Transmigration (13 page)

 

 

"There are vast tomes of investigation into such phenomena. Even if the
results are inconclusive, you have to admit that thousands of people
have been honestly convinced that this kind of thing has been happening
since the dawn of history."

 

 

Unexpectedly, she was suddenly interested, eager. She took a couple of
quick steps and stood just in front of him, small, vibrant, challenging.

 

 

"You're Fletcher?" she said.

 

 

"Yes."

 

 

"You're also Ross?"

 

 

"Yes."

 

 

"But meantime you're Fletcher?"

 

 

"Yes."

 

 

"Kiss me."

 

 

He saw at once what she had in mind, but he didn't think about it.
Such an invitation from such a girl required no consideration.

 

 

He took her in his arms and sought her lips with his. She was passive,
then willing, then responding. As kisses went, this one soared to the
stars. Neither of them had anything to learn from any of the great lovers
of history.

 

 

When Anita could speak, she whispered, still in his arms: "Now I believe
the unbelievable. But it's not what you told me. You're not Fletcher,
obviously. And you're not Ross either."

 

 

 

 

Fletcher thoroughly enjoyed one part of the day. Ross usually lunched at
the Students' Union, but he cooked his own evening meal, which he called
supper, because he never had anything else to eat later. If funds ran to
it he drank, but never ate.

 

 

Left to his own devices in Ross's tiny kitchen, Fletcher ran riot with
the modest stores. Since there was rice, tins of chicken, prawns and
shrimps, ham left over from breakfast, a few sausages and tomatoes,
he made a vast mound of paella and ate every last morsel. He had never
enjoyed a meal more. Ross's healthy appetite combined with Fletcher's
unhealthy preoccupation with food made it a feast of the gods.

 

 

At last, as Fletcher was sprawled on the bed in postprandial torpor,
Ross admitted his existence again.

 

 

--You ate enough to last me for a week.

 

 

--Wasn't it wonderful?

 

 

--I can't understand the way you eat, Fletcher.

 

 

--I can't understand the way you drink, Ross.

 

 

--Anyway, I want to be rid of you.

 

 

--We're agreed

 

 

--And I've thought of a way that might work. A very simple way.

 

 

Their thoughts were very guarded. Each had reached certain conclusions
he didn't intend to share with the other.

 

 

--What is it? Fletcher asked.

 

 

--You'll have to let me do it.

 

 

--I will. You want to take over now?

 

 

--Yes, but I think after all I'll tell you what I have in mind. You
remember what happened before you got into Judy's brain?

 

 

--Of course.

 

 

--You knew your time had come, so you got in touch with Baudaker. For
more than twelve hours you strove to touch other minds. That must have
toned you up, stimulated you in some way. You got a headache. Without
really knowing why, you got drunk. That toned you up some more.

 

 

--Appearances were much the other way.

 

 

--But don't you see? You wanted to live, and you wanted to die. You wanted
to find out about your special talents, and you wanted to pretend they
didn't exist. You tried to touch minds, and achieved only negative
results . . . like a golf champion pretending he couldn't play golf and
doing ten times worse than someone who had never tried.

 

 

--Well?

 

 

--I'm going to buy two bottles of whisky, and drink them.

 

 

--No! Why not beer, like before?

 

 

--Because you don't like whisky. You don't like being drunk, either, do
you? I'm nearly sure I've found the way, Fletcher. Somewhere around the
end of the first bottle you'll hop into oblivion or into somebody else,
and which it is I personally do not care.

 

 

After a moment's hesitation Fletcher realized there was nothing to
hesitate about, if he meant what he had said.

 

 

--Go ahead.

 

 

For a time Fletcher closed all the doors and let Ross take over. The
first taste of whisky brought him back: he wanted to gag, but Ross
wouldn't let him.

 

 

Back in his room with the two bottles and a glass, alone, the door
locked, in a comfortable armchair, Ross said aloud: "It's good stuff,
Fletcher. Proper malt whisky, the real Highland stuff. I can't really
afford it, but anything to get rid of you."

 

 

--The feeling's mutual.

 

 

--Yes, I wonder if some celestial entity is having a game with us? We're
all sick. You're sick, Judy was sick, I'm sick. I use the past tense
in one case because possibly Judy isn't sick any more. It's interesting
about her. Cute kid. Pity she weren't six years older. That's one thing
I never did, Fletcher, rob cradles. Anyway, maybe she isn't sick any more.

 

 

--That's one thing I'm happy about.

 

 

--Be happy if you like, Fletcher. But not when I take another swig of
whisky, because that's not supposed to make you happy . . . .

 

 

It did not.

 

 

"As for me," Ross said, aloud again, "you may even have done me some
good too. That is, assuming this works and you get the hell out of me."

 

 

He sipped some more whisky, drinking it like wine.

 

 

"We're alike in many ways, as you finally decided. Insecure background,
no security of affection. It hit us in different ways, that's all. You
decided not to exist any more than you could help. If anyone said 'boo'
to you, you crawled into your shell. I decided I'd bloody well take what
I could get. And it worked, in a way."

 

 

--Not a good way.

 

 

"No. We're agreed about that. Ours is better."

 

 

--What do you mean, ours?

 

 

"Wow, what a kissl And she was right. We weren't Ross, and we weren't
Fletcher. We were something possibly worthy of Anita. Did you notice,
she seemed to think so too?"

 

 

--I don't understand.

 

 

"Then you're a fool. Well, maybe that's unjust, Fletcher. I take it
back. I take it back, but you're still a fool."

 

 

The level in the whisky bottle was sinking rapidly.

 

 

"I really am most extraordinarily grateful to you, Fletcher -- that is,
assuming you get the hell out of me in about five minutes." As was only
to be expected, he made a sad hash of the word "extraordinarily."

