Chapter 10 — COMPANY MAN

There had been a number of rallying points of opposition to the Tyrancy, and these intensified as our reforms were implemented. The common man, it seemed, did not really want reform—not when it inconvenienced him. Already editorials were lamenting the good old days of President Tocsin, "the last legitimate leader" of North Jupiter. There was a climate of rebellion that was coming to permeate every level of the society.

I had never realized how unpopular I could get, but I had no doubt of it now. I knew I would be lynched if I walked openly down any hall of any major city-bubble of this section of the planet. Perhaps if I had acted to control the press, it would have been better, but I refused to do that. So the editorials lambasted me continually, and the people followed, convincing themselves that they were worse off than they had been, despite the manifest fairness of the reforms the Tyrancy had made.

But I was riding the tiger. I could not simply step down; to do so would be to throw the society into chaos and to wipe out the groundwork we were laying for the new society. No revolution is painless, and the Tyrancy was a revolution: a revolution of reform. Once the benefits began to manifest themselves, the common attitude would change. We knew that, and it was what kept us going. But now we were in the darkest siege of the long tunnel, seeming to make very little progress.

The day I received Thorley's missive, the bubble shook with the force of a nearby detonation. It rocked us all. In moments we learned the cause: A missile had been launched at the bubble, one with a black-hole shield similar to that of a sub but smaller. That protected it from most observation, but if it had collided with the bubble, it would have caused a deadly implosion. The Navy had intercepted it, but this one had come uncomfortably close. An investigation would be made to ascertain the source and why it hadn't been intercepted long before becoming an actual threat to the bubble; someone's head would roll.

"But we just can't be secure from this type of threat," Spirit informed me seriously. "You are too much of a target, Hope, and the threats come too thickly, from too many directions. Some of the ones we have stopped without fanfare have been frightening: poisoned food, flawed oxygen supply, hypnotic devices—anything. It isn't enough to put away the perpetrators; more keep developing. Sooner or later we're apt to be overwhelmed."

"What's our best course, then?" I asked.

"I think it's time to remove the main target. You are the Tyrant; the people are convinced that if they can just get rid of you, all their problems will abate. It isn't true, of course, but it's hard to argue effectively against that sort of ignorance."

Remove the main target. "So it's time for me to go into hiding," I said, hardly surprised.

"At least until the furor subsides," she agreed. "Once the policies start taking proper hold and things improve—"

"I feel as if I'm running out," I complained. "The budget is further out of balance than ever, and that's my—"

"You won't be running out. You will just be going to work on a more specific aspect. Our biggest present problem is industry: we nationalized companies in key industries, but when we used them as our Employers of Last Resort, they became not more efficient but less efficient. We are taking enormous losses on those companies, and that isn't going to change until we can make them efficient—with the last-resort employees."

"Get me some really good managers, and we'll get them efficient," I said.

"The best managers fled to private enterprise," she reminded me. "Unless we want to get coercive, we'll have to develop our own from scratch—and that takes time. Which is where you come in now."

"I don't know how to manage a company!" I protested.

"You'll learn. Reba set it up. For over a year a man answering your general description has been shifting from job to job and company to company, showing proficiency but moving on when he was unable to get promotions fast enough to suit him. He blew the whistle on one inefficient practice and was eased out of a bubble company."

"But we protect whistle-blowers!"

"We try to protect whistle-blowers," she said. "The company found another pretext to suppress him, so nothing could be proved. That is often the way of it. So he has a reputation for erratic brilliance, but he can't get along with management."

"Put him in as management," I said. "See what he's made of."

"Exactly," she agreed. "You will enter our Jupiter Bubble Company as a trainee manager, slated to run the company after you master the details of its operation. You should be able to make something of it—and then to make something of the other Jupiter companies. That will turn the tide on the economy and the budget."

"Just like that!" I exclaimed wryly.

"As you said, get some good managers...."

 

The front offices of the Jupiter Bubble Company were palatial, but I saw them only briefly. I was introduced as Jose Garcia, an ambitious Hispanic who was smart enough but not patient enough, now granted the position of prospective Manager of Jupiter Bubble, provided I could master the business. It was very like a patronage plum, because the Tyrant was known to favor whistle-blowers and Hispanics, and the prior management of the company was not particularly pleased. However, the Tyrant had spoken, so they had to tolerate me, hoping I would foul up badly enough to be displaced before I assumed the actual power.

Not the most delightful situation, but it was evident that despite my similarity to the form and age of the Tyrant himself, no one even thought of connecting me with him. Minor spot surgery had been done on my face to change its configuration, so that I simply didn't look like the Tyrant despite being fairly close. My throat had also been treated, so that my voice had a different timbre and was not recognizable as that of the Tyrant.

Amber was with me, also subtly modified. Her hair had been changed in color, length, and styling, and her nose and mouth as well. In fact, she now resembled my lost love Helse remarkably closely. Was that coincidence or Spirit's teasing design or my imagination? Did it matter? She remained Amber to me, and her revised appearance did not bother me, and it did protect her from possible recognition. She was now to be called Amena, close enough to be familiar, far enough to eliminate the possible connection. She was my underage girlfriend: before the Tyrancy, relations with her would have been considered statutory rape, but now they were legitimate because she was nubile and consenting. My prior association with her, in the mock identity, had been the reason given for my disfavor; though the association was legal, it remained socially awkward, and a company was not required to promote those who were in such poor favor with their peers that a managerial position would be unlikely to work.

