Mission: Earth "Black Genesis" (43 page)

A wide-open invitation to rob the place!

I myself had a very happy afternoon nap, contemplating it.

I must have overslept but there was ample excuse for it. I had not dared sleep for days. But things were running my way now. When I awoke, Heller was already disembarking from the subway at 116th Street. I watched tolerantly. His fate would soon be sealed.

He went directly to the temporary reservation area. There were quite a few students about, milling, finishing off their signups. I realized that it wasn't registration

week, really. It had been registration day, per se, yesterday, judging from the crowd sizes.

I sat back to enjoy Heller getting his comeuppance. No way would this Miss Simmons let him into this school. Not with those grades. Heller's plans would be thrown into a cocked hat!

And there she was. She had just finished her last student. She ignored her short waiting line. She had a smile on her face but it was the kind you see on the female spider just before she has a meal of a male.

"Well, if it isn't the young Einstein," said Miss Simmons. "Sit down."

Heller sat down and Miss Simmons scrambled through her papers and then sat back with that horrible smile. "It appears," she said, "that they don't care who blows up the world these days."

"You called me 'Wister' yesterday."

"Well, times have changed, haven't they. Who do you know? God?"

"Has my enrollment received advisement?" asked Heller.

"That it has, young Einstein. Now, ordinarily we do not permit a transfer from another school into the senior class."

"I could make up–"

"Hush, hush. But in your case, it seems this is to be allowed. And into our competitive School of Engineering and Applied Science, too."

"I am very grate–"

"Oh, hush, young Einstein. You have not heard it all. Ordinarily we require a fresh American College Test that must average 28% or above. But you, young Einstein, seem to have had that waived."

"Well that's goo–"

"Oh, there's more," said Miss Simmons. "It has

always been mandatory that a student entering engineering school receive a Scholastic Aptitude Test and that the grade for verbal and written be above 700. But you are not being required to do any SAT at all."

"That's truly marv–"

"And more, young Einstein. Our requirement for a B average for such enrollments has been waived. Now, isn't that nice?"

"Indeed," said Heller. "It is very ni–"

"It is far too nice, young Einstein. I have direct orders here to admit you. As a senior. In the School of Engineering and Applied Science. As a candidate for a Bachelor in Nuclear Science and Engineering, graduating next May. And the order is signed by the president of the university himself."

"Really, I'm overwhel–"

"You'll be overwhelmed shortly," said Miss Simmons and her smile vanished. "Either somebody has gone stark raving loony or the reduction of government subsidies and the lack of a post-war boom makes them slaver for your twenty-five hundred dollars and they have gone stark raving loony! You and they are NOT going to get away with it. I will not have my name on the form registering you and turning upon the world a nuclear scientist who is a complete imbecile. Do I make myself clear, young Einstein?"

"I'm very sorry if–"

"Oh, don't waste energy on getting upset at this point," said Miss Simmons. "You are going to be upset enough later to need every calorie! Oh, I have no choice but to enroll you, young Mr. God Junior. But there are ways of enrolling and ways of enrolling. Now, shall we begin?"

"I really–"

"Now, to start with," said Miss Simmons, "you do

not have all the requisite credits in former schooling for this degree. There are four subjects here which are omitted and I am signing you up to take them IN ADDITION to the heavy engineering subjects you will be required to take for the semester."

"I am sure I–"

"Oh, don't thank me yet! There's more! Now, I very much doubt that with those D grades, you were firmly founded in the subjects in which you received them. So I am making your acceptance conditional upon special tutoring to bring those subjects up to the mark along with your regular class work."

"I think I–"

"I know you are grateful," said Miss Simmons. "So I will add another favor. Your Saint Lee's was a military school. And I adjudicate that your military science and study credits given there are not valid unless you continue on with and complete your entire ROTC—Reserve Officers' Training Corps—schedule in this, your senior year. You can really get a bellyful of how nasty war is! And the Army can be persuaded it is unpatriotic not to complete them. I intend to write them a little note. That means three additional class periods and one drill period a week. All on top of the extra subjects and tutoring. Now, isn't that nice, God Junior?"

