Chapter Six
The Daily Schedule for all exercisers allowed four hours freetime, an hour before and after each of the two daily comsesh workouts. This added up to eight hours a day, and it was the only time an exerciser was authorized to be away from his home dorm. Part of his freetime was consumed in traveling to and from comsesh. The rest could be spent sightseeing, socializing at one of the Mixed Company centers, or exploring the amusements of the faddist villages. The remaining sixteen hours of a Clocktime day were lived inside the dorm, half of it set aside for sleepytime, the balance as CQ. Two hourly studytime periods were compulsory even for adult exercisers during Confined-to-Quarters; otherwise the exerciser could do anything he wanted—except go outside.
After all, everyone couldn’t be out on the walks or spilling over the greenscape at the same time. The world just wasn’t big enough.
When Cory left his dorm it was nightfall by the Clock, that time of day when the light of the sky dimmed, receding toward the horizon all around, leaving a steel-gray canopy overhead, and a dim, gray and shadowless world below. But he was luckier than he could have hoped. He had only been out a few minutes when, with customary suddenness, realnight came, darkening the sky and cooling the air perceptibly.
Clocktime had a fixed span of twenty-four hours a day, as ordained by the Clockmaker in the wisdom of His purpose at the time of the Creation. But the sky also reflected a different “day” and “night,” defined by shorter and variable spans of more intense light and deeper darkness, on a cycle which ranged from about thirteen-and-a-half to twenty-one-and-a-half hours for the complete realday.
Rarely did realnight coincide with the Clock. Whenever it did the world seemed to have a different atmosphere. Those who were outside at such times generally felt more energetic and lively, invigorated by the cooler air and enchanted by the magic interplay of artificial lights among the intensely black shadows. It was a time when more young people seemed to be inclined to socialize, and almost everyone outside was reluctant to be called home to the routine of study or sleep.
For Technician Cory the coincidence of realnight with nightfall brought unexpected relief. What he hoped to do would be a lot easier to accomplish with extra darkness.
Animated crowds jammed the walks and the nearby greenscape, excited for their own reasons by the night’s unusual spectacle. Cory tried to lose himself among them. Even the special circumstances of the evening were not enough to banish his uncomfortable self-consciousness over the Clockpatch on his left shoulder—a blue clock face broken by a wedge of scarlet showing the four-hour interval during which, day or night, he could legitimately be on the walks.
His group wore scarlet markers. Another had green segments against the same blue background. The remaining group of exercisers—those who were now outside—were identified by a yellow wedge cutting into the blue clock face.
Everywhere he looked Cory saw these yellow emblems, and he had the impression that everyone who passed him glanced in surprise or suspicion toward his shoulder at the scarlet wedge which seemed to burn through his coverall and sear the flesh. But no one spoke, or raised a shout, or tried to stop him.
Except for authorized honeymoons, which were restricted by law to a period of three weeks, male and female exercisers did not live together. Though defiantly unconventional in some of their customs, faddists lived by the same rules in matters of sexual conduct and relationships. Cory understood that the grayshirt colonies practiced what was called free love, but the practice—identified as it was with an inferior group—aroused no envy in him. His dreams were of Citizen Zona, not of an unwashed grayshirt.
The women’s dorms he sought were clustered around a large square in three long buildings, each two stories high. Cory had seen them often enough in passing, and he had picked up a girl several times at the entrance to her dorm for an evening together at one of the Mixed Company social centers. He had never been inside a female dorm. More than one male exerciser of his acquaintance had claimed he had, but Cory could not be sure any of these boasts were true.
If he were caught, Cory thought, he would have to admit to some such clandestine adventure. Would that get him off with a minimal penalty? Not likely. But it did no good to dwell on the possible punishment he was bringing on himself. The time for that was before he left his dorm.
The walk let him cruise along the southern border of the greenscape within thirty yards of the U-shaped arrangement of dormitories. An animated crowd, young girls mostly, children allowed out to see the glitter of a realnight, filled the central square. Approaching the dorms from this direction undetected, or unquestioned, was impossible.
Would there be sentries, he wondered for the first time, posted to enforce the first precept of the General Rules of Conduct? He had no thought of breaking that fundamental law—Zona would have something to say about that, he thought wryly—but who would believe his protest?
This whole escapade was mad, Cory thought—but a stubborn anger rose instantly to trample any weakening of purpose. A world in which Owen could be so casually condemned was itself mad.
The mainwalk, a broad two-way avenue running north and south to the borders of the world, appeared just ahead. Cory nimbly made the transfer to a southgoing walk. He let it carry him past the women’s dorms. When he was well beyond them he jumped off. He was in an area of storage warehouses. He made his way purposefully among these squat buildings. A gang of grayshirts, busily attacking crates or piling goods onto delivery belts, kept their eyes generally averted, pretending to ignore him. Beyond the warehouse strip was another, smaller greenscape, some small service buildings, and a path leading to the first of the long dorm buildings.
