Galaxy's Edge Magazine: Issue 4: September 2013 (10 page)

Norm blinked. He lay in a body-molded cot, in a grey-blue room with the words “Recovery Area L” glowing at him from the walls. Around him, other people lay, while attendants bustled, waitress-like. Then Norm looked up and saw the cat.

“Well? How was it?”

“My God,” Norm said. “It was—it was—”

It was unbelievable. That was what Gallinski had been about to say. But what came out was, “It was a real blow for common sense the day they granted voting rights to women.”

“Ah, good,” the cat said. “It’s working. Just a test. Are you ready to be something else?”

“Yes, please,” said Norm, with fervor.

Next he was an ostrich. Then a killer whale. He even tried the hummingbird (the dogfights were incredible—beyond the dreams of fighter pilots) and then the horse, which he liked pretty well, although the cat was right about the fifteen seconds. Then a super-spy, a rock star, and an astronaut, and they were all amazing. Better than he’d thought they’d be.

When he’d finished these, having adventures at every stop, three days had passed, and he felt ready.

“I’m through playing around,” he told the cat, over lunch, in a plaza in between two ziggurats. (Norm had pasta salad, the cat a waffle cone of fish heads.) “I’m ready to be someone awesome. Successful. Confident. Amazing.”

The cat licked fish scales from its whiskers.

“We have just the thing,” it said.

***

And once again, after the waiting lines and processing, he wasn’t Norm Gallinski. But neither was he Jesus, nor the Buddha, as he had half expected. Rather, he was Billy Huse, of Oak Hill, West Virginia, bookkeeper at a coal extraction company, stepping off the curb at Walmart.

The Norm part of him reeled. At first he thought there must be some mistake. Billy was a nobody. Unmarried, short, and flabby. He wore a ripped blue pocket tee and jeans. His life was not exciting. Nobody would ever envy him or even wonder who he was.

His feet, in inexpensive Walmart sneakers, made in Shandong, China, by people who knew next to nothing about either Americans or feet, were plagued by bunions from a multitude of hours in poorly-fitting footwear. His bills and debts outstripped his income. And he’d had skin cancer twice.

These things filled Gallinski’s mind, like the Earth fills up your field of view if you’re face down, lying on it. But when he looked at it through Billy Huse, shockingly, the problems, though they still existed, shrank, as if they’d moved a hundred thousand miles into the distance.

And instead of them he saw the parking lot, corn-rowed with cars that twinkled in the late-day light, pale, pink, and orange, that also painted cat’s paws on the spackled clouds, stacked so high and far above the range of facing mountains that Norm felt like he’d fall straight up off the bottom of the world. The sunset warmed him inside, and the cool breeze chilled his skin. The argument between the two created eddies in his chest, that swirled. His arm hairs stood. He smelled fried fries and wafts of distant dumpsters from the ghosts of fast-foods past. And together all of it came close to lifting him off of the ground, and skyward.

He continued past a fat lady in lime green stretch pants, who mouth-breathed, scowling, and he somehow knew with certainty that a visionary savant from an alternate dimension had done a gorgeous painting of her, having seen her through a sort of wormhole, and that, in that dimension, the painting moved everyone who saw it to tears of joy, and had sold at auction for their alternate-dimensional equivalent of a hundred billion dollars.

He reached his car—an aging Aries K—and was almost swept away with gratitude for how it carried him in comfort inexpensively, with greater ease than kings from ages past could travel, and his feeling for it made it seem to glow, which stretched and smoothed his mind, like plastic wrap pulled taut across a bowl of grapes.

Norm suspected Billy Huse of being high on meth or oxycontin, but a quick inventory of recent memory showed no such chemical indulgences. This was the real McCoy, the Spock and Kirk of authenticity. To Billy, quite simply, each moment was a morsel in a never-ending meal at a five-million-star restaurant, and he was always hungry. To put it short, he appreciated everything. Religiously. Ridiculously deeply. Hot Pockets, even. He could look at one and feel a welling in the visceral, ancestral depths, could wonder at the farms and the machinery, shift workers and corporate structures and the marketing and shipping, chemistry and ignorance, love, hate, biology, and years of people’s lives and minds that worked together in colossal concert to bring this questionable comestible to being, and it would make his head and heart almost literally sing and spin and lift.

