PREVIOUS
After parking the department's speedy beefed-up hovercar on the roof of the
San Francisco Hall of Justice on Lombard Street, bounty hunter Rick Deckard,
briefcase in hand, descended to Harry Bryant's office.
'You're back awfully
soon,' his superior said, leaning back in his chair and taking a pinch of
Specific No 1 snuff.
'I got what you sent me for.' Rick seated himself facing
the desk. He set his briefcase down. I'm tired, he realized. It had begun to hit
him, now that he had gotten back; he wondered if he would be able to recoup
enough for the job ahead. 'How's Dave?' he asked. 'Well enough for me to go talk
to him? I want to before I tackle the first of the andys.'
Bryant said,
'You'll be trying for Polokov first. The one that lasered Dave. Best to get him
right out of it, since he knows we've got him listed.'
'Before I talk to
Dave?'
Bryant reached for a sheet of onionskin paper, a blurred third or
fourth carbon. 'Polokov has taken a job with the city as a trash collector, a
scavenger.'
'Don't only specials do that kind of work?'
'Polokov is
mimicking a special, an anthead. Very deteriorated - or so he pretends to be.
That's what suckered Dave; Polokov apparently looks and acts so much like an
anthead that Dave forgot. Are you sure about the Voigt-Kampff scale now? You're
absolutely certain, from what happened up in Seattle, that -'
I am,' Rick
said shortly. He did not amplify.
Bryant said, 'I'll take your word for it.
But there can't be even one slip-up.'
'There never could be in andy hunting.
This is no different.'
'The Nexus-6 is different.'
'I already found my
first one,' Rick said. 'And Dave found two. Three, if you count Polokov. Okay,
I'll retire Polokov today, and then may be tonight or tomorrow talk to Dave.' He
reached for the blurred carbon, the poop sheet on the android Polokov.
'Ono
more item,' Bryant said. 'A Soviet cop, from the W.P.O., is on his way here.
While you were in Seattle I got a call from him; he's aboard an Aeroflot rocket
that'll touch down at the public field, here, in about an hour. Sandor Kadalyi,
his name is.'
'What's he want?' Rarely if ever did W.P.O. cops show up in San
Francisco.
'W.P.O. is enough interested in the new Nexus-.6 types that they
want a man of theirs to be with you. An observer - and also, if he can, he'll
assist you. It's for you to decide when and if he can be of value. But I've
already given him permission to tag along.'
'What about the bounty?' Rick
said.
'You won't have to split it,' Bryant said, and smiled creakily.
'I
just wouldn't regard it as financially fair.' He had absolutely no intention of
sharing his winnings with a thug from W.P.O. He studied the poop sheet on
Polokov; it gave a description of the man - or rather the andy - and his current
address and place of business: The Bay Area Scavenger Company with offices on
Geary.
'Want to wait on the Polokov retirement until the Soviet cop gets here
to help you?' Bryant asked.
Rick bristled, 'I've always worked alone. Of
course, it's your decision - I'll do whatever you say. But I'd just as soon
tackle Polokov right now, without waiting for Kadalyi to hit town.'
'You go
ahead on your own,' Bryant decided. 'And then on the next one, which'll be a
Miss Luba Luft - you have the sheet there on her, too - you can bring in
Kadalyi.'
Having stuffed the onionskin carbons in his briefcase, Rick left
his superior's office and ascended once more to the roof and his parked
hovercar. And now let's visit Mr Polokov, he said to himself: He patted his
laser tube.
For his first try at the android Polokov, Rick stopped off at the offices-of
the Bay Area Scavengers Company.
'I'm looking for an employee of yours.' he
said to the severe, grey-haired switchboard woman. The scavengers' building
impressed him; large and modern, it held a good number of high-class purely
office employees. The deep-pile carpets, the expensive genuine wood desks,
reminded him that garbage collecting and trash disposal had, since the war,
become one of Earth's important industries. The entire planet had begun to
disintegrate into junk, and to keep the planet habitable for the remaining
population the junk had to be hauled away occasionally ... or, as Buster
Friendly liked to declare, Earth would die under a layer - not of radioactive
dust - but of kipple.
