Pegasus in Flight (6 page)

“How do you mean ‘demonstrated’?”

“Time and motion studies, energy expenditures—that sort of recordable data. Remember, I’ve seen your kinetics in action, but I doubt that Ludmilla or even Per Duoml have taken the trouble to watch them work. They’ve been too busy bitching about weightlessness and the silence of space to appreciate the effort kinesis actually takes. I thought you might not have thought of that gimmick. So I had a chat with a Talent I know who was up on the platform, and he gave me some remarkable insights into the actual shift mechanics.
If
the day’s matériel was properly organized, the kinetic could put everything in place for the grunts to lock on and weld.

“Then, the noise element. Samjan ran some of the ‘noises’ past me—” He grimaced and crossed his eyes in sympathy. “—and I think if we did a tape simulation of what a sensitive hears in unshielded quarters and played it back . . .”

“Not to Ludmilla. She insists there is no noise in space.”

“She’s more of a Mute than I am.”

“But I take your point. I hadn’t thought of a trick like that.”

“No trick, my dear, just presentation—and that’s where I’m the expert.” His grin was a mixture of impudence and malice.

For the first time in her Talented life, Rhyssa found herself fascinated by a Mute, and half of that fascination was due to the fact that she could not predict what he would do or say next. It was fun matching wits with him during subsequent interviews, giving the onerous task an unexpected exhilaration.

Dave Lehardt was at her side for the initial meeting with a Barchenka who oozed smug satisfaction that she made no attempt to disguise. Rhyssa was hard put to remain civil. Dave Lehardt talked so fast that the engineer had to listen attentively to catch his points. Per Duoml was, as usual, with her, but Rhyssa had been spared another confrontation with Prince Phanibal.

“All we have had is talk, empty talk,” Ludmilla Barchenka said when Dave had explained the dual problems of short shifts and shielding. “Even the physically impaired are able to work proper shifts in space: no gravity, no sound!” She shot an accusatory look at Rhyssa.

“Ah, but it is not gravity which is a problem, nor the vacuum. Ludmilla Ivanova, I have arranged a demonstration . . .”

“I have no time for demonstrations,” the Exalted Engineer stated dismissively. “I must return to the platform. Already there are delays which must be rectified.”

“Understood, Engineer Barchenka,” Dave said soothingly, with just the right amount of respect and understanding. “Perhaps Per Duoml will attend. This demonstration is likely to put the basic problems into proper perspective, and thus help us all resolve the main problems with the maximum benefit to your project.”

Duoml would be much easier to deal with—his mind was not totally closed, although he was as dedicated to the project as Barchenka. If they could
prove
their points to him, they would be halfway to victory.

“I think she’s disappointed she didn’t have to invoke that wretched statute,” Rhyssa told Sascha later.

“D’you think we gave in too easily?” he asked.

“The news quotes Barchenka calling it the ‘cowardly capitulation of the effete.’ ”

“Let her. If we can just swing Duoml to our side.” Rhyssa frowned. “I don’t see what else we could have done. Dave Lehardt is running public-opinion polls. One point is clear:
Everyone
wants Padrugoi to be finished,
everyone
wants someone else to work up there, and
everyone
thinks people who volunteer for anything are crazy.”

The next day, Dave Lehardt and Rhyssa Owen took Personnel Manager Per Duoml to the most prestigious exercise complex in Jerhattan, a facility that occupied the first nine floors of a Residential ziggurat near Central Park. The largest gymnasium was set up with three sets of stress-monitoring paraphernalia and technicians, three pyramids of standard-size packages, a forklift, a bevy of impartial observers, and the Complex director, Menasherat ibn Malik, who had been a multiple Olympic gold medalist for four times running.

Per Duoml was suitably impressed by ibn Malik. So was Rhyssa, for the man exuded physical vitality and competence. He also had no more Talent than Dave Lehardt, who appeared well acquainted with him. Dave stood by, a slight smile on his face, while ibn Malik accepted Per Duoml’s homage and conversed amiably with him.