 

 

The whisky, evidently, had hit him very suddenly, almost in mid-sentence.
That was quite possible at the rate he was drinking it.

 

 

Fletcher, although acutely uncomfortable, was not as drunk as Ross was,
and this was strange. The same blood was coursing through the part of
Ross's brain that was his, and the alcohol content of the blood was
rising rapidly. But then, there must be something quite non-physical
about these recent phenomena; what remained of Fletcher was more than
just a small area of Ross's brain.

 

 

"There's one very strange thing about you, Fletcher. You've got this
feeling about good. You're not a real Chris-Christian, despite your
background. Maybe you're a pig, prig I mean. You're certainly a pood,
I mean prude. . . . " He started to laugh.

 

 

"All the same," he went on, recovering, "I see the sense in this
good obsession of yours. It gives you a certain direction, a certain
purpose. I mean, even if it's of no particular value in itself, you do
have something to hang on to that I haven't got. I never was a genuine
diab-diab- what's the word? You can't build a life on evil for evil's
sake. It's a slare and denusion. A dare and a slelusion. A . . . "

 

 

He laughed helplessly, only minutes from coma. He had drunk a whole
bottle of whisky and started on a second in half an hour.

 

 

And his scheme, Fletcher thought, was not going to work. There was
nothing forcing him out of Ross. He had been revolted by every cubic
centimeter of whisky consumed, but he was not permitted to be sick,
and the alcohol did not appear to affect him.

 

 

However, as Ross tried to pick up the glass and succeeded only in spilling
its contents over his legs, Fletcher suddenly felt himself being nudged
from his haven.

 

 

He remembered the youth Gerry nudging the girl into the water. Time after
time she recovered, but in the end she had to go in over her head.
Irregular nudges like that were dislodging him now, and he realized
that it was the almost comatose Ian Ross who was applying them.

 

 

--Get out, Fletcher. Get out, get OUT!

 

 

There were no words. It was an emotional plea, and it was a plea,
not a command. Ross could not command. Fletcher, if he chose, could
command. The host could only urge, or nudge.

 

 

And Ross, drunk and bound to get very much drunker, even if he consumed
no more whisky, was nudging violently, with shattering effect.

 

 

There was desperation in the effort, and as Ross's shield slipped,
Fletcher sensed what Ross had been keeping from him, or at least not
quite telling him.

 

 

Ross wanted to rid himself of the consciousness that remained of Fletcher,
the stranger in his head who could watch him, talk to him, control him,
enslave him.

 

 

Yet he had no intention of getting rid of the part of Fletcher that
he needed, the part that supplied something which had been missing
in him. And Fletcher was willing to leave it, if he could do for Ross
anything remotely like what he had done for Judy.

 

 

Ross pressed with all his emotional strength, and Fletcher, like Sheila
when she was finally flung off balance, felt the water close over
his head.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER 4: BAUDAKER

 

 

He was in the laboratory, feeding figures into the computer. It was a
purely mechanical job requiring only occasional attention.

 

 

Fletcher had learned how to be quiescent; either totally, or seeing,
hearing and feeling without advertising his presence. Ross had sensed
him nevertheless, but only after he had become careless.

 

 

This time Fletcher was careful and remained careful. Baudaker, absorbed
in his work and the private thoughts the work allowed, knew nothing,
although this was the first time Fletcher had entered a conscious mind.

 

 

Fletcher was at once aware of two major differences this time, one
disappointing, one extremely pleasant. The disappointing thing was
the return to a third rate body. Judy and Ross were young and strong;
Judy was so exuberantly healthy that the mild discomfort of her injured
leg scarcely registered, and Ross, careless though he was of his body's
welfare, had not yet succeeded in doing it any permanent harm. Baudaker,
however, was middle-aged and flabby, and had smoked far too much for
many years. Fletcher felt a permanent constriction round his chest and
a constant throat irritation, a constant desire to cough. He was not,
this time, hungry at all.

 

 

The pleasant thing was that poor little Baudaker, though anything but well
adjusted, and with certain areas of vast sorrow and unease which Fletcher
did not try to probe just then, was a well-meaning man of old-fashioned
respectability and honesty. For the first time Fletcher could be content
in his host. If he could only compel Baudaker to stop smoking . . .

 

 

At that moment Baudaker lit another cigarette. The last was still smoking
in an ashtray. Open-mindedly Fletcher savored the first draw. There must
be some pleasure in smoking, or so many people wouldn't do it.

 

 

If there was, he failed to find it. He learned, too, that Baudaker didn't
really enjoy smoking either. A compulsive smoker, he really enjoyed only
the first cigarette in the morning, the one that started him coughing,
and the last one at night.

 

 

Reaching the end of his task, Baudaker began to tidy up. What he was
doing was as usual, extra, voluntary work. It was work that somebody
had to do, and Baudaker was the willing horse.

 

 

Fletcher sensed and wondered at Baudaker's reluctance to go home.
He would not have to wonder long.

 

 

Baudaker put out the lights, locked up and went out. It had started to
rain. He turned up his collar and dashed for his car. Although it was
parked under trees less than a hundred yards from the entrance to the
psychology building, he was gasping for breath as he reached the little
black car, ten years old, and fumbled to unlock it. Rain ran down the
back of his neck. Spots danced before his eyes, and his hands shook so
that it took him a long time to get the door open.

 

 

He crashed the gears vilely and Fletcher thought: that's a problem that
has to be faced. I didn't choose to be here, but I'm here. Baudaker has
a right to his own life and his own body, but if I'm going to stay in it
he's got to cut down on smoking, go for a walk sometimes, and wash more
often. Also, since I can if he can't, why shouldn't we drive a car better?