DREAMER�S CAT An unpublished novel by Stephen Leather So it's two o'clock in the morning and just under three weeks before deadline and I'm sitting in a bar somewhere in Manila's red light area with a Japanese Scotch on the rocks in my hand and a thumping great headache. Am I worried? Damn right I'm worried. When you work for the Cerebral Broadcasting Services Corporation you don't miss deadlines. Still, I'm doing OK. I've got the central character all fixed up, an aging private eye on the trail of a serial killer, and I've got a good idea of the locations - Manila, New York, London and an undersea vacation centre off the Seychelles. Some of the scenes I can play back time and time again in my head but there are still a few grey areas in the plot. Too many for comfort, and less than three weeks to get them sorted out. Yeah, OK, I admit it. I'm worried. From my bar stool I can see myself reflected in the mirror behind the scantily dressed dancing girls and it makes me wince. I do not look good. I do not look good at all. I'm only 48 years old for God's sake but every hair on my head is grey and the laugh lines around my eyes and mouth are still there even when I've nothing to smile about. I look old. And tired. And worried. "You look old. And tired. And worried," says Ruth. She is sitting on the stool next to mine. Cute. "How long have you been there?" I ask. "Not long," she says. "This is a dump." I ignore her and drain the contents of my glass. A bargirl who has seen better days comes over and asks me if I want another. "He's had enough," says Ruth, but the girl doesn't acknowledge her, just keeps looking at me with raised plucked eyebrows. I nod. My head hurts. She brings me a refill and leans her thickening forearms on the bar. "You on vacation?" she asks me in a voice as brittle as spun glass. "Sort of," I say. "Calm before the storm, you might say." "Manila is a good place for a vacation," she says, obviously not listening. Ruth leans over the bar and puts her face close to the girl's cheek. "Go away you foul-smelling hag," hisses Ruth. I try not to laugh. "What's funny?" asks the girl. "Nothing," I say. "Have you visited Manila before?" she asks. "No," I answer. The truth. "And never again," says Ruth. "And never again," I say. "Where are you from?" she asks. "I was born in London. Now I live in Chicago. And Paris." "And sometimes on a small island about three hundred miles from Sri Lanka that isn't even on the map," says Ruth. The truth. A young guy, thirty at most, wearing cut-off denim jeans and a grubby white t-shirt, appears at my shoulder and motions at Ruth's chair. "Anyone sitting here, Buddy?" he asks me in a mid-Western drawl. I shake my head and regret it immediately. It hurts. It hurts a lot. "Tell him to sit somewhere else," hisses Ruth. I grin at her. "You tell him," I say. "Say what?" says the guy. "You sit there," I say. "You can help me entertain this charming young lady here." Ruth jumps off the stool just before he slides on and she stalks up and down behind me, her stub of a tail twitching in annoyance and growling occasionally. I ignore her. I have to when other people were around. They wouldn't understand. "Thanks, Buddy," says the man. "Leif," I say. "The name's Leif." "Leif me outta this," growls Ruth. She is not taking rejection well. "Jack," he says. "Jack Rosenberg. From Houston." He orders a beer for himself and a whisky and ice for me. I tell the girl to put them on my tab. She asks if I'll buy her a drink and I shake my head and she asks Jack and he says yes but I tell her to put that on his bill. If Jack the Lad from Houston wants to be taken for a ride he can do it under his own steam. The girl asks Jack what he does for a living and he tells her he is a real estate agent looking around for big chunks of the Philippines for folks back home. "What do you do, Leif?" she asks me. I think about lying but then think, what's the point? It was two in the morning and I've lost count of the whiskies I've put away and they won't believe me anyway. "Me?" I say. "I'm a Dreamer." "They won't believe you," says Ruth in a sing-song voice. She girl looks at me wide-eyed and Jack the Lad snorts into his San Mig. "Bullshit," he says, froth on the end of his nose. "Bull fucking shit." "Told you they wouldn't believe you," sings Ruth. "I thought Dreamers were all young. Teenagers," says the girl. "We are," I say. "We just age quickly." "You're too old to be a Dreamer," she says. "And you're too old to be working behind a bar," I answer. I love witty repartee. "And too ugly," adds Ruth. She sits down behind my stool and begins scratching her ear with her left rear leg, grunting with each stroke. "Buddy, everyone knows that there isn't a Dreamer in the world older than 25. And it looks to me as if you'll not be seeing 50 again," says Jack. "If you're a Dreamer then I'm the Prime Minister of Russia." He drains his glass and the girl moves away to refill it. He turns his body towards me and looks me up and down like a butcher weighing up a carcass. "You ain't no Dreamer," he says. "Whatever you say," I reply, avoiding his eyes. Perhaps it wasn't such a good idea telling him. "Smart boy," says Ruth. She stops scratching and sits proudly, watching the American with a mischievous grin on her face. "Telling this deadhead was real smart. Real smart." That's the trouble with Ruth, she knows what I'm thinking before I even think it, yet her mind is a closed book to me. Bitch. "Language," she says throatily. "Behave," I say. "In your dreams," she hisses. "What do you mean, behave?" says the American. "You looking for trouble?" So what could I say? I'm not talking to you, Jack, I'm talking to the cat. Sure, that'd open up a nasty seething can of worms, wouldn't it. Better to say nothing. "Nothing," I say and look down into my glass and watch the ice cubes melt. "Good grief," sighs Ruth. Jack decides I'm not worth talking to and swaggers along the bar to another stool. The bargirl carries his drink over and sits opposite him. She says something to him and he laughs out loud and the two of them look over at me and laugh again. "Wimp," says Ruth. She rears up on her haunches and leaps smoothly back onto the stool. Poetry in motion. No awkwardness, no strain, no effort. Smooth. She is a lovely mover. "Thank you," she says, accepting the unspoken compliment. "You're welcome," I say softly. Don't get me wrong. I don't usually talk to Ruth. Not in public anyway. People wouldn't understand. All they would see is me chatting to myself and it wouldn't be long before they'd carry me off and measure me up for a white jacket with very long sleeves. Ruth has to stay a secret. People wouldn't understand. But it's easy to forget after a few drinks, to forget that she isn't real and that the rest of the world can't see the grey and brown bobcat with the tufted ears and the white teeth and the knowing brown eyes and the sharp tongue. "Hazel," Ruth interrupts my thoughts. "My eyes are hazel." I raise my glass to her. "To the cat with hazel eyes," I say. Jack and the bimbo laugh again but I ignore them. That's one of the pluses of being a Dreamer. I can ignore anything. Except Ruth. Three weeks to go before deadline. Three lousy weeks before I had to put up or shut up. "You'll make it," says Ruth. "You always do." I nod at her and take another pull on the Scotch. It's a Japanese malt, a good one. It's expensive, but what the hell, I can afford it. It doesn't make my throbbing head feel any better, but then again nothing ever does. The headaches go with being a Dreamer. The headaches and the slide into insanity. Perks of the job. "Don't forget the money," says Ruth as she begins grooming her stiff white whiskers with her left paw. Yeah, the money. Access to more money than Jack or the bimbo could even imagine, more money than any one person could ever spend in a lifetime. While you're under contract you have access to the huge resources of the Corporation, you can have anything in the world you want. Anything. But unless you run the full course of the contract you don't get to keep a cent. It keeps us on our toes, that's the idea, anyway. "And how many Dreamers actually fulfill their contracts?" asks Ruth. "Answer me that." Yeah, that's the rub. Three at most. Four if I can meet my deadline. Since the psi-disc boom started 10 years ago only three Dreamers have gone the distance. "And where are they now?" she asks. Persistent. Nobody knows. But lets face it, if I lay down my tenth psi-disc and I get to collect my retirement cheque then you're not going to see me for dust either. Whatever happened to Leif Ableman? Did he ever finish his last psi-disc? Did he collect his pot of gold? Or is he in a padded room in some secluded asylum dribbling down his chin and chewing the fat with an imaginary cat? Nine down, one to go. "You'll make it," says Ruth. My biggest fan. The door to the bar opens with a hiss and I turn to see a tall, thin greying man with a stoop step into the gloom, blinking his hooded eyes until they get used to the lack of light. Herbert Chastel de Beauville. My minder, helper, gopher, sometime pimp and banker. Go back far enough and his family probably owned vast estates in France and for all I know his distant relatives lost their heads during the Revolution but now there wasn't a trace of French in his accent, his voice is a nasal Brooklyn wine with missing consonants and vowels strangled at birth. He always speaks as if he has a head cold. As usual he is dressed in a black suit that is slightly baggy around the knees and too short in the arms and the shoulders are flecked with dandruff. "Leif," he says, running a hand through his hair in much the same way that Ruth has been cleaning her whiskers. He moves to sit on the stool next to mine and Ruth slides down to the floor again with a soft growl. "Herbie," I say, giving him a genuine smile. "Let me buy you a little refreshment." There is no need to ask him how he knows where I am. He can track me all over the world with the company chip-card, and anyway I'd told him I was working on the Manila angle last time I'd called him in the Chicago office. But deadline was still three weeks away. "No time," he says. He pinches the top of his hooked nose with his fingers and rubs the corners of his eyes. He looks tired. "What's wrong?" I say, putting my empty glass on the bar. "Another one has died," he says quietly. "Jimmy Kratzer. You know him?" I shake my head. "Heard of him, sure. But never met him. One of the rising stars isn't he? Yeah, now I remember. He did 'Breakout' didn't he?" "That and a couple of others. The company reckoned his next one was sure to go platinum." Platinum means a billion sales in a year. Two of mine had hit platinum. Two of my earlier psidiscs. The last one sold just under 400 million in five months so there was a chance it would make it too. Not that the company worried about one year's sale figures. It was the repeats that counted, and the quality stuff like mine would go on for years. That's the beauty of the psi-discs, the customer never gets bored with them. Every time is like the first time, you live them rather than view them. That's the sales pitch, anyway. "What happened?" "Same as before. He was laying down his disc and he just died. Total brain death, no nervous impulses, nothing." Kratzer is the third Dreamer to have died in as many months. Not that Dreamers are immortal, far from it. Their death rate is higher than combat soldiers, but usually they drive their cars off cliffs or jump out of luxury hotel windows or blow their brains out or withdraw into a coma and just give up on life. This was different. Someone was killing Dreamers while they were laying down their psi-discs. And I was only three weeks away from my deadline. Herbie falls silent as he continues to massage the bridge of his nose. He is the bearer of bad news and isn't sure how to break it to me so I decide to make it easy for him. "What's wrong?" I ask. He looks at me gratefully. "They want you in Chicago. Soonest." "Why?" "It's obvious, isn't it," sneers Ruth from behind me. "They want you to find out what happened." "They didn't say," says Herbie. "He's lying," says Ruth as she paces backwards and forwards, her powerful shoulders flowing under her grey and brown fur. Maybe he is and maybe he isn't, but either way they've gone to the trouble of sending my minder in person rather than just telexing or phoning. For a moment I wonder what would happen if I tell Herbie to sod off and that I'll see him in Chicago in three weeks but deep down I know there is no point. Sooner or later I am going to have to start work on my psi-disc and God only knows what will happen to me then. "Let's go, then," I say to Herbie. I wave to the bargirl and she brings me the bill. I hand her my card, the black company chip-card. She looks at with surprise written all over her face and I get a kick out of her confusion. There are hundreds of thousands of Corporation cards, but most of them are green or gold. There are a few thousand platinum ones, most of them owned by the upper echelons of Corporation management, but only a couple of dozen black cards, and they are only in the hands of Dreamers and their minders. She holds it almost reverently and then wipes it through her register. She looks at it again as if trying to imprint it on her memory before she hands it back so that she can tell her family and friends later. There was a Dreamer in our bar. A real live Dreamer. I follow Herbie out into the street, leaving the girl talking to Jack. This time neither of them are laughing. * * * We take the company jet back to the States. It's not quite as fast as the supersonic Mitsubishi 797s that they use on the commercial routes but there's no waiting for the plane to fill and no getting caught up in Customs. Herbie and I just show our company chip-cards and after they're wiped through the computer we're on our way. The jet is sleek. No windows. At four times the speed of sound, who needs them? It's all just a blur anyway. The inside is finished like an old-fashioned study, wood panelled walls and a plush wine-coloured carpet and antique furniture. Herbie had asked me a couple of years ago how I wanted my plane fitted out and I told him I didn't care, that I'd leave it up to him. The boy done good. The seats are burgundy leather wing chairs with restraining straps for take off, landing and the hour or so we spend in near-weightless conditions. There's a full range of in-flight entertainment, including 50 or so psi-discs. Mine are all there, of course, but I never plug in. I occasionally view the latest releases, but only to see what the competition is doing. Yeah, I know that every commercial flight in the world, even cattle class in the Third World airlines, have psi-discs to keep the passengers happy. And I know that passengers would prefer to get out and walk at 75,000 feet rather than take off the psi-disc headbands and talk to the person next to them. But when I fly I read books or talk. I flick through the rack of discs while Herbie watches me. "Anything I should worry about?" I ask him. "Alex Lee's new one is there. 'Killers from Korea'. It's getting good reviews." "Have you seen it?" "Naturally." Herbie sees them all, as a fan. Like 95 per cent of the population, he's an addict. "Well?" "Yeah, it's good. It's a blood and guts Kung Fu story, but you get to take part in two of the gang fights. It feels good, there's one bit where you're up against two thugs with hatchets and you get to kick them both at the same time. And there's another bit where you dodge an axe thrown by the leader of the Korean assassins and then catch it by the handle as it goes past. Good effects." "OK, OK, no need to sound so bloody enthusiastic about it," I say, somewhat hurt. Alex Lee is one of the new wave Dreamers from China. Full of emotion and colour, but lacking subtlety and depth. That's how I feel, anyway. And the last thing I want is my minder telling me how great he is. "He's not a patch on you, Leif, you know that," says Herbie, and I feel a little better. I'm the third Dreamer that Herbie has had under his wing. I don't know what happened to the previous two, it's not polite to ask. Not where Dreamers are concerned. "Yeah, I know Herbie. I just like to hear you say it," I tell him, to show him that I appreciate him. Him and Ruth, I can't do without either of them. So where is the cat with hazel eyes? Not here, that's for sure. She hates flying. Totally illogical, I know, that an imaginary cat should refuse to fly, but that's the way it is. She'll pick me up again once we've landed. She's got to the stage now where she virtually comes and goes as she pleases. If I really want her around I can put pressure on her to come, but it's not easy. She walks her own path. Take her name for example. Ruth. That was not my choice. I reckon it makes her sound like a maiden aunt with white hair and a rocking chair. I wanted to call her Bobby. Bobcat, Bobby, get it? She did and one day told me in no uncertain terms that she would not answer to such a childish name. "You may call me Ruth," she told me frostily. "Why Ruth?" I'd asked and she told me. Felis Rufas. Latin for Bobcat. From Rufas to Ruth. It was a name with some style, she said, and she was a cat with style. Fine. Ruth it is. At least Herbie didn't go in for name-changing. Herbie was OK. He was a good choice as a minder. Anyone who wants to make a living looking after a Dreamer has got to be a first class diplomat, a tireless organiser and have the constitution of a carthorse. Anything I want, anything at all, Herbie has to get for me. Any food, any object, any girl. A good minder is like a genie, I rub his bottle and he fetches me my heart's desire. Something else a minder needs: a complete absence of jealousy. Imagine it. The Dreamer has access to virtually unlimited funds and can try anything, do anything, that he wants. The minder has to arrange it. Sure, they get well paid for it, but it pales into insignificance compared with what we get. Assuming we fulfill our contracts. Three weeks to go says a small voice in my head, but Ruth isn't there to tell me I'll make it. Herbie's voice interrupts my thoughts. "See anything you like?" he says. I shake my head and sit back in my armchair, half floating because we're so high above the ground and moving so quickly in a curved flight path. "You know me, Herbie. I'm a Dreamer, not a voyeur. But be my guest." He refuses, even though I know he hates flying, too, and he'd much prefer to spend the time plugged into the psi-disc player. "What do you think's going on, Herbie?" I ask and he seems startled. His eyes narrow and he studies my face as if I've got spots. "With the Dreamers, you mean?" he asks and I say yes, what else. He rubs his hands up and down his trousers as if wiping them clean. Maybe he's sweating. Maybe he's worried about something. Maybe he's just scared of flying. "It could be just coincidence," he says but we both know that's not it. Before this year no Dreamer has ever died in the studio. One went gloriously insane while laying down a Stalk and Slash horror disc but no one has ever died before. Now three have gone in as many months. "Could it be mechanical failure?" I ask. "Electrocution or something. A power surge?" "If it was I'm sure the technical boys would have gotten it sorted out by now," he says, with a bit more confidence. "Yeah, well if it's not coincidence and its not an accident then that can only mean it's deliberate," I say. "Does the Corporation have any ideas?" Herbie shakes his head and I don't like the way he seems to be holding something back. I wish I could see inside his mind, but even Dreamers can't do that. Our skills, and our weaknesses, lie within our own skulls, the pound or so of neural matter that even the new Korean supercomputers can't match when it comes to creativity. "You'll have to ask them," says Herbie. "They tell me nothing, you know that. I was just told to bring you back early. Safe and sound." "Yeah, in mind and body." I miss Ruth. I wish she was here. "I'm not far away," says a voice in my head that might have been her. Or I might have imagined it. The throbbing in my brain is back. Stronger than before. * * * Ruth is waiting for me outside CBS Tower, prowling up and down the pavement like an anxious parent as the Corporation limo pulls up to the kerb. It's a Toyota, top of the range, it comes with all the accessories including a psi-disc player and a rack of the Corporation's new singles for passengers - maximum playing time 30 minutes. Herbie had given them the once over but hadn't plugged in, instead he made small talk and tried to keep my spirits up. "Long time no see," says Ruth, rubbing her shoulder along the backs of my legs and purring. "Miss me?" Crazy cat. "Look who's talking," she says, and follows Herbie and me through the glass doors and into the marbled foyer. The Tower is the tallest in Chicago, 180 storeys, and every one is staffed by CBS employees. On the way to the lifts we have to walk through the ultrasonic metal detector and are frisked by two armed doormen. "How long has security been this tight?" I ask Herbie. He shrugs and says he doesn't know. "Since the Dreamers started dying," says Ruth and sits down in front of the express lift that serves the recording studio floor. Herbie almost treads on her tail and she leaps out of the way, hackles up and spitting. "Watch where you're treading, Dog Breath," she says and fakes a swipe at his legs, claws out. The door hisses open and we file in, Ruth first, then Herbie, and then me. On the way up to the 89th floor the lift tells us how the main stock market indicators - the Dow Jones, the Nikkei and the People's Daily - are doing, gives us the strength of the dollar, the yen and the yuan, and lists the top 10 psi-discs. Seven of them are CBS products. One of them is mine. The lift has a woman's voice, she sounds about 35 years old, with blonde hair and green eyes, soft creamy skin and a beauty mark on her right cheek, rounded breasts and good legs. "Sounds like a Clouded Leopard to me," says Ruth. "With sleek flanks and grey eyes and a long tail with evenly spaced stripes." To each his own, I suppose. I wonder how Herbie perceives the throaty lift voice, but it's all in the mind anyway, it's computer-generated and is changed every week or so. The lift door opens into a grey foyer with lots of tall potted palms and a large abstract picture that looks expensive, every splash of paint carefully thrown at the canvas from across the room, you know sort of thing. There's a lot of red in it and not much green. I know the way because I've been here nine times before so I lead Herbie and Ruth down a white corridor with recessed fluorescent lights to the office of Max Blyth. Dr Max Blyth it says on the plaque on his door but Max isn't pretentious, he only uses the title when booking restaurant tables. On the other side of the door is his secretary, a tall black girl with a close-cropped Afro haircut and a low-cut dress. "Probably types well, too," purrs Ruth. The secretary buzzes Max and he doesn't keep us waiting, we're shown right in. Max is Vice President (Recording) and has an office befitting his status, just about big enough for a half decent game of touch football. After the game the teams would have plenty of space to sprawl around the three long leather sofas that formed a seating area in one corner or they could have run a few laps of the good doctor's desk to wind down. Max is already on his feet and walking towards us with his hand outstretched and he squeezes hard as we shake hands. He nods at Herbie and ignores Ruth. Max is real. "Leif, thanks for coming," he says and waves me towards the sofas. I sit in the middle of one, Herbie flops down into another, his trousers riding up around his calves showing lime green socks, and Max sits on the edge of the third one. Ruth lies down in the middle area and curls up with her head on her paws, one eye closed and the other watching me. Her tail slides slowly from side to side along the plush purple carpet making a soft, scraping sound. "You've heard what happened to Jimmy Kratzer?" says Max. He leans forward towards me, like a vulture examining a body to see if there's any life left in it. Max is about the same age as Herbie, but whereas Herbie has gone grey with the strain of handling Dreamers, Max has gone virtually bald. There's not a trace of vanity in either men, though, and while Herbie steadfastly refuses to dye his grey locks, Max won't have a transplant even though it's covered by Blue Cross. He wears glasses too, for God's sake, when everyone one else with eye problems either has laser surgery or has permanent contacts fitted. It's as if Max wants everyone to be aware of how his body is gradually falling apart. He's wearing his usual in-office attire - a white technician's coat with three pens in the top pocket and a brass five-pointed star with the word Sheriff etched into it to show that he's got a sense of humour. You've got to remember that most of the time he's dealing with Dreamers who are barely out of their teens, which explains the big bowl of brightly-coloured jelly beans that dominates his desk and the Coke vending machine by the door. "Sure," I say. Why else would I be here three weeks before deadline, I think, but I don't say it because Max is a nice guy and one of the few people in the Corporation in my age group. Us old guys should stick together. Ruth snorts and opens both eyes and raises her head as if she's going to say something but then thinks better of it and rests it back on her paws with a deep, mournful sigh. "And you also know that we've lost two other Dreamers. And they both went the same way." "What way is that?" I ask. "Complete brain death," says Max. He leans so far forward that his glasses slip down his nose and he pushes them back with the middle finger of his right hand. "Their whole neural networks just packed up. No electrical activity at all, anywhere in their bodies. We tried artificial respiration, everything, but there was nothing left. It was as if their lives had just been switched off." "You checked the equipment?" "They were in three different studios when it happened. And we stripped down the system each time," he explains patiently. He seems to be humouring me, which makes me think he already knows what's going on but doesn't want to tell me. I decide to stop asking questions and to just listen. If nothing else I want to find out why the Corporation has suddenly become so interested in security. We sit in silence for a while, the only sound I can hear is Ruth's gentle purring. Max folds his arms across his chest and pushes his glasses back again. Still nobody speaks. Herbie coughs nervously. Both Ruth's eyes are closed and I think she's asleep. "You wish," she says, but her eyes are still closed. "Max," I say eventually, "there's something you're not telling me." Max gets to his feet and walks over to his massive desk. Luckily he doesn't disturb Ruth. He leans on the edge of his desk and then decides that's not cool enough so he lifts himself up and sits on it, swinging his legs slowly. "We think the clue to what happened to the three Dreamers lies in the psi-discs they were laying down. All three were about six hours into their discs when they died." "The same time?" "Not quite, but within half an hour of each other." "Have you played the master discs back?" Max looks embarrassed and Herbie starts to study his shoes. "We tried it with the first one, but we lost two technicians," says Max. "Lost?" "They died, Leif. At exactly the same point as when the Dreamer died." "And they went the same way?" I ask. "Yeah," says Max. "They're fine right up until the psi-disc ends, and then every nerve just stops dead. Brain, heart, muscles, everything." "Why two?" I say. "Why did you do it twice if you knew what would happen?" Max stands up again and walks back behind his desk to sit in his big, black executive chair. The man is obviously on the defensive. "The first time we didn't know what we were up against. We played the disc right the way through and the technician just died. So we took the disc and put a block on it about five seconds before it was interrupted and we tried it again. He died, too. We're not sure if he died because of what's on the psi-disc or because of the jolt the sudden ending gave him. We think the latter....." "But you're not sure," I say, and he nods his head in agreement. "And they want you to make sure," says Ruth quietly, and she does not appear happy with the idea. "And you want me to make sure," I say, and I am not happy with the idea either. "That's it in a nutshell," says Max, and from the look on his face and can see he's far from pleased as well. At least we're all in agreement. "We want you to plug into the three psi-discs and work your way through them, to find out what the hell is going on," says Max. Ruth sits up and is studying Max. From where I'm sitting she seems to be examining his throat and weighing up the distance she'd have to spring in order to rip it clean out. She is growling, a menacing sound like a two-stroke motorbike engine. "Why me, Max? What have I done to deserve this?" He holds his arms out towards me, appealing for understanding. He looks like one if the bums you pass in the street begging for $10 for a cup of decaf and there is the same pleading whine in his voice when he says "I hate asking you to do this but you are next in line....." He leaves the sentence hanging, but I get the drift. I'm the next Dreamer due to lay down a psidisc - three weeks to go and counting - and they are holding me to it. And we all know that if I go and lay down the disc then the same thing is going to happen to me. So why not be a good boy and do what they want - find out what killed the first three - make that five, let's not forget the backroom boys - and help them make sure it doesn't happen again so that I can fulfill my contract and get the hell out of the business. Ruth walks over to me and puts her head in my lap, thrusting herself forward, her lips slightly parted so that I can feel her warm breath through the material. She seems to be the only one in the room who is concerned about me. I move my hand forward and gently scratch her in the place she likes, in the middle of the forehead, but I make it look as if I'm rubbing my own leg. She purrs and moves her head from side to side with pleasure, narrowing her eyes. She wags her tail like a dog. "I heard that," she growls, but she's joking. "You wish," she purrs. "So you'll do it?" says Max. Herbie is fidgeting and obviously wishes he was somewhere else. "What else can I do, Max? I assume the Corporation is holding me to my contract?" Max nods, but at least he has the decency to look shame-faced about it. "When?" I ask, and I'm not surprised when he says as soon as possible. Tomorrow. * * * I spend the night in my flat. Herbie bought it for me soon after I signed my Corporation contract, or rather he paid for it with his chip-card. Nothing a Dreamer buys while he's under contract is actually his property, it can all be taken away if he drops out before the five years and 10 psi-discs are up. The way the Corporation looks at it is that Dreamers should have access to any experience they want so that they can incorporate it into their psi-discs. But anything that is bought with the chip-card remains the property of the Corporation. I guess it makes sense. Any other way and you could buy a jet plane or an ocean-going liner or even a bloody space ship and then sell it straight away and pocket the money. No, the last thing the Corporation wants is Dreamers with stacks of cash, it wants us lean and hungry, chasing after the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, otherwise we'd just lay down one psi-disc and then take the money and run. That's why they tie us to a five year, ten disc contract, so that we'll keep playing with madness. And maybe, just maybe, some smart-arsed accountant somewhere up on the 90th floor had figured out that if enough Dreamers fall by the wayside the Corporation's bottom line would look a whole lot healthier. Anyway, the deal is that for five years we get to live out our dreams courtesy of the black card and pick up a seven-figure salary, but that the real pay off has to wait until the end of the contract. Then we are talking about serious money, so serious that you are set for life. For a hundred lifetimes. That's why I'll be laying down a psi-disc within the next three weeks, I'm certainly not doing it for the creative kick. Herbie decorated the flat and I left it up to him. The lounge area is all glossy black leather and grey thick pile carpet with the latest Vietnamese video and hi-fi equipment - including the obligatory psi-disc player and collection of Corporation discs - and is about the size of Max's office. There are four bedrooms but I've only ever been in one, the master bedroom which has one of the three bathrooms. There's a kitchen somewhere but I'm not a great one for cooking so I've never gone looking for it. The bedroom is like something out of Arabian nights, silk-lined walls and a sort of tent-like canopy over the bed and all the furniture is gilded with little twiddly bits on the ends and there's a huge mirror on the wall opposite the end of the bed. I think Herbie did it as a joke, so I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of mentioning it. Anyway, I've only slept there a dozen or so times, before or after laying down a disc. Tonight I cannot sleep. I am lying on my back, naked under the black silk sheet, looking up into the silver canopy above my head. It's like lying under a rocket. I'm trying to push the noise out of my head but it won't go, there's a buzzing sound as if there's a tormented fly trapped in my skull and the sound of waves washing onto a stony beach. Once or twice I manage to quieten my mind down but I still don't drift off to sleep, I remain trapped in an uncomfortable limbo, too bodily tired to go out or read and too restless to dive into the black void of sleep. There's a bump at the end of the king's size bed and I feel Ruth walk along the sheet, placing each paw carefully so as not to step on me. The bed rocks with each step she takes until her head is directly over mine. She blinks her eyes slowly and licks the end of my nose with the roughness of her tongue. Her breath smells vaguely meaty. "Can't sleep, huh?" she says. She smiles at me, then arches her back up and stretches from her nose to the tip of her stub of a tail, clenching and unclenching her claws before dropping down next to me, her head turned sideways and resting on my chest, tucked under my chin. At full strength she's almost as long as I am and I feel her warmth right down the edge of my body. I put my arm around her and she cuddles up next to me, purring loudly. "You're worried?" she asks. "About tomorrow?" "Today," I correct her. "It's two in the morning. Yeah, I'm worried." "You'll be OK," she says. "They'll stop the disc before the dangerous bit, and you know what you're doing. You're not some low grade technician, you're a Dreamer. If there is anything, you'll see it coming." "The three Dreamers didn't." "They didn't know what they were looking for." "And what am I looking for?" Ruth sighs deeply and nuzzles her head under my chin, her thick coat is soft and warm and I can feel her whiskers pricking gently into my skin. She says nothing for a while and I start to feel that I'm actually going to fall asleep for the first time when suddenly she stiffens. "What's wrong?" I ask. "I've just had a thought," she says. "What will become of me if something happens to you?" "I don't know, Ruth," I say quietly. "I really don't know. What do you think will happen?" She sighs and it feels as if she shrugs. "I suppose I'll have to find another master," she whispers, so softly that I can barely hear her. * * * I'm alone when I wake up. There's a phone by the bed and I ask it the time and it tells me its eight o'clock and I tell it get Herbie. Seconds later he's on the line. I keep my eyes closed and my head still as I talk with him because my head still hurts. "Are you OK, Leif?" he asks and I say sure, just my migraine playing up. He understands and knows there's nothing he can do to help. The pressure effects Dreamers in different ways, some break out in rashes, some develop a stammer or have nervous twitches. Me, I get headaches. At first I tried to do something about them, but after half a dozen medics examined me and took Xrays and ultrasounds and God knows what else and then just shook their heads and muttered that they'd have to do further tests, then I knew that I'd just have to live with them. "Are you going to be in the recording studio with me?" I ask him. "Do you want me there?" he says, and I sense a barrier, a reluctance, that suggests the studio is the last place he wants to be, but I say yes, I'd like him close by and he says he'll be there. Max wants me in bright and early, nine o'clock, so I've plenty of time. I shave and shower, but the voice activated thermostat seems to be playing up and I spend most of the time saying "hotter" or "colder" but can't get the temperature right. The phone rings while I'm lathering my hair and I have to shout to make myself heard over the running water. "Are you up?" Max asks, obviously worried that I'm gonna chicken out. "I'll be there, Max," I say. "What's the noise?" he says. "I'm in the shower," I tell him. "Really?" he says and then at the top of his voice yells "Colder! Colder! Colder!" He hangs up as the water temperature drops twenty degrees in response to his commands and I curse him and tell my shower not to be so stupid. Max can be a big kid at times. Ruth reappears while I'm standing in the dryer, moving around slowly and enjoying the feel of the warm air playing over my skin. "That looks like fun," she says, and sits down to watch. "It's not polite to stare," I tell her. "And you know what curiosity did to the cat." "You've got nothing that I haven't already seen," she says. I get out of the drying cubicle and walk around Ruth to the wardrobe in the bedroom. "Any thoughts on what I should wear?" I ask her as she pads in after me. "You always look good in the grey," she says and so I take the grey suit and a light blue shirt with a button-down collar. "Tie?" I say and she shakes her head. "Casual," she says. She watches me as I dress. "Can I have some milk?" she asks. I squat down in front of her and hold out my cupped hand. I imagine it's half full of white, creamy milk and offer it to her. She purrs and bends her head over my hand, butting it as she laps up the milk. When she's finished she mews loudly. There is milk on her light brown nose but my hand is bone dry. Imaginary milk for an imaginary cat. "Yeah, but it tastes so good," she says. * * * Max is polishing his glasses when Ruth and I walk into his office. Herbie is there, too, drinking a cup of tea, finger crooked daintily. They both seem nervous and try to jolly me along with small talk about the weather, the stock market, anything to keep my mind off what it is they're asking me to do. We take the lift up to the recording studio together and even the synthesized lift voice seems to be on edge. Ruth sits at my feet and is first out when the lift stops. There are three technicians waiting for us in the studio, all wearing white coats. One of them has a brass star like Max's but his has the word "Deputy" embossed on it. I look at Ruth and she says "Three. All real. Stop worrying." I have to check, to make sure that my mind isn't playing tricks on me, and the more nervous I get the more likely it is that I will start seeing things. When I woke up this morning the canopy above my bed was pink and I was sure that it was silver last night. And there was the smell of green apples in the lift. It could have been the aromatiser on the blink but I didn't want to ask Max or Herbie. The technicians are standing in front of a bank of computers and VDUs, the equipment that captures the impulses from the brain of the Dreamer and translates it into binary code which is then transferred to the psi-disc. Today, though, we're going to be doing it in reverse, the impulses are going to be fed into my brain. �IP3�"Stop worrying," soothes Ruth, "you're breathing like a train." At the far side of the studio is the soundproof glass cubicle where the Dreamers do their stuff. The glass can be electronically darkened or lightened to suit the individual Dreamer. Some prefer to work in complete darkness, some want as much light as possible. Me, I like it midway, the sort of gloom you get on an autumn evening. Inside the cubicle is a leather couch, twice as wide as a man and half as long again, raised slightly at both ends for the head and the feet, and there are two restraining straps because sometimes Dreamers thrash about when they're laying down a disc in the same way that sleepers move during amateur dreams. At the end where the head goes is the impulse collector, similar to the commercial headbands that you use to play back the psi-discs, but a hell of a lot more expensive. There's a screen to the left of the door and I go behind it and take off my clothes and hang them on the hooks there. I slip on a white robe, the sort they give in you hospital. "Are you ready, Leif?" asks the Deputy and I nod and walk with him to a side room where there is a big adjustable chair. "Short back and sides," I say as I sit down. He laughs but with little warmth. I guess he hears the joke from every Dreamer who sits in the chair. He shaves my head with a minimum of fuss with a buzzing razor that sounds like a swarm of angry wasps. The hair falls in clumps to the floor. It doesn't worry me, I've been through it nine times before and I'm well passed the stage of bothering about my looks. I'm 48 years old for God's sake. When he finishes shaving my scalp he takes a blob of greasy, metallic smelling stuff from a glass bottle and massages it into the skin. "OK, Leif," he says when he's finished. "That's us." "Why the haircut?" asks Ruth. "I thought you were just observing." She's right, of course. The shaving is only necessary when you're laying a psi-disc down, it improves the connection, not by much admittedly, but enough so that it's worth the trouble. Playback is different, hair doesn't effect the reception much, but Max reckons that as I'm using the same equipment that the first dead Dreamer used that we might as well make sure that as many of the conditions are the same. We'll be playing the disc back at slow speed, too, at the same rate the Dreamer was laying it down. The only difference would be that the disc would stop a few seconds before the end. I just hope that he times it right. "Stop worrying," says Ruth as Max leads me to the glass booth and helps me get comfortable. Ruth sits by the side of the couch and watches as Max attaches the headset and checks the connections. When the average punter plugs into a psi-disc he gets the ultimate thrill - to live another life, to experience somebody else's dream first hand. He never thinks about the Dreamer who lays down the disc, the sweat and the pain that goes into the making of it. A psi-disc can run from a few minutes up to several hours, but most last for between two and three hours. The record is held by Andy Hedges and his five hour version of 'A Christmas Carol' but he went loopy shortly afterwards and swallowed a bottle of sleeping tablets. The tablets were so that he wouldn't die dreaming, I guess. Snag is, it takes