August 5, 2025 • 22 mins
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Hated by Frederick Pohl. After space, there was always
one more river to cross the far side of hatred
and murder. The bar didn't have a name, no name
of any kind, not even an indication that it had
(00:21):
ever had one. All it said on the outside was
Cafe Eat Cocktails, which doesn't make a lot of sense,
but it was a bar. It had a big TV
set going yatata yatata, and three glorious colors, and a
jukebox that tried to drown out the TV with that
lousy music they play. Anyway, it wasn't a kid hang out.
(00:43):
I kinda like it, but I wasn't supposed to be
there at all. It's in the contract. I was supposed
to stay in New York and the New England states.
Cafe Eat Cocktails was right across the river. I think
the name of the place was Hoboken, but I'm not sure.
It all had a kind of dreamy feeling to it.
(01:04):
I was well. I couldn't even remember going there. I
remembered one minute I was in downtown New York looking
across the river. I did that a lot, and then
I was there. I don't remember crossing the river at all.
I was drunk, you know, you know how it is
double bourbons and keep them coming. And after a while
the bartender stops bringing me the ginger ale because gradually
(01:25):
I forget to mix them. I got pretty loaded long
before I left New York. I realized that. I guess
I had to get pretty loaded to risk the pension.
And all used to be I didn't drink much, but
now I don't know. When I have one drink, I
get to thinking about Sam and Wally and Chowterhead and
Givli and the Captain. If I don't drink, I think
(01:48):
about them too, And then I take a drink and
that leads to another drink and it all comes out
to the same thing. Well, I guess I said it already.
I drink a pretty good amount, but you can't blame me.
There was a girl. I always get a girl someplace.
Usually they aren't much, and this one wasn't either. I mean,
(02:08):
she was probably somebody's mother. She was around thirty five
and not so bad. Though she had a long scar
under her ear down along her throat to the little
round spot where her larynx was, it wasn't ugly. She
smelled nice. While I could still smell, you know, and
she didn't talk too much. I like that only, well,
(02:29):
did you ever meet somebody with a nervous cough? Like
when you say something funny, a little funny, not a
big yack. They don't laugh, and they don't stop with
just smiling, but they sort of cough. She did that.
I began to itch. I couldn't help it. I asked
her to stop it. She spilled her drink and looked
at me, almost as though she was scared. And I
(02:52):
had tried to say it quietly too, Sorry, she said,
a little angry, a little scared. Sorry, but you don't
have to you forget it, sure, but you asked me
to sit down here with you. Remember, if you're going
to forget it. I nodded at the bartender and held
up two fingers. You need another drink, I said. The
(03:13):
thing is, I said, Givey used to do that? What
that cough? She looked puzzled. You mean like this? God,
damn it? Stop it. Even the bartender looked over at
me that time. Now she was really mad, but I
didn't want her to go away. I said. Givey was
a fellow who went to Mars with me. Pat Givey, Oh,
(03:37):
she sat down again and leaned across the table low Mars.
The bartender brought our drinks and looked at me suspiciously.
I said, say, Mac, would you mind turning down the
air conditioning. My name isn't Mac. No have a heart.
It's too cold in here. Sorry, he didn't sound sorry
(03:59):
I was. I mean that kind of weather. It's always
cold in those places, you know, around New York. In
August it hits eighty eighty five ninety. All the places
have air conditioning. And what they really want is for
you to wear a shirt and tie. But I like
to walk a lot. You would too, you know, and
you can't walk around much in long pants in a
suit code and all that stuff not around there, not
(04:22):
in August. And so then when I went into a bar,
i'd have one of these built in freezers for the
used car salesmen with their dates or maybe their wives,
all dressed up for what. But I froze Mars. The
girl breathed, Mars. I began to itch again. Want to dance?
(04:44):
They don't have a license, she said, Byron, I didn't
know you'd been to Mars. Please tell me about it.
It was all right, I said. That was a lie.
She was interested. She forgot to smile. It made her
look nicer. She said, I knew a man, my brother
in law. He was my husband's brother, I mean, my
(05:04):
ex husband. I get the idea. He worked for General
Atomic in Rockford, Illinois. You know where that is? Sure?
I couldn't go there, but I knew where Illinois was.
He worked on the first Mars ship, Oh, fifteen years ago,
wasn't it. He always wanted to go himself, but he
couldn't pass the tests. She stopped and looked at me.
(05:26):
I knew what she was thinking, But I didn't always
look this way. You know, not that there's anything wrong
with me now. I mean, but I couldn't pass the
tests any more. Nobody can. That's why we're all one trippers.
I said. The only reason I'm shaking like this is
because i'm cold. It wasn't true, of course. It was
that cough of Givli's. I didn't like to think about
(05:48):
Givley or Sam or Chowdhead or Wally or the Captain.