While he could not be certain where Zona lived, once he had heard her laughingly refer to the long walk she had from her room just to reach the moving walk. That suggested the building which formed the base of the U-shaped cluster and was farthest from the walk. But it could just as easily refer to one of the rear units in either of the other dorms.
Cory gambled on the central dorm—the one now nearest to him. A path led directly to a rear entrance in the middle of the building. In the erratic light other doors were visible at intervals along the unbroken facade of the building. Cory approached the main entrance slowly and cautiously, stepping off the open path into the more shadowed area of greenscape. Close to the dorm a low wall provided screening for a series of waste disposal incinerators common to all living quarters. Cory crouched behind the wall, watchful for the appearance of any grayshirt janitors. None appeared.
He had reason to be grateful for his caution. Pausing in shadow created by the intensely black sky of realnight, he was no more than thirty feet from the blank, windowless back wall of the dorm. In that moment of hesitation a figure moved inside the entry, visible through the top panel of the door. Instinctively Cory dropped to his knees so fast his heart seemed to bob up into his throat. The black-clad Authority Figures always brought a conditioned apprehension, a childhood carryover. There had never been a father, but there had always been the Authority.
They always worked in pairs, Cory knew. In this instance both would be women. Both would be superb exercisers, he thought, reminded of the ease with which Zona had flipped him during their workout. Trying to get past them would be foolhardy, even if it were not unthinkable.
His determination somewhat dampened, Tech Cory retreated from the guarded entrance. There were other ways. A service entrance might be best. It might not be so vigilantly protected.
He found one, unlocked and untended, a hundred yardss to the right of the main entrance. It was at a lower level, reached by a service ramp extending from a food storage depot. Twin belts, continuously in motion, flanked the ramp, carrying goods into the dorm or transporting waste from it.
Cory slipped quietly into the building by way of the ramp. He found himself in a huge basement pantry, largely automated in its functions. A nearby stairway led him to the first residential level. Here he peeked out along a wide, white, brightly illuminated corridor. High-pitched voices rose nearby, but no one was in sight. Halfway along the corridor was an office. If it were empty, he might find a list of residents and their rooms …
For a moment longer Cory hesitated. Then he stepped boldly into the corridor and started toward the office. There were many reasons for turning back—too many. Even if he found Zona’s room, which suddenly seemed the wildest of chances, he had no way of guessing how she would react when she saw him. Would she scream? Give an alarm? Or—he winced at the thought—toss him against the nearest wall?
He was still a dozen strides from the office when, without warning, a door burst open, spilling a half-dozen girls into the corridor directly in his way. Each was lightly clad in a white tunic. Cory stopped, frozen like a Statue in mid-stride. For several pulse-pounding seconds the girls stared at him without a sound. They were young, he had time to note. No more than fifteen, most of them less. That meant—holy time! He had stumbled into a maternity dorm.
Bedlam burst upon the hallway as if released by a spring. Several of the girls began to shout or scream simultaneously. Another fled in panic down the hall. Others were pointing at Cory, their faces excited and scared and hostile. He saw other doors opening along the white-faced walls. He turned and ran.
Cory pounded down the stairs. In the food pantry he ran head-on into a grayshirt laborer. The worker—a slight, gray-haired woman with a smell about her of damp old clothes and sweat—gave a small cry and tumbled to the floor. Instantly contrite, Cory started toward her. Then he heard other voices on the stairs, approaching fast. Panicking, Cory abandoned the woman. He bolted up the ramp and flung himself into the shadows of the greenscape.
He did not stop running until his trembling legs and heaving lungs drove him to his knees. It was a moment when he could briefly regret not having exercised more enthusiastically, increasing his stamina. But he had covered a considerable distance, zigzagging across the greenscape and among some storage bins and back again to the parklike strip behind one of the side dorms. Behind him there were no longer any sounds of pursuit.
He stared morosely at the nearby dorm. He had been saved by the dark shadows of realnight, not by any cleverness of his own. Another time he would not be so lucky. For the moment the darkness continued to hide him, but a sense of the futility of his venture was inescapable. He could not again risk barging in—
Hairs stirred at the back of his neck. The shadows which concealed him worked as effectively for others. Now a black shape rose, taking human form, only a few steps away. Facing him. Someone had been watching him all along. Cory’s muscles tensed and he sucked in a deep, painful lungful of air. This time he would not be able to run far …
A low ripple of laughter reached him from the shadows, bringing another chill to the back of his neck. Then the figure slipped closer to him, crossing a patch of open greenscape, and he saw that it was a woman—in the tunic of an exerciser.
“Don’t be afraid—I won’t shout,” she whispered.
Cory was not sure whether to believe her or not, but something in her conspiratorial manner—or memory of her smothered amusement—held him rooted.
“You’re meeting someone, aren’t you?”
“No, I was …” Cory broke off. On a hunch he corrected himself. “Yes. That is, I hope to.”
“Here?”
“Well, no—I was hoping to get inside.”
