Before any of them had a chance to trace the communication, which had certainly not come from Marc Remillard, a nearly invisible door in the far wall slid open and a dapper individual of small stature, exuding surplus creativity and hyperkinesis, bounded out. “Alex!” he cried. “God, it’s been too long, mon bonhomme!”
As a youth, Peter Paul Dalembert, Jr., had been the ingenious enabler who always found ways to implement the extravagant schemes cooked up by Marc, Alex, and their other bosom pal, Boom-Boom Laroche. In maturity, clever and indefatigable as ever, Peter had become the Chief Executive Officer of CEREM and Marc Remillard’s right-hand man.
Alex greeted Dalembert with restraint and introduced his Rebel colleagues.
“May I present Professor Anna Gawrys, Chairman of Cambridge University’s Institute for Dynamic-Field Studies … Cordelia Warshaw, Intendant Associate for Europe and Visiting Fellow in Cultural Xenology at Oxford … Patricia Castellane, Planetary Dirigent of Okanagon … Hiroshi Kodama, Planetary Dirigent of Satsuma … Rory Muldowney, Planetary Dirigent of Hibernia.”
“Wonderful to have you here at CEREM,” Dalembert said. Forgoing the more discreet open-palm operant greeting, he vigorously pumped the hands of the visitors. Alex rated a fond punch in the biceps. “You folks sure picked the perfect time to drop in on us! The new CE rig shell was about ready for its preliminary run and Marc decided to push the test up a couple of days so you could see it.”
Alex looked startled. “He’s got the new brain-booster working already?”
“Not quite. We’re only testing the cryogenic shell components, and they’re still in a much bulkier protoconfig than the ultimate design called for in the Keogh specs.” Peter Dalembert paused significantly. “Marc hired them away from Du Pont, you know.”
“The Keoghs?” Alex’s amazement was frank. “That must have put a nice dent in the corporate dividend.”
Dalembert chuckled. “We can afford it. Having the Keoghs personally in charge of the shell project probably halved this first phase of development. Of course, they’re cosmic-class wacka-doos, but Marc manages to cope … This way, everybody.”
The CEREM executive led them through the doorway and into a fully enclosed transport capsule. In less than thirty seconds they reached their destination, a glassed-in observation chamber overlooking a hangarlike area crowded with a confusing array of equipment. Dozens of technicians were in attendance. In the center of the big room, brightly spotlit, was an elevated platform holding a hulking, matte-black piece of apparatus attended by acolytes in white coveralls.
“Please sit down,” Dalembert urged his guests. “The test will begin in just a few minutes. Marc timed it to your arrival.”
“How very thoughtful of the dear man,” murmured Rory Muldowney.
Immediately adjacent to their balcony chamber, and clearly visible through a transparent wall, was an elaborate command center. Inside, four men and a woman, wearing comsets, were busily speaking to computers and studying expanses of monitoring equipment.
“The guy nearest to us is Doctor Jeffrey Steinbrenner, our new bionics chief.”
As Dalembert spoke, Steinbrenner looked up and regarded them coolly. His gaunt frame had not a gram of excess flesh on it. They felt his ultrasenses flick over them in a brief, disdainful inspection before he turned back to his work.
“Lovely congenial sort of chap,” said Rory Muldowney.
Dalembert grinned. “And talented! Next to Jeff are Jordan Kramer and Gerrit Van Wyk, Professor Gawrys’s former colleagues. Inventors of the mechanical mind-probe.”
They were also prominent Rebels, which Dalembert forbore to mention.
“I know them well,” Annushka said, “although they were not exactly my academic associates. The Department of Psychophysics is not part of IDFS. It was … a considerable surprise to me when Jordan and Gerry left Cambridge University to work in the private sector.”
“We made them an offer they couldn’t refuse.” Peter Dalembert said.
Completely absorbed, neither of the psychophysicists in the command center favored the guests with telepathic greetings. Kramer was a pleasant-looking man with large features and sandy hair. Van Wyk, scuttling from one bank of diagnostic monitors to another as he muttered into his comset, bore an unfortunate resemblance to an irritable, flaxen-headed frog. It was possible for the visitors to farsense what the people in the command center were saying, but the comments were so loaded with dismaying technical jargon that they were nearly unfathomable.
