On Wednesday morning, in response to the postcard, Craig Stafford brought his eleven-year-old son to the New York State Medical Center, which in Kingston was located in a quadrant of the license bureau. Randy’s examination started right on time; and in less than an hour the computer in Albany had read the sensors and scanned the blood, urine, and skin analyses and turned the holorays into digital bits of physiological data. From then on it was only a matter of waiting for the transmission lines to free up for the report.
The doctor was smiling as the printout spewed from his deskside terminal.
“Good news, Mr. Stafford,” he said, tearing the paper from the console with a professional flourish. “Randy’s in excellent condition. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that this is the best report I’ve seen this week.”
Stafford frowned. “That means you’ll be taking him.”
“Well, I wouldn’t put it that way.”
“What way, doctor—how would you put it?”
The doctor glanced again at the bottom line of the report, the sum of the digits. “Randy’s a lucky boy,” he said. “Actually, there’s less than half a chance of making it on the first examination; and many children, unfortunately, are never considered healthy enough, despite our chemotherapy programs. But your son is ready now. No problem. He can go to the hospital this week.”
For an instant Stafford thought it sounded almost convincing, but then, as he got out of his chair, the tight marks deepened in his long face and his compatibly long fingers curled into fists of defiance. It occurred to him that Randy was still out in the waiting room, anxious to hear the happy verdict; but to Stafford it was the worst possible result. He had hoped for a negative report. He had hoped at least for a postponement.
He said, “I don’t want him to go.”
“But it’s the hospital . . .”
“Forget it, I just don’t want him there. Leave him alone.”
“I can’t permit ...” The doctor paused. He folded the computer listing, creasing each seam, and put it into a preprinted envelope. “That’s a bad attitude, Mr. Stafford,” he began again in a bedside manner inherited from past medical generations. “First of all, the law is absolute and uncontestable, as you well know, for the good of the general public. It’s obviously not a matter for voluntary choice. How can a child decide? How can you decide for him? No, no, it’s simple enough. If he qualifies for the hospital, he goes there. . . . And if you understand the purpose of the hospital, you must want Randy—”
“I know all about it,” Stafford countered, “even if I didn’t get to go there myself. You put a strong, healthy kid in the hospital for almost a year. You have him contract every known disease, one by one; then you cure him, one by one, so he’s loaded with permanent antibodies and immune to everything and spends the rest of his life in perfect health.”
“Well, that in itself-”
“Is bullshit!” Stafford went on, striding closer to the desk and leaning over it. “Sure, the good old AMA has it all worked out. Give the kid cancer, diabetes, all the heart disorders, a couple hundred viruses, and everything else that God knows. Build up his immunities so he can live to a hundred and eighty . . . live with a body full of scars and plastic parts, and memories of a year in hell.”
If the doctor was the least bit disturbed, he didn’t let on. Going about his business, he put the envelope in a stiff folder and removed a small blue card that was attached to the front of the folder.
“You have the wrong impression,” he said flatly. “Without the hospital, your son would be lucky to reach ninety.”
Stafford shook his head. “It’s not worth it.”
“Of course it is. You know that Randy would get many of the illnesses naturally, as his life went on. By taking them all at once, under supervision, and at an early age, when he can fight them off, he can gain quick cures and double his life expectancy.”
“What about all the suffering?”
“Well, there’s some price to be paid,” the doctor said. “Frankly, Mr. Stafford, the only easy way to build up antibodies is through the use of vaccines. But vaccines are effective for only a limited number of diseases; they are not permanent—especially after the age of one hundred; and humans have become somewhat resistant to them. Vaccines, after all, are a much weaker dose than the real thing.”
Stafford’s shoulders sagged.
The doctor nodded. “It’ll be all right,” he said, as he double-checked the blue plastic card.
Apparently satisfied, he handed the card to Stafford. There was nothing to see but a few punched holes and a serial number. Stafford looked up questioningly.
The doctor explained, “Randy must check into the hospital on Friday afternoon. The processing will go quite rapidly if you have this card with you. Will you be able to bring him yourself?”
“Yes,” Stafford told him. “It’s not my workyear.”