about three hours to lay down one hour of psi-disc time, so a three hour run takes nine hours and it has to be done in one go. It's only by speeding up the disc time that you can produce the depth and pack all the information in, and it has to be done in one operation because you can't edit like you used to be able to do with film or video tape. There are so many variables involved - sound, colour, texture, smell, feel - all the five real time senses - that any stopping and starting produces such jolts that anyone playing the psi-disc is immediately jolted back to reality, and it's not a pleasant feeling, like having a bucket of ice cold water thrown over you while you're asleep. Some medics reckon the shock could actually be enough to kill you, but what do they know? They're still looking for a cure for AIDS for God's sake, with three million dying from it last year. So to lay down a disc the Dreamer has to plug himself into the recording mechanism and spend up to nine hours rigidly controlling his thoughts, holding a totally different reality in his head, a world that must appear to be totally real with real characters and real situations. It's like a dream, but it's one in which the Dreamer must retain total control. You know what it's like when you have your own amateur dream. You switch from place to place with no rhyme or reason, you can start a conversation in a restaurant and then be talking to the same person dressed as a cowboy and then when you look away you're on an island and then when you are looking back it's your father you're talking to and he's telling you your dog has died and then you're being chased through a thick jungle by a tribe of head-hunters blowing bugles. Random noise, no plot or continuity. That's fine for your own private dreams and nightmares but who in the world is going to pay good money to experience garbage like that? A few trendies, maybe, but random images have little commercial value, even among the avant garde community. So the Dreamer spends months working on the plot and the characterisation and the locations, researching and experiencing any of the sensations he wants to incorporate into the psi-disc. Then, when he's ready, he locks himself away in his head and lays down the disc. Any disturbance, any flicker in the self-created reality, and the company makes you go back to the start and begin again. Too many attempts and you're deemed to have broken your contract. Is it tough? Yeah, but it's not impossible. "How's that feel?" asks Max and I tell him it feels fine. He walks around the side of the couch so that I can see him. "Right," he says. "Now remember, Leif, we're playing at slow speed, but you shouldn't notice because our equipment is so much better than the commercial players. If at anytime you think there's anything wrong bring yourself out of it straight away, don't take any risks. OK?" I give him the thumbs up. Getting out won't be a problem, I know that. Even a child knows how to pull out of a psi-disc during playback, a simple mental blink and you're back in the real world instantly. "So why didn't the Dreamers pull out?" asks Ruth, voicing the question at the same time as it occurs to me, but I know there is no point in mentioning it to Max. If he knew he'd tell me. Max goes out of the cubicle and Ruth follows him. A few seconds later the glass darkens so that it's as if I'm lying in a thick fog. Max's voice, slightly to the right and behind me, counts down slowly from ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. It is....... ....Night. But not dark, I'm sitting next to a crackling wood fire, the heat warming my face and the smell of smoke in my nostrils. I'm dressed in blue jeans and thick leather boots, a red shirt and a brown leather waistcoat. There's a thick belt around my waist and there's a heavy weight pulling it down the right side. It's a gun, a cowboy gun. With me around the campfire are four men, two young, one middle aged and one a grizzled old guy with a straggly grey beard that reaches half way down his chest. We are eating bacon and beans off battered metal plates. It tastes good. The men are laughing and joking, and they call each other by name so that I can identify them. The young one with the black hat and the pencil-thin moustache is Reb, the young guy next to him, clean shaven and bad skin, is his brother Dave. The middle aged man, hunched over his plate and wolfing down forkfuls of beans, is our leader, Jake. He looks strong and mean. The oldest member of the team is Doc, the group's cook and bottle-washer. Doc has managed to get juice from the beans on his beard and he tries to wipe it off with the back of his hand. Doc looks at me and says "put another log on the fire," and I do. That's the preliminaries over, anyway. It's a cowboy disc and it will be seen from my viewpoint, but as usual I'll just be an observer, along for the ride. Even if I say not one word the story will still go on, and if I try to throw in my own ideas I'll just be ignored. The skill of the Dreamer is to allow the viewer to feel that he is taking part, while at the same time not introducing too many variables. As the guys eat I look around and drink in the atmosphere. It's good, very good. The air is filled with the sound of lowing cattle, and I can smell them through the wood smoke. There is a full moon hanging in the night sky and occasionally night birds fly overhead. I look for faults, I move my head quickly from side to side but the effect holds up, even at the periphery of my vision. I scoop up a handful of the soil we are sitting on and smell it. Nothing. The Dreamer has a good visual eye but he's weak on smell. I lick the soil. No taste. Yeah, he was good, but not first ranking. Mind you, I can't fault the visuals or the sound. I guess he was fairly inexperienced, one of the new ones. It takes a while to develop the depth, to fill in all the details, not just the superficialities. We finish eating and Doc collects the plates. Dave and I pull the first watch and we saddle up our horses and as the rest of the men roll out their blankets we ride slowly around the herd. Somewhere in the distance a coyote throws back its head and howls at the moon. The herd seems uneasy, constantly moving and stamping their hooves. We hear a noise, a scuffling and the sound of a horse neighing over at the far side of the herd and we kick our mounts, hard, and urge them in that direction. Dave sees them first and screams "Indians!" and draws his gun, firing two shots in the air to attract the attention of the sleeping men and then gives chase. I follow, holding the reins tight and keeping my head low, my horse's hooves pounding into the dirt, jolting every bone in my body, my backside slapping into the saddle. My horse is breathing heavily and so am I. My gun is in my hand and I see three Indians ahead on white ponies, no saddles, gripping with their knees. Their bodies shine in the moonlight, sweat glistening on their shoulders. They have rifles, and paint-smeared faces, and one of them has hair flowing down to the small of his back, kept clear of his face with a band of red cloth. Dave is shooting at them and Long Hair reins in his horse and aims and fires and I see Dave spin off his horse and smash into the ground, blood soaking his shirt. Jake and Reb are by my side, guns drawn. Reb leaps from his horse and kneels at his brother's side, shouting and swearing, while Jake yells at me to follow him and we gallop after the Indians. Their ponies are smaller than our horses but they have more stamina and they gradually pull away and we lose them in the boulders at the base of a towering sandstone cliff. We ride back in silence. Dave is dead. Reb wants to take him with us but Jake says we're three days from the railway terminus where we have to deliver the cattle and that we can't carry a body through three days of sweltering heat, so we bury him. Reb says a few words about his brother over the shallow grave and Doc recites the Lord's Prayer. We pile stones on top of the freshly-dug earth to keep the coyotes away. Reb says he wants to stay and hunt down the Indians but Jake tells him not to be stupid, it's already going to cost us a day rounding up the cattle, most of them had scattered when the shooting started. Reb is angry and he throws a punch at Jake but his heart isn't in it and Jake blocks it and kicks his legs from underneath him. Jake grabs Reb by the shirt and pulls him up. He puts his face right up close and tells Reb that he understands, that he'll help track down the Indians who killed his brother but that we deliver the cattle first. Reb calms down and agrees. We ride back in silence, then we hand over the cattle and hit town with our back pockets full of money. Despite Dave's death we're all determined to enjoy ourselves, and we settle down at a corner table in the saloon with a couple of bottles of rough whisky and a dog-eared pack of playing cards. We play poker and I win consistently. Reb drops out quickly and goes and stands at the bar drinking. A stranger asks if he can sit in, a swarthy guy with a week's worth of stubble on his chin and dark, brooding eyes. He's wearing a black hat, so you know right away that he's a baddie. I keep on winning and when he's fifty dollars down he pushes back his chair and gets to his feet, going for his gun and calling me a cheat. He's fast, very fast, and his gun is in his hand before my hand reaches my holster. I start to panic and the one thought in my mind is maybe this is where it happens, this is where I die, shot in a seamy saloon in a one horse town in the middle of nowhere, and I start to scream that it's not fair, that I don't deserve to die over a few dollars, when suddenly Jake is there, smashing one of the bottles of whisky over the guy's black hat. Whisky and bits of broken glass fly everywhere and the guy crashes down onto the table and it splinters and collapses. I scramble for the money and Jake tells us that it's time to go so the four of us leave the saloon and climb on our horses. "Where we going, Jake?" asks Doc and Jake says the general store for provisions and then we're off on the trail of the Indians that killed Dave. We ride through the desert, the brims of our hats down to shield us from the fierce sun, sipping from canteens of warm water and lying up in the shade during the worst of the mid-day heat. We find Dave's grave, still marked with the rocks. At least the coyotes hadn't got him. We ride out to the boulders where we lost the band of Indians. No tracks, of course, not with the desert winds, but Jake tells us to spread out and search for the Indians and then to meet back at Dave's grave. I find nothing, but the time goes quickly and when I get back Jake and Doc are already there waiting for me. Doc has found the Indian camp, some ten miles to the west, so we sit down and brew coffee while we wait for Reb to return. The coffee is black and bitter and hot and Doc serves it in chipped blue and white enamel mugs. I burn my tongue and it really hurts. Reb wants to go right away, there's a bloodlust in his eyes and I can see that's he's thirsting for revenge, but Jake says no, it'll be dark soon so we wait. The following morning we ride the ten miles to where Doc found the Indian camp and we hide the horses behind the brow of a hill. The camp lies in the valley where three hills meet. A river runs through the valley and there are Indian women up to their knees in it washing clothes while their babies play on the river bank. There are the skins of some wild animals stretched out to dry on poles and a cluster of a dozen or so small tepees. There are no horses, which means the men must be out hunting. Or stealing cattle. "Let's get the bastards," says Reb, but Jake pulls him back. We lie down among the rocks and watch. "The men aren't there," says Jake. "There's only the squaws and children." "They're still Indians," says Reb, hatred in his voice. "Easy boy," says Doc. A dozen tepees means at least a dozen warriors, I think, and there are only four of us. Jake says we wait until the men return but as evening begins to draw in there is still no sign of them, and we know they won't travel at night. "Come on, Jake," says Reb. I don't like the way this is working out. There's a sour feeling in my stomach and my mouth is dry. Jake asks Doc what he thinks and Doc says that we can't let them get away with what they did to Dave and that it was their fault in the first place for stealing our cattle. Nobody asks me what I think, I'm just there for the ride, but I want to tell them that this is wrong, that they are only women and children, but I follow them to the horses. We take our guns out and ride together over the brow of the hill and down towards the tepees, threading our way through the rocks until we reach the bottom of the slope and then we start galloping. A young girl carrying firewood sees us first and she starts to yell a warning. Reb shoots her without even appearing to aim but he hits her straight in the face and it explodes inwards and she falls backwards, the twigs and branches still in her hands. Reb howls with pleasure and kicks his horse's flanks. Doc and Jake start firing, too, as we sweep through the tents and down towards the river bank. The women start to run out of the water, leaving their clothes on the rocks as they rush to pick up their children. Jake fires at an old woman and hits her in the back and then he shoots a mother holding a small baby. Doc is screaming and firing at a group of children, no more than toddlers. I'm caught up in it all, the adrenaline is coursing through my body and I start yelling as well and then I start firing. I hit a young girl but I'm not sure if I kill her and I pull the horse around, away from the water, and Jake and I chase after a group of three women who are running to one of the tepees. They hide inside and Jake and I ride around it, firing through the material of the tepee and laughing as the women inside scream and die. I know this is wrong, I know that this should not be happening, but at the same time I'm enjoying it, I'm getting a buzz out of it that I've never experienced before. I'm shouting and cheering like an animal and my hands are shaking so much that I drop some bullets when I'm reloading. Reb has climbed off his horse and has grabbed a teenage squaw down by the river. He throws her to the ground and starts to pull off her dress. "I'm gonna have me an Indian girl," he shrieks and hits her about the head with the but of his gun before climbing on top of her. "Sounds like a good idea to me," says Jake and he gets off his horse and ties it to one of the skindrying poles. I follow his example. The horses whinny and stamp their feet. A women runs past us with two young teenage girls and ducks into one of the tepees. We follow her. They scream as we force our way into the tent. Jake holsters his gun. "Say, aren't they pretty young things?" he asks me and I say yes. The older woman - their mother perhaps - steps in front of them as they cower on the ground behind her. "Get rid of her," says Jake. For some reason I put my gun away and pull out my hunting knife. The woman is waving her hands at me and crying. The girls hide their faces. I know this is wrong but I can't stop myself. I don't want to stop myself. I move towards the woman and I grab her around the neck, pulling her onto the knife as I thrust it upwards. She gasps and I pull out the knife and stab her again and again until the handle is wet with blood. She falls to the ground. I wipe the knife on my trousers and then put it back in its scabbard. Jake grabs one of the girls and uses his knife to cut away her dress. Her skin is soft and brown. She is very young. "Take the other one outside," says Jake. "Enjoy yourself." I grab the second girl. She too is young, her hair tied in two long braids, small breasts and slightly plump with puppy fat. Her eyes are wide and frightened. Her fear makes me feel brave and strong and I seize her wrist and twist her towards the daylight, pushing her ahead of me and out of the tepee. Behind me I hear Jake unzipping his pants while the girl makes small, pleading noises. I am excited, and once out of the tepee and I trip the girl so that she falls on her back. She draws up her legs and tries to curl up. I reach down to her. As I do I hear a noise behind me and I turn around, hand on my gun. It is......... .....Grey. Inside the recording studio. I am trembling and sweating, and I feel both excited and disgusted at the same time. Excited at what I had been doing, thrilled at the way I'd killed the old woman and taken her daughter, yet also sick with the disgust at the way I'd been acting. Or maybe it was more that I was disgusted at the fact that I'd been enjoying it. Max is by my side, and Herbie is there, too. Ruth springs up and puts her front paws close to my head and she nuzzles my ear. "You look terrible," she says, and licks my cheek. "Are you OK?" says Max. "I'm fine," I say, but I'm not sure if that's the truth. Max removes the headset and places it on its stand. I sit up and rub my eyes. "You look like you need a coffee, a real coffee," says Ruth. "Can you get me a coffee, Herbie?" I say, sitting up. I needn't tell him not to bother with the decaf rubbish, he knows what I like. And what I don't like. I wait until Herbie leaves the booth before I turn on Max. "Did you know what it is on that psi-disc?" I ask. He looks surprised. "Western, cowboys and indians," he says, looking at a clipboard in his hand. "What's the problem, Leif?" "Who was the Dreamer?" I ask. He looks at the clipboard again and I know he's playing for time. He knows all the Dreamers and I'm damn sure he knows everything there is to know about the three who died. "Nick Woolrich," he says. "Never heard of him." "I'm not surprised. It was his first psi-disc. Was it good?" I ignore his question because I don't think he's being entirely honest with me. "What can you tell me about him?" Yet again he examines the clipboard and I want to take it from him and break it over his head. "Calm down," says Ruth. "You look like you're going to explode." She's right, I feel angry and all revved up, I think it's a spill over from the psi-disc, Max is one of my oldest friends, I'd never want to hurt him no matter what games he plays. "He's a youngster, did very well in the entrance examination, and this was his first feature." "Have you seen the storyboard?" Of course he had. But he looks at me and says no. "It's gone upstairs," he says. "Upstairs?" "The top," he says. "Chief executive's office." "I want to see him," I say. "Now." Max nods, but he doesn't seem to be taking me seriously. Ruth jumps up onto the couch and leans against me. She is growling protectively and for all I know she's planning to spring at him. "You betta believe it," she says, and she continues to growl at him. "I mean it, Max. Now." "I'll speak to his secretary," he says and he leaves me alone in the booth. "I'm still here," says Ruth. Alone except for Ruth. "What happened?" she asks, her head on one side, studying me with her hazel eyes. "It was so violent, far more violent than anything I've ever experienced," I tell her. "There's no way it would get past the censors. If nothing else it contravened the rule that the viewer mustn't directly participate in violent or sexual acts. It doesn't make sense, Ruth. Every Dreamer knows that anyone plugging into a psi-disc must be an observer, not a participant. It's OK to see someone being killed, and to take part in fights, but they must not kill themselves. It's OK to watch a rape, but not to take part." "And that psi-disc allowed you to take part," she asks. "Not allows," I say. "Encourages. Pushes. Entices." Max returns and tells me that Louis Aintrell will see me right away. I should bloody well hope so, too. In the last four and a half years I've earned CBS something like $75 billion. "Aren't you going to clean yourself up first?" asks Max as I leave the cubicle. "No time," I say. Herbie returns with a plastic beaker of coffee and he hands it to me. "Thanks, Herbie. Can you get me a towel?" I go behind the screen and change back into my suit. Herbie passes me a towel over and I use it to wipe the gunge off my head. They walk me to the lift but I insist that I go up to the penthouse offices alone. Alone except for Ruth. * * * The lift tells me that it's thirty degrees outside and that the dollar is up two points against the yen and down four against the yuan, whatever that means, and then it starts reciting the latest Tokyo stock prices. Japanese defence stocks are up on the news that Shosadio Industries has signed a 75 billion yen deal to sell strategic nuclear warheads to Thailand. I tell it to be quiet and it obeys. I have to pass two secretaries and a personal assistant to get to Louis Aintrell's office. He and his personal staff take up the whole of the penthouse floor and his office is big enough to land a small plane. The chief executive of CBS has an ego to match, the sort of ego that enters a room a good 30 seconds before he does. He is dressed, as always, immaculately, a suit of deepest blue, a dazzlingly white silk shirt and a red power tie. He walks to greet me, hand outstretched showing two inches of white cuff and a solid gold link, flashing the Aintrell smile. He pumps my hand up and down and tells me it's great to see me and how long as it been. Almost a year I say and he shakes his head in disbelief. His hair is perfectly combed, as black and gleaming as his shoes, with just a hint of grey at the temples, his skin is tight and unmarked and does little to dispel the rumours that he has had a facelift. But what the hell, who hasn't these days? He gazes around his airfield of an office like a helicopter pilot looking for a landing site and chooses two dark green velvet armchairs in front of a long, low coffee table. He steers me towards them and waits for me to get comfortable before he speaks. "Well Leif, Max seems to think you have something very important to discuss with me, important enough to justify me rearranging my diary. Here I am, how can I help you?" he says. He looks deep into my eyes like a father confessor and smiles that smile that had housewives all over America swooning when he was anchor man on prime time 3-D news for one of the major networks over a quarter of a century ago, before he switched to management and before the psidiscs were on the market. "This man is a greaseball," says Ruth. She has plonked herself down in front of Aintrell and is glaring at him. I want to laugh but I know Aintrell will misunderstand so I bite the inside of my cheek and try to keep a serious look on my face. "Have you seen the storyboard of the psi-disc that Nick Woolrich was working on, the cowboys and indians romp?" "It passed over my desk some time ago, I think it's back with the Creative Department now." "But you agreed it?" "Hell Leif, you know the system as well as I do. It comes from Creative to me and then to Legal and then to Recording. Of course I saw it." "His eyes are too close together," says Ruth. The Aintrell smile never had any effect on her, and right now it's doing nothing for me, either. "You saw nothing wrong with the storyboard?" I ask and he shakes his head. "Such as?" he asks. "Such as participating in killings and rape," I say, and even as I say it I get a tingle remembering how the girl looked as I grabbed her. Frightened. Weak. Defenceless. Aintrell sighs and leans forward. "OK, OK, I admit it was sailing fairly close to the wind, but it was his first disc. We wanted to give him a free reign, let his creativity express itself, rather than stifling him from Day One." "There's creative flow and there's downright illegalities, and the law says that psi-disc viewers can only observe acts of violence or sex. We both know it's illegal to allow viewers to take part." Aintrell laughs, throwing his head back and raising his hands in the air. "Are you trying to tell me you've never plugged into a porn psi-disc?" he asks. "No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying that making them is illegal." "Illegal now, I agree," he says. "But laws change. Alcohol was illegal during prohibition. Until a few years ago marijuana was illegal. The law is flexible. It evolves." "And you're expecting the law on psi-discs to change?" "No Leif, I'm not saying that at all. Laws are for the politicians to decide, not businessmen. What I am saying is that we decided to allow the youngster free reign." "Even though it was illegal?" "Maybe because it is illegal," says Ruth. "Perhaps he wants to stay one step ahead of the competition." "I think I'm just repeating myself now, Leif," says Aintrell wearily. "All I can do is to assure you that there was no question of CBS releasing the Woolrich psi-disc, not as the law stands at the moment, anyway." "But you wouldn't be averse to stockpiling a few illegal discs on the off-chance that the law changes, would you?" I ask, and I get the Aintrell smile. He stands up and Ruth shuffles backwards to give him room to get by. I get up too and Aintrell shows me to the door. "What do you think happened to the three Dreamers?" I ask him on the way out. He puts his arm around my shoulders and it feels like a boa constrictor preparing to squeeze the life out of me. "Leif, we're all hoping you can tell us," he says. "Have our competitors lost any Dreamers?" I say, the thought coming to me out of the blue. Recorded Cerebral Artists Inc have just as many Dreamers as the Corporation. "I don't know, I'll find out and get back to you. Take care Leif, I mean it. We'll talk again soon, I promise. And good luck with the remaining two psi-discs." He keeps talking as he ushers me out, not giving me a chance to speak. The door closes behind me, narrowly missing Ruth's tail. "Makes you wonder why he hasn't already asked RCA, doesn't it?" says Ruth. "Yeah, that's what I was thinking," I reply. "I know," she says, and sticks her nose up in the air. Cute. We go back to see Max and Herbie, and when we walk into Max's office the two of them suddenly stop talking and they look guilty as if they'd been sharing a dirty joke. "How is he?" asks Max. "Same as usual," I reply. "Ego the size of a planet." "He wants you to plug into the other two psi-discs?" I nod, and so does Ruth. "Yeah, but not today. I'm knackered." "That bad?" asks Herbie and I say yes, it was that bad. We say our goodbyes to Max and see ourselves out. The lift tells us to have a nice day and Ruth tells it do something anatomically impossible with a duck. Herbie has the limo ready and waiting outside the building but I tell him I'd rather walk. "Home?" he asks, and I say yes. Standing on the pavement, I ask him if he has much contact with any of his opposite numbers at RCA. His eyes narrow, sensing a trap, because fraternising is strictly forbidden in our contracts. CBS and RCA are practically at war. "Don't worry, Herbie," I tell him, "it won't go any further. I just need to know if RCA is having the same problems that we are." "You want to speak with one of the RCA Dreamers?" he says. "Not necessarily," I say. "One of their minders will do. Someone in the know, anyway." "I'll see what I can do," says Herbie. "By tomorrow," I tell him, but he understands the urgency. He takes the car, Ruth and I walk. A down and out in a thick black coat and a red, green and yellow scarf knotted around his neck tries to bum $50 off me. His teeth are black and his skin is covered with red blotches and his breath reeks of something alcoholic, something only distantly related to a 10-year-old Japanese malt. His eyes are fixed on me but he seems to be staring into middle distance, the look of a psi-disc viewer. Ruth growls at him but he ignores her. He's real enough. Real and poor. I take out my wallet and give him $50. He takes the note and moves away without thanking me. Without even seeing me. Two smartly dressed businessmen talking on portable video phones give me a strange look as they walk briskly past and I remember that I'm totally bald. On the way back to the flat I think back over Woolrich's psi-disc. The images were so strong that they had stuck in my mind far more than psi-discs normally did. It had lacked depth, sure, but there was so much power and energy in it, some sort of force that had pulled me through it even though my subconscious wanted to fight against it. I wondered whether or not I could lay down a disc as strong as that. Mine tend to be more subtle, more characterisation and more complex plots. There is always action, sure, that's what makes the psi-discs so popular, but I use action as part of the development of the plot. I'm not averse to seeing characters die, and die violently, but there has to be a reason for it. Sex can also add spice to a disc, even rape, but Woolrich's psi-disc seemed to have no other reason than to titillate. Even that would be OK if it wasn't for the fact that it was the viewer who actually took part in the rapes and killings. Hell, I'm no prude, and Aintrell was right, everyone gets a kick out of the illegal porno discs, but the only ones I've ever plugged into have been voyeuristic. And there is a difference. It's one thing to watch a rape, it's something totally different to take part. The psychologists have pretty much discounted on the theory that commercial psi-discs can encourage susceptible individuals to copy what they view, though a growing number of rapists still claim that they only did it because they were corrupted by porno psi-discs. But they do agree that allowing the viewer to actually experience the violence and sex is likely to corrupt, especially if viewed over a long period. The psi-discs could become a rehearsal for the real thing. I hadn't been convinced before, but after plugging into Woolrich's little saga I now knew what they mean. For a period after coming out of the disc I was on an emotional high that is only now starting to wear off. I actually did want to kill and to rape, it was burning through me like an intense hunger. And that was after just one viewing. Imagine what I'd be like after weeks, or even months, of plugging into psi-discs like that. I'd be an animal. "And what's wrong with being an animal?" asks Ruth, head turned up as she pads along by my side. I ignore her, there are too many people around and I already look strange with my bald and shining head. "You've got plenty of hats back in the flat," she says, smugly. * * * Sleep keeps avoiding me, and the images of the raid on the Indian village keep running through my mind. What worries me the most is the fact that the images are so strong, and so is the adrenaline rush that comes with them. My headache seems worse than yesterday. Ruth seems uneasy as well and is constantly shifting position on the bed and grunting each time she moves. At seven o'clock I decide I can't lie in bed any more and I shower and dress and go out for a walk. I'm wearing an old tweed cap that I brought in London years ago, the sort of headgear that gamekeepers wear while tending Japanese pheasant farms. It's not that the lack of hair is physically uncomfortable, the weather is too mild for that, but it stops the curious looks. There's no need for anyone to be bald these days and it's unusual enough to attract attention. "It looks pretty stupid, too," says Ruth, walking by my side. Suddenly my cat is a fashion expert. Traffic is already bumper to bumper along the main roads, most of them on auto-pilot, guided by computer-controlled servo-mechanisms pulling information from navigation satellites hundreds of miles up in space. The air is thick with fumes and noise as we head for the park. It has become a tradition, the early morning walk around the lake before laying down a disc, the last chance to get my thoughts in order. This was different, though, this was me preparing myself mentally for exposing myself to whatever was on the second psi-disc, and I have a feeling it isn't going to be pleasant. We pass a down and out asleep on a concrete bench, his head resting on a plastic carrier bag containing his belongings. He snores loudly and Ruth growls. The wind is whipping up small waves on the lake and it ruffles Ruth's fur, making it look as if she was being stroked by an invisible hand. She faces into the wind and lets it play over her face, her eyes closed, purring with pleasure. I stand next to and follow her example. It feels good. The smell of traffic seeps into the park, there is no escape from the fumes or the buzz of engines. A police jet helicopter clatters overhead, heading for the outskirts of the city, air-to-surface missiles hanging under its stubby wings. "What's worrying you?" Ruth asks. "You're not scared are you?" "I don't know," I reply, and it's the truth. "I just feel I'm caught up in something that I don't understand. I think that Aintrell knows a lot more than he's telling me." "You think the Corporation knows what's happening?" "I think that Aintrell has a good idea, and maybe Max, too. They're up to something, Ruth." She prowls around me, tail swishing slowly back and forth, nodding her head up and down the way she always does when she's deep in thought. Round and round me she walks, pacing as if she was in a cage. "I wish I could help make it better for you," she says. I drop my hand down and tickle her behind her left ear. "Just being here helps," I say. "You're the only one I can trust." She rears up and plants her front paws on my chest and looks up at me with her knowing hazel eyes. "You'd better believe it," she says and headbuts me affectionately. I lower my head and rub noses with her. Her's feels like warm fine grade sandpaper. "You don't think they deliberately want to hurt you, do you?" "It's not impossible, is it?" I reply. "One more psi-disc and they have to pay me close to one billion dollars. If I fail to deliver they don't have to pay me anything." "If that's the reason, Leif, then it would be a hell of a lot easier just to have you killed," she says, and I have to agree with her. "Come on," she says. "Let's walk. You need the exercise." My biggest fan and my biggest critic. "You betta believe it," she says. * * * Back in the flat the phone tells me that Herbie has called. I tell it to get him on the line. Herbie tells me that he's got someone he wants to see me and asks me to meet him downstairs in ten minutes. He's punctual, as usual. The limo pulls up to the kerb and the door swings open. There are two people in the back, Herbie and a young man with a raspberry coloured crew cut and a black motorcycle jacket with shiny chains stitched down the arms. "Leif, this is Eric Takahashi, he's a minder with RCA," says Herbie. Eric nods but makes no move to shake hands. He seems to be wearing brightly-coloured woollen gloves. His name is Japanese but it's hard to tell, what with the dyed hair and pallid completion. His eyes don't look like Oriental eyes but that's not surprising these days, more than half have had the operation, folding eye-lids and all. Eric grins and offers me a stick of marijuana chewing gum but I say no thanks, a bit early in the day for me. "So you're Leif Ableman," says Eric, putting the pack of gum back in his pocket. "I didn't realise you were so old." "Me neither," I say. I'm only 48 years old, for God's sake. "How old are you?" he asks. "Forty eight," I say. He looks me over and I can see that he wants to ask what's it like to be so old, to be so close to checking out of Life. "That's old for a Dreamer," says Eric. He is obviously not going to let go of the subject. He leans over me so that he can talk to Herbie. "What's the average age of a Dreamer these days, Herbie? Twenty one? Twenty two?" Herbie, to his credit, looks suitably pained. Eric realises he isn't going to get an answer but doesn't seem to appreciate how tactless he is being. "Eric, the reason Herbie has arranged this meeting is because there's something I have to know," I tell him. "Fire away, man," he says. He starts fingering a gold stud in his left earlobe as if it is a lucky talisman. There is a large dimple in the middle of his chin. Perhaps he had that done at the same time as he had his eyes altered. "Have any of RCA's Dreamers died recently?" He stops chewing and swallows his gum. His mouth falls open. His teeth are too perfect to be natural. How much of Eric Takahashi is real and how much has been created, I wonder. "Died?" he repeats. "Try him with an easy question first," says Ruth. She is sitting on the front passenger seat, facing backwards so that she can watch us. "Ask him what it's like having an IQ lower than his shoe size." "Died," I say. "Deceased. Passed away. Cashed in their chips." Eric waves his hands in front of his face as if swatting a swarm of invisible insects. "Hey man, I hear you, but we're talking commercial secrets here. RCA and CBS aren't exactly bosom buddies you know. I mean, I'll shoot the breeze with you under a white flag and all that, but give me a break, will yer? This is heavy shit." "Eric, I have a reason for asking," I say patiently. "Look, if it makes you feel any easier, I'll tell you something first, OK?" He doesn't look any more relaxed. He squeezes his ear lobe. Maybe the stud is some sort of acupuncture pressure point, stress reliever or something. "CBS has lost three Dreamers. All dead. I want to find out what happened." "Awesome," says Eric. "That is awesome. Totally unreal." "RCA has had Dreamers die?" I say. "Yeah. Two in the last month. Shit. We thought maybe it was your Corporation behind it. Industrial espionage and all that." "Were they new talent or old?" "One of each. One was a teen star laying down his second psi-disc, the other was two away from finishing his contract." "Do you know what happened?" He shook his head. "Naw, total info clampdown from management. The buzz is that something went wrong while they were plugged in, but nobody knows what. A technician is supposed to have snuffed it, too." I look at Herbie. "Snap," I say and he nods his head in agreement. Whatever is happening is happening to both companies. "Any idea what sort of psi-discs they were working on?" I ask, playing a hunch. "Sort?" he asks, lines furrowing his brow. "What do you mean, what sort?" "Subject matter," I reply. "Have you seen the storyboards?" "Naw. Neither of them were mine," he says. "Sex, violence, anything like that?" "I told you, man, total secrecy." "But RCA is going ahead with new psi-discs?" "No question about it. My boy is due to lay down his next one in four weeks time." "Is he worried?" "Naw, he doesn't know nothing. He spends most of his time spaced out on crack. That's my biggest headache, keeping the drug cops away from him. It's costing us a fortune. The sooner they legalise it the better. Roll on December." "Have you sent up his storyboard yet?" "Naw, he's still working it out in his head." "Is there any pressure from Creative to make it more violent?" He shook his head. "They're always pressing for more sensations, you know that, man. But they've still got to get them past the censors." "Yeah, I guess so," I say, but Aintrell's words echo in my head. The law is flexible. It evolves. Even cocaine is set to be legalised in a few months, and the drug pressure groups are already gearing up to start pressing for heroin use to be decriminalised. What the censors won't allow today could be family viewing by next year. Especially if the Corporation were to start applying a little pressure, financial or otherwise. The Government's not likely to need too much persuading, not with the state of the economy and so many people out of work. The more plugged into psi-discs, the fewer will be protesting on the streets or blowing up IRS offices. "Leif," says Herbie. "Time's pressing and Max is expecting us." He's right, of course, so I ask Eric if we can drop him off. He tells us that his own limo is following ours so we let thank him and let him out there and then before driving to CBS Tower. Max is champing at the bit by the time we finally get to his office. We are late but I refuse to let him intimidate me, he's not the one that has to plug into the potentially lethal disc so I reckon I deserve a little leeway. "Do you want anything before we go up?" asks Max. "Coke," I say and he looks shocked, thinking I mean the white powder. It takes Herbie by surprise, too, because they both know I don't do drugs. I raise my eyebrows and sigh and point at the red and white vending machine. "Oh, right, sure," says Max and gets me a can. He throws it underarm and I catch it left-handed. Max asks Herbie if he wants anything and he says no. Max takes a Coke to keep me company. We open them in the lift and mine sprays a plume of foaming brown liquid over Herbie's gleaming shoes. Ruth creases up laughing, and so does Max. "Sorry, Herbie," I say, but I can see that he doesn't believe me. While the lift gives us a breakdown of the world news and the nuclear pollution report, I ask Max to tell me about the second psi-disc. "The Dreamer is, I mean was, a woman. One of the few female Dreamers. Her name was Janet Dewar, 23-years-old, and it was her fourth psi-disc." "Subject?" "Space adventure, science fiction, from the point of view of a space trooper in a battle squadron defending Earth from aliens, you know the sort of thing." "Yeah. They're all the vogue these days." "That's one of the good things about sci-fi, the format allows you to let rip with the special effects," says Max. "Sure, but too many Dreamers use the special effects to cover up for a lack of plot and characterisation," I reply, then realise how bitchy that sounds. "Don't knock it," says Max. "Just give the punters what they want. And what they want is action and excitement." And sex and violence? Give them what they want so long as it's legal, that's what he means. The technicians give us dirty looks when we get to the studio as if we should apologise for keeping them waiting. Nobody does. I finish the Coke and lob the can into a steel waste paper bin. Max takes it as a challenge, empties his can and throws it in as well. I go behind the screen and change into the gown. There's no need to shave my head again, there's only the barest stubble, but the goo still has to be rubbed in, and then Max takes me into the booth and attaches the headset. "OK Leif," he says. "Exactly the same as yesterday. Stick with it unless you feel you are in danger. We'll be here, but there's nothing to worry about. We've stopped it a full two seconds before Jan ran into problems." Ran into problems. A nice way of putting it. He means died. "Max," I say. "Is there anything else I should know?" He looks down at me as I lie on the couch. "No," he says, "Sure?" "Sure." I am certain that he is lying, I can see it in his eyes, but there is nothing I can do. "Let's go for it then," I say. He leaves me alone in the cubicle. I cannot turn my head to look through the glass but I can feel Ruth there, staring at me and worrying. The glass turns opaque, white at first and then grey. I become aware of the headache again, the dull throb behind my eyes. It is...... ........Light. Artificial light, cold and bleak. I'm sitting in what looks like a lecture theatre, ranks and ranks of orange plastic seats fixed to stainless steel benches. There are no windows in the room, and no obvious source of the harsh light. There are about eighty of us in the room, men and women, and we are all dressed in the same light blue one-piece uniform. It looks as if it is made out of some sort of metallic material but it feels like the finest Korean silk. There is a plastic zip running from the neck down to the