'Mr Ackers,' the switchboard woman informed him. 'He's
the personnel manager.' She pointed to an impressive but imitation oak desk at
which sat a prissy, tiny, bespectacled individual, merged with his plethora of
paperwork.
Rick presented his police ID. 'Where's your employee Polokov right
now? At his job or at home?'
After reluctantly consulting his records Mr
Ackers said, 'Polokov ought to be at work. Flattening hovercars at our Daly City
plant and dumping them into the Bay. However -' The personnel manager consulted
a further document, then picked up his vidphone and made an inside call to
someone else in the building. 'He's not, then,' he said, terminating the call;
hanging up he said to Rick, 'Polokov didn't show up for work today. No
explanation. What's he done, officer?'
'If he should show up,' Rick said,
'don't tell him I was here asking about him. You understand?'
'Yes, I
understand,' Ackers said sulkily, as if his deep iooling in police matters had
been derided.
In the department's beefed-up hovercar Rick next flew to
Polokov's apartment building in the Tenderloin. We'll never get him, he told
himself. They - Bryant and Holden - waited too long. Instead of sending me to
Seattle, Bryant should have sicced me on Polokov - better still last night, as
soon, as Dave Holden got his.
What a grimy place, he observed as he walked
across the roof to the elevator Abandoned animal pens, encrusted with months of
dust. And, in one cage, a no longer functioning false animal, a chicken. By
elevator he descended to Polokov's floor, found the hall unlit, like a
subterranean cave. Using his police A-powered sealed-beam light he illuminated
the hall and once again glanced over the onionskin carbon. The Voigt-Kampff test
had been administered to Polokov; that part could be bypassed, and he could go
directly to the task of destroying the android.
Best to get him from out
here, he decided. Setting down his weapons kit he fumbled it open, got out a
nondirectional Penfield wave transmitter; he punched the key for catalepsy,
himself protected against the mood emanation by means of a counterwave broadcast
through the transmitter's metal hull directed to him alone.
They're now all
frozen stiff, he said to himself as he shut off the transmitter. Everyone, human
and andy alike, in the vicinity. No risk for me; all I have to do is walk in and
laser him. Assuming, of course, that he's in his apartment, which isn't
likely.
Using an infinity key, which analyzed and opened all forms of locks
known, he entered Polokov's apartment, laser beam in hand.
No Polokov. Only
semi-ruined furniture, a place of kipple and decay. In fact no personal
articles: what greeted him consisted of unclaimed debris which Polokov had
inherited when he took the apartment and which in leaving he had abandoned to
the next - if any - tenant.
I knew it, he said to himself. Well, there goes
the first thousand dollars bounty; probably skipped all the way to the Antarctic
Circle. Out of my jurisdiction; another bounty hunter from another police
department will retire Polokov and claim the money. On, I suppose, to the andys
who haven't been warned, as was Polokov. On to Luba Luft.
Back again on the
roof in his hovercar he reported by phone to Harry Bryant. 'No luck on Polokov.
Left probably right after he lasered Dave.' He inspected his wristwatch. 'Want
me to pick up Kadalyi at the field? It'll save time and I'm eager to get started
on Miss Luft.' He already had the poop sheet on her laid out before him, and
begun a thorough study of it.
'Good idea,' Bryant said, 'except that Mr
Kadalyi is already here; his Aeroflot ship - as usual, he says - arrived early.
Just a moment.' An invisible conference. 'He'll fly over and meet you where you
are now,' Bryant said, returning to the screen. 'Meanwhile read up on Miss
Luft.'
