The Futurological Congress: From the Memoirs of Ijon Tichy Read online

  Still, I didn't move. The manhole cover snapped shut with another clang and I was alone. A flashlight placed upright on the floor threw a faint circle of light across the ceiling, which provided a little illumination. Two rats walked by, their tails tightly braided. Now that had to mean something, I told myself, but what? It was probably better not to ask.

  Something stirred, gurgling in the sewer. "Well, well," I said under my breath, "and whose turn is it now?" The viscous surface of the water was broken, and there appeared the glistening, black forms of five frogmen wearing goggles and oxygen masks, and holding guns. One by one they jumped up on the platform and approached me, slapping their flippers on the concrete.

  "¿Habla usted español?" the first addressed me, pulling off his mask. He had a swarthy face and a thin mustache.

  "No," I answered. "But I bet that you speak English."

  "Some smart-aleck gringo," he snapped to another. As if on command, they all leveled their guns at me.

  "You want me to jump in the sewer?" I asked cheerfully.

  "Stand against the wall! Hands up! Higher!"

  A barrel was stuck in my ribs. This hallucination, I observed, was quite accurate—the pistols were even wrapped in plastic bags, to prevent them from getting wet.

  "There were more of them here," said the man in the mustache to a stocky brunet who was trying to light a cigarette (this one looked like the leader). Meanwhile they searched the place, kicking the beer cans with a deafening clatter, turning over chairs. At last the officer said:

  "Any weapons?"

  "Nothing on him, Captain. I checked."

  "Can I lower my hands now?" I asked. "They're falling asleep."

  "We'll put them to sleep—for keeps. Give it to him now?"

  "M'm," nodded the officer, blowing smoke through his nose. "No, wait!" he added.

  He walked up to me, swaying his hips. Attached to the belt was a cluster of gold wedding rings on a string. Amazing detail, I thought, so realistic!

  "Where are the others?" he demanded.

  "You're asking me? Why, they hallucinated themselves out the manhole. But you know that, of course."

  "Touched in the head, Captain. Loco. Let me put him out of his misery," said the one with the mustache, releasing the safety on his pistol through the plastic.

  "Not that way, stupid," said the officer. "You'll make a hole in the bag, and where will you get another? Use a knife."

  "Excuse me for interrupting," I said, lowering my hands a little, "but I think I would prefer a bullet."

  "Who has a knife?"

  They all looked. Of course they wouldn't find one, I thought. That would end things much too quickly. The officer threw his butt on the ground, crushed it beneath the toe of his flipper with a scowl, spat and said:

  "Finish him off. Let's go."

  "Yes, by all means!" I eagerly agreed.

  They crowded around me, curious.

  "What's your hurry, gringo? Look at the bastard, he's begging for it! Maybe we should only cut off his fingers and nose!" They all had suggestions.

  "Gentlemen, please! No half measures now! Do your duty, show no mercy!" I urged them.

  "Into the water! Upstream!" barked the officer, and they pulled their masks on while he opened his diving suit, unbuttoned his jacket, drew out a small revolver, blew into the muzzle, then twirled it like some cowboy in a cheap Western and shot me in the chest. A fierce, searing pain went through me. I began to sink along the wall, but he seized me by the hair, pulled my head back and shot me again, point-blank in the face. The flash was blinding, but I didn't have time to hear the bang. Afterwards I was in total darkness, suffocating, for ages it seemed, then something picked me up, tossed me about, not an ambulance, I hoped, or a helicopter, but the darkness grew darker yet, and finally even that darker darkness was blotted out, till nothing was left.

  When I opened my eyes I was propped up on a well-made bed in a room with a narrow window, the glass painted over with white. I stared dully at the door, as if waiting for something. Not that I had the faintest idea of where I was or how I had gotten there. On my feet were flat sandals, and my pajamas had stripes. Well, that was a little variety at least, I thought, though this dream didn't look like it would be too interesting. The door swung open. Standing in the middle of a group of young people in white lab coats was a short, bearded doctor, bristly gray hair on his head, gold spectacles on his nose. He held a rubber mallet.