groin. There are two gold stars on each of my shoulders and over my left breast there is a rectangular metal badge. I have to turn my head to the side to read the lettering on it. It says "Navigator." �IP2�We are all looking at a man standing behind a silvery lectern. He has five stars on each of his shoulders and a jagged scar that runs from his right ear across to the bridge of his nose. He is totally bald and parts of his head are a greyish-blue as if there is steel beneath the skin. He is too far away for me to read the metal badge on his chest - it is surrounded by gold, red and green squares, medals I guess - but I know that he is our Commander. He is briefing us on our next mission. We are in Deep Space, he tells us, approaching a planet called Kuei. We are many light years from Earth and the reason we feel so strange is that we have only recently been woken from artificial sleep. We are warriors, and we are to make war on the Kueians. The Kueians, he says, are waging war on the Earth, even as he speaks. We are too far away to help repel the invaders, but we can attack where they least expect it - their home planet. To the Commander's left a swirling mass of dots of lights coalesces into a three-dimensional picture of a Kueian, a seven foot tall lizard, standing upright on its rear taloned legs, its tail just touching the ground behind it. The eyes are yellow and slanted with a diamond-shaped iris and lethal pointed teeth protrude from its gaping mouth. It owes more to Tyrannosaurus Rex than to any living lizard on Earth. The 3-D image slowly revolves so we can all see the enemy. It has an opposable thumb which means that unlike the dinosaur it can hold things, and it is as technologically advanced as we are, the Commander tells us. Maybe even more so. The image changes and we see the Kueian dressed in its space combat gear. It looks similar to our own, he says, though the helmet is a different shape and there is a single tank on the back-pack rather than our three cylinders. Notice that there is no sign of the tail when the Kueian is suited up, says the Commander. He explains that the tail is prehensile, it has no function. In fact the biologists reckon it will go completely over the next few thousand years. The Kueian disappears and in its place there is a Kueian star fighter, a white needle with small fins at the rear. It is fast and highly manoeuvrable in space, less so in the Kueian atmosphere. Our own fighters have smaller boosters but larger wings which means we have the edge on them in the thick atmosphere so our strategy is get past them and lure them closer to the planet before attacking. The two types of ship are comparable in terms of weaponry, laser guns and heat-seeking smart bombs, so the battle is going to be a test of pilot skill. And, he says, raising his voice to fill the room, it is a battle that we are going to win. As one we stand and salute our Commander and then we chant "Victory! Victory! Victory!" as he strides out of the room. We split up into groups of three - a Pilot, a Weapons Officer, and a Navigator - and head for the hangers. The Pilot I am with is a girl, petite with close-cropped blonde hair and no make-up, the only sign of femininity the slight swell of her breasts under the uniform. Her name is Jill Manette. The weapons officer is black, muscular and squat, as tall as Jill but twice as wide. He grins a lot and jollys us along as we walk. His name is Xavier Barrymore. Our star fighter is in the second wave of nine. Men in white overalls and silvery helmets are dashing around, checking and double-checking, while some of the fighters are still being armed. The main hanger doors are still shut but the siren sounds, telling us that it's time to suit up. The suit modules are ready under the wings and Jill, Xavier and I step into them, standing with our legs slightly apart and arms out at right angles to our bodies. The suit modules hiss as they close and the armoured suits clamp shut over our uniforms. When the modules slide open we are covered from our necks to the soles of our feet with black carbon-fibre plates, flexible and reasonably comfortable but also able to withstand the vacuum of space and the blast of a laser. The suits make a faint grating noise as we climb up into our gravi-seats. Our helmets are there, ready and waiting, and I slot mine home with a practised twist. The internal air supply automatically cuts in but I immediately plug into the on-board air. Jill and Xavier do the same. The canopy shuts. We are alone, surrounded by frantic activity but nonetheless alone. We are a team. Jill and I sit together, facing forward. There is a duplicate set of controls in front of me but it is for emergency use, nothing else. My task is to monitor the surveillance and guidance computers and to maintain contact with the rest of our wave and the Attack Commander. Xavier sits facing the rear, directly behind us, where he operates the defence and attack weapon systems. One by one the fighters signal their readiness until all three waves are prepared. Then the whiteoveralled technicians disappear out of airlocks at either side of the hanger and the huge hangar doors slowly crank open to reveal the emptiness of space. The engines of the first wave kick into life and they roar out of the hangar in groups of three. Our fighter judders as Jill fires our boosters and then we lift off and fly out, the middle ship of the first unit of our wave. My stomach lurches as we shoot out of the mother ship and into open space. I look over my right shoulder and see the huge ship behind us. It seems to go on forever. We tilt to the right and the mother ship slides out of view. I look forward again and for the first time see the planet below, a swirling globe of blue and orange and yellow. The effect is good, very good. I am impressed by the woman who put this together. The visual effects are pretty well perfect, there is only a slight flicker when I look at the stars out of the corner of my eyes, and the sound is excellent. There is a vague smell of rubber from the helmet and the water that the suit system supplies for drinking has a faint chloride taste. I can feel the plates of the suit pressing into my flesh through the material of my uniform. Janet Dewar knew her stuff. Most people have no problem at all when it comes to the visual and aural side of dreams, but the other three senses are what separates the amateurs from the Dreamers. Try it yourself. Close your eyes and think of an apple, green and shiny. Now imagine the sound it makes as you bite into it. That's harder, but most people can do it. Now hold it close to your nose and try to capture its smell. And the taste of it on your tongue. Or the feel of it as you chew it. Now keep the picture of the apple in your head and make it smell like a lemon, with the texture of a peach and the smell of a pear. Damn near impossible for 99.99 per cent of the population. And the other .01 per cent are Dreamers, like me and Janet Dewar. But even among Dreamers there are degrees of ability, and by the look of it she is top ranking. And this is only her fourth psi-disc. The Commander's voice fills my helmet. He is leading the middle ship of the first unit of the first wave, as usual. He is speaking to all the fighters, telling us that the enemy has taken off and that we will make contact within four minutes. He is not telling us something we do not know because all Navigators have already seen the tell-tale blips on the nuclear propulsion detection system, but he is our Commander and always speaks to us before combat to let us know that he is there and that he is leading us. "Make Earth proud of you," he says and then we go into communication blackout. Space combat is so fast there is no point in inter-ship communication, there would be no time to shout a warning or advise fellow fighters on what to do. All that counts is the skill of the pilot, the speed and accuracy of the on-board computers and the programming of the battle computers. There is little for the Navigator to do during battle, it is all up to the pilot and the weapons officer, and even the weapons officer is secondary to his computers. Most of the weapons are operated by the battle computer unless specifically over-ridden. Jill gives me a quick nervous smile and I give her the thumbs up. We can't see Xavier behind us but I guess he is just as nervous. "Three minutes," says Jill over the internal communication system. There are more blips on the screen now, and they are fanning out. I flick the read out onto the head up display in my helmet. Now wherever I look I see the blips superimposed on my field of vision. The Kueian fighters seem to operate in groups of six flying in a spear formation, five making up the point and the sixth close behind. There are at least ten groups of six so we are outnumbered. "It looks as if they were expecting us," says Jill, and Xavier curses. "Two minutes." The planet now takes up almost a full quarter of our field of vision, but there is still no sensation of flying in to it as there is very little detail of its surface, just vague, swirling colours. There is no sign of the enemy fighters, though there are now eighty blips on the propulsion detector screen. "One minute," says Jill. My mouth is dry and I take a pull on the water nipple in the side of the helmet. I find it hard to swallow. I look to the left and right but I cannot see the two other fighters in our unit. They must be flying slightly below us. Far away to the left I can see a tiny star moving parallel to us which could be another unit in our wave, but I'm not sure. "Here they come," says Jill, then the fighter sways to the right and the seat seems to punch me in the back. My eyes blur with the acceleration and I don't see anything go past but when I look at the screen again there is now a group of six blips behind us. The weapons computer fires the lasers automatically and Xavier lets out a cheer. "We got one!" he yells and then I come close to blacking out as Jill flips the fighter into a corkscrew dive, the stars spinning and whirling through the canopy, then she jerks it hard to the left and we are flying directly into the planet. There are now four enemy formations behind us but there are still more blips being launched. "This is a bloody death trap," shouts Jill as she rocks the fighter from side to side. One of the formations is in pursuit and there are bursts of savage light flying past our wingtips. I hear a huge explosion to our left and I turn to see one of the ships from our unit disintegrate into a cloud of dust and flame. I smile, because in real life I wouldn't have been able to hear the explosion - sound can't travel through space. I get a small feeling of satisfaction knowing that Miss Dewar has been just a little too clever, and then the fighter starts spinning again and I almost pass out. I can hear Xavier shouting in my helmet and then Jill sharply tells him to cut it out. There's another explosion, this time to the right, and then our fighter rocks as we get hit by the shock waves (another mistake on Miss Dewar's part because shock waves can't travel through a vacuum). We are the only ship left in our unit. God knows how many are left in our wave, but I see flashes in the atmosphere below that show how badly our first wave is doing. I wonder if the Commander has been hit. Jill is throwing our fighter from side to side and then I feel the juddering vibrations as we enter the outer reaches of Kuei. There is a high pitched whine as Jill extends the wings of our fighter and the vibration gradually dies away. There are now more flashes of laser light. I look at the close range screen and see we are being pursued by four Kueian fighters, then one disappears and Xavier yells "Got him!" in my helmet. We have two smart bombs left, one under each wing, and I hear Xavier muttering to himself as he keys in the co-ordinates of two of the enemy fighters that are chasing us. The ship lurches twice as the two bombs are jettisoned and a fraction of a second later their boosters burst into life and they give chase. I watch the screen intently and see the two targeted fighters take evasive action, punishing spiral dives that must be tearing their pilots apart, but it does them no good and the two blips vanish from the screen. "Two left," says Xavier, "and we're out of bombs." "No need to state the obvious," says Jill. "We can all read the screens." We are so close to the planet now that it no longer looks like a globe. It is flat and seems to stretch forever above our heads. We are flying upside down, then Jill puts the fighter in a reverse downward dive and the blood rushes from my head until the suit squeezes and compensates. Good effect. She follows the dive through until we are flying the right way up and Kuei is below us. The Commander's voice fills our helmets, breaking radio silence for the first time. The reception is bad, his voice crackles and keeps breaking up, but enough comes through for us to understand that the first wave has been ripped apart by the Kueian fighters and that we are to abort the attack and retreat to the mother ship. "Terrific," says Jill. "We go all that trouble to get them behind us and now we're supposed to retreat. I wish he'd make up his mind." The Kueian formations are splitting up and two more fighters are on our tail. We are only fifty klicks or so above the surface and the atmosphere is slowing us up so the Kueians are gaining on us, but the atmosphere also means we become more maneuverable so we'll have the advantage if we fight but not if we run. "We are going to have to fight our way out," Jill says under her breath, but Xavier and I had already worked that out for ourselves. She slams on our reverse thrusters and lifts the nose of our fighter and we go into a tight loop, lasers flashing on automatic. We score two hits, destroying one of the enemy fighters and sending another spinning down with flames spewing from its left booster. Jill puts us in a dive again and kicks in our thrusters but as she does there is a flash of blue light and two metres of our right-hand wing vapourises. "We're hit," yells Xavier. "Quiet," shouts Jill as she wrestles with the controls. It is obvious that she cannot steer the fighter as we yaw from side to side. "Call up environment status," she tells me, but before I can move the computer does it automatically, replacing the blips on the helmet visor with a readout of the land below. Temperature tropical but bearable, atmosphere richer in oxygen than Earth but with less nitrogen and higher concentration of carbon dioxide. Humidity much higher than Earth's. Uncomfortable but breathable, but God knows what there is in the way of bacteria or viruses floating around. Not that our auto-immune systems are likely to get a chance to get to grips with them considering the way we're in a crash dive with half of a wing missing. "Activate distress beacon," Jill tells me, and I hit the button on the console in front of me. "Find us a landing place," she says, but before I can answer she tells me she'll do it herself and the environmental data is replaced by a map of the area below us. A small circle flashes up near the centre and the words "Optimal Landing Zone" flashes in small green letters. "That's it," says Jill. "Prepare to eject." She stands the fighter on its nose so that we are diving straight at the ground some ten clicks below and then there is a tremendous whooshing noise and the pod containing the three of us, including the canopy, is thrown out, and again the suits squeeze to compensate for the tremendous acceleration. The pod has its own directional jets, but they do little more than change our direction, they are not powerful enough to get us back into space. The Kueian fighters leave us and head back to attack the rest of our wave. Jill tries to keep us on course for the landing area chosen by the computer, then when we are five klicks above the surface two huge canopies billow out from either side of the pod. We swing from side to side as we drift down. Jill gives us a quick briefing on what to do when we land. She tells us to grab our blasters from the racks behind our seats and our survival packs which are set into the arm rests. We are to unplug our helmets and when we are ready she will blow the canopy and we are to get as far away from the pod as we can because one minute later it will self-destruct. "OK?" she asks. "OK," I reply and Xavier does the same. I hope I don't sound as nervous as he does. "Get ready for impact," she says, and then begins to count down the distance to landfall in hundred metre units. "Four, three, two, one, brace yourself," she says and then the ground rushes up at us and we slam into it. The seats absorb most of the impact but it still knocks the breath out of me. The tactile sensations are incredible, this Dreamer really knows her stuff. I grab my blaster and its power pack and I pull the survival kit from its slot in the arm rest, and then I disconnect the helmet. The head up display immediately cuts out. I turn to look at Xavier and he is fumbling with his kit. Jill curses him and that makes him even more clumsy but then he too is ready and Jill shouts "Blowing canopy now" and then the canopy is thrown backwards and the Kueian atmosphere rushes in, hot and clammy. We clamber out and drop down the side of the pod into orange mud which comes up to our ankles and we run together towards a thicket of bluish trees. The mud sticks to our feet and seems to pull us back and it makes a thick, squelching sound as we run. Xavier gets there first and Jill and I practically dive on top of him. We roll behind a thick tree trunk and hug the ground. The explosion is deafening but we can also feel the tremendous shock waves and the vibrations through the ground and then bits of metal and plastic are blown through the undergrowth above our heads. They fall down on us like raindrops and when I look up there is nothing left of the pod, just a smouldering crater in the mud. We are marooned on an alien planet. I sit up and take stock of our surroundings. The sky is a vibrant yellow. In the distance are a range of jagged mountains, white at the top suggesting snow and blue towards the base, vegetation perhaps. Most of the vegetation has a bluish tinge, perhaps whatever passes for chlorophyll on Kuei reflects the blue range of the spectrum rather than green. Nice touch, that. I scan the horizon and the mountains are everywhere. We are on a huge plain, dotted with clumps of trees and bushes. No sign of animal life. Steam is rising steadily from the damp ground and the air is wet and damp, but not uncomfortably so. My face is beaded with perspiration but my body feels cool as the suit is taking care of everything below my neck. Just to see how good Miss Dewar is, I scoop up a handful of leaves by the trunk of the tree we have been hiding behind and press them to my nose. There is faint smell of what could be thyme. I pull off a piece of it and chew it slowly. It is rubbery and tastes of spearmint. I am impressed, very impressed. She has an amazing sense of detail, and has produced effects that most viewers wouldn't even bother with, wouldn't even know were there. We are all still wearing our helmets, but with the visors up so that we can breath. Jill and Xavier get to their feet. They do not mention the fact that I am chewing blue leaves. "What now?" asks Xavier. Even though we now longer have a fighter, it is still the Pilot who is in charge. "We walk," she says, without hesitation. "But any rescuers will come to our last reported position," says Xavier. "So will any pursuers," replies Jill. "The Kueian fighters must have relayed our position to their base, otherwise they would have followed us down. No, we walk. If an Earth rescue ship comes we'll see it." Xavier gives me a pained look. Yes, I'd picked up the fact she'd said "if" and not "when". We walk three abreast, Jill in the middle, Xavier to her left and me to her right, at a brisk pace. The mud makes it hard work but the suits keep us dry and cool. We have no map, and no real idea of where we are going, Jill's only plan seems to be to put as much distance between ourselves and the still-smoking crater behind us. After a few klicks we are all gasping for breath and we are continually changing our weapons from shoulder to shoulder. Xavier goes to take a drink from his survival pack but Jill tells him to take it easy. The yellow sky is beginning to darken and in the distance we hear eerie howling noises that could be animal or insect, no way of telling. The mountain range we are walking towards doesn't appear to be getting any closer, and after a few more klicks Xavier asks Jill why we are bothering. Before she can answer the air is filled with the roar of engines and something, something big and black, screeches overhead. It is a jet plane about half the size of a fighter but with wider wings and two large tail vertical tail fins at the rear. It is not an Earth machine. The enemy has found us. "To the trees," yells Jill. "Move it." We run to the nearest group of trees, bending double and groping for our blasters. The plane seems to stop dead in mid-air about one klick away from us, slowly rotating. "Has it seen us?" asks Xavier, and Jill shrugs. His question is answered a few minutes later when two more of the black planes arrive. The three take up a triangular configuration around us and then they simultaneously float to the ground. "Hold your fire," whispers Jill. "You take that one," she gestures with the barrel of her blaster, "Xavier, you look after the one behind us. I'll take the one on the left." Jill and I take aim in a kneeling position, while Xavier lies down flat on the ground. For a while nothing happens, the planes sit in the mud, engines off. Then all three emit a high pitched whirring noise and ramps descend from the bellies of the planes and splash down. "Ready," says Jill. Down each of the ramps slide silver cubes, about as tall as a man. They slip into the mud, and then the ramps are retracted. The engines of the planes burst into life and all three fly off in the same direction. "What the hell is going on?" says Xavier, raising himself up. His suit is plastered with orange mud. "Hold your position," snaps Jill. She keeps us on alert for a full five minutes but the planes do not return. "OK," she says eventually. "Let's check out these cubes." We walk together to one of the silver boxes. Xavier tries to walk around it but is bounced back as if he has hit an invisible wall. I try to walk around in the opposite direction but the same happens to me. The two force fields meet at a sixty degree angle, apparently in the centre of the cube. We walk along the length of the field to the next cube, and finally back around to where we started from. We are trapped in an equilateral triangle which is about two klicks across at its widest point. "Right," says Jill, "let's see what the blaster can do." We walk to the centre of the triangle and she aims her blaster at one of the cubes, switches the safety off and fires. Nothing happens. She tries again. Nothing. Her blaster does not work. She checks the power pack but there is nothing wrong, it is fully charged. Without being asked Xavier tries, but his blaster is also useless. So is mine. "Now what?" asks Xavier. "Now, we wait," says Jill. We don't have to wait long. Some sort of helicopter, a long thin cylinder with three equally spaced rotors, arrives, flying low and almost silently. It touches down just outside our triangular prison. The rotors keep turning as a hatchway opens and three figures climb out. They are wearing the suits and helmets that the Commander had shown us back in the briefing room. The Kueians. All three are carrying blasters. They walk slowly towards the nearest cube. "Drop your weapons and walk towards us," one of the figures shouts, his voice amplified by his helmet. "We'd better do as he says," says Jill. "Our blasters are useless, anyway." We drop our weapons and raise our hands. "Walk towards us," the Kueian says, and we obey. One of the figures steps up to the silver cube and seems to stroke it, then all three walk through the force field. One is carrying strips of plastic which he uses to bind our hands behind our backs, then we are herded to the helicopter and pushed roughly through the hatch. There are two more Kueians there, standing guard over half a dozen Earth flight crews. Jill recognises a girl wearing Pilot insignia and she nods at her. We are pushed onto the floor at the rear of the cabin, then our captors shut the hatch and we lift off. There are no windows in the cabin so we have no idea how high we are flying or in what direction, but 15 minutes later there is a change in pitch of the engines and a bump as we touch down again. Three armed Kueians go out and come back with two more prisoners and they are shoved on the floor next to us. One is a Navigator, the other a Pilot. The Pilot has a cut above his left eye and his arm is in a sling from his survival pouch. We take off again. Five times we land and each time more prisoners are taken on board. Then we fly for a long time with no stops. There is no talking. The first time Xavier opened his mouth one of the Kueians stepped forward and hit him across the face with the butt of his blaster. Eventually the helicopter comes to rest again and we are shepherded out. We are on the roof of a tower block, looking down on what seems to be a space port, ranks of Kueian needle fighters and larger battle-cruisers and freighters. There are many towers around us, each with helicopter landing pads on the roofs. We are ushered to a circular pillbox in the centre of the roof. Two metal doors hiss open and we are pushed into a steel room. It is an elevator and we descend quickly. We go down for an age, far too long to account for the height of the building, so I guess we are being taken deep underground. My ears pop with the change in altitude. The lift doors open onto a long white corridor and we are taken down it to a doorway guarded by two Kueians. Their helmets are off and for the first time we can see the faces of our enemy, scaly dry skin and unblinking yellow eyes. One grins evilly and a black forked tongue flashes out like an obscene serpent tasting the air. There is a silver cube at the feet of one of the guards and he bends down to touch it before we are pushed through. We are in a high ceilinged room, five times the height of a man. Close to the roof there appears to be a mirror running around the edge of the room, several metres deep. I see only reflections but I know without a doubt that there are Kueians behind it and that we are being studied. I risk a look behind us and see the guard bend down and stroke the cube again. The doorway is the only exit. The walls and ceiling are orange in colour and seem to have been carved from the planet's rock. The ceiling above us has a yellowish sheen and is the main source of light in the room. We are made to stand in a single line. Jill is separated from Xavier and I. She smiles as if to say "don't worry." There are 18 of us in the line, a dozen men and six women. Our five captors, still wearing suits and helmets, stand in front of us, legs apart and blasters at the ready. The middle one - the leader perhaps - takes half a pace forwards. "Take off your suits," he says. The voice sounds as if it has been amplified. Nobody moves. He turns and gestures towards one of his colleagues who aims his blaster at the face of one of the women Navigators. I think he is going to threaten her but he fires and her head disappears in a cloud of red droplets and her corpse slumps to the ground. We are all horrified and stand with our mouths open. I am scared rigid. "All commands will be obeyed instantly," says the leader. "The penalty for failure to do so is death. Take off your suits." We do as he says and drop them on the ground in front of us. Two of the Kueians collect them and put them in a pile at the back of the room. One of the Kueians walks slowly along the line reading our names and ranks aloud into a small recording device. When he is finished he hands it to the leader who looks at it and nods. "For you the war is over," he says. "For the moment at least. Four pilots, six Weapons Officers and eight Navigators. Seven Navigators, rather. That is all that remains of your attack force. Your attack was a dismal failure." A few of us hang our heads in shame but I look straight ahead. I can see my reflection in his helmet visor. "It is time for you to make a choice," he says, and reaches up to take off his helmet. His colleagues twist their's off at the same time, and they lift them off together. The gasps of astonishment are even louder than when they killed the Navigator. They are men, like us. The leader has piercing blue eyes and blonde hair. His nose is tilted up at the end and his hair is lightly curled giving his face an angelic look, like a choirboy about to perform before doting parents. His companions are all male, all in their late twenties or early thirties, all with hair slightly longer than ours. One of the men has a black beard, whereas none of the Earth troops have any facial hair. These men are not Earth troopers but they carry themselves like soldiers and they are most definitely from our planet. Having removed his helmet, the leader's voice sounds normal when he speaks again. "We too were once defeated in battle by Kueian forces," he says. He smiles, but it is not a pleasant expression, it's as if he is remembering some cruel event from his past, pulling the wings off a fly or torturing a small bird, perhaps. "We decided to join the Kueians, as mercenaries. We fight with them, in our own squadrons, with our own officers and an Earth Commander. We live well and we get to do what we do best, what we have been trained to do. We are a warrior elite, and we win. Which is more than can be said for you." His smile broadens, but it still fails to convey any warmth. Other than the opening of his mouth to show his teeth his face is totally devoid of any animation, any humanity. "You now have a choice, the same choice that we were faced with some years ago. You can fight with us......" He pauses for effect, swinging his blaster from side to side, marking us off one by one with the barrel of his weapon. "Or you can die," he says. He raises his voice for the first time. "All those who wish to pledge themselves to the Kueian Empire, take two steps forward." I look to the left and then to the right. Nobody moves at first, everyone seems confused. I do not know what to do. The decision is made for me by Xavier. He grips me tight with his hand and holds me still. One of the Weapons Officers, a small, stocky man with a bullet-shaped head, is the first to step forward, his eyes fixed on the wall in front of him. One or two of the men in the line curse him, but quietly, under their breaths, as if wary of punishment. A second figure moves, this time the Pilot with his arm in a sling who was captured soon after Xavier, Jill and I. He too looks straight ahead. I look at Xavier and he narrows his eyes and shakes his head. I am very frightened and wonder if this is when the Dreamer died, if Miss Dewar stood her ground while laying down the psi-disc and was blown apart. I think of pulling out but reject the idea. Max will not let me down. I am sure of it. I hope. Two more men step forward, both Weapons Officers. I take a perverse pride in the fact that no Navigators have offered to turn traitor. "Is that all?" says the angelic warrior. Nobody else moves. I can feel a tightness in my chest and I find it hard to breath, and I'm not sure if it's my own reaction to the fear, or if they are emotions that Miss Dewar has woven into the psi-disc. If the emotions are her's then this is one of the most advanced psi-discs I've ever experienced and she deserves an Oscar. My mouth is dry and I cannot swallow. "Very well," says the angel. He nods to his men and they take aim with their blasters. I close my eyes as they begin to fire and I hear bodies slump to the floor but there is no pain, no burning sensation, no blinding light. I open my eyes. The bodies of the four men who had left our line lie on the floor, dead. The Pilot with the sling is on his back, a smouldering hole in his chest and a look of absolute surprise on his face. The stocky Weapons Officer lies on his side, a red wound under his ribcage where he had been shot as he turned to run. Xavier is looking at me with an "I told you so" expression. I want to hug him. The angel walks up and down the line, just beyond the corpses. "Good," he says. "Only four. Twenty two per cent. That is in the lower quartile, you will be glad to hear. The Kueians have no desire for troops who are prepared to change sides so readily. Make no mistake, at least half of you will end up serving the Kueian war machine, but we will decide who will fight and who will die. You will be taken to your cells now and you will be fed. Tomorrow we will make the final selection." He dismisses us and we are taken out of the room and back along the corridor. We are split up into smaller groups and taken in different directions through a maze of corridors and placed in individual rooms, two metres by three metres, twice as high as a man, with no windows and no door. The entrance is guarded by a silvery cube, smaller than the ones used to hold us in the triangular prison on the surface of the planet. I don't even try to get through it. I wait. The cell is made from the same orange material as the room, with illumination coming from the yellowish ceiling. There is no sense of time passing, my watch has been taken from me. All I have are my uniform and my boots. Two guards come for me eventually, one of them I recognise, he was one of the five guards in the room, the one who had taken our name and ranks and read them into the recorder. He leans down and touches the cube and then waves me into the corridor. They stand either side of me and march me back to the hall. A group of prisoners are already waiting there, I see Xavier and Jill and they both give me a half wave. They are standing and talking quietly and I begin walking over to them but then one of the guards, a middle-aged man with wisps of red hair and a scar on his neck shouts at us and tells us to line up. I manage to get next to Xavier but Jill is pushed to one end of the line, out of reach. We stand at attention while the rest of the Earth troops are marched in and added to the end of the line. There are more guards carrying blasters this time, as if they are expecting trouble. The angel stands in front of us once more, his legs apart and his chin up in an attitude of arrogance, looking down his upturned nose at us. "Yesterday I told you that you will have the choice to serve the Kueians, that we want the best of you to fight alongside us as mercenaries. What I didn't tell you is that you will all help the Kueian war machine in some way. If you are lucky then you will serve as troopers. As warriors. I am now going to show you how those who do not fight will serve." The cold smile slowly creeps across his face and he rests the butt of his blaster on his hip. With a slow grating noise an orange panel in the wall behind him slowly slides back showing a large video screen. The image on the screen is so awful, so bizarre, that it takes seconds to register what it is we are looking at. It is our Commander. What is left of him. He is lying on a parody of a hospital bed, a white couch with chains for restraining straps, and his head is held in a metal clamp. He is conscious, we can see his eyes occasionally blink. There is a large machine next to him, boxlike with cylinders attached to its side and a thick grey plastic tube leading from it to his mouth and tubes containing red fluid (blood?) crawling up to his neck and another, thicker, tube running to his stomach. There is no sheet covering the Commander, and we can clearly see what has been done to him. His right leg has been removed, close the groin, and his left foot taken off at the ankle. Both arms are missing, one taken off at the shoulder and one at the elbow. One of his eyes is nothing but a socket filled with clotting blood. The angel does not look around. "Those of you who do not choose to fight alongside us will help those who do," he says. "Occasionally our men get hurt in battle and we take care of them. We have the best medical treatment in the galaxy, there is no injury we cannot repair......providing we can get the spare parts." He lets that sink in before continuing. Xavier is standing with his mouth wide open and is breathing like a sleepwalker. "Those who do not fight will be used to give life to those who do. We are in need of a range of body parts following the cowardly Earth attack on Kuei. Any that are not used immediately are kept on life support systems. It is not a pleasant way to live. Or perhaps I should say, it is not a pleasant way to die." The four guards standing with him take aim with their blasters and I hear the guards behind us to the same. One of the women is crying but I do not look around. The angel continues. "You now have the choice I gave you yesterday. You can fight with us, or you can die. Let me repeat, you will help us anyway. There is no dishonour now in choosing to fight. Those who join us will be trained in the Kueian way, the Kueian philosophy, and in time you will fight because you want to. But if you choose not to fight now, you will not get another opportunity." He looks at each and every one of us, one by one. My heart chills when his eyes pass over me. An angel with the power of life and death. "Those who wish to fight, take two steps forward," he barks. Again the decision is taken for me when Xavier steps forward and takes me with him. Only one man and two women do not move. They are marched out in silence. We are now reduced to ten in number. The angel seems pleased and runs his hand up and down the barrel of his blaster. "Good," he says, almost to himself. "Good. Now, there is one more stage to go through before you begin combat training. And it will be your first lesson in Kueian philosophy. Kueian society is very much a male-dominated system. The females do not fight, nor do they associate with the male of the species unless it is mating time. The role of the female is solely one of procreation and the raising of the young to puberty. At puberty the males are separated from the females. Education, medicine, business, science, all are the prerogative of the male." One of the women in our line sighs as if relieved, and I begin to think that maybe he is going to tell us that he is about to release the women. "The Kueians insist that we follow their philosophy, so that captured women cannot fight in our mercenary squadron. Their beliefs also forbid us from using female spare parts in male surgery." It is obvious then that he does not intend to let them go and I wonder what will happen to the two women who have already been taken out. He has something sinister in mind, of that I'm sure. I look over at Jill and she has her hand up to her mouth as if she knows what is coming next. "To put it bluntly, we have no use of the three women in your group, other than as your next test." He is now only addressing the men in the line as if the women have ceased to exist. "You must now prove that you are prepared to turn your back on your past, to commit yourself fully to your new masters." One of the guards behind us walks around and hands each of us a hunting knife of the finest steel, ridged on one side and lethally sharp on the other. They will do us no good against the guards and the blasters, but the unarmed women are a different matter. "You are to kill the females of your species," says the angel. "This is something you must do if you are to join us. We have all been through it. It is your blooding. Your new masters are watching..." he raises his eyebrows and tilts his head up at the mirrored gallery overhead "...and the better you perform, the better will be your prospects." Behind the glass I can feel the eyes of the Kueians boring down on us. "Also, bear in mind that if you do not do well, you will be killed. That is the Kueian way. The way of the warrior." He moves slowly backward, against the orange wall. The other guards do the same until they form a ring around the room, blasters at the ready. The angel takes a shiny aerosol from a pocket, it is almost hidden by his palm, the sort that is used for breath freshening. "To make it easier for you, to remove your inhibitions as it were, our masters have developed this hormonal spray. It acts as a stimulant and, as you'll find out, something of an aphrodisiac." He walks down the line and squirts it at each of us in turn, holding his breath as he does so, then steps away and repockets the aerosol. "Begin," he says. The knife feels good in my hand, it is heavy but well balanced. A couple of the Weapons Officers are making swishing movements with their knives, men who are used to fighting with computers finally getting to hold cold, hard steel, and enjoying it. The women are not sure what is happening, they huddle together like frightened sheep. Jill has her hand on the shoulder of the woman she recognised in the helicopter. Xavier is standing next to me and seems to be hypnotised by the shining blade in his fist and there is a faraway look in his eyes and beads of sweat on his forehead. One of the men throws down his knife and tries to rush past the guards at the exit. He hits the force field and spins back into the room, falling to his knees with hands clasped to his nose, Blood trickles to the floor, red on orange. The guard to the left of the doorway steps forward and shoots him in the head with his blaster. Blood sprays across the floor and the man slumps to the ground, his head hitting the rock with a sickening thud, his legs still in a kneeling position. He looks like a Muslim at prayer. "We're gonna have to do this, man," Xavier says to, swishing his knife at waist level. "I don't wanna end up in one of their body banks. We're gonna have to do this if we're gonna survive." There is nothing I can say, I know that, and to be honest there is an ache in my groin, anticipation for what I know is to come. I'm just along for the ride, but I cannot suppress the rising excitement, the thrill. I don't know if the kick is my own reaction to the psi-disc or something that Miss Dewar has injected into the subliminal tracks in the same way that most Dreamers overlay music to increase the atmosphere. The aerosol spray was a good idea, it encourages the viewer to get involved, to feel that anything he does can be blamed on the hormone mist. We have now split into two groups, the women standing facing each other, whispering intently, the men standing in a rough semi-circle and weighing our knives. Two of the Weapons Officers move first, walking slowly towards the women as if not knowing what to expect. Above us the Kueians watch through the two-way mirrors. And wait. The girls stand their ground, standing back to back, their fingers curled and ready to attack. The men move in, like wolves attempting to split off a weak zebra from its herd. Jill tries to kick one of them, but misses. The taller of the two men grabs her leg and pulls her and she loses her balance, arms waving frantically in the air. She screams and the man steps back and pulls hard so that she topples backwards. The other two women try to hold her upright, grabbing an arm each. All the men start to move then, myself