We were rapidly shunted to the most basic aspect of company business: prospecting. I was supposed to gain experience from the bottom up, and this was taken literally. I found myself with Amber (I have no need to call her Amena here, so am not bothering) in a mini-scoutship. It had facilities for two, for a month at a time: food, water, air, energy, sleep, entertainment. Now, this might sound like fun, but in fact, it was not considered so.

For one thing, the prospect-ship was cramped. There were no passages; there were crawlways. No separate kitchen or bathroom: one tiny chamber served both capacities. It was assumed that since the ship had to be under acceleration for the kitch/head facilities to work properly, one person would be piloting while the other did the job here. Thus the merging of plumbing made sense—to an executive who didn't have to use it. Food prepared here was, in the vernacular, termed fart-fare. Mark one item to be corrected when I had power.

"It facilitates the processing of garbage," I explained wryly to Amber. "You can put it in one end and out the other without having to move."

She smiled, because this was evidently meant to be funny, but she didn't really understand. She was not, and would never be, a "clever" type of woman. She was just glad to be alone with me at last. I hoped she would not find the next month excruciatingly tiresome.

The operation of the ship was simple enough for any duffer. I would have had no problem regardless, because of my time in the Navy, but this facilitated things for Amber. She was able to use a joystick to guide it in any direction, a lever to control acceleration. The screen showed a panoramic view of what was outside, with an inset and cross hairs for specific detail. Anything more complicated she could safely leave to me.

Our mission was to locate suitable bubbles for exploitation. We were in the bubble-band of Jupiter, the nether region of the atmosphere where a combination of density, temperature, and turbulence caused substances to be dredged from the hellish interior and precipitated out before settling down. I am no chemist, so this may be somewhat garbled, but my understanding is that among those exotic substances are carbon, silicon, aluminum, tungsten, and tantalum, and that some of the precipitates are natural crystals of exceeding hardness. Not as hard as diamond but harder than sapphire. It is said that the bubbles are formed of carborundum, but I believe it is more complicated than that, with an admixture of boron. At any rate, that material is just about the toughest stuff extant in nature. It isn't economical to form it in such quantities in the laboratory, considering the high pressure required and the rarity of the trace elements at our level of the atmosphere. Nature does it best, so we harvest it wild.

Of course, nature doesn't form many perfect hollow spheres of enormous size. The bubbles were seeded centuries ago and allowed to grow. Again I am hazy on the technical detail and can only say that an enormous number of very small molds were sent out—hardly larger than molecules—crafted in such fashion as to attract deposits of crystallized bubblene (that is, the boron, carborundum, or whatever mix) but with a very special quality. The deposits become unstable beyond a certain size, so that they tend to shed their inner layers even as their outer ones are forming. One might picture a tree, rotting from the center as it puts on growth outside, only more disciplined. Thus the spheres do become hollow and become proportionately thinner-shelled as they grow larger. The result is the bubbles, ranging from pea-sized to city-sized.

But the Jupiter atmosphere is large. Though there is a tonnage of bubble formations at this level that can only be crudely estimated, the individual bubbles are spread far apart, and there is a murk of inchoate material that clouds whatever view there might be. Thus, searching for the forming bubbles is like the proverbial needle in the haystack. They are there, but it is a challenge to find them.

That was our job, as prospectors. Once free-lance individuals had prospected for nuggets of gold on the surface of archaic Earth; now they sought spheres in the wilder reaches of the Jupiter atmosphere. Bubblene was just as precious as gold had been; without the bubbles, civilization as we know it would not be possible. Oh, certainly the fundamental breakthrough had been the gee-shield; that made System exploration possible. But the bubbles, combined with the shields, made extended settlement feasible. It was the same on Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune: all had their bubble-bands, and all harvested the bubbles and fashioned them into ships and cities. Nothing but a bubble could withstand the rigors of atmosphere and space, for bubblene was virtually impervious to accidental destruction. Gravel-meteorites merely scratched the superhard surface, and neither heat nor cold (within reason) weakened it. A new bubble was a treasure indeed!

So we quested, but the chances of our discovering a good bubble within a month were small. Some prospectors searched for years before making a decent strike, and some never succeeded. Some died in the effort. But those that succeeded could have their fortunes made, depending on the size and quality of the bubble they staked. Thus there were many volunteers, despite the discomfort and danger; man tends to be foolishly optimistic, or perhaps he just likes to gamble.

Our ship's hull was of bubblene, of course, and it was thick. The pressure here was about a thousand bars—a thousand times that of Earth-normal. The natural bubbles were porous, so that atmospheric pressure inside equalized that outside, but the ships had to provide and protect the human environment. Implosion was definitely a threat, and I felt it as a kind of claustrophobia, though I knew that the ship was designed to withstand the pressure. I fought the feeling, knowing that it was merely the legacy of my rearing in the relative vacuum of space, where explosion was the threat. I could not afford to be handicapped by emotion. Amber didn't seem to be aware of the pressure; perhaps she didn't grasp its nature or extent. I was not about to educate her about it; her ignorance was bliss, in this case.