I didn't like to think about any of them. It
made me shake. You see, we couldn't kill each other.
They wouldn't let us do that. Before we took off.
They did something to our minds to make sure. What
they did it doesn't last forever. It lasts for two years,
and then it wears off. That's long enough, you see,
(06:10):
because that gets you to Mars and back. And it's
plenty long enough in another way, because it's like a
straight jacket. You know, how to make a baby cry,
hold his hands. It's the most basic thing there is.
What they did to us so we couldn't kill each other.
It was like being tied up, like having our hands held,
so we couldn't get free. Well, but two years was
(06:33):
long enough. Too long. The bartender came over and said, Pal,
I'm sorry. See I turned the air conditioning down. You
all right? You look so, I said, sure, I'm all right.
He sounded worried. I hadn't even heard him come back.
The girl was looking worried too, I guess because I
was shaking so hard and I was spilling my drink.
(06:56):
I put some money on the table without even counting it.
It's all right, I said, we were just going. We were.
She looked confused, but she came along with me. They
always do once they find out you've been to Mars.
In the next place, she said, between trips to the
powder room. It must take a lot of carriage to
sign up for something like that. Were you scientifically inclined
(07:18):
in school? Don't you have to know an awful lot
to be a space flyer? Did you ever see any
of those little monkey characters they say lives on Mars?
I read an article about how they lived in little
cities of pup tents or something like that, Only they
didn't make them, they grew them funny, ever see those
That trip must have been a real drag. I bet,
(07:39):
what was it nine months? You could have a baby?
Excuse me say? Tell me all that time? How'd you
well manage things? I mean, didn't you ever have to
go to the you know? Or anything? We managed? I said?
She giggled, and that reminded her, so she went to
the powder room again. I thought about getting up and
(08:01):
leaving while she was gone, but what was the use
of that. I'd only pick up somebody else. It was
nearly midnight. A couple of minutes wouldn't hurt. And I
reached in my pocket for the little box of pills
they give us. It isn't refillable, but we'd get a
new prescription in the mail every month, along with the
pension check. The label on the box said caution use
(08:22):
only as directed by physician, Not to be taken by
persons suffering heart condition, digestive upset, or circulatory disease. Not
to be used in conjunction with alcoholic beverages. I took
three of them. I don't like to start them before midnight,
but anyway, I stopped shaking. I closed my eyes, and
then I was on the ship again. The noise in
(08:43):
the bar became the noise of the rockets, and the
air washers and the sludge sluicers. I began to sweat,
although this place was air conditioned too. I could hear
Wally whistling to himself the way he did, the sound
muffled by his oxygen mask and drowned in the rocket noise,
but still perfectly audible. The tune was sophisticated lady. Sometimes
(09:04):
it was easy to love, and sometimes chasing shadows, but
mostly sophisticated lady. He was from Juilliard. Somebody sneezed, and
it sounded just like Chowderhead sneezing. You know how everybody
sneezes according to his own individual style. Chowderhead had a
lady like little sneeze. It went hada, real quick, all
(09:25):
through the mouth, no nose involved. The captain went rush,
Wally was and Ghivli was Petah. Sam didn't sneeze much,
but he sort of coughed and sprayed, and that was worse.
Sometimes I used to think about killing Sam by tying
him down and having Wally and the Captain sneeze him
(09:45):
to death. But that was a kind of joke. Naturally,
when I was feeling good or pretty good, usually I
thought about a knife for Sam. For chowdhead, it was
a gun right in the belly. One shot. For Wall
it was a Tommy gun, just stitching him up and down,
you know, back and forth. The captain I would put
(10:06):
in a cage with hungry lions, and gively I'd strangle
with my bare hands. That was probably because of the cough.
I guess she was back. Please tell me about it,
she begged. I'm so curious. I opened my eyes. You
want me to tell you about it? Oh? Please, about
what it's like to fly to Mars on a rocket? Yes,
(10:29):
all right, I said, It's wonderful what three little white
pills will do. I wasn't even shaking. There's six men
see in a space the size of a buick, and
that's all the room. There is two of us in
the bunks all the time, four of us on watch.
Maybe you want to stay in this sack an extra
ten minutes because it's the only place on the ship
(10:50):
where you can stretch out, you know, the only place
where you can rest without somebody's elbow in your side.
But you can't because by then it's the next man's turn,
and maybe you don't have elbows in your side while
it's your turn. Off watch. But in the starboard bunk
there's the air regenerator master valve. I bet I could
still show you bruises right around my kidneys. And in
(11:12):
the port bunk there's the emergency escape hatch handle that
gets you in the temple if you turn your head
too fast, and you can't really sleep, I mean not
soundly because of the noise that is when the rockets
are going. When they aren't going, then you're in free fall.
