Terraplane Page 12

  "I can't," he said at last. With voyeur's view I saw her cry, doelike, with no sound other than the hush of tears rushing down her cheeks.

  "Jake," she said. "Brazhny."

  She returned to the couch, leaving her bastard behind, his perfect control undisturbed. Before sleep took me again into more bearable state, I recalled inescapably clear what I'd seen; remembered the impression in Doc's back, the mark which reawared me with Alekhine's warning, that all that seemed familiar would show as other as time passed. The notion buckled my mind, the memory terrorized it. Scars etched Doc's back, but this was no scar; a message passed without tattoo's signal. He carried a brand name: an elongated oval keloid-raised from his shoulder blade. The oval's upper curve read NO DEPOSIT; the lower, NO RETURN. Centered within that ring, in the oldstyle script used to the day we absorbed them, their mark: PROPERTY OF THE COCA-COLA CO., .ATLANTA, GA.

  "HUNGRY?" Doc ASKED SHORTLY AFTER WAKING US AT NINE, while we dragged ourselves free from sleep's grave. Jake and I hadn't chowed since Skuratov's treat the night previous plus one, so many years gone by.

  "Is a scrubber close?" Jake asked, unfolding his blackened whites. Hearing no reply, he remarked: "Supply detergent and I'll tub it."

  Oktobriana rose, her sheet sticking to her as if with glue. "Detergent is not yet invented, Jake," she said.

  "We got laundry soap," Doc said, grasping the drift. "Won't you ruin that suit if you soak it? Won't it shrink?"

  "It's sized and set," said Jake, standing, keeping his sheet onehanded before him. My suit, of highest corporate style, was of course naturalized, and its wrinkles were such that it appeared to have been plowed under by tanktread nightlong.

  Doc nodded, semblancing that he understood. "How're you feeling, miss?" he asked. "You want to take a bath?" Her sheet unwrapped as she stood; Doc averted eyes, seeming not so comfortable with nudity's sight without an examtable near to certify propriety.

  "Too early for feel of water on skin," she said, kneeling before one of her cases, reaching forward for the other, her left leg rising for balance. "My name is Oktobriana. Mother's familiar name for me was Chada, if you find that more easy to say."

  "I couldn't call you child, miss-"

  Wanda padded in; sighted upended Oktobriana and blew. "Put on some clothes, girl!" she shouted. "Don't you see those damn windows are open?" Oktobriana, unnerved, drew a shirt round her top half. Wanda spotted Jake tugging his own sheet round. "Ever' damn one of 'em buck naked. In my house-"

  "Where else they going to dress, Wanda-"

  "What if some cop looked in and saw you two in here with her? Running around bareass like she was the main course at a buffet flat. That's not how you act around here-"

  "All right, Wanda," Doc said, moving hallways. "Jake. Luther. Thisaway. "

  "Haul ever' one of us down to the precinct house," Wanda continued; noted Oktobriana's deliberations. "They may want to see what they're missing, girl, but Idon't. Put on some pants. "

  At bathroom's threshold we stopped as if bluntaxed; Turkish lavatories weren't so primitive. Jake stared at the toilet as if deciding how to disarm it.

  "She's always beefin' this time of morning," said Doc. "What're you looking at, Jake?"

  "You know this is flooded?" Jake said, regarding the bowl. Doc clamped a hand onto his mouth, keeping from shooting untoward word.

  "See that chain hanging down? Do what you got to do, then when you're finished, give it a good hard yank." Overhead, we sighted the chain's root emerging from a wall-affixed porcelain tank. "This is the tub," Doc continued, explaining. "Want to take a shower, use the top two knobs there. "

  "Recognized," said Jake, reaching past the curtain, pressing the knobs with his fingers.

  "They turn," said Doc. Stepping hallways, he added: "You don't both have to go at once if you don't want to. We got plenty of water. "

  "Unintended," I said, closing the door and seating myself upon the shut lid. Beneath the tub's freestanding legs showed a lakebed's sediment, a host of life. Running my shaver cross my face I wondered what feelings remained from the dawn encounter I'd eavesdropped; had no desire to inquire, yet. When Jake untubbed I saw he'd dressed within; his drying suit dripped from his frame, its ivory restored.