We proceeded through the soup, and I gave her practice in the handling of the ship. The gee-shield prevented it from descending, even when stationary, but mishandling could still generate mischief. The ship maneuvered by planing with its wings when accelerating, so could lift or descend, and it was theoretically possible to skim too deep and encounter pressure too great for the hull to withstand; it was best to be careful. To turn left or right one merely rotated the ship so that the planes acted sidewise. Simple in theory, sometimes tricky in practice, because of the murk and the turbulence.

Outside all was wind and dust and streamers of gas. Sometimes we spotted larger blobs of substance, but they were generally misshapen, useless for our purpose. Some ships were harvesters of amorphous material, scooping it in and carrying it up to the factories for processing. Such mining was big business. But we were going for bigger game.

After several hours I was satisfied that Amber had the hang of it; henceforth we could take turns piloting. Normally one pilot was on duty at all times, even if not actively searching; it was prudent to keep an eye out for both danger and bubbles. Most discoveries were actually random, though innumerable search systems existed that supposedly enhanced the chances. The longer someone looked, and the more sharply he looked, the more likely he was to score: that was the essence.

But at the conclusion of this first shift we put the ship on auto-pilot, for we had another matter in mind. We had not before had the chance to be completely alone and private, together. We wanted to make love.

One might suppose that this would be a simple matter. It was not. First, there was the social aspect. Remember, at this time Amber was just fifteen years old, and though she had the body of a young woman, there were ways in which she remained childlike. I wanted her, in part, because of that youth, so like that of Helse when I had known her. But I was fifty-two and conscious of the disparity in ages. We had made love many times and in many ways—via the helmet—but this was real and therefore hazardous in its own special way.

Second, there was the physical aspect. This was a ship designed to support two—in different places. Sleeping was definitely conceived as a solitary matter. The bedroom cell was a niche that opened from a rear wall, just about big enough for one large man or, possibly, two small ones. We discovered that we could, by dint of much effort and discomfort, jam in together, but the fit was so tight that sexual activity was really not feasible. I suppose if a man and a woman were experienced, so that each knew exactly what contour fitted what and were not ambitious for mutual satisfaction, it could be done. That was not the case with us. We wanted to do it gently and well. That pretty well eliminated the bed.

That left the kitch/head: not the most conducive locale. If one person sat on the vac-pot, there was just room for the other to stand. I looked at the pot, disgusted, but didn't see a much better way.

"This isn't the way I wanted it to be the first time," I said. "But..."

She smiled, not concerned. Amber never complained about anything.

She retreated to the entry tunnel, giving me room to strip. When I was naked, I sat on the pot, giving her room. And you know, as her clothing came off, this awkward situation brought a powerful sense of déjà vu. Seeing a young woman's private parts in the chamber for natural functions—that was the way it had been with Helse when I had had to help her urinate in free-fall. You see, Helse had masqueraded for safety's sake as a boy and therefore had to use the male facilities, and they were awkward for a woman to use in free-fall. So I had had to hold her to the funnel while she squatted to relieve herself. It had been a tremendously stimulating experience for me, at age fifteen, the guilt of my reaction adding to the excitement. The facility for elimination differed here, being designed to be used while under gee, but the similarity of situation was close enough to evoke the same effect in me. In an instant I had a rigid erection.

Amber stared. I realized, belatedly, that this was the first time she had seen such a thing in life. In the helmet she had seen it many times and handled it and felt it inside her, but this was a different level of experience. She paused, evidently daunted, and I suffered a siege of embarrassment, Perhaps I should have arranged to do this in darkness this first time.

Then she laughed. "It's real!" she exclaimed.

I relaxed. At least she wasn't horrified or terrified. I reached for her, and, of course, she was within reach because it was impossible to be out of reach of anything in this chamber.

I brought her down to me, but she hesitated. "I can't sit on that!" she protested.

"Certainly you can," I informed her.

"But..."

I showed her how. It seemed it had not occurred to her that both it and she could occupy my lap simultaneously. When she discovered how this worked, she was delighted.

And so she sat on my lap, facing away from me, divinely impaled, and I reached around her to squeeze her young breasts in my two hands. I had in mind a considerable period of dalliance in that position before the culmination, but I had misjudged my tolerance. No sooner were we fairly set than I erupted.

"Damn!" I swore, for, of course, she had barely started on her own course of pleasure.

But she had a different reaction. "It worked!" she exclaimed. "You went inside me and you did it, just like the helmet!" She put her hands on mine, so that now her breasts were double-cupped, and squeezed them, pleased at this success.

I decided not to argue. There would be plenty of time for her to discover the other type of pleasure. For now her verification of her own performance seemed sufficient.

 

Of course, we didn't stay in the ship all the time. Periodically a sub descended to take us aboard. Amber was given a brief fling at the comforts of civilization, such as a soft and roomy bed, noncanned food, and relief from the stress of prospecting. I had no such reprieve; it was necessary for me to make periodic public appearances so that the populace would not realize that I was in hiding. I might have broadcast interviews, but that would have meant communicative contact with the prospect-ship, and that was too dangerous to risk. So I went physically, which was an odd mechanism for secrecy.

"The former congressmen have announced a government-in-exile," Spirit informed me. "And challenged you to meet them in debate."