  "Now here's an interesting case, gentlemen," he said. "Most interesting. The patient suffered an overdose of hallucinogens four months ago. The effects, of course, wore off soon after, yet he refuses to acknowledge this and persists in the opinion that everything he sees is in reality unreal. Indeed, he had progressed so far in his aberration that he actually pleaded with the soldiers of General Diaz—they were then fleeing from the occupied palace through the sewer system—to be executed, calculating that death would in fact constitute an awakening from the illusion. His life was saved thanks to three extremely serious operations—two bullets removed from the left ventricle—and he continues to believe that he hallucinates."

  "Schizophrenia?" asked a thin female intern. Unable to see over the shoulders of her colleagues, she was standing on tiptoe to get a look at me.

  "No. We are dealing here with a new form of reaction psychosis, undoubtedly brought on by the wanton application of those lethal drugs. A hopeless case. His condition is so grave, in fact, that it's been decided to have the patient immediately undergo vitrification."

  "Really, Professor?" cried the female intern. She could hardly contain her excitement.

  "Yes. As you all know, hopeless cases presently may be refrigerated in liquid nitrogen for a period of forty to seventy years. The subject is placed in a hermetic container, a sort of Dewar flask or thermos, with a complete history of the disease. As new discoveries and advances in medicine are made, the vaults in which these people lie in storage are inventoried, and whoever can be helped is promptly resuscitated."

  "Do you give your consent to be vitrified?" the female intern asked me, poking her head between two hulking colleagues. Her eyes shone with scientific curiosity.

  "Sorry, I don't talk to apparitions," I said. "But I can tell you what your first name is. Hallucinda."

  They left, shutting the door, but I could still hear her voice: "Vitrification! Perennial hibernation! Why, it's like traveling in time! How romantic!" I didn't exactly share her opinion, but there was no point in trying to resist this elaborate fiction. The next day, in the evening, two orderlies wheeled me to the operating room, where there was a glass tank; the vapors rising from it were so cold, I had to catch my breath. After a number of injections I was laid out on the operating table, fed some sweet, transparent liquid through a tube—glycerin, explained the older orderly. A friendly type. I decided to name him Hallucinathan. As I was falling asleep, he leaned over and shouted in my ear: "Pleasant dreams!"

  I couldn't answer, I couldn't move, not a finger, afraid all the while—weeks, it seemed!—afraid they'd be too hasty and throw me into the tank before I lost consciousness completely. And apparently they were in somewhat of a hurry, for the last sound that reached me from that world was the splash my body made as it plunged into the liquid nitrogen. Most unpleasant.

  *

  Nothing.

  *

  Nothing.

  *

  Nothing, absolutely and positively nothing.

  *

  For a while I thought, maybe something, but no, I was wrong. Nothing.

  *

  There's nothing here—that goes for me too.

  *

  How much longer? Nothing.

  *

  Almost something, but I can't be sure. Have to concentrate.

  *

  Something all right, but not very much. Normally I'd say it was nothing.

  *

  Glaciers, blue and white. Everything made of ice. Me too.

  *

  Pretty, those glac
iers. If only it wasn't so damned cold.

  *

  Needles of ice, crystals of snow. The Arctic. Frozen to the bone. Bone? What bone—pure, transparent ice. Brittle and stiff.

  *

  Try me, I'm freezer-fresh. But what means "me"? That is the question.

  *

  I have never, never been this cold. But luckily it's a complete mystery what "I" is. Is "I" a who, a which or a what? An iceberg perhaps? Do icebergs have little holes?

  *

  I am a winter cauliflower basking in the rays of the sun. Spring at last! Everything thawing. Particularly me. In my mouth—either an icicle or a tongue.

  *

  It's a tongue. Meanwhile they're twisting me, bending me, rolling me out and pounding me. And rubbing, and punching. I'm under a plastic sheet, above me—lamps. So that's what made me think of the hothouse cauliflower. I must have been raving. White everywhere—but it's the walls, not snow.

  *

  They have defrosted me. Out of gratitude I've decided to keep a diary—just as soon as my fingers loosen up enough to hold a pen. Gleaming ice and sparkling snow still dance before my eyes. The cold is beastly, but now at least I can warm myself a little.