He turned the plastic card over and over in his fingers, leaving faint damp marks on both sides. He knew he couldn’t stop what was happening. Once Randy passed the health review, the hospital was the compulsory next step. Actually, he should be a proud father like everyone else in his situation. But that terrible year.
“Some of them die,” he said.
The doctor stood up and came around the desk as if to cue an end to the pointless discussion.
“That’s true,” he admitted. “Some die. In many cases, though, they are children in borderline physical condition who never should have been admitted. Their parents probably used official influence to get them in. Myself, I think we should make the requirements stricter. At any rate, don’t worry—we have a ninety-four-percent survival record. Very good odds, you know.”
“Worse than I thought,” was Stafford’s bitter reply. Pocketing the admission card, he started toward the outer office to get his son, knowing that he would have to meet Randy’s cheers with at least a faint smile of enthusiasm.
Like a laugh in the dark.
* * * *
At home, Myra was waiting for them outside the front door, up on her toes, her pretty face full of hope, her delicate hands clasped between her small breasts, all of her lit up in anticipation. Stafford waved artificially from the car in the driveway, but it was Randy who ran up to give her the word.
“Mom, I’m going,” he said excitedly. He was also up on his toes, reaching for her. Short for his age, and slim, and somewhat soft. Much like Myra’s side of the family, Stafford thought. Still, strong and healthy in his own right, as the doctor had proven this morning, Randy would probably survive the immunizations.
But in what condition? Through what agony? At what cost?
Stafford trembled briefly, and moved away from the car.
“Friday, Mom,” Randy was saying. “I’m going to the hospital on Friday. It’s all set.”
Myra hugged him.
“That’s so wonderful, Randy. Oh, I prayed and prayed . . . and I’m happy for you.” Her bright eyes were not aware of her husband’s leaden steps as he came up to join the celebration, and even the metallic edge on Stafford’s words didn’t break through her glow of wishes-come-true.
Once more he asked his son, “Do you really want to go?”
“Sure, Dad,” Randy answered, acting victorious. “Only the best people go. Mom says so. Everybody wants to go to the hospital.”
“But everybody can’t go.”
“Yeah. . . . Especially Joey,” Randy said, a little more quietly. “If Joey was going with me—”
“Never mind,” Myra put in. “You’ll make new friends at the hospital. Now, go upstairs and change clothes, and then you can go over to tell Joey the news.” With her arm resting on Randy’s shoulder, she guided him to the accessway; and when she came back to Stafford, it was with a further explanation. “Joey took the exam last week, and he was underweight. They turned him down. His mother was frantic, she was so sure.”
Stafford made a vague gesture that indicated nothing but that temporarily covered his end of the conversation. A moment later, when he was sure that his son was out of earshot, he gave in to the feelings that were knotted in his stomach.
“The whole thing stinks,” he said, but Myra had heard his opinion many times before.
“Please don’t start that now. It’s all settled, and there’s nothing more you can do about it.”
“But damnit, Myra, you’ve seen the hospital. You know what it’s like in there.”
“It’s not that bad.”
“Not that bad? How can you-”
“Stop it, Craig!” This time there was a snap to her usually mild voice, and he could see the start of angry tears. “You’re being ridiculous, and you know it. It’s a great chance for Randy.” She wheeled and stalked out of the room, leaving Stafford cut off from further debate.
He was tired of arguing about it, anyway. The doctor, his wife, his son, the world.
The whole goddamned world.
No one ever listened.
He sank into the cushions of his telereading chair, but he drew no comfort from it. Neither did a deep breath do anything to extinguish his nerves. Shuddering, he wondered why he always saw a completely different hospital. Maybe he was wrong, or unreasonable, or just stubbornly old-fashioned. After all, the hospitals were created by medical geniuses as an answer to mankind’s plea for a longer life, and every father dreamed of having his children admitted, of giving his children something more than he had, a shot at two hundred years.
Almost every father.
Somehow he couldn’t stand the image of Randy in the hospital. He could see him there writhing near death, in masses of agony, rattles of pain. Suffering, screaming. Sleeping only with drugs. And one after another: asthma, leukemia, tumors, cataracts, pneumonia ... No relief, no end, not for a year. . . .