And that's bad too, because you dream about falling. But
when they're going, I don't know, I think it's worse.
(11:33):
It's pretty loud, and even if it weren't for the noise.
If you sleep too soundly, you might roll over on
your oxygen line. Then you dream about drowning. Ever, do
that you're strangling and choking and you can't get any air.
It isn't dangerous, I guess anyway. It always woke me
up in time, though, I heard about a fellow in
a flight six years ago. Well, so you've always got
(11:55):
this oxygen mask on all the time, except if you
take it off for a second to talk to somebody.
You don't do that very often because what is there
to say. Oh maybe the first couple of weeks. Sure,
everybody's friends, then you don't even need the mask for
that matter, or not very much. Everybody's still pretty clean.
The place smells, oh, let's see about like the locker
(12:18):
room in a gym. You know, you can stand it.
That's if nobody's got space sickness. Of course we were
lucky in that way, but that's about how it's going
to get anyway. You know, outside the masks, it's soup.
It isn't that you smell it so much. You kind
of taste it in the back of your mouth and
your eyes sting. That's after the first two or three months.
(12:39):
Later on it gets worse, and with the mask on,
of course, the oxygen mixture is coming in under pressure.
That's funny. If you're not used to it. Your lungs
have to work a little bit harder to get rid
of it, especially when you're asleep. So after a while
the muscles get sore, and then they get sourer, and
then well, before we take off, the Psyche people give
(13:01):
us a long doda that keeps us from killing each other,
but they can't stop us from thinking about it. And afterward,
after we're back on earth, this is what you won't
read about in the articles. They keep us apart. You
know how they work it. We get a pension naturally,
I mean there's got to be a pension, otherwise there
isn't enough money in the world to make anybody go.
(13:22):
But in the contract it says to get the pension,
we have to stay in our own area. The whole
country's marked off six sections. Each has at least one
big city in it. I was lucky I got a
lot of them. They try to keep it so every
man's hometown is in his own section. But well, like
with us, Chowterhead and the Captain both happened to come
(13:42):
from Santa Monica. I think it was Chowderhead that got California, Nevada,
all that southwest area. It was the luck of the draw.
God knows what the captain got. Maybe New Jersey, I said,
and took another white pill. We went on to another place,
and she said, suddenly I figured something out the way
you keep looking around. What did you figure out? Well,
(14:05):
part of it was what you said about the other
fellow getting New Jersey. This is New Jersey. You don't
belong in this section, right right, I said, after a minute,
So why are you here? I know why you're here
because you're looking for somebody, That's right, She said, triumphantly.
You want to find that other fellow from your crew.
(14:27):
You want to fight him. I couldn't help shaking white
pills or no white pills, but I had to correct her, No,
I want to kill him. How do you know he's here?
He's got a lot of states to roam around in, too,
doesn't he six New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, all the
way down to Washington. Then how do you know he'll
(14:49):
be here? I didn't have to tell her how I knew,
But I knew. I wasn't the only one who spent
his time at the border of his assigned area, looking
across the river, or staring across a state line, knowing
that somebody was on the other side. I knew. You
fight a war, and you don't have to guess that
the enemy might have his troops a thousand miles away
(15:09):
from the battle line. You know where his troops will be.
You know he wants to fight too. Hatta Peta. I
spilled my drink. I looked at her. You you didn't,
She looked frightened. What's the matter? Did you just sneeze?
Sneeze me? Did I? I said something quick and nasty.
(15:32):
I don't know what. No, it hadn't been her. I
knew it. It was Chowterhead's sneeze. Chowterhead Marvin T. Roebuck
his name was five feet eight inches tall, dark complexed,
with a cast in one eye. Spoke with a Midwest
kind of accent, even though he came from California. Shrick
for shriek, horror, for horror like that. It drove me
(15:56):
crazy after a while. Maybe that gives you an idea
what he talked about up mostly a skunk, a thorough going,
deep rooted mother, murdering skunk. I kicked over my chair
and roared, roebuck, where are you, damn you? The bar
was all at once silent, only the jukebox kept going.
(16:16):
I know you're here, I screamed, come out and get
it you last I told you i'd get you for
calling me a liar the day while he sneaked a smoke, silence,
everybody looking at me. Then the door of the men's
room opened. He came out. He looked, lousy, eyes, all
red rimmed, and his hair falling out. The poor crumb
couldn't have been over twenty nine. He shrieked you. He
(16:40):
called me a million names. He said, you thieving rat.
I'll teach you to cheat me out of my candy ration.
He had a knife. I didn't care. I didn't have anything,
and that was stupid, but it didn't matter. I got
a bottle of beer from the next table and smashed
it against the back of the chair. It made a
good weapon, you know, I'd take that against a knife anytime.