"That can have no legal status!" I protested. "I am the legitimate government of the U.S. of J."

"Legitimate but not conventional—or popular," she reminded me. "The people are paying a lot of attention to this movement. Because these are all former members of the former government, they possess a certain status in the eyes of the majority. We can hold down the random rebellions, but these people can sow the seeds of endless mischief, leading the majority into resistance."

"I'd better tackle them, then," I said. "If they want to debate, I'll debate. The facts support my programs."

"Yes. But they may be up to something else. We have to be careful."

"Of course. Set up electronic weapon detectors and have a pacifier ready."

"They have nullifiers," Coral said. "But we have null-nullifiers. They will not be proof against pacification."

"So I can go into their midst personally and brace them and make points for the Tyrancy," I said. "It should be fun."

I went, after my personnel had made their arrangements. I really wasn't worried; this was a group of twenty former senators, of both major parties, all with excellent reputations. Obviously they intended to awe the audience with their credentials and to impress upon the audience—which should include most of Jupiter—the obvious justice of their cause. They stood foursquare for the old ways, the good ways, the ways that should be restored. However, I was prepared to remind that same audience of the phenomenal problems those old ways had engendered—problems that my reforms were now attacking. Soon the results would begin to show, if we just stayed the course. I didn't expect my message to be completely popular, but I was sure it would make the more sensible people pause. The very fact that I, the Tyrant, came in person to debate those who pretended to be a counter-government—that demonstrated the extent of free speech that existed today and the openness of my dialogue. Repressive dictators did not indulge in this sort of thing.

They were seated in a large semicircle on a stage, with the media pickups for an audience. Shelia parked her wheelchair at the edge of the stage where she could prompt me, and Coral stood beside her. I tried never to make a big thing of my personal protection; the Navy was never far from me, but Coral looked more like my mistress than my bodyguard. Indeed, on this occasion she wore a fetching red print dress that made her look more like a college girl than a mature woman, and she had a mock rose in her hair. Because of the rigid precautions against weapons, she carried none on this occasion, but, of course, her entire body was a kind of weapon when required.

This chamber was elegant. It was fashioned in the manner of an ancient Roman hall, with decorative columns and sculpture, and the walls, floor, and ceiling were of brightly phosphorescent material, so that external illumination was hardly necessary. This lent an ethereal quality to the proceedings.

In addition, there were mock stone alcoves set up as fountains, where water flowed and formed little falls. These were made up like portals to the outside, and beyond them was a panoramic holo scene that changed visibly to show the seasons, in accelerated manner. It had been fall as I entered; as I watched, intrigued as I often am by the innocent marvels of civilization, winter approached. The falls congealed to ice, and icicles spread across like bars. Delightful!

The program began. I expected an opening diatribe against my policies but was surprised. A senator from my own party rose from his chair, strode forward, raised his hand, and proclaimed: "Hail, Caesar!"

The power failed. The artificial lights went out, leaving only the glow of the walls, and the susurration of the air refreshing system ceased. Of all times for a breakdown!

But in a moment I realized that it was more than that. The senators were rising together and stepping to the mock windows. They were reaching for the icicles.

Coral was at my side, almost at a bound. "Out, sir!" she hissed. "Exit by Shelia!"

I started toward my secretary, but several senators were already moving to cut me off. Shelia, realizing what was happening, wheeled her chair to clear the exit.

As if in slow motion, while I was striding toward her, I saw it happen. Two men bent to grab her chair. They heaved it up and forward. The chair skidded sideways, then tilted over as the wheel struck the edge of the stage. It overturned, dumping Shelia down into the audience section.

I changed course to reach her, horrified. The drop was not great, but she had been pitched out headfirst, the chair coming down on top of her. If she was hurt—

"To me!" Coral snapped. I saw that the men had closed off the exit, and now all twenty were advancing on me, holding icicles.

Obviously this had been most carefully rehearsed. The setting, the freezing water, generating weapons where there had been none, the power cutoff that prevented either the pacifier from being used or any message from going out. The holo-cameras were dead; no one could see what was happening here. They had never intended to debate me! Now they had twenty against two, and the two were unarmed, and one a woman. In scant minutes a crack Navy unit would burst in here and take over, but evidently the senators believed they had time enough.

"Straight defense won't do it," I muttered to Coral as we stood back to back.

"Build a wall," she replied tersely.

I recognized another Oriental concept of hers. "Right."

The first senator came at me like a kamikaze, his icicle held clumsily in an overhand mode, stabbing down. I ducked under, whirled, caught his descending arm, and heaved him the rest of the way over my shoulder. He landed heavily, his arm outstretched and in my grip, and I quickly twisted his wrist and took the slippery icicle from it. Then I kicked him hard in the head, so that he would lie still, and whirled to face the next.

I heard a thunk behind me and knew that Coral had landed her client beside mine. She might look like a delicate young lady, but she was a more efficient and deadly combat specialist than I was. Then I stabbed forward with my icicle, plunging it into the belly of my attacker. The ice shattered, but it didn't matter; as he collapsed in agony I simply took his weapon.

Another body landed behind: Coral's contribution. Four down, sixteen to go. We were building our wall. When it got high enough, we would use it as a barricade.