Gallinski spent the next three days like this. Steeped in bliss behind Billy’s too-small desk, staring at crabbed figures on his outdated computer screen, or in the break room that eddied with the scents of remnants of a thousand former lunches. Feeling like he’d just sipped a gin and tonic in a hot tub, or was in the midst of a continuous, continual massage, administered by the single most respected artist from a civilization of two million years, devoted solely to the betterment of therapeutic touch.

Here he was, a nobody. Yet, inexplicably, the happiest man who ever lived.

When time was up, Gallinski lay in recovery area L again, on his back, gasping, once more in his old familiar, fearful self.

“Well?” the cat said.

“My God. I never realized how wonderful it is to vote for nationalist socialist candidates.”

“Excellent. So you enjoyed yourself.”

Gallinski whimpered.

“Put me back,” he said.

The cat’s eyes widened.

“We can’t,” it said. “Your week is up.”

“Then I’ll stay another week. I’ll pay.”

“Mr. Gallinski.” The cat sounded affronted. “We can’t put you back just like that. There are forms to be completed. And anyway, the danger to your own physicality is monumental. We have to wait at least six months before we can re-process you.”

Six months! Gallinski couldn’t stand six minutes! As Billy Huse, each moment, however squalid, was a triumph. But now he couldn’t even comprehend how it was done, like a dog who’d seen a man do algebra. And every second as himself was such a tragedy it made Macbeth look like a funny Super Bowl commercial featuring a couple babies and a talking llama.

“Come on,” the cat said, sounding worried. “We’d better get you back to your own kitchen. You’ll feel better.”

But Gallinski wasn’t going back. He leapt up off the cot and thrust aside the two attendants who attempted to restrain him.

“Mr. Gallinski, please!” the cat was shouting, while other guests looked on wide-eyed from their own cots. “This is only an amusement park! There are other ways to work toward lasting change!”

But Gallinski wasn’t listening. He knocked down the guard who came at him (thanking whatever gods there were that, with all their tech, the people of the future had ignored physical fitness) and grabbed his weapon—a gun that looked like Chick-fil-A was given veto power over its design team. He bolted for the door, and knocked aside a tray of instruments that silverwared across the floor.

He ran into the hall of velvet ropes and waiting lines, pushed past some tourists, and shoved his way into the processing area.

“Put me back in Billy Huse!” he yelled at one of the technicians.

“But—”

He aimed the gun. “Do it! Now!”

He climbed into the big machine’s receptacle while the technician, looking worried, pressed some buttons. Then, once more, everything went black.

When he awoke, he blinked, stood up, stretched his legs, and used his beak to scratch beneath his wing.

“What the—”

“I’m sorry,” the cat said. “I tried to warn you.”

Gallinski stood at eye-level with the cat. He looked down at himself.

“It’s like I said. The human form can’t take more than a week of processing. So far everyone who’s tried has been transformed into an animal. Mostly small ones. Chickens. And because of the complexities of overprocessed DNA, reversal is impossible.”

“You mean I’m stuck this way?” Gallinski said.

“I’ll admit it narrows your options,” said the cat, “what with your lack of thumbs and your bathroom habits. But there are a few things chickens can do, since you still have eyes and the same brain, albeit in miniature.”

Gallinski tried to concentrate, but he found himself craving corn meal.

“For instance,” the cat said, “we do have several openings in quality control.”

Original (First) Publication

Copyright © 2013 by Tom Gerencer

******************************************

Robert Silverberg is one of the true giants of science fiction. He is a multiple Hugo and Nebula winner, a Nebula Grand Master, and a Worldcon Guest of Honor, the author of numerous acknowledged classics in the field. This story won the 1971 Nebula.