(17:02):
I ran toward him, and he came all staggering and
lurching toward me, looking crazy and desperate, mumbling and raving.
I could hardly hear him because I was talking too.
Nobody tried to stop us. Somebody went out the door,
and I figured it was to call the cops, but
that was all right. Once I took care of Chowderhead,
I didn't care what the cops did. I went for
(17:23):
the face. He cut me first. I felt the knife
slide up along my left arm, but you know, it
didn't even hurt, only kind of stung a little. I
didn't care about that. I got him in the face,
and the bottle came away, and it was all like
gray and white jelly, and then blood began to spring out.
He screamed, Ah, that scream. I never heard anything like
(17:44):
that scream. It was what I had been waiting all
my life for. I kicked him as he staggered back,
and he fell, and I was on top of him
with the bottle, and I was careful to stay away
from the heart or the throat because that was too quick.
But I worked over the face and I felt his
knife get me a couple of times more, and and
I woke up, you know, and there was doctor Santley
(18:06):
over me with a hypodermic needle that he'd just taken
out of my arm, and four male nurses in fatigues
holding me down, and I was drenched with sweat. For
a minute, I didn't know where I was. It was
a horrible queasy, falling sensation, as though the bar and
the fight in the world were all dissolving into smoke
around me. Then I knew where I was. It was
(18:27):
almost worse. I stopped yelling and just lay there looking
up at them. Doctor Santley said, trying to keep his
face friendly and noncommittal. You're doing much better, Byron boy,
much better. I didn't say anything. He said, you worked
through the whole thing in two hours and eight minutes.
Remember the first time you were sixteen hours killing him,
(18:48):
Captain van Wick. It was that time. Remember who was
it this time, chower Head. I looked at the male nurses. Doubtfully.
They let go of my arms and legs. Chowter Head,
said Doctor Santley. Oh, roebuck, that boy, he said, mournfully,
his expression saddened. He's not coming along nearly as well
(19:09):
as you. Nearly. He can't run through a cycle in
less than five hours, and that's peculiar. It's usually you.
He well, I better not say that, shall I No
sense in setting up a counter impression when your pores
are all open, so to speak. He smiled at me,
but was a little worried in back of the smile.
I sat up. Anybody got a cigarette? Give him a cigarette, Johnson,
(19:32):
the doctor ordered the male nurse standing alongside my right foot, Johnson,
did I fired up? You're coming along splendidly. Doctor Santley said.
He was one of these sight guys that thinks if
you say it so it makes it so, you know
that kind We'll have you down under an hour before
the end of the week. That's marvelous progress. Then we
(19:53):
can work on the conscious level. You're doing extremely well,
whether you know it or not. Why in six months,
say in eight months? Because I like to be conservative,
he twinkled at me. We'll have you out of here.
You'll be the first of your crew to be discharged.
You know that. That's nice, I said. The others aren't
doing so well, No, not at all, well, most of them,
(20:14):
particularly doctor Givley. The run throughs leave him in terrible shape.
I don't mind admitting I'm worried about him. That's nice,
I said, and this time I meant it. He looked
at me thoughtfully, but all he did was say to
the male nurses, he's all right, now help him off
the table. It was hard standing up. I had to
hold on to the rail around the table for a minute.
(20:36):
I said, my set little speech, Doctor Sandley, I want
to tell you again how grateful I am for this.
I was reconciled to living the rest of my life
confined to one part of the country the way the
other crews always did. But this is much better. I
appreciate it. I'm sure the others do too. Of course, boy,
of course. He took out a fountain pen and made
(20:57):
a note on my chart. I couldn't see what it was,
but but he looked gratified. It's no more than you
have coming to you, Byron, he said. I'm grateful that
I could be the one to make it come to pass.
He glanced conspiratorily at the male nurses. You know how
important this is to me. It's the triumph of a
whole new approach to psychic rehabilitation. I mean to say,
(21:18):
our heroes of space travel are entitled to freedom when
they come back home to Earth, aren't they? Definitely, I said,
scrubbing some of the sweat off my face on to
my sleeve. So we've got to end this system of
designated areas. We can't avoid the tensions that accompany space travel. No,
but if we can help you to eliminate harmful tensions
(21:38):
with a few run throughs, why it's not too high
a price to pay? Is it not a bit? I
mean to say? He said, warming up? You can look
forward to the time when you'll be able to mingle
with your old friends from the rocket, free and easy,
without any need for restraint. That's a lot to look
forward to, isn't it? It is? I said, I look
(21:59):
forward to it very much, I said, And I know
exactly what I'm going to do the first time I
meet one. I mean, without any restraints, as you say,
I said, And it was true I did. Only it
wouldn't be a broken beer bottle that I would do
it with. I had much more elaborate ideas than that.