included, we rush them and pull them apart, ignoring their cries for help. It is as if I am seeing everything through a faint red haze, I am panting like an animal and there is an intense pressure in my groin, a sexual longing, an urge. Miss Dewar or my own reaction? I just don't know, and for the moment, I don't care. Jill is now on the floor, one man holding her arms behind her head, the other sitting on her legs. She calls out to Xavier but he turns his back on her. So do I. She continues to cry out and then I hear the sound of her uniform being ripped and then her screams are muffled as if something has been placed over her mouth. Xavier and I team up with a Pilot, a thin guy with tight, black curly hair and sharp features, a swarthy stubble over his jaw. A true team. Pilot, Weapons Officer and Navigator, but this time with no thoughts of flying a fighter. We have only one thought on our minds - the girl in front of us. Her chest is heaving and she stares at us, waiting to see which of us will make the first move. She is pretty, and the uniform does not hide her curves. She is the Pilot that Jill knows. The thought of Jill makes me turn to look at her. They have torn a strip of cloth from her uniform and used it to gag her. The man sitting on her legs has used the knife to cut her uniform apart as if skinning a rabbit and is cutting her bra with the blade. He pulls it and throws it behind him, then reaches down and holds her breasts, then squeezes, viciously, and she bites down hard on the cloth in her mouth. "Come on, man," says Xavier, and bangs me on the shoulder. The Pilot has grabbed the girl and has his knife at her throat. "Let's get her," says Xavier. I know I should say no, I know I should tell them both that this is wrong, but I cannot. I see what they are doing to Jill behind me but it doesn't disgust me, it excites me, and I want to do it to the girl in front of me. I want to tear the uniform from her, to strip her naked, to take her. And to kill her. Over the girl's shoulder I see the angel. He is watching me, the arrogant smile on his face. Our eyes meet and he nods as if satisfied with what he sees. "Hold her legs," Xavier tells me. She tries to kick me and connects with my arm. It hurts, but it doesn't matter, it just makes me more determined. I kick her legs sideways and duck down and seize them before she knows what is happening, then I wrench them up so that she is right off the ground, the Pilot has her by the neck and I keep hold of her knees. "Deck her," yells Xavier, animal lust in his eyes. "Get her down, get her down." We slam her to the floor, but keep a tight grip so that she can't get away. She has jet black hair in a pageboy cut, thick eyebrows and wide, frightened eyes that are a deep grey. She begins to scream and the Pilot moves to put his hand over her mouth but then decides not to bother, there is nobody to help her. She screams and screams, no words, just howls of terror, not because we are hurting her, but because she knows what we are going to do to her. And she knows that nothing can stop us. Nothing and no-one. The Pilot holds both her wrists in one hand and uses the other to rip down the zip of her uniform. Xavier pulls off her boots while I lie across her knees. The Pilot can only get the zip down as far as her breasts with one hand so I take over and pull it down to her groin. Xavier is grunting, he has both boots off now and tells us to hold an arm each while he pulls the uniform off. She kicks and bucks and her nails are sharp so we don't want to risk letting her hands lose while we strip her so the Pilot and I use our knives to slice off her sleeves from cuff to shoulder. Xavier grabs the torn material near her neck and pulls hard, peeling her as if she was a banana. Her bra and pants are white and lacy. "No, damn you, no," she screams, and she keeps shouting until the Pilot slaps her across the face, backwards and forwards, right and left, until she shuts up, her lips swollen and her cheeks flaring red. Xavier cuts her bra with the knife, nicking her skin as he flicks the blade through the cotton strap. A small dribble of blood runs down her white skin like a line drawn with a red pen. He pulls the pants off roughly and throws them down by her boots. She is naked, kicking her legs, trying to push him away. The Pilot takes both her arms and pins them to the ground, leaving me free to help spread her legs. I grab her left ankle and pull it savagely and she yelps and before she can put her legs together Xavier drops down on top of her, unzipping his own uniform. He is grunting, flecks of spittle around his lips. While he is pushing into her I look over his shoulder and see what they are doing to Jill. They have turned her over so that she is lying on her front. The first man has finished with her and he is now sitting on her shoulders, his knees either side of her neck so that her face is hidden from me. The other man is taking her from behind and he is not gentle, he is pounding into her, banging her hard into the ground with each thrust, his head back and the tendons straining in his neck, his eyes glassy. As I watch he reaches a climax and groans, then collapses down on her, his chest heaving. The other man gets off Jill's back, his knife in his hand, and he runs it slowly across her shoulders. I can see her face now. Her eyes are open. She is looking at me and she is crying. Her lips are bloody. The man puts the blade of the knife against her neck and he pulls it and blood pools out over his hand and onto the stone floor. She closes her eyes without a sound. Beside me, Xavier rolls off the girl and tells me it's my turn. She has stopped resisting, her legs stay open as Xavier moves away. He takes his knife and puts it under her chin as if about to drive the tip through into her skull. "I want my friend to enjoy this, you bitch," he says savagely. "You'd better move, you'd better give him a good time." He pushes the knife up, just enough to break the skin and blood runs down her neck. All thoughts of whether this is right or wrong have gone, I am not even conscious of the Kueians watching above or the arrogant leers of the armed guards around us. I shrug off my uniform, leaving it hanging around my knees as I grab her thighs and pull them apart. She purses her lips, her teeth clamped together, and I pull her towards me. "Go on, man," says Xavier, "she's yours. Take her. Take her and hurt her." I hear a noise behind me, and sense rather than see something leaping at me. I turn, letting go of her fleshy thighs and raising my arms to protect my head. It is........ .........Grey. I am alone, and there are no sounds of violence. I am panting for breath, bathed in sweat and I am sexually aroused under the gown. The side of the cubicle slides back and Max comes into view. I must look in a right state because he seems worried. He puts a medi-scope on the side of my neck and reads my blood pressure and pulse rate but I don't need any equipment to tell me that my heart is racing. My erection dies down quickly, saving me further embarrassment, but while the physical signs of excitement disappear, my mind is still filled with the images of the psi-disc. �IP2�"Bad?" asks Max quietly. I cannot look at him or speak. I close my eyes and try to steady my breathing. Bad? No, not bad. My first thought when I snapped back into the cubicle was to curse Max and the technicians for bringing me back to reality, for pulling me away from......well, you know what from. From raping and killing without conscience. From acting like an animal. I want to ask him to send me back, to let me see how it ends, to taste the fear of the girl and possess her and then see her die, but I know how it ends. It ends with the death of the Dreamer, and yet maybe it would almost be worth it. That's how it feels right now, but I'm rational enough to know that the feelings must be discounted and controlled, I am on a hormonal high that has been induced by the psi-disc and I must bring myself down before I talk to anyone in the real world, before I try to explain what I am going through. Janet Dewar is in a different league to any Dreamer I have ever heard of. Technically she is damn near perfect, but she does more than provide information for the five senses, she seems to be able to influence emotions, it's almost some sort of mind control. And what is so frightening is the way it carries over into the real world. If it had been a girl who had walked into the cubicle instead of Max, and if we had been alone, and if I had had a knife......God, I can't stop my mind racing away, the heady mix of sex and violence in my head speeds up my heart rate again and I concentrate on relaxing, trying to fill my mind with calming images, waves breaking on the beach, eagles soaring in the sky, choirs singing in cool cathedrals. "Are you all right, Leif?" asks Max. I open my eyes and try to speak but my mouth is dry and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. He sees my discomfort and tells one of the technicians to fetch me a glass of water while he removes the headset. I try to sit up but I'm too tired so I stay where I am. Max holds the glass to my lips and I drink greedily. "Easy," he says. "Did we leave it too late?" He's worried that he hadn't ended the psi-disc soon enough, which means the old bastard knew he'd been cutting it fine. "No, that wasn't it," I say, which leaves him even more puzzled, but I'm not sure if I want to tell him what is troubling me. Maybe my reaction to the psi-discs is a weakness in my own personality rather than a feature of the discs themselves. I guess that's what worries me most, that it's insanity on my part, that I've been a Dreamer for too long. But that doesn't explain why three Dreamers have died and why two technicians who plugged into their psi-discs also lost their lives. Still, at the moment I do not feel like opening up to Max. He takes hold of my left shoulder and Herbie seizes my right arm and together they ease me into a sitting position. The wet gown makes a crusty, scraping sound as it pulls away from the leather couch and I feel sweat run down my back. My hands are shaking and I clasp them together in my lap. Max walks around to stand in front of me and bends at the waist so that he can look into my eyes like a referee checking a punch-drunk boxer to see if he's OK to go on with the fight. "I'm all right Max," I say. "You don't look it," says Ruth. For the first time since coming out of the psi-disc dream I notice her, sitting at the foot of the couch with anxious eyes. Her head is cocked on one side, her ears up and alert and she is clenching and unclenching her claws like she does when she's very happy or very agitated. She twitches her nose as if smelling the fear that I know is oozing from my pores, fear and excitement. "Do you want to rest?" asks Max. I shake my head fiercely. "I want a drink," I say. Herbie offers me the glass of water again and I look at him disdainfully because he is supposed to anticipate my every whim. "A real drink," I say, with emphasis on the "real." Herbie looks suitably chastened but Max folds his arms across his white coat and says no, no alcohol, not until I've had a check-up. I insist I'm OK but Max taps the side of his head with his forefinger. "Physically that may be so, Leif, but what about in here? I want you to have a chat with Walker." "The last thing I need just now is a chat with the company shrink, Max. Give me a break. Better still, give me a drink." "Orders, Leif," he says, and his lips tighten. "Whose orders?" I ask but I know the answer to that before he even untightens his lips to tell me that the command has come down from Aintrell's office. "Now?" I ask. "Now," repeats Max, firmly, but with a trace of a smile because he knows he's won. I slip off the couch and walk out of the booth to get changed. "Wimp," calls Ruth behind me before dropping gracefully down on to the tiled floor and padding out. Walker's office is down on the 48th floor, it's about half the size of one allocated to Max, which gives you some idea of where he stands in the Corporation hierarchy. He has possibly the oldest secretary in the building, perhaps the world, a white-haired matron with a nanny's cheery personality and wide, child-bearing hips that could give birth to a mammoth if she so desired. God knows what a psychiatrist would make of Walker's choice in secretary. Look to ze mutter, ze mutter is ze key to it all, as Freud might have said. "She can probably type, too," says Ruth. Miss Reynolds can type, and there's even a rumour that she even studied shorthand back in the archaic days of note-taking, and she waters the plants and makes Walker endless cups of milky tea and for all I know changes his nappies at regular intervals. "Good morning, Leif," she says brightly. Her hair is done up in a tight bun, held in place with a Victorian pin that could be used to harpoon a whale. If there were any whales left in the polluted oceans. "Good morning, Miss Reynolds." That's the way it works, I'm afraid. She calls everyone, the chief executive and the main board directors included, by their first names and everyone refers to her as Miss Reynolds. It's partly because of her age, but she also has an aura that commands respect and civility. I don't think anyone actually knows what her first name is. "Vanessa," says Ruth. "She looks like a Vanessa." Miss Reynolds looks less like a Vanessa than anyone you could ever imagine. Her face looks freshly-scrubbed and there is not a trace of make-up, she has apple cheeks and a small, prissy mouth with thin lips and is plump enough to keep the wrinkles away, a flowery print dress with a wide white belt that stretches the material across the landing strip platform of her massive matronly bosom. She waddles slowly to Walker's door, knocks twice and ushers us in. "Can I get you tea, Archibald?" she asks. Nobody else refers to Archie Walker as Archibald, but the day Miss Reynolds joined the Corporation she had decided that Archie was not a fit and proper Christian name, at least not for her employer. She had even changed the plaque on his door to read Archibald D. Walker, BSc, PhD. It later turned out that she'd made a special trip to Personnel to discover his middle initial. "Tea would be lovely, Miss Reynolds," he says meekly. "And for you Leif?" "Nothing, thank you, Miss Reynolds." It is impossible to be impolite to her, or to not use her name in conversation. "I'll have a bowl of milk, please, Miss Reynolds," Ruth says sweetly, but is ignored. Miss Reynolds smiles as if to tell me that not sampling her brew is my loss and closes the door quietly behind her. For some reason I immediately feel like a young schoolboy who has been left alone in the classroom and I have an intense craving to write obscenities on the blackboard. "Well....." says Walker, addressing the six foot tall rubber plant in the corner of his office. He is one of those men who do not like eye contact when they speak and does everything he can to avoid it. He's a thin guy, average height, with brown wavy hair that he brushes back away from his sloping forehead, giving the impression that he's been riding a bike into the wind. He has sideburns that come half way down his cheeks and he looks and sounds like a 19th century North of England mill owner. He's English, got his psychology degree from some obscure provincial university and then came to America to seek fame and fortune and found it with CBS Corporation. He's wearing a brown suit and a white shirt with brown dots on it and a dark brown tie. He didn't bother getting up to shake hands with me but I'd bet a million dollars that he's wearing brown socks and shoes. Brown is a good colour for Archie Walker BSc, PhD, it reflects his lack of character, his blandness. There is never any small talk with him, no greeting, no questions about family or friends, and no physical contact. The only person I have ever seen touch him is Miss Reynolds, who occasionally puts a proprietary hand on his shoulder while putting his cup of tea on his ordered desk. The desk is protection, like his motherly secretary, and he rarely comes from behind it as if he is glued into his black leather chair that sticks up a good six inches above the back of his head. "Well...." he says again and puts his hands together on the his pristine blotting pad, fingers interlinked. That's his usual conversation position, as if afraid that the movements of his pale hands will give away his innermost thoughts. He has no need to worry, I doubt if he has any innermost thoughts. Despite the brown suit and the brown hair, he is the most colourless man I have ever met, and ten minutes after meeting him it's hard to even remember what he looks like. His job as Corporation psychologist is to prevent any of the Dreamers from suing for damages when they burn out. Each six months, prior to laying down a psi-disc, Dreamers have to report to Walker for a chat, a little heart to heart, during which he will warn us of the dangers of laying down discs, and how we are to speak up if we have any problems or symptoms that might indicate we are not 100 per cent capable of doing the job. Naturally we all say that everything is hunky dory, he gives us a few standard tests, and then Miss Reynolds sends us on our way. The whole interview is recorded, so that as and when Dreamers do go loopy or top themselves, the Corporation can put its collective hand on its corporate heart and say that it has done its duty. No Dreamer has ever been able to convince a lawyer to take on the might of the Corporation. Mind you, most of the Dreamers who go over the edge aren't in a fit state to speak to an ice cream vendor, never mind a lawyer. "Mr Aintrell tells me you are having a rough time with the psi-discs," he says, and I nod but don't say anything. There is a quiet knock on the door and Miss Reynolds waddles in and puts a cup of steaming tea on Archie's desk and walks out without saying a word. "Is there anything in particular that you find upsetting about them?" Archie asks the large white flower pot containing the plant. It doesn't answer and neither do I. I wonder how much Aintrell has told him about the discs. "Mr Aintrell is worried that you might not be able to handle the last psi-disc. And he also worries that you might not be able to fulfill your own contract." "I'll lay down my last psi-disc," I say. "There is no need to worry on that score." "Then on what score should we be worried?" he asks the plant. You've got to be careful with Walker. He seems to be such an innocuous deadhead that you start to forget, to forget that he's a top rate psychologist and to forget that everything is being faithfully recorded. "Has Aintrell plugged into the psi-discs?" I ask him. "You'll have to ask Aintrell," he says. "Helpful, isn't he," comments Ruth. She leaps up onto his desk and stands on his blotter, growling into his face. "How about I rip his nose off," she says. I don't say anything, and eventually Walker speaks to the plant again. "How are you generally, Leif?" "He's fine, no thanks to you," spits Ruth. "I'm fine," I say, but I can't keep the exasperation out of my voice. I mean, what else can I say? Not so good, Archie, but the sky occasionally changes colour and things don't smell right anymore and every now and again inanimate objects turn into animals and I damn near died because I thought I saw a child in the road. Oh yes, by the way, I've started talking to a bobcat with hazel eyes who refuses to fly. If I start talking like that there's no way they're going to allow me to finish my contract. Walker slowly nods his head up and down as if giving my answer serious consideration, while Ruth mimics him. "What sort of problems do the other Dreamers have?" I ask. "In what way?" he says. Whenever he can Walker answers a question with another question as if he's frightened to give out any information. I wonder what deep dark secrets he has buried away in the recesses of his mind. "Do they go mad, do they see things, do they hear voices?" "Any problems that I am told about obviously must remain confidential," he replies. "Yeah, I bet," says Ruth. "Just between you, the Dreamer, and the Corporation." "Let's talk generally then. Generally speaking, what sort of problems are Dreamers susceptible to?" Walker looks even more uncomfortable. He is not used to being asked questions. At any moment he might burst into tears and go running to clutch the skirts of Miss Reynolds. Except that would mean leaving the sanctuary of his desk and chair. "Do they tell you when they're going to kill themselves?" I press, and he flinches. This is not going to sound good when Aintrell plays back the tape, and I'm starting to shout. If I'm not careful it's going to look as if I'm losing it. I quieten myself down because the last thing I need right now is "Psychologically Unstable" stamped on my file. Along with "Contract Terminated." Ruth looks at me over her shoulder. "Wimp," she says. "Tell him what for. Tell him what he can do with his psychological testing and his hidden video recorders." It's easy for her to say, she's only a cat. We sit in silence, the three of us, four if you include Walker's plant. He mumbles something and I ask him to repeat himself. "It's a difficult area, Leif, this whole business of Dreamers. It's such a new science, or art, that there is virtually nothing in the way of research about the effects on the Dreamers. Sure, there's papers galore on the effects on the public, whether or not viewers are over-influenced by what they see, the effects of advertising embedded in the discs, how children react to the shifts in reality. But no-one has really researched into what it does to the Dreamers, have they?" It's the longest speech I've ever heard him make. "But you speak to them, they tell you what they're going through," I say. He finally tears his eyes away from the plant and looks at me. "Do you?" he asks. There's not a lot I can say to that. He's right, of course. If I haven't opened up to him, then why should anyone else? He suddenly seems to realise that we have eye contact and he lowers his gaze. He appears to be examining Ruth's forepaws but I know he can't see her. "The psi-discs I've seen, two of them so far, are violent," I say. "Very violent." "There seems to be a trend in that direction these days," he agrees. "Initially the mere sensation of the psi-discs was attraction enough for people to buy them. But the more they use them, the more extreme they want the experiences. That's the way of the world. That's what happened with television and movies. There is no reason for psi-discs to be any different, is there?" He even manages to turn a statement of fact into a question. "But isn't there a danger that the psi-discs might alter personalities?" "Of the viewers or the Dreamers?" he asks. "Viewers," I answer. "Both," says Ruth. "That's really not for us to decide, Leif. That's for the Government censors and watchdogs like the Moral Crusade. All we do is to produce psi-discs within their guidelines. What more can we do?" "OK, let me put it another way. Assuming CBS Corporation follows the existing rules and regulations, what are the chances of a viewer becoming disturbed? Mentally disturbed, I mean." He exhales deeply, the stress of having to provide an answer rather than another question. "Who can say, Leif? Who can say?" "Not you, that's for sure, Dog Breath," hisses Ruth. "Doesn't he ever give a straight answer?" No, he doesn't. Actually, its probably because years of analysis and probing means that he can't communicate anymore, even if he wanted to. "Are you married?" I ask him. "Why do you ask?" he says. See what I mean? I bet if you ask him the colour of his socks he'll come back with a question. "No reason," I say. "Look, how many complaints does the Corporation get from viewers alleging that they've suffered because of plugging into psi-discs?" "That would be something to ask Legal, wouldn't it?" he says. "About the psi-disc you plugged into today, the one by Janet Dewar. What was it about?" "It was a space adventure, dog fight among the stars, battling aliens to save the Earth, you know the sort of thing." "How would you rate it?" "Good. Lots of excitement." "Violent?" "Very?" "Anything unusual about it?" "Unusual?" Two can play at the question game. "Anything, how can I put it, excessive?" "It was very violent, Archie, but I'm sure you know that. Why don't you come right out with it and tell me what it is you're after?" "What makes you think I'm after anything?" he says without missing a beat. I want to hit him, hard, I want to grab him by the throat and squeeze, to see his eyes bulge and pop and the cartilage crunch beneath my tightening fingers, I want to see him choke and die.... "Easy Leif, easy," says Ruth, and I realise just how angry I've become, the red mist is back and there's a pounding pulse in my head. A few seconds more and I could have grabbed Archie Walker and pulled him out of the chair, thrown him down hard on the desk and pounded my fist into his face, again and again..... "Leif!" shouts Ruth. She is standing in front of my chair, butting her head against my knees. "Relax, don't let him upset you. That's what they want." I reach forward and stroke her between the ears and she purrs. I lean forward and she turns up her head and licks me on the nose, and then she rubs her head against my cheek. I pretend to tie my shoelace so that Walker doesn't think I've totally flipped, then I flop back into the seat and give him a big, open smile. "No, Archie, there was nothing excessive about it. You should try it, it's a hell of a show. Now, is there anything else you want to know?" I fill my head with soothing images, foremost among them is stroking a bobcat with hazel eyes. For only the second time during the interview he looks at me, and he shakes his head. "No Leif, that's all. Thanks for dropping by." He doesn't get up to see me out and I know without looking back that he doesn't watch me go. Outside Herbie is waiting for me and we walk to the lift together. "Goodbye Herbert, goodbye Leif," trills Mrs Reynolds. She doesn't say goodbye to Ruth, but she takes it well. She sits between Herbie and me while we wait for the lift, washing her face with her right paw and grunting with concentration. The lift arrives and Herbie lets me in first. Ruth plays it cool and waits until the last minute, until the doors are almost shut, before she jumps in. Herbie and I reach for the buttons together, he goes for the one marked "G" but I hit the Penthouse button first. "Louis Aintrell and I have something to discuss," I say by way of explanation. He starts to argue, telling me that we'll need an appointment, but I tell him to be quiet. The lift begins to rattle off the latest share prices and I tell it to shut up, too. Ruth can sense I'm not to be annoyed so she keeps quiet. "You wish, Jack." Yeah, well two out of three isn't bad. We storm past his secretaries and his assistant, ignoring their protests. I reach the door first and I'm through before they can stop me. Aintrell is behind his desk, a big cigar in his mouth and two stuffed shirts from Legal hanging on his every nicotine-scented word. "I'd like a chat," I say. "Now." Aintrell flashes me The Smile and gets to his feet, apologising to his legal eagles and pointing them to the doors. They glare at me as they go but it's no contest as far as the chief executive is concerned, I'm a revenue earner, one of the best, and lawyers are just the hired help. "Leif, Leif, Leif," he croons. "Good to see you. Come on, sit down, sit down." For some reason he seems to be saying everything twice, as if doubling the amount of time he has to think. He doesn't, it has to be said, seem over-surprised to see me. Herbie has had the good grace to wait outside but Ruth is stalking up and down on one of the wide window sills. "I wouldn't miss this for the world," she purrs. Aintrell puts his arm around me and guides me into one of the big green armchairs. "Would you like a drink?" he asks and I say no thanks even though I'd like nothing better. "Me too," says Ruth. Aintrell taps his cigar on the edge of a crystal ashtray the size of an Olympic discus and then waves it in the air like a magician's wand. I wonder what Archie Walker would say about men who smoke big cigars, but realise that he'd probably just ask a question like "Why do you think they do?" The chief executive crosses his legs at the ankles and relaxes back in the chair. "What's your problem, Leif?" he asks quietly, and he sounds as if he cares, as if a close relative had died and he's about to offer to pay for the funeral expenses. "You were listening?" I ask. "Of course," he says, and I'm immediately grateful for his honesty. At least he didn't play psychologist and ask "listening to what?" "You knew there was nothing Archie Walker could do to get an insight into those psi-discs and my reaction to them," I say. "He's never managed to get anything out of any of the Dreamers, he's just there to rubber stamp the psychological profiles, we both know that. He's not even in on the selection procedures." Aintrell nods and pulls deeply on his cigar, inhaling the smoke and holding it in his lungs as if it was too precious to share with the atmosphere. He lays back his head and only then lets the smoke out in a narrow jet that expands as it heads for the ceiling, like a nuclear cloud. "You're not telling me anything I don't know so far," he says, still looking at the ceiling. "You knew that he'd get up my nose, especially so soon after being exposed to that woman's psidisc. You wanted to see my reaction. Normally I can handle that jerk of a shrink, but you wanted to see how I could handle him after......." "After what, Leif?" "After going through what was on her disc." He is studying me now, his cigar forgotten. "And what was on the disc?" "Violence. Even more intense than on Woolrich's disc." "From the viewer's point of view, or third party?" "Viewer. Did you know?" He shrugs but doesn't say one way or another. "He knows," says Ruth, and I believe her. She was right about them using me, she was right about them wanting me to lose my temper with Archie. She might be a product of my imagination, but she often operates at a subconscious level that allows her insights that are denied me, things I've noticed or deducted but at a level far below conscious thought. "You betta believe it," she says from the windowsill. "Whose idea are these discs, Louis?" I ask him. "The Dreamers," he replies. "They have complete editorial control, you know that." "But you're guiding them?" "We are looking for something different," he says, sitting forward in his chair. "We're looking to get back to the leading edge of these discs, to keep ourselves ahead of RCA. Latest viewing figures show they are gaining on us, they picked up an extra three points last month. We need something to grab attention, to get our ratings up." "Like sex and violence?" "There's always been sex and violence, Leif. Not from you, I know, but it's always there." "Not to this degree, and never from the viewer's point of view. That's illegal." Aintrell sighs and taps ash off his cigar again. "As I said yesterday, it's illegal according to the present rules. But the goalposts could be shifted at any time." "They're not safe," I say. He looks at me intently. "So they did affect you," he says sharply. "Excite," I answer, picking my words carefully. "They were incredibly exciting, incredibly stimulating. And there was a spill over after I came out." "Spill over?" "Anger. Intense anger. I was on a high and it took some time to come down." "But that's good," he says enthusiastically. "Don't you see, Leif. That's what we need. A hook. Something to keep them coming back for more. You know the value of repeats." "Yeah, I know the value of repeats." I wanted to say that there was more than that, that I had wanted to hurt Archie Walker, and that if his secretary had been half way attractive I might have wanted to hurt her, too. But there was a nagging doubt in my mind, and the doubt was whether the feelings were my own or if they had been induced by the disc. If it was the psi-disc, and I told Aintrell how it had gripped me, then maybe I'd lose my contract. It was only a maybe, but I was so close to finishing that I couldn't risk it. I'd have to wait until I was really sure and that meant plugging into the third and final fatal disc. He continues to speak, rolling the cigar between his finger and thumb. I lose concentration and it turns into a snake, a yellow and brown snake with a black flicking tongue and I jump but when I look again it's just a cigar. "But don't let the novelty of the new psi-discs blind you to the problem at hand," he says, not noticing my discomfort. "Are you any nearer finding out what killed the Dreamers?" Ruth is prowling around Aintrell's huge office, weaving in and out of the furniture, nose to the ground as if she's hunting for something. "I think there's a definite something, but I'm not sure what it is," I say, but realise that doesn't really make sense. "What I mean is, in both of the discs there comes a point when something happens, or is about to happen. Like an attack. It's not as if the thing just stops dead, do you see?" I can see by the blank look on his face that he doesn't. "I thought at first that maybe it was something to do with the intensity of the discs, that the Dreamers burnt themselves out, but that doesn't seem to be it." This is not easy, it's on a par with trying to explain colours to a blind man. How can a businessman like Aintrell be expected to understand the complexities of the world that Dreamers inhabit? "Just before the disc ends there's a sensation of being attacked, by something. But there's no time to see it, I just react and then bang, I'm awake." "Something?" he asks. "Something. Or somebody. Maybe an animal. Or a machine. But something that moves, something that is extra to the discs that the Dreamers were laying down, as if something had entered into the disc. Do you understand what I'm saying?" Aintrell exhales smoke in a cloud, just as Ruth walks by his chair. She stops and coughs, her whole body shaking, but she's only fooling around because the real world has no effect on her, in the same way that she can have no impact on the real world. "Oh really?" she says sarcastically, and her chest heaves and the coughing fit intensifies. I ignore her, she only wants to be the centre of attention. "You wish, Jack," she says, but at least the retching noises stop. "I think I understand," says Aintrell. "You're saying that the Dreamers had no inkling of what was to come, and that it was outside their control. But does that mean that whatever killed them wasn't a product of their imagination?" That as they say, is the $64,000 question. Had the Dreamers created their own executioners, or had somebody, or something, else killed them. And if it was their own imagination, their own creativity, then why would they do it? I watch Ruth, sitting by Aintrell's chair and rubbing her head against the velvet material as if scratching an itch. Her eyes are closed. A picture of innocence. I wonder if the other Dreamers had created companions like Ruth, and if they could turn on their creators. Suppose Ruth decided to go into one of my dreams, would we be on equal terms? Could she kill me? But how can I explain that to Aintrell, that the Dreamers could have been killed by their own creations. And that mine was sitting by his chair having a good scratch. End of conversation. End of contract. Anyway, it would be unlikely in the extreme, because the Dreamers would have known it was coming and would simply pull themselves out of it. Far more likely is that something else had managed to get into the mind without them knowing, and was able to take them by surprise. That's what I tell Aintrell, anyway, though again it's difficult to put it into words. He nods and smokes as I talk, occasionally flicking ash into the ashtray. When I finish describing how both psi-discs end he sits forward, giving me the Aintrell smile. "Tell me, Leif. Who do you think is responsible?" I hold up my hands as if warding off an attack. "Hey, how am I supposed to know that?" I say. "You're the one who should now if the Corporation has been threatened." "What makes you say that?" "Say what?" "Threatened. What makes you say that someone is threatening the Corporation?" "I'm not saying anyone is, Louis. All I'm saying is that if anyone is, you'd be the first to know. Right?" He sits back in his chair and examines his cigar as if checking it for hidden explosives. "Right," he says. "And?" He sighs. "No one is threatening the Corporation, or at least we haven't received any threats. Yet." He left the "yet" hanging there like a lost seagull looking for its nest. "You know RCA have lost three Dreamers?" I ask, and it's clear from the look on his face that he doesn't. "Who told you that?" he asks, stabbing the air with his cigar in time to the words. "That's the talk on the street," I say, reluctant to tell him of my meeting with Eric Takahashi, fraternising with the enemy and all that. "It seems two of their Dreamers died in similar circumstances. I was wondering if perhaps CBS and RCA were both fighting dirty." Aintrell laughs, a bellowing guffaw that starts somewhere in his stomach and finishes at the far end of his enormous office. "That's preposterous, Leif, and you know it. We're keen competitors, which is as it should be, but killing each other's Dreamers? Christ man, you know what a precious resource a Dreamer is. Killing you guys off is the last thing we'd do." Yeah, I know how rare Dreamers are. About twenty million people take the tests each year, and in a good year fifty make the grade. We're not exactly one in a million, but we're close. Too close for the firms to start knocking us off. It would be like two feuding cattle barons killing off their steers one by one. It wouldn't matter which of them won in the end. They'd be better off shooting each other, or trying to screw up each other's distribution networks. "In that case, maybe you should start looking for a third party, someone who wants both Corporations to shut up shop. The Moral Crusade, maybe." "Possible," he says. "More likely to be a crank who thinks we should all go back to watching movies or reading books or playing the piano on dark winter evenings." "What do the police think?" I ask. He doesn't reply and avoids my eyes, concentrating on his cigar. "He hasn't told them," says Ruth accusingly. "You haven't told them, have you?" I say, and Aintrell admits that I'm right. "We're right," says Ruth. Yeah, OK, Aintrell admits that me and my cat are right. "My cat and I," purrs Ruth. Now my cat's an English teacher, for God's sake. "It's something we should handle in-house, as it were," continues Aintrell. "It isn't something the police have any expertise in. If we do receive an extortion demand then of course we'll call them in, but we don't consider it necessary just yet." "You don't think the police have any expertise in investing murder?" I say. I am amazed at his arrogance. "Leif, Leif, Leif," he says, as if consoling an unreasonable mental patient. "We don't know that they were murdered, that's one of the things you have to prove. You prove that there is a murderer and I'll call them in. I can't say fairer than that." He flashes The Smile and looks at me exactly as he used to look into millions of homes across America, the face you can trust. It isn't true unless you heard it from the mouth of Louis Aintrell. Yeah, well that was then and this is now and I don't believe him. I think he knows exactly what's going on with the new psi-discs, and I don't think he's got the slightest intention of bringing outsiders in to wash his dirty linen. Still, what can I do? I'm going to have to plug into the third psi-disc tomorrow, and shortly afterwards I'll have to lay down my own. Then I can turn my back on the whole bloody lot of them. Ruth opens her eyes and hisses, and there is a fierceness about her that brings home with a jolt how wild she really is. She is never happy around Aintrell. She walks over to me and puts her head on my knee, eyes upturned and watching me. Time to go. Aintrell springs to his feet and leads me to the door, waving his half-smoked cigar and thanking me for coming, he wishes me well tomorrow and asks me if I'll come up and see him after I've gone through the third psi-disc. Herbie is waiting for me outside and he does not look happy. I tell him I want to be alone for a while and he looks relieved. I guess I haven't been the best of company over the past couple of days. "You can say that again," says Ruth. We ride down in the lift together. "Herbie," I say, "where do the CBS Dreamers hang out these days? Those that like hanging out, I mean." Most Dreamers avoid contact with others of their kind, not because we hate talking shop but because it can get a bit confusing at times, each with our own relative grip on reality. He tells me the name of a bar and an address and asks if I want him to tag along, obviously unhappy that I might change my mind about wanting to be on my own. "No, that's OK," I say. "I'm going for a walk now, but later tonight I might fancy a drink or something." The lift opens and we say goodbye in the lobby. I don't know what he does in his spare time, but I know that all I have to do is whistle and he'll be back. "Like a stupid dog," says Ruth. "Dogs make good companions and are loyal and faithful," I whisper. "There are lessons there to be learned by the whole feline family." "You wish, Jack," she says and she wags her tail and pants. Cute. * * * We walk aimlessly through the streets of the city, or rather I wander and Ruth pads by my side. She walks close, occasionally brushing my leg with her shoulder, or lifting her head so that my hand knocks against her ear. Nothing obtrusive, it was just her way of letting me know she was there. I was walking in protective slouch mode, hands in pockets, shoulders slumped, feet scuffing the ground, signalling to any muggers watching that I'm not the sort worth pulling into a dark alley and taking my wallet. As it happens, any mugger stupid enough to roll me would find my wallet contains precious little in the way of cash and he wouldn't know the code numbers that go with the chipcard. Ruth is matching her pace with mine, stopping with me at each road intersection, looking right and left each time we step off the kerb. "Where shall we go?" I ask her, quietly so I can't be overheard. "Dunno," she says. "What do you feel like?" "My mind's in a whirl, Ruth," I say. "I just want to keep moving, do you understand?" "Hey, tell me about it. I'm a cat, you know, and cats love to prowl. We choose to cruise." My street-tough cat. We walk for a while longer, both of us looking down at the pavement. When I look up we've walked out of the business district and are now in a seedy residential district, either a broken down area that's being gentrified or a former upper class enclave on the way down. There are a couple of burnt out cars at the side of the road and some of the buildings are boarded up. An unmanned police drone hovers above us, checks us out and whizzes off. "Where are we?" I ask Ruth. She looks up and sniffs the air. "Dunno," she says. "Why don't we go to the zoo?" "The zoo?" "Yeah, you know. Animals in cages. It'll do you good." "Where the hell is the zoo?" She groans and rolls her eyes. "Pull yourself together, Leif. We'll catch a cab." There seem to be few vehicles on