  "Alkaline," he noted, with slim fingers touching a waterdrop to his tongue. "It'll loosen the fabric if used overmuch."

  "So don't." As Jake examined his look in the mirror I readied, and stepped in. Standing beneath gurgling waters, the drizzle itching rather than washing, or so it felt, I considered the ease with which one might, if prepped as I was in such sitch, slide into alien culture. Years past I'd first entered New Guinea incog with my select team, coming as wanderers that we might meld into the dayby-day for a time and so work our subterfuge upon the chosen before our opposition showed, leaving quietly as we'd come once we finished, trailing behind us changed minds and scraps of consumed belief. All we did at first was appear, needing help; within hours found locals keen to assist, our strangeness alluring overmuch. Once attracted, success assured. Such, I told myself, didn't differ here; it was the old case of the advanced circling the primitive to accomplish broader goals.

  As in induced afterimage, I suddenly recalled his Cain's mark, and felt rather rounded myself.

  Feeling near-human again once toweled and redressed, I returned to the front, seeing Oktobriana again sitting close to Jake; nonetheless, he evidenced no passion. Doc lounged in a nearby chair; I hadn't seemed to disturb conversation. Wanda appeared at kitchen door, a white apron shielding most of her Halloween orange frock's shine.

  "Anybody want to come give me a hand?" she asked. "Anybody want to eat?"

  "That means us," said Doc. "Somebody got out of the wrong side of bed this morning," he said to us, winking.

  "Oktobriana and I require conferencing," I said. "We'll assist shortterm. "

  "Let's get to it, Jake," he said, rising.

  "Jake," I said, catching him in midflight. "Let's reset the coordinates. The green's still on?"

  "Still," he said, tossing it, disappearing into cook's void. "Dot's not moved."

  "Tiny buttons on side," Oktobriana said, looking after his path. "You know latitude and longitude here?" I nodded. "Punch them in. Moscow grid will be replaced by New York area grid."

  "How many are in memory?" I asked.

  "All major cities and all Russian cities with populations over five thousand. " Clatter's sound rebounded from the near distance. "No, Jake. This way. That's right," we heard Doc say. As the grid reformed, fifty kilometers rounding midtown showed. Repressing, I gained closer view In Jersey, amidst the lines of nonexistent express lanes, his speck showed blue.

  "Hasn't moved," I said. "Unconscious, possibly. Dying, perhaps. Brokenboned or stuck in the mud."

  "But living still," she said. "We must see if machine survived fall."

  "Maybe Doc can drive us back out there," I said. "What's purposed, though? It's chanced you can effect readjustment?"

  "No foreseeable chance, but is worth effort," she said. "Not foreseeable does not mean impossible."

  "Can we contact Alekhine somehow?" I asked. "Your transferral's possibility must have seemed an option."

  "He did not recommend."

  "Still you must have incorporated a contact mode."

  "There is method of signaling, yes, but remember that I did not expect to be in city of New York if transferred. As said, Sashenka was stationary at both times of use. Such shift in location while moving from one plane of earth to other was not foreseen."

  "What's the signal method, then?" I asked. "If he's-"

  "Likely he is not," she said. "I prefer to leave as last-chance attempt. "

  "That's senseless," I said. "If it's remotely chanced it's worth it. What's the method?"

  "These trackers have special method of contact capability with out danger of observation. Sanya obtained pair for us before first visit. By resetting tracker I can signal to show arrival using Morse code. Transmit location and me
ssage in white flashes on tracker screen.

  "What happened to yours?"

  "Disappeared immediately before I left Dubna. Made me realize time had come to move. I knew they could find me but hoped they would not see effort as necessary. With mine, certainly, they knew I could see them-"

  "So let's transmit to Alek-"

  "Without access to mainframe resetting of tracker back to original use is thereafter impossible. Where is mainframe here? As said, this is vacuum-tube existence. Holding only one instrument it seems senseless to rush till we have our device back in hand recovered, yes?"

  "If I hadn't left him with the other tracker-"

  "If shit was gold we would all be capitalists," she said. `Again, there is no choice. We got get malcontent Skuratov. Retrieve machine. See if it is operable. Try to contact Sanya then. Sanya not to be found, we try to reset device-"

  "But can you?" I asked.