(22:21):
And of the Hated by Frederick Pohle
The Hated by Frederick Pohl. After space, there was always
one more river to cross the far side of hatred
and murder. The bar didn't have a name, no name
of any kind, not even an indication that it had
(00:21):
ever had one. All it said on the outside was
Cafe Eat Cocktails, which doesn't make a lot of sense,
but it was a bar. It had a big TV
set going yatata yatata, and three glorious colors, and a
jukebox that tried to drown out the TV with that
lousy music they play. Anyway, it wasn't a kid hang out.
(00:43):
I kinda like it, but I wasn't supposed to be
there at all. It's in the contract. I was supposed
to stay in New York and the New England states.
Cafe Eat Cocktails was right across the river. I think
the name of the place was Hoboken, but I'm not sure.
It all had a kind of dreamy feeling to it.
(01:04):
I was well. I couldn't even remember going there. I
remembered one minute I was in downtown New York looking
across the river. I did that a lot, and then
I was there. I don't remember crossing the river at all.
I was drunk, you know, you know how it is
double bourbons and keep them coming. And after a while
the bartender stops bringing me the ginger ale because gradually
(01:25):
I forget to mix them. I got pretty loaded long
before I left New York. I realized that. I guess
I had to get pretty loaded to risk the pension.
And all used to be I didn't drink much, but
now I don't know. When I have one drink, I
get to thinking about Sam and Wally and Chowterhead and
Givli and the Captain. If I don't drink, I think
(01:48):
about them too, And then I take a drink and
that leads to another drink and it all comes out
to the same thing. Well, I guess I said it already.
I drink a pretty good amount, but you can't blame me.
There was a girl. I always get a girl someplace.
Usually they aren't much, and this one wasn't either. I mean,
(02:08):
she was probably somebody's mother. She was around thirty five
and not so bad. Though she had a long scar
under her ear down along her throat to the little
round spot where her larynx was, it wasn't ugly. She
smelled nice. While I could still smell, you know, and
she didn't talk too much. I like that only, well,
(02:29):
did you ever meet somebody with a nervous cough? Like
when you say something funny, a little funny, not a
big yack. They don't laugh, and they don't stop with
just smiling, but they sort of cough. She did that.
I began to itch. I couldn't help it. I asked
her to stop it. She spilled her drink and looked
at me, almost as though she was scared. And I
(02:52):
had tried to say it quietly too, Sorry, she said,
a little angry, a little scared. Sorry, but you don't
have to you forget it, sure, but you asked me
to sit down here with you. Remember, if you're going
to forget it. I nodded at the bartender and held
up two fingers. You need another drink, I said. The
(03:13):
thing is, I said, Givey used to do that? What
that cough? She looked puzzled. You mean like this? God,
damn it? Stop it. Even the bartender looked over at
me that time. Now she was really mad, but I
didn't want her to go away. I said. Givey was
a fellow who went to Mars with me. Pat Givey, Oh,
(03:37):
she sat down again and leaned across the table low Mars.
The bartender brought our drinks and looked at me suspiciously.
I said, say, Mac, would you mind turning down the
air conditioning. My name isn't Mac. No have a heart.
It's too cold in here. Sorry, he didn't sound sorry
(03:59):
I was. I mean that kind of weather. It's always
cold in those places, you know, around New York. In
August it hits eighty eighty five ninety. All the places
have air conditioning. And what they really want is for
you to wear a shirt and tie. But I like
to walk a lot. You would too, you know, and
you can't walk around much in long pants in a
suit code and all that stuff not around there, not
(04:22):
in August. And so then when I went into a bar,
i'd have one of these built in freezers for the
used car salesmen with their dates or maybe their wives,
all dressed up for what. But I froze Mars. The
girl breathed, Mars. I began to itch again. Want to dance?
(04:44):
They don't have a license, she said, Byron, I didn't
know you'd been to Mars. Please tell me about it.
It was all right, I said. That was a lie.
She was interested. She forgot to smile. It made her
look nicer. She said, I knew a man, my brother
in law. He was my husband's brother, I mean, my
(05:04):
ex husband. I get the idea. He worked for General
Atomic in Rockford, Illinois. You know where that is? Sure?
I couldn't go there, but I knew where Illinois was.
He worked on the first Mars ship, Oh, fifteen years ago,
wasn't it. He always wanted to go himself, but he
couldn't pass the tests. She stopped and looked at me.
(05:26):
I knew what she was thinking, But I didn't always
look this way. You know, not that there's anything wrong
with me now. I mean, but I couldn't pass the
tests any more. Nobody can. That's why we're all one trippers.
I said. The only reason I'm shaking like this is
because i'm cold. It wasn't true, of course. It was
that cough of Givli's. I didn't like to think about
(05:48):
Givley or Sam or Chowdhead or Wally or the Captain.
