The Day of the Boomer Dukes Read online

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  _Just as medicine is not a science, but rather an art--a device, practised in a scientific manner, in its best manifestations--time-travel stories are not science fiction. Time-travel, however, has become acceptable to science fiction readers as a traditional device in stories than are otherwise admissible in the genre. Here, Frederik Pohl employs it to portray the amusingly catastrophic meeting of three societies._

  THE DAY OF THE BOOMER DUKES

  by Frederik Pohl

  _Illustrated by EMSH_

  There was a silvery aura around the kid ... the cops'guns hit him ... but he didn't notice....]

  I

  Foraminifera 9

  Paptaste udderly, semped sempsemp dezhavoo, qued schmerz--Excuse me. Imean to say that it was like an endless diet of days, boring,tedious....

  No, it loses too much in the translation. Explete my reasons, I say. Domy reasons matter? No, not to you, for you are troglodytes, knowingnothing of causes, understanding only acts. Acts and facts, I will giveyou acts and facts.

  First you must know how I am called. My "name" is Foraminifera 9-HartBailey's Beam, and I am of adequate age and size. (If you doubt this, Iam prepared to fight.) Once the--the tediety of life, as you might say,had made itself clear to me, there were, of course, only twoalternatives. I do not like to die, so that possibility was out; and theremaining alternative was flight.

  Naturally, the necessary machinery was available to me. I arrogated asmall viewing machine, and scanned the centuries of the past in the hopethat a sanctuary might reveal itself to my aching eyes. Kwel tedietythat was! Back, back I went through the ages. Back to the Century of theDog, back to the Age of the Crippled Men. I found no time better thanmy own. Back and back I peered, back as far as the Numbered Years. TheTwenty-Eighth Century was boredom unendurable, the Twenty-Sixth a morassof dullness. Twenty-Fifth, Twenty-Fourth--wherever I looked, tediety waswhat I found.

  * * * * *

  I snapped off the machine and considered. Put the problem thus: Wasthere in all of the pages of history no age in which a 9-Hart Bailey'sBeam might find adventure and excitement? There had to be! It was notpossible, I told myself, despairing, that from the dawn of the dreamingprimates until my own time there was no era at all in which I couldbe--happy? Yes, I suppose happiness is what I was looking for. But wherewas it? In my viewer, I had fifty centuries or more to look back upon.And that was, I decreed, the trouble; I could spend my life staring intothe viewer, and yet never discover the time that was right for me. Therewere simply too many eras to choose from. It was like an enormouslibrary in which there must, there had to be, contained the one fact Iwas looking for--that, lacking an index, I might wear my life away andnever find.

  "_Index!_"

  I said the word aloud! For, to be sure, it was the answer. I had thefreedom of the Learning Lodge, and the index in the reading room couldeasily find for me just what I wanted.

  Splendid, splendid! I almost felt cheerful. I quickly returned theviewer I had been using to the keeper, and received my deposit back. Ihurried to the Learning Lodge and fed my specifications into the index,as follows, that is to say: Find me a time in recent past where there isadventure and excitement, where there is a secret, colorful band ofdesperadoes with whom I can ally myself. I then added twospecifications--second, that it should be before the time of the highradiation levels; and first, that it should be after the discovery ofanesthesia, in case of accident--and retired to a desk in the readingroom to await results.

  It took only a few moments, which I occupied in making a list of thegear I wished to take with me. Then there was a hiss and a crackle, andin the receiver of the desk a book appeared. I unzipped the case, tookit out, and opened it to the pages marked on the attached reading tape.

  I had found my wonderland of adventure!

  * * * * *

  Ah, hours and days of exciting preparation! What a round of packing andbuying; what a filling out of forms and a stamping of visas; what anorgy of injections and inoculations and preventive therapy! Merelygetting ready for the trip made my pulse race faster and my adrenalinbalance rise to the very point of paranoia; it was like being given atrue blue new chance to live.

  At last I was ready. I stepped into the transmission capsule; set thedials; unlocked the door, stepped out; collapsed the capsule and storedit away in my carry-all; and looked about at my new home.

