Universe 5 - [Anthology] Read online

  Although their sex was different and their companionship intimate, Speedy and Big Yank had never considered having larvae together. Their friendship was of a more manly or girlish character and very firm-footed, all twelve of them.

  “You really think something outré is going to happen inside the museum?” Big Yank mused.

  “It’s a dead certainty,’ Speedy assured her.

  * * * *

  In the scarab room silent awe had given way to whispered speculation. Exactly what and/or who were those gemlike beetle forms arranged with little white cards inside the glass-walled cases? Even the scribe-beetle guide found himself wondering.

  It was a highly imaginative twelve-spotted cucumber beetle of jade-green who came up with the intriguing notion that the scarabs were living beetles rendered absolutely immobile by hypnosis or drugs and imprisoned behind walls of thick glass by the inscrutable gunboats, who were forever doing horrendous things to beetles and other insects. Gunboats were the nefarious giants, bigger than Godzilla, of beetle legend. Anything otherwise nasty and inexplicable could be attributed to them.

  The mood of speculation now changed to one of lively concern. How horrid to think of living, breathing beetles doped and brainwashed into the semblance of death and jailed in glass by gunboats for some vile purpose! Something must be done about it.

  The junketing party changed its plans in a flash, and they all scuttled swifter than centipedes back to the convention, which was deep into such matters as Folk Remedies for DDT, Marine Platforms to Refuel Transoceanic Beetle Flights, and Should There Be a Cease Fire Between Beetles and Blattidae? (who still went “Blat, blat!”).

  The news brought by the junketters tabled all that and electrified the convention. The general secretary eyed elater was on his back three times running and then on his feet again—click, click, click, click, click, click! The president Colorado potato beetle goggled his enormous eyes. It was decided by unanimous vote that the imprisoned beetles must be rescued at once. Within seconds Operation Succor was under way.

  A task force of scout, spy, and tech beetles was swiftly told off and dispatched into the museum to evaluate and lay out the operation. They confirmed the observations and deductions of the junketters and decided that a rare sort of beetle which secretes fluoric acid would be vital to the caper.

  A special subgroup of these investigators traced out by walking along them the characters of the word scarab.Their report was as follows:

  “First you got a Snake character, see?” (That was the s.)

  “Then you get a Hoop Snake with a Gap.” (That was the c.)

  “Then Two Snakes Who Meet in the Night and have Sexual Congress.” (That was the a.)

  “Next a Crooked Hoop Snake Raping an Upright or Square Snake.” (The r. )

  “Then a repeat of Two Snakes Who Meet in the Night, et cetera.” (The second a. )

  “Lastly Two Crazy Hoop Snakes Raping a Square Snake.” (The b. )

  “Why all this emphasis on snakes and sex we are not certain.

  “We suggest the Egyptian delegation be consulted as soon as it arrives.”

  Operation Succor was carried out that night.

  It was a complete success.

  Secreted fluoric acid ate small round holes in the thick glass of all the cases. Through these, every last scarab in the Egyptian Rooms was toted by carrying beetles— mostly dung beetles—down into deep beetle bunkers far below Manhattan and armored against the inroads of cockroaches.

  Endless attempts to bring the drugged and hypnotized beetles back to consciousness and movement were made. All failed.

  Undaunted, the beetles decided simply to venerate the rescued scarabs. A whole new beetle cult sprang up around them.

  The Egyptian delegation arrived, gorgeous as pharaohs, and knew at once what had happened. However, they decided to keep this knowledge secret for the greater good of all beetledom. They genuflected dutifully before the scarabs just as did the beetles not in the know.

  The cockroaches had their own theories, but merely kept up their picketing and their chanting of “Blat, blat, go the Blattidae.”

  Because of their theories, however, one fanatical Egyptian beetle went bats and decided that the scarabs were indeed alive though drugged and that the whole thing was part of a World Cockroach Plot carried out by commando Israeli beetles and their fellow travelers. His wild mouthings were not believed.

  * * * *

  Human beings were utterly puzzled by the whole business. The curator of the Met and the chief of the New York detectives investigating the burglary stared at the empty cases in stupid wonder.

  “Godammit,” the detective chief said. “When you look at all those little holes, you’d swear the whole job had been done by beetles.”

  The curator smiled sourly.

  * * * *

  Speedy said, “Hey, this skyrockets us beetles to the position of leading international jewel thieves.”

  For once Big Yank had to agree. “It’s just too bad the general public, human and coleopterous, will never know,” she said wistfully. Then, brightening, “Hey, how about you and me having another adventure?”

  “Suits,” said Speedy.

  <>

  * * * *

  M IS FOR THE MANY

  by J. J. Russ

  J. J. Russ is not Joanna Russ; his first name is Jon, he’s married, and has a young daughter, and he’s a psychiatrist who practices in California. His poems and stories have appeared in Cimarron Review, The Smith, San Francisco Magazine and Fantastic.