Heller was just looking at her by now. Stunned, no doubt.

She had turned to her accordion-folded computer printouts of class timings and assignments already made. "But here is where you are really going to thank me, God Himself. When I received this order at breakfast, I worked it all out. There is no way to assign all these hours in such a way that the classes are consecutive. Several of them occur at the same exact hours. You have to be in two, and in one case three places at the same time.

And that is the way you have been assigned. You will be absent, one class or another, any way you want to look at it. The professors will rant. You will find yourself in front of deans. And it is they, not I, who will tell you that you cannot graduate and get your diploma next May. If they come back on me, I will say you just demanded it all, and you did, didn't you, Jehovah?"

Miss Simmons sat back and tapped a pencil against her teeth. Then after a bit she said, "Oh, I don't blame you for being over-awed in appreciation. You see, Master of All He Surveys and Creator Himself, I do not like INFLUENCE. Also, I am a member of the Anti-Nuclear Protest Marchers, its secretary in fact. And though the organization may be old and it may be suppressed and it may be that the New York Tactical Police Force is just waiting to bash in our heads again, the thought of letting a nuclear scientist as unqualified as you loose upon the world turns my blood to leukemia. Do we understand each other, Wister?"

"Really, Miss Simmons–"

"Oh, I almost forgot. Just in case you find time heavy on your hands—loafing about with this schedule– I have added another course to make up for a missing optional. It is Nature Appreciation 101 and 104. One goes out every Sunday, all day, and admires the birds and trees and learns, perhaps, what a nasty thing it is to make those world-destroying bombs! I teach this class myself, so I can keep an eye on your vicious proclivities. Now you can thank me, Wister."

"Really, Miss S–"

"And as they are so interested in money, all this adds another fifteen hundred and thirty-three dollars to your bill. I hope you don't have it. Pay the cashier. Good day, Wister. NEXT!"

Heller took the papers she had already made out. He took the invoice.

He went over and paid the cashier.

Aha! My heart had gone out to Miss Simmons more and more. What a sterling character! I toyed with the idea of sending her some candy "From an Unknown Admirer." No, on the other hand, a pair of brass knuckles would be more in her line. With maybe a Knife Section knife to keep on her desk. But really, did she need it?

Just before noon, Heller came to the High Library. It was a very imposing building with a Roman look—ten huge columns stretched across the front, an enormous rotunda, a very noble facade. It was fronted with a vast expanse of steps almost as wide as the building itself.

He passed a fountain and then a statue with the words Alma Mater on it. He went halfway up the upper steps and slumped down on the stone.

And well he might slump. I had been kept laughing for the last two hours following his zigzag course around the enormous campus. He trotted here and he trotted there. He was locating every single one of the large number of classrooms, halls, armories and drill fields he would have to attend. He had constantly checked a copy of a computer printout and he had found that he had a schedule which went two classes at the same time, followed by no class for the next hour and then, in one case, three classes at the same time! I was kept in stitches. Not

even the great Heller could cope with that schedule. And it went seven days a week!

As he sat there in the hot noonday sun, he must be realizing that there was no way on Earth he could get a diploma and carry out the silly plans he had undoubtedly made to carry his mission through just to spite me. And get me killed.

Students were drifting up and down the steps, no vast throng. Young men and women, not too well dressed. Heller must look younger than some of them, despite being, in fact, several years older in time and, in all honesty, decades older in experience. How silly he must feel, a Royal officer of the Fleet, sitting there amongst these naive creatures. Another joke on him and on them, too. I idly speculated what they would think if they knew a Voltar combat engineer was sitting right there, in plain view, a Mancoian from Atalanta more than a score of light-years away, a holder of the fifty-volunteer star, that could blow their planet to bits as easy as he could spit or could prevent an invasion that would slaughter every one of them. What a joke on them. How stupid they were!