  "Is worth effort," she said. "Men such defeatists. Device I believe can be reenergized by proximity to operating Tesla coil. Large coil. Larger perhaps than any in existence here, but uncertain. Problem is if I can infer directives given as programmed by Sanya. If not-" She quieted, her lip twisting beneath her teeth. "So we try to reset device anyway. We succeed or fail. If we fail we are faced with great problems-"

  Wanda's roar broke our conversation. "Wha'd you mean I'm baking bread that's already baked? Help me fry this bacon-"

  "Have you noted inexplicables in the surroundings?" I asked, thinking again of that movie poster, Doc's brand, unspecifiable feels.

  "Being unconscious most of time since arrival makes thorough observation difficult," she said. "There are things I have noticed. What is point?"

  "We're not in the past, are we?" I said. "Not truly."

  "Certainly we are not in past," she said. "How many times I tell you causality prohibits? You cannot drink vodka already drunk."

  "During his first passthrough he certainly realized, then. You mentioned as much." A fly, stricken with lust for my head, repeatedly caressed and stroked. "He surely told more than you've told. Early on you must have clad old theories in new clothes. So where are we?"

  "To us it seems past," she said. "Tb them, and in fact, it is present day.

  "Repeat and clarify."

  "This is coexistent sphere of existence," she said. "Occupies same space as ours but at different aspect. Neither world has known of other's existence. Perhaps each started as mirror image of other. It seems this one developed at slower rate though following like path. We have theory that at places there are windows between worlds naturally occurring for short time, allowing accidental transferral. That explained many paraphysical aspects in theory. Sanya, therefore, developed method to get between places at will-"

  "That's crazed," I said. "It's comic book-"

  "True, just the same."

  "It's impossible to put two into one."

  "Is obviously possible," she said. "Visualize wide meadow with high mesh fence running down middle. Mesh in fence so fine that person standing on one side cannot see other side's presence. Meadow same on both sides but perhaps fence's shade causes slower growth on one half. Makes sense?"

  "What occurs within the fenceline?"

  "Anything," she said. "We believed that it is area of extreme flux. Passing but halfway through would probably be very hazardous."

  "Sticking to this imbecile metaphor," I said, still disbelieving, "how then is access gained?"

  She shrugged. `Aim water from hose at fence. Water pours down on other side. We are water."

  "In theory we can return-"

  "In fact Sanya did return," she said. "All is needed is operable device. New hose, as it were. Fact remains that we must leave here soon as possible. Inherent problems contain great potential for much mischief and harm."

  "What?" I said. "We'll marry our great-grandparents by mistake?"

  "You don't need umbrella unless rain falls," she said, annoyance rising. "There is nothing to that. Here they would be other people. Silly fantasies may be put aside. Two unavoidable problems of which I am thinking are much more serious and likely."

  `And they are-"

  "This world would seem to be following path similar to ours but we do not know for certain. We cannot foresee how actions here will cause hurtful changes affecting this world's future."

  "Or helpful changes," I said. "That's considered?"

  "That was Sanya's idealistic belief," she said. "Before leaving second time he said in fact that he saw it as solution, not problem. I disagree because we do not know what effect our actions have, and we should not have power to change such things. But problem of disease is much more immediate and terribly serious."

  "Disease?"

  "Simplest disease here may kill us if our immunity does not match, and there is no reason it would. Think of common transfer of plagues from culture to culture in past. Medieval Black Death. Your American Indians wiped out by white-man diseases. Is same principle. Longer we are here, the more we are exposed to whatever might be here."

  "He wasn't qualmed by that?"

  She shook her head. "Such a fool."

  A thump, as from a blunt striking a solid, came from the kitchen. "Jake!!"

  The possibilities unlimited. I rushed in, fearful of what casualties might have been sustained, Oktobriana trailing, and my stomach did flip upon entering-not from sight, from smell; frying food's excremental scent permeated air at oxygen's exclusion.

  "We got enough help in here," Wanda shouted, her hands fisted. "Look how he's helped. Couldn't-you- just step on the damn thing?"

  Embedded wallways, at noselevel, was a cleaver; on the floor below were a roach's halves.