  Here he tells a deft, acerbic story of the relationship between love and need. (Well, one of the relationships, anyway.)

  * * * *

  When Nyta was angry she kicked the resilient gray bag in which Rey was suspended. If the impact interfered with her husband’s trances, he never admitted it, but it gave Nyta satisfaction nonetheless. Her leg swung, clad in golden mesh disks, and with every swing she felt her toe sink into the fluid-filled sack. Every time, Rey’s floating body must have jolted slightly inside. But the bag never burst and Rey never woke and nothing was any different.

  Time was going by.

  Lery turned, watched her for a moment instead of the kaleidoscopic patterns on the screen. “Mommy,” he asked, “why you kick the bag?”

  “Because I’m mad at Daddy, baby.”

  “Why you mad at Daddy?”

  “Because . . . there’s nobody else to be mad at” Nyta went on kicking until her leg was weak, but the exercise changed nothing. Lery would soon be five, the time for Bupop to take him the way they had taken Alba. In only two weeks she would be sealed in the partment with Rey and their bags and the screen. Without a baby. The thought made her shudder.

  She coaxed Lery into her arms and cradled his head. His silken brown hair that grew in overlapping curls, his endless questions, his moist and curious eyes—soon they’d just be memories to wish inside her bag.

  But two weeks is a long time.

  Rocking, she crooned the song remembered from her childhood, an ancient lullaby full of words she didn’t understand. “Rock-a-bye baby on the treetop. When the wind blows, the cradle—”

  “Mommy!” Lery shook himself out of her arms. “I wanna watch the screen.” He ran away and reactivated the shifting three-dimensional patterns that he now preferred to her songs.

  * * * *

  As usual, Lery complained when she took over the screen for motherhood hour. Nyta held him firmly on her lap and smiled at the five other women who seemed to be sitting in her partment.

  “My, Lery’s getting so big,” Mercia said, cuddling her ten-month-old twins against her breasts. “Your work is almost over!”

  “I know.” Nyta held onto her smile.

  Simi, the oldest of their group, stroked the furry animal on her lap. “You should be proud. From a little nothing, you’ve helped him grow to where he’s ready to take his own place in the world.” The other women applauded.

  “It wasn’t hard,” N
yta said. “He’s so cute.” She hugged him tightly and ignored his squirming.

  Simi adjusted the diaper around the hole cut for her animal’s tail. “Soon you’ll be needing a substitute, like me. I tried synthetic babies, but the tiny things don’t grow. It’s unnatural.” The animal blinked. Its bright eyes were surrounded by rings of pink flesh and its nose was flat and broad. “Dandy here is so much nicer.”

  Ugly, Nyta thought Not like a baby, not like my Lery.

  * * * *

  By dinnertime Nyta decided, and told Rey while they were eating. He plucked another food container from the wall beside the screen and chewed serenely. He grinned ecstatically, just as he did after all his trances.

  “They’ll never let you. Forget lads and sack up. Use your bag, like me.” Rey didn’t seem to notice her new golden drape. As usual, he avoided looking at Nyta, making her feel fat and ugly, conscious of flesh sagging from curves he’d once admired.

  “I don’t want to! You know what happens when I trance.” Remembering the nightmares, she pressed her arms over her heavy breasts. “I mean it. I want to keep Lery.”

  Rey shrugged. Although he was four years older than Nyta, his lean face was unlined, his cool gray eyes were clear and unworried. “I don’t care. But you know the law.”

  Nyta interrupted quickly. “That’s why we’ll ask Bu-pop.” She shook her long brown hair. “I need a baby ... a child.”

  “Okay, okay.” Rey put up his palms defensively. “But what’s so special about him?” He shrugged his shoulder in the direction of Lery.

  “I just need him.” Nyta incinerated food containers in the low, shining sposal, wincing with each brief flash.

  “Why you need me?” Lery asked.

  Nyta smiled. She loved answering his questions. “Because ... I do. Because you’re nice. Because I love you.”

  Rey laughed dryly, without malice. “You’d better think up something better for Bupop. They’re tough about things like this.”

  “But they’ll have to understand.” Compulsively, Nyta fingered the slack skin under her chin.

  “You know what they’ll tell you.” He began to edge back to his bag.

  “Rey!” She closed her eyes tightly and put thoughts out of her head by- singing, “Rock-a-bye baby . . .”

  “Bye-baby, bye-baby,” her son echoed.

  * * * *

  After Rey untranced the next morning, they summoned Bupop on the screen. There was a breathtaking shimmer of colors, accompanied by throbbing and passionate music. A resonant voice bellowed: “Be fruitful and replicate!” And then the colors condensed into a gray-haired man who seemed to be sitting in front of the screen. He nodded his head graciously in the direction of Nyta and Rey.

  “Bureau of Population,” he said. “May I help you?”

  “I want to keep my baby!” Nyta blurted immediately to the controller, and then blushed and bit her tongue. She had to ask just right...