A couple of girls and a young man drifted by. One of the girls said, "Ooo! Are you on the baseball team?"

"I didn't know they were still turned out," said the boy. "Why, you're wearing spikes!"

Heller looked at one of the girls. "You can't get to first base if you don't."

They all of them burst into screams of laughter. I tried and tried to figure out what they were laughing about. (Bleep) that Heller, anyway. Always so obscure. And he had no right to start currying popularity. He was an extraterrestrial, an interloper! Besides, they were pretty girls.

"Name's Muggins," said the boy. "This is Christine

and Coral—they're from Barnyard College: that's part of Empire but all women, oh boy!"

"My name's Jet," said Heller.

"C'm up'n see us s'm'time," said Christine.

They all laughed again, waved and walked on down the broad steps.

And here came Epstein!

He was dragging an enormously long roll of something behind him. It was about a foot in diameter and certainly over twelve feet long! He passed the fountain and then the statue. He stopped a couple steps below Heller. He was dressed in a shabby gray suit and a shabby gray hat and, in addition to the roll, he was carrying a very scuffed up, cheap attache case. He sank down on a step, puffing.

"And how is Mr. Epstein?" said Heller cheerfully.

"Oh, don't call me that," said Epstein. "It makes me uncomfortable. Please call me Izzy. That's what everybody does."

"Good. If you'll call me Jet."

"No. You are really my superior as you have the capital. I should call you Mr. Wister."

"You have forgotten," said Heller, "that you are responsible for me now. And that includes my morale." Then he said very firmly, "Call me Jet."

Izzy Epstein looked unhappy. Then he said, "All right, Mr. Jet."

Heller must have given it up. "I see you found some clothes. I was worried that they'd all been destroyed."

"Oh, yes. I took a bath in the gym and I got two suits, this hat and this briefcase from the Salvation Army Good Will. They wouldn't do for you, of course, but if I dressed too well, I would attract attention and invite bad luck. One must never appear to be doing too well-the lightning will strike."

This Izzy Epstein was turning my stomach. It was quite obvious that he was a neurotic depressive with persecution complexes and had overtones of religio-mania, evident in his fixations on fate. A fine mess he would make for Heller. Neurotics are never competent. But on the other hand, it was really a break for me that Heller had run into him. The fellow couldn't even manage his own affairs, much less Heller's.

"Well, you look better, anyway," said Heller.

"Oh, I'm exhausted! I have been working flat out all night to prepare a proposal for you. The only building I could find open was the Art College, so I had to use their materials."

"Is that what that is?"

"This roll? Yes. All they had left out was studio paper—the kind they use behind models, twelve feet wide, a hundred feet long. And they didn't leave out any scissors. So I used that."

He tried to unroll it. But he didn't have enough arm reach. Heller started to help him but Izzy said, "No, no. You're the investor. You there!" he called out suddenly.

A couple of new students had come out of the library. Izzy stopped them at the top of the huge, wide stairway. "You hold this end," he said to one. "And you this end," he said to the other. "Now, hold it tight." The two stood there, twelve feet apart, holding the top of the roll.

Heller had followed Izzy up. Izzy took the roll and backed down two steps, unreeling it. At the top, in wild, garish ink, all along it, it said: Confidential Draft.

"You will probably find it too colorful," said Izzy, understating it like mad, for it was blazing in the sunlight, "but they had only left around old dried-up pots of poster paint and I had to mix it with water. And there

were only some discarded brushes. But, it will give you the idea."

He backed down two more steps. Revealed to view were some odd lines and symbols. It looked like three wooden hay forks raking apples—and all of different colors, all bright.

"Now, that first row is what we call the mask corporations. We incorporate those separately in New York, New Jersey, Nevada and Delaware. They all have different, noninterlocking boards of directors."