'An opera singer. Allegedly from Germany. At present attached to the
San Francisco Opera Company.' He nodded in reflexive agreement, his mind on the
poop sheet. 'Must have a good voice to make connections so fast. Okay, I'll wait
here for Kadalyi.' He gave Bryant his location and rang off.
I'll pose as an
opera fan, Rick decided as he read further. I particularly would like to see her
as Donna Anna in Don Giovanni. In my personal collection I have tapes by such
old-time greats as Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Lotte Lehmann and Lisa Della Casa;
that'll give us something to discuss while I set up my Voigt-Kampff
equipment.
His car phone buzzed. He picked up the receiver.
The police
operator said, 'Mr Deckard, a call for you from Seattle; Mr Bryant said to put
it through to you. From the Rosen Association.'
'Okay,' Rick said, and
waited. what do they want? he wondered. As far as he could discern, the Rosens
had already proven to be bad news. And undoubtedly would continue so, whatever
they intended.
Rachael Rosen's face appeared on the tiny screen. 'Hello,
Officer Deckard.' Her tone seemed placating; that caught his attention. 'Are you
busy right now or can I talk to you?'
'Go ahead,' he said.
'We of the
association have been discussing your situation regarding the escaped Nexus-6
types and knowing them as we do we feel that you'll have better luck if one of
us works in conjunction with you.'
'By doing what?'
'Well, by one of us
coming along with you. When you go out looking for them.'
'Why? What would
you add?'
Rachael said, 'The Nexus-6s would be wary at being approached by a
human. But if another Nexus-6 made the contact-'
'You specifically mean
yourself.'
'Yes.' She nodded, her face sober.
'I've got too much help
already.'
'But I really think you need me.'
'I doubt it. I'll think it
over and call you back.' At some distant, unspecified future time, he said to
himself. Or more likely never. That's all I need: Rachael Rosen popping up
through the dust at every step.'
'You don't really mean it,' Rachael said.
'You'll never call me. You don't realize how agile an illegal escaped Nexus-6
is, how impossible it'll be for you. We feel we owe you this because of - you
know. What we did.'
'I'll take it under advisement' He started to hang
up.
'Without me,' Rachael said, 'one of them will get you before you can get
it.'
'Good-bye,' he said and hung up* What kind of world is it, he asked
himself, when an android phones up a bounty hunter ad offers him assistance? He
rang the police operator back. 'Don't put any more calls through to me from
Seattle,' he said.
'Yes, Mr Deckard. Has Mr Kadalyi reached you,
yet?'
'I'm still waiting. And be had better hurry because I'm not going to be
here long.' Again he hung up.
As he resumed reading the poop sheet on Luba
Luft a hovercar taxi spun down to land on the roof a few yards off. From it a
red-faced, cherubic-looking man, evidently in his midfifties, wearing a heavy
and impressive Russian-style greatcoat, stepped and, smiling, his hand extended,
approached Rick's car.
'Mr Deckard?' the man asked with a Slavic accent. 'The
bounty hunter for the San Francisco Police Department?' The empty taxi rose, and
the Russian watched it go, absently. 'I'm Sandor Kadalyi,' the man said, and
opened the car door to squeeze in beside Rick.
As he shook hands with
Kadalyi, Rick noticed that the W.P.O. representative carried an unusual type of
laser tube, a subform which he had never seen before.
'Oh, this?' Kadalyi
said. 'Interesting, isn't it?' He tugged it from his belt holster. 'I got this
on Mars.'
'I thought I knew every handgun made,' Rick said. 'Even those
manufactured at and for use in the colonies.'
'We made this ourselves,'
Kadalyl said beaming like a Slavic Santa, his ruddy face inscribed with pride.
'You like it? What is different about it, functionally, is - here, take it' He
passed the gun over to Rick, who inspected it expertly, by way of years of
experience.
'How does it differ functionally?' Rick said. He couldn't
tell.
'Press the trigger.'
Aiming upward, out the window of the car, Rick
squeezed the trigger of the weapon. Nothing happened; no beam emerged. Puzzled,
he turned to Kadalyi.
