Total Recall (6 page)

The door opened and a birdlike middle-aged woman entered. She wore a stylish pants suit that didn’t do enough for her. Her body was too skinny and her hair too red. This was an artificial woman in the bad sense: she was trying to make herself look competent and successful, and succeeding mainly in making herself look ungainly.

“Good evening, Mr . . .” She paused to check the video chart, obviously at a loss for his name. She found it. “Quaid, I’m Dr. Lull.” She spoke with a Swedish accent, and treated him with an impersonal conviviality that would have grated had he not been sedated.

“Pleased to meet you,” he said insincerely.

The amenities over, Dr. Lull donned a surgical smock, then flipped through Quaid’s computer chart. “Ernie, patch in matrix 62b, 37, and—” She looked at Quaid. “Would you like to integrate some alien stuff?”

“Two-headed monsters?” he asked doubtfully.

She laughed with something approaching actual feeling. “Don’t you keep up with the news? We’re doing alien artifacts these days.”

Oh. “Sure. Why not?” The notion intrigued him. Maybe that was one reason he was so interested in Mars. He hoped to explore, to discover the remnants of some vast lost alien complex, superscience, stun the world with the discovery, bathe in the notoriety of his achievement . . .

Dr. Lull tossed the matrix to Ernie. That suggested what she thought of such notions: just a bit of fiction on a cartridge.

“You got it,” Ernie said.

As Ernie plugged in the proper cartridges, Dr. Lull fastened straps over Quaid’s arms, legs, and torso to hold the rest of him securely in place. This alarmed him slightly; did they think he was going to go into convulsions?

“Been married long, Mr. Quaid?” Dr. Lull inquired, actually seeming interested. Maybe a woman of her contours was attuned to the notion of being married, having trouble achieving it.

“Eight years.” That surprised him as he heard himself answer. Oh, it was true—but he realized that Lori still looked no older than twenty-five. She had aged hardly a whit; his mental picture of her on the day of their marriage was unchanged from his memory of her session with him this morning. Odd that he hadn’t noticed this before. Not that it bothered him; he’d be happy to have her keep her appearance for the next forty years.

Yet even so, that woman of his Mars dream—how old was she? Not out of her twenties, surely.

“Slipping away for a little hanky-panky?” Dr. Lull asked, licking her lips. She was definitely interested in the subject; her tone was positive rather than condemning.

Quaid realized that even unattractive middle-aged women had dreams. She was indulging in hers by playing a muted verbal footsie with him, perhaps picturing herself in bed with him just the way he pictured himself in bed with any young and sexy woman he encountered. For the first time he realized that this sort of fancy might be an imposition on the other party, even when unvoiced. At times he had bantered with a young woman, only to have her turn away as if affronted, when he hadn’t meant anything by it. Now, picturing himself as the object of Dr. Lull’s lust—himself strapped down in this chair while she slowly stripped off his clothes and handled him in whatever way might titillate her—he understood the woman’s side of it. He did not care to be victimized by her imagination. “Not really,” he replied shortly.

“All systems go,” Ernie said.

Dr. Lull was all business again. “Good. Then we’re all set.” She stepped on a lever, and the back of Quaid’s chair lowered to a fully reclining position. “Ready for dreamland?”

Quaid nodded. It suddenly occurred to him that the helmet might have been reading his thoughts all this time. Did she know what he had been thinking about her? He hoped not!

She reached to the tubing and opened the IV drip. Quaid was startled again; he had thought it was already on! Had all that relaxation been strictly imagination?

“I’ll be asking you a few questions, Mr. Quaid,” Dr. Lull continued, “so we can fine-tune the wish-fulfillment program. Please be completely honest.”

Not likely!
But he was sure he could handle her questions, which wouldn’t approach his secret thoughts.

Now he really was beginning to feel the effect of the anesthetic. He wasn’t floating, he was sinking. His mental barriers were descending; he no longer cared if she knew his opinion of her.

Dr. Lull did not ask a question immediately. Instead she checked his vital signs. She was being careful with his health; that much he appreciated. That business about a poor sap getting lobotomized had bothered him; he didn’t want any such accident.

Now she was set. “Your sexual orientation?”

Easy! “Hetero.” She was just zeroing him in, making sure his reactions aligned with their indications.