  Pyew! Kwel smell of staleness, of sourness, above all of coldness! Itwas a close matter then if I would be able to keep from a violenteructative stenosis, as you say. I closed my eyes and remembered warmviolets for a moment, and then it was all right.

  The coldness was not merely a smell; it was a physical fact. There was adamp grayish substance underfoot which I recognized as snow; and in ahard-surfaced roadway there were a number of wheeled vehicles moving,which caused the liquefying snow to splash about me. I adjusted my coatcontrols for warmth and deflection, but that was the best I could do.The reek of stale decay remained. Then there were also the buildings,painfully almost vertical. I believe it would not have disturbed me ifthey had been truly vertical; but many of them were minutes of arc froma true perpendicular, all of them covered with a carbonaceous materialwhich I instantly perceived was an inadvertent deposit from the air. Itwas a bad beginning!

  However, I was not _bored_.

  * * * * *

  I made my way down the "street," as you say, toward where a group ofyoung men were walking toward me, five abreast. As I came near, theylooked at me with interest and kwel respect, conversing with each otherin whispers.

  I addressed them: "Sirs, please direct me to the nearest recruitingoffice, as you call it, for the dread Camorra."

  They stopped and pressed about me, looking at me intently. They werehandsomely, though crudely dressed in coats of a striking orange color,and long trousers of an extremely dark material.

  I decreed that I might not have made them understand me--it is alwaysprobable, it is understood, that a quicknik course in dialects of thepast may not give one instant command of spoken communication in thefield. I spoke again: "I wish to encounter a representative of theCamorra, in other words the Black Hand, in other words the cruel andsinister Sicilian terrorists named the Mafia. Do you know where thesecan be found?"

  One of them said, "Nay. What's that jive?"

  I puzzled over what he had said for a moment, but in the end decreedthat his message was sensefree. As I was about to speak, however, hesaid suddenly: "Let's rove, man." And all five of them walked quicklyaway a few "yards." It was quite disappointing. I observed themconferring among themselves, glancing at me, and for a time proposedterminating my venture, for I then believed that it would be better toreturn "home," as you say, in order to more adequately research thematter.

  * * * * *

  However, the five young men came toward me again. The one who had spokenbefore, who I now detected was somewhat taller and fatter than theothers, spoke as follows: "You're wanting the Mafia?" I agreed. Helooked at me for a moment. "Are you holding?"

  He was inordinately hard to understand. I said, slowly and withpatience, "Keska that 'holding' say?"

  "Money, man. You going to slip us something to help you find thesecats?"

  "Certainly, money. I have a great quantity of money instantlyavailable," I rejoined
him. This appeared to relieve his mind.

  There was a short pause, directly after which this first of the youngmen spoke: "You're on, man. Yeah, come with us. What's to call you?" Iqueried this last statement, and he expanded: "The name. What's thename?"

  "You may call me Foraminifera 9," I directed, since I wished to beincognito, as you put it, and we proceeded along the "street." All fiveof the young men indicated a desire to serve me, offering indeed to takemy carry-all. I rejected this, politely.

  I looked about me with lively interest, as you may well believe. Kweldirt, kwel dinginess, kwel cold! And yet there was a certain charm whichI can determine no way of expressing in this language. Acts and facts,of course. I shall not attempt to capture the subjectivity which is thecharm, only to transcribe the physical datum--perhaps even data, whoknows? My companions, for example: They were in appearance overwrought,looking about them continually, stopping entirely and drawing me withthem into the shelter of a "door" when another man, this one wearingblue clothing and a visored hat appeared. Yet they were clearly devotedto me, at that moment, since they had put aside their own projects inorder to escort me without delay to the Mafia.