“Now, Manager Duoml,” the Complex director said, gesturing to the three men who entered from the side. Stripped down to their shorts, they were all festooned with wires, which were in turn hooked up to the machines. “Let me introduce you to Pavel Korl, bronze medalist in heavyweight boxing; Chas Huntley, a forklift operator with International Canning; and Rick Hobson, the kinetic.”

Rhyssa was almost as bemused as Per Duoml as ibn Malik made the introductions. Korl and Huntley were big men, towering over Duoml and certainly making Rick Hobson, who was average in height and build, look insignificant.

“Now, if you would care to check the movables in each pile, Manager Duoml, to assure yourself that they are equal in weight . . .”

Duoml complied, and it was clear that he had to struggle to lift any of them.

“Then once our guinea pigs’ wires are double-checked, we can start the test—which is rather simple. By muscle, by machine, and by mind, our subjects will transfer their piles across the floor. The energy levels required, the stress factors, and calories consumed will be displayed on the monitors. Now,” ibn Malik said, moving to the big screen set in the wall for use at sporting events, “on Padrugoi, three men will be doing exactly the same in Q hangar.” He spoke into his collar mike. “If you’re ready up at Padrugoi?” The big screen lit up with a scene not dissimilar to the one around them, except that all the men wore space suits. “In space, our hand shifter is Jesus Manrique, the lifter is operated by Ginny Stanley, and the kinetic is Kevin Clark. Are you all ready? On your marks—” The gold medalist raised his arm. “Get set—go!” His arm came down, and the activity on the gym floor and in Q hangar commenced. “This test
will last an hour,” he informed Per Duoml, gesturing for the observers to take seats to one side.

After the first few minutes, Per Duoml stopped watching the burly figure of Korl manhandling the packages down the floor, or Huntley zipping back and forth on the loader. He kept his eyes either on Rick, who had seated himself at a table and, with no visible effort, kept a steady stream of packages flowing, or on the platform kinetic, who was doing his work while leaning against a stanchion. Occasionally Duoml flicked a look at the monitors chattering out their hard copy.

Both Talents worked their way through their piles in half the time it took the others. The instrumentation proved that they had expended half again as much energy and used up twice as many calories.

When the test had been completed, Dave Lehardt stripped the hard-copy sheets from all six printers. Neatly folding them, he handed the sheaf to Per Duoml, who took it without a word. The test subjects were all thanked and left the gym, Rick Hobson throwing Rhyssa an impudent wink as he walked by.

“You will, of course, wish to analyze the results of this test with your own motion experts, Manager Duoml,” Dave Lehardt said, “but I’m sure you recognized the fact that weightlessness grants no bonuses to the kinetic. As to the noise factor . . .” The publicist took a compact recorder from his hip pocket and thumbed it on.

At the babel and squeaks and metallic groans, Per Duoml covered his ears in defense and stared in shock at Rhyssa.

“That
is what a sensitive ‘hears’ on the station,” Dave said, raising his voice and inserting his words in between the worst of the noise. It was a fair selection, representing the streams of consciousness of eighty mentalities: resentments, complaints, shouts, pains, angers, and myriad metallic noises that some of the kinetics endured. “With ten thousand people living up there already, the mental noise is never-ending. So all that garbage is a constant secondary drain on their nerves, reducing their efficiency if they have no respite from it in shielded quarters.”

Having set the decibel rate herself, Rhyssa knew that covering his ears gave Duoml frail protection, but she did not reduce the volume until Dave had finished his little speech.

“I see that you hadn’t realized just what we meant by noise,” she said finally. “But the cost of shielding personnel quarters for the kinetics is going to be less than the cost of materiel lost or damaged due to tired minds.”

“You have made your points,” Per Duoml said with a grim expression. “I shall present them to Ludmilla Barchenka.”

“Present them and insure their implementation, Per Duoml, and you will have the kinetic assistance you require. Oh, and one other minor point,” she added, smiling to take the sting out. “Barchenka is to relay all orders to the kinetics through the regular channels. We will have no more of her rousting Talents out of their quarters at inappropriate hours and insisting on ‘extra duty’ because her schedule is two minutes out of line! Have I made myself clear on that point?”

He nodded, his expression solemn.