GOOD NEWS FROM THE VATICAN

by Robert Silverberg

This is the morning everyone has been waiting for, when at last the robot cardinal is to be elected pope. There can no longer be any doubt of the outcome. The conclave has been deadlocked for many days between the obstinate advocates of Cardinal Asciuga of Milan and Cardinal Carciofo of Genoa, and word has gone out that a compromise is in the making. All factions now are agreed on the selection of the robot. This morning I read in
Osservatore Romano
that the Vatican computer itself has taken a hand in the deliberations. The computer has been strongly urging the candidacy of the robot. I suppose we should not be surprised by this loyalty among machines. Nor should we let it distress us. We absolutely must not let it distress us.

“Every era gets the pope it deserves,” Bishop FitzPatrick observed somewhat gloomily today at breakfast. “The proper pope for our times is a robot, certainly. At some future date it may be desirable for the pope to be a whale, an automobile, a cat, a mountain.” Bishop FitzPatrick stands well over two meters in height and his normal facial expression is a morbid, mournful one. Thus it is impossible for us to determine whether any particular pronouncement of his reflects existential despair or placid acceptance. Many years ago he was a star player for the Holy Cross championship basketball team. He has come to Rome to do research for a biography of St. Marcellus the Righteous.

We have been watching the unfolding drama of the papal election from an outdoor café several blocks from the Square of St. Peter’s. For all of us, this has been an unexpected dividend of our holiday in Rome; the previous pope was reputed to be in good health and there was no reason to suspect that a successor would have to be chosen for him this summer.

Each morning we drive across by taxi from our hotel near the Via Veneto and take up our regular positions around “our” table. From where we sit, we all have a clear view of the Vatican chimney through which the smoke of the burning ballots rises: black smoke if no pope has been elected, white if the conclave has been successful. Luigi, the owner and headwaiter, automatically brings us our preferred beverages: Fernet-Branca for Bishop FitzPatrick, Campari and soda for Rabbi Mueller, Turkish coffee for Miss Harshaw, lemon squash for Kenneth and Beverly, and Pernod on the rocks for me. We take turns paying the check, although Kenneth has not paid it even once since our vigil began. Yesterday, when Miss Harshaw paid, she emptied her purse and found herself 350 lire short; she had nothing else except hundred-dollar travelers’ checks. The rest of us looked pointedly at Kenneth but he went on calmly sipping his lemon squash. After a brief period of tension Rabbi Mueller produced a 500-lire coin and rather irascibly slapped the heavy silver piece against the table. The rabbi is known for his short temper and vehement style. He is twenty-eight years old, customarily dresses in a fashionable plaid cassock and silvered sunglasses, and frequently boasts that he has never performed a bar mitzvah ceremony for his congregation, which is in Wicomico County, Maryland. He believes that the rite is vulgar and obsolete, and invariably farms out all his bar mitzvahs to a franchised organization of itinerant clergymen who handle such affairs on a commission basis. Rabbi Mueller is an authority on angels.

Our group is divided over the merits of electing a robot as the new pope. Bishop FitzPatrick, Rabbi Mueller, and I are in favor of the idea. Miss Harshaw, Kenneth, and Beverly are opposed. It is interesting to note that both of our gentlemen of the cloth, one quite elderly and one fairly young, support this remarkable departure from tradition. Yet the three “swingers” among us do not.

I am not sure why I align myself with the progressives. I am a man of mature years and fairly sedate ways. Nor have I ever concerned myself with the doings of the Church of Rome. I am unfamiliar with Catholic dogma and unaware of recent currents of thought within the Church. Still, I have been hoping for the election of the robot since the start of the conclave.

Why, I wonder? Is it because the image of a metal creature upon the Throne of St. Peter stimulates my imagination and tickles my sense of the incongruous? That is, is my support of the robot purely an aesthetic matter? Or is it, rather, a function of my moral cowardice? Do I secretly think that this gesture will buy the robots off? Am I privately saying, Give them the papacy and maybe they won’t want other things for a while? No. I can’t believe anything so unworthy of myself. Possibly I am for the robot because I am a person of unusual sensitivity to the needs of others.