  27 VII. My reanimation took three weeks. Apparently there were some difficulties. I'm sitting in bed and writing. I have a large room during the day, a small one at night. My nurses are attractive young women in silver masks. A few without breasts. And I'm seeing double, or else the head doctor has two heads. The food is ordinary—mashed potatoes, milk, oatmeal, beef, bread and butter. The onion soup was a little burnt. Glaciers still haunt my dreams—they will not go away. I shiver, turn blue, freeze over, frostbitten, snowridden, icebound until dawn. The hot water bottles and heating pads don't help. Some brandy at bedtime might.

  28 VII. The nurses without breasts are students. Impossible otherwise to tell the sexes apart. Everyone is tall, attractive, perpetually smiling. I am weak and as fussy as a child, the littlest thing irritates me. After an injection today I grabbed the needle and stuck the head nurse in the behind, but she never once stopped smiling. Sometimes I feel like I'm floating away on my ice floe, that is, my bed. They show me pictures on the ceiling: kitty-cats, bunny-rabbits, horsies, doggies and bumblebees. Why? The magazine they gave me is for children. A mistake?

  29 VII. I tire quickly. But I know now that before, at the beginning of the reanimation, I was imagining things. This is to be expected. It's perfectly normal. Those who arrive from several decades in the past must be acclimated gradually to the new life. The procedure is not unlike that used to bring a deep-sea diver to the surface; it can't be done all at once, not from any great depth. Thus a defrostee—the first new word I've learned—is prepared by degrees and stages to face an unknown world. The year is 2039. It's July, summer, lovely weather. My private nurse is Aileen Rogers, blue eyes, twenty-three years old. I came into the world—for the second time—in a revivificarium outside New York. Or a resurrection center. That's what they commonly call it. This is practically a city, with gardens. They have their own mills, bakeries, printing presses. Because there's no grain or books nowadays. And yet here's bread, cheese, cream for the coffee. Not from a cow? My nurse thought that a cow was some sort of machine. I can't make myself understood. Where does the milk come from? From the grass. Yes, I know that, but what eats the grass to make the milk? Nothing eats the grass. Then where does the milk come from? From the grass. The grass makes it all by itself? No, not by itself. That is, not exactly. It has to be helped. Does the cow help it? No. Then what kind of animal? No kind of animal. Then where does the milk come from? And so on, in circles.

  30 VII 2039. It's simple really—they sprinkle something over the pasture and the sun turns the grass into cheese. Which still doesn't explain the milk. However it's not all that important. I'm starting to stand up now, and can use the stroller. Today I saw a pond filled with swans. They're tame, they come when you call. Trained? No, guided. And what does that mean? Where are the guides? Guided by remote control. Amazing. Natural birds no longer exist, they all died out at the beginning of the twenty-first century—from the smog. That I can understand.

  31 VII 2039. I've begun to attend lectures on contemporary life. Given by a computer. It doesn't answer all my questions. "You'll learn that later on." For thirty years the Earth has enjoyed permanent peace thanks to universal disarmament. Hardly any armies left. It showed me the robot models. There are a lot of them, all kinds, only not in the revivificarium—to keep from frightening the defrostees. World-wide prosperity has been achieved at last. The things I want to hear about are not the most important, says my preceptor. Instruction takes place in a small cubicle, in front of a console. Words, pictures, 3-D projections.

  5 VIII 2039. Four more days and I leave the revivificarium. There are presently 29.5 billion people inhabiting the planet. Nations and boundaries, but no conflicts. Today I learned the fundamental difference between the new people and the old. The key concept is psychem. We live in a psychemized society. From "psycho-chemical." Words such as "psychic" or "psychological" are no longer in usage. The computer says that humanity was torn by the contradictions between the old cerebralness, inherited from the animals, and the new cerebralness. The old was impulsive, irrational, egotistical and hopelessly stubborn. The new pulled in one direction, the old in the other. (I still find it difficult to express myself when it comes to more complex, sophisticated things.) The old waged constant war against the new. That is, the new against the old. Psychem eliminated these internal struggles, which had wasted so much mental energy in the past. Psychem, on our behalf, does what must be done to the old cerebralness—subdues it, soothes it, brings it round, working from within with the utmost thoroughness. Spontaneous feelings are not to be indulged. He who does so is very bad. One should always use the drug appropriate to the occasion. It will assist, sustain, guide, improve, resolve. Nor is it it, but rather part of one's own self, much as eyeglasses become in time, which correct defects in vision. These lessons are shocking to me, I dread meeting the new people. And I have no intention of ever using psychem myself. Such objections, says the preceptor, are typical and natural. A caveman would also resist a streetcar.