Rhyssa hoped he could convince Barchenka.

CHAPTER 6

“No,
please
!” Peter Reidinger cried as the electrician was about to disconnect the tri-d in the ward. His cry was echoed by the other children.

“Look, kids, there’s some kind of freaky drain on the hospital’s power supply, and we’ve finally traced it to this ward. I gotta fix it, or some of your support systems will go down when they shouldn’t,” the electrician said with a hint of exasperation in his tone.

“No, wait, please,” Peter said. “The program’s all about the space platform and the Talents.”

“Huh?” The electrician took a better look at the monitor.

“It’ll only be a few minutes! Just the newscast!”

Peter pleaded.

“Wal, I guess—”

“Shhhh,” Peter interrupted, straining to hear the commentator. Not that he really needed the voice-over to identify the scene as the estate of the late George Henner, one of the earliest supporters of the parapsychics. As the camera panned across the trees and lawns, the boy was startled by the place’s eerie familiarity.
This
was the place he had sought—a place of tranquil greenery and huge old trees and vine-covered buildings. The place that had scared him away. And now he knew why.
They
would not want to have their precinct invaded.
They
needed their privacy to do all the wonderful things they did. Like help to finish the last three spokes of the Padrugoi Platform so that mankind could, at last, reach for the stars.

“It’s not only the Talented who are making a sacrifice,” the commentator went on, still standing in that marvelous oasis, “for Industry and Commerce have granted leave of absence to their Talented employees to assist with this final push out to space. Platform Manager Ludmilla Barchenka announces that the most ambitious world project yet undertaken will be completed on schedule. And now to other news in the Jerhattan district . . .”

“Okay, mister,” Peter said, relaxing against his frame. “That’s what we wanted to see.”

“You’re not looking for a career in space, are you?” the electrician asked, half-teasing. He was always a little nervous around kids who were so badly injured.

Peter cocked his head at him. “Why not? With no gravity, I wouldn’t be stuck in this frame, and a push of my toe or my little finger—” He waggled the two extremeties, which were, after months of therapy, all he
could
move. “—I could float about.”

“Yeah, I guess you could. Now, nurse, can I start with this frame?” the electrician asked, gesturing to the multiple-tasking device that gave Peter what independence he had in his condition.

“Yes, it’s time for Peter’s body-brace session anyway,” Sue Romero said. “C’mon, Peter.”

“Aw, do I have to? Couldn’t I watch what he does?”

“No, the moment for positive thinking has come. Let me see that limbic-system smile on your face.”

Peter hated the body brace and the morning’s ‘torture session,’ as he mentally categorized the therapy. He felt heavy in the frame, his body more lifeless than ever. “But see, I can move my big toe and my little finger. Please . . .”

“Hey, what the—?” the electrician exclaimed. The diagnostic reader he had just hooked up had unexpectedly registered a blip.

While Peter gamely concentrated on his body-brace drills, the electrician checked out the bed’s wiring, but except for that one brief blip, he could find no short, no dysfunction in any of the circuitry. By the time an exhausted Peter was back in his bed, the electrician had done a thorough test of all the specialized treatment electronics in the ward. Baffled by the continual surges on the ward’s circuits, the man left a small monitor attached to the one piece of equipment that had registered an abnormality, slight though it had been, and left.

Peter knew by her face that Sue Romero was disappointed in him. He did try to make his body remember how to move. The frame sent electrical impulses into his atrophied muscles, the theory being that the little jolts would restimulate neural and muscular activity. He hated that intrusion into his body even more than he hated being paralyzed.

“Peter, if you would only stop resisting the mechanism,” Sue said reproachfully. “If you would only go with it, instead of denying the help it could give you. You could, you know, even get to the platform. Your schoolwork was excellent—there’d be no problem with the educational end . . .” She trailed off, fighting her own dispiritedness. Sometimes with the very badly damaged children, she felt she was pounding at the well-known immovable object—generally, as in Peter’s case, the child itself.