'The triggering circuit,' Kadalyi said cheerfully',
'isn't attached. It remains with me. You see?' He opened his hand, revealed a
tiny unit. 'And I can also direct it, within certain limits. Irrespective of
where it's aimed?
'You're not Polokov, you're Kadalyi,' Rick said.
'Don't
you mean that the other way around? You're a bit confused.'
'I mean you're
Polokov, the android; you're not from Soviet police.' Rick, with his toe,
pressed the emergency button on the floor of his car.
'Why won't my laser
tube fire?' Kadalyi-Polokov said, switching on and off the miniaturized
triggering and aiming device which he held in the palm of his hand.
'A sine
wave,' Rick said. 'That phases out laser emanation and spreads the beam into
ordinary light.'
'Then I'll have to break your pencil neck.' The android
dropped the device and, with a snarl, grabbed with both hands for Rick's
throat.
As the android's hands sank into his throat Rick fired his regulation
issue old-style pistol from its shoulder holster; the .38 magnum slug struck the
android in the head and its brain box burst. The Nexus-6 unit which operated it
blew into pieces, a raging, mad wind which carried throughout the car. Bits of
it, like the radioactive dust itself, whirled down on Rick. The retired remains
of the android rocked back, collided with the car door, bounced off and struck
heavily against him; he found himself struggling to shove the twitching remnants
of the android away.
Shakily, he at last reached for the car phone, called in
to the Hall of Justice. 'Shall I make my report?' he said. 'Tell Harry Bryant
that I got Polokov.'
'"You got Potokov." He'll understand that, will
he?'
'Yes,' Rick said, and hung up. Christ that came close, he said to
himself. I must have overreacted to Rachael Rosen's warning; I went the other
way and it almost finished me. But I got Polokov, he said to himself. His
adrenal gland, by degrees, ceased pumping its several secretions into his
bloodstream; his heart slowed to normal, his breathing became less frantic. But
he still shook. Anyhow I made myself a thousand dollars just now, he informed
himself. So it was worth it. And I'm faster to react than Dave Holden. Of
course, however, Dave's experience evidently prepared me; that has to be
admitted. Dave had not had such warning.
depression
Again picking
up the phone he placed a call home to his apt, to Iran. Meanwhile he managed to
light a cigarette; the shaking had begun to depart.
His wife's face, sodden
with the six-hour self-accusatory depression which she had prophesied,
manifested itself on the vidscreen. 'Oh hello, Rick.'
'What happened to the
594 I dialled for you before I left? Pleased acknowledgement of -'
'I
redialled. As soon as you left. What do you want?' Her voice sank into a dreary
drone of despond. 'I'm so tired and I just have no hope left, of anything. Of
our marriage and you possibly getting killed by one of those andys. Is that what
you, want to tell me, Rick? That an andy got you?' In the background the racket
of Buster Friendly boomed and brayed, eradicating her words; he saw her mouth
moving but heard only the TV.
'Listen,' he broke in. 'Can you hear me? I'm on
to something. A new type of android that apparently nobody can handle but me.
I've retired one already, so that's a grand to start with. You know what we're
going to have before I'm through?'
Iran stared at him sightlessly. 'Oh,' she
said, nodding.
'I haven't said yet!' He could tell, now; her depression this
time had become too vast for her even to hear him. For all intents he spoke into
a vacuum. 'I'll see you tonight,' he finished bitterly and slammed the receiver
down. Damn her, he said to himself. What good does it do, my risking my life?
She doesn't care whether we own an ostrich or not; nothing penetrates. I wish I
had gotten rid of her two years ago when we were considering splitting up. I can
still do it, he reminded himself.
Broodingly, he leaned down, gathered
together on the car floor his crumpled papers, including the info on Luba Luft.
No support, he informed himself. Most androids I've known have more vitality and
desire to live than my wife. She has nothing to give me.