I didn't like to think about any of them. It
made me shake. You see, we couldn't kill each other.
They wouldn't let us do that. Before we took off.
They did something to our minds to make sure. What
they did it doesn't last forever. It lasts for two years,
and then it wears off. That's long enough, you see,
(06:10):
because that gets you to Mars and back. And it's
plenty long enough in another way, because it's like a
straight jacket. You know, how to make a baby cry,
hold his hands. It's the most basic thing there is.
What they did to us so we couldn't kill each other.
It was like being tied up, like having our hands held,
so we couldn't get free. Well, but two years was
(06:33):
long enough. Too long. The bartender came over and said, Pal,
I'm sorry. See I turned the air conditioning down. You
all right? You look so, I said, sure, I'm all right.
He sounded worried. I hadn't even heard him come back.
The girl was looking worried too, I guess because I
was shaking so hard and I was spilling my drink.
(06:56):
I put some money on the table without even counting it.
It's all right, I said, we were just going. We were.
She looked confused, but she came along with me. They
always do once they find out you've been to Mars.
In the next place, she said, between trips to the
powder room. It must take a lot of carriage to
sign up for something like that. Were you scientifically inclined
(07:18):
in school? Don't you have to know an awful lot
to be a space flyer? Did you ever see any
of those little monkey characters they say lives on Mars?
I read an article about how they lived in little
cities of pup tents or something like that, Only they
didn't make them, they grew them funny, ever see those
That trip must have been a real drag. I bet,
(07:39):
what was it nine months? You could have a baby?
Excuse me say? Tell me all that time? How'd you
well manage things? I mean, didn't you ever have to
go to the you know? Or anything? We managed? I said?
She giggled, and that reminded her, so she went to
the powder room again. I thought about getting up and
(08:01):
leaving while she was gone, but what was the use
of that. I'd only pick up somebody else. It was
nearly midnight. A couple of minutes wouldn't hurt. And I
reached in my pocket for the little box of pills
they give us. It isn't refillable, but we'd get a
new prescription in the mail every month, along with the
pension check. The label on the box said caution use
(08:22):
only as directed by physician, Not to be taken by
persons suffering heart condition, digestive upset, or circulatory disease. Not
to be used in conjunction with alcoholic beverages. I took
three of them. I don't like to start them before midnight,
but anyway, I stopped shaking. I closed my eyes, and
then I was on the ship again. The noise in
(08:43):
the bar became the noise of the rockets, and the
air washers and the sludge sluicers. I began to sweat,
although this place was air conditioned too. I could hear
Wally whistling to himself the way he did, the sound
muffled by his oxygen mask and drowned in the rocket noise,
but still perfectly audible. The tune was sophisticated lady. Sometimes
(09:04):
it was easy to love, and sometimes chasing shadows, but
mostly sophisticated lady. He was from Juilliard. Somebody sneezed, and
it sounded just like Chowderhead sneezing. You know how everybody
sneezes according to his own individual style. Chowderhead had a
lady like little sneeze. It went hada, real quick, all
(09:25):
through the mouth, no nose involved. The captain went rush,
Wally was and Ghivli was Petah. Sam didn't sneeze much,
but he sort of coughed and sprayed, and that was worse.
Sometimes I used to think about killing Sam by tying
him down and having Wally and the Captain sneeze him
(09:45):
to death. But that was a kind of joke. Naturally,
when I was feeling good or pretty good, usually I
thought about a knife for Sam. For chowdhead, it was
a gun right in the belly. One shot. For Wall
it was a Tommy gun, just stitching him up and down,
you know, back and forth. The captain I would put
(10:06):
in a cage with hungry lions, and gively I'd strangle
with my bare hands. That was probably because of the cough.
I guess she was back. Please tell me about it,
she begged. I'm so curious. I opened my eyes. You
want me to tell you about it? Oh? Please, about
what it's like to fly to Mars on a rocket? Yes,
(10:29):
all right, I said, It's wonderful what three little white
pills will do. I wasn't even shaking. There's six men
see in a space the size of a buick, and
that's all the room. There is two of us in
the bunks all the time, four of us on watch.
Maybe you want to stay in this sack an extra
ten minutes because it's the only place on the ship
(10:50):
where you can stretch out, you know, the only place
where you can rest without somebody's elbow in your side.
But you can't because by then it's the next man's turn,
and maybe you don't have elbows in your side while
it's your turn. Off watch. But in the starboard bunk
there's the air regenerator master valve. I bet I could
still show you bruises right around my kidneys. And in
(11:12):
the port bunk there's the emergency escape hatch handle that
gets you in the temple if you turn your head
too fast, and you can't really sleep, I mean not
soundly because of the noise that is when the rockets
are going. When they aren't going, then you're in free fall.