“You would go to her room—to your friend?” There was an eager excitement, even glee, in the woman’s voice.
“Yes.”
She crouched close to him, her face less than a foot from his, and Cory saw that she was an older woman, her hair visibly gray, her face drawn into the established lines of maturity. Involuntarily Cory thought of his mother for the second time that day. This woman looked as old—beyond the maximum allowed in the Personnel Specifications. But that was impossible.
The woman sighed. “My friend—the father of my child—came to my room, once. But that was so long ago. Long ago,” she repeated wistfully. “And he is gone now.”
“Gone?”
“He was older than I.” The words were resigned, but the voice was not without a hint of bitter loss.
Gambling, Cory asked, “Will you help me get inside?”
The woman’s breath caught, and she clasped her hands. For a moment Cory thought that he had misjudged her feelings. Then he heard the ripple of her laugh, a young woman’s laughter—or that of an older woman feeling briefly young again. “She is here? In this dorm?”
“I don’t know. But I can give you her name. Do you suppose you could find out where her sleeproom is?”
The woman was quickly stirred by the romantic appeal, and she agreed instantly. “What is her name?”
“Zona—Citizen Zona. Do you know her?”
The stranger’s negative shake of her head brought disappointment. “She is young, I’m sure. It’s not likely that we would meet. But don’t worry—I’ll find her for you. You wait here.” She giggled suddenly. “I am called Cordelia, by the way.”
“Don’t you think I should come …”
But the woman was gone, slipping away silently, disappearing among the shadows of the greenstrip. Straining his eyes, Cory caught a brief glimpse of her only when she was quite close to the dormitory. Then she rounded a corner and was lost to sight.
Waiting impatiently, Cory had a feeling of being suspended in time, as if the Clock itself had stopped. He wondered if the woman—Cordelia, a name that was unfamiliar to him, quaintly old-fashioned—would betray him. He thought not. Her excitement had not been feigned.
But if she failed? If Zona lived elsewhere? What then? Would he creep back to his room, hoping that he would not be stopped on the walks? Back to his familiar room, and to the boyish Technician Eric, whose every word and act would be a reminder of Owen’s fate? What had he hoped to achieve, anyway, with this wild chase into the night? What would his futile protest accomplish?
Angrily Cory shrugged off the questions. What he had done would not bring Owen back, but he did not regret the decision.
Not yet, a cool inner voice warned him.
Then Cordelia was back, silencing his doubts and quieting his fretful impatience. “You are in luck—your Zona lives here. And her room is at this end of the dorm. It’s not far at all.”
“How busy is it? Is it quiet now? Is there any chance of getting in without being seen?” The questions tumbled out. “I don’t want to bring her any harm.”
“She will not mind,” Cordelia said with another sigh. “She knows you’re coming to her?”
“No.”
The woman stared at him, surprised. But she said, “Then she will be even happier.”
“I hope so,” Cory said, more to himself than in reply.
“Of course she will.” Cordelia paused, glancing toward the dorm. “There is an exit at the end of the corridor near her sleeproom. It is an exit only, it won’t open from the outside. I’ll open it for you. Then, when there is no one to see you …”
Cory nodded. “I don’t know how to thank you.”
“There is no need. It’s been a long time for me, but I haven’t forgotten.” The way she spoke gave the impression that she was re-living the only intensely joyful experience of her life.
Cordelia guided Tech Cory around the end of the long dormitory building and pointed out the door through which he would enter. Then she left him again. This time there was only a brief delay before he saw the door crack open. He waited. After another moment she peered out, beckoning him.
Cory ran to the door, pushed it open, and stepped into another white-walled corridor. With relief he saw that it was a short branch hallway with no more than a half dozen rooms opening off it.
“Hurry!” Cordelia whispered. “It is number twelve—there!”
She pointed toward Zona’s room. Cory felt his heart begin to labor again, his chest seeming to fill as if he had been running a long way. Now that he was on the verge of succeeding in his reckless gamble, all his doubts rushed in on him.
But Cordelia, watching him, had none, and he felt no reservations about his gratitude to her. “Thank you,” he said fervently.
In answer she leaned toward him—in the brightness of the dorm she seemed younger, and her eyes were shining—and kissed him quickly, warm dry lips brushing his cheek. Then she turned away, a slight figure in a white tunic hurrying along the corridor, glancing back once over her shoulder.
Cory knocked on Zona’s door. There was no immediate response. He heard voices some distance away in the building and glanced down the hall. Cordelia was waiting at the intersection, looking back anxiously. Fingers fluttered in an urgent gesture.
Again Cory knocked. “Who is it?” came a muffled question.
The voices were closer now, a babble of talk and merriment. Cordelia’s face mirrored worry that skidded swiftly toward fright. Cory tried the door button. To his surprise the door was not locked. It slid open instantly. Just as a blur of movement was visible at the end of the short hallway Cory jumped into the sleeproom and let the door close behind him.
He looked into Citizen Zona’s astonished blue eyes.