The boy was exhausted, eyes closed, arms and legs sprawled just as he had been rolled out of the body brace. Sue Romero could not afford to pity him—it was unprofessional and helped neither of them in his rehabilitation—but she did. As she turned away, she thought he was sleeping. She would have been amazed to learn that he was reviewing that vision of the Center, with its trees and lawns and . . . Rhyssa Owen.

That night, Rhyssa was wakeful, going over and over that telecast. She had felt good about it during filming. Dave Lehardt had done his job well. They would, of course, have to wait until opinions had been sampled, but Rhyssa felt that Barchenka was coming out a poor second at the moment, despite her apparent triumph at the cowardly capitulation of the effete Talents. Rhyssa fretted that she had somehow weakened the consolidated strength of Talents and wondered how she could rectify what was still, in the minds of most Talented, an untenable position with Barchenka getting her way.

She felt then the gossamer touch—envious, yearning, wistful, and so terribly sad that a sob clogged her throat.
Wait, little friend,
she murmured in the softest of tones.

Say what?
With the voice came mixed impressions of startlement, sense of apology-denial-rejection, and an astringent smell. And then the touch—timorous and reluctant—was gone.

Rhyssa tried to follow, her touch feather soft, but the retreat had been too swift, like a flicker of shadow across the moonlight outside her window. She made a quick note of the time: 3:43. Then she lay there savoring that touch, examining it, letting her perception analyze it.

Such swiftness suggested a young mind—no old thoughts or experiences to slow the instantaneity of action. A boy on a prank . . . A boy? Doing an out-of-body maneuver? A boy in a hospital—yes, a hospital would account for the astringent odor—his movement constrained so that only his mind could travel?

That fit the pieces together so perfectly that Rhyssa got out of bed and paced over to the console.

“Bud, I want a call out to all hospital Talents,” she said, unable to keep the elation out of her voice.

“The peeper caught you again?”

“That’s right. An adolescent boy, quite likely crippled or paralyzed. I want to see who was awake on the wards at three-forty-three this morning.”

“The last thing you need tonight is some pimple-faced nerd rousing you.”

“On the contrary, Bud, I think that’s exactly what I did need. A youngster able to go out of body? He’s got to have fantastic potential.”

“For what?” Budworth wanted to know.

“That,”
Rhyssa said with a surge of hope, “is what we’ll have to find out.”

As she climbed back into bed, she had a lot to think about before she could compose herself for sleep. How long had it been since a new Talent that strong had been identified? And what sort of a Talent was it? Even strong telepathy did not leave an image, however transparent. A new type of kinesis? Very few kinetics could move themselves! Inanimate objects, yes, but animate ones, no. Most out-of-body experiences were the results of traumas and useless in a commercial sense—and theorists still argued over whether the out-of-body phenomenon was a kinetic manifestation or a strong telepathic projection.

Just remember, she told herself that it was the commercial applications of Talents that provided us with legal immunities, good jobs, and special status for the past four score years . . . and let us get marvelously complacent. Maybe it wasn’t really “noise” that even kinetics heard in space but some other form of interstellar communication, a multilingual garble that they were picking up. Open your mind up, gal. Look around you. Look at Dave Lehardt. He has to be Talented, even if it won’t register on a Goosegg graph.

Why, Rhyssa Owen, she asked herself, does Dave Lehardt
have
to be Talented?

And that was the quandary she fussed over as she finally slipped into an uneasy sleep.

“I discovered some interesting new facets of employment on the platform,” Dave Lehardt told Rhyssa in her office two days later. “Came out in further talks with my platform contact, Samjan, and a few judicious inquiries.” He gave her a humorless grin. “The casualties.”

“Yes, the total is horrific.” Rhyssa shuddered. “But working in space there were bound to be some.”

“Some?” Dave raised his eyebrows. “Some, yes, but when I checked with Johnny Greene in Altenbach’s office, we found several different sets of figures on the casualty rate.”

Rhyssa straightened. When Dave had arrived unexpectedly, she had been busy reshuffling the rotas of the Center’s kinetics, steeling herself to endure their understandable reproaches and arguments. Any interruption was welcome.