And that's bad too, because you dream about falling. But
when they're going, I don't know, I think it's worse.
(11:33):
It's pretty loud, and even if it weren't for the noise.
If you sleep too soundly, you might roll over on
your oxygen line. Then you dream about drowning. Ever, do
that you're strangling and choking and you can't get any air.
It isn't dangerous, I guess anyway. It always woke me
up in time, though, I heard about a fellow in
a flight six years ago. Well, so you've always got
(11:55):
this oxygen mask on all the time, except if you
take it off for a second to talk to somebody.
You don't do that very often because what is there
to say. Oh maybe the first couple of weeks. Sure,
everybody's friends, then you don't even need the mask for
that matter, or not very much. Everybody's still pretty clean.
The place smells, oh, let's see about like the locker
(12:18):
room in a gym. You know, you can stand it.
That's if nobody's got space sickness. Of course we were
lucky in that way, but that's about how it's going
to get anyway. You know, outside the masks, it's soup.
It isn't that you smell it so much. You kind
of taste it in the back of your mouth and
your eyes sting. That's after the first two or three months.
(12:39):
Later on it gets worse, and with the mask on,
of course, the oxygen mixture is coming in under pressure.
That's funny. If you're not used to it. Your lungs
have to work a little bit harder to get rid
of it, especially when you're asleep. So after a while
the muscles get sore, and then they get sourer, and
then well, before we take off, the Psyche people give
(13:01):
us a long doda that keeps us from killing each other,
but they can't stop us from thinking about it. And afterward,
after we're back on earth, this is what you won't
read about in the articles. They keep us apart. You
know how they work it. We get a pension naturally,
I mean there's got to be a pension, otherwise there
isn't enough money in the world to make anybody go.
(13:22):
But in the contract it says to get the pension,
we have to stay in our own area. The whole
country's marked off six sections. Each has at least one
big city in it. I was lucky I got a
lot of them. They try to keep it so every
man's hometown is in his own section. But well, like
with us, Chowterhead and the Captain both happened to come
(13:42):
from Santa Monica. I think it was Chowderhead that got California, Nevada,
all that southwest area. It was the luck of the draw.
God knows what the captain got. Maybe New Jersey, I said,
and took another white pill. We went on to another place,
and she said, suddenly I figured something out the way
you keep looking around. What did you figure out? Well,
(14:05):
part of it was what you said about the other
fellow getting New Jersey. This is New Jersey. You don't
belong in this section, right right, I said, after a minute,
So why are you here? I know why you're here
because you're looking for somebody, That's right, She said, triumphantly.
You want to find that other fellow from your crew.
(14:27):
You want to fight him. I couldn't help shaking white
pills or no white pills, but I had to correct her, No,
I want to kill him. How do you know he's here?
He's got a lot of states to roam around in, too,
doesn't he six New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, all the
way down to Washington. Then how do you know he'll
(14:49):
be here? I didn't have to tell her how I knew,
But I knew. I wasn't the only one who spent
his time at the border of his assigned area, looking
across the river, or staring across a state line, knowing
that somebody was on the other side. I knew. You
fight a war, and you don't have to guess that
the enemy might have his troops a thousand miles away
(15:09):
from the battle line. You know where his troops will be.
You know he wants to fight too. Hatta Peta. I
spilled my drink. I looked at her. You you didn't,
She looked frightened. What's the matter? Did you just sneeze?
Sneeze me? Did I? I said something quick and nasty.
(15:32):
I don't know what. No, it hadn't been her. I
knew it. It was Chowterhead's sneeze. Chowterhead Marvin T. Roebuck
his name was five feet eight inches tall, dark complexed,
with a cast in one eye. Spoke with a Midwest
kind of accent, even though he came from California. Shrick
for shriek, horror, for horror like that. It drove me
(15:56):
crazy after a while. Maybe that gives you an idea
what he talked about up mostly a skunk, a thorough going,
deep rooted mother, murdering skunk. I kicked over my chair
and roared, roebuck, where are you, damn you? The bar
was all at once silent, only the jukebox kept going.
(16:16):
I know you're here, I screamed, come out and get
it you last I told you i'd get you for
calling me a liar the day while he sneaked a smoke, silence,
everybody looking at me. Then the door of the men's
room opened. He came out. He looked, lousy, eyes, all
red rimmed, and his hair falling out. The poor crumb
couldn't have been over twenty nine. He shrieked you. He
(16:40):
called me a million names. He said, you thieving rat.
I'll teach you to cheat me out of my candy ration.
He had a knife. I didn't care. I didn't have anything,
and that was stupid, but it didn't matter. I got
a bottle of beer from the next table and smashed
it against the back of the chair. It made a
good weapon, you know, I'd take that against a knife anytime.
