Philip Dick - Vulcan's Hammer

Barris, face to face with him for the first time, felt a complete and absolute fear of the man; it came with a certitude that he had never before known in his life.

Ahead of them, Rachel led the way upstairs.

Barris said, "I'd be interested to know when this woman went over to you." He indicated Rachel Pitt, who stood by a window of the hotel room, gazing meditatively out at the buildings and rooftops of Geneva.

"You can see Unity Control from here," Rachel said, turning her head.

"Of course you can," Father Fields said in his hoarse, grumbling voice. He sat in the corner, in a striped bath­robe and fleece-lined slippers, a screw driver in one hand, a light fixture in the other; he had gone into the bathroom to take a shower, but the light wasn't working. Two other men, Healers evidently, sat at a card table poring over some pamphlets stacked up between them in wired bun­dles. Barris assumed that these were propaganda material of the Movement, about to be distributed.

"Is that just coincidence?" Rachel asked.

Fields grunted, ignoring her as he worked on the light fixture. Then, raising his head, he said brusquely to Barris, "Now listen. I won't lie to you, because it's lies that your organization is founded on. Anyone who knows me knows I never have need of lying. Why should I? The truth is my greatest weapon."

"What is the truth?" Barris said.

"The truth is that pretty soon we're going to run up that street you see outside to that big building the lady is look­ing at, and then Unity won't exist." He smiled, showing his malformed teeth. But it was, oddly, a friendly smile. As if, Barris thought, the man hoped that he would chime in-possibly smile back in agreement.

With massive irony, Barris said, "Good luck."

"Luck," Fields echoed. "We don't need it. All we need is speed. It'll be like poking at some old rotten fruit with a stick." His voice twanged with the regional accent of his origin; Barris caught the drawl of Taubmann's territory, the Southern States that formed the rim of South America.

"Spare me your folksy metaphors," Barris said.

Fields laughed. "You stand in error, Mister Director."

"It was a simile," Rachel agreed, expressionlessly.

Barris felt himself redden; they were making fun of him, these people, and he was falling into it. He said to the man in the striped bathrobe, "I'm amazed at your power to draw followers. You engineer the murder of this woman's husband, and after meeting you she joins your Movement. That is impressive."

For a time Fields said nothing. Finally he threw down the light fixture. "Must be a hundred years old," he said. "Nothing like that in the United States since I was born. And they call this area 'modern.'" He scowled and plucked at his lower lip. "I appreciate your moral indignation. Somebody did smash in that poor man's head; there's no doubt about that."

"You were there too," Barris said.

"Oh, yes," Fields said. He studied Barris intently; the hard dark eyes seemed to grow and become even more wrathful. "I do get carried away," he said. "When I see that lovely little suit you people wear, that gray suit and white shirt, those shiny black shoes." His scrutiny traveled up and down Barris. "And especially, I get carried away by that thing you all have in your pockets. Those pencil beams."

Rachel said to Barris, "Father Fields was once burned by a tax collector."

"Yes," Fields said. "You know your Unity tax collectors are exempt from the law. No citizen can take legal action against them. Isn't that lovely?" Lifting his arm, he pulled back his right sleeve; Barris saw that the flesh had been corroded away to a permanent mass of scar tissue, from the man's wrist to his elbow. "Let's see some moral indig­nation about that," he said to Barris.

"I have it," Barris said. "I never approved of the general tax-collecting procedures. You won't find them in my area."

"That's so," Fields said. His voice lost some of its feroc­ity; he seemed to cool slightly. "That's a fact about you. Compared to the other Directors, you're not too bad. We have a couple of people in and around your offices. We know quite a bit about you. You're here in Geneva be­cause you want to find out why Vulcan 3 hasn't handed down any dogma about us Healers. It needles your con­science that old Jason Dill can toss your DQ forms back in your face and there's nothing you can do. It is mighty odd that your machine hasn't said anything about us."

To that, Barris said nothing.

"It gives us sort of an advantage," Fields said. "You boys don't have any operating policy; you have to mark time until the machine talks. Because it wouldn't occur to you to put together your own human-made policy."

Barris said, "In my area I have a policy. I have as many Healers as possible thrown into jail-on sight."

"Why?" Rachel Pitt asked.

"Ask your dead husband," Barris said, with animosity toward her. "I can't understand you," he said to her. "Your husband went out on his job and these people-"

Fields interrupted, "Director, you have never been worked over by the Atlanta psychologists." His voice was quiet. "This woman has, So was I, to some extent. To a very minor extent. Not like she was. With her, they were in a hurry."

For a while no one spoke.

There's not much I can say, Barris realized. He walked over to the card table and picked up one of the pamphlets; aimlessly, he read the large black type.

DO YOU HAVE ANY SAY IN RUNNING YOUR LIVES?

WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU VOTED?

"There has been no public election," Field said, "for twenty years. Do they teach that to the little kids in your schools?"

"There should be," Barris said.

Fields said, "Mr. Barris-" His voice was tense and husky. "How'd you like to be the first Director to come over to us?" For an instant Barris detected a pleading quality; then it was gone. The man's voice and face be­came stern. "It'll make you look good as hell in the future history books," he said, and laughed harshly. Then, once more picking up the light fixture, he resumed work on it.

He ignored Barris; he did not even seem to be waiting for a reply.

Coming over to Barris, Rachel said in her sharp, con­stricted fashion, "Director, he's not joking. He really wants you to join the Movement."

"I imagine he does," Barris said.

Fields said, "You have a sense of what's wrong. You know how wrong it is. All that ambition and suspicion. What's it for? Maybe I'm doing you people an injustice, but honest to God, Mr. Barris, I think your top men are insane. I know Jason Dill is. Most of the Directors are, and their staffs. And the schools are turning out lunatics. Did you know they took my daughter and stuck her into one of then: schools? As far as I know she's there now. We never got into the schools too well. You people are really strong, there. It means a lot to you."

"You went to a Unity school," Rachel said to Barris. "You know how they teach children not to question, not to disagree. They're taught to obey. Arthur was the product of one of them. Pleasant, good-looking well-dressed, on his way up-" She broke off.

And dead, Barris thought.

"If you don't join us," Fields said to him, "you can walk out the door and up the street to your appointment with Jason Dill."

"I have no appointment," Barris said.

"That's right," Fields admitted.

Rachel screamed, pointing to the window.

Coming across the sill, through the window and into the room, was something made of gleaming metal. It lifted and flew through the air. As it swooped it made a shrill sound. It changed direction and dropped at Fields.

The two men at the card table leaped up and stared open-mouthed. One of them began groping for the gun at his waist.

The metal thing dived at Fields. Covering his face with his arms, Fields flung himself to the floor and rolled. His striped bathrobe flapped, and one slipper shot from his foot and slid across the rug. As he rolled he grabbed out a heat beam and fired upward, sweeping the air above him. A burning flash seared Barris; he leaped back and shut his eyes.