Executive (25 page)

“And what of Megan?” she screamed.

“Your mother and I are separated. She understands.”

“She's not my mother!” Hopie said. “I don't know who my mother is! Sometimes I hate her for being secret—and for making me a bastard! Why did you have to do it, Daddy? What was wrong with your wife? You just had to—”

“You misunderstand—”

She slammed me in the nose. The pain exploded, and almost immediately the blood flowed from a burst blood vessel.

I let it flow. “I'm sorry,” I said.

“Sorry!” she mimicked. “Why weren't you sorry before you started all this?”

“If you would talk to Amber—”

“I'll talk to her!” she cried. “You bet I will!” She ran out of the room, and I knew that her rage was forty-nine percent grief.

Coral came in to medicate me and clean me up, for my blood was all over my face and shirt. “I didn't think you wanted protection this time,” she murmured.

I nodded. “There is some punishment a man must accept.”

“She'll settle down, in time.”

“I knew she would be angry,” I said. “But I didn't realize how angry.”

“Daughters don't have to be understanding of adult weakness.” Under her skilled hands the flow of blood eased and stopped, and so did the physical pain. “You'll be bruised, sir.”

“Not only physically,” I agreed.

Hours later, when I was lying sleepless in my bed, my nose bandaged, Hopie came quietly to me. “Oh, Daddy!” she said.

I sat up and gazed at her, unspeaking. She threw herself into my arms and sobbed. She cried for about fifteen minutes, then disengaged. “I will tell Thorley,” she whispered, and left. Then I slept.

Next morning Shelia handed me a feelie chip. “From Amber?” I asked, startled.

“From Hopie,” she said. “I have not played it.”

I was thankful for that. “Hopie said she was—”

“She's already gone.” She glanced sidelong up at me. “That must have been some session you had.”

I touched my bandaged nose. “You guessed!”

“She shows similar wounds.”

I nodded, knowing it was the emotional carnage she meant. I took the chip and played it at the earliest opportunity, apprehensive about what it would show. Hopie had evidently forgiven me my transgression, but the whole story was not yet clear. My talent blurs when applied to those I love; I did not know my daughter's mind.

The scene was of Amber, sitting in the room they shared, the helmet on her head. Hopie entered, saw her, and took up a similar helmet.

My muscles tightened. The helmets show the programmed scenes when used separately with the chips, but because they tune in on the user's brain signals, they can interact when used close to each other. This can cause unpredictable effects and is not recommended for amateurs. It is the closest approach to telepathy that we presently possess. Hopie was within the interactive range, deliberately.

The scene dissolved and re-formed: now it was no longer what Hopie had programmed to set the situation; it was the shared dream of the two girls.

Amber's scene was a field of pretty flowers, the horizon far distant, showing that this was not the interior of a bubble or dome. The sun as seen from Earth shone brightly down, warming her. She was in a simple print dress, sitting cross-legged. She held a daisy, and she was picking off the petals in the age-old “He loves me, he loves me not” ritual. But the query was never completed; no matter how long she picked, there were always more petals. She could have been at this for hours.

Then a man strode toward her, his boots trampling down the living flowers. I winced; the man was me, imperfectly rendered but recognizable. In real life I would never trample flowers; they were too valuable.

But this was hardly intended to be the real me; it was something else, and I doubted that I would like it very much.

Amber looked up and saw the me-figure. She smiled welcome.

The me-figure smiled. He reached down and more or less lifted her to her feet. Then he took her by the hair and held her cruelly while his free hand ripped off her dress.

Amber's face showed surprise and shock. Obviously she had never expected such an approach from me. But she did not resist. She even tried to help with the removal of the clothing. Perhaps she did not realize that the me-figure was not being animated by the real Hope Hubris but by his angry daughter, who was attempting to show how badly I was acting.

In moments Amber was naked. The me-figure leered and developed an impossibly monstrous erect phallus, one that would have torn the girl apart if forced into her. He started to do just that—but then was engulfed in flames. He screamed as his hair blazed up.