Now the senators paused. They were obviously ready to give their lives in this cause, this treacherous assassination of Caesar in the Senate chamber, but they realized that they were giving their lives without cause at the moment. It was evident that Coral and I could eliminate them handily, one by one.

"All together!" one cried.

They tried to charge together, but it was impossible. One stumbled, his legs tangled with that of his neighbor, and went down in front. I knocked him in the neck with my booted toe, putting him down to stay. Meanwhile Coral spun around in place, and her dainty-seeming foot flung out to score on the side of the head of another, tumbling him unconscious into the throng. Another lost balance, and I caught his flailing arm and brought his face down to my rising knee.

But I felt the stab of an icicle in my left shoulder. There were too many men, all stabbing clumsily with their weapons; I could not avoid them all! I whirled, catching that arm, hauling the man further off-balance, then using an aikido twist to send him back into the throng.

The Navy arrived. Lasers flashed, catching the remaining senators in rapid order. In a moment, of the original party, only Coral and I were standing. She was bleeding also, but it didn't look serious.

I hurried across to help Shelia. She was bruised but unbroken; she had had the sense to break her fall with her arms and then to stay quiet, knowing she could not help us.

Now a Navy medic was seeing to us, expertly treating our wounds. An officer saluted me. "Sir, how shall we dispose of the prisoners?" he inquired.

Abrupt rage overcame me. "Interrogation, trial, execution," I said. "Root out the plot."

"Yes, sir." He turned to his business.

That was about all there was to it. Coral and Shelia and I had escaped without serious injury, thanks to our immediate and effective action. But I was not pleased. I should never have fallen into that trap!

One might suppose that the public would rise up against the would-be assassins. It was not so. The news media, in a position to ascertain the facts of the case, elected generally to pretend that I was the one at fault. Three sterling senators were dead, several more injured, and the rest were gone from Jupiter society—all because of the whim of the Tyrant.

No, I did not clamp down on the press. I would not violate my oath. But this marked the turning point in the Tyrancy's handling of assassination and terrorism. After this they were publicly executed.

 

The job quickly became routine, despite the evident hazard. We quested interminably for bubbles, but though dust and rocks were plentiful, large objects were rare. Once we thought we spied one, but it turned out to be another prospect-ship.

Tedium was the greatest problem. Oh, certainly we made love, but the novelty of physical sex soon passed. At my age it took time to recharge; I found that about once per twenty-four-hour period was all I really cared for, and even though we did our best to make a production of each one, that left about ninety-five percent of the time available for other things. To some, paradise is isolation with a pretty and willing woman; no one who has actually tried that believes in it anymore. For one thing, the challenge is gone. For another, a desire fulfilled is a desire eliminated. When Amber had been anonymous via the helmet, she had been fascinating; each contact was an act of discovery. When she became known but forbidden, she was still fascinating. Now both her mystery and reticence were gone, and there was not a great deal remaining. She was not an intellectual partner; she did not know how to play challenging games. I couldn't even argue with her; she accepted everything I said or did without significant resistance.

Oh, we got along. But the glow was off. I became eager to find a bubble and get out of the ship, and I suspect that Amber, could she have been persuaded to hold an opinion of her own, would have felt the same. The quest became everything.

Naturally, when we finally scored, it was at the wrong moment. We had tried just about every possible variant of sex, struggling to relieve the boredom, and had discovered a promising game: Pin the Tail on the Donkey. No, no pin, no tail; we used our own anatomy, seeking to make the sexual connection. Naked, we took turns freezing in place, in free-fall, while the other closed his or her eyes and sought to make physical contact at only the key site. The closer the first touch to the bull's-eye, the higher the score. Amber was leading, having landed her bottom on my left knee, but I had figured out by elimination and by sound what her position had to be and believed I could home in on the site this time. Doing it blind was much more exciting than doing it sighted, and I was really getting into the spirit of the game. If I scored, I would get to complete the act, while she was bound by the rules to remain fixed in position, ravished without reprieve. If I missed, she would get another turn, would probably score, and I would have to remain frozen while she had her way with me and won the game. The victory, at this stage, was more important than the sex.

I drifted through the short space, in my blind free-fall, head, hands, and feet held back, only my center extremity forward—and felt contact with her body. I opened my eyes and saw that I had scored; it was her cleft I was touching. "Ha, wench!" I exclaimed.

And the alarm sounded.

Amber laughed. It was a rule: the alarm severed any play. I had lost my opportunity and would have to start from scratch next time.

"Damn nuisance!" I muttered, and launched myself to the cockpit, my bare anatomy squeezing past hers in what at any other time would have been an interesting fashion. She made as if to bite at my member, and I made as if to knee her in the head. I squeezed into the pilot's seat, which was clammy to my skin, and she followed to peer over my shoulder.

Ahead was a blip, a monstrous one. "Oops—we've drifted out of zone," I said, disgusted. "That's a city!"

But immediately I realized that it couldn't be; we were well below the inhabited level. Any true city-bubble would implode here. It was a city-sized bubble!

We homed in on it, and the size expanded as we got close. This thing was huge! It was like a planetoid, a perfect sphere. This was our strike!

We circled it, making sure there were no flaws, before planting our strike marker.

And spotted a marker already in place. This bubble had a prior claim.