the road in this neighbourhood, but eventually I spot one, the driver with his head close to the windscreen and hands grabbing the steering wheel as if expecting an ambush at any moment. He stops the cab barely long enough for Ruth and I to climb in the back, then accelerates away sharply. Twenty minutes later we're in the zoo, walking slowly around the exhibits. We stand in front of the wolves enclosure while Ruth struts around and makes fun of them. They ignore her. I buy an ice cream and she asks me if she can lick it and I tell her she's crazy but she insists so I hold the cone down for her. "It's good," she says. "But not as good as milk from my master." For some reason she's being especially nice to me today. Maybe she realises how upset I am after the two psi-discs, and how worried I am about tomorrow. We find an unoccupied bench and I sit down, close to the end. She lifts herself on, one paw at a time, and then lies down with her head in my lap, eyes closed in contentment. From where I'm sitting I can see the enclosures where the big cats are confined. One of the enclaves resembles a surrealistic swimming pool which has been drained of all of its water, with a sprinkling of logs. There are man-made caves set into the side of one of the concrete swirls and inside sit two tigers staring blankly out into the daylight. They seem to be watching me eat the ice-cream but it's hard to tell from their expressionless faces. One of them lifts a giant paw to its mouth and begins to wash its whiskers with small, careful strokes. It looks as if it's mimicking the way I'm eating. "You're crazy," says Ruth. "They wouldn't waste their time watching you." "Yeah, I know." I reach down and ruffle the fur on her chest as I finish off the cone. "How do you think they feel, being caged?" I ask her. She moves her head a fraction as if shrugging. "Probably bored," she purrs, enjoying the slow tickling of my finger. "Just bored?" "You want me to give you some sort of garbage about them pining for lost freedoms, the open plains, the herds of wildebeest?" she says. She stumps me with that, because that's what I was thinking, that big cats must surely hate to be confined, they must hate it with all their soul. "Mostly a tiger thinks about its stomach," says Ruth. "Every now and then they think of sex, but once that's out of the way the male wanders off again and the female is stuck with the litter. Then they go back to thinking about food." "I thought they mated for life." "Yeah, I suppose that's what the female tigers are led to believe," she says. "You men are all the same." I think she's being sarcastic. Or maybe it's a dig at my two ex-wives. But these days it's getting harder to fathom her sense of humour. "But if they had the choice, surely they'd choose freedom?" I press. She twists her head up to look at me, and smiles. "They'd take the option which was most likely to keep their stomachs filled," she said. "Let me tell you, killing your food isn't all it's cracked up to be. Killing for sport is OK, and I can understand killing for revenge or for territory, but given the choice of being fed decent chunks of prime beefsteak or having to lie in wait by a waterhole for five or six hours, I know which I'd choose." "And being in a cage doesn't bother them?" She looks at me knowingly. "We're all in cages, Leif." Yeah, that's true enough. Here's me talking about freedom and roaming the plains and I'm the one imprisoned in a CBS contract and tied to two ex-wives by cast iron alimony agreements. "What sort of cage are you in?" I ask her. She raises her eyebrows in mock horror. "Me?" she says. "I'm in the cage of your mind, aren't I?" She sees my face fall and fakes a slash at my throat with her paw. "It's not so bad," she says. "The cage?" I say. "Your mind," she answers, then puts her head back in my lap. She starts to breathe deeply and is soon asleep. * * * We get back to the flat at about six o'clock, just as the daylight begins to creep out of the rooms. I take off the cap and throw it on one of the sofas. I hate hats, no matter how long I have them on my head I'm always aware of their presence, like a band of steel around my forehead getting tighter and tighter, but until my hair grows back I'm stuck with it. I was being honest when I told Herbie that I wanted to be on my own, but I also know that I must talk to other Dreamers to find out what the hell is going on. If the Corporation is changing its stand on violence in its psi-discs then it's possible that they wouldn't tell me about it because I'm so near the end of my contract. But the new intake, those that have only recently been signed up, might have been given new instructions. I shower and change into jeans and a sweatshirt then look at myself in the mirror and wince, a 48-year-old wreck trying to pass himself off as a teenager. The effect is not easy on the eye, and I realise with a jolt what bad shape I'm in. Looking straight down I am unable to see my knees. That is not a good sign. I have fallen victim to gravity and over-indulgence in a big way. "Hardly surprising considering the type of restaurants you frequent," says Ruth archly. She looks not one day older than when I first met her and that was almost four years ago. "And bearing in mind your alcohol intake," she adds. "I'm going to have to change," I say. "It'll be an uphill struggle," she says. "The clothes, I mean," I say. I figure that if I'm going to meet the juvenile delinquents that pass for Dreamers then I should dress for the part, but I'm not going to fool anybody. I throw the jeans and shirt back into the wardrobe and put on something more befitting a middle-aged man with a paunch. "And bald," says Ruth. "Don't forget bald." The grey flannel trousers, white shirt and red sweater look OK, a bit like an off-duty scoutmaster, and I try on a selection of hats until I find one that's half-way decent. "You call a Yankees baseball cap decent?" accuses Ruth. "It'll have to do," I say. Anything is better than a bald head. The bar that Herbie told me about is within walking distance so I don't bother calling for the limo, but on the way out the phone rings. I ask the phone who it is and it tells me that it's someone called Helen Gwynne from the Moral Crusade then waits for me to either accept the call or tell it to take a message. I decide to speak to her. "You don't know me but I'd very much like to talk with you about CBS's psi-discs," she says. "What in particular do you want to talk about?" I ask. "I'd rather go over it in person," she answers. "Do you mind if I come around now? I can be there in ten minutes." That surprises me because my number is not listed and there are very few people who know where I live. She senses my unease and quickly adds: "Herbert Chastel de Beauville suggested I get in touch with you." That settles it for me and I tell her I'll see her. I pour myself a tumbler of 15-year-old Matsumoto Glenlivet with a dash of spring water while I wait. I turn on the 3-D TV and tell it to switch to the news channel. A blonde with the eyes of a frightened fawn and a 40-year-old man with the looks of a presidential candidate are taking turns to go through the headlines. The US trade deficit has hit a record high, the only exports that are actually on the increase are psi-discs. Unemployment is at 23 per cent, a slight improvement on last year, but a tame economist in a ten-second interview claims that the Government is fiddling the figures. The Japanese moonbase is to start commercial mining operations next week in a joint venture with the Soviets, and Green activists have launched a campaign to stop it. A new Korean supercomputer thrashes a Chinese chess Grandmaster eight games to one and announces it is retiring. A sniper with a laser rifle kills 16 teenagers at a High School in Cleveland before he's taken out by a heat-seeking missile that had been programmed with his individual infra red profile. A member of the SWAT team says its the fifth time they've had to use the missiles this month and that the police need more funding. "The Japanese missiles don't come cheap, what with the strength of the yen and that," he says. A girl from Singapore wins the Miss Universe title and says she wants to do more to help the people of poorer countries. She plans to visit Europe. I barely drink half of the whisky before the security video phone tells me she's here and I tell it to let her in. I have the door open for her as she gets out of the lift. She is not what I expect, in that she doesn't look like an elderly spinster who would throw up her arms in horror at the merest hint of exposed female flesh or scenes of violence. I've seen a few of the Moral Crusade spokesmen - and women - on late night chat shows, and they're rarely under sixty years old and have a tendency to look down their noses when they talk about the evils of sex and violence and the effect they have on the weaker members of society and how it is the duty of the more responsible citizens to do all they can to protect them. Helen Gwynne looks to be in her early thirties with straight blonde hair parted dead centre and falling to just above her shoulders. Her eyes are a piercing blue and her skin is milky white. She smiles when she shakes my hand, and her grip is firm, like a man's. Her nails are very long and painted a glossy red, the same shade as her lipstick. "Thank you for seeing me, Mr Ableman." "Leif," I say, "please call me Leif." She is wearing a dark blue jacket with wide lapels and padded shoulders over a pale blue silk shirt and a pleated skirt made out of the same material as the jacket. Her shoes are black and simple but obviously expensive and as I follow her into the room I see the black lines down the back of her legs that show she is wearing stockings. In her wake she leaves the lingering fragrance of something exotic and flowery, and her hips sway as she walks as if she is used to being watched. She has the bearing and looks of a former model, past the flush of youth and a bit too heavy for the catwalk these days but still very desirable. "And at least ten years younger than you," purrs Ruth sweetly. Helen arranges herself in one of the sofas, delicately crossing her legs and pulling the skirt down over her knees. "Can I get you anything?" I ask her and she says she'll have a vodka and tonic so it looks as if the Moral Crusade isn't against alcohol. As I pass her the tumbler she hands me her business card and I put it on the bar, next to the bottle of whisky. I settle down on the sofa facing her and ask her what it is she wants from me and why she feels that she has to come to my flat to talk about it. Ruth lies down at her feet, her eyes on me. "Well Mr Ableman, I mean Leif, as you probably are aware the Moral Crusade is very concerned about the effects pornography in all its various forms are having on our society." Sure, everyone knows about the activities of the Moral Crusade. They reckon that membership of the Crusade stands at some ten million in the US alone, so they have a fair amount of clout and the networks do listen to them. They've yet to make much headway with the psi-disc companies, mainly because we're not reliant on advertising at all, but they do have a couple of representatives on the Government censorship committees where they are forever making themselves heard. I've always reckoned that what consenting adults do, or watch, in private is their own concern, but that was before I'd plugged into the last two psi-discs and experienced the effects they had on me. Maybe the Crusade do have a point, maybe they would be too much for some people to handle. But I'm not sure if I should be telling Helen Gwynne that, so I just nod politely while she demurely sips her drink. There is lipstick on the glass when she takes it away from her mouth. "Thanks to the efforts of the Moral Crusade, and other concerned groups, I think it is fair to say that the programmes we see on our television screens these days are considerably healthier than they were a few years ago," she says. For healthier, read boring. One of the reasons for the runaway success of the psi-disc is that the daily output of the networks is now so drab and lifeless that it offers about as much stimulation as watching a fridge defrost. I continue to nod and admire her legs. "And it is with no small personal satisfaction that the sexual content of our newspapers, especially the racier tabloids, has decreased substantially since the Moral Crusade made its objections known." Now that newspapers are transmitted electronically and printed on personal laser printers, I reckon that they fall within the privacy of your own home category. Only those who subscribe receive the stories and pictures, so for the life of me I can't see what damage they are doing. But after the Moral Crusade organised mass rallies outside the offices of newspapers they felt were too titillating or violent and followed it up with a worldwide boycott of products advertised in them, it didn't take long before the publishers started to throttle back. It wasn't worth the grief. Helen Gwynne does have very shapely legs. She has a thin gold chain around her left ankle, so subtle that I'd missed it at first. "The cinema industry too has decided to comply with our standards, I am happy to say." True enough, though audiences have dwindled. Nobody wants to pay to watch flat screens anymore. The movie moguls blame the psi-disc corporations but personally I reckon it's because the films they produce these days are every bit as dry as the television, even when they're in 3-D. They've given up. The only sector that's doing well is the 3-D video and laser disc sector and that's because people prefer their entertainment without advertising breaks. But given the choice, everyone prefers the psi-disc. That's why our sales and profits are soaring and the rest of the entertainment business is in the doldrums. Which, I guess, is why the lovely Miss Gwynne has dropped in for a chat. "The only area where we have so far failed to make any progress is in the psi-disc market," she says. She uncrosses her legs and presses them close together and I wonder if I have been staring. "Yes," says Ruth tartly. "You were." "Which is why I have come to see you, Leif," she says, and places her glass on the table next to the sofa. I can clearly see the imprint of her lips on it. "In many ways what goes on inside corporations like CBS is a closed book to us. We see the final products but we have virtually no technical knowledge, and the psi-disc companies allow us no input at the creative stage." I can understand why the Moral Crusade sent along a looker like Helen Gwynne to give me a going over. If it had been one of the tweed twin set and pearls brigade or an earnest priest with watery eyes and minty breath then I'd have shown them to the door already but she was so easy on the eye and had such class that I'd listen to her even if she was selling the latest computerised encyclopedia. "Do you mind if I smoke?" she says, catching me by surprise. I was busy watching the way her breasts seem to bump the material of her shirt each time she moves her shoulders. It isn't that she appears top heavy or anything, it's just that I'm constantly aware of what is lurking under the silk. "Leif, you're staring," purrs Ruth. She rolls on her back with her paws in the air, scraping her head along the thick pile carpet. "No, of course not," I reply and hand her an ashtray. I realise then that she's not carrying a handbag but she takes a packet of cigarettes from her jacket pocket, along with a slim, gold lighter. She tosses her head once she has her cigarette lit and purses her lips as she blows the smoke towards the floor. Ruth fakes a cough. "We believe that the psi-disc corporations are planning to develop a new range of discs, discs which are more explicit than anything we have seen before. We have made approaches to both CBS and RCA but have been told quite bluntly that we are to mind our own business." She took a long pull on the cigarette and when she exhales I see lipstick smeared on the filter. "Well, Leif, constant vigilance over any medium which can affect the minds and attitudes of our society is our business. Very much our business." She smiles, seeking my agreement. "Surely all psi-discs have to be cleared by the Government anyway, and the Crusade is represented on the censorship committee. You can make your feelings known then," I tell her. She pulls a face as if there is a bad taste in her mouth. "What worries us, Leif, is that we have detected a gradual change in emphasis among the other members of the committees, those members who are not attached to the Moral Crusade. To be frank, Leif, it is as if some of the committee members are being leaned on. If the trend continues, we are reasonably certain that there will be a tendency for more violent psi-discs to be permitted, and there will be a more liberal approach taken towards their sexual content." "Well?" I say, because I'm still not sure what it is she wants. "Well, we've decided to approach you, Leif, because you are, how can I put it tactfully, slightly more mature than the usual Dreamers." Yeah, that's pretty tactful. She means I'm a hell of a lot older than they are. "Not much gets past her, does it?" purrs Ruth. "We thought that your maturity might mean that you would be more sympathetic to our views than the Dreamers who are already turning out material which we consider is too strong. Also, we have seen all nine of the psi-discs you have recorded, and we have been impressed by their...." She seems to be struggling for the word so I help her. "Maturity," I say. She smiles. "Exactly," she says. "Your discs have character, depth, integrity, strong storylines and more often than not there is usually a strong moral theme running through them. Good triumphs over evil, crime doesn't pay, the importance of protecting one's family and loved ones..." "And all the rest of the cliches," says Ruth. "And your version of Macbeth was superb, absolutely superb. You won an award for that, didn't you?" Yeah I did. It was my fifth psi-disc and I fancied a change, so I spent three months living in a castle Herbie found for me on the west coast of Scotland, cold, damp and totally miserable. He found a top chef who cooked meals in the style of medieval England and we hired a team of top swordsmen to teach me the finer points of fencing and the end result was sheer magic, even if I do say so myself. I gave Herbie the Oscar because the awards mean nothing to me anymore, my sole concern now is to finish my contract and get the hell out of the business. Funny that she should pick on that one as an example of the quality of my work. I wonder if she realises how many deaths there were and how gory it was, it was actually one of the most violent psi-discs I've ever done. I nod, trying to be cool. "Yeah, but I still don't see what you want from me. You want me to campaign on the Crusade's behalf?" "Good Lord, no," she laughs, and the blouse moves, rippling like a windswept sea. She stubs out the cigarette with a savage twist, breaking the white cylinder in half. She had only taken two or three puffs at it, obviously one of those smokers who take more pleasure in the lighting than the inhaling. "We simply require some guidance, Leif. Some information. For instance, are you aware of any new policy with regard to violence in psi-discs? Are we right in assuming that CBS wants to make a new range of violent discs for general release?" She looks at me carefully as she speaks to see how I react to the question, but I've got enough control over my emotions not to be caught as easily as that. I shrug and she laughs again, a deep throaty sound that sets the silk rustling once more. Yeah, I know, I'm staring. "I suppose it was a little naive of me to expect you to tell me company secrets, wasn't it?" "I guess so. Why are you suddenly taking such an interest in the psi-disc business?" "It's not a sudden interest, we've always felt that they exert too much of an influence, especially on children and those who aren't as intelligent as, well.....as you and I, for instance. The ones who are easily influenced. In the past the Government has been quite firm about what can go into the discs, but if their vigilance should slacken, there's no telling what damage might be done." "But what evidence do you have that viewing violent discs can be dangerous?" I ask. She takes another cigarette from her pack and slowly lights it, her eyes on the flickering flame. "We're both too young to remember a time without television, Leif, but we both know that the crime rate soared once televisions became commonplace. There were more rapes, more assaults, more murders. Not in the early days I grant you, but later in the eighties and nineties. As television became more violent, more liberal if you like, there was a corresponding increase in crime. That is a fact." "But at the same time there was a bigger population anyway, and an expanded police force, more crimes being investigated, more statistics kept," I tell her. "I don't think the link between more violence on the television and more violence in society is as strong as you make it sound." "That's like saying there's no proven link between smoking and lung cancer. We all know there is." "But that doesn't stop you smoking, does it?" She blows a perfect smoke ring and watches it drift towards the ceiling, a languid smile on her lips. The smile gets wider and wider and then she laughs again. She seems to be laughing a lot. Maybe she likes me. "You wish, Jack," sneers Ruth. "There is a difference, Leif," she says. "I smoke because I enjoy it, but any damage is confined to myself, arguments about passive smoking notwithstanding. Nobody else gets hurt. But if I watch a violent film or plug into a violent psi-disc and then go out and run someone over in my car or rob them or rape them then there is someone else involved - a victim." For some reason the thought of Helen Gwynne committing rape is incredibly stimulating and it's difficult to get the image out of my mind, especially considering the erotic way she's handling the cigarette. "Point taken," I say. "But it's not my job to say what is and what isn't too violent. That's for the censorship committee to decide." "And if the committee is being unduly influenced, Leif? What then?" "That would be unfair. But again I don't see how that involves me." I get up and refill my tumbler with whisky. She says she doesn't need a refill. She is making me nervous, not because she's giving me a hard time, but because she is so attractive and so selfconfident and yeah, let's face it, she's goddam sexy. I consider making a move but I know how easily that could backfire, she is after all a paid official of the Moral Crusade and probably would not take too kindly to being pawed by a man some fifteen years her senior. I walk over to the window and look out over the Chicago sky line and the moon hanging over it, pure and white. "You're nearing the end of your contract, Leif. One more psi-disc and you can retire, for good. Rich beyond the dreams of most men, far richer than most of us could ever hope to be. When that happens, we'd like you to join us as an adviser, a consultant. Someone who can advise us on how to proceed, to give us information on how the psi-disc corporations work, but more importantly, how the Dreamers work. If we had some understanding of how you Dreamers actually produce the psi-discs, then perhaps we could start to understand how we can stop them from degenerating into cesspits of sex and violence. That's what we want from you, Leif. We want you to join us." That makes sense, I suppose. Most people have a vague idea of how the Dreamers work, but only a handful outside the corporations actually know anything about the technicalities. "Will you help us?" she asks softly, and stubs out her cigarette. "Let me think about it," I say, but in my heart I've already made up my mind, and it's not just the thought of working alongside Helen Gwynne that tempts me. I would relish the opportunity of giving the Moral Crusade the inside track on Louis Aintrell et al. She glides up off the sofa and stands with me at the window, not so close that we're touching, but close enough so that I can smell her perfume. We both stand and look at the stark office towers and there, slap bang in the middle of the skyline, is CBS Tower, the tallest of them all. I've often wondered if Herbie chose the flat because of the view. "I've always envied Dreamers," she says wistfully. "Envied what? The money?" "Of course the money," she says, "but it's more than that. The sheer creativity, the ability to.....I don't know how to explain...it must be like being God, to be able to create whole worlds, characters, and to able to make them doing anything you want. It's like being a writer, producer, director, and actor, all at the same time. You must get such a feeling of power. I took the test myself, but of course nothing came of it. How many is it that actually pass the test?" "I dunno. A couple in every million, I guess." All the psi-disc corporations hold ability tests on a regular basis, trawling through the population for those with the talent to be Dreamers. There's no shortage of applicants, of course, not with the prospects of virtually unlimited wealth, and the rest of the perks. Most take the test when they're still in their teens, but if you fail once there's no point in taking it again. It's like having your IQ measured, it's not something you can change, not markedly anyway. The test is actually quite simple. They strap the headset on and then ask you to visualise things. They start off asking for something simple, like a horse. Then they tell you to change its colour, the to have it walk, then run. Then they ask you to imagine another animal, a black dog, say, and then they'll ask you to make the horse disappear at the same time as the dog barks. They begin with simple things like that, then gradually increase the degree of difficulty until you're holding several characters in your head all speaking at once. Most don't even get behind the dog stage, they just don't have firm enough control over their imagination. Try it yourself. Close your eyes and think of a black dog. Now stop thinking about it. Yeah, difficult isn't it? Now matter how you try to shut out the image of the dog, it keeps coming back. That's the difference between Dreamers and the rest of the world - when the Dreamers want the dog to go, it stays gone. "Cats are harder," Ruth chips in. Yeah, cats are harder. "You're so lucky," says Helen. "It has its drawbacks," I reply. She doesn't understand. "I can't think of any," she says. She rests her hands on the window sill and leans forward so that her lips are only inches away from the glass. Her breath starts to condense, misting up her reflection. "It's a question of reality. Perception and reality," I say. For some reason I want to explain it to her, to tell her what I really should have told the company shrink. "Everything you perceive as being real is filtered through your five senses. You see it, hear it, smell it, taste it, and you feel it. Before psi-discs you could either watch television or a movie - either way you viewed it through only two of your senses,, sight and hearing. A few producers experimented with vibrating seats to give the sensation of movement and a couple of oddballs tried releasing smells in the cinema, but they never got anywhere. The reason the psi-discs are so successful is that you experience all five simultaneously. And so long as the Dreamer is good, whatever you take from the psi-disc appears real." She nods. "The Dreamers produce reality, which is great. You make Dreams for other people." "Sure, and once you take off your headset, you are back in your own reality. You dip in and out of the discs with no blurring between the two. Which is fine for you and the rest of the population." She turns to look at me, eyes narrowed. "But it's not fine for you?" I shake my head. "Dreamers have such a rigid control of what they imagine that perceived reality and real reality start to intermingle. We get so used to creating reality for other people that our brains can start to play tricks on us. Instead of examining reality through its five senses, it starts to take shortcuts." "You mean you see things?" I laugh at that, especially as Ruth has padded up behind me and is rubbing her ears against the backs of my legs. "You'd better believe it, kid," she purrs. "We all see things," I say. "It's a matter of degree." I point at the moon. "Look at the moon, for instance, suspended in the sky. But we both know that we are whirling around the sun at thousands of miles an hour, and the moon is moving around us. But we perceive it to be hanging there. And it's even more complicated than that, because by the time the light from the moon reaches our eyes, it's already moved. Now look at the stars. Each one we see as a bright point of light, but that's just a matter of perception. The stars themselves are millions upon millions of miles away, so far away that it takes light millions of years to get to us. So it's perfectly possible that the star itself burnt out thousands of years ago, but because the light is still getting here we perceive that the star exists. And the reverse applies to the blackness between the stars. There might be stars in those spaces that have recently been created, but the light won't get here for millions of years. So the stars that you see tonight might no longer exist, and the ones that do exist you can't see. Which is reality, and which is your perception of reality?" She looks suitably confused, and now so am I. "But that applies to all of us, Leif. We all have to filter our surroundings through our senses." "Of course we do. But that means that everybody has their own sense of what is real and what isn't. Everything we experience is based on a series of assumptions and approximations. We see the stars so we assume they are there. We perceive that the moon is still even though we know it is hurtling through space. You'd be surprised just how many of your senses are dependent on assumptions. Try telling the difference between whisky and brandy with your eyes closed, or see if you can tell the difference between an apple and a pear by taste alone. Most people can't. You just assume that an apple will taste like an apple, and so on. It's the brain's responsibility to gather all the information, and then to use logic and assumption to put together the overall picture. So your view of reality depends on the way your brain processes the information. Take ten eyewitnesses to an accident and ask them to describe what happened and you'll get ten different versions - ask any traffic cop." Ruth butts my left knee with her head and purrs. "You're gonna confuse her, you know," she says. "Her eyes are starting to mist over." I look at Helen Gwynne's gorgeous blue eyes but they don't seem to me to be misting over. Maybe Ruth is jealous. "You wish, Jack." Helen brushes a strand of her straight blond hair away from her forehead and with a flick of her neck sends a wave of yellow over her shoulder where it sways and ripples. "But I still don't see how that causes Dreamers such problems," she says, frowning. "OK, it's because your brain makes assumptions based on past experience. My brain makes assumptions based on the creative bit of my mind. And part of the creative bit lies in the subconscious, where I don't have any influence over it. The more I use my conscious mind to create alternative realities, then the more my subconscious mind does the same." This is exactly the sort of conversation I should have had with Archie Walker, it would have given him enough to fill a dozen textbooks, I'm sure. I'm not even sure why I'm opening up to Helen Gwynne. Maybe it's because she's no threat to me or my contract. "Maybe it's the eyes," says Ruth. Helen's eyes (they are a beautiful shade of blue) open wider. "But that's madness," she says quietly, her hand up against her cheek, the five scarlet-painted nails sharp against her skin. "Yeah," I agree, "that's what it is. That's why so many Dreamers don't get to finish their contracts. They go mad. They see things that aren't there. Their subconscious minds start creating their own version of reality." "Like what? What happens?" "Sometimes it's simple things like tastes getting mixed up, or smells not being right. That's how it starts. Then you start to see things. You look at a chair and you see a chair and then you look away and when you look back it's a rhinoceros, until you concentrate on it and then it becomes a chair again. It usually happens when your conscious mind is occupied on something else. In really bad cases concentrating isn't enough, and the subconscious reality becomes every bit as real as the actual reality, if you see what I mean. And when you get to that stage, it's usually too late." "That really happens?" "Yeah," I say. "It happens. More often than not, it happens. Soon after I'd laid down my second psi-disc I met a Dreamer called Willie Corriere, just by chance I saw him using his black chip-card in a bar and I started talking to him. Every so often he would say something to the space next to him and glare at it. I asked him what he was doing and he told me that my friend kept interrupting him. There was nobody there and when I told him that he started swearing and shouting, directing his anger at me. I calmed him down eventually with the aid of a bottle of whisky and that's when I found out what the Corporation neglects to tell first-time Dreamers. Willie had got so good at creating characters that he did it subconsciously, and he did it so well that they formed part of his reality. He had no way of knowing whether a person was his creation or a 'real' person. Willie was going mad and he was taken into a Corporation rest home six months later, two-thirds of the way through his contract." "What about you?" "What do you mean, do you mean do I see things? The answer is yes, every now and again." "But how do you stop yourself going mad? How do you keep a grip on real reality as you keep calling it?" I smile and look at Ruth who gives me the Cat Smile back, her head tilted to one side, her eyes narrowed and amused. There is a limit to how much I'll tell this woman, and we've just reached it. Ruth is my secret, and she has to stay that way. Ruth is my safety valve, she keeps me sane. Through her I can determine what is, and what isn't, real. Anything, or anybody, which reacts to her in any way does not exist. And she is always 100 per cent honest with me. If I ask her if something is the product of my imagination she will tell me and she will tell the truth. Ruth came into my life before I got to the stage where I was seeing things, well, major things anyway. I was already losing my grip on taste and smell, and colours would occasionally shift, but I wasn't seeing non-real people. And even now, after nine psi-discs, I have my subconscious creativity under control, with just the occasional slips. But I can't tell Helen Gwynne any of that, so I wave the glass of Japanese whisky under her nose and tell her that it's the drink that keeps me on the straight and narrow. She turns away from the window and goes back to the sofa to light her third cigarette. "Do you not realise, Leif, that if the psi-discs can have that much effect on the professionals, the Dreamers, then they must be just as dangerous for the average viewers, especially for children?" "I don't agree. I think it's the same genetic ability to create the psi-discs that makes the Dreamers susceptible to the hallucinations. The average viewer isn't sensitive enough to be affected." "But that's only your theory," she says, and I have to agree with that. "So, will you help us?" she says. "Yes," I say. "But only after I've finished my contract." "Which is when?" "Three weeks, maybe earlier. I'll call you." She gets to her feet again with the rustle of silk. "Promise me one thing," she says. "What's that?" She takes a long pull on her cigarette and inhales the smoke, holding it deep in her lungs before letting it out slowly and sensually, watching me all the time from under lowered lids. "If you come across anything that you think helps the Crusade's case, something that is so important it won't wait, then get in touch with me immediately. Will you promise me that?" I say yes, and I mean it, not because I have a burning urge to spill the beans on CBS Corporation but because if I do turn up anything nasty then I might, just might, need some sort of insurance. She puts the cigarette out in the ashtray and I follow her to the door, my eyes on the sway of her hips. She holds out her hand and I shake it, feeling the pressure of her nails against my flesh and we say goodnight and then she's gone. As the door closes behind her I realise I have been holding my breath. "Nice," I say. "If you like that sort of thing," hisses Ruth, who obviously doesn't. "Are we going out, or what?" * * * There is a hefty bouncer in a stained dinner jacket guarding the entrance to the bar and holding at least a dozen people at bay, most of them in their very best party gear. I make to walk past him and his arm descends like a portcullis, blocking the doorway at neck height. Ruth walks by him, her nose in the air. "We're full, sir," says the bouncer, with the emphasis on the "sir". It's not immediately obvious what has got up his nose, my pullover or the baseball hat, or maybe just the fact that I'm at least twice the age of the rest of the would-be revelers trying to get in to his exclusive establishment. "Sorry," he says, as an afterthought. I fish into my wallet and show him the black Corporation chip-card. His eyebrows threaten to leap off his forehead and he takes his arm away. He says "sorry" again and this time he sounds as if he means it. Dreamers are generally big spenders and it would be more than his job is worth to offend one. Ruth is waiting for me inside, sitting on the edge of a darkened dance floor watching the boys and girls at play. Most of them are rich kids with dads in high places, a scattering of drug dealers and young girls on the make, all frantically jerking around the floor as if their lives depended on it. None of them look like Dreamers. How can I tell? It's in the eyes, like with policemen. The music is loud and throbbing, and my head starts to pulse in time with the beat. Ruth pulls a face. "So this is where the beautiful people hang out," she says and I can see that she's not impressed. We skirt the edge of the floor together, changing colour with the overhead lights. There is a long bar to the left of the dance floor with a line of stools, all of them occupied. The men look intense and well groomed and the women look available and expensive and I look out of place. I get a few strange glances. Nobody else seems to be wearing a pullover and a baseball hat. One of the barmen, in a crisp white shirt and black bow tie, catches my eye and I ask for a Kumagai malt and ice. I hand him the chip-card, which turns a few heads at the bar. Suddenly I become more than just a guy in a funny hat. I sip the drink and wander along the bar towards a semi-circle of booths beyond the dance floor, hidden in the gloom. Ruth walks ahead, taking care not to bump into anyone, her ears alert, eyes flicking from side to side, in hunting mode. There are two of them in the booth at the far right, both in their teens with faraway looks in the eyes, as if they're not giving their full attention to the world around them. As if they know of a better world. One of them is tall with shoulder length yellow hair and a faint blond shadow of a moustache that is speckled with a white powder. He is sniffing a lot and keeps reaching up to pinch his nostrils. The other is a good head shorter, also blond, but his hair is curly, like a Greek god's, and he is pretty in a girlish way. The two of them are giggling with a couple of bimbos in low-cut dresses and lots of gold jewellery but it's clear that the girls are just there for decoration. I stand and watch for a while, toying with my drink, with Ruth sitting by my side, until the taller of the two notices me. He looks up aggressively and sniffs, reaching up to brush his powder-crusted nose. "Hey man, get your face out of my space," he says. "A poet," says Ruth. "A veritable poet." I take my black chip-card out of my back pocket and show it to him and he looks as surprised as the bouncer. "Leif Ableman," I say. "Can I join you?" The two youngsters look at each other and then back at me. "Leif Ableman?" says the tall one. "The Leif Ableman?" says the short one. "Good grief," says Ruth. "Yeah," I say. "Can I talk with you guys?" "Sure, sure," says the tall one and waves the bimbos away. "We'll catch you girls later," he says with a total lack of conviction. They give me a stony look as they move off. They do not seem happy. "Put anything you want on our tab," the tall boy shouts and the girls cheer up, but it is still clear that I am not their flavour of the month. "They obviously don't know who Leif Ableman is," purrs Ruth. "Sit, sit," says the short one, who introduces himself as Robbie Menzies. "And I'm Rick Mcgee," says the one with long hair. I've heard of both of them, Robbie has laid down two discs, one about a rock band on tour and the other a gritty police drama, and Rick has done three, one of which went platinum. "Hey man, your Macbeth was the greatest," says Rick, sniffing again. "They made us do it at school and I thought it was gonna be a bummer but it was out of sight. That was about six months before I took the test myself. I'm gonna try and do one of the classics myself, maybe Hamlet, what do you think?" "Go for it," I say. "Hard work or what?" asks Robbie. "Yeah," I say. "The Macbeth one took months of research, and you've got less flexibility when it comes to plot and characterisation, but that can be a good thing too. You should try it.....it's good discipline." The two of them nod enthusiastically and Robbie orders another round of drinks. "You want some coke?" asks Rick, and he doesn't mean the fizzy stuff. "Thanks but no thanks," I say. "Ever try it?" he asks and I tell him I've tried everything there is to try and that on my list of best experiences the white powder comes less than half way up and that I can think of at least three other pastimes that end in nosebleeds which are twice as much as fun. I smile when I say it so that he knows I'm joking because I don't want to piss him off. He laughs and says yeah, he knows what I mean. "When are you two guys gonna be laying down your next discs?" I ask. "Four months," says Rick. "Five," says Robbie. "You?" "Less than three weeks," I reply, "it's my tenth" and the two of them do a double take, looking at each other with open mouths and then back to me. "Wow!" says Robbie. "I've never met a Dreamer who's done nine." And I've never met anyone above the age of six who says Wow. Ruth looks at me wide-eyed. "Did he just say Wow?" she asks, and shakes her head sorrowfully. "Hey man, you should be celebrating," says Rick, and running the back of his hand under his nose. "One more and you're home free." "Wow!" says Robbie again. "I'll celebrate after the event," I say. The fresh drinks arrive and I take mine off the waitress' tray and raise it in salute. "To sleep," I say. "Perchance to dream," we all chorus, and drink each other's health. It's an old joke. "What's it going to be about?" asks Robbie and Rick jabs him in the ribs with his