“I suppose those are the precious Keoghs,” said Patricia Castellane, indicating the two other workers. A young man and woman of strikingly similar appearance, handsome and ginger-haired, were engrossed in the displays on the consoles before them.
“Wait until you meet them,” Dalembert said. “You’ll want to keep your mindscreen at max if you know what’s good for you … Ah! Looks like we’re just about ready to begin.”
On the main floor below, a tall, splendidly muscled figure had emerged from a side corridor and was striding purposefully toward the central platform where technicians waited. He was attired from neck to toe in a tight black suit studded with monitoring receptacles and having a neck-ring seal. As he climbed onto the platform he raised a gloved hand in casual salute to the visitors in the observation booth. Their farsight showed a face with lofty cheekbones and a high-bridged nose, framed by jet-black curly hair. Gray eyes, compelling and luminous, were set deeply into shadowed orbits. The mouth was wide, lifted in an attractive one-sided smile.
Marc Remillard said: Good of you all to come!
Even in those few brief words, his mental voice had an extraordinary effect, projecting warmth, kindliness, and an overwhelming, almost seraphic authority. Rory Muldowney found himself wondering how he could ever have tarred the man with the same brush as his rakehell father. Why, he was magnificent! He was an ideal candidate for leader of the Metapsychic Rebellion! He was—
A Paramount Grand Master in metacoercion.
Annushka Gawrys also found herself battling to resist Marc Remillard’s magnetism. Get a grip on yourself, old woman! she thought. Remember what happened at the last Concilium session. Are you going to let this enchanter bamboozle you again? Chyest-noye slovo, ya yemu etog ne spushu!
A few months earlier, Marc Remillard had formally addressed the galactic governing body for the first time since his scandalous accession speech in 2063. As he defended his right to continue his CE research, both the human and the exotic Magnates of the Concilium had been utterly mesmerized by him. Objectively, they suspected that they were being swayed by the wiles of a paramount coercer rather than by the logic of his argument; but they could not help responding positively to him in spite of it. The moratorium on metacreative CE research was voted down and returned to the Human Science Directorate for further study in committee. Marc was left free to continue his work—at least until the next Concilium session.
Marc’s rebuttal speech had been a stunning ploy that was especially effective because it had been so unexpected. In the fifteen years since his nomination to the Concilium, he had served unobtrusively, almost negligently, as a simple magnate-at-large. His superlative metafunctions were common knowledge, but he had been careful not to parade them. After the upset vote on the moratorium, the buzz among the magnates in the corridors of Concilium Orb contained equal amounts of fervent approval and an appalled sense of having been well and truly flim-flammed.
But Marc would not be able to play his coercive trick twice. Unless those Science Directors with Rebel leanings voted en bloc to avert it, the Directorate would try to shoot him down again. And next time it would probably succeed …
“That mass of dark cerametal machinery on the central platform is the prototype of our new cerebroenergetic enhancer,” Peter Dalembert said. “We call it the clamshell. It’s still rather bulky, but we’ll pare the mass down in time. The techs will help Marc get into it, then—”
Patricia Castellane interrupted, astonished. “Sur
ely he’s not going to act as his own guinea pig in this experiment!”
“He always has,” Dalembert replied matter-of-factly. “Every CE device CEREM has produced had its initial human test on our glorious leader. Marc says it’s a great incentive for the engineers to get things right the first time around—and of course his paramount faculties give him a safety edge no other test subject would have. This particular run-up won’t involve boosting cerebral output per se. It’s only a test of the refrigerated full-body armor for the rig.”
“Full body?” Rory Muldowney’s brow creased in bafflement. “I don’t understand. You mean this new brain-revver involves more than a CE hat?”
“Helmet-style cerebroenergetic enhancement has an upper limit of about three hundred times normal metapsychic output,” said Alex Manion. “If you try to energize much beyond that, the brain’s hyped creativity burns up the operator’s body. It’s a variant of the flashover effect that almost killed Dorothea Macdonald during the Caledonian diatreme.”
“And to prevent this infelicitous outcome,” Hiroshi Kodama said, “the body is refrigerated?”
“Frozen to near absolute zero,” said Dalembert cheerfully.