For an instant I confess that I felt temptation: to remove the other marker and set our own, claiming this phenomenal strike ourselves. But quickly I suppressed the urge. For one thing, it was illegal and unethical. For another, claims were normally booby-trapped against just such an intrusion.

Sadly we moved on.

About a month later we found a bubble we could keep. It was smaller than the first but still well worthwhile. We staked our claim and contacted the company office, and our tour as prospectors was done. But somehow the disappointment of that first, denied strike remained with me. To have been so close to such a fortune in commissions...

 

I was not so foolish as to meet physically with my opposition again. I confined myself to more formal news conferences, and I was confined to my interview chamber: they could attack only my holo image. But that they did.

Some questions were routine, but one man stood and cried, "I call upon all decent citizens to fight without letup to end the terrible Tyrancy! We are being oppressed by a madman and must free ourselves of this yoke by destroying him!"

He paused, evidently having run out of initial material. He had not expected to get this far before being lasered down or hauled out.

"Continue," I told him. "Free speech is one of the guarantees the Tyrant makes."

There was a ripple of laughter. But it wasn't very strong, and I could see that there was considerable support for the man's position. I had indeed progressed from savior to enemy in the minds and hearts of the average folk. They simply weren't interested in my substantial reforms; they saw only the inconvenience that they themselves suffered at the moment.

 

Normally the discoverer of a bubble either took his bonus and retired, or if it was a small strike, went on as much of a binge as it would finance, then returned to prospecting. But I was a management trainee, so we stayed with our bubble, following it as it proceeded from the wild state to the civilized state.

First it had to be brought to the processing level. A gee-shield was installed, so that it was no longer dependent on the turbulent currents for support. Tugs nudged it upward, until it floated just below the inhabited level. Then it was cleaned up and rendered airtight, and a lock installed. The atmosphere was pumped out, the pressure reduced to Earth-normal, and breathable air was instituted.

Then they began fashioning the bubble into a residential sphere. They got it spinning, so there was internal gee, and installed prefabricated units and plumbing and electrical lines and all the rest. Amber and I participated, working on one crew and another, getting the overall picture.

I worked under a Saxon foreman named Gray, who evidently had not been given the word about Jose Garcia's manager-trainee status. Gray was no bigot and no genius; he just knew his job and wanted it done right. His job was to establish secure foundations for the residential section of this bubble, so that there would never be a collapse after the apartment chambers were installed. Under his direction I had to drill holes into the hard shell of the bubble, to anchor those foundations. This was simple in concept but not in detail; those holes had to be positioned so precisely that they were surveyed in, and the drilling had to be done by heavy-duty laser. Bubblene is the hardest commercially viable substance available and is resistant to breakdown, but the same properties that make it excellent for ships and cities make it hellish to penetrate. Certainly a suitable laser will vaporize anything, but vaporized bubblene is dangerous, as it naturally precipitates the moment the vapor leaves the heat, coating everything it touches with bubblene. That means that the body of the laser drills itself and perhaps the hands of its operator. The first worker to encounter that effect had to have his hands flayed, literally, to get them clean. I used hefty protective gloves, of course; in fact, I was in a light space suit, because though there was now air in the bubble, accidents and leaks were always possible in the early stages of conversion. Still, I had no hankering to play with such vapor. So my unit was set to heat the material to the softening point, so that it could be drilled. My laser was focused in a ring, and a diamond-sonic bit was in the center of that ring, gouging out the material and sucking the debris into a holding chamber. I had had to take a spot course in the use of this instrument, and I watched its indicators carefully, doing my job right. It was tedious, but each successful hole was an accomplishment; I knew that a century hence, this bubble would probably still be in use, and these same holes would be containing the bolts that anchored all its internal structures. That's a kind of immortality.

As the days passed I came to know Gray. He had a wife from whom he was estranged, and a six-year-old daughter he visited at every opportunity. He shared custody, but now that she was entering school, she couldn't be with him in the bubble. He was evidently irritated about that; he had no objection to education, but he loved his child and didn't like the separation. Thus the school became the focus of his ire.

"You see the kind of books they're using to teach those kids to read?" he demanded rhetorically. "Dick and Jane?"

I admitted that I hadn't. "My ward is fifteen," I said. "She's beyond Dick and Jane, though she's still perfecting her reading. She's..." I shrugged. "They call it retarded. She doesn't take well to schools, so I had to have her tutored. Now she's carrying on alone; if she passes the test, she'll get her credit, anyway."

"Ward?" he asked. It seemed he hadn't been informed about this this, either.

I shrugged again. "She—we wanted each other, and it's legal now, but some folk don't understand. I... lost my other job because of that, but we're together."

He nodded. "Man's business with a woman is his own, if she's consenting." I knew from the records I had checked that he was tolerant on this score, for his interest in a woman not much older had been responsible for the damage to his marriage.

"You mentioned the early reading books," I said. "I was educated on Callisto, and I learned English as a second language. We didn't use Dick and Jane, but I know they've been around for centuries. I guess they're pretty stodgy."

He laughed. "You haven't seen 'em? Then you sure don't know! They aren't stodgy anymore! I was helping Lisa to read from them, and I nearly got a hard-on! What the hell are they teaching our kids these days?"

I remembered that Hopie had set out to reform the school system in many ways, but this sounded strange. "Just what is in those books?"