At that point he heard Randy calling from upstairs.
He found the boy stretched out across the bed, face-down. He touched Randy’s shoulder, and the muffled voice blurted, “I don’t want to go.”
Stafford sat next to him.
“But you said you did.”
“That was before, Dad. Now I’m scared. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me. There’s going to be a bunch of people I never saw before, and they never saw me before. And I don’t like hospitals, anyway. ... I want to stay here.”
“Take it easy,” Stafford told him. Then he bit his tongue and said, “I wouldn’t send you there if it wasn’t all right.”
He took his son’s arm affectionately, helping him to turn over and up, trying to discover the real look on his face. If Randy was afraid now, he thought, what would happen when he was really in the midst of that ghoulish infirmary . . . when he was plugged into electronic nurses and tubes of plasma . . . when they came at him with hypodermic needles and surgical knives . . . when the errant strains of earthwide bacteria swarmed through his eleven-year-old body?
Or when he found out that it hurt all the time?
Sitting up on the bed, Randy swallowed hard and put a little bravery back in his chin, as if realizing that the meeting was man-to-man as well as father-to-son.
He said, “I’d probably be okay if Joey was going, too. If he was there, you bet I wouldn’t be scared at all. Can’t you tell them to let Joey go with me?”
“Maybe he’ll make it next time,” Stafford replied. He rustled Randy’s dark hair. Then his hand slipped down to Randy’s neck, pulling him just a little closer. “Tell you what, though. I’m going to ride out and take a look at the hospital tomorrow, to make sure they’ve got things in good shape for you.”
Being in the second of his three offyears, Craig Stafford had acquired the habit of sleeping until ten o’clock in the morning— mainly because Myra, who tired easily, managed to sleep that late every day of every year. But on Thursday morning Stafford had his breakfast coffee at the throughway Savarin as the day was just beginning, and he pulled his car into the hospital grounds at the very start of visiting hours.
The fence was a miles-long plastic ribbon that formed a semicircle down to the Hudson River. Within it, Stafford followed the wide road that led up to the hospital; once there, he tried to read, but couldn’t concentrate on, the huge plaque of dedication that had been signed by President Cooper in 1996. The building itself loomed up in front of him; like its many duplicates across the country, it was forty-five stories high, windowless, and immaculately white.
And assuredly soundproof.
The few other visitors in the south wing of the fifth floor were women and they moved silently with Stafford around the railing that circled above the ward. Below him, the huge room of beds was encased in a clear plastic dome that made it open and public, offering an unhampered view of the entire arena. The outside walls were a checkerboard of servogear and electronicaides. The beds were the latest in four-by-six-floaters. The lighting was indirect-nonreflective, which meant that it could be left on all day and all night with only minor automatic adjustments to its intensity. And in the main aisles that crisscrossed between the beds, a moving center strip—it seemed like a treadmill—allowed the skittering men and women in white uniforms to review their hundreds of patients.
To Stafford it was a pitiful zoo. He stopped walking, folded his arms on the railing, peering in.
He wasn’t sure why he’d come or what he was looking for. Reassurance, no doubt. But it wasn’t there. Instead, there was visible evidence of torture and murder. In the beds, every one of them filled, he saw the empty faces of unknown children—sad and hopeless strangers trapped in nothing they had asked for. From where he stood, he couldn’t hear their screams, but he felt every one that echoed inside the enormous cage.
A red-haired girl ripped the stuffing from her pillow.
Another girl pounded her stomach with angry fists.
A boy coughed and choked and went on crying.
Another boy tore a gash in his face.
One boy slept.
“Which one is yours?” a woman’s voice asked, and Stafford turned to give her half of his attention. She was close to Myra’s age, but a little bigger all around.
“Not here yet,” Stafford replied without emotion.
“Oh, that’s certainly too bad,” she lamented. “But don’t give up, he might make it. Or is it a girl? Tell me, have you tried vitamins?”
“It’s a boy—my son.”
“Oh, then you must try exercise, too. Exercise and vitamins.”