“If he’s elected,” says Rabbi Mueller, “he plans an immediate time-sharing agreement with the Dalai Lama and a reciprocal plug-in with the head programmer of the Greek Orthodox Church, just for starters. I’m told he’ll make ecumenical overtures to the Rabbinate as well, which is certainly something for all of us to look forward to.”

“I don’t doubt that there’ll be many corrections in the customs and practices of the hierarchy,” Bishop FitzPatrick declares. “For example we can look forward to superior information-gathering techniques as the Vatican computer is given a greater role in the operations of the Curia. Let me illustrate by—”

“What an utterly ghastly notion,” Kenneth says. He is a gaudy young man with white hair and pink eyes. Beverly is either his wife or his sister. She rarely speaks. Kenneth makes the sign of the Cross with offensive brusqueness and murmurs, “In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Automaton.” Miss Harshaw giggles but chokes the giggle off when she sees my disapproving face.

Dejectedly, but not responding at all to the interruption, Bishop FitzPatrick continues, “Let me illustrate by giving you some figures I obtained yesterday afternoon. I read in the newspaper
Oggi
that during the last five years, according to a spokesman for the Missiones Catholicae, the Church has increased its membership in Yugoslavia from 19,381,403 to 23,501,062. But the government census taken last year gives the total population of Yugoslavia at 23,575,194. That leaves only 74,132 for the other religious and irreligious bodies. Aware of the large Moslem population of Yugoslavia, I suspected an inaccuracy in the published statistics and consulted the computer in St. Peter’s, which informed me”—the bishop, pausing, produces a lengthy printout and unfolds it across much of the table—“that the last count of the Faithful in Yugoslavia, made a year and a half ago, places our numbers at 14,206,198. Therefore an overstatement of 9,294,864 has been made. Which is absurd. And perpetuated. Which is damnable.”

“What does he look like?” Miss Harshaw asks. “Does anyone have any idea?”

“He’s like all the rest,” says Kenneth. “A shiny metal box with wheels below and eyes on top.”

“You haven’t seen him,” Bishop FitzPatrick interjects. “I don’t think it’s proper for you to assume that—”

“They’re all alike,” Kenneth says. “Once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen all of them. Shiny boxes. Wheels. Eyes. And voices coming out of their bellies like mechanized belches. Inside, they’re all cogs and gears.” Kenneth shudders delicately. “It’s too much for me to accept. Let’s have another round of drinks, shall we?”

Rabbi Mueller says, “It so happens that I’ve seen him with my own eyes.”

“You have?” Beverly exclaims.

Kenneth scowls at her. Luigi, approaching, brings a tray of new drinks for everyone. I hand him a 5,000-lire note. Rabbi Mueller removes his sunglasses and breathes on their brilliantly reflective surfaces. He has small, watery grey eyes and a bad squint. He says, “The cardinal was the keynote speaker at the Congress of World Jewry that was held last fall in Beirut. His theme was ‘Cybernetic Ecumenicism for Contemporary Man’. I was there. I can tell you that His Eminency is tall and distinguished, with a fine voice and a gentle smile. There’s something inherently melancholy about his manner that reminds me greatly of our friend the bishop, here. His movements are graceful and his wit is keen.”

“But he’s mounted on wheels, isn’t he?” Kenneth persists.

“On treads,” replies the rabbi, giving Kenneth a fiery, devastating look and resuming his sunglasses. “Treads, like a tractor has. But I don’t think that treads are spiritually inferior to feet, or, for that matter, to wheels. If I were a Catholic I’d be proud to have a man like that as my pope.”

“Not a man,” Miss Harshaw puts in. A giddy edge enters her voice whenever she addresses Rabbi Mueller. “A robot,” she says. “He’s not a man, remember?”

“A robot like that as my pope, then,” Rabbi Mueller says, shrugging at the correction. He raises his glass. “To the new pope!”

“To the new pope!” cries Bishop FitzPatrick.

Luigi comes rushing from his café. Kenneth waves him away. “Wait a second,” Kenneth says. “The election isn’t over yet. How can you be so sure?”