Below, Marc had reclined on the lower half of the fantastic clamshell and the technicians were hooking up his suit connections. Then the hinged upper portion swung closed, leaving his bare head still exposed and resting on a broad shelflike protrusion. The apparatus was nearly as bulky as a standard groundcar. Innumerable cables and lines sheathed in shiny metal flex connected it to several other pieces of equipment surrounding it.
“Here comes the headpiece,” Dalembert said. “At this stage of the rig’s development, it’s a much-modified E18 bucket with a brainboard in creative mode. There’s the usual crown-of-thorns, plus cerebellar and stem electrodes to integrate the brain with the cryonics system. Auxiliary life support and backup AV communications gear keep the op alive and in touch until the big freeze isolates his pre-energized cerebrum from the rest of the body.”
A traveling hoist trundled up, poising a massive casque directly above Marc’s head. The minds of the guests heard him issue a farspoken order that was computerized and rebroadcast over the observation chamber’s speaker
ENHELM OPERATOR.
In the command center, Jeffrey Steinbrenner was whispering into the mike of his comset. The headpiece lowered into place, mating with the rest of the apparatus and enclosing Marc Remillard in more than four tons of cerametal armor.
ENGAGE AUXILIARY CEREBROENERGETICS.
“Now the little photon beams in the crown-of-thorns are drilling his skull,” Dalembert said. “Cerebral electrodes will sprout inside his brain in preparation for the CE phase-in. His own grandmasterclass autoredaction will maintain the vitals of the gray matter once the auxiliary CE kicks in.”
ENERGIZE CRYONICS. INITIATE METABOLIC REPROGRAMMING.
“More needles into his cerebellum and medulla. Circulatory shunts in his carotid and femoral arteries draw off the blood and replace it with a cryogenic fluid. A dermal lavage formula fills the clamshell and helmet. He’d drown if he hadn’t already stopped breathing. In another minute his body will be frozen to minus two hundred and sixty degrees Celsius.”
ENGAGE PRIMARY CEREBROENERGETICS. ENERGIZE SIECOMEX TO LEVEL THREE HUNDRED.
“Hello!” Dalembert said in surprise. “That’s not in the test sked.”
Some farspoken communication passed between him and Steinbrenner. In the command center, the gaunt bionics director eyed the CEO and shrugged. Then Steinbrenner, Kramer, and Van Wyk left their own consoles and went to stand behind the Keoghs. The lighted screens before the pair cast eerie shadows on their intent faces. Dierdre Keogh’s hands danced over an old-fashioned input keyboard. She was smiling. Her brother Diarmid addressed the controlling computer verbally through his comset, calling up situation analyses completely incomprehensible to the eavesdropping observers.
“What is happening?” Annushka Gawrys asked anxiously.
They waited—then delighted relief flooded out of Peter Dalembert’s mind. “The test is a success! We didn’t expect Marc to actually enhance, but he did it anyway. The diagnostics indicate augmented creativity function at the three hundred output level, the usual ceiling for the El8 helmet configuration. Now Marc will begin shutdown and—”
ENERGIZE TO LEVEL FOUR HUNDRED.
The people in the command center exchanged glances. Diarmid Keogh said, “Operator, say again.”
I SAY ENERGIZE TO LEVEL FOUR HUNDRED. GO!
“But is that possible?” Cordelia Warshaw whispered.
Alex Manion’s face was grim. “Yes. Theoretically, the El8 has an almost open-ended augmentation potential. The upper limit is in the operator’s brain, not the equipment.”
ENERGIZE TO LEVEL FIVE HUNDRED.
“We’re not ready for this,” Dalembert muttered. He called out on the declamatory mode: NegativeDiarmidnegative! DoNOT-energize!
Diarmid Keogh looked up from his control console with a sardonic expression. He said: Hisvitalsarebangonthemoney & heistheboss & hegetswhathewantswhenhewantsit.
ACTIVATE PLATFORM AREA SR-45 SIGMA SAFETY SHIELD.
Down on the main floor, the technicians retreated and a mirrored hemisphere eight meters in diameter popped into existence, engulfing the platform and the machinery on it.
ENERGIZE TO LEVEL SIX HUNDRED.
Under his breath, Dalembert said, “Oh, God. If he backflares he’ll vaporize the rig. And himself.” He leaned forward and turned on a small display screen. An image of the apparatus inside the shield appeared.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” breathed Rory Muldowney. “Will you look at that.”
