Algis Budrys - Rogue Moon

“We don’t know why. We only know what a man can and cannot do while within that part of the formation which has been explored. Thus far, we have a charted safe path and safe motions to a distance of some twelve meters. The survival time for a man within the formation is now up to three minutes, fifty-two seconds.

“Study your charts, Barker. You’ll have them with you when you go, but we can’t know that having them won’t prove fatal past the point they measure now. You can sit here and memorize them. If you have any other questions, look through these report transcriptions, here, for the answers. I’ll tell you whatever else you need to know when you come down to the laboratory. I’ll expect you there in an hour. Sit at my desk,” Hawks finished, walking quickly toward the door. “There’s an excellent reading light.”

Hawks was looking at the astronomical data from Mount Wilson, talking it over with the antenna crew, when Barker finally came through the double doors from the stairwell, holding the formation-chart folder. He was walking quickly and precisely, his face tight.

“All right, Will,” Hawks said, turning away from the engineer in charge of the antenna. “You’d better start tracking the relay tower in twenty minutes. As soon as we’ve got him suited up, we’ll shoot.”

Will Martin nodded and took off his reading glasses to point casually toward Barker. “Think he’ll chicken out?”

Hawks shook his head. “Especially not if it’s put that way. And I’ve done that.”

Martin grinned softly. “Hell of a way for him to make a buck.”

“He can buy and sell the two of us a hundred times over, Will, and never miss an extra piece of pie out of his lunch money.”

Martin looked at Barker again. “Why’s he in this?”

“Because of the way he is.” He began to walk toward Barker. “And, I suppose, because of the way I am. And because of the way that woman is,” he murmured to himself. “I imagine we can mix Connington in, too. All of us are looking for something we must have if we’re to be happy. I wonder what we’ll get?”

“Now, look,” Barker said, slapping the folder. “According to this, if I make a wrong move, they’ll find me with all my blood in a puddle outside my armor, and not a mark on me. If I make another move, I’ll be paralyzed from the waist down, which means I have to crawl on my belly. But crawling on your belly somehow makes things happen so you get squashed up into your helmet. And it goes on in that cheerful vein all the way. If I don’t watch my step as carefully as a tightrope walker, and if I don’t move on time and in position, like a ballet dancer, I’ll never even get as far as this chart reads. I’d say I had no chance whatsoever of-‘ getting out alive.”

“Even if you stood and did nothing,” Hawks agreed, “the formation would kill you at the end of two hundred thirty-two seconds. It will permit no man to live in it longer than some man has forced it to. The limit will go up as you progress. Why its nature is such that it yields to human endeavor, we don’t know. It’s entirely likely that this is only a coincidental side-effect of its true purpose — if it has one.

“Perhaps it’s the alien equivalent of a discarded tomato can. Does a beetle know why it can enter the can only from one end as it lies across the trail to the beetle’s burrow? Does the beetle understand why it is harder to climb to the left or right, inside the can, than it is to follow a straight line? Would the beetle be a fool to assume the human race put the can there to torment it — or an egomaniac to believe the can was manufactured only to mystify it? It would be best for the beetle to study the can in terms of the can’s logic, to the limit of the beetle’s ability. In that way, at least, the beetle can proceed intelligently. It may even grasp some hint of the can’s maker. Any other approach is either folly or madness.”

Barker looked up at Hawks impatiently. “Horse manure. Is the beetle happier? Does it get anything? Does it escape anything? Do other beetles understand what it’s doing, and take up a collection to support it while it wastes time? A smart beetle walks around your tomato can, Doctor, and lives its life contented.”

“Certainly,” Hawks said. “Go ahead. Leave now.”

“I wasn’t talking about me! I was talking about you.” Barker looked around the laboratory. He stared up at the instrument galleries. “Lot of people here. All because of you. I guess that feels pretty satisfying.” He put the folder under one arm and stood with his hands’ in his pockets, his head to one side as he spoke flatly up into Hawks’ face. “Men, money, energy — all devoted to the eminent Dr. Hawks and his preoccupations. Sounds to me like other beetles have taken up a collection.”

“Looking at it that way,” Hawks said dispassionately, “does keep it simple. And it explains why I continue to send men into the formation. It satisfies my ego to see men die at my command. Now it’s your turn. Come on, Lancelot — your armor’s waiting for you. Can’t you hear the trumpet blowing? What’s this—” He touched a lipstick smudge around a purple bruise on the side of Barker’s neck. “A lady’s favor? Whose heart will break if you should be unhorsed today?”

Barker knocked his hand away. “A beetle’s heart, Doctor.” His strained face fell into a ghastly, reminiscent smile. “A beetle’s cold, cold heart.”

Barker lay in his suit, his arms sprawled at his sides. Hawks had asked the Navy crew to step away from the table. Now he said softly, “you’ll die, Barker. I want you to give up all hope. There isn’t any.”

“I know that, Doctor,” Barker said.

“I’ve said you’d die again and again. You will. Today is only the first time. If you retain your sanity, you’ll be all right — except you’ll have the memory of dying, and the knowledge that you must die again tomorrow.”

“In some other unbelievable way. You’ve told me this before.” Barker sighed. “All right, Doctor — how are you going to do it? What little piece of magic are you going to work?” He was noticeably calm; in the same way he had faced Sam Latourette. His expression was almost apathetic. Only the black eyes, their pupils dilated broadly, lived in his face.

“There are going to be two of you,” Hawks said. “When you’re scanned, the signal describing you will be sent not only to the receiver on the Moon but to the one in the laboratory here. The signal to the laboratory receiver will be held in a tape delay deck until the duplicate signal has reached the Moon. Then both receivers’ will simultaneously resolve a Barker. We put this system into operation as soon as we understood there was no hope for the volunteer on the Moon. It means that, so far as Earth is concerned, the volunteer has not died. It has worked perfectly each time.”

Barker looked patiently up at him.

Hawks went on laboriously. “It was conceived of as a lifesaving thing,” he said, his upper lip twitching. “And it will save your life. Barker M, on the Moon, will die. But Barker L, here, will be taken out of his suit, and will be you, and will, if he retains his ability to remember coherently, and to reason, go home tonight as though this had been just another day in his life. And only you,” he said, his stare focusing behind the surface of Barker’s skull, “who stand on the Moon and remember me speaking to you now, will know that you are the luckless one, Barker M, and that a stranger has taken your place in the world.”

His eyes returned to the Barker lying in the suit. “Someone else will hold Claire in his arms tonight. Someone else will drive-your car and drink your whisky. You are not the Barker I met in your house. That man is gone. But no Barker has known death yet — no Barker has had to go into a place from which there is no return. You can get out of that suit at this moment, Barker, and leave here. I would.” He watched the man intently.