“Get out of there!” the man yelled indignantly. He was dressed in a union janitor’s jumpsuit.
“Uh, yeah,” Dodd said, climbing out. His muscles were all stiff. He felt like he was dreaming. “Thank you,” he muttered.
“I was about to throw a ton of trash in on you, you nut.”
“Thanks again,” Dodd said, to the janitor’s disgust. He wandered away looking delirious, searching for a phone to call in sick to work.
20. LAST DAY
This is it, Saul was thinking. This is the last day. He had to keep telling himself this.
Saul had the feeling he was spinning out of control. It was a strong physical sensation, almost strong enough for him to doubt his eyes which were telling him he was traveling in a straight line. The ball rolled in front of him, bouncing grimly along, being controlled by his crew. They controlled his floating chair as well. I’d hate to think what would happen if I had to control it, he thought. I would send myself spinning into a tree.
A cable ran down from the socket in his skull to a fortune’s worth of cephalic hardware on board the chair. His crew monitored the images being recorded. Just as people needed a waking life to inspire dreams, the Travels animator AI’s had to have raw images to build the broadcast; Saul was using experimental techniques to raise the AHL in his raw images so that it would be super-fuel for the AI’s. More and more he found he had to do things himself because no one else would do.
I’m not spinning, he told himself firmly. I am not.
He was holding on to the arms of the flying chair with a death grip, his mouth set in a grimace. He was starting to hallucinate. Occasionally he would catch a glimpse of an enormous chasm off in the ocean, the water pouring down into mist … or it would be right on the other side of a grove of trees, a red gaping hole miles across and miles across. The breeze that tossed his thinning hair went unnoticed, along with the shout of the seagulls and the crash of the ocean waves. He took slow, deep breaths; patient breaths. He was sweating in streams.
He could see the edge of the chasm coming closer. He was crawling toward it like an ant approaching the Grand Canyon. The force of all his superiors at Telcron Systems was at his back, all the board members and advertisers, all pushing him forward. The ground at the edge of the chasm was suddenly crumbling at his feet, he could feel it. He could look down and see it. There was no way to avoid going over; he already was over. He reached out and grabbed for something, anything … he caught the edge and held on.
His crew watched the images with amazement. The sphere was running along the edge of a bottomless canyon, almost tumbling over … but not quite. An angled rock here, an outcropping there … just when it looked like it was going over it would bounce away. The AHL reading was high on the scale. What an imagination Saul had! What a master of the Mataphin! Watching the raw image coming in they failed to hear his mournful cries for help.
All that was left between him and the fall was one weak, tenuous grasp on the bare face of the rock. The drop spread out underneath him vividly, all Arizona reds and greys, old sandstone bluffs and arid dry sand. The sweat from his hand was making it slippery.
Just do it, he thought. Push yourself off with a yell. Let go, let yourself fly. Then you’ll have all the weight of the push behind you. Everything will be behind you. You can do it, just let yourself. Come on, if you can let yourself go over then you can let yourself do anything. Just do it. Just let go.
Saul held on anyway. He held on despite what he was telling himself. One tenuous grasp held him, and he clung.
His crew watched as the AHL went up yet another digit.
Saul gripped his chair, kept his eyes open, and kept up his slow, even breathing. This was killing him, he could feel it. The chasm gaped like an open mouth ready to swallow him. He hung on, desperate, knowing full well it was futile. How in the hell can I keep this up? he thought.
Easy. Let go.
I’m just one person, damn it! How can I compete with Jesus Christ? How can I make His followers abandon Him? To them He is God! Who am I? I am a small and unhappy man who has burned his brain with drugs, who has produced mutant offspring, who has lost his wife to another woman – who has placed himself in a position where he must do something that he can not do.
You can do it. You can do it if you let go.
I can not!
You have no choice.
I will fight it to the end, he thought, and willed himself back over the lip of the chasm, back onto flat ground.
The Travels sphere went bouncing off away from the chasm, off onto a flat, featureless plain. The rolling slowed but did not stop; it rolled on, lost, tired. Saul’s crew watched in dismay –
the image had nothing to do with the reality, had nothing to do with the ball they were controlling for Saul’s eyes. The AHL meter dropped to almost zero. Saul’s eyes were closed; he’d fallen asleep.
“Saul? Saul?”
Saul opened his eyes. A voice was calling his name from the arm rest. He touched a panel and said, “What?”
“Why don’t we call it a day, Saul. We’ve got some fantastic material, best stuff anyone here’s ever seen. We’re all tired, and we know you must be. We’re going on twelve hours now.”
“No,” Saul said. “No, not yet. Give me a minute, I’ll get back on track.” Just today, he told himself. I only have to get through today. This is the last day before Jesus comes, he’ll be here tomorrow.
Saul pulled a Mataphin dispenser out of a pouch on his harness. Hold back, he told himself, and was proud that he only took two. He could feel himself spinning again, careening out of control toward the edge. He dug in, held on. Rocks fell away under his feet. It can’t be Jesus, he told himself. The only reason I’m thinking he’s real is because of the pressure. It’s the pressure that’s getting me.
There would be no pressure, his own voice said in his ear.
There would be no pressure if you let go.
SHUT UP!
The crew heard it this time, his fearful, angry cry. They looked up, watching him sadly. After a moment they returned to their work, guiding the ball and Saul’s chair, processing the raw images. The AHL began climbing again. Saul was back on track. It was amazing, they didn’t know how he could do it. Those that really understood what it took to get images this dense from a human mind regarded him with a mixture of reverence and horror.
Finally, three hours after sunset, Saul and the crew finished. Now Saul had to take all they had produced back to Telcron and hover over the technicians and their computers while the animator AI’s processed it for broadcast. By tomorrow it would be on the air, and Saul would know by noon whether or not he had accomplished his task.
21. FIRST DAY
Dodd stepped outside into the morning air, standing in front of the door and letting it close behind him. He took a deep breath and faced the morning as if it were a thing in front of him to contemplate. Nothing down at the plant had led him to believe he had the day off today, even if the Second Coming did occur. He had always worked alternating Sundays, it was part of his original contract. Unless Jesus Himself changed things Dodd figured this would continue as always.
If Jesus really does come, he thought, today could be the end of the world. This made the day seem physically different to Dodd as he strode at his normal pace toward the subway terminal. The air around him seemed charged, as if there were going to be a lightning storm. The morning sunlight seemed different; the light was richer, more golden. There was not a cloud in sight.
The streets and walkways were much quieter today than usual, even for a Sunday. There were only a few other people at the station, one a young woman. From behind she looked like Savina.
She turned and glanced at him; she was older than he’d thought, at least in her mid-twenties. She smiled at him and then shyly turned away.
Dodd wondered about Savina. Where was she? Was she with Danny? Was she with the Indian woman? He hoped to God she was still okay. He hadn’t heard anything since that anonymous message.