“The
Osservatore Romano
,” I say, “indicates in this morning’s edition that everything will be decided today. Cardinal Carciofo has agreed to withdraw in his favor, in return for a larger real-time allotment when the new computer hours are decreed at next year’s consistory.”

“In other words, the fix is in,” Kenneth says.

Bishop FitzPatrick sadly shakes his head. “You state things much too harshly, my son. For three weeks now we have been without a Holy Father. It is God’s Will that we shall have a pope. The conclave, unable to choose between the candidacies of Cardinal Carciofo and Cardinal Asciuga, thwarts that Will. If necessary, therefore, we must make certain accommodations with the realities of the times so that His Will shall not be further frustrated. Prolonged politicking within the conclave now becomes sinful. Cardinal Carciofo’s sacrifice of his personal ambitions is not as self-seeking an act as you would claim.”

Kenneth continues to attack poor Carciofo’s motives for withdrawing. Beverly occasionally applauds his cruel sallies. Miss Harshaw several times declares her unwillingness to remain a communicant of a Church whose leader is a machine. I find this dispute distasteful and swing my chair away from the table to have a better view of the Vatican. At this moment the cardinals are meeting in the Sistine Chapel. How I wish I were there! What splendid mysteries are being enacted in that gloomy, magnificent room! Each prince of the Church now sits on a small throne surmounted by a violet-hued canopy. Fat wax tapers glimmer on the desk before each throne. Masters of ceremonies move solemnly through the vast chamber, carrying the silver basins in which the blank ballots repose. These basins are placed on the table before the altar. One by one the cardinals advance to the table, take ballots, return to their desks. Now, lifting their quill pens, they begin to write. “I, Cardinal——, elect to the Supreme Pontificate the Most Reverend Lord my Lord Cardinal——.” What name do they fill in? Is it Carciofo? Is it Asciuga? Is it the name of some obscure and shriveled prelate from Madrid or Heidelberg, some last-minute choice of the anti-robot faction in its desperation? Or are they writing
his
name? The sound of scratching pens is loud in the chapel. The cardinals are completing their ballots, sealing them at the ends, folding them, folding them again and again, carrying them to the altar, dropping them into the great gold chalice. So have they done every morning and every afternoon for days, as the deadlock has prevailed.

“I read in the
Herald-Tribune
a couple of days ago,” says Miss Harshaw, “that a delegation of two hundred and fifty young Catholic robots from Iowa is waiting at the Des Moines airport for news of the election. If their man gets in, they’ve got a chartered flight ready to leave, and they intend to request that they be granted the Holy Father’s first public audience.”

“There can be no doubt,” Bishop FitzPatrick agrees, “that his election will bring a great many people of synthetic origin into the fold of the Church.”

“While driving out plenty of flesh and blood people!” Miss Harshaw says shrilly.

“I doubt that,” says the bishop. “Certainly there will be some feelings of shock, of dismay, of injury, of loss, for some of us at first. But these will pass. The inherent goodness of the new pope, to which Rabbi Mueller alluded, will prevail. Also I believe that technologically minded young folk everywhere will be encouraged to join the Church. Irresistible religious impulses will be awakened throughout the world.”

“Can you imagine two hundred and fifty robots clanking into St. Peter’s?” Miss Harshaw demands.

I contemplate the distant Vatican. The morning sunlight is brilliant and dazzling, but the assembled cardinals, walled away from the world, cannot enjoy its gay sparkle. They all have voted, now. The three cardinals who were chosen by lot as this morning’s scrutators of the vote have risen. One of them lifts the chalice and shakes it, mixing the ballots. Then he places it on the table before the altar; a second scrutator removes the ballots and counts them. He ascertains that the number of ballots is identical to the number of cardinals present. The ballots now have been transferred to a ciborium, which is a goblet ordinarily used to hold the consecrated bread of the Mass. The first scrutator withdraws a ballot, unfolds it, reads its inscription; passes it to the second scrutator, who reads it also; then it is given to the third scrutator, who reads the name aloud. Asciuga? Carciofo? Some other? His?