"I'll tell you what's in 'em!" he exclaimed, getting his ire in gear again. Those who are tolerant about man's business can be less so about children's business. "Here she was reading this book, 'See Dick run. Run run run.' Then next page it says, 'Dick runs to Jane's house. Jane says, "I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours." Dick says, "Great!" Then Jane lifts up her dress. Dick looks. Look, look, look!' I mean, it goes on like that! Playing sneak-peek behind the couch. And that's only the beginning!"

I managed to avoid a smile. Hopie had certainly reformed the first-grade reader! My daughter, who had been so shocked at my relationship with Amber! Surely Thorley had not been responsible for this suggestion; she must have gotten it from Roulette. "How did Lisa react to it?"

"She thought it was great!" he said indignantly. "She couldn't wait to turn the page. She couldn't even handle all the words on the one page, but she wanted to get to the part where Dick showed his. 'See it grow. Big, big, big!' My six-year-old little girl!"

"Well, curiosity is natural in children. If such material encourages them to read—"

"It did that, all right!" he agreed. "But, my God—if that's what's in the first-grade reader, what the hell's in the second-grade reader? What's in the high school reader?"

"I don't think they've changed those yet," I said. "Amena's in that one, and it's copyrighted 2650. They're probably stair-stepping it up, following one grade through, until the whole school system's been updated."

"Then it's not too late to get rid of this smut!" he said.

"Lots of luck," I said. "The Tyrancy's pretty set in its ways."

"The Tyrancy!" he exclaimed. "I thought it was great at first, but now with this shit, and the med cutoff—" He grimaced.

"You're over the limit?" I asked. This was an excellent way to survey the reactions of the common man to the new programs.

"My mother is. She's seventy-five, and the cutoff's at seventy. First time she gets sick, they'll just let her die. How can they do that? She's a good woman!"

"Well, I heard that medical expenses were getting up so high—"

"Sure, and they need to be cut back. But not out of my mother's hide!"

There, of course, was the rub. People who agreed with the thrust of the new programs still didn't want to pay the price themselves. But ultimately every program had to be paid by the people; there was no other way.

"I wonder..." I said. "Your Lisa... my Amena can't speak English, but she understands it. She might listen, and she could signal 'no' if the word was wrong. That way you could use books outside the Dick and Jane trainer."

His face brightened. "Sure thing! Let's try it."

We tried it the next time his daughter came to visit. Amber had learned how to read English now, which made it possible for her to study in that language, since it was not necessary to speak what she was reading. We found a fairly simple book, and little Lisa read aloud, and Amber nodded affirmatively for the right words and negatively for the wrong ones. The two girls liked the arrangement, and it seemed to help both.

The work progressed, and by the time I drilled my last bolt hole, the first tier of apartments was anchored on the region where I had started, and the second tier was in progress. So, things were moving along, but I saw that it would have been far more efficient had all the holes been drilled together by a skilled crew that traveled from bubble to bubble, so that in one day the next step could proceed. As it was, my speed of work limited the following work, making it inefficient. I mentioned this to Gray, and he agreed. "But don't bother suggesting it to the front office," he advised. "This is JBC, guaranteed inefficient. If we started doing things the way they should be done, we'd get halfway competitive with the private bubble companies, and the bureaucrats would be out of work."

"But I thought this company was planetized in order to make it competitive!" I protested.

"Fat laugh! No government ever made anything competitive. There's no incentive."

"Something I've got to tell you—" I began.

"That you're in training to take over? I found out."

"It wasn't supposed to be a secret," I protested.

"The damn inefficient paperwork took so long to come down, I might never have been informed," he said. "But you're such a bright one, I couldn't figure what you were doing here in the bottom echelon. So I inquired."

"You aren't angry that I didn't tell you?"

"I know why you didn't tell me! You figured you wouldn't learn much if you walked up and said, 'Hey, boss, I'm going to be your boss soon, so watch your step!' "

"I really hadn't thought of it that way," I protested.

"I guess you didn't. You're a decent guy; you really want to learn. So you just kept your mouth shut and learned, and I let you. Comes to the same thing. My recommendation's already in; you got a good one, same as it would have been if you'd been for real. You did good work."

"I tried to," I said. "But, look—when I do get there, I really do want to turn this company around. Certainly I'll change the hole-drilling routine. But that's only one facet of a huge operation; I can't learn it all from direct personal experience. So if you have any notions, I want to hear them."

"Thought you'd never ask. I have this bright idea for a new kind of bubble, but nobody'd listen. I think it could put one like this on the market at half the price."

"A fifty percent saving on a city-bubble? If there's no catch—"

"See, there're a thousand little bubbles down there growing, for every big one. And a lot of fragments. They don't all grow perfect. Those pieces bobble around a while and drop out; when they're not hollow, they get to weigh too much. But there's a lot of good stuff there. Bubblene is valuable no matter what shape it's in. I figure we could fish out all the little bubbles, twenty feet in diameter, that we throw back now, and some chunks of solid bubblene, and take 'em into a big workshop bubble and melt 'em together so we have maybe a hundred little ones making one big one, like a bagful of balloons, tied in together by the spare bubblene. Put a lock in each one, make it an apartment. The whole thing spins for gee. Can leave the center hollow, even, or use it for storage. Could have a hundred home-bubbles in one big ring, even, spinning for gee. Because they're so much more common than the big, perfect ones, and no complex internal structures are needed, the cost would be much less." He paused to see how I was taking it.