That made him think
of Rachael Rosen again. Her advice to me as to the Nexus-6 mentality, he
realized, turned out to be correct. Assuming she doesn't want any of the bounty
money, maybe I could use her.
The encounter with Kadalyi-Polokov had changed
his ideas rather massively.
love to the machine
i
Snapping on his hovercar's engine he whisked
nippity-nip up into the sky, heading toward the old War Memorial Opera House,
where, according to Dave Holden's notes, he would find Luba Luft this time of
the day.
He wondered, now, about her, too. Some female androids seemed to him
pretty; he had found himself physically attracd by several, and it was an odd
sensation, knowing intellectually that they were machines but emotionally
reacting anyhow.
For example Rachael Rosen. No, he decided; she's too thin.
real development, especially in the bust. A figure like a child's, flat and
tame. He could do better. How old did the poop sheet say Luba Luft was? As he
drove he hauled out the now wrinkled notes, found her so called 'age'.
Twentyeight the sheet read. Judged by appearance which with was the only useful
standard.
In the enormous whale-belly of steel and stone carved out to form the
long-enduring old opera house Rick Deckard found an echoing, noisy, slightly
miscontrived rehearsal taking place. As he entered he recognized the music:
Mozart's 'The Magic Flute', the first act in its final scenes. The moor's slaves
- in other words the chorus - had taken up their song a bar too soon and this
had nullilled the simple rhythm of the magic bells.
'Zauberfloete'
What a
pleasure; he loved "The Magic Flute". He seated himself in a dress circle seat
(no one appeared to notice him) and made himself comfortable. Now Papageno in
his fantastic pelt of bird feathers had joined Pamina to sing words which always
brought tears to Rick's eyes, when and if he happened to think about it.
Koennte jeder brave Mann solche Gloeckchen finden, seine Feinde wuerden dann ohne Muehe schwinden.Well, Rick thought, in real life no such magic bells exist that make your enemy effortlessly disappear. Too bad. And Mozart, not long after writing "The Magic Flute", had died - in his thirties - of kidney disease. And had been buried in an unmarked paupers' grave.
Papageno: 'My child, what should we now say?' Pamina: 'The truth. That's what we will say.'Leaning forward and peering, Rick studied Pamina in her heavy, convoluted robes, with her wimple trailing its veil about her shoulders and face. He reexamined the poop sheet, then leaned back, satisfied. I've now seen my third Nexus-6 android, her realized. This is Luba Luft. A little ironic, the sentiment her role calls for. However vital, active, and nice-looking, an escaped android could hardly tell the truth; about itself, anyhow.
The Mission Street Hall of
Justice
The Mission Street Hall of Justice
building, onto the roof of which the hovercar descended, jutted up in a series
of baroque ornamented spires; complicated and modern, the handsome structure
struck Rick Deckard as attractive - except for one aspect. He had never seen it
before.
The police hovercar landed. And, a few minutes later, he found
himself being booked.
'304,' Officer Crams said to the sergeant at the high
desk. 'And 612.4 and let's see. Representing himself to be a peace
officer.'
'406.7,' the desk sergeant said, filling out the forms; he wrote
leisurely, in a slightly bored manner. Routine business, his posture and
expression declared. Nothing of importance.
'Over here,' Officer Crams said
to Rick, leading him to a small white table at which a technician operated
familiar equipment. 'For your cephalic pattern,' Crams said. 'Ident
purposes.'
Rick said brusquely, 'I know.' In the old days, when he bad been a
harness bull himself, he had brought many suspects to a table like this. Like
this, but not this particular table.
His cephalic pattern taken, he found
himself being led off to an equally familiar room; reflexively he began
assembling his valuables for transfer. It makes no sense, he said to himself.
