Roger Zelazny - Donnerjack

“I see your point, sir. And, to be honest, my friend was a bit of a bitch herself. I think she would have liked to identify with Ishtar—assertive feminism or something—but it just didn’t work for her.”

“A pity, but we are straying from your own conversion—and your recent experience. How did you learn you had developed a virt power?”

“I was doing some work and my notepad slipped. I’d just finished the adept training here and I reached out and… well, it stopped.”

“Did you report immediately?”

“No, sir. I didn’t. I practiced for a couple of days. I wanted… I was afraid I’d look like a fool.”

“Did you share this information with anyone who was not a member of the Church?”

“No, sir. I didn’t.”

“Very good. Continue not to do so. We do not wish to be flooded with neophytes who only desire to acquire paranormal abilities.”

“But don’t most people already know about them?”

“We did make the news of our miracles public, but most dismiss them as tabloid fodder. However, if everyone knew someone who has a virt power—someone nice and ordinary like a local librarian who just doesn’t need to get up to get a book off the shelf—we would be inundated by the greedy.”

“I can’t, you realize.”

“Can’t what?”

“Get a book off the shelf. It’s too heavy and my grip isn’t precise enough.”

Kelsey smiled. “Continue your studies, Davis, and you will be able to do that and other things—things even more wonderful. However, I am troubled with the question of your faith. When can you take leave again from your job?”

Eden wanted to say immediately, but he knew that wouldn’t do.

“I just took off a long chunk of time for the last training session, sir. I’ve just about burnt my vacation time.”

“Have you begun a new project?”

“Well, I’m about done with a short one I started when I got back. I’ve been angling for one on early Gothic novels for a professor at Harvard. It involves the Devendra P. Dharma Collection and promises at least one trip to Italy.”

“It sounds quite interesting. However, would you be interested in being hired by us instead?”

“Us?”

“The Church. We could hire you to do some research for us. Some of your work time would be directed to instruction in the faith.”

Eden tried to keep from looking too excited, but he knew his eyes had widened in astonishment.

“Could you really do that? I don’t want to jeopardize my job. It’s taken me a long time—”

“We can do it. I doubt your employers would turn down a lucrative contract that specifically called for your services.”

“I guess you’re right, Mr. Kelsey.”

“Then you will accept?”

“Will the terms be the same as usual for my job?”

“We would be working through your usual employer. You would even have your usual work hours—though we might ask you to donate some time to the Church for your lessons.”

“Consider me hired.”

“Tell me, Mr. Davis. Do you feel the presence of a god here?”

Eden closed his eyes, reached out for that strange tingle he had felt once or twice and had dismissed as part of the aesthetic trims of the Elishites—something like a subaudible hum, perhaps. He would never have worked it into his Davis biography if he hadn’t believed that there was something at work—though he suspected sophisticated programming rather than gods.

“No, Mr. Kelsey. I do not.”

“Honest, too. Very good. Come kneel beside me. We will sing the praises of the divinities who—even if they are not physically present— do have a tendency to listen to those of our Church.”

Taking his place on the kneeler next to Kelsey, Arthur Eden mouthed the appropriate responses. It looked like if he played his cards right and was very careful, he would have the research opportunity of a lifetime. Perhaps he would even meet the founders of this religion, uncover its deepest secrets.

He smiled and raised his voice in song.

In the evening, as he sat in his lab wondering whether the banshee would howl or a ghost put in its appearance, Donnerjack thought back over the old days, when he and Jordan and Bansa had worked out what was to become the theoretical basis of Virtu. It was raining, as usual, and his mind skipped back over nights of good fellowship and amazing leaps of logic. Of pizza and beer. Was he still capable of the sort of work the three of them had done back then?

Near midnight, he received a message from the CID. It was a holo, from Reese.

The man stood before him, looking as he had just a few hours earlier.

“If you receive this,” he began, “I’ve made it through one more. Don’t know what sort of shape I’ll be in for some time, though. You’ll hear from me eventually. Glad you didn’t get the other message.”

Donnerjack touched a code. “Paracelsus,” he said, “spare me a minute.”

The AI appeared wearing a baseball uniform with a Cleveland Indians insignia. “Hi, boss,” he said.

“Paracelsus,” said Donnerjack, “tell me what happened.”

“Well,” said the other. “We worked something up between us, Sid and I, decided it was the best course of action, and turned it over to the proges to administer. They did, and it worked beautifully.”

“Remind me to call you the next time I’m feeling ill,” Donnerjack said. “In the meantime, when would it be best to talk with Reese?”

“Call him Monday to congratulate him, but give him three weeks before you talk of work.”

“This is a very important job.”

“You want to kill the best man for it?”

“No.”

“Then do as I say, boss. He needs the rest.”

“Done,” Donnerjack responded. “He can’t be replaced. He’s as precious as Bansa would be if he were still around.”

“I’ve heard of Bansa, the man who started the whole thing,” Paracelsus said.

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Donnerjack replied. “But he came up with some novel theories as to what happened.”

“He still holds several places in our oldest pantheon,” Paracelsus said, almost defensively.

“Wouldn’t put it past him. Who is he?”

“The Piper, the Master, the One Who Waits.”

“I think I know him as the Piper.”

“You do?”

“Well… I heard him playing, saw him. What can you tell me about his other personae?”

“The Master is a geometrician who had to do with the creation of the universe. The One Who Waits will figure in the closing or change of Virtu.”

“None of my business, actually, but do you believe in these beings?”

“Yes.”

“Do many others of your sort?”

“Yes.”

“Why would an AI care to worship anything? You’re as self-sufficient as anything in the business. What do you need gods for, unless they’re truly real?”

“They are as real—more real, I believe—than many figures in other religions.”

“Well, buying that they exist, what do they do for you?”

“I guess the same sort of things that beings in other religions do for their followers.”

“It can’t be healing since you guys don’t get sick.”

“No. Spiritual comfort and understanding, I suppose. A dealing with the right feelings for those things which lie beyond reason.”

“That sounds worthwhile, I’d say. But how do you know your gods are authentic?”

“I might ask how anyone knows that about any religion. You would have to respond that most religions require a leap of faith at some point.”

“I might.”

“But I have seen the Piper and know that he is real.”

“I, too, have met the Piper—or at least heard him play.”

Paracelsus stared. Finally, “Where?” he asked.