elbow, spilling his drink. "It's bad luck to ask," says Rick. "You know better than that." Robbie looks shamefaced and apologises, but I say no, it's OK, and I give him the bare bones of the plot. Hell, it's not as if anyone can steal a dream. They both say that it sounds good and wish me well, but I can see that there is something on their minds, something they want to tell me but don't know how to raise the subject, like maybe there's something unsavoury stuck to my upper lip, or more likely they've heard what's been happening to the other Dreamers. We sit and laugh and joke and drink, and twice Rick takes a small gold tube from his shirt pocket and uses a small gold spoon to sniff cocaine. Nobody pays him any attention. Both times he offers it to Robbie but he turns it down, maybe out of respect to me, I don't know. Every now and again one or the other would lapse into silence and look off into the middle distance as if occupied with some weighty mental arithmetic and after a few seconds would snap back as if awaking from sleep, and a couple of times Rick would jump as if somebody had prodded him in the small of the back. I wonder how they managed to keep themselves sane, what with dreaming and taking drugs, and then I have a flash, a sudden vision of the three of us sitting here, each with our own individual guardians of our sanity. Me with my bobcat with hazel eyes, and Robbie and Rick with whatever their minds had conjured up, as real to them as Ruth is to me. "How do you keep sane?" asks Rick, as if he's been reading my mind. "What do you mean?" I say, not sure if I understand him. He looks to the right and to the left and then juts his head forward so that it's just inches from mine. He grins and it's an evil smile, but his eyes are warm. Watering and bloodshot, but friendly. "Sometimes, Leif, I see things. Things that aren't there." He laughs, a jerky, uneven sound that sets my teeth on edge. "And sometimes I don't see things that I know are there." Robbie looks very uneasy and seems unsure of how to react to Rick. Maybe he's worried that I'll report him to the Corporation shrink and that his contract will be killed. Robbie smiles nervously at me and says that Rick is spaced out and that he doesn't know what he's saying. Rick slams his fist down on the table, rattling our glasses, and tells his friend to mind his own business. "Hey, stay cool," I say. "I know what you mean, it's OK. It happens to us all." "I know that," says Rick. "We all know that. But what they don't tell us is how to stay sane. Why the hell won't they tell us?" He leans forward and his head thuds against the table top. He begins to bang his head again and again against the hard wood surface. Considering the amount of powder he's been pushing up his nostrils, I doubt if he's feeling any pain. I put my hand on his shoulder and shake him softly but he ignores me. Robbie shrugs. "He gets like this a lot," he says. "We all do," I reply. "It's just that we show it in different ways." Robbie looks grateful, like a hungry dog that's been thrown a meaty bone. "You mean, you see things too?" Ruth growls, deep and low, the sound of a piece of wood being rubbed against tree bark. "Careful Leif," she says. "Careful what you say." I know what she means. I don't know these guys well enough to start spilling my guts to them. Just because they wear their hearts on their sleeves is no reason for me to open up to them, at least not about Ruth. "You have to keep a grip on your senses, Robbie," I say, choosing my words carefully. "You have to know what is real, and what isn't. And you have to hold onto that." He closes his eyes and shakes his head. "God, I wish it was as simple as that," he says. So do I. "Try and get someone to act as a benchmark," I say. "Someone who can tell you what is and what isn't reality. Someone who can tell you when you are dreaming." And that is as close as I am going to get to opening up about Ruth, my benchmark. My pearls of wisdom don't seem to make him feel any easier, but Rick stops banging his head against the table, thank God, and sits back in his seat, watching the lights above the dance floor and sniffing. The couple in the booth next to us, a young man with slick-backed hair in a dark blue Italian suit and a blonde girl in a tight lime-green body stocking, sit with their hands clasped on the table, wearing psi-disc headsets and spaced out grins on their faces. Robbie sees me looking at them. "It's killing the art of conversation," he laughs. "Yeah," I agree. "It's killing everything. Why bother living if you can buy dreams instead?" He nods. "I thought of getting a dog," he says quietly. "A dog?" "Yeah, a pet. I figured it might help, you know? Like they used to have seeing-eye dogs in the days before transplants. Maybe the dog would tell me." I don't know what to say to him and I feel sort of embarrassed. Rick slaps him on the back. "I've got a great idea," he says. "What," says Robbie, and he sounds wary. "I'll buy you a dog," he says. "And we'll call it Stay. Great name for a dog. Every time you want it to come you'll have to shout 'Come here, Stay. Come here.' He'll soon be as crazy as we are." He starts to giggle and Robbie pushes him away, a look of disgust on his face, but after a while he begins to laugh, too. Our glasses are empty so I wave at a waitress and she staggers over on four inch high heels and pushes her cleavage in my face. I guess the barman told her about the chip-card. She looks me full in the eye and pouts her lips and in a husky voice asks me what I'd like. Just a hunch, but I reckon that if I play my cards right I could have her. Rick reaches over and runs the back of his hand over her breasts and she makes to swat it away with her tray and then she notices his chip-card on the table in front of him and she points her impressive bosom at him full on like a battleship aiming its guns. Fickle bitch. "How much?" he asks, looking her up and down, following her curves with his eyes. She's pretty, in a tarty way, with big, trusting eyes and long lashes and wavy, chestnut brown hair. "I beg your pardon?" she says, but it's obvious that she knows what he means. Rick leans over the table and plays with his chip-card, flexing it backwards and forwards. He smiles and raises his eyebrows and sniffs. "You," he says. "And me," he says. "In a big bed with satin sheets," he says. She breaths in sharply and we all watch her breasts rise and fall. "What sort of girl do you think I am?" she asks, but we already know what sort of girl she is, all we're doing now is fixing the price. "Ten thousand," he says quietly. "Twenty five," she says, totally unfazed about selling herself in public. "Fifteen," says Rick, even though it doesn't matter one way or another what the final price is because the Corporation will pick up the tab. "Twenty two," she says and Rick leans back in his seat. "Naw," he says. "I've changed my mind. Get us another round of drinks instead." She doesn't believe he's serious and stands there smiling, pursing her lips and holding her chin up so we can see what a long, smooth, sensuous neck she has, and how it flows unflawed down to her soft, inviting cleavage. "Behave, Leif," says Ruth archly. "You're old enough to be her father." She jumps up next to Robbie and sits there cleaning her whiskers. "OK, fifteen," she says. "Fifteen is OK." Rick waves her away, and the smile has gone from his face. "You had your chance, love, and you blew it. Run along and get us some drinks, will you?" She glares at him, pure hatred, and then turns on her heels and clicks away, and we all watch her backside writhe under her tight skirt. "You are an animal," says Robbie. "Huh," says Ruth, and I know what she means. Animals don't treat each other like that, not with such contempt. That's the prerogative of us humans. "Silly bitch," sneers Rick, and Ruth gives him a warning growl. "But a great figure. Maybe I'll change my mind later." He helps himself to another blast of white powder and his eyes get the same glassy look as the two kids plugged into the psi-disc. I wonder which is the more addicted, and whether the dreams or the drug has the more potent side effects. "How did you get to be a Dreamer?" Robbie asks me, and I shrug. "Took the tests, like everyone else." "But you're...." He hesitates, unsure what to say, but I get the drift, "Older than usual," I finish for him and he nods. "Yeah," he says. "No offense, but...." "That's OK," I say. "I never set out to be a Dreamer. I was a novelist." "Books?" says Robbie in amazement and Ruth snorts at his deductive powers. "Yeah, believe it or not." "There's no money in books, surely?" "Not now there isn't, no. But there used to be. I was good enough to make a decent living at it, before psi-discs came on the market. By then I had two ex-wives and seven figure alimony payments to make and my agent told me to take the test. I don't think either of us thought I'd get anywhere, but I was a natural." "What's it like, writing books?" he asks. He looks really impressed and that surprises me because he's a Dreamer, a real talent using pure imagination to build fantasy worlds, and he wants to know what it's like putting words on paper. Weird. "Hard work, a real grind," I answer, my head full of memories of hours sitting in front of a VDU when the words wouldn't come, when the pictures would be in my head but I simply couldn't find the words to describe them, when I knew what the characters wanted to say to each other but I couldn't write the dialogue. Wordless days would turn into wordless evenings and then I'd turn to the bottle. Other days the words would pour onto the page and sometimes that was worse, because the fictional world that I created was always so much better than the one I lived in. The women were prettier and more loving, the conversations always wittier, the settings always perfect, so much so that I began to resent the imperfections of the real world. And that made me turn to the bottle, too. "Let's face it, Leif, you were just looking for an excuse to drink," says Ruth and I want to argue with her and tell her that she's wrong, that I was just a victim of the constant battle between perception and reality, an innocent bystander, but what the hell, maybe I am just fooling myself. Robbie is still hanging on my every word while Rick has slumped back in his seat and is squinting at the flashing lights. "It's a totally different skill to Dreaming. When you're laying down a dream you have to hold the whole thing in your head, but when you're writing you have to do it bit by bit, with more explanation, more descriptions." "More depth," says Robbie, and he's right. More depth. Dreams are the big sellers, the mega money earners, but they're shallow. They're in three dimensions but they have no depth. You plug in, it's real, you pull out, it's gone. The experience is vivid and moving, but it doesn't require any thought or analysis. I'd forgotten that, how I used to treat the psi-disc Corporations with the same contempt that Rick had shown the waitress. How I swore I'd never prostitute the talent I thought I had. Yeah, well that was then and this is now. My ex-wives lawyers want cheques, not unpublished manuscripts. The waitress comes back with murder in her eyes and puts the drinks down on the table with enough force to register on the Richter Scale, but Rick doesn't even notice her. My drink tastes metallic, at least the first mouthful does but the second seems OK. "I tried writing a novel while I was researching my second disc," says Rick and he sounds as if he's ashamed, as if he's just told me he had a social disease. "I never finished it." "You should," I say. "Mostly it's just a matter of sticking at it, getting the words down on paper, and then correcting it and polishing it until it's right. What's it they say, ninety five perspiration and five per cent inspiration?" "Yeah, the exact opposite of Dreaming," says Rick, his eyes still fixed on the flashing lights. We all nod in agreement. It doesn't matter how hard you work at being a Dreamer, you can either do it or you can't, working at it doesn't help. Sure, you can improve the quality by researching and checking locations and so on, but at the end of the day you still have to have the genetic make-up, the gift, or whatever the hell it is that separates Dreamers from the rest of the world. "Has the Corporation been asking you to beef up the content of your next psi-disc?" I ask Robbie. "Beef up?" he says. "Yeah, you know, more sex and violence, that sort of thing." "Yeah, my minder has been suggesting that I make them more realistic, let the viewer take part rather than just observing, so that they get in close. And not to be inhibited by the regulations." "By the censors, you mean?" "Yeah, he hinted that the law might be changing soon and that we should get ready to take advantage of it." "Full sex?" "He didn't say that, no." "And killings?" "Killings have always been OK, you know that. But the viewer's not allowed to participate, that's not going to change, is it?" "I dunno. What about you, Rick?" Rick seems to snap back to reality with a jerk and I wonder what he was looking at and if it was real or something that his mind had created. "Say what?" "We were just talking about sex and violence," I tell him. Rick raises his glass. "Here's to it," he says. "Have you been told to put a bit more sex and violence into your next disc?" "For sure," he says and drinks noisily and then wipes his lip with his hand and then starts to massage the bridge of his nose. There are flecks of blood below his nostrils. "They told me the Corporation would prefer it if I went a bit further than usual. And my stuff has always been on the edge of good taste, you might say. The last one was touch and go with the censors, but they want me to let myself rip on the next one. I'm looking forward to it. That waitress is giving me a few good ideas already." "Rick, who was it who told you to let yourself rip?" "Louis Aintrell of course," he says. "The Big Man himself. Right from the top. Along with the promise of a big bonus if I come up with the goods." So there it is. Helen Gwynne was right, the Corporation is banking on a change in the regulations and Louis Aintrell is the sort who would quite happily engineer a change in the law if it meant a boost in ratings and profits. "What about you," asks Rick. "Are they trying to get you to do the same?" I shake my head. "They either reckon I'm too old or too close to retirement," I say. "Rubbish," says Ruth. "You can go on for ever." She looks annoyed, her claws make a slow scratching noise on the chair as she clenches and unclenches them. A frown suddenly crosses Robbie's face and he looks 10 years older. "You don't think there's any connection between the new instructions and the Dreamers who died, do you?" he asks. "I dunno," I say. "What have you heard?" "Just that there have been a few unexplained deaths among Dreamers, that's all. The rumour is that there's something wrong with the equipment but you never know. I don't trust the suits, not one bit." Rick snorts but I'm not sure if it's a sign of disbelief or if the caked powder is blocking his nasal passages. "It's not the equipment," he says. "Dreamers are dying all over, its not just happening at CBS." "So what do you think it is?" I ask. Rick leans over the table and juts out his chin. "If you ask me, there's somebody out there with a grudge against Dreamers. A nutter, a psycho. They'll catch him before long. Or her." "Come off it, Rick," says Robbie scornfully. "The Dreamers died in the studio, they weren't shot or knifed. Total brain death is what I heard." "Well, I for one refuse to let it spoil my life," says Rick. "I've got four months to go and I'm gonna live it like there was no tomorrow." He reaches for his cocaine supply and shovels a spoonful up each nostril and sniffs in short bursts. "If he keeps on like that there isn't going to be a tomorrow," says Ruth. "How much did she say?" says Rick. "Fifteen," says Robbie. Rick sighs and sniffs. "I reckon she might just be worth it. What do you think?" he asks me. "Up to you," I say. "You won't know till afterwards." You never do. I once got Herbert to fix me up with an Arabian princess and that set me back half a million dollars. Correction, it cost the Corporation half a million dollars. And no, she wasn't worth it. I stayed with them for another round of drinks and then I left them to it because I'd found out what I wanted to know. The couple at the next table were still locked into their psi-disc, inane grins on their faces and blank eyes. The bouncer wished me a good night as I went out, Ruth at my heels. I hail a cab and allow Ruth to climb in the back first. There is a psi-disc player there and a selection of short-playing discs, from five minutes up to half an hour. The shorter ones were the experience type, you know, try your hand at sky-diving, skiing, scuba diving, that sort of thing. It's getting to the stage now where the Corporations are trying to fill up every minute of the population's spare time. I'm sure if they could manage it they'd like nothing more than to see everyone hooked up 24 hours a day. Scary. * * * Ruth wakes me up, gently butting me with her nose and licking my cheek with her sandpaper tongue. "Wake up, you'll be late," she says when I eventually open my eyes. She is standing on the bed, front paws on the pillow, looking down at me and breathing her hot breath on my face. She puts her head on one side and I can see the tip of her tongue protruding from between her white teeth. I pull one of my arms from under the quilt and ruffle the fur between her eyebrows and she closes her eyes and purrs. I grope my way to the bathroom and tell the shower to keep the water cold until it blows the cobwebs from my skull. "Why so tired?" she asks. She's lying on the white bath mat and watching me shower, like she always does, not staring, looking away when I look at her as if I was the last thing on her mind. "I dunno. I didn't have too much too drink. I think maybe it's the psi-discs they're putting me through, there's lots of stress. Nervous tension, I suppose." "Why don't you tell them to wait a while before doing the next one?" I tell her that's not possible, there's too much at stake, and besides, I want to know what happened. I want to know why. I pace up and down the flat as I towel myself dry and she walks with me in silence, following my wet footprints and keeping her head low, her nose just an inch above the carpet. Helen Gwynne's card catches my eye and I ask the phone to get her and I tell it that I want visual. It connects and then she's on the screen, her blond hair shining and her eyes wide. "Nice to see you, Leif," she says and I step forward because I'm not sure how much of me is showing on her screen and I'm well past the age where my body drives women wild. These days it just drives them away, though it's amazing how they always come running back when you show them the Corporation chip-card. "How are you today?" I ask and she says she's fine and then pauses. obviously wondering why I've called her. "About our conversation last night," I say and she nods expectantly, her hair rippling and flowing like yellow water. "I want to help," I say. I tell her I've got some information for her and that I'd like to see her later tonight. "When?" she asks and I say I'll call her later because I don't know how long I'll be in the studio. She smiles and says she'll look forward to it and cuts the connection and I feel a dull ache in my groin. * * * Max is waiting for me in the studio along with Herbie and a cluster of technicians gathered around one of the VDUs. The technician with the Deputy badge walks over and inspects my scalp and says that it'll do, no need to shave me again. Max puts his hand on my shoulder in a fatherly gesture and asks me if I'm OK and I smile and say yes but I don't trust him any more because if Louis Aintrell is behind these discs then I'm damn sure Max knows what's going on as well. "I'm raring to go, Max," I say but maybe I'm laying it on a bit thick because he looks at me suspiciously and asks if I'm sure. "I'm fine, Max. Honest. Tell me about the disc." He thrusts his hands deep into the pockets of his white lab coat which makes me suspect that he's got something to hide. "The Dreamer's name is Jimmy Kratzner, just 16 years old." I knew that already because Herbie had told me in Manila, but I hadn't realised he was so young. "Sixteen?" I query. "That's right," says Max. "This was his fifth." "Hell, he started young." At one psi-disc every six months he must have done his first one when he was 13. "He was on our youth programme," says Max, which means it was Kratzner's parents who pushed him into it. What sort of 13-year-old has any sort of grip on his imagination, for God's sake? "He was good," continues Max, as if excusing himself. "We had really high hopes for him." "Yeah, I'm sure. Subject?" "It's hard to define," he says, avoiding my eyes like the company shrink. "It doesn't fit into any of the normal categories. I suppose fantasy is the nearest description I can think of." "Fantasy?" Anger flares because I know there's something he's not telling me. "What the hell do you mean by fantasy, Max? What the hell is fantasy? Sexual fantasy, you mean? Violent fantasy? Rape? Murder? What exactly was going through his head before he died, Max?" I realise I'm shouting. All the technicians have turned away from their VDU to look at me and Max is standing with his arms crossed defensively across his chest and there is a strange look in his eyes, not fear, not anger, a sort of hurt look as if I'm accusing him unjustly. He starts to speak but then just mumbles something and raises his hands and then drops them again. I grab him by the arm and pull him into the booth with me and close the door behind him. He sits down on the leather couch, his shoulders sagging and his head down. "Max," I say. "We go back a long way. I need your help now more than ever before. You have to tell me what's going on." "I can't," he says quietly. I put my hands on his shoulders and shake him gently. "You must," I say and when he lifts his head to look at me I know that he's going to tell me, I can see it in his eyes. Acceptance. And pity. "I'll be out if I tell you anything," he says. "And you know what that means." Yeah, I know. No pension, no salary, no housing, no medical benefits, and probably a blacklisting thrown in. The Corporation carries a lot of weight and Max could end up never working again, at least not in a job that would support his lifestyle. "If you don't tell me, I could end up like the other three CBS Dreamers," I say. I feel his shoulders move as he shrugs. I put my face up close to his. "They can't hear, Max. We're alone. You don't have to tell me anything, I'll do all the talking. All I want is a yes or a no. Understand?" He nods. His lower lip is trembling, maybe fear at the risk he was taking or shame at being treated like a child. Whatever, I'd won, I could feel it. "Aintrell is pushing the Dreamers to churn out more sex and violence, yes?" Max nods. "And the three Dreamers who died were doing what Aintrell wanted, yes?" Another nod. "The Corporation knew that Dreamers had died at other psi-disc studios?" "Yes," he says quietly. I shake him, hard, and his head whips back, his chin up. "Well why the hell didn't somebody tell me? Why didn't you tell me, Max?" "Because you wouldn't do it, that's why. Your psychological profile showed you wouldn't be up to it. There was no point." "That explains why I wasn't asked to lay down porno psi-discs for CBS, but it doesn't explain why I wasn't told about what was going on." I'm angry but I keep my voice level and low. "Aintrell was worried that you might go running to the authorities. The legislation hasn't changed yet, but it will be, he plans to make sure of that. And he didn't want you running around telling everybody." "But he must have realised that I would find out as soon as I plugged into the psi-discs?" "We didn't know how much was on the discs, how far the Dreamers had got before they died. Leif, it was a secret, you must understand. Aintrell is putting a lot of money about and calling in a lot of favours to get the law changed. He can't afford to let the cat out of the bag too early. He's invested millions in this." Cat out of the bag makes me think of Ruth. She has stayed outside the glass booth and is scratching her ear as she watches me. "You should have told me before, Max," I say, and let go of his shoulders. I lean backwards against the glass and look at him. He looks broken, like a puppet who's strings have been cut. Strings that lead to the grasping hands of Louis Aintrell. "Max," I say, and he looks up. "Max, is Aintrell's dirty dealing anything to do with the deaths?" "We don't know," he says quietly. "I swear to God we don't know. What we do know is that all the Dreamers who died were working on the new psi-discs." "What about the other psi-disc companies? What about the deaths there?" "We don't know, but I'd guess so, yes." "But that would mean that Aintrell's secret wasn't very secure, wouldn't it?" I snapped. "It could be that they're applying their own pressure to get the law changed. The market for soft porn, and the harder stuff, is worth hundreds of millions, maybe billions. And even without Aintrell's influence it would change eventually. Just look at how the laws have softened over the years. First soft drugs became accepted, now hard drugs are being legalised and Government controlled. No one gets sent to prison for petty theft anymore, or simple assault. Rapists get electronically tagged and confined to their homes, it's only murderers or armed robbers who get put behind bars these days. Leif, society is becoming more flexible, more understanding. More tolerant. Aintrell is simply anticipating a trend, that's all. And so are the other companies." "So where does this leave me, Max?" "What do you mean?" "Now that I know what Aintrell is up to, what happens to me?" "That's up to you, Leif, but whatever you do you must keep me out of it." There is a pleading look in his eyes that makes me feel sick to the stomach. I thought I knew the man, I thought I trusted him. "Aintrell is going to force me to do my last disc, isn't he?" I ask, even though I know the answer. "Of course," says Max. "Even though it means I could die?" Max nods. The question is, of course, is that what Aintrell wants? Does he want me dead so that the Corporation doesn't have to pay out on my contract, or because he wants his secret to be safe? Or does he really want me to find out what or who is killing the Dreamers so that he can keep stockpiling his new range of discs for the day when the law is changed? "You have to plug into the third disc," says Max. "You have to find out what happened to the other three so that we can make sure it doesn't happen to you when you lay down yours. You have no choice." I nod and say that I agree. Something inside me has just stopped caring. I feel numb. He slides off the couch and stands in front of me, looking as if he wants to say something, and then he shakes his head and goes out of the booth. I follow him and change into the smock behind the screen in silence. There is nothing I want to say. To anyone. Even Ruth keeps her distance, but she watches me all the time. At least she cares. "You'd better believe it," she says quietly as she prowls around the studio, her stub of a tail swishing in the air. One of the white-coated assistants, not the Deputy, a young, tall guy with an untidy mop of red hair and two days growth of reddish beard, helps me lie down and attaches the headset. He goes out and the glass darkens to grey. I hear Max's voice behind me, slowly counting down. Five... four... three.... two... one.... It is........ ........dark, very dark. It takes me a second or so to realise that it's not pitch black, I begin to see faint stars in the sky above me. There is no moon and the pinpricks of light are few and far between as if it is the sky of another planet, a planet with few neighbours, at the edge of the galaxy. I am wearing a robe of some coarse, hairy material that scratches my skin, horsehair or something. It makes me want to itch all over and makes me aware of the fact that I am naked below the robe. It has a hood that is pulled well over my head so that I can only see straight ahead and I have to turn from side to side to widen my angle of vision. I look down and I can see simple leather sandals on my bare feet, smooth and well-worn. I am standing on a path made up of tiny, grey stones that winds through a forest of black stunted trees, twisted and misshapen as if deformed by tortuous weather or some man-made cataclysm. They are devoid of leaves and the branches are like twisted arms trying to claw at the sky. There is no sound at all, no wind, no night noises. It's as if the Dreamer has been so busy concentrating on the visuals that he's forgotten the sound track but Kratzner is good, very good, so the silence is obviously deliberate. I seem to be alone, but as I slowly turn and look behind me I see a group of robed figures approaching down the path, all wearing the same shapeless garments as mine, heads bowed so that I cannot see their faces, just their peaked hoods. They are walking in single file and it is not until they get up close that I hear their sandals crunching softly into the stony path. The figure in front is holding a wooden torch, the top smeared with burning pitch, and he holds it aloft, high above his head, as if signalling to those behind that they are to follow, but they do not look up. There are a dozen of them following the figure with the torch, and as they pass me the burning pitch throws their shadows onto the ground and they ripple like ghosts. I hear a squeaking noise and turn my hooded head to look back down the path and see two more figures pulling a wooden cart. The cart is old and warped, and its two large wheels are misshapen, swinging against the axle. The figures are almost bent double as they pull it along and their breath forms clouds of vapour in the air around their hoods. I hear them grunting softly with each step as they draw near. There is a large sack lying in the back of the cart, the top tied with a length of thick hemp. The sack seems to move, though it could just be the motion of the cart. I turn again to look back down the path and see a final figure carrying another burning torch. I fall in step behind the cart and follow it along the path. I am totally confused, I have no idea who we are, where we are going or what it is we are supposed to be doing. There has been no explanation, and it is obviously deliberate because Kratzner knows what he's doing. The effect is very disorientating. Nobody speaks to me, I can't even see their faces. All I can see is the back of the rattling cart and the sack. The path twists right and left but the scenery is always the same, bleak and bare and cold. It starts to climb up and two of the figures walk back to help pull the cart but even with four it is still a struggle. I move forward and push the back. As I do I hear a low moan from the sack, the sound of an animal in pain. I put my shoulder against the cart and push hard, my feet slipping against the path because there seems to be no grip on the bottom of the sandals. I look up and at last I can see our destination, an imposing Gothic castle of black stone, standing stark against the skyline, with jagged turrets and sheer walls. It seems to rear above us, thrusting straight out of the ground and up into the sky. There are no windows, not even gaps in the stone for archers to fire through, but there is an entrance, an entrance that looks as if it had been made for a race of giants, ten times the height of a man and wide enough to take six of the carts at once. The entrance is blocked by a massive door of black wood encrusted with metal spikes. There appears to be no way for those inside the castle to look out, but somebody sees the procession approaching because with an eerie screech the huge door begins to swing inwards on rusty hinges. We move slowly through the doorway into a dark, dank courtyard, the wheels of the cart occasionally catching in the gaps between the roughly-hewn flagstones, and then the door grinds closed behind us. The walls surrounding the courtyard seem to go up forever, blank and featureless, and it is only when I tilt my head right back that I can see the small square of night sky far above us. Every few yards around the courtyard blazing torches are mounted into the wall, spitting flames and hissing, but what little light they give out is quickly swallowed by the gloom. The door clunks shut, the sound reverberating around the courtyard and making my stomach quiver. The courtyard has only two doors, the one which has just closed behind us and another, slightly smaller, facing us. The leader of the procession stands in front of it and hammers on it with the bottom of his torch, three times. We hear footsteps, a slow plodding tread of someone climbing stone steps, and then the sound of bolts being drawn back. Something small and black flits silently through the air over our heads. The door is opened by another hooded figure, but his robe is of a scarlet material, the colour of fresh blood. He mumbles at the figure with the torch and together they walk through the doorway, deep in conversation. The rest of the figures follow in single file, except for the four who had been pulling the cart. They pull the sack roughly off the back of the cart and it thuds to the ground. Whatever is inside grunts and then moans. All four grab the sack and together they manhandle it through the door. I follow them. It leads to a narrow hallway off which lead two stairways, one up and one down, both winding so tightly that only half a dozen steps can be seen at any time. We are going down, in darkness because the torch is too far ahead of us to cast any light where we are. I grope for each step with my feet and keep one hand on the damp stone wall as we descend. In front of me I hear the sack bumping down step by step accompanied by small whimpering sounds. Behind me I hear the door shut and the bolts being drawn back, and then there is light on the wall as the last figure, the one with the torch bringing up the rear, follows us. We seem to descend for ever so wherever we are going is well below ground level, deep in the bowels of the earth. I shudder involuntarily, partly because of the cold but mainly because of sense of doom that fills my soul. It's the complete lack of plot or explanation that is so disturbing. Ahead of me I hear another door being opened, then after two twists of the stairway I see it, and I follow the figures with the sack into a stone-walled room that smells musty and airless. The final figure comes in behind me and closes the door. The only illumination comes from the two blazing torches which are reflected in the water dripping down the walls. One of the figures sticks his torch into a metal holder set into the wall, while the other lights two more torches already fixed either side of the door. The ceiling is high, about ten feet above are heads. The room is oblong, about thirty paces long and ten wide, the walls are constructed from big stone blocks and the floor is made of slabs of grey stone, partly covered with damp straw. There are various pieces of equipment around the room and against the walls, equipment made of metal and wood and leather. I recognise a vicious looking rack, and there is what seems to be a large butcher's block with manacles at either end. The wood is cut and scarred and there are places where it has been stained with blood. There is a metal bed with no mattress, instead the base is covered with hundreds of small points, each with a wicked barb on the end. There are other curious contraptions that I have never seen before, but it is clear what they are used for and what this place is. It is a torture chamber. There is a knock on the door and one of the figures opens it. Another figure in a red robe comes in holding a metal bowl containing red-hot coals. He walks across the room, the bowl held almost reverently in both hands, and he places the coals onto a brazier in the corner. There is a pile of coal on the floor and he uses the bowl to scoop up some and place it on top of the live embers, then he takes a large pair of bellows hanging on the wall and blows air noisily through the brazier. It sounds like a giant, laboriously breathing. Still no-one speaks, but everyone seems to know what they are supposed to do. Except me. The four who carried in the sack are standing around it, looking down. One kneels and unties the rope, slowly and methodically, and throws it to one side like a dead snake. The other three grab the bottom of the sack and with a grunt pull hard, spilling out the contents. It is a girl, a very young girl, fifteen or sixteen at the most, barely conscious, her limbs loose, her eyes half open as if she has been drugged. Her mouth opens and closes but no words come out. Her hair is long and dark chestnut in colour, and there are strands of it across her face as she sprawls on the stone floor. She is wearing a simple white dress, stained and dirty from her time in the sack and it clings to her figure, her breasts clearly showing through, and it has ridden high up her thighs showing her long, lean legs. Her skin is light brown as if she is used to being outdoors, playing in the sun, and her legs are smooth and unmarked. She moans and rubs her eyes with the backs of both hands like a child awakening from sleep. She moves her head from side to side and the strands clear away from her face. She is very pretty, her face bears no trace of make up but her lips are full and red and her fearful large green eyes look at us from under thick, jet black lashes. She looks straight at me and something lurches in my stomach. Her eyes dart away from me and panic flashes across her face as she sees the figures around her. She draws her legs up against her chest and the dress moves higher up her thighs. She is naked underneath it. Her eyes still look sleepy and she seems to have trouble keeping them open. She tries to sit up but the effort seems to much for her and she flops back onto the floor with a sigh. Two of the figures who tipped her out of the sack take one of her arms each and they pull her to her feet. They are not gentle and I can see their dirty, yellowing nails bite into her soft tanned flesh. Her knees are still bent and she sags forward, unable to stand. One of the red-robed figures moves forward and stands in front of her. From where I am standing his face his hidden but he is looking straight into her eyes and she can see him. She tries to push away from him but she is held firm, then he raises his hand and slaps her hard across the face, right, then left, and then right again, the three slaps echoing around the cell like pistol shots. She screams and tries to kick out, but her captors pull her out of range and her legs flail uselessly. Her cheeks are bright red now and her eyes are flashing fire. She is wide awake, and struggling, which is obviously what he wants. For the first time she sees the burning brazier and her fearful eyes seem fixed to the glowing coals. "No," she says quietly, "Please, no." They pull her towards the brazier, her bare feet scrabbling against the stone floor. They stand her in front of it and she begins to whimper. "No," she cries. "Please don't. Please don't." Her voice is trembling, her whole body begins to shake. All the figures except for the two in red and the two holding her gather around the brazier in a semi-circle. The tension in my stomach is becoming almost unbearable. It's an intense feeling of apprehension. And fear. And desire. They drag her to the wall and hold her arms up while they attach thick iron manacles to both wrists then they step back, leaving her facing the wall. She pulls one arm and then the other, but the chains are strong and give her little scope for movement. Her arms form a "v" above her head and she has to stand with her heels slightly raised. The effort of being on near tip-toe stretches the backs of her legs and tightens her buttocks and makes her arch her back slightly. She is crying, and between the sobs she keeps repeating "no, no, no." From somewhere a whip is produced, it's about six feet long and made of leather, and it's given to one of the figures in red. He weighs it in his hand as if testing its balance, and then swishes it through the air. Satisfied, he stands behind the girl and spreads his feet shoulder width apart, sizing up the distance between the end if the whip and the girl's back. She hears the movement and looks over her shoulder, her eyes wide and tear-filled. She shakes her head and begs him not to hurt her. The other red robed figure walks in between them and grabs her dress at the neck, pulling it so that it tears, and then he rips it down the middle of her back so that it hangs in two pieces from her arms. Now she is totally exposed, her bare flesh covered in a sheen of sweat. There is not an ounce of fat on her young body, every muscle group is clearly visible under her smooth, brown skin. The man behind her waits, as if taking pleasure from postponing the moment when he will inflict the pain, and then the whip courses through the air and slashes into her skin leaving a footlong welt on her back. She puts her head back and screams, no word, just a howl of pure agony that reverberates around the room as if trapped there with her, unable to escape. He waits until her screams stop, standing behind her with the whip at his side. He waits until she looks over her shoulder again so that the second stroke bites into her skin as she looks into his eyes. The second scream is louder than the first it seems, and longer. He whips her again and she stops yelling, her legs give way and she hangs by her arms, her body flat against the wall. The second red robed figure steps forward and grabs her by the chin, twisting her head back. He peers close to her face and savagely pulls up one of her eyelids with his thumb. She is unconscious. He slaps her across the face but she stays slumped against the wall. He walks over to the rack and from behind it he pulls out a wooden bucket with a rope handle and drags it along the floor to where she is hanging. He picks up the metal bowl that had contained the glowing coals and fills it full of water, then throws it into her face, hard. She gasps and coughs and pushes herself upright, shaking her head as if confused. She jerks around to look at her tormentor and begins to wail again. The figure puts the bowl into the bucket and walks over to the brazier and examines a series of metal rods hanging on nails behind it. He selects one and rams it into the fire. The figure with the whip nods slowly and draws back his arm. There are three thin red welts along her back, an inch apart and parallel to each other. He is an expert. The whip flashes through the air and cracks against her skin and she howls and wrenches her arms against the manacles. Now there are four welts. He turns and holds out the whip to the figure in the grey robe at the end of the semicircle and steps back. The man runs his fingers along the length of the leather, as if enjoying the feel of it, then he slowly runs the tip of it down the crest of her spine to her backside. She squirms, trying to escape its probing, then he slashes it across her shoulders, overlapping one of the marks already