The monstrous clamshell apparatus, still tethered by its multitude of umbilicals, was slowly levitating unsupported above the platform, tilting until the casque enclosing Marc Remillard’s energized brain was fully upright.
“He’s doing it with his mind,” Cordelia whispered.
Patricia Castellane said, “The sigma bubble’s breaching at the top.”
Sweat had broken out on Peter Dalembert’s brow. “It’s impossible. That platform sigma shield is state-of-the-art. You couldn’t punch through it with a battery of X-lasers!”
“Try the creative energy of a paramount metapsychic mind,” Alex Manion said quietly, “magnified six hundred times.”
The massive CE rig floated up through the breached force-field, hovering on a level with the balcony containing the observation chamber and the command center. The Rebel visitors, the CEREM supervisors, and the floor technicians watched, transfixed, as the cerametal casque shimmered, brightened, and seemed to become as tenuous as mist. Their farsight perceived a ghostly simulacrum of Marc Remillard’s smiling face, superimposed upon an incandescent brain.
A mind-voice echoed in the skulls of Alex Manion, Annushka Gawrys, Cordelia Warshaw, Patricia Castellane, Hiroshi Kodama, and Rory Muldowney.
THE ANSWER TO THE QUESTION YOU WANTED TO ASK IS YES … BUT ONLY IF YOU’RE WILLING TO DO IT MY WAY.
They said: We are. All of us are.
EXPLICIT, said the brain, WE’LL TALK MORE ABOUT IT IN A LITTLE WHILE.
14
FROM THE MEMOIRS OF ROGATIEN REMILLARD
LATE SUMMER IS ORDINARILY A VERY SLOW TIME FOR THE ANTIQUARIAN fantasy book business. The wares that I peddle are best savored in cosy rooms, when bad weather and too-long nights provoke a need for escapism and whet the contemplation of the outrageous. During the dwindling bright sunny days, most people prefer to be out under the open sky rather than poking around in musty old bookstores.
A good thing, too. I was in no shape to deal with customers.
I fixed my door-sign to read GONE FISHING and kept the place locked up all through August 2078, while my brain healed from Dorothée’s painful excavation. When I wasn’t off fly-angling or birdwatching I puttered around the shop, putting together a new E-catalog and reorganizing the stock. Early in September I took a class in bookbinding from
a woman over in Lyme Center. With that under my belt, I set about repairing some battered old Fantasy Press and Shasta Publishers science-fiction titles with badly stained covers, rebinding them in morocco leather. I crafted durofilm repros of the original dust jackets, hand-marbled the endpapers, and put in cutesy-poo satin ribbons for bookmarks. The restored volumes were pretentious but appealing, and I sold them for a hefty sum to a wealthy fish-factory owner in Vladivostok.
Solvency is cheering. I reopened the shop just in time for the fall term at Dartmouth College. My regular customers returned and I tried to get on with my life.
Unfortunately, as October began to put a nip in the New Hampshire air, I found myself becoming increasingly depressed and insomniac, gripped by a feeling of impending disaster that I was unable to shake.
Thinking about Denis.
Thinking about Fury.
Denis simply could not be the monster. Not that quiet man I’d known from infancy. Not the loving husband and father who patiently coped with his mercurial wife Lucille and his brilliant, bewildering offspring. Not the orchid hobbyist or the lover of peaceful hikes in the New England countryside. Most certainly not the introspective scholar who often wandered into The Eloquent Page on pleasant autumn afternoons after his seminars were finished and took me out for an espresso and Danish. He and I would sit together under the Starbucks umbrella of the little coffeeshop next door to my place, sharing college gossip. Denis would smile tolerantly as I made risqué cracks about the physical attributes of comely young females passing by, and I’d pretend that I understood his learned disquisitions on the latest book he had just finished writing, An Ontological Interpretation of Unity.
Fury as Denis’s alter ego? The idea was idiotic on the face of it. He was too kind, too guileless, too genuine. It was true that his prodigious mindpowers frightened me—but that was even more true of Paul, Marc, and Jack; and I knew none of them could possibly be the monster.
No. Anne had made a tragic mistake in judgment—or else she herself was Fury, as I’d suspected earlier, with the evil twin of her multiple personality setting up a diabolical smoke screen to confuse the good twin.