The Zap Gun

God would be amazed, probably pleased, by the ruin items 260 through 280, when built by Lanferman Associates, can call into being. It is the Greek sin of hubris made incarnate logos-wise in the flesh—or rather in poly-something and metal, miniaturized with backup systems throughout in case some gnat-sized component fails.

And even God, in raring back and passing the original miracle, The Creation, hadn't gone into miniaturized backup system. He had put all His eggs in one faultily woven basket, the sentient race which now photographed in 3-D ultra-stereophonic, videomatic depth something which did not exist. He thought, Don't knock it until you've tried it. Because getting clear 3-D ultra-stereophonic, videomatic depth shots of constructs which do not exist is not easy. It has taken us fifteen thousand years.

Aloud he said, "The priests of ancient Egypt. Circa Herodotus."

"Pardon?" Pete said.

Lars said, "They used hydraulic pressure to open temple doors at a distance. As they raised their arms and prayed to the animal-headed gods."

"I don't get it," Pete said.

"You don't see?" Lars said, feeling baffled. It was so obvious to him. "It's a monopoly, Pete. That's what we've got, a goddam monopoly. That's the whole point."

"You've gone nuts," Pete said grumpily. He fooled with the handle of his empty coffee cup. "Don't let that Peep-East flunky come in here and get you shook."

"It's not him." Lars wanted to make his point; he felt the urgency of it. "Down below Monterey," he said, "where nobody can see. Where you fellas run the prototypes. Cities blown up, satellites knocked down—" He halted. Pete was jerking his head warningly toward silver-tipped Miss Bedouin. "A hedgehog satellite," Lars said carefully, thinking of the most ominous extant. The hedgehogs were considered impenetrable, and out of the more than seven hundred Earth-satellites in current orbit, almost fifty were hedgehogs. "Items 221," he said. "The Ionizing Fish that decomposed to the molecular level, drifted as gas—"

"Shut up," Pete said harshly.

They finished their coffee in silence.

6

That evening Lars Powderdry met his mistress Maren Faine at the Paris branch of Mr. Lars, Incorporated, where Maren maintained an office as elaborate as—He searched for the metaphor, but Maren's esthetic tastes eluded description. Hands in his pockets he gazed around him as Maren disappeared into the powder room to make ready for the real world. For her, existence began when the workday ended. And this despite the fact of her high managerial position. Logically she should have been career-oriented, as involved in her vocation as the darkest, most sullen Calvinist.

But it had not worked out that way. Maren was twenty-nine, slightly tall—she stood five-seven barefoot—with luminous red hair. No, not red; it was mahogany in tone, polished, not like the artificial, photograph-grained plastic but the real thing. Yes, Maren's coloration had been proved authentic. She woke up illuminated, eyes bright as—hell, he thought. What did it matter? Who cared at seven-thirty in the morning? A beautiful, alert, slightly-too-tall woman, colorful and graceful and muscular at that time of day, was an offense to reason and an abomination to sexuality, in that what did one do with her? At least after the first few weeks. One could hardly go on and on...

As Maren reentered the office, coat over her shoulders, he said, "You really don't care what goes on here."

"You mean the enterprise? The incorporated?" Her cat-eyes flew wide, merrily; she was way ahead of him. "Look, you have my soma at night and my mind all day long. What else do you want?"

Lars said, "I hate education. I'm not kidding. Soma. Where'd you learn that?" He felt hungry, irritable, at loose ends. Due to the buggery of contemporary time-zone computation he had in actuality been on his feet sixteen hours.

"You hate me," Maren said, in the tone of a marriage counselor, I know your real motivations, the tone implied. And it also implied: And you don't.

Maren gazed at him squarely, unafraid of anything he might do or say. He reflected that although technically he could fire her by day, or kick her out of his Paris conapt by night, he had really no hold over her. Whether her career meant anything to her or not, she could get a good job anywhere. Any time. She did not need him. If they parted company she would miss him for a week or so, grieve to the extent of bawling unexpectedly after the third martini... but that would be it.

On the other hand, if he were to lose her the wound would never close.

"Want di

Maren said, "No. Want prayer."

He stared at her. "W-what?"

Calmly she said, "I want to go to church and light a candle and pray. What's so strange about that? I do it a couple of times a week, you know that. You knew it when you first—" Delicately she finished, "Knew me. In the Biblical sense. I told you that first night."

"Candle for what?" Lighting a candle had to be for something.

Maren said, "My secret."

Feeling baffled he said, "I'm going to bed. It may be six o'clock to you but it's past two a.m. for me. Let's go to your conapt and you can fix me something light to eat and then I'll get some sleep and you can go pray." He started toward the door.

"I heard," Maren said, "that a Soviet official managed to get to you today."

That startled him. "Where'd you hear that?"

"I got a warning. From the Board. An official reprimand to the firm, telling us to beware of short old men."

"I doubt it."

Maren shrugged. "The Paris office ought to be informed, don't you agree? It did happen in a public place."

"I didn't seek the idiot out! He approached me—I was just having a cup of coffee." But he felt uneasy. Had the Board really transmitted an official reprimand? If so, it ought to have come to his attention.

"That general," Maren said, "whose name I always forget—the fat one you're so afraid of. Nitz." She smiled; the spear in his side twisted. "General Nitz contacted us here in Paris via the ultra-closed-circuit vidline and he said to be more careful. I said talk to you. He said—"

"You're making this up." But he could see she wasn't. Probably it had happened within the hour of his meeting with Aksel Kaminsky. Maren had had all day to relay General Nitz' warning to him. It was like her to wait until now, when his blood-sugar was low and he had no defense. "I better call him," he said, half to himself.

"He's in bed. Consult the time-zone chart for Portland, Oregon. Anyhow I explained it all to him." She walked out into the hall and he followed, reflexively; together they waited for the elevator which would carry them to the roof field where his hopper, property of the firm, was parked. Maren hummed happily to herself, maddening him.

"You explained it how?"

"I said you had been considering for a long time that in case you weren't liked, appreciated here, you intended to 'coat."

Levelly, he said, "And what was his answer?"

"General Nitz said yes, he realized that you could always 'coat. He appreciated your position. In fact the military on the Board, at their special closed session at Festung Washington, D.C. last Wednesday had discussed this. And General Nitz's staff reported that they had three more weapons fashion designers standing by. Three new mediums which that psychiatrist at the Wallingford Clinic at St. George, Utah had turned up."

"Is this on the level?"

"Sort of."

He made a quick computation. "It's not two a.m. in Oregon; it's noon. High noon." Turning, he started back toward her office.

"You're forgetting," Maren said, "that we're now on Toliver Econ-time time."

"But in Oregon the sun's in the middle of the sky!"