there. This time there is no scream as she passes out again, her knees banging into the stone wall. The whip is given to the next man as more cold water is thrown into her face. She is whipped half a dozen times and passes out twice before the whip is handed to me. The handle is thick and hard, made of plaited black leather, and it tapers gradually to the tip where it is about the diameter of a pencil, pliant and springy, like steel. I move behind her and swish the whip through the air. It feels good, there is a hidden power in it as if it is gaining strength from more than just my arm. I don't know what is happening, I don't know why the girl is being punished or who the men in robes are, but I don't care anymore, I am swept up in what is happening, aware of it all but no longer as an observer, as a participant. A willing participant. She looks at me with crying green eyes, her mouth slightly open, her cheeks flushed. She looks right at me, into my soul, but I feel no pity. Just desire. A longing to possess. She bites her lip and the teeth look incredibly white against her red lips and she swallows and then she says "Please, no" but it's the plaintive voice of someone who knows that what is going to happen is inevitable. Her eyes never leave mine as I raise my whip hand. "Please," she says and then I bring it down with all my might, aiming at an unmarked space between the small of her back and her buttocks. Only when the leather bites into her flesh does she close her eyes and she cries out, pulling the chains and rattling them against the wall. A trickle of blood runs from the end of the wound and slowly runs down her buttocks and along her leg until it dribbles over her ankle and onto the stone. I want to do it again, to have her watch me as I strike, but I have to pass the whip on to the figure on my right. Only when she has been whipped by every figure in the room does it stop. She is unconscious again. A bowlful of water is splashed into her face and she is slapped but she doesn't come around. She isn't dead because we can see her breathing and occasionally she makes soft moaning sounds. The two red robed figures step forward and take an arm each before unfastening the manacles, then they drag her away from the wall and throw her onto the floor, on her back, not caring about the welts. She lies there unmoving, her legs apart and her arms twisted above her head, her breasts rising and falling. She looks perfect, as if she was asleep, all the marks of violence are hidden and her face is placid, as if a kiss on her forehead would wake her with a smile. One of the red robes pulls the water-filled bucket over to her and tips it over her, gallons of it. It fills her mouth and she comes to, spluttering and spitting, her arms flailing in the air trying to ward off the torrent of water. He keeps pouring until the bucket is drained and she is soaked. She sits up, her hands on the ground behind her, her pert breasts sticking out and wobbling with each cough, then she rolls over on to her side, her left cheek on the floor, gasping for breath. The man who poured water over her walks over and picks up the piece of rope that had been used to tie the sack. His companion grabs the girl's hair and pulls her to her knees. She tries to fend him off but he slaps her and she stops struggling. Her arms are pulled behind her and they tie her wrists. She kneels with her head down, water dripping from her face, mingling with her tears. One of the men stands behind her and grips her hair with both hands, tilting her head up so that she has to look at us. The other red robe slaps her, so hard that her whole body moves to the left. If it wasn't for the man behind her she would have fallen to the ground. The man who slapped her moves to the side and another steps forward and hits her, the sound echoing around the cell. Then another figure hits her, and another, and another, and another, and then it is my turn. The red robe jerks her head up again and she looks at me, her eyes fully open, her long lashes blinking, her lips puffy, her cheeks scarlet. "Please," she whispers. Her head is level with my groin, her soft mouth only inches away from my robe. She looks at my groin, and then up again at my face. "Please," she says again and then I hit her, putting all my strength into the slap and enjoying the feel of my palm against her skin. As I walk away I realise there is blood on my hand. Her blood. I turn and watch the rest of the gathering line up and hit her, until the red robed figure releases her and lets her slump to the floor, her wrists still tied. She lies there, all resistance gone, weeping. They drag her then and pull her over to a rough wooden table, about six feet long and two feet wide with two metal clasps at one end, bolted to the wood. They stand her in front it and bend her over so that her feet are on the floor but her body is stretched over the table. She lets them move her like a puppet, stretching her arms out without them forcing her. They untie her arms and fix her wrists in the clamps and she turns her head so that her right cheek is pressed against the wood. There is a smudge of blood around her lips, bright red and wet. Her tongue flicks out and licks it and she winces. Her back is rising and falling gently as she breaths. One of the red robed figures walks over to the brazier and pokes at it with the metal rod. He pulls it out and examines it carefully before pushing it back into the red hot coals, but my eyes are fixed on the girl, the way she is held there, ready for us, available for us to take whenever we want. Part of me keeps thinking that it's not real, it's not happening, I'm lying in the studio with the headset on and all I'm doing is reliving a dream of a teenager but another part of me keeps repeating over and over again "take her, hurt her, have he" and I don't know whether that's my own subconscious taking over or if it's a subliminal part of the disc and to be honest I don't care. I am hard and erect under the robe and I don't care if it's a dream or if it's real, all I want is the girl. She looks at me and her mouth moves again and there's no sound but I know she's trying to say "please." I notice then that all the figures in the room are looking at me. And waiting. Still not a word has been spoken and yet I know what I must do. I step forward and walk up to the girl. Her hair is lying wetly around her head like a dark halo, and her brown skin is criss-crossed with red welts, some of them bleeding. I can clearly see the one that I gave her and I reach over and run my finger along it. The girl winces and gasps and somehow that makes me even more excited so I press down on the wound, hard, and she cries out. I put both hands on her, up near her armpits and I slide them down, caressing her breasts which are squashed underneath her, and running them along her slim waist and down to her firm, unmarked buttocks. The figures behind me begin some strange chant which does not sound of this world, there are no words I recognise, no rhythm, but it seems to be encouraging me and I know they are all looking at me. The girl seems to know what is expected of her. As I stroke the soft curves of her flanks she moves each leg in turn, spreading herself for me as she watches me all the time. I reach between her legs I can feel how wet she is there, how she seems to be so ready for me to enter her, almost as if that is what she wants and then a voice inside my head says yes, that is what she wants. She wants you inside her. She wants you to take her, and to take her hard. She wants you to hurt her. I lift up the front of my robe and step forward, the anticipation in my groin so intense that it pains me. I drop the material over her back and now I can feel myself touching her thighs and I know that all I have to do is to push myself forward and I will be inside her. She moans softly and I feel her push herself against me. She wants you says the voice. Behind me I hear a scratching at the door to the cell, but I don't turn around. One of the figures in red, I still can't tell them apart, pulls the branding iron from the coals and uses a thick cloth to hold it as he passes the handle to me. The end is glowing whitely and I hold it up to my face to examine it and I can feel the heat on my skin and smell the searing metal. The girl sees the hot iron and she groans a little but her eyes stay on mine. Her eyes are so big, so pure, that I almost lose myself in them. The scratching at the door gets louder. I hold the rod to one side as I reach under the robe and touch her once again, brushing against her thighs and again I feel how wet and warm she is and the voice in my head says yes, she wants it. She wants you and she wants to be hurt. I raise the rod over her back and point it down to the flesh and something bangs against the door, hard enough to jolt it but I don't react and neither does the girl. I am close, so close to entering her that I can feel her warmth under the robe, pulling me almost magnetically towards her, but I hold back and wait, savouring the moment, my flesh inches from her flesh, the branding iron inches from her back. She senses my hesitation and her eyes widen and the voice in my head says "she wants it" with savage insistence and then her mouth opens and she says "please" and the door bursts apart and she pushes herself back onto me with a low moan and I plunge the glowing iron down and a voice screams inside my head "Leif!" and then it's................ .......Ruth. Standing over me, snarling. She cuffs me with her paw but her claws are retracted so she doesn't slash, just thumps the side of my head. "Leif," she shouts. "Wake up." I come to, blinking my eyes and shaking my head, my heart is thumping I am still erect under the gown and there is a fierce ache in my groin. I am breathing heavily and I can feel that my face is flushed. Ruth looks relieved and she sits down on the couch, her left flank pressing tight against my skin, her head tilted to the left. "You OK?" she says. I nod my head but I'm not OK, my head is whirling with images of the torture chamber, and the girl. "What happened?" I ask her. "I don't trust them," she says. "They were going to push you too far this time, they were going to make you run through the whole disc, right to the end." "To the end?" She nods. "And you know what that would have meant," she says. Yeah, I know. The anger builds as I push myself off the couch, thankful that my erection is subsiding. As I hit the floor the door opens and Max comes in looking flustered and I thump in the face and he slams against the wall of the booth and slides to the floor. He puts his hand to his mouth and it comes away bloody, but the blood isn't as vivid or as red as that of the girl's. His doesn't look real. I step over him and walk to my clothes, Ruth close at my heels. The technicians keep their distance and I grab my stuff and head for the door. I shake off the sweat-soaked gown as I wait for the lift and I'm half dressed by the time it arrives. When the door opens again outside Louis Aintrell's office I'm fully dressed and still mad. Mad as hell. Ruth keeps telling me to calm down but I ignore her. I push past his secretaries and his personal assistant and crash through the door. Aintrell is sitting in one of the green armchairs, talking to a grey-haired man in an expensive suit with a briefcase balanced on his knees. Aintrell flashes the big smile and gets to his feet as I walk towards him. There is something large and pointed and crystal on a low sideboard and without breaking my stride I pick it up and bring it smashing down on his forehead. It makes a crumpling sound and blood streams down his face. He doesn't moan or groan or look me in the eye like the girl did, he just drops to the floor. His right arms flops along the carpet, palm upwards and I stamp down on it and crush it with my heel. He looks as if he has passed out but I don't care because there's nothing I want to say to him. I kick him hard in the ribs and I feel something crack. It feels good. His visitor looks at me in horror and jumps to his feet, the briefcase thumping onto the thick carpet, and he backs away with his hands up. I step towards him with the crystal whatever-it-is raised above my head and he says "please" in a soft voice and I'm about to hit him when Ruth screams "Leif, no," and she jumps at me and tries to grab my arm and I drop the weapon. I turn my back on the man and walk quickly out of the room, elbowing one of the secretaries in the chest when she tries to stop me. The lift isn't there and I kick the doors until it arrives and I pace around as we descend, blood lust roaring in my ears. Ruth sits in the middle of the floor and stares at me as I stalk around her. She has stopped talking to me because I'm not listening anymore. The lift tells me it's hot outside and that Green activists have claimed responsibility for an explosion in the World Trade Centre and I pound the speaker with my fist until the flesh is cracked and bruised and bleeding and the metal grille is bent and silent. The lift doors open and two teenage girls back away when they see me, hands to their mouths. I push through them and one of them screams. One of the security men at the door has the phone pressed to his ear and he nods when he sees me and says something and hangs up. He walks from behind his desk, hands up as if he's going to go for my throat, but with a big smile on his face, the sort of smile you give to elderly relatives when you're not sure whether or not you're in their will. "Mr Ableman, can we have a word with you, please?" he says ingratiatingly, motioning another of the uniformed guards to move to my right. I keep walking and he makes to stop me and I kick him hard and fast between the legs and the air explodes from his lungs and I'm out of the door before he starts yelling. Pedestrians give me a wide berth as I storm down the street which is just as well because I'm not looking where I'm going. All I can see is the girl, defenceless in front of me, the burning iron in my hand, the way her mouth opened and the way she said "please." She wanted me to hurt her, she wanted it and I wanted it and my blood was still racing with the thrill of it. I step off the pavement and there's a squeal of brakes and a blaring horn, but I ignore it. Then the driver winds down his window and begins cursing me and for the first time I become aware of him. It's a taxi and the driver is red-faced and obese, a limp ginger moustache and watery blue eyes and he swears at me and gives me the finger. Something snaps inside my head. My feet feel light as I walk over and there's anger burning in his wet eyes but I know it's nothing compared with the searing hatred in mine and I start to kick his door with the full force of my body behind it. Once, twice, three times, and with each blow the thin metal buckles inward. His mouth falls open and for a second he's too stunned to react and then he fumbles for the door handle. I step back and wait until his foot hits the road then I kick the door with everything I've got and his leg makes a snapping noise, like twig breaking. All the colour drains from his flaccid face and he makes a sound like he's going to be sick and then he starts to cry. I turn my back on him with contempt and carry on down the road. I can hear cars slow down to look at me as drivers cancel their autopilots but I don't care. Nothing matters. A police observation saucer wings down and examines me with its twin telephoto lenses and analyses my heat profile with its sensors and then it pulls away until it's hanging fifty feet or so above my head, and it follows me as I walk. There's a bubble in my head, a thick membraneous thing that's getting bigger and bigger and squeezing my brain and I know that when it bursts I'll be OK but right now it's just pressing my brain against my skull and inside the bubble is the girl. And the pain. And the desire. I hear running footsteps and somebody calling my name. I look over my shoulder and it's Herbie, running like a madman, arms flailing and chest bent forward as he hurtles along the pavement. I keep walking and when he catches up he's gasping for breath. Herbie, like me, is too used to the luxury cars and the private planes to be running down the street. "Leif, what's wrong?" he asks. "You know what's wrong," I say, venom in my voice. "Tell me," he says. "They were going to run the whole disc, right to the end," I say. "And they means you. You and Max and Aintrell." "Why would they do that?" he asks. There is sweat pouring down his brow, and he loosens his tie. There are damp patches under the arms of his baggy black suit. "I don't know why. Maybe out of morbid curiosity to see what happens. Maybe to get rid of me so they don't have to settle my contract. Maybe because I know what they're up to. But it doesn't matter why." Herbie looks confused and he puts his hand on my shoulder, trying to slow me down, but I shake it off. I don't want to be touched. By anyone. But least of all by someone I don't trust. "This doesn't make sense," he says. "Nobody is trying to hurt you, Leif, Believe me." "I don't." I am seconds away from hitting him, I can feel it. My fists tighten and I imagine how it would feel driving them into his face. It feels good. Maybe he'd enjoy it. Like the girl did. "The way I heard it everything was going OK and then you came out of it early and that you started attacking everybody," says Herbie. We step off the road again, crossing a street, me without looking, Herbie holding his hand up to stop cars and grinning apologies, almost skipping to keep up with me. "What makes you think they were trying to kill you?" I stop in the middle of the street, oblivious to the impatient blaring horns and verbal abuse. "My cat told me," I say and he looks confused but before he can say anything I head butt him in the face, enjoying the feeling of my forehead smashing the bridge of his nose. His blood splatters on my clothes and he reaches up to hold his nose to stop the flow and as he does I drive my knee between his legs and he goes down, retching. I leave him lying on the tarmac. I don't care any more. It's as if I'm seeing everything through a red film, a bloody veil over my eyes. I bang into an old man and he staggers back and holds a lamppost for support, a small boy pedalling past knocks against my leg and his handlebars jerk from side to side as he tries to regain his balance. I hear a siren in the distance, getting louder and louder. I walk faster and break into a run. I take a left turn and a right and then another left and then I'm in a street I don't recognise, a street of overflowing dustbins and littered pavements and dark, uninviting alleyways. There are tall, brownstone buildings that have been allowed to fall into decay, peeling paint and rotting wood, either side of the road, towering above me and blocking out most of the sunlight. The pavements are busy with housewives talking, children playing with toy guns, dogs barking, men slouching against doorways with watchful eyes and hands in their pockets. Some of them look up at the police robot observer as it shadows my movements. I stop running because I'm starting to attract attention but it doesn't make any difference and I realise that's probably because I'm splattered with blood. I pull out a handkerchief and wipe my face and keep on walking. Ahead of me I hear another siren and in the distance I see a police car turn into the street so I immediately turn left into an alley. It's dark and cold as if sunlight had never ventured there. There are piles of rubbish, damp cardboard boxes and black plastic bags and the smell of stale fish and vomit. Something dark and furry runs away on silent feet and Ruth sniffs contemptuously. Ahead of me I see a long, thin rectangle of light where the alley leads to another street and I keep my eyes fixed on it as my feet tread on God know's what. Suddenly I am aware that I'm not alone, three figures to my left. They could be men or women, I can't tell. They're whispering and there's a flash in my head and I'm back in the cell, looking at the brazier, and the figures are wearing robes. I look for the girl but she's not there, just Ruth looking anxiously up at me and telling me to run. I ignore her, she's not real. Only the girl is real and I can't find her. The figures move towards me and I ask them where she is but they don't answer. Maybe they don't realise that I'm real. I hold out my hands to show them that I'm on their side and one of them grabs my wrists and another hits me in the face and then one of them kicks me in the stomach. My arms are twisted behind me back and I try to kick out but they move so quickly, they seem to flow around me and then I feel a jolt in my chest and I find it hard to breath and I feel sick. Somebody goes through my pockets and I feel my wallet go and then my legs are kicked from under me and I hit the floor. I try to get up but I'm kicked in the ribs and I bite my tongue and my mouth is filled with the taste of wet, salty blood. My arms are wrenched high behind my back as they rip my jacket off and then something thumps me on the back of the neck and then my head explodes in a pure white flash and then it's............... ............dark. A deep, enveloping darkness into which gradually creep small red circles like donuts that whirl around in random formations. The circles elongate and twist and form lips, pouting red lips that keep on forming the word "please" over and over again. "Leif please, please wake up." It's Ruth, but I don't see her among the galaxy of lips. "Please, Leif, please." I open my eyes and the lips disappear but it's still dark. There's something cold and hard pressing against my left cheek and something hot blowing on my right side and the smell of fresh, crusty bread. I can't feel my left arm at all, it's as if it's been hacked off at the shoulder. Maybe it has and I'm bleeding to death. I try to remember where I am because this could be a Dream or it could be me coming out of a Dream, it's impossible to tell. I close my eyes again and the whirling lips are back, speaking with the voice of the girl, and I open them again and blink. There's something bitter in my mouth and I spit it out and it runs down my left cheek and I realise I'm lying on the ground, my arm twisted underneath me. "Leif," says Ruth. "The police will be here soon. Come on." I roll over onto my back and my arm flops free and begins to tingle as the blood flows back. I can feel the damp cold ground under my legs and there's a breeze blowing the hairs on my thighs and I grope down with my good arm and feel my bare skin. "They've taken my trousers," I say through cracked lips. "They've taken my bloody trousers." "Yeah, I know," says Ruth. "Now are you going to get up or what?" I force myself into a sitting position. I'm naked apart from my underwear. I mean, for God's sake, I can understand them taking my wallet and my watch, and maybe my jacket, but what is anyone going to do with my socks? The anger has gone now, I'm just cold and miserable and hurting. I graze my knees as I get up. "OK?" asks Ruth. "OK," I say. It hurts when I talk. I reach down and ruffle her ears and she pushes her head up against my hand and purrs. "I was worried for a while," she says. "You were so angry. I'd never seen you like that before." "It was a rough ride," I tell her. We walk to the end of the alley but I keep to the shadows. "What am I going to do?" I ask Ruth. "A cab is your best bet," she says. "You're in no state to walk. And you'll probably get picked up if you try. At least the spy in the sky has gone. It went shooting after the men that attacked you. But it'll be back, and so will the police." Yeah, she's right. As usual. I stand in the dark, pulling back each time pedestrians walk by, and after ten minutes I see a cab pull up and drop off a young girl in a tight tiger-skin effect dress that makes the hair on Ruth's back stand up on end. I wait until she's paid her fare and then I dash out and slip onto the back seat before she has a chance to close the door. She giggles and peers through the window at me and Ruth snarls at her and spits. I slide down the seat as far as possible but the driver has seen me through the driving mirror and he turns around in his seat to get a better view. "Out," he says. "Get outta my cab you perv." "I've been robbed," I say. "Just get me home and I'll get you your money." He points his finger at me and if it wasn't for the bulletproof screen behind his seat he'd be poking me in the chest. "We ain't going nowhere. Get outta my cab or I'll call the cops." "I have money," I insist. "I have more than enough money, I promise." "Out," he says. He's not listening to me and that makes me angry. I've spent more in a day than he'll earn in his lifetime. In a dozen lifetimes. This ignorant slob is nothing, he'll never amount to anything, never achieve anything, and he's going to throw me out into the street. I slam my hand against the toughened glass and it smears with blood. My blood or the girl's? I don't know anymore, and I hit the glass again and again. "I'm a Dreamer, you bastard," I scream at him. "I'm a Dreamer and you're nothing. Do you hear that, you're nothing. Now take me home." Spittle drips down my chin and I can feel my cheeks flaring and I'm mad, so mad that I could kill him if I could reach him. I hammer with both hands and I can see the fear in his eyes and he turns back and instructs the autopilot and the car starts. I collapse back into the seat and close my eyes but when I do the red lips appear and there's a humming noise in my ears and somewhere in the far off edges of my mind I can hear Ruth calling me. When I open my eyes again the cab has stopped and the driver is out talking to two uniformed policemen. We're not parked outside my building and I'm not that surprised. I try to get out of the offside door but my way is blocked by a third cop and so I make a break for the other door but they grab me by my arms and frog march me into the police station. "This is going to end in tears," says Ruth sadly as she walks behind us. I try to trip them up and shake them away but their grip is tight and one of them thumps me in the kidneys to quieten me down and I stop resisting. For a moment I flash back to the girl and the way she was held by the robed figures and the way she gave up struggling and how later she appeared to want the pain, to welcome it. The doors hiss open and I'm taken down a long corridor, my bare feet sliding on the shiny floor, the policemen not speaking, not even looking at me as if I was just a parcel being delivered. At the end of the corridor is a green-painted metal door and another officer unlocks it and I'm taken through it and down a flight of stairs. It's too narrow for us to go three abreast so one of the officers walks ahead, the other holding both my arms. The stairs lead to another corridor with a line of metal doors leading off to the left. Each of the doors is black with a small hatch about head height. They are obviously cells. The corridor is lit by fluorescent lights set into the ceiling and covered by metal mesh but my vision seems to ripple and I can see burning torches on the wall and my unspeaking captors are wearing rough woolen robes and as they unlock a door with an electronic key card I see a brazier in the corner of the cell and there are manacles hanging from the walls and a figure in red is poking a metal rod into the fire. I begin to struggle but claws bite into my arms and my head is forced down so that all I can see is their feet. They're wearing sandals, and the floor is damp stone, and then I'm thrown forward so that I lose my balance and fall down onto my knees. I scream and twist around to try and grab the knees of the man behind me but a fist clubs against the back of my neck and it's........ ..........light, harsh and painful when I open my eyes. The source of the pain is a square of perspex in the ceiling behind which there is a bright circular fluorescent light like a huge eye glaring down at me. I'm lying on my back and when I try to move a jolt of pain courses through my neck. There is no pillow, I'm lying on a thin plastic mattress about an inch thick which is on a raised concrete step at the side of a cell. I slowly raise myself up and get to my feet. My legs hurt and there is a large, red mark over my stomach. The cell seems to have been designed so that anyone in it would be incapable of doing themself any damage. The walls are encased in a thick, spongy plastic, soft when pressed and so smooth that there is nothing to grip. There are no obstructions at all on the walls or ceiling, the only breaks in the monotony being the mattress on its concrete pedestal, a toilet bowl set into one corner made of thick white plastic, and the cell door. It's a cell for potential suicides, which gives me a good idea of what they think of my state of mind. I've no sense of time anymore, I don't know if it's day or night. I suppose that the fact the light is on suggests that it's day outside, but maybe they leave the light on all the time so that they can see what I'm doing. The hatch is sealed shut and there are no obvious signs of observation cameras but I'd be amazed if there wasn't one behind the perspex in the ceiling. Ruth is sitting by the door, concern on her face. "How long have I been out?" I ask her. She shrugs. "A couple of hours," she says. "I didn't think they'd hit you all that hard." "You should have seen it from my point of view," I answer, but she's right. It wasn't just the punch, it has more to do with nervous exhaustion, every fibre of my being, mental and physical, is aching and I want to do nothing but sleep. I sit down on the toilet and put my head in my hands, massaging my temples. I can feel the blood pounding through my head as if an artery is about to burst. When I open my eyes again the girl is lying naked on the mattress, her hands tied behind her back and her hair over her face so that her lips are hidden but I can clearly hear her say "please, please" and then I wipe my eyes and she's gone. "What's wrong?" asks Ruth. "I'm confused," I say. She pads over and puts her head on my knee. I can feel her fur brushing over the grazes and bruises but it doesn't hurt. She looks up at me with big eyes and smiles. She doesn't say anything, she doesn't have to, I know what she wants. What she likes. I scratch behind her ears and she purrs, her eyes still on mine. As always, touching her acts almost as a sedative, calming me down as I smooth my flesh along her fur. Her purring gradually replaces the thumping in my head and my breathing begins to match her rhythm as if our bodies were becoming one. We sit like that for a while and eventually she breaks the silence. "Better?" she asks quietly. "You know it is," I say. I hold her with both hands, my palms on her jowls while my thumbs rub her ears. I can feel sharp teeth against my wrists. One bite and she could kill me. "You'd better believe it, Jack," she says, playing the tough alley cat. "I'm seeing things, Ruth," I say and she asks what's new about that. Of course she has a point. I'm sitting on a cold toilet seat in a prison cell wearing nothing but a pair of underpants and talking to a figment of my imagination. It does not look good, sanity-wise. "It's getting to the stage where I'm finding it hard to tell whether or not I'm dreaming," I tell her. It's not just a question of things appearing or my imagination playing tricks on me, that I can cope with. Hell, I'm used too it. It's much, much more than that. Now I can't even tell if I'm awake or dreaming. Damn! I thought I was going to be able to make it, I really thought I'd do it. And now I can feel it all slipping away." I stand up, forgetting she was there, and I knock her head with my knee and she yelps. I pace up and down the cell, my hands bunched into fists and my breath coming in ragged gasps. "It's not fair," I shout and there are pinpricks of tears in my eyes. It's not fair because I was doing OK, I had nine down and one to go and then I'd be out of it for good, and now Aintrell and Max and the rest of them had been playing with my mind to such an extent that I'd lost what little grip I had on reality. They should have left me alone, they should have got a younger guy to plug into the discs and do their detective work instead of pushing that filth into my skull. And then they had to go and push me to the limit, they had to betray me, they knew what would happen but they thought they'd try it anyway. The light flickers and the walls of the cell seem to undulate and then harden into stone and there are torches on the wall and burning pitch crackles and drops to the floor and a figure in a red robe pulls a branding iron from the fire and inspects it. I can't see his face, he keeps his head down as he moves towards me, keeping the hot metal low, and then he jabs it my leg and it burns, God it burns so much I almost pass out and there's the smell of burning flesh and the pain hits me and I scream and step back against the wall. A second figure in red grabs my left arm and pins it against the wall and slaps me across my face and there's blood in my mouth. The other figure raises the branding iron and puts it inches away from my face and I can feel the heat on my skin and then he draws it back and aims it at my eye and I begin to scream again and then there's a blur of movement and a snarl and Ruth springs across me and grabs his arm and bites and he drops it and it clatters to the floor but she doesn't let go. She pulls him to the ground and I can see her jaws tighten and then she throws her head from side to side, ripping and tearing at his flesh. I grab the figure next to me and throw him against the wall. His head jerks back and thuds against the stone and I grab his hood with both hands and pull it back. The gleaming smile of Louis Aintrell leers at me and the blood vessel in my head hurts and a red film drops over my eyes and I headbut him hard the way I'd hit Herbie, whenever that was. My forehead slams into his face but it doesn't feel like cartilage, it's as if I'm slamming my head into a wall and when I move my head back Aintrell has gone and there's blood on the plastic wall and I slam my head against it again. And again. And again. There's a commotion outside the cell door and groping hands pull me away from the wall and there's blood pouring down my chin and the fury is part of me now. There are three policemen, one on each side and a third with an airjet hypodermic loaded with God knows what and I point my finger at him and tell him to get away from me. "I'm a Dreamer," I scream at him. "I'm a Dreamer and I can make you vanish. I can make it as if you were never on this planet. Now get the hell away from me." And then my arms are grabbed and the thing is placed against the side of my neck and I hear a click and somewhere in the distance I hear Ruth calling my name. It is........... ........daytime. Light filters weakly through the gap between hastily closed curtains and just manages to etch an elongated triangle of light against the far wall of my bedroom. There is a strong feline smell and when I roll my head to the left I see Ruth's face, her eyes closed in sleep. I turn the other way and I see her back legs. She's lying across the top of my head like a scarf, half on and off the pillows. There's a crystal decanter of water on the bedside table and I reach over for it but my co-ordination is all shot and I fumble the stopper and it falls to the floor. Ruth opens one eye and grunts and then Herbie appears at the doorway, a mug of coffee in his hand. He has a wad of sticking plaster across his nose and he has two black eyes as if he's been without sleep for a week. He sits on the side of the bed like a concerned mother and asks me if I'm OK. "I think so," I say and he helps me sit up and gives me the mug. I reckon he looks a darn sight worse than me, but what can I say to him? I'm the one that hurt him. I wonder if he'd be sitting here if he didn't depend on me for his livelihood, but I know that's not fair because Herbie is a good enough minder to work with any Dreamer. "Water," I say, my mouth so dry that the word sounds furred. He puts the mug down and pours me a glass of water from the decanter and watches as I drink it. Ruth gets to her feet and pads down to the end of the bed and walks around in a tight circle before flopping down by my feet, her chin on her paws. "How did I get back here?" I ask Herbie. I remember what happened in the cell, I remember the alley, and I remember the dungeon, but they are all so mixed up that I don't know which actually happened and which was in my head. My neck hurts where the cop hit me and my forehead hurts where I butted the wall and I feel as if I'm bruised all over, but I'm well past the stage of knowing which is real and which isn't. "We did a check of all the hospitals and police stations," he says. "It was obvious the way you were behaving that you'd end up in one or the other." He grinned ruefully and put his hand up to his plaster as if reassuring himself that it was still in place. "Sorry about that," I say. "Forget it," he says. "I didn't know what I was doing," I say. "Forget it," he repeats, but I can't. I can't forget any of it. The dungeon. The cell. The girl. The pain. It's all locked in and running round and round my synapses, sparking and hurting. "What happened to your clothes?" he asks. "Did the police take them?" "No, I was mugged," I say. "At least, I think I was." "They must have given you a real working over," he says, taking the empty glass from my shaking hand and replacing it on the table. "The company physician gave you the once over while you were sedated. Said most of it was superficial. Except for the burn." The word lances through my consciousness as if I'd been speared with a rapier. "Burn?" I repeat. "On your leg. Somebody took a red hot iron to your leg. Don't you remember?" Yeah, I remember, but I can't explain that to Herbie. Hell, I'm not even sure if I can explain it to myself. I pull back the quilt and sure enough, there is a bandage across the part of my leg where the red robed figure had attacked me before Ruth savaged his arm. But that was in my imagination, so how come the burn? And what would have happened if Ruth hadn't come to my rescue? I could have died. "You'd better believe it," she says, and I do. "I guess they must have done it when they attacked me. I don't remember much of the last day or so." Herbie studies me as I take a mouthful of the hot coffee and put the mug next to the empty glass. I pull the quilt back over my leg because I don't want to think about it, not for a while anyway. "Did you sort things out with the police?" "Of course," he says, because that's his job, he's paid to make sure that my life proceeds as smoothly as possible between psi-discs. Herbie will be glad when I've done the last one and he can pick up his bonus and move onto the next Dreamer. "They won't be pressing charges." He smiles. "Nor will I," he adds. "Sorry about that," I say, but deep inside I'm not sure if I am. Herbie is part of the Corporation, they're his lords and masters, I'm just his temporary charge. And if the Corporation is trying to set me up, then maybe he's part of it. "Herbie," I say, as the thought enters my head for the first time, "have you ever heard of a woman called Helen Gwynne? She works for the Moral Majority." He shakes his head. "I don't think so. Why?" I realise then that maybe it was a mistake mentioning her name because Herbie isn't stupid, and if he knows I've been talking to Helen he might think that I'm going to spill my guts to her. "I was talking to one of the other Dreamers a while back and he said she'd been asking him questions about sex and violence in the new discs, I was just wondering if you knew of her." "I'm pretty sure not," he says. "How do you spell her surname?" I spell it for him and he takes a gold pen from his pocket and writes it down on the back of one of his business cards. Hell, I realise with a jolt that she's left her card in the next room, next to the whisky bottle, and if Herbie's been wandering around he could easily have spotted it. But if he has already seen it than he wouldn't go through the charade of asking to spell her name. Or maybe he's just playing games with me, maybe he's already guessed that she's been here and that I'm lying to him. Hell, why didn't I just keep my big mouth shut? "I'll check it out," he says. "You'd better rest, the Doc said you should take it easy for a while." "I'm fine," I tell him, but I lie back and make myself comfortable. Ruth gets up and walks up to the top of the bed and stretches out, laying the full length of her body against mine. "I'll let myself out," says Herbie. "Call me if you need anything." He stops at the bedroom door and looks at me quizzically. "Leif?" "Yeah?" "Are sure you're OK?" "We're fine," says Ruth. "Get lost." "I'm fine," I say. "Get lost." I wait until I hear the main door shut and then I slide out of bed and go into the main room and over to where the booze is but I can't find Helen's card there. Maybe the cleaner took it. Or maybe Herbie did. Hell. I ask the phone to get Helen at home but there's no record of a home phone number for her and there's no answer from the Moral Crusade's office. "What time is it?" I ask the phone and it tells me its almost six so I guess they've closed for the day. I hadn't realised it was so late. In fact I don't even know what day of the week it is. I walk over to the window that runs the length of the room and look down on the city below. The sun is beginning to redden and it'll soon be ducking down behind the horizon, fading like last year's fashions. Then it'll be night. A small knot forms in my stomach in anticipation of the dreams that I know will come. Ruth pads up behind me and rears up on her back legs, her front paws on my stomach, claws withdrawn so she won't hurt me. She rubs her whiskers against my bare flesh. They tickle. "They don't," she says. "They do," I insist, and stroke her neck. "Can I have some milk?" she purrs and drops back to the floor, shifting her weight from leg to leg, her tongue licking her upper lip. I hold out my cupped hand and imagine it full of cold, frothy milk and she laps it up with relish. She finishes every drop and that sits down and cleans her face with her left paw, using it like a damp flannel. "Ruth?" I say and she looks up. "What?" "How did you know they were going to run that psi-disc right to the end?" "I heard them talking," she says, going back to the serious business of washing her whiskers. I pat her on the head. "I'm glad you did," I say. "Me too," she purrs. "Who was talking?" I ask her. The doorbell rings before she can answer and I walk over to the television monitor by the door. It's Helen Gwynne. "Helen?" I say, confused because I can't think why she's here. "I heard you'd been hurt," she says. "Can I come up?" "Of course," I answer and tell the computer to open the security door. While she makes her way up to my floor I go back into the bedroom and pick a thick, white towelling bathrobe from one of the wardrobes and check myself in the bathroom mirror. I look OK. No worse than usual. I'm cleaning my teeth when the doorbell rings again and I rinse out my mouth and get to the door on the second ring. She looks stunning in a crisp white blouse under a black jacket with padded shoulders and a straight black skirt that ends just below her knees that is split up