The Philip K Dick Reader

The boy stammered out his name shyly. "Bert Robinson. Doesn't it say there on my card?"

Patterson turned to Evelyn. "It's the right number. But this isn't Unger. Something's happened."

"Say, Doc," Robinson asked plaintively, "is there something going to keep me out of the Service or not? Give me the word."

Patterson signaled the robot. "Open up the hall. It's all over with. You can go back to what you were doing."

"I don't understand," Evelyn murmured. "It doesn't make sense."

"You're all right," Patterson said to the youth. "You can report for induc­tion."

The boy's face sagged with relief. "Thanks a lot, Doc." He edged toward the descent ramp. "I sure appreciate it. I'm dying to get a crack at those webfoots."

"Now what?" Evelyn said tightly, when the youth's broad back had disap­peared. "Where do we go from here?"

Patterson shook himself alive. "We'll get the Census Department to make their check. We've got to locate Unger."

The transmission room was a humming blur of vid and aud reports. Pat­terson elbowed his way to an open circuit and placed the call.

"That information will take a short time, sir," the girl at Census told him. "Will you wait, or shall we return your call?"

Patterson grabbed up an h-loop and clipped it around his neck. "As soon as you have any information on Unger let me know. Break into this loop immediately."

"Yes, sir," the girl said dutifully, and broke the circuit.

Patterson headed out of the room and down the corridor. Evelyn hurried after him. "Where are we going?" she asked.

"To the therapy house. I want to talk to the old man. I want to ask him some things."

"Ga

"I want to ask him about the present, not the future." They emerged in the blinding afternoon sunlight. "I want to ask him about things going on right now."

Evelyn stopped him. "Can't you explain it to me?"

"I have a theory," Patterson pushed urgently past her. "Come on, before it's too late."

They entered the therapy house. Technicians and officers were standing around the huge map table, examining the counters and indicator lines. "Where's Unger?" Patterson demanded.

"He's gone," one of the officers answered. "Ga

"Gone where?" Patterson began to swear savagely. "What happened?"

"Ga

Patterson grabbed Evelyn Cutter. "I want you to set off a general emer­gency alarm. Have the building surrounded. And hurry!"

Evelyn gaped at him. "But --"

Patterson ignored her and raced out of the therapy house, toward the main hospital building. Ahead of him were three slowly moving figures. Lieutenant West and Ga

"Get away!" Patterson shouted at them.

Ga

"Get him away!" Patterson dived for the old man -- but it was too late.

The burst of energy seared past him; an ignited circle of blinding white flame lapped everywhere. The hunched-over figure of the old man wavered, then charred. The aluminum cane fused and ran down in a molten mass.

What had been the old man began to smoke. The body cracked open and shriveled. Then very slowly, the dried, dehydrated fragment of ash crumpled in a weightless heap. Gradually the circle of energy faded out.

Ga

Lieutenant West stared at the still-smoking ash. His lips twisted into words. "We'll never find out. We can't change it. We can't win." Suddenly his fingers grabbed at his coat. He tore the insignia from it and hurled the square of cloth savagely away. "I'll be damned if I'm going to give up my life so you can corner the system. I'm not getting into that death trap. Count me out!"

The wail of the general emergency alarm di

Someone was standing there. A man, his hands deftly at work removing an object that flashed in the afternoon sun. The man was V-Stephens. He got the object of metal and plastic loose and disappeared with it, away from the win­dow.

Evelyn hurried up beside Patterson. "What --" She saw the remains and screamed. "Oh, God. Who did it? Who?"

"V-Stephens."

"LeMarr must have let him out. I knew it would happen." Tears filled her eyes and her voice rose in shrill hysteria. "I told you he'd do it! I warned you!"

Ga

"That's right," Patterson said. "It's too late. Your chance is gone."

"If we could have got him to talk --" Ga

"You couldn't. It wasn't possible."

Ga

Around Patterson's neck his h-loop buzzed loudly. "Doctor Patterson," the monitor's voice came, "there is a rush call for you from Census."

"Put it through," Patterson said.

The voice of the Census clerk came ti

"What is it?" Patterson demanded. But he already knew the answer.

"We have cross-checked our results to be certain. There is no person such as you described. There is no individual at this time or in our past records named David L. Unger with the identifying characteristics you outlined. The brain, teeth, and fingerprints do not refer to anything extant in our files. Do you wish us to --"

"No," Patterson said. "That answers my question. Let it go." He cut off the h-loop switch.

Ga

Patterson ignored him. He squatted down and poked at the ash that had been David Unger. After a moment he snapped the h-loop on again. "I want this taken upstairs to the analytical labs," he ordered quietly. "Get a team out here at once." He got slowly to his feet and added even more softly, "Then I'm going to find V-Stephens -- if I can."

"He's undoubtedly on his way to Venus by now," Evelyn Cutter said bit­terly. "Well, that's that. There's nothing we can do about it."

"We're going to have war," Ga

Patterson moved aside as a group of hospital robots approached the charred remains and began gingerly to collect them in a single heap. "Make a complete analysis," he said to the technician in charge of the work-detail. "Break down the basic cell-units, especially the neurological apparatus. Report what you find to me as soon as you possibly can."

It took just about an hour.

"Look for yourself," the lab technician said. "Here, take hold of some of the material. It doesn't even feel right."

Patterson accepted a sample of dry, brittle organic matter. It might have been the smoked skin of some sea creature. It broke apart easily in his hands; as he put it down among the test equipment it crumbled into powdery frag­ments. "I see," he said slowly.