  8 VIII 2039. My nurse and I visited New York. A green vastness. The height of the clouds can be regulated. The air cool and fresh, as in a forest. The pedestrians in the street are dressed like peacocks, their faces generous, kind, always smiling. No one is in a hurry. Women's fashions, as usual, a little mad—the ladies have animated pictures on their foreheads, tiny red tongues or bobbins sticking out of their ears. Besides your regular hands you can get detachables. As many as you like, easy to unbutton. They don't do much, but are great for carrying packages, opening doors, scratching between your shoulder blades. Tomorrow I say goodbye to the revivificarium. There are two hundred of them in America, but even so delays and backups have already begun to plague the timetables for defrosting those multitudes who in the last century so trustingly laid themselves down to freeze. Long waiting lists of the refrigerated have forced a speed-up in the rehabilitation process. A problem which I fully understand. I've been given a bankbook, so I won't have to look for work until after the New Year. Everyone they thaw out automatically receives a savings account, compound interest, with a so-called resurrection deposit entry.

  9 VIII 2039. Today is an important day for me. I already have a three-room compartment in Manhattan. Took a chopper straight from the revivificarium. They say: "chop on over" or "chop on up." There's a difference in meaning, but I fail to grasp it. New York, formerly a garbage dump choked with cars, has been transformed into a system of high-rise gardens. Sunlight piped in by solareduct. I never saw such polite, considerate children in my life—they're like out of a storybook. On the corner of my street is the Registration Center for Self-nominating Nobel Prize Candidates. Next door are art galleries, where they sell only originals—Rembrandts, Matisses—guaranteed, with certificates of authenticity. All dirt-cheap! In the annex to my
skyscraper there's a school for small pneumatic computers. Sometimes I hear them—through the ventilators?—hissing and chugging. These computers are used, among other things, to stuff pet dogs that have passed away. Which seems a bit grotesque to me, but then people like me constitute an insignificant minority here. I go for many walks in the city. And I've learned how to use the scuttle. Nothing to it. Bought myself a lapis lazuli caftan with a white breast, silver sides, vermilion ribbon, gold-embroidered collar. It was the most conservative thing I could find. All sorts of wild apparel available: suits that continuously change in cut and color, dresses that shrink beneath the gaze of admiring males—shrink in either sense—or else fold up like flowers in the night, and blouses that show movies. You can wear medals too, whatever kind and as many as you like. And you can grow hydroponic Japanese bonsai on your hat, and—even better—you can not. I don't think I'll put anything in my ears or nose. The vague impression that these people, so beautiful, graceful, amiable, serene, are somehow—somehow different, special—there's something about them that puzzles me, makes me uneasy. But what it is, I can't say.

  10 VIII 2039. Aileen and I went out for dinner. It was very pleasant. Then afterwards, the Historical Amusement Park in Long Island. We had a wonderful time. I've been watching the people carefully. There's something about them. Something peculiar—but what exactly? Can't seem to put my finger on it. Children's clothing—a little boy dressed like a computer. Another floating down Fifth Avenue, high over the crowd, throwing jellybeans at the people walking underneath. They wave at him and laugh indulgently. An idyll. Hard to believe!

  11 VIII 2039. We just held a preferendum on the weather for September. Weather is determined by vote, a month at a time. Election returns instantly tallied by computer. You cast your ballot by dialing the correct number on the telephone. August will be sunny, with little precipitation, not too hot. Lots of rainbows and cumulus clouds. Rainbows are possible without rain—there are other ways of producing them. The meteorol representative made a public apology for the clouds of July 26, 27 and 28: a sky control technician sleeping on the job! Sometimes I eat out, sometimes in my compartment. Aileen lent me a Webster dictionary from the revivificarium library, since there aren't any books now. But what has replaced them? I couldn't follow her explanation, but didn't let on, not wishing to appear stupid. Dinner with Aileen again, at the "Bronx." A sweet girl, always has something to say, not like those women in the scuttle who let their handbag computers carry all the conversation. Today at the Lost and Found I saw three of the things quietly chatting in a corner, until they got into an argument. Everybody in the street seems to be panting. Breathing heavily. A custom of some kind?