“He’s really all right. In fact, he’s scheduled here for this Friday—tomorrow.”
She brightened sincerely. “I’m certainly glad for you. . . . That’s mine over there, at the head of the third row. See him? That’s Mike, our oldest child.”
The boy Stafford saw was a quivering wreck. The cheeks were sunken. The hair was awry. And the eyes were clamped shut, as if to avoid the cold stares of the dials and gauges and cathode-ray tubes that were arranged in a forest around him. Stafford was about to offer his sympathy, but the woman wasn’t in tune.
“He’s almost finished with cirrhosis of the liver,” she boasted. “Next week he’ll probably start on arthritis. That’s an easy one-takes only a few days.”
Stafford nodded skeptically, unable to find the right answer or the right tone of voice. Like Myra, he thought, the woman had been brainwashed with the benefits of advanced medicine and was completely oblivious to the cruelty that completed the process. He stood by for a moment before he walked away from her; then, as he moved on, his eyes searched the ward from child to child—seeing Randy in every bed, sick and hurt, begging for relief. Finally, he turned his back to it all and started slowly towards the elevator.
Down.
As the doors slid open on the main floor, Stafford caught sight of the arrow sign that pointed to the office of the director; and the same impulse that had brought him to hell, or to the hospital, struck another hot link in his nerve chain and sent him striding down the corridor in the indicated direction.
* * * *
Luriwist, the director of the hospital, was fat. Most of the excess flesh was around his waistline, indented by his belt. Some of it also lay around in his cheeks, which, together with flashing teeth, made him seem always happy. All in all, he looked like a man who appreciated second helpings, morning chats, and the huge executive offices.
He, of course, did not see any cause for Stafford’s complaints.
“Your son is in very good health,” Luriwist said, reading the record from the green glow of a display tube. “You’ve got nothing to worry about.”
“I just don’t want him here,” Stafford repeated. He was standing at the far end of a banquet-size desk and had begun the conversation by pounding on it.
Luriwist clicked off the tube. “Best thing that could happen to him. Wish to God I could take it myself. Why, when the boy gets to be twice your age, he’ll look and feel better than you do now.”
“Maybe.”
“Do you doubt it?”
“Sure I doubt it. It hasn’t been done long enough to know one way or another. Show me a generation of two-hundred-year-olds.”
“That’s academic,” Luriwist argued with smiling complacency. “It’s all based on sound medical knowledge, and there were countless treatments on experimental subjects—animal and human. We were able to triple the lifespan of some of the smaller animals. Anyway, it was proven in all cases that the level of antibodies produced in the bloodstream was more than enough—”
“I don’t care about that!” Stafford shouted. He was beginning to feel battered and worn. “Did those medical geniuses ever measure the emotional scars that come from a year in this place? Did they ever try it themselves? What do you think—did they care about anything but antibodies?”
Luriwist flopped back in his chair. Only his eyes reflected a change in the stoic outlook, and those eyes were fixed on Stafford’s face.
“What the hell is the matter with you, Stafford?”
Stafford gave it some thought. “The pain, the suffering, the whole year—I can’t have Randy go through it.”
The director raised a brow.
“Oh, one of those guys, huh?” He tapped his fingers on the edge of the desk, and his voice became less superficial. “Well, we run into your kind now and then, and sometimes we work out a deal. But it’ll cost you, say, a thousand superdollars.”
“For what?” asked Stafford. “To keep Randy out?”
Luriwist shook his head. “No way to do that. But what we can do ... Is Randy your real son? Not adopted or anything?”
“Of course he’s mine. Would I be-?”
“Then I suppose we can do business,” the director said. He leaned forward and used one hand to underline his words. “But the deal is off the record. Strictly off the record. Understand? Anyway, we can fix it so that your son will feel no pain at all.”
“Safely?” Stafford wondered, then had his doubts. “I don’t see how you can do that.”
“Why not? Pain is only a message that’s sent through the nervous system to the brain. The secret is to divert the message.” Luriwist put some of the secret into his smile. “So we divert the message,” he continued. “We block the nervous system in just the right places. We take the pain away from the patient and transfer it to another person of his immediate family.”