Who are these people? If this place has always existed, why 'didn't we know
about it? And why don't they know about us? Two parallel police agencies, he
said to himself; ours and this one. But never coming in contact - as far as I
know - until now. Or maybe they have, he thought. Maybe this isn't the first
time. Hard to believe, he thought, that this wouldn't have happened long ago. If
this really is a police apparatus, here; if it's what it asserts itself to
be.
A man, not in uniform, detached himself from the spot at which he had
been standing; he approached Rick Deckard at a measured, unruffled pace, gazing
at him curiously. 'What's this one?' he asked Officer Crams.
'Suspected
homicide,' Crams answered. 'We have a body - we found it in his car - but he
claims it's an android. We're checking it out, giving it a bone marrow analysis
at the lab. And posing as a police officer, a bounty hunter. To gain access to a
woman's dressing-room in order to ask her suggestive questions. She doubted he
was what he said he was and called us in.' Stepping back, Crams said, 'Do you
want to finish up with him, sir?'
'All right.' The senior police official,
not in uniform, blue-eyed; with a narrow, flaring nose and inexpressive lips,
eyed Rick, then reached for Rick's briefcase. 'What do you have in here, Mr
Deckard?'
Rick said, 'Material pertaining to the Voigt-Kampff personality
test. I was testing a suspect when Officer Crams arrested me.' He watched as the
police official rummaged through the contents of the briefcase, examining each
item. 'The questions I asked Miss Luft are standard V-K questions, printed on
the -'
'Do you know George Gleason and Phil Resch?' the police official
asked.
'No,' Rick said; neither name meant anything to him.
'They're the
bounty hunters for Northern California. Both are attached to our department.
Maybe you'll run into them while you're here. Are you an android, Mr Deckard?
The reason I ask is that several times in the past we've had escaped andys turn
up posing as out-of-state bounty hunters here in pursuit of a suspect.'
Rick
said, 'I'm not an android. You can administer the Voigt-Kampff test to me; I've
taken it before and I don't mind taking it again. But I know what the results
will be. Can I phone my wife?'
'You are allowed one call. Would you rather
phone her than a lawyer?'
'I'll phone my wife,' Rick said. 'She can get a
lawyer for me.'
The plainclothes police officer handed him a fifty-cent piece
and pointed. 'There's the vidphone over there.' He watched as Rick crossed the
room to the phone. Then he returned to his examination of the contents of Rick's
briefcase.
Inserting the coin, Rick dialled his home phone number. And stood
for what seemed like an eternity, waiting.
A woman's face appeared on the
vidscreen. 'Hello,' she said.
It was not Iran. He had never seen the woman
before in his life.
He hung up, walked slowly back to the police
officer.
'No luck?' the officer asked. 'Well, you can make another call; we
have a liberal policy in that regard. I can't offer you the opportunity of
calling a bondsman because your offence unbailable, at present.. When you're
arraigned, however -'
'I know,' Rick said acridly. 'I'm familiar with police
procedure.'
'Here's your briefcase,' the officer said; he handed it back to
Rick. 'Come into my office ... I'd like to talk with you further.' He started
down a side hall, leading the way; Rick followed. Then, pausing and turning, the
officer said, 'My name is Garland.' He held out his hand and they shook.
Briefly. 'Sit down,' Garland said as he opened his office door and pushed behind
a large uncluttered desk.
Rick seated himself facing the desk.
This
Voigt-Kampff test,' Garland said, 'that you mentioned.' He indicated Rick's
briefcase. 'All that material you carry.' He filled and lit a pipe, puffed for a
moment. 'It's an analytical tool for detecting andys?'
It's our basic test,'
Rick said. 'The only one we currently employ. The only one capable of
distinguishing the new Nexus-6 brain unit. You haven't heard of this
test?'
'I've heard of several profile-analysis scales for use with androids.
But not that one.' He continued to study Rick intently, his face turgid; Rick
could not fathom what Garland was thinking. 'Those smudged carbon fimsies,'
Garland continued, 'that you have there in your briefcase. Polokov, Miss Luft
... your assignments. The next one is me.'