"Makes so much sense, I don't see why they aren't doing it already," I remarked. "Are you sure there's no catch?"

"If there is, I don't know it. Some apartments are set up isolated, anyway; the people seem to like them. This is just bigger-scale."

I remembered the apartment complex where I had found Megan twenty years before. Spheres on the ends of rods, the whole complex rotating for gee. Larger bubble arrangements like that, or in other shapes, each apartment separate—I saw nothing against it. "There has to be some reason they wouldn't go for it," I said. "It makes too much sense to ignore."

"Well, when you get there, you look up the files and find out which one my suggestion's filed in. Maybe they put the reason there."

"I will."

"You'll be moving on now," he said.

"To the apartment installation crew," I agreed. "I have to learn something about every facet of this operation."

"They don't seem to be rushing it much," he said. "You didn't need to spend a whole month on holes just to learn how it's done."

"I'm not their choice for top exec," I confided.

He burst out laughing. "So that's it! They figure if they drag you around in it long enough, you'll get tired and quit."

"Or foul up, so they can fire me before I get power," I agreed.

"Why don't they just torpedo you, then? There're lots of ways you can make a person foul up, if you've a mind."

"I have to wash out legitimately. I think the Tyrancy's getting fed up with bungling, and if they were caught messing up the new boss—"

"Maybe," he agreed. "Or maybe they're bungling that job, like everything else." He pondered a moment, then said, "You know, the boys've been staying clear of you, because of what you are. But you seem okay to me. Why don't you come into town with us tonight? You can hear a lot of ideas, if you're really interested."

I had been aware that there was not much socializing, but since many of the times that I went into town alone or with Amber were actually secret returns to my role as Tyrant, I had found it convenient. Still, I did want to know the pulse of the common man, and this seemed like a good opportunity.

Five of us went stag to a bar and had alcoholic drinks. I was afraid they would also go to a civilian tail, but they knew of my situation with Amber and spared me that. Instead they went to an execution.

I am not sure I have discussed this before. It had been my original intention as Tyrant to eliminate the death penalty for crime, but circumstances had overtaken me. We were undertaking a program to control population, and also to save money. It turned out to be nonsensical to allow old sick folk to die without medication and to prevent new babies from being born, while preserving the lives of murderers. There had turned out to be plenty of lesser criminals to man the inclement space stations: those that had some potential to reform and return eventually to society. So the death penalty had remained, despite my initial misgiving. But with a twist. Roulette had worked this out, and I had lacked the gumption to overrule her.

A large audience had formed for the occasion. Men, women, and even some children. On the stage in front were the prisoner, the judge, and a woman in black: the representative of the victim. The prisoner was bound beside a wall.

"The accused has been found guilty of murdering John Jones, as charged," the judge said, and his amplified words carried throughout the chamber. "I hereby sentence him to be lasered until dead." He turned to the woman. "You, Mrs. Jones, widow of the deceased, may execute him yourself." He handed her a laser rifle.

The woman shied away from it. "Oh, I could not do that!" she protested. There was a murmur of mixed emotion from the audience.

"Then it is your privilege to give the order to the execution squad," the judge said. At his signal a troop of six men entered, each carrying a laser rifle. They lined up and took aim at the prisoner.

The woman tried, but the sound would not come out of her mouth despite the yelled encouragement of members of the audience. Some were eating candy, I noted. I was disgusted, not so much at them as at myself. How could I have let such a scene be legitimized under my government?

"If you do not choose to take vengeance yourself," the judge said sternly, "then I shall select at random another person to do it."

When the woman backed away, demurring, the judge looked out over the audience. His glance passed across the various interested spectators and halted at the one who had the greatest doubt about the proceeding. "You," he said.

I started. He was speaking to me!

"I can't..." I protested.

"On pain of being found in contempt of this court," he said firmly, "I direct you to perform this office for the representative of the deceased. Only in this manner will justice be fulfilled."

Still I hesitated. I had never expected to be tapped for this! Yet it was my doing, however indirect. Was I to lack the stomach to carry out my own policy?

"Do it! Do it! Do it!" the audience chanted.

"Order!" the judge rapped, and the chant faded.

Now his gaze returned to me. "Come up here. Address the execution squad."

Numbly I mounted the stage. I faced the firing squad. I took a breath. "Fire," I said.

Six lasers fired. They were heavy-duty; in an instant the body of the prisoner was charred black. It fell to the floor.

A cheer went up. Justice had been served! But somehow I did not find it satisfying.

The judge handed the woman in black a slip of paper. "Here is your certificate for one birth," he said. "In this manner may the life lost be returned to you."

That was it. The woman now had permission to have a baby; the paper would gain her a spot antidote to the universal contraceptive in the environment. But how would she conceive it with her husband gone?

The answer became apparent. Already men surrounded the widow, proposing marriage. The demand for the right to procreate was enormous. She might come out of this in better condition than before the murder. If that was what counted.

Suddenly I appreciated on a gut level the common man's objection to the Tyrancy. I was beginning to feel it myself.