“You mean that I’d feel the pain instead of Randy?” Stafford said, half-breathing, half-speculating.
“It could be arranged,” was the reply, “if you’ve got the thousand.”
Stafford’s mind was a tape of quick thoughts. It was easy enough to get the money. The pain was another matter. Could he himself take a year of it? He’d seen enough to know its awful touch; but the strength of a large man was a lot tougher target than the inexperience of a small boy, and somehow, just knowing that Randy was escaping it. . . So it would hurt, Stafford told himself firmly and finally. The physical pain would be no worse than the mental anguish it saved.
But he still wasn’t convinced.
He said, “It doesn’t seem possible.”
“It’s very possible,” Luriwist assured him. “Look, we don’t publicize it, because people would claim that it’s like black magic. And maybe it is. There you are, Stafford—call it black magic.”
“I don’t like black magic.”
“All right, then I’ll tell you the truth. It’s based on a medical practice that was thoroughly discredited at the end of the century. But a couple of experts on our staff kept playing around with it, and the best thing they found was pain transfer. We’ve used it successfully a number of times.”
“That’s not much of an explanation—”
“Cut it out, Stafford!” Luriwist seemed to be growing weary and ill-tempered. “I’m not going to give you a classroom lecture. Either you want to do it, or you don’t. Make up your mind.”
Stafford moved his legs apart to a ready stance.
“I’ll bring the money with me tomorrow.”
“Cash, please,” said Luriwist.
* * * *
The guard at the gate checked with registration, then signaled them on with a flick of his hand. Randy was wedged in the front seat of the car with his head leaning on his mother’s shoulder. Stafford glanced down. For some reason the boy seemed younger than ever, almost a baby again.
“How do you feel?” Stafford said.
“Okay, I guess,” his son answered quietly.
Myra tightened her arm around him. “Do you remember everything I told you? Remember that the doctors and nurses are there to help you. And don’t forget to look for us on weekends.” She paused, recounting.
“Mom?”
“What is it, dear?”
“Joey didn’t even come over to say good-bye this morning.”
“Never mind that. There are plenty of boys just your age right here in the hospital.”
Randy wiped his eyes. “Dad?”
“You’ll be all right,” Stafford said, and he saw a parking space far down the line.
Once they reached the check-in area, the blue plastic card lived up to its promised expediency and brought on a single piece of paper to be signed and two male escorts in white uniforms who greeted Randy with brave, cheery words and much-used smiles, both before and after they hooked onto him.
And quickly, Stafford saw him go.
He turned Myra around and led her to the elevator, which they took up to the seventeenth floor. It was quite crowded; Friday afternoons were used for general admissions, and 17H was the ward of the day. They edged to a place on the rail close to the plastic window; they got there in time to see Randy ushered to a bed, his mouth open, the clean, crisp hospital gown dragging slightly below his feet. Myra stood on her toes and waved. Stafford bit hard. “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” he told her.
On the lower level, once again in the lavish office, Stafford put the money on the desk and waited while the director counted it. He still felt that it might be some sort of con game, some weird scheme without fulfillment or redress. At best it was a gamble.
He said, “Are you sure it’ll work?”
Luriwist shoved the money into a drawer.
“I don’t see why not. It always has,” he explained. “A top man on the staff will be giving the treatments. Each treatment will divert the pain from your son for months at a time; and as that happens, the nerve sensations will automatically find you, his own flesh and blood. I hope you’re strong enough to take it.”
“I’m ready,” Stafford said.
“Then I’ll send up the word, and you’d better start for home immediately.” For the first time, a note of sympathy could be heard in Luriwist’s voice. “Good luck, Stafford.”
* * * *
Myra felt his touch and turned her head to him.
“Oh, you’re back. I’m glad,” she said anxiously. “There’s something strange going on with Randy. Do you see that man in the dark suit?”
Stafford looked down into the ward. A dark-suited man with a small black case was standing at Randy’s bedside.
“What about him?”
“Well, he just came along and stopped the doctors from giving Randy his first injection. I can’t imagine who he is.”
“Probably a specialist,” Stafford said, knowing it was the truth. “The hospital always makes sure that everything gets off to the right start. Let’s watch for a minute and see what he does.”
What he did was open the black case and take out a handful of stainless-steel needles. The shafts were of various lengths and seemed to be knurled down to within an inch of the points.
What he did was twirl the needles rapidly as he inserted them—two in each of Randy’s ears, four more at selected points around Randy’s spine.
What he did was attach an electronicaide to the end of each needle. Immediately a redline graph began pulsing on a wall display, and Randy’s hands began to shake.
Stafford watched it all, astounded.
“Acupuncture,” he mumbled, mostly to himself, but Myra picked it up.
“Why, I thought nobody used that anymore.”
Stafford calmed himself. He considered his words carefully. “Evidently they use it here, Myra. I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about. This is one of the best hospitals.”
Inwardly, he was still amazed. Acupuncture! What had Luriwist said? A medical practice that was thoroughly discredited at the end of the century. The ancient art of acupuncture. Chinese medicine. Needles in the skin.
Well, why not? was Stafford’s second thought. What else but acupuncture could produce the miracle of diverting Randy’s pain? . . . And suddenly it occurred to him that he should have left the hospital right after he made the arrangements.
“Really, Craig,” Myra was saying, “I think we ought to ask about it. I’ve never heard of anyone—”
“Let’s just leave it to the experts,” Stafford replied firmly, checking his watch.
It took a while to get Myra away from the ward and out to the car; but then Stafford drove rapidly, recklessly, anxious to get home before anything started on him. He wondered how soon it would be. Of course, Myra would have to know, he told himself. He’d need all her help to get him through it. Would she understand? He glanced over, finding her outwardly happy and proud, but also seeing a deeper strain of worry and loneliness. Well, she’d feel better when she found out. . . .
At that instant she grabbed his sleeve. She clutched her stomach. She doubled over and bit into his arm. Then she twisted her head to stare up at him, her eyes wide and pleading as she let out the first scream.
* * * *
Lou Fisher writes:
First of all I must confess to all the readers of this anthology that I am not a prolific writer. This note, by itself, is a considerable addition to my total output, and one that I will probably include in future tallies to make them seem like more. It’s not that I don’t want to write in continuous streams, that I don’t want meaningful fictions to pour out of me like they pour out of Barry Malzberg or Evan Hunter or any of the prolific writers I admire. I dream of writing like that. But the magic eludes me; whatever it is.
In my case, there are a number of good-sounding excuses. There is a full-time job as writer-editor of programming manuals for a computer company. And a house that needs handling and three cars that need oil. Of course, there is an energetic wife who needs to share her experiences, and two teen-age daughters who need to be guided (ha!) through their tumultuous years. Not to mention hours of all-out devotion to tennis, softball, volleyball, golf, bowling, bridge, cribbage, and reading. Anyone can see that I go to extremes to use up my time so I won’t feel guilty about not writing. It doesn’t work. There is plenty of time left over, and it has never been the problem. The problem, obviously, is in the mind, in the spirit.
Now that I have started to confess, I might as well go all the way. For the first time I will lean over my records and see what I have done in the way of published works. It will turn out to be much less than what I had hoped for when I first started to call myself a writer. Okay, here it is, starting in 1958: eighteen stories in a number of splashy men’s magazines, four paper-back novels, also in the men’s field; and five (only) science-fiction stories. That doesn’t include reprints. God, all of my men’s stories and novels were reprinted and reprinted in later years under new and dramatic titles; it’s no wonder I never knew until now how many I actually had written.
There was something else. For about a year I wrote a monthly column of gambling advice for one of the men’s magazines. (The far-seeing editor decided that I was a gambling expert because the hero of my four novels was a bookie named Chet McCoy.)
Naturally, I am happiest writing science fiction, and lately I have been trying to stay with it. My stories so far have appeared in F&SF, Fantastic, and Galaxy; a story called “Triggerman” reappeared in The Best from Galaxy, Volume II.
But about this story. Well, every once in a while my writing urge overcomes my writing block, and an idea that’s been stewing for months in my middle consciousness expands into all sorts of weird images, and I try to put it together the best I can.