  "Got it," said Jake, nonchalant.

  "Just swat 'em, Jake. Get the Flit can," said Doc, freeing the blade. "Didn't know who you was trying to get."

  "Crazy man," muttered Wanda as she shook a skillet holding baconstrips in a depth of grease over the stove's free flame. "Sticks bacon in the breadbox, shuts the lid, wants to know how he's supposed to watch it cook. Pokes knobs instead of turning 'em. Lays pans on the oven half a foot from the burner and wants to know how long they'll take to heat. He ever been in a kitchen before?"

  "Like your eggs fried?" Doc asked. I peered into a stovetopped warmer. Therein eight jaundiced baby crania floated in their brownish gray drowning pool. Their smell muckered twiceover, so early in the morning. "Jake's just used to kitchens in the future, isn't that right, Jake? They've probably got gizmos that roast your food right on the hoof, right?"

  Jake nodded. "Napalm-"

  "I have such appetite," said Oktobriana. I mouthbreathed, to lessen that overpowering smell, the permanent scent of greasy burn.

  "Dishes that wash themselves," Doc went on. "Turnips the size of basketballs-"

  "May I have two unshelled eggs?" I asked, knowing that something essentialled.

  "You want 'em raw?" Doc asked. "Got ulcers?"

  "Terrible ones," I lied. "I'll have them glassed, please-"

  "Cook for 'em half the morning in this heat and he's gonna sit there and suck eggs? Shit-"

  "Come on, Wanda," said Doc. "Cool off."

  `All of you just go ahead and sit down," she said. The kitchen's size impressed, so used was I to the dry shower stalls New York realtors of our day call Ingestion Areas; each of us had overmuch room as we tabled round in the room's center, the broad window facing us, flies' ceaseless whine tingling our ears. While our hosts and Oktobriana ravaged their emplated horrors, I stirred my eggs until drinkable and Jake tore away his toast's casing.

  "Don't like crusts, Jake?" Doc asked, cramming down bacon.

  "Surface particulate concentration highest thereon," he said, staring down. "What's the flooring?"

  "Linoleum," said Wanda. The name unfamiliared; whatever it was, it split and peeled at flooredge, showed dirt's annual accumulation beneath surface gloss. "What do you have? Something else?"

  "Mirafloor," said Jake. "A springy industry by-product comp
ressed flat-" Wanda appeared unimpressed. An unavoidable aspect of this time, it seemed, was that as the outer world grew more gray-brown while Depression lingered, the inner shone as if polychromed, one's loss overcompensated by the other. Sitting on an aqua chairpad, vizzing sunlight filtered through the kitchen window's green-and-white awning and chrome yellow curtains, my knees brushing a red-checkered tablecloth holding an odd, slippery feel, drinking from a bloodred tumbler, eyeing others' shiny blue plates, I felt mugged by hue, strangled by a rainbow

  "Called that friend of mine I was talking about this morning," said Doc, forcing yellow oil from his yolks, dipping toast in its sebum. "Doesn't have any blank flyers handy but has something just as good. Said to come up after breakfast. They're just a little ways up the street."

  "You talk to Cedric or you talk to Lee?" asked Wanda.

  "You know Lee's never up before noon," he said. "This'll even us up till the next time one of his girls gets into trouble-"

  "That'll be next week, more than likely. Why don't you men eat like this little girl here?"

  "A carboload's nonessentialled," said Jake. "I'm sufficed." Flies circled round before diving into fresh runs across our plates.

  "I am not little girl," Oktobriana corrected, clearing her initial plate; Doc reloaded.

  "Don't eat like one," said Wanda. "Want me to take the general up there, then?"

  "Why don't you," said Doc, in a quiet monotone. "Luther, pull that picture out of your passport before you go. He's going to need to put it in your new one."

  "New American passport?"

  Doc's right eyebrow lifted, owl-like. "Venezuelan. It's all he had right now. I give him your height, weight, how old you are. He's going to give you a new name, too, just to keep it all kosher."

  "I don't look Venezuelan-"

  "Don't look like you're from Norway," said Doc. "They mix a lot more down there than they do up here. You'll pass. You speak any Spanish?"