved to the left until we came up to a gate of steel bars. And another TV camera. We stood there a moment. Then the barred door slid sideways. Into the wall. We walked down the corridor. I • heard the gate thud shut behind us.

We walked to where another guard waited outside a dosed door. He held a clamp pad of teletype duplicates.

“Four dash 618 dash 99,” one of my guards told him.

The em outside the door looked at me.

“Name?” he said. “Last name first, followed by first and middle names.”

“Flair, Nicholas Bennington,” I said.

“All correct, " he told my guards. Then made a small checkmark on his pad.

He withdrew a ring of magnetic keys from his pocket. He unlocked the door. Room 317. They all stood aside. I entered. The door was closed and locked behind me. It looked like painted wood, with a small panel of clear glass. But when they clanged it shut, I knew it was steel.

I took a few steps into the sunlit room and looked about.

“Good afternoon, Dr. Flair,” a metallic voice said. “How are you feeling?”

I wish to go on record as stating that during the approximately six weeks I spent in Room 317, Public Security Ward, Hospice No. 4, Alexandria, Virginia, I was not physically abused or maltreated. I was provided with a fresh paper suit and paper slippers every week. The food brought to my room was plentiful, though bland. For some bureaucratic reason, I was not allowed salt, pepper, or any other seasonings. Although I requested them.

My sleep was never deliberately disturbed, and I was furnished with most of the scanning material I asked for. I was not allowed newspapers, news magazines, radio, television, a watch or clock, or a calendar. Nor was I allowed Somnorifics or any other drugs. However, during the fourth week, I contracted a very mild viral infection, and the nurse who had conducted my initial examination arrived to administer an injection. She would not tell me what it was, but it served excellently; I recovered fully within three days.

That was the only medication I received during my stay. Of course, it was possible that my food was drugged. Or even the water flowing from the tap in the small nest attached to Room 317. But several times a week I conducted a self-examination. Taking my pulse and testing muscular and visual coordination. I never found even a hint of covert drug administration. It was operative that shortly before, during, and for a brief period following my interrogations in the Cooperation Room, pulse rate increased. But
this
was undoubtedly due to a stimulated adrenalin flow, and was to be expected under the circumstances.

I exercised, faithfully, in Room 317. An hour after awakening and an hour before sleep. I practiced Yoga, isometrics, and my own version of T’ai Chi Ch’uan. In place of Somnorifics, I used selfhypnosis, alpha, and transcendental meditation. I would say that, during the six weeks of my stay, my physical health was excellent.

The objects with whom I came in contact were remarkably few. The morning guard who brought me breakfast, took me to and from the first interrogative session of the day, and who brought me lunch, was a hulking but pleasant em who said his name was Horwitz. The afternoon guard who took me to and from the second interrogative session of the day, and brought my evening meal, was a squat, muscled ef who said her name was Kineally. I called her “Princess.” She liked that.

And of course, I was on nodding acquaintance with several corridor guards, head guards who watched the TV monitors outside the elevator bank, and the gate guards. I never learned any of their names. Some were polite, some were not. But there was no physical brutality. Never. At least not to me. And none that I personally witnessed. On several nights I was awakened by screams coming from nearby rooms. But they may have been the results of nightmares. It was possible.

I masturbated twice a week, on Tuesday mornings and Friday nights. Usually I slept soundly and woke refreshed. The scanning material that was provided kept my brain active and inquiring. When I wanted surcease from purely cerebral computing, I imagined what the objects looked like who spoke to me. The two Voices.

Voice No. 1 spoke to me only in Room 317. The loudspeaker was concealed behind a ceiling air-conditioning vent. This Voice was concerned with my physical well-being and daily routine. Had I slept well? Did I require anything special in the way of relaxation? A paper chess set perhaps? Were my bowel movements regular? And so forth. I was able to respond to these questions merely by speaking into the air. A sensitive microphone, probably concealed in the same vent, picked up every tone, whisper, belch, fart. As far as I could determine, Voice No. 1 was on duty 24 hours a day.

I recall once, awakening at what I judged to be about 0300,1 said, into the air, “Are you there?”