She nodded. “Now take a look at this monitor.”

He gazed drowsily at a vague female outline on a computer screen he hadn’t noticed before.

“How do you prefer your women?” she asked. “Blonde, brunette, redhead, Negro, Oriental?”

“Brunette.” But Lori was a blonde. It was the Mars-woman who was brunette. Still, it was the truth—more than he hoped the doctor realized. There was no doubt that Lori was all that a man could ask for. Did his reservation about her stem solely from the color of her hair? He would have to think about that, when he had time to think without being spied on.

He heard soft typing to the side. That would be Ernie, putting the specs into the system. The schematic image adjusted to match Quaid’s taste: the woman became brunette, with dark hair, dark eyes, and a slightly olive skin. Not quite like the one in his dream, but he didn’t care to have that match perfectly. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was just that some things were too private to be programmed. Maybe it was that he didn’t want his true dream woman distorted by an artificial memory. Let this be some other woman, similar, but not so close as to be confusing. The memory might not be as nice, but caution was best.

“Slim, curvaceous, voluptuous?” Dr. Lull asked crisply.

He was really getting sleepy now! That stuff in the IV didn’t fool around. “Volupshus.”

“Demure, aggressive, wanton? Be honest.”

Why shouldn’t he be honest? Well, there was a reason, but he couldn’t quite recall it at the moment. “Wanton . . . and demure.” Let them wrestle with that conflicting matchup!

“41A, Ernie.”

So much for conflict! Maybe if he wasn’t so sleepy he’d have been able to mess them up a little. As it was, he had spoken true, with someone in mind even though he had thought to keep her a bit removed.

He was vaguely aware of Ernie slipping cassette 41A into his console. The computer image became a schematic version of the woman in Quaid’s dream. The likeness was so close it was startling.

Oh, no! Did they know? They couldn’t! Yet—

“Boy, is he gonna have a wild time,” Ernie chortled. “Won’t wanna come back.”

Quaid faded out. He was on his way, wherever.

CHAPTER  7
Problem

M
cClane was interviewing another prospective client, a lonely middle-aged woman. These were fairly common customers; women seemed to have more suppressed dreams than men, and to be more depressive. They weren’t necessarily poor, either, just tired of being stuck at home while their husbands got all the action. What he offered was ideal for them.

“So you see, Mrs. Killdeer, we really can remember it for you wholesale. This will be the best experience you ever had!”

“But there won’t be any souvenirs,” she complained.

“Not true,” McClane said earnestly. “For just a few credits more, we supply postcards, photographs of you at the sights,
letters
from the handsome men you met—”

The videophone rang, interrupting him. Damn! He’d told them not to do that when he was closing a deal. He activated the ’phone and Dr. Lull appeared on the screen.

“Bob?” she asked. Her voice was tense. “You better get down here.”

McClane rolled his eyes in the full view of Mrs. Killdeer, as if in league with the customer against the company. It was hardly an exaggeration; good sales were not all that common, and he hated to have his clincher speech messed up. “I’m with a very important client.”

“Looks like another schizoid embolism,” Dr. Lull said.

McClane was shocked. Worse, so was Mrs. Killdeer.
She understood the reference!
This was all too likely to cost him two clients: Quaid and Killdeer. What an awful break!

He stood and attempted a reassuring smile. “I’ll be right back.”

But he very much feared she would not be there when he returned. Damn, damn, damn!

He strode out of the sales office and down the hall to the rear memory studio. The fools, to interrupt him with an announcement like that, in the hearing of a client! He was going to kick some ass! Did Renata Lull think she could pull a stunt like this and—

But as he entered the studio he pulled up short, his ire forgotten. He stood appalled at what was happening.

The client, Douglas Quaid, had gone crazy. He was shouting and thrashing about in the chair, struggling violently to break the straps that held him down. He was a powerful man—just how powerful McClane hadn’t properly appreciated before—and the IV connection was in danger of being separated. Indeed, the whole chair was rocking. What had happened? An adverse reaction to the sedative?

Quaid was like a different person. He wasn’t crazed so much as enraged. His eyes were flinty, and his voice was cold and menacing. “You’re dead meat, all of you!” he shouted with perfect clarity. “You blew my cover!”

