“If there’s nothing inside the TV cabinet-”
Squatting down, Kemmings removed the screws holding the
back panel of the TV set in place. The panel came loose and he set it down on the floor.
There was nothing inside the TV cabinet. And yet the color hologram continued to fill a quarter of the hotel room, and the voice of the newscaster issued forth from his three-dimensional image.
“Admit you’re the ship,” Kemmings said to the robot doctor. “Oh dear,” the robot doctor said.
Oh dear, the ship said to itself. And I’ve got almost ten years of this lying ahead of me. He is hopelessly contaminating his experiences with childhood guilt; he imagines that his wife left him because, when he was four years old, he helped a cat catch a bird. The only solution would be for Martine to return to him, but how am I going to arrange that? She may not still be alive. On the other hand, the ship reflected, maybe she is alive. Maybe she could be induced to do something to save her former husband’s sanity. People by and large have very positive traits. And ten years from now it will take a lot to save—or rather restore his sanity; it will take something drastic, something I myself cannot do alone.
Meanwhile, there was nothing to be done but recycle the wish fulfillment arrival of the ship at its destination. I will run him
through the arrival, the ship decided, then wipe his conscious memory clean and run him through it again. The only positive
aspect of this, it reflected, is that it will give me something to do,
which may help preserve my sanity.
Lying in cryonic suspension-faulty cryonic suspension
Victor Kemmings imagined, once again, that the ship was
touching down and he was being brought back to conscious
ness.
“Did you dream?” a heavyset woman asked him as the group
of passengers gathered on the outer platform. “I have the im-
pression that I dreamed. Early scenes from my life. ..over a
century ago.”
“None that I can remember,” Kemmings said. He was eager
to reach his hotel; a shower and a change of clothes would do wonders for his morale. He felt slightly depressed and wondered why.
“There’s our guide,” an elderly lady said. “They’re going to
escort us to our accommodations.”
“It’s in the package,” Kemmings said. His depression remained. The others seemed so spirited, so full of life, but over
him only a weariness lay, a weighing-down sensation, as if the
gravity of this colony planet were too much for him. Maybe
that’s it, he said to himself. But, according to the brochure, the
gravity here matched Earth’s; that was one of the attractions.
Puzzled, he made his way slowly down the ramp, step by step,
holding onto the rail. I don’t really deserve a new chance at life
anyhow, he realized. I’m just going through the motions. ..I
am not like these other people. There is something wrong with me; I cannot remember what it is, but nonetheless it is there. In me. A bitter sense of pain. Of lack of worth.
An insect landed on the back of Kemmings’s right hand, an old insect, weary with flight. He halted, watched it crawl across his knuckles. I could crush it, he thought. It’s so obviously infirm; it won’t live much longer anyhow.
He crushed it-and felt great inner horror. What have I done? he asked himself. My first moment here and I have wiped out a little life. Is this my new beginning?
Turning, he gazed back up at the ship. Maybe I ought to go
back, he thought. Have them freeze me forever. I am a man of guilt, a man who destroys. Tears filled his eyes.
And, within its sentient works, the interstellar ship moaned.
During the ten long years remaining in the trip to the LR4 System, the ship had plenty of time to track down Martine Kemmings. It explained the situation to her. She had emigrated to a vast orbiting dome in the Sirius System, found her situation unsatisfactory, and was en route back to Earth. Roused from her own cryonic suspension, she listened intently and then agreed to be at the colony world LR4-6 when her ex-husband arrived
if it was at all possible.
Fortunately, it was possible.
“I don’t think he’ll recognize me,” Martine said to the ship.
“I’ve allowed myself to age. I don’t really approve of entirely
halting the aging process.”
He’ll be lucky if he recognizes anything, the ship thought. At the intersystem spaceport on the colony world of LR4-6,
Martine stood waiting for the people aboard the ship to appear on the outer platform. She wondered if she would recognize her former husband. She was a little afraid, but she was glad that she had gotten to LR4-6 in time. It had been close. Another week and his ship would have arrived before hers. Luck is on my side, she said to herself, and scrutinized the newly landed interstellar ship.
People appeared on the platform. She saw him. Victor had changed very little.
As he came down the ramp, holding onto the railing as if weary and hesitant, she came up to him, her hands thrust deep in the pockets of her coat; she felt shy and when she spoke she
could hardly hear her own voice.
“Hi, Victor,” she managed to say.
He halted, gazed at her. “I know you,” he said.
“It’s Martine,” she said.
Holding out his hand, he said, smiling, “You heard about the
trouble on the ship?”
“The ship contacted me.” She took his hand and held it.
“What an ordeal.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Recirculating memories forever. Did I ever
tell you about a bee that I was trying to extricate from a spider’s web when I was four years old? The idiotic bee stung me.” He bent down and kissed her. “It’s good to see you,” he said.
“Did the ship-”
“It said it would try to have you here. But it wasn’t sure if you
could make it.”
As they walked toward the terminal building, Martine said, “I was lucky; I managed to get a transfer to a military vehicle, a high-velocity-drive ship that just shot along like a mad thing. A new propulsion system entirely.”
Victor Kemmings said, “I have spent more time in my own unconscious mind than any other human in history. Worse than early-twentieth-century psychoanalysis. And the same material over and over again. Did you know I was scared of my mother ?”
“I was scared of your mother,” Martine said. They stood at the baggage depot, waiting for his luggage to appear. “This looks like a really nice little planet. Much better than where I was. ..I haven’t been happy at all.”
“So maybe there’s a cosmic plan,” he said, grinning. “You
look great.”
“I’m old.”
“Medical science-”
“It was my decision. I like older people..’ She surveyed him.
He has been hurt a lot by the cryonic malfunction, she said to herself. I can see it in his eyes. They look broken. Broken eyes. Torn down into pieces by fatigue and-defeat. As if his buried early memories swam up and destroyed him. But it’s over, she thought. And I did get here in time.
At the bar in the terminal building, they sat having a drink.
“This old man got me to try Wild Turkey bourbon,” Victor
said. “It’s amazing bourbon. He says it’s the best on Earth. He brought a bottle with him from. ..” His voice died into silence.
“One of your fellow passengers,” Martine finished.
“I guess so,” he said.
“Well, you can stop thinking of the birds and the bees,”
Martine said.
“Sex?” he said, and laughed.
“Being stung by a bee, helping a cat catch a bird. That’s all past.”
“That cat,” Victor said, “has been dead one hundred and eighty-two years. I figured it out while they were bringing us out of suspension. Probably just as well. Dorky. Dorky, the killer cat.
Nothing like Fat Freddy’s cat.”
“I had to sell the poster,” Martine said. “Finally.”
He frowned.
“Remember?” she said. “You let me have it when we split up.
Which I always thought was really good of you.”
“How much did you get for it?”
“A lot. I should pay you something like-” She calculated.
“Taking inflation into account, I should pay you about two million dollars.”
“Would you consider, ” he said, “instead, in place of the money, my share of the sale of the poster, spending some time
with me? Until I get used to this planet?”
“Yes,” she said. And she meant it. Very much.
They finished their drinks and then, with his luggage trans
ported by robot spacecap, made their way to his hotel room.
“This is a nice room,” Martine said, perched on the edge of
the bed. “And it has a hologram TV. Turn it on.”
“There’s no use turning it on,” Victor Kemmings said. He