“Then I got JG and Samjan together, and they both did a bit of research,” he went on, “and, using their security clearances, they came up with what we think are the real statistics.” His expression was bleak, and there was a stillness about his body that forewarned her. “You know how the unemployed are terrified to be conscripted to Padrugoi? They may not be Talented, but they’ve got an instinct about baaaaaad situations. They have good reason not to want to get conscripted. She loses grunts at a frightening rate, far beyond the allowable. The major reason is because Barchenka’s so bloody-minded about keeping her Sacred Schedules, she won’t interrupt a shift to retrieve drifters!”

To be sure she understood his meaning, Rhyssa unconsciously tried to read his mind. It was like stubbing her toe on a stair raiser, and she blinked. “Run that past me again, please, Dave,” she asked, struggling with confusion at her inability to read him the way she was used to reading most of her friends.

“Surely you’ve seen the promotional footage,” he said, “with the grunts suited up and pushing gi-ormous sections of a spoke with the tips of their fingers or a spare foot?”

“Yes . . .”

“In the
real
working situation, not that mockup they did for recruitment, a worker’ll push too hard, and with every action causing a reaction in space, the poor sod goes spinning off into the dark deeps.”

“Yes . . .”

“Well, Barchenka doesn’t stop work to rescue them. Oh, no, anyone that stupid has to wait until the shift is over before his buddies are allowed to go after him. That is,
if
a skiff is available, and
if
the bod’s been tracked.”

Appalled at the vivid scene his words evoked, Rhyssa stared at him. “Is this public knowledge?”

He gave her a cynical look. “Why do you think the grunts never take surface leave? It’s not the fact that they’re paid so little that they can’t afford surface leave, or that there’s no available space on shuttles for mere grunts, or that they’re unlikely to have any family to visit on Earth. It’s that they’re plain not allowed back down to tell
anyone
what’s happening. The grunts are also segregated so that even the observant among the more elite employees don’t know exactly what’s going on. It took both JG and Samjan and some long program analyses to piece fact out of the publicly available fictions.”

“But all the recruitment films show safety lines and . . .” Part of Rhyssa crowed with delight at discovering Barchenka resorting to very questionable tactics, while another part balked at the enormity of the crime.

“That’s
promo
footage, my dear director. The theory is great. In practice, Barchenka dispensed with safety lines—they kept getting tangled in equipment, slowing down her precious work schedule. So safety lines are a space myth.

“And Barchenka has such saving ways.” Dave Lehardt perched his lean frame on the edge of her desk. “For instance, we discovered by an analysis of records that a suited grunt is given only enough air in his tanks for that shift and maybe a sniff or two left over. Oh, there’s plenty of safety regs for the engineers and supervisors and skilled technicians—but not the grunts. She doesn’t care what happens to them. There’re plenty more where they came from.”

Rhyssa was outraged. “You just validated my instincts about that woman. Law be damned, I won’t ask my kinetics to face such risks!”

Dave gave a snort.
“They’re
far too valuable to be risked. There’d be too much of a stink kicked up if a drifting Talent wasn’t retrieved right then. Overworked, yes. Samjan confirmed the notion that eight-hour shifts are another platform fallacy.

“On top of that conspicuous savings of consumables, I uncovered several other little anomalies: grunt suits have limited-range com units. They can’t be heard shrieking for help! Might disturb their fellow workers.”

Rhyssa stared at him aghast.

“There’s also a high incidence of agoraphobia among the grunts and genuine space cafard. But ailing grunts are never transferred down. They just disappear! Accidental death! Never suicide! Always accidental. After all,” he said, taking on a mock Russian accent, “everyone knows how dangerous it is to ignore safety warnings and procedures. And then there appears to be a neat little system which causes unexpected casualties during the routine drills they so conspicuously hold from time to time on Padrugoi.” Dave paused again. “Checking through medical records, it becomes apparent that the unfortunate victims of those drill ‘accidents’ are always either the injured or the headcases.”

“Oh, my God, Dave!” Rhyssa propelled herself from her chair to pace agitatedly up and down the tower room.
“Why
haven’t any of the precogs caught this?”

“According to your brief summary on Talents’ capabilities, precogs usually latch onto large numbers, Rhyssa. There are never enough—”