Dr. Lull and Ernie were cowering against the far wall, trying to keep a safe distance from the struggling man. But McClane had had more experience with cases gone bad; they were more common than he allowed the records to show. Every client was an individual, with different synapses and reactions; there were bound to be some mismatches.

“What the fuck is going on here?” McClane demanded, aggravated. “You can’t install a simple goddamn double implant?!” Politeness was for prospective clients, not for errant employees.

“It’s not my fault,” Dr. Lull protested. “We hit a memory cap.”

“Untie me, you assholes!” Quaid roared. “They’ll be here any minute! They’ll kill you all!”

Huh? “What’s he talking about?” McClane snapped.

“Stop this operation
now!
” Quaid yelled.

How could the guy be talking so clearly? A reaction-induced berserker might scream and froth at the mouth, but his words would be mostly blasphemy and gibberish. Quaid sounded alarmingly coherent. “Mr. Quaid, please calm down,” McClane said, trying to be soothing. Maybe they could change the mix, get him sedated all the way down, then explore the problem. A memory cap? Who would have expected that!

“I’m not Quaid!”

Multiple personality? That just might account for this, and react like a memory cap, because of the memory taken by the alternate personalities. But Lull should have caught that! McClane nervously walked closer to examine Quaid’s eyes.

“You’re having a reaction to the implant,” he said, though he was by no means sure of that. Anything to get this thing muscled down so they could work their way out of it! “But in a few minutes—”

Quaid strained again at his bonds. Suddenly the strap holding his right arm snapped. That arm shot up and grabbed McClane by the throat. What devastating power the man had!

“Untie me.” Quaid’s words were softly spoken now, but the quiet menace was all too apparent.

McClane, choking, tried to pry Quaid’s hand from his neck. But even his two hands couldn’t loosen the iron grip. Construction workers had strong arms; he had known that. Why hadn’t he told them to double the straps? He was going to faint before he could even talk!

Ernie came out of his stasis. He rushed over and tried to wrestle Quaid’s arm down, using his full body weight. He might as well have pushed against the branch of an oak tree. McClane felt his consciousness wavering as he struggled unsuccessfully to breathe.

Dr. Lull hastily readied a syringe gun and frantically jabbed it into Quaid’s thigh. She fired dose after dose of narkidrine, until the man finally released his grip and passed out.

McClane fell to the floor, gagging, the studio and the world reeling. Ernie clung to him, managing to slow his fall.

Dr. Lull came over to help. “Are you all right?” she asked anxiously, putting a hand down to check his forehead.

McClane shoved her hand away and gasped for breath. What a mess this was!

“Listen to me!” Dr. Lull said urgently. “He’s been going on and on about Mars.” Now it was evident that she was genuinely frightened. “He’s really
been
there!”

The world slowly ground down and fell into its proper place, but McClane still felt the pressure of those terrible fingers against his throat. He was bruised, for sure, but lucky it was no worse. What a monster! “Use your fucking head, you dumb bitch!” he rasped. “He’s acting out the secret agent role from his Ego Trip! You should have strapped him securely enough to hold him, so that when he thought—”

“That’s not possible,” Lull said coolly. She didn’t like strong language, but this time her carelessness had invited disaster.

“Why not?” he inquired condescendingly. She wasn’t going to get away with any pseudo-medical jargon to talk her way out of this foul-up!

“We haven’t implanted it yet.”

McClane stared at her, his oncoming retort abruptly stifled. “Oh, shit . . .” Suddenly he was terrified. No implant? And the man had been talking about an actual Mars experience? This was no longer weird, it was dangerous!

“I’ve been trying to tell you,” Dr. Lull said significantly. “Somebody erased his memory.
The man really has been to Mars!
And that’s not all—”

“Somebody?” Ernie cried hysterically: “We’re talking the fucking Agency!”

“Shut up!” Dr. Lull slapped him. The stinging blow stunned them all into silence.

McClane tried to think. But how could he think about the unthinkable? The mess they had walked into made a schizoid embolism look like an eyestrain headache. Because it looked like Ernie was right: the memory cap must have been implanted by the Agency. No one else had the technology. And everyone, from heads of state to the lowliest rockrats in the Martian mines, knew that interfering with the Agency’s plans could have serious, not to mention fatal, results. He didn’t have to be an Einstein to figure out that blowing an operative’s cover, even by accident, would qualify as major interference.