The scene shifted to show the source of the flame. It was a dragon with a long and sinuous neck, burnished scales, and a switching tail. It inhaled, reorienting on the target, then belched out another fierce jet of fire.

The me-figure tried to flee, but the flame pursued; it was obvious that he could not escape a horrible death by burning. But as the fire arrived naked Amber leapt to intercept it, spreading her arms to take the brunt of it on her breast. She, the ravished, was sacrificing herself to save me.

Abruptly the dragon vanished. The scene reverted to its original state: girl with flower. Evidently Hopie had not intended to have Amber burned, but Amber had power over her own scene-figure and could do what she willed.

Again the me-figure approached, and again he attacked the unresisting girl. This time the act was halted by the arrival of a huge turbaned pirate bearing a sword with a blade four feet long. He swung it violently at the me-figure, lopping off an arm. The sword evidently had a laser-buttressed edge, so that it cut right through flesh and bone.

Again Amber leapt to protect me. She jumped to intercept the next cut, losing one of her own arms.

And again the scene abruptly abated; Amber was not supposed to be the target.

The third attack was more subtle. This time the me-figure did not rip off Amber's dress; he merely took hold of her, dragging her away. She scrambled around to get her feet properly under her, so that she could come along willingly.

The scene darkened. A quick pan of the sky showed that a storm was forming, the clouds roiling in great gray masses as they never did in a Jupiter bubble. A wind came up, flattening the flowers and tearing at the me-figure's clothing and Amber's dress.

Then snow pelted down, and its very touch froze the flowers, for they turned instantly gray and stiff.

Soon the two figures were plowing through ankle-deep drifts.

A poncho appeared, settling around Amber's shoulders, but there was none for the me-figure. Instead the wind tore at him so persistently that his clothing tore away, exposing him further to the elements. He would soon freeze to death.

Amber removed her poncho and set it on the me-figure, trying to protect him from the deadly chill. But the poncho dissipated into mist as she did so, and was gone. Another poncho formed around her. She tried to give this also to the me-figure, but again it misted out, re-forming about her. The message was plain enough: only she could be warm.

The snow quickly became knee-deep, and the wind cut through cruelly. The me-figure faltered, his motions slowing; he was literally freezing to death. He tottered and fell face forward into the snow.

Amber got down and tried to lift him up, but her strength was inadequate. She turned him over, brushing the snow from his face. His features were frozen; he did not respond to her ministrations. He was preserved as an icy statue.

Amber bent to kiss his frozen lips, but still there was no response. She tried once more to wrap the poncho around him but, once more, to no avail. He was gone.

Then she gazed up at the snowy sky, and her face was wet with tears, not with snow. “Why are you doing this?” she cried in English, the language she was locked into.

For an instant the scene froze, not in the cold sense but in the still sense. I knew what was happening: Hopie had never before heard Amber speak in that language and was so astonished that she was forgetting to animate the scene.

Then she recovered. Her own figure appeared in the scene. “You're talking English!” she exclaimed.

“How can you do that?”

“This isn't the real world,” Amber reminded her. Then, realizing: “ You are doing this?”

“Yes. I'm in the adjacent helmet. They interact.”

“But—why are you killing your father?”

“Because he means to abuse you,” Hopie said grimly.

“Oh, no, no!” Amber cried. “He is a great and gentle man, and he would never hurt me!”

“Amber, don't you understand? He wants to have sex with you. ”

“Yes. And I with him. I love him.”

Hopie was flustered. “But you—you're a child! It isn't right! He's abusing his position, his power over you!”

“Oh, Hopie, please understand! I have no life without him! I love him utterly! All I want is to be with him completely.”

“To be... one of his women?” Hopie asked disdainfully.

“Oh, yes!”

“But you know he can't love you! He doesn't love anybody, really! He only uses women! They love him, but it's one-sided. How can you even consider letting yourself be—”

“He loves each one a little,” Amber said. “None of them as much as Helse or Megan or you. But enough.”

Hopie paused, shaken anew. “You really mean it, don't you? You want to be one of his mistresses! You don't care what it means!”