(17:02):
I ran toward him, and he came all staggering and
lurching toward me, looking crazy and desperate, mumbling and raving.
I could hardly hear him because I was talking too.
Nobody tried to stop us. Somebody went out the door,
and I figured it was to call the cops, but
that was all right. Once I took care of Chowderhead,
I didn't care what the cops did. I went for
(17:23):
the face. He cut me first. I felt the knife
slide up along my left arm, but you know, it
didn't even hurt, only kind of stung a little. I
didn't care about that. I got him in the face,
and the bottle came away, and it was all like
gray and white jelly, and then blood began to spring out.
He screamed, Ah, that scream. I never heard anything like
(17:44):
that scream. It was what I had been waiting all
my life for. I kicked him as he staggered back,
and he fell, and I was on top of him
with the bottle, and I was careful to stay away
from the heart or the throat because that was too quick.
But I worked over the face and I felt his
knife get me a couple of times more, and and
I woke up, you know, and there was doctor Santley
(18:06):
over me with a hypodermic needle that he'd just taken
out of my arm, and four male nurses in fatigues
holding me down, and I was drenched with sweat. For
a minute, I didn't know where I was. It was
a horrible queasy, falling sensation, as though the bar and
the fight in the world were all dissolving into smoke
around me. Then I knew where I was. It was
(18:27):
almost worse. I stopped yelling and just lay there looking
up at them. Doctor Santley said, trying to keep his
face friendly and noncommittal. You're doing much better, Byron boy,
much better. I didn't say anything. He said, you worked
through the whole thing in two hours and eight minutes.
Remember the first time you were sixteen hours killing him,
(18:48):
Captain van Wick. It was that time. Remember who was
it this time, chower Head. I looked at the male nurses. Doubtfully.
They let go of my arms and legs. Chowter Head,
said Doctor Santley. Oh, roebuck, that boy, he said, mournfully,
his expression saddened. He's not coming along nearly as well
(19:09):
as you. Nearly. He can't run through a cycle in
less than five hours, and that's peculiar. It's usually you.
He well, I better not say that, shall I No
sense in setting up a counter impression when your pores
are all open, so to speak. He smiled at me,
but was a little worried in back of the smile.
I sat up. Anybody got a cigarette? Give him a cigarette, Johnson,
(19:32):
the doctor ordered the male nurse standing alongside my right foot, Johnson,
did I fired up? You're coming along splendidly. Doctor Santley said.
He was one of these sight guys that thinks if
you say it so it makes it so, you know
that kind We'll have you down under an hour before
the end of the week. That's marvelous progress. Then we
(19:53):
can work on the conscious level. You're doing extremely well,
whether you know it or not. Why in six months,
say in eight months? Because I like to be conservative,
he twinkled at me. We'll have you out of here.
You'll be the first of your crew to be discharged.
You know that. That's nice, I said. The others aren't
doing so well, No, not at all, well, most of them,
(20:14):
particularly doctor Givley. The run throughs leave him in terrible shape.
I don't mind admitting I'm worried about him. That's nice,
I said, and this time I meant it. He looked
at me thoughtfully, but all he did was say to
the male nurses, he's all right, now help him off
the table. It was hard standing up. I had to
hold on to the rail around the table for a minute.
(20:36):
I said, my set little speech, Doctor Sandley, I want
to tell you again how grateful I am for this.
I was reconciled to living the rest of my life
confined to one part of the country the way the
other crews always did. But this is much better. I
appreciate it. I'm sure the others do too. Of course, boy,
of course. He took out a fountain pen and made
(20:57):
a note on my chart. I couldn't see what it was,
but but he looked gratified. It's no more than you
have coming to you, Byron, he said. I'm grateful that
I could be the one to make it come to pass.
He glanced conspiratorily at the male nurses. You know how
important this is to me. It's the triumph of a
whole new approach to psychic rehabilitation. I mean to say,
(21:18):
our heroes of space travel are entitled to freedom when
they come back home to Earth, aren't they? Definitely, I said,
scrubbing some of the sweat off my face on to
my sleeve. So we've got to end this system of
designated areas. We can't avoid the tensions that accompany space travel. No,
but if we can help you to eliminate harmful tensions
(21:38):
with a few run throughs, why it's not too high
a price to pay? Is it not a bit? I
mean to say? He said, warming up? You can look
forward to the time when you'll be able to mingle
with your old friends from the rocket, free and easy,
without any need for restraint. That's a lot to look
forward to, isn't it? It is? I said, I look
(21:59):
forward to it very much, I said, And I know
exactly what I'm going to do the first time I
meet one. I mean, without any restraints, as you say,
I said, And it was true I did. Only it
wouldn't be a broken beer bottle that I would do
it with. I had much more elaborate ideas than that.
(22:21):
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