Voice No. 1 came back: “I am here.”

It was the Voice of Room 317. I never heard it anywhere else. I had little doubt that Voice No. 1 had me under constant surveillance. Through mirrors inset into the walls of the bedroom and nest. Even my masturbation was shared, although Voice No. 1 never alluded to it. The two-way mirrors were the only decorations in the small area. The furnishings were one bed, one chair, one desk. The toilet in the nest was seatless. The sink had recessed fixtures. As did the shower stall. I was supplied liquid soap, in small amounts, in a plastic container. The single tumbler was soft plastic. Impossible to slit wrists or throat with that. Toilet paper was supplied to me each week in thin pads. Along with paper sheets, pillowcases, and a paper towel. I controlled the air conditioning and heating in the room via a thermostat, and the illumination via a rheostat. Although the overhead light could never be completely extinguished.

“You’ve got the VIP Suite,” the Princess told me. “You should see some of the others.”

“I can imagine,” I said.

“No,” she said. “You can’t.”

Voice No. 1 intrigued me. Androgynous. At times it was definitely emish: heavy throatiness and deep overtones. Other times it was efish, almost flutey. It could be both in the same sentence. Running back and forth, soprano to baritone. The effect was not displeasing, but I could not believe it was a natural voice. I computed it might be the voice of someone I knew, a voice I might identify, and so it was being electronically distorted.

During my second week in Room 317,1 asked Voice No. 1, “Are you ef or em?”

The answer came back: “Yes.” Followed by a brief laugh of such a variety of tones that I became absolutely convinced Voice No. 1 was being filtered and amplified. For what reason other than that stated above, I could not guess.

Voice No. 2, that of the Interrogator, was definitely an em’s voice. I heard it only in the Cooperation Room. It was beautiful. Deep, resonant, with a booming, organlike quality. A diapason there. Never less than harmonious. With a unique, echoing quality. It was only later that I began to detect a fruity, actorish dissonance.

I was taken to the Cooperation Room twice a day. At times I computed as being approximately 1000 and 1400. During the first two weeks, sessions were quite brief. A half-hour or so, I reckoned. Later, I spent two full hours in the morning and two in the afternoon. This regimen was, obviously, structured.

One fact I have neglected to mention: I never saw any objects but the guards. Although I was certain the other rooms on the third floor were occupied. On my short trips down the corridor to the Cooperation Room, I heard sounds of movement behind locked doors. Once I heard singing. Once I heard an ef’s voice reciting Shakespeare: “Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow.. . .” And frequently I smelled things in the corridor. Smells of objects. Sweat. Feces. Other things. So I knew I was not alone on the third floor, although it seemed so.

The Cooperation Room to which I was taken for my daily interrogations (seven days a week) was located in my wing of the Public Security Ward; it was not necessary to pass through any of the barred gates in the corridor to get there. It was a long, narrow room, soundproofed with white plastibest panels. There was a small mirrored panel set into each of the walls. For surveillance and filming, I presumed. The Interrogator’s voice came from an overhead ventilation duct, as in Room 317, and I answered by speaking into the air. In a normal tone of voice.

During my interrogative sessions, the room contained only an enameled steel table, about card-table size, and a single plastilume chair. Both of these were immovable. Bolted to the floor. The chair so close to the table that I had to bend my knees and sidle into the seat. I noted several other ringbolts, steel loops, and small steel boxes set into the polished floor. Around the room, at baseboard level, were many electrical outlets and small connections that looked like electronic jacks. None of these were used during my sessions. Illumination came from rose-tinted fluorescent fixtures on the ceiling. Not an especially pleasant light, but not too annoying.

I had an impression that, for each session, the Cooperation Room had been hastily prepared for my interrogation shortly before my arrival. Frequently the floor showed damp patches: evidence of recent mopping or flushing. Once I noted a reddish-brown stain on the floor directly under my table, missed by the cleaning server. Invariably, when I entered the room, I smelled artificial pine. The air had obviously been sprayed heavily with a scented deodorant.

On our first exchange, I learned the Interrogator was humorless.