  * * * * *

  Mafia! Fortunate that I had found them to lead me to the Mafia! For ithad been clear in the historical work I had consulted that it was notultimately easy to gain access to the Mafia. Indeed, so secret were theythat I had detected no trace of their existence in other histories ofthe period. Had I relied only on the conventional work, I might neverhave known of their great underground struggle against what you termsociety. It was only in the actual contemporary volume itself, thecuriosity titled _U.S.A. Confidential_ by one Lait and one Mortimer,that I had descried that, throughout the world, this great revolutionaryorganization flexed its tentacles, the plexus within a short distance ofwhere I now stood, battling courageously. With me to help them, whatheights might we not attain! Kwel dramatic delight!

  My meditations were interrupted. "Boomers!" asserted one of my fiveescorts in a loud, frightened tone. "Let's cut, man!" he continued,leading me with them into another entrance. It appeared, as well as Icould decree, that the cause of his ejaculative outcry was the discoveryof perhaps three, perhaps four, other young men, in coats of the sameshiny material as my escorts. The difference was that they were of adifferent color, being blue.

  * * * * *

  We hastened along a lengthy chamber which was quite dark, immediatelyafter which the large, heavy one opened a way to a serrated inclineleading downward. It was extremely dark, I should say. There was also anextreme smell, quite like that of the outer air, but enormouslyintensified; one would suspect that there was an incomplete combustionof, perhaps, wood or coal, as well as a certain quantity of generaldecay. At any rate, we reached the bottom of the incline, and my escortbehaved quite badly. One of them said to the other four, in these words:"Them jumpers follow us sure. Yeah, there's much trouble. What's toprime this guy now and split?"

  Instantly they fell upon me with violence. I had fortunately becomerather alarmed at their visible emotion of fear, and already had takenfrom my carry-all a Stollgratz 16, so that I quickly turned it on them.I started to replace the Stollgratz 16 as they fell to the floor, yet Irealized that there might be an additional element of danger. Instead ofputting the Stollgratz 16 in with the other trade goods, which I hadbrought to assist me in negotiating with the Mafia, I transferred it tomy jacket. It had become clear to me that the five young men of myescort had intended to abduct and rob me--indeed had intended it allalong, perhaps having never intended to convoy me to the office of theMafia. And the other young men, those who wore the blue jackets in placeof the orange, were already descending the incline toward me, quiterapidly.

  "Stop," I directed them. "I shall not entrust myself to you until youhave given me evidence that you entirely deserve such trust."

  * * * * *

  They all halted, regarding me and the Stollgratz 16. I detected that oneof them said to another: "That cat's got a zip."

  The other denied this, saying: "That no zip, man. Yeah, look at themLeopards. Say, you bust them flunkies with that thing?"

  I perceived his meaning quite quickly. "You are 'correct'," I rejoined."Are you associated in friendship with them flunkies?"

  "Hell, no. Yeah, they're Leopards and we're Boomer Dukes. You cool them,you do us much good." I received this information as indicating that thetwo socio-economic units were inimical, and unfortunately lapsed into anexample of the Bivalent Error. Since p implied not-q, I sloppily assumedthat not-q implied r (with, you understand, r being taken as the classof phenomena pertinently favorable to me). This was a very poorconstruction, and of course resulted in certain difficulties. Qued,after all. I stated:

  "Them flunkies offered to conduct me to a recruiting office, as you say,of the Mafia, but instead tried to take from me the much money I amholding." I then went on to describe to them my desire to attain contactwith the said Mafia; meanwhile they descended further and grouped aboutme in the very little light, examining curiously the motionless figuresof the Leopards.

  They seemed to be greatly impressed; and at the same time, very muchpuzzled. Naturally. They looked at the Leopards, and then at me.

  They gave every evidence of wishing to help me; but of course if I hadnot forgotten that one cannot assume from the statements "not-Leopardimplies Boomer Duke" and "not-Leopard implies Foraminifera 9" that,qued, "Boomer Duke implies Foraminifera 9" ... if I had not forgottenthis, I say, I should not have been "deceived." For in practice theywere as little favorable to me as the Leopards. A certain member oftheir party reached a position behind me.

  I quickly perceived that his intention was not favorable, and attemptedto turn around in order to discharge at him with the Stollgratz 16, buthe was very rapid. He had a metallic cylinder, and with it struck myhead, knocking "me" unconscious.