at the back so that I can see halfway up her thighs as she walks past me into the room. She's carrying a white leather handbag with a gold clasp. There's a small black bow in the back of her hair, the sort of decoration you'd expect to see on a schoolgirl. She's wearing black high heels and stockings and she walks as if she knows I'm watching her. "Of course she knows you're watching her, your eyes are practically out of their sockets," says Ruth. She goes and sits down by the stereo and sulks. Helen turns to look at me with one eyebrow raised archly. "It's a bit early to be in bed isn't it," she says with a smile. Her lipstick and nail varnish are matching again, this time a glossy purple, the colour of a four-day old bruise. She sits down and there's the whisper of silk brushing against silk and the way her breasts move under the blouse suggests that she isn't wearing a bra. "I'm not feeling so hot," I say. "Can I get you a drink?" She nods and says she wants a gin and tonic and I try to remember if that was what she drank last time she was in the flat. I don't think it was, but I'm not sure. "You don't look as if you've been mugged," she says as I fix her the drink. The hairs go up on the back of my neck because I can't figure out how she knew what had happened to me but I keep my voice steady. "You should see under the robe," I joke and hand her the glass. I'm surprised at how steady my hand is. One of her nails touches my flesh as she takes the drink and it feels like a cat's claw. She raises it slowly to her lips and as she drinks I hear her voice in my head saying that seeing under the robe is exactly what she wants to do. I'm suddenly aware of the texture of the towelling robe against my groin and I flash back to the dungeon and to the robe I was wearing there and the flames and the manacles and the girl. The room dips in and out of focus and the carpet ripples and is replaced by the stone floor of the torture cell and I look at Helen and she moistens her lips and says "please." "Sorry?" Reality snaps back with an audible click in my ears. "Can I have some more ice, please?" "Of course." I take the glass and fill it with more cubes from the bar. "How did you know I'd been attacked?" I tell her. Part of me is hoping that she'll say it was Herbie because then I'll know she's lying but relief washes over me like a wave when she looks me straight in the eye and says it was a contact on the police, someone sympathetic to the aims of the Moral Crusade. "He rang to say that a Dreamer had been pulled in and thought that it might be useful ammunition for us to use against the Corporation. He didn't have your best interests at heart, I'm afraid." "Few people do these days," I say. She looks concerned. "Do you want to tell me about it?" she says. "I wouldn't," says Ruth. I help myself to a 15-year-old Kumagai malt and swirl around the crystal tumbler. "I'm not sure," I say. She pats the sofa next to her as if she was calling a small child to sit. I go, meek as a lamb. "To the slaughter," hisses Ruth and I throw her a reproving look. She wrinkles her nose and shakes her head. I ignore her. Helen slips off her shoes and curls her right leg underneath herself, one arm resting along the back of the sofa, close to the back of me neck. She sips her drink, leaving lipstick on the edge of the glass. Did that happen last time she was here? Did I clean the glass afterwards? I can't remember. I just can't remember. She puts the glass down on the table beside the sofa and it clinks against the wood. "Did the police hurt you?" she asked. "No, it wasn't the police," I say. "I was mugged." "Mugged?" "Yeah, in an alley. They took my clothes." She throws back her head and laughs, her eyes sparkling. "It wasn't funny," I say, but she looks so good when she laughs that I find it impossible to take offense. "It's just that, well, I know things are bad out there but I can't imagine anyone wanting to steal your clothes." She sees the way my face falls again and hurriedly adds "not that there's anything wrong with your clothes." "They took my wallet as well," I say. "How many of them were there?" "Three," I say. "Maybe four. I can't remember." It's true, I can't. I can't remember how many there were, what they looked like, what it felt like when they hit me. It was fading like an uneventful dream and if it wasn't for the bruises I might have believed that it had all been in my imagination. Except that I had a burn on my leg that could only have come from the red robed figure in the torture cell and that, surely, had been confined to my dreams. A thought flashes across my crowded, rumpled mind and it scares me. Maybe the torture cell is real and the alley where I was mugged is in the wildlands of my imagination. I shiver and she asks me if I'm all right. I take a mouthful of whisky and wince as it bites into a cut inside my cheek. It makes my eyes water and I hope that she doesn't think I'm crying. She reaches over and touches my shoulder. "It's been one hell of a day," I say. "Tell me," she says. "Didn't your policeman friend tell you?" "He said that you'd been held in a cell." "And?" "Well, yes he did say that you'd been in a fight or something at the Corporation." "A fight, yeah, that'll be right." "Tell me what happened." "How's your drink?" "Fine," she says with a smile. "Don't change the subject." "She's got you summed up, hasn't she," asks Ruth, but I ignore her. She walks stiff legged up to my side of the sofa and sits down heavily on the floor with a sigh as if she had the cares of the world on her shoulders. I reach down and ruffle her ears and she purrs. "You remember what you were saying about violent psi-discs, about the Corporation wanting to get the law changed?" She nods and clicks her handbag open and ferrets out a packet of cigarettes and her lighter. She licks her lips before slipping in the pure white cylinder and the end smears with lipstick as she lights it with a chunky silver lighter. Last time she had a gold one, didn't she? A slim gold one? She closes her eyes as she tosses her head back and inhales and then she looks at me. "I remember." "Three Dreamers have died laying them down. That's three of our Dreamers. Others have died at other companies. There's something weird going on, something I don't understand." "But what does that have to do with your fight?" "The Corporation asked me to plug into them, to find out what happened. They were violent, very, very violent. And they seemed to effect me more than other psi-discs have ever done." "In what way?" She crosses and uncrosses her legs. "You're staring," says Ruth. She's right. "When I came out of them I was in a state of excitement, it was as if what happened in the disc was more real than reality, if you see what I mean. It was as if real life was a disappointment, as if my subconscious wanted to go back into the dream." "Or try to act out the dream in real life?" She understands. I can see it in her eyes. She sits there with her back straight, one arm holding the cigarette a few inches from her mouth, lips slightly pursed, the other resting on the back of the sofa slowly caressing the black leather. "Yeah," I answer. "It spilled over, the emotions, the desires, everything. Like I was possessed. God, if they affect me like that then what will they do to....." "To ordinary people?" She makes it seem like a term of abuse. "Yeah, to ordinary people." I sip my drink and feel the smooth malt flow down my throat and spread warmly across my stomach. The Japanese malts are worth paying the extra for. That's what the ads say, and they're right. My mind is beginning to feel numb and I wonder if the doctor has given me a painkiller and if it was reacting to the alcohol. There is a slight buzzing in my ears and my shoulders ache. "That's why we must protect them," she says. "That's why the Moral Crusade must stand up to the Corporation, and make sure that the discs are kept for those who can handle them." That jolts me a bit because I can't imagine anyone being able to handle the discs. They were so strong, the images so vivid, that I was sure that repeated exposure would drive anyone over the edge. "What was so bad about the third disc?" she says. "There was no plot to it, none that I could follow anyway. There was no dialogue, no characterisation. Nothing." "Nothing? You mean it was blank?" "No, not blank. Just images, violent images. Torture, pain, for no apparent reason." "Of a sexual nature?" she says quietly. "Yeah, against a girl. A young girl." "How young?" she says. She looks tense, her eyes are wide open now, and I can hear her breathing. Or maybe its Ruth. "You wish, Jack," she says. "Fifteen," I say, "maybe younger." "And who was hurting her?" "Men. A group of men." "What did they look like?" I want to tell her how I was plugged into the disc for too long, how the technicians at the studio had tried to run me right through to the end, how the robed figures kept appearing in my mind, but she keeps asking for details, descriptions, feelings. "They were wearing robes. So was I." She turns away from me to stub her cigarette out. "Tell me what happened. Right from the start," she says and then she turns back to face me and crosses her arms around her chest as if it was cold and she is hugging herself for warmth. The movement pushes her breasts upward and outward, emphasizing her cleavage. "You're staring," Ruth says again. She's right. Again. The lights in the room flicker, twice, and the effect is like torchlight and I'm looking at her lips, her purple bruised lips, and she says "please" and so I tell her. From the start. From the moment I see the parade of robed figures to the end, to the bit where the girl is helpless before me and I'm standing there with the branding iron in my hand and she is pushing herself back onto me. I tell her everything, as if it had been my dream, going over every detail, every emotion, building the story layer by layer, the sounds, the smells, the textures, pacing it subtly, taking her through it as if she had been there. Several times she crosses and recrosses her legs and I am distracted by the sound of silk and the sight of the white skin of her thighs but I keep the story going. She keeps hugging herself and when I get to the torture cell she begins slowly rocking backwards and forwards, her eyes never leaving mine. My voice now sounds as if it is coming from outside my body, as if the words are being spoken by some unseen narrator. I begin to get caught up in the story as I tell it, and then I get past that stage and it's as if the words are going straight into my subconscious without going though my ears. My hands start to tremble and I feel whisky slosh out of the glass so I lean to the side and put it on the carpet, still watching her, no longer aware that I'm still talking. It's as is we are both there in the chamber, watching the girl being bound, watching her being hurt. My hand is wet with whisky and I raise it to my mouth and I lick it without thinking and her eyes are on my hand and she licks her lips. I can hear her breathing and my head is pulsing in and out in time with my heart and she moves forward in a rush, her lips banging against my teeth, her breasts crushed to my chest. She pulls the bathrobe down off my shoulders and I feel her nails bite into my back and start to scratch as her tongue invades my mouth. She's moaning and pulling me back onto the couch, down on top of her, her mouth never leaving mine, her eyes tightly closed. She bucks her hips and slips her legs either side of mine and brings them up high and crosses her ankles, squeezing me tight. There's the taste of blood in my mouth and I realise she's bitten my lip and I try to pull away but she grips me tighter and kisses me harder, sucking the breath from me. Sucking the blood from me. She begins to draw her nails slowly across my back, hard, so hard that I try to cry out and ask her to stop but she kisses me harder and my head is spinning. Her nails cut into my flesh and I feel blood there and then she throws back her head and looks at me with wide eyes, still scratching and when I cry out in pain she laughs and grips me harder with her legs. There is blood on her lips. My blood, bright red against her dark lipstick. "Do you want me to stop?" she says and I want to say yes but I can't, the desire is too strong, too overwhelming and I force my mouth onto hers and kiss her with all my strength. I feel her legs relax and then she starts pushing the robe down and I lift myself up to help her. She gets it down to my waist and then pulls her legs up and uses her feet to push it off completely. I feel her silk stockings scratching against my naked skin. She turns her head away to escape my mouth and presses her cheek against mine and bites my earlobe, hard enough to make me wince, and then she whispers in my ear. "Undress me," she says. I lift myself up on one elbow and with the other begin to undo the buttons on her blouse but she grabs my wrist and says "no, not so gentle. Rip them off me." The lights flicker again and we're not on the sofa we're lying on a stone floor strewn with musty hay and there is water dripping down the walls and somewhere behind me is movement, somebody watching, and then her hand moves up to my chest and she slowly scrapes her nails down to my stomach, the pain startling and exciting me and then I grab the material of her blouse and wrench and twist it and the buttons pop off one by one like coals crackling on a fire and then it tears. I move my head down to kiss her breasts and at the same time I tear her skirt off and throw it one side as I hear the rattle of chains and the sound of a door being locked. "Harder," she says. "Bite me, bite," she moans and I do as she says, clamping my teeth down hard on the flesh and she screams and her legs tighten around my waist again and she forces her hips up against me, grinding hard. I move my hand down between her legs and I'm not surprised to find she isn't wearing briefs, just the stockings, and she's so wet, so very wet. She thrusts her hands up against my shoulders and forces me up off her, panting with exertion, and I see red bite marks on her left breast as it rises and falls. "Wait," she whispers, and pulls her legs up and turns onto her side and then onto her front. She looks over her shoulder at me and smiles and then draws her knees up, raising her backside and opening her legs and I hear the sound of metal being pushed into burning coals and somewhere in the distance a deep, sinister chant like some unholy choir and she pushes herself back onto me and says she wants me to hurt her and I don't understand and I tell her I don't know how to, I don't know what to do, and she laughs. "I'll show you," she says. I grip her around the waist and I scratch my nails into her soft flesh and I let her show me. It is......... ..........night. I'm in bed and its dark outside but the curtains are slightly open and there's enough moonlight coming in for me to see that I'm in my own room looking up at the silk canopy. My head is throbbing and so is the burn mark on my leg but there are new pains too, an ache in my shoulder and what seem to be bite marks on my arms and my back feels as if it's been scratched with a rake. I'm naked and lying on top of the quilt and I'm alone. My head feels heavy and it's an effort to keep my eyes open and I want to fold back into sleep but something forces me to sit up and look around the room. Helen isn't there. For some reason it's vitally important that I find her. A picture of her flashes through my mind, Helen lying on her front, her back covered in blood, her eyes blank and staring, one arm grotesquely twisted under her body. The image fades every bit as quickly as it arrives but in the back of my mind I have a terrible feeling of guilt and an overwhelming impression that she is dead. I'm not sure if I'm awake or asleep, I can feel the bites and bruises and the burn but I can't feel my feet as I stand on the thick pile carpet and walk to the door. There's the smell of something burning, like meat cooking or scorched hair, and I head towards the kitchen. The walls seem to ripple as I walk and I can hear deep, baritone voices singing and the smell gets stronger and I close my eyes and rub them and I swallow hard but nothing clears my head. The closer I get to the kitchen the longer each step seems to take until I'm standing there looking in. I go to run my hands through my hair but all I feel is bare skin and a slight stubble. It's all white units and gleaming appliances and looks more like a place to do open heart surgery than to prepare a meal. Helen is there, kneeling at the side of the massive German fridge, her back to me. There are deep welts running vertically down her skin from just below her neck to the base of her spine, not bleeding but bright red and raised. The light from the open fridge shines through her golden hair and makes her shoulders shine. There is a carton of milk in her right hand and she is holding the fridge door with her left and she is murmuring softly. There is a white china saucer on the floor, half full of milk. Ruth is lapping at it. She has her back to me and I see her tail twitch with pleasure as she drinks. Neither of them see me and I back away quietly, the singing in my ears getting louder, and I keep putting my hand up against the wall to steady myself as I grope my way back to the bedroom. I fall onto the bed and sleep wraps itself around me like a shroud. A voice that sounds like Ruth whispers in my ear "you're dreaming, you're dreaming" and then it's............ ..........daytime. I'm curled up on my side with the quilt wrapped around me with my knees up against my chest and the first thing I see when I open my eyes are my clothes hanging on the back of a chair. I don't remember putting them there. I can hear deep, throaty breathing and feel warm air on my neck and I say "Helen?" and turn around but she's not there, it's just Ruth. "Whaddya mean, just Ruth?" she says accusingly, one eye open, the other squashed closed against a pillow. I stumble out of bed and into the shower and tell it I want it cold and hard and I inspect my battered body as I wash. The bandage has gone but the burn is still there on my leg and so are the bruises but as I twist around and check my back in the mirror I can see that the scratches have gone. Or maybe they were never there in the first place. I tell the phone to get Herbie on the line. He sounds sleepy and tells me that it's six o'clock in the morning. "I want to do it today," I say and I can practically hear his jaw drop. "Today," I repeat, just in case he doesn't understand. He does. "Are you sure?" he says, but he knows that it's not something I'd joke about. It's my call, we do it when I'm ready, anytime of day or night. "I'm sure," I say. "But there's no storyboard," he says. He also knows that there's nothing in the contract that says I have to produce a storyboard before laying down a psi-disc. It's become the norm, and it's sometimes useful to get your thoughts in order before you go into the studio and the Corporation likes it because it gives them a measure of creative control and gives the marketing department a head start, but again it's my call and I tell Herbie that I'll be doing it unscripted. "When?" he says, starting to sound more awake. "One hour," I say. "Are you sure?" he says again and I ignore him. "Just be there at seven," I say. "And send a car." I cut the connection before he can answer. An hour might not seem like much notice but the studios are manned 24 hours a day and there isn't that much preparation to do, and almost all of it is in the head of the Dreamer. I begin to get my head straight as I wash. Straight is a good word for it. I try to concentrate my thoughts into a single mass, and I shape the mass into a train, one of the old type locomotives, steam belching from a squat chimney, big wheels grinding around and pistons hissing and belching. I fill my head with the image, excluding everything else. The train is on tracks which stretch to the horizon in a dead straight line, unbroken and unbending. I force everything else from my mind, the pain, the burn, the headache. "And me?" says Ruth and I make the train sound a long, shrieking whistle to block her out, too. There's going to be no walk around the lake before this one, no time for stray thoughts to move around my head, just the train, the black, steaming, roaring train, racing towards the skyline, unstoppable. I don't eat anything and I don't drink anything, and I don't allow myself to put any thought into choosing what to wear, I just grab the first things that come to hand: a leather jacket by some fancy Italian designer, a pair of faded blue jeans and a denim shirt. While I'm waiting for the limo I pace up and down between the bedroom door and the window, my face set like stone and my mind filled with the train. When the bedroom clock says its time I go down and pace outside the building. The car arrives and Herbie is in the back. He says hello and I nod but I don't reply, I just get in and sit next to him, my hands gripping my knees tightly. My lips are clamped together and I can feel the place where Helen bit me last night and I block that out and concentrate on the train. There are carriages behind the train, half a dozen, painted royal blue with gilt trim and windows of black glass so that I can't see inside. Herbie tries to talk to me but I ignore him as we pull away and into the early morning traffic. He's seen me tense before, but never like this, and I know he's concerned but there's nothing I can do to make him feel any easier. If I open my mind to him I open it to everything else so I just keep thinking about the carriages, the steel wheels spinning around and clicking as they pass over the joins between the rails. He stops speaking and settles back into the plush leather seat. The train picks up speed and the clickety-clack of the wheels begins to sound like a chant, the chant of deep, male voices so I make the train sound its shrieking whistle again as if the driver has seen a tunnel approaching. I concentrate on the heat of the engine, the boilers stocked with red hot coals, heating the water into steam that forces the pistons faster, ever faster. The car stops and the driver gets out and opens my door for me and I follow Herbie into the building, barely conscious of the security guards and the metal detectors and then we're in the lift and the train is roaring down the line, a column of smoke wavering over the carriages and hanging in the air for hundreds of yards behind the engine before dispersing in the wind. The lift door opens with a hiss of steam and we walk in silence to the studio where I undress and slip on the smock and sit with my eyes closed as one of the technicians shaves the stubble of my head and rubs in the gel. Max is there but I don't say anything to him and Herbie takes him by the arm and off into a corner where he talks quietly to him. They both look at me anxiously but there's nothing I can say to them I have to keep my mind closed, everything blocked out except the steam engine hurtling down the tracks. A voice asks me if I'm OK and I nod and I walk alone to the cubicle and lie down with my eyes closed and wait for one of the technicians to fit the headset, then I hear Max call my name and I open them and see him standing over me, frowning. "What's going on, Leif?" he asks and the engine shrieks, loud and long, and I close my eyes hard and in the distance I hear myself say: "Just do it." The train is moving at full speed, the wheels blurring and the clicks as they pass over the joins between the rails merge into one long whirring sound like the teeth of a comb being flicked with a thumb. I hear them leave the cubicle and then I sense the light go down and then I hear Max's voice counting down, his voice shaking and uncertain. Ten ..... nine ..... eight ..... seven ...... six ....... five ...... four ...... three .... two .... one ..... It is.......... ........evening. Manila. I'm sitting in a ramshackle old cab being driven at breakneck speed through the crowded streets towards the Manila Hotel. The vinyl seats are worn and stained and there are holes in the carpet on the floor. The driver has the radio full on and it's tuned to a local pop station that is playing a tune I vaguely recognise but with Filipina words. There's a letter in my hand and its creased as if it has been read many times and refolded. I'm also holding an envelope and in crooked typewritten letters it's addressed to Leif Ableman, Private Investigator, at an office in the Makati area. I concentrate on the interior of the cab, building on the smell of alcohol and sweat and astringent aftershave and the heat, the sweaty stickiness that precedes a tropical storm. Then I build on the exterior, the dirty streets crammed with new limousines and rust-encrusted jalopies, and everywhere the Jeepnies, the gaudy, chromed monstrosities based on the Second World War American jeeps and now used as cheep and cheerful public transport. Horns blaring, children shouting, and everywhere smiling faces. It looks as if I'm the only person in Manila not smiling. I read the letter. "Mr Ableman," it says. "I have information that may interest you about the Call Girl Killer. I would like to see you at the Presidential Suite at the Manila Hotel at 6.30." It is signed with a scrawl that I can't read. The cab jerks to a halt at a set of traffic lights and a small girl with a heartbreakingly beautiful face and her two front teeth missing runs up to the passenger door and holds up small garlands of purple and white flowers. I wind down the window and am immediately hit by the smell of exhaust fumes. She pushes the garlands closer to my face and I breath in the sweet perfume, but it doesn't mask the smell of the traffic. I hand her a pink banknote and she gives me one of the garlands and giggles. A boy, a head taller than the flower seller, sees the sale and runs up with armfuls of newspapers, most of them in Filipina but there are a couple in English. One of them has a huge headline in blood red letters which says "Call Girl Killer Slays Again" and I buy it from him and wind the window up, shutting out the noise and the pollution. I read the story. The maniac has killed again, slashed a hooker to death and carved his trademark, the letter "E", on her stomach. The police warn that he may kill again, and bearing in mind that today's death is the ninth they're probably right. We arrive at the hotel and as a boy in a white uniform and a pillbox hat opens the door for me I thrust a handful of notes into the driver's hand. I stand on the steps of the hotel and slowly look around at the surrounding trees. In the distance I can hear small children splashing in a swimming pool, and there is the chirping of insects, millions of little clicking noises, and above my head swallows silently swoop and whirl as they feed on the wing. I step into the lobby, walking across a brown and white marble floor between dark wood furniture with plump red cushions. Three huge ornate chandeliers look as if they're about to drag the wooden panelled ceiling down. Around the perimeter of the massive space are tall white archways except for one side where the reception desk and cashier are. I go up to the desk and am immediately greeted by three beautiful teenagers, two of them girls. One of the girls, long black hair and flashing eyes, asks me if she can help and I ask her the way to the Presidential Suite. She tells me and I turn around and head for the lift. Ruth is there, sitting by a round wooden table on which is standing a bowl full of yellow flowers, something like chrysanthemums. She looks worried. "Leif?" she says quietly. I ignore her, concentrating hard on the atmosphere of the hotel, the attentive staff, the tourists booking in, the small boy bent almost double by the weight of a large suitcase, a chef walking between restaurants with a ludicrously tall white hat swaying on his head as he walks. "Leif, why am I here?" Ruth says, walking at my side and looking up. We cross the lobby and head for the lifts. She doesn't sit like she normally does, but walks in front of me and puts her paws on my stomach, digging her claws in, not hurting but insistent. "Why am I here?" she says. "Did you bring me here?" The lift arrives and we get in. "Leif!" hisses Ruth, but I ignore her. I get out first and as I walk along the corridor towards the suite I hear her follow me with slight rasps as her open claws catch on the plush carpet. There is a small private swimming pool surrounded by tall green plants before we get to the main doors which lead to the suite. There are two white wooden reclining chairs by the blue water. On one of them is a slightly damp pink towel. I knock on the double doors and walk up and down as I wait, but nobody answers. I bang again with my knuckles and this time the door swings open. "What is happening, Leif?" asks Ruth. I walk through the door into the room beyond, a room full of Filipina statues and paintings, of solid wood and leather furniture. There is a long, rectangular table with carved feet that look like a cat's paws, and a sideboard with carved panels that depict jungle scenes. There are flowers everywhere, and on the table a rattan bowl filled with exotic fruit. There are two doors leading off the lounge area, both of them shut. As I walk into the centre of the room the door shuts behind us with a resounding thud. Ruth is startled, she whirls around, hissing, her right paw raised to strike, claws out and teeth bared before she sees we are alone. She relaxes a little, but only a little. I concentrate with all my mind, on the room, on its surroundings, on the view from the large picture window. Ruth moves into the centre of the room and stands by the table, sniffing at the fruit. She is pretending to be at ease but I can see that her claws are still out and the tendons are taut under her fur. There is a gun on the table, a revolver, black metal with wooden grips. It's a big gun, heavy and menacing. I pick it up and it is an effort to lift. There are six brass cartridges in place and the gun is cocked, ready to fire. I slip my finger around the trigger and I can tell without pulling that it will require a lot of pressure before it will go off. It is a serious weapon and not one that will go off by accident. "Ruth," I say and she looks up. I hold her gaze, concentrating on her hazel eyes and then I bring the shutters in my mind down, four of them, each covering one of the walls, thick steel plates studded with rivets, like the sides of a battleship. Ruth jumps with fright, so much so that all four of her paws leave the ground. When she lands her feet are splayed out and her lips are curled back and she looks quickly around, looking for a way out but seeing that all the doors and windows are now covered by the metal sheets. I don't need the furniture so I let that go, and the paintings, and the statues and I make the ceiling flat and featureless and metallic and I turn the wooden floor into thick steel and then all that is left is me and Ruth. "And the gun," she says. And the gun. She backs away, her eyes never leaving mine. She looks fearful, for the first time ever she looks threatened. "What's happening, Leif?" she says. "You know what's happening," I tell her. She smiles and slowly sits down, her head on one side, nose twitching. I hold the gun down at my side, barrel pointing at the ground. I back off to the other side of the room and lean against the wall. "I trusted you," I say and her ears prick up. She doesn't say anything. "I trusted you and you betrayed me." "I saved your life," she says, frowning her cat frown. "Do you want to tell me what's going on?" I ask her. Ruth shrugs and she looks at the floor as if she's suddenly seen something there that requires all her attention. "Ruth," I say. She ignores me, and slowly slides her front paws along the metal floor until she's lying flat out, her legs extended towards me. She sighs deeply and rests her chin on her paws and blinks. "They were trying to kill you," she says. "Who were?" "The Corporation. Max. Aintrell. All of them. I was trying to protect you." "When you brought me out of the third dream, maybe you were protecting me." "That's how you knew, isn't it?" she asks and I nod. "There was only one way you could have known when that psi-disc was supposed to have ended, and that's if you'd been there in the first place. You must have been there when the Dreamers died." "So I saved you," she says. "Why can't you just leave it at that?" "Because there's more to it than that. You know what I mean, Ruth." My legs begin to shake, with tiredness or fear, I'm not sure which, so I create a chair, black wood with a purple cushion, and I sit on it. "What about a cushion for me?" she asks. "This metal is cold." "Sure," I say, and next to her is a big square cushion, made of thick green material and filled with down. She gets smoothly to her feet and plops down on it. "You planned this, didn't you?" she says. "That's what the train was about, you were blocking me out, weren't you? You were worried that I'd find out what you were up to." "I wasn't sure if I could keep you in one place. I had to make sure you'd be here." "Where would I go without you?" she says quietly. "That's what I don't know, Ruth. I thought I did, I thought you were part of me, but now I'm not so sure." "I am part of you." "Then what about the Dreamers you killed?" She sits up on the cushion and looks at me, saying nothing. "Well?" I press. "You wanted it," she says quietly. "You wanted it, so I did it. For you." I shake my head fiercely. "That's not true," I say. "That's not what I wanted." "You wanted them out of the way. They were the competition and you wanted them dead." "No!" I shout. "You're lying. I just wanted to finish my contract and to hell with them." I see fear in her eyes and realise that I'm waving the gun at her so I rest it in my lap. "You don't always know what you want, Leif. There are things that you keep from yourself, you know. Things that go on in your subconscious that you're not aware of." "And you are?" She nods, slowly, then gets up and carefully steps off the cushion and onto the steel floor. She walks around behind it as if using it as a barrier. "I know you," she says. "Sometimes I know you better than you know yourself." Could she be right? The thought jumps into my head as if it was catapulted in but I know that it's not true. Laying down the discs isn't something I get a kick out of, not in the way that I used to take pride in the books I wrote. The discs mean just one thing to me. Money. I search my real feelings looking for any inkling that she might be right, but nowhere can I find any semblance of jealousy, no slight wish to hang onto the job of being a Dreamer, no reluctance to walk away. "You're wrong," I say. "You're wrong or you're lying." She walks up and down behind the cushion, growling softly. "Which is it, Ruth?" She doesn't answer. "You were always supposed to be honest with me," I say. "I was supposed to protect you," she answers quietly, avoiding my eyes. She knows what is coming and I can smell her guilt. "What about Helen Gwynne?" "You wanted her. Who was I to stop you?" "Was she real?" "You know the answer to that already." "I want to hear you say it." She sighs and stops pacing. Her shoulders sag and her nose twitches. "She wasn't real." "Why didn't you tell me?" She shrugs and her silence angers me. I feel the barrel of the gun tapping against my leg and I force myself to stop. "Look Leif, she was a product of your imagination, you created her. You can't blame me for what happened." "You were supposed to warn me." "I'm sorry," she answers and she looks it. I feel sorry for her and I want to hold her and stroke her but I have to find out what's being going on. And I still have to get her to tell me why she killed the Dreamers, because I'm sure it was her. So sure I can taste it. "Can I have some milk?" she asks in a plaintive voice that I've not heard her use before. "No," I say. "Later." I feel bad as soon as the words leave my mouth, as if I've just struck a crippled child. "First tell me why you allowed me to believe in Helen." "I thought she'd make you happy." "You've never made value judgments about my life before." "You've never been under this pressure before." "I can take it. One more disc and I'm home free." "Yeah," she spits. "You are. And what about me?" Her voice is loaded with bitterness and realisation begins to dawn. I think I'm beginning to understand. "What do you mean?" I ask her. "Nothing," she growls. "Is that what you're worried about? You're worried about what happens to you when my contract is finished." She doesn't say yes and she doesn't say no and she doesn't have to because it's written all over her face. "You'll always be with me," I say. "No," she snaps. "Now you're lying. When you walk away from CBS you won't need me any more. You won't need my protection or my help. You won't need me, period." "So that's what all this has been about. You're worried about your own existence. Your survival. Is that it?" She sniffs and shakes her head. "You just don't understand," she says. "I think I do. You think that if I'm no longer a Dreamer I'll have no use for you. That you'll vanish." "You wish, Jack," she says. "So what then?" She walks around the cushion and stands in front of me, her head tilted back. Her eyes look moist and her tail is rock solid. "You don't understand, do you?" she says. "No," I answer, and she sighs deeply. "I love you, Leif," she says, speaking softly.. "I love you with all my being. I can't bear the thought of you not wanting me or needing me. I don't think I'll vanish when you stop being a Dreamer, I think I've now got such a strong sense of my own identity, my own self, that I can stand alone. I don't need you to tell me what to do, I don't depend on you for my existence any more, but I do want to be around you. And I do want you to want me. And there was only one way to make sure that you stayed that way." "By having me continue as a Dreamer?" "Yes." "So you killed the other Dreamers?" She sits down and scratches behind her ear with one of her back paws as if using the time to think of an answer, working out what she should say and how I would react to it and what I planned to do with the big, black, loaded gun. "I wanted to make sure that you continued to work as a Dreamer. You're an endangered species, it only needs a few to drop out and the Corporation would have to persuade you to carry on." I sit in silence and watch her. "Can I have some milk now?" she says. "Soon," I say. "You don't feel guilty?" "They were nothing. You saw the sort of trash they were laying down. They were sick." "So now you're some sort of avenging censor," I say. "Make your mind up Ruth. First you say you were doing it for me, then you said you did it so that I'd stay with you, now you're telling me you did it to make the world a better place. Make your mind up." "I did it because I love you, but the fact they were like they were meant it was easier." "But you'd have done it anyway?" "I wasn't prepared to let you go," she says quietly. She hasn't moved since she sat down in front of me, perfectly still like some sort of Egyptian cat statue. I reach down and stroke the fur between her ears but she doesn't push her head against my hand and she doesn't purr. "I've lost you, haven't I?" she says. "I've spoilt it." I kneel down in front of her, the gun still in my hand. I'm careful to keep it pointed away from her but I keep my finger inside the trigger guard. I can smell her meaty cat breath rolling across my face in waves, her nostrils flaring ever so slightly as she exhales. Her lips are slightly apart and I can see her sharp white teeth. Her canines, if cats can be said to have canine teeth, are fractionally hooked over her black lips. "I have spoilt it, haven't I?" She looks down at the ground, avoiding my eyes. "I trusted you," I say. "And without trust, there's nothing." "Can you ever trust me again?" she asks softly and I don't answer and she looks up sharply and she sees the answer in my eyes. I get to my feet and walk behind the chair and she knows for sure then what's in my mind. She gets up to and walks over to the edge of the room and then follows the steel plate along to the corner and turns and faces me. The fur on her spine is standing upright as if loaded with static electricity. She's about fifteen feet away from me and I know she could reach me with one leap and I keep the gun pointed down but ready to raise it if I have to. It's heavy but I know I'll make it. "You're going to, aren't you?" she whispers. She doesn't say the word "shoot," she leaves the word unspoken between us. There's so much I want to tell her, but I don't know how to. She's allowed my subconscious to run riot, to populate my world with characters, characters like the figure in red and Helen Gwynne. Ruth allowed the door to the black parts of my mind to swing open and now I don't think it can be closed. She's right, she has spoilt it. I was so close, so close to getting through my contract with my sanity and now I've stepped over the edge. She's screwed up my mind so much that I'm sure I'll never get it straight again. But there's more to it than that. I want to tell her that I'm worried that she'll grow to hate me and that one day, maybe in my dreams, she'll come after me with her claws out and her fangs bared, ripping at my throat and slashing my chest. I'm worried that she might turn on me. And I want to tell her that I'm sorry, so very sorry, and that it had all been for nothing because I'd never have left her, I'd never have deserted her. "Now you're the one who's not telling the truth," she says. Her back legs tense as if she's ready to spring and I bring the gun up to waist level, but still with the barrel pointing to the side. "Without trust there is nothing, Ruth," I repeat. "I'll be good. I promise." "You can't promise. You've already killed five people, you're too independent now. You've a mind of your own. And you're dangerous." "Not to you, I'm not." I smile. "I know. But you might be eventually. Maybe not to me, but to people I know. Maybe subconsciously I might wish someone dead and you might act thinking you were helping me. Or you might get jealous of someone who gets too close to me. I can't take the responsibility Ruth. You're wild now. I can't control you. I can't control anything anymore." "Then I'll go away. I can survive on my own. Let me go, Leif." "You know I can't. You know you're part of my mind, a product of my imagination. There's only one thing to do. Only one way out." She crouches down, legs tense, claws scratching on the steel floor, her muscles like springloaded pistons ready to burst into action. Fifteen feet. One leap. I raise the gun. "Please Leif, don't. I love you." I increase the pressure on the trigger as I lift the gun until I feel it meet resistance and I know that one more squeeze and it will fire. There are tears in her eyes and as I steady the gun her mouth opens and she screams "No!" and begins to leap but before her front paws leave the floor the end of the barrel is against my right temple, a cold circle of metal against my skin, and then I pull the trigger and it's............... THE END See more of my work at www.stephenleather.com Copyright 2000 Stephen Leather The right of Stephen Leather to be identified as the author of the work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.