“He only touches those he really respects or cares about. I thought there was no chance for me, and when I found there was—oh, Hopie, don't deny me this, my only real pleasure in existence! You know I have no life of my own! You're his daughter; you have everything, but I have nothing!”

“I'm his daughter,” Hopie repeated. “His illegitimate offspring. You call that everything?”

“He only ever loved one woman enough to have a child by her. What could be more precious to him than that child?”

Hopie considered. Then, slowly, her militancy crumbled. She began to cry.

Amber went over to her. “Oh, Hopie, don't be sad. You have been so good to me, I don't want to make you unhappy!”

Hopie reached out to embrace her. The two girls clutched each other, both crying, while the snow melted away and the flowers returned.

“Show me how it is with you,” Hopie said at last.

Amber was perplexed. “How it is?”

“We're connected now. How do you feel about my father? Just let your feeling go, and I will read it.”

Amber let her feeling go. It expanded to fill the scene—not a picture, not a sound, but sheer, inchoate, encompassing emotion, such total longing, need, desire, passion, and love that it swept aside all considerations of age, sex, propriety, legality, status, and doubt. Her body might be marginally adult, but her feeling was the essence of womanly abandon.

I, the object of it all, found myself awed. This emotion—it vaporized anything childish or playful or innocent. This was the very depth of reality. To be loved so utterly—could I possibly be worthy?

A brief eternity later it ebbed, for it had been only a glimpse. A peek into Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory combined, into Nirvana and Nothingness. Amber's entire brain was misorganized, without the normal feedbacks and governors. Her love was absolute.

“I never understood,” Hopie breathed.

Neither had I, I realized.

“You never felt the lack,” Amber responded.

The scene dissolved.

“Missive from Thorley,” Shelia informed me, handing me the letter. Thorley, of course, clung quaintly to the printed page, despite its inefficiency, because he identified literally with the press. It is a bias I appreciate, for when I wish to express myself with unstressed candor, this is the medium I choose. The written word. Its magic supersedes technology.

At my leisure I broke the archaic wax seal on the envelope and read: My Dear Tyrant:

I feel it incumbent upon me to advise you of a private interview I had most recently with your adopted daughter, Hopie Hubris. She came to me with what I assumed was to be a concern relating to her post as Minister of Education, but which turned out to be of another nature.

She advised me that you had required her to inform me of a private peccadillo: your passion for a rather young woman in your charge, by name Amber. It seems that Amber was given to you by Chairman Khukov two years past and serves as a kind of translator, being conversant in her fashion with a number of tongues. Now it is your intent to make of this young woman a mistress, she being amenable.

Obviously it is not my prerogative to pass judgment on your private affairs, nor is it my desire to do so.

The secret passions of any man, I suspect, would embarrass him were they made public. As this particular one appears to relate in no way to your performance in office, I see no need to expose this girl to the kind of notoriety that would develop if the matter were to become public. In sum, sir, I will keep your secret. I am sure you would do the same for me.

However, there is a related matter that I found necessary to impart to your daughter. After completing her mission, which, it seems, was not entirely to her liking, she unburdened herself to the point of inquiring rhetorically why she had had to be the one to perform this office.

“Because, my dear young woman,” I said to her, assuming that familiarity that our labors on the organization of education facilitated, “the Tyrant, knowing that news of this nature could not be entirely concealed from those with a keen nose for the nuance of human fallibility, wished to advise me in a fashion which could not be doubted that the object of his amorous intention was not yourself. Had other been the case, it would indeed have been necessary to expose—”

Here I had to abate my explanation, for she was staring at me with such chagrin that I realized that further discussion was pointless. She departed forthwith. May I say, sir, that if I have caused your daughter unwarranted distress, I am deeply disturbed. Certainly I bear her no malice and consider her to be a fine young woman with an attractive penchant for literary expression. It may be that I spoke carelessly in this instance. As it is too late to mitigate such damage as I may have done, I am taking the liberty of informing you of the situation. I leave the remainder in your hands.