Rick stared at him, then grabbed
for the briefcase.
In a moment the carbons lay spread out before him. Garland
had told the truth; Rick examined the sheet. Neither man - or rather neither he
nor Garland - spoke for a time and then Garland cleared his throat, coughed
nervously.
'It's an unpleasant sensation,' he said. 'To find yourself a
boutity hunter's assignment all of a sudden. Or whatever it is you are, Deckard'
He pressed a key on his desk intercom and said, 'Send one of the bounty hunters
in here; I don't care which one. Okay; thank you.' He released the key. 'Phil
Resch will be in here a minute or so from now,' he said to Rick. 'I want to see
his list before I proceed.'
'You think I might be on his list?' Rick
said.
'It's possible. We'll know pretty soon. Best to be sure about these
critical matters. Best not to lea~,re it to chance. This info sheet about me.'
He indicated the smudged carbon. 'It doesn't list me as a police inspector; it
inaccurately gives my occupation as insurance underwriter. Otherwise it's
correct, as to physical description, age, personal habits, home address. Yes,
it's me, all right. Look for yourself.' He pushed the page to Rick, who picked
it up and glanced over it.
The office door opened and a tall, fleshless man
with hardetched features, wearing horn-rim glasses and a fuzzy Vandyke beard,
appeared. Garland rose, indicating Rick.
Phil
Resch, bounty hunter
'Phil Resch, Rick Deckard.
You're both bounty hunters and it's probably time you met.'
As he shook hands
with Rick, Phil Resch said, 'Which city are you attached to?'
Garland
answered for Rick. 'San Francisco. Here; take a look at his schedule. This one
comes up next.' He handed Phil Resch the sheet which Rick had been examining,
that with his own description.
'Say, Gar,' Phil Resch said. 'This is
you.'
'There's more,' Garland said. 'He's also got Luba Luft the opera singer
there on his list of retirement-assignments, and Polokov. Remember Polokov? He's
now dead; this bounty or android or whatever he is got him, and we're running a
bone marrow test at the lab. To see if there's any conceivable basis -, 'Polokov
I've talked to,' Phil Resch said. 'That big Santa Claus from the Soviet police?'
He pondered, plucking at his disarrayed beard. 'I think it's a good idea to run
a bone marrow test on him.'
'Why do you say that?' Garland asked, clearly
annoyed. It's to remove any legal basis on which this man Deckard could claim he
hadn't killed anyone; he only "retired an android".' Phil Resch said, 'Polokov
struck me as cold. Extremely cerebral and calculating; detached.'
'A lot of
the Soviet police are that way,' Garland said, visibly nettled.
'Luba Luft I
never met,' Phil Resch said. 'Although I've heard records she's made. To Rick he
said, 'Did you test her out?'
'I started to,' Rick said. 'But I couldn't get
an accurate reading. And she called in a harness bull, which ended it.'
'And
Polokov?' Phil Resch asked.
'I never got a chance to test him
either.'
Phil Resch said, mostly to himself, 'And I assume you haven't had an
opportunity to test out Inspector Garland, here.'
'Of course not,' Garland
interjected, his face wrinkled with indignation; his words broke off, bitter and
sharp.
'What test do you use?' Phil Resch asked.
'The Voigt-Kampff
scale.'
'Don't know that particular one.' Both Resch and Garland seemed deep
in rapid, professional thought - but not in unison. 'I've always said,' he
continued, 'that the best place for an android would be with a big police
organization such as W.P.O. Ever since I first met Polokov I've wanted to test
him, but no pretext ever arose. It never would have, either ... which is one of
the values such a spot would have for an enterprising android.'
Getting
slowly to his feet Inspector Garland faced Phil Resch and said, 'Have you wanted
to test me, too'?'
A discreet smile travelled across Phil Reschs face; he
started to answer, then shrugged. And remained silent