  “I see.” The gray head bobbed, apparently unoffended. “And you are ...”

  “Rey and Nyta Jonsn,” Rey said, “partment F829-Q19484-J, sir.”

  The man closed his eyes for a moment and a faint humming came from his skull. “You’ve given us one child so far?”

  “Alba.” Nyta’s eyes watered.

  “You know two’s quota, of course?”

  “Yes, sir, but so fast . . . my son’s due to go in a few weeks—”

  “Surely that’s no surprise, my dear.” There was compassion in the controller’s face that made Nyta hopeful. “You know,” he went on, “we nurture all children from their fifth birthdays, ensuring standard adjustment and sparing you all that bother”—he frowned only briefly— “of draining interdependencies.”

  “But Lery’s still a baby. He needs me.”

  “Now, now.” The compassionate man smiled warmly. “Surely you yourself remember when you were taken, the joy of freedom; the excitement of independence, the warmth of your first bag.”

  Nyta remembered mostly the nightmare trances that began in her bag, memories of her parents being sealed behind her, feelings of burial and suffocation. “Lery’s special,” she said. “And I’m a good mother for him. You’d see ...”

  “I’m certain you are. But you have use of offspring for five years only. After that’—his head shook slowly— “they are free.”

  “Then I want another!” Nyta’s voice broke.

  “Nyta!” Rey apologized to the controller. “She knows it’s impossible, sir.”

  “Never mind.” The controller’s tone was mellow with patience. “That’s what I’m for, isn’t it?” Leaning forward, he stared into Nyta’s eyes. Close up, she noticed that his eyes had no lids, and that they were spinning slowly around the pupils. “Now, my dear, you must realize we cannot allow exceptions. If we take three children from you, how can we deny others?’

  Nyta wanted to kill him. “Not everybody wants—”

  “Our partments are full. No one, you understand, may do more than replace himself. When there are excess or premature deaths we make exceptions...” Somehow, lidlessly, he closed his eyes again and again his skull hummed. Nyta hugged herself tightly and gnawed her lip. “In your case”—the controller waved a benevolent hand from side to side—”we cannot”

  Nyta felt numb.

  “Of course, you still have time.” The controller smiled faintly and his voice brightened. “Pretransfer offspring are yours. None of our affair.”

  Rey nodded. “That’s right”

  “Quota, my dear. Quota cannot be exceeded.”

  Not Lery ... Lery’s special, she thought.

  “That’s what I told her, all right.” Rey grinned.

  Lery, impatient with the monotonous screening, asked, “What’s kota?”

  Nyta cupped her hands over his ears.

  The gray-haired man gave a last paternal nod. “I suggest you consider substitutes. Also, use your bag. Happy dreams,” he said, and vanished from the partment

  “You heard him,” Rey said. “Sack up!”

  * * * *

  “Men,” Simi told her that afternoon, “they just don’t understand. All they think about is their bags and orgasmic trances and new permutations on the matrix programmer.”

  “Sounds like my Jun, all right.” Mercia giggled.

  “They don’t know what it s like to feel a baby grow in your own belly,” Simi went on, “or to care about something little and helpless more than for yourself. Even an animal like my Dandy here.” Simi stroked the long-tailed animal, whereupon it turned its lips out in a snarl and tried to bite her hand. “Men don’t understand. They think only about themselves—big babies, all of them.”

  “My husband says he likes babies,” a newlywed said, and then blushed. “We have a double bag. He says when the baby comes he’ll help take care of it.”

  “Help.” Simi pronounced the word like an insult. “You’ll see.”

  Nyta looked again at Simi’s animal, which now had closed its eyes and wedged its ugly face in Simi’s armpit. “Where do you get animals?” she asked. “Are they expensive?”

  * * * *

  Nyta’s first animal had long ears, was white and furry with pink eyes and big front teeth. She bought it from Simi’s dealer, a cuxio vendor on an obscure channel. He guaranteed authenticity, but couldn’t tell Nyta its name. She enjoyed petting it until Lery killed it while trying to unscrew its head.

  Next she bought a playful green-eyed carnivore that delighted her with the vibrations of its throat against her skin. But when it punctured Rey’s bag with its needle-sharp claws, causing his fluid to run low during an exceptionally inventive trance, he insisted that it be returned. Nyta cried for hours, thinking of how she could have cuddled it when Lery was gone.

  The last animal, also the smallest, was gray and tapered at both ends. Its rear sloped to a long bare tail, and its head was pointed in a whiskered snout, always nibbling. It liked to snuggle in Nyta’s warm lap until one evening, surprised at being squeezed, it snapp
ed at her finger. A red drop quivered on the fingertip. Without thinking, Nyta grabbed the animal by its tail and dropped it into the sposal. As the wriggling body dropped, the sposal widened its metallic iris. Nyta changed her mind—too late—and the animal vanished with a white flash and faint sizzle.

  Lery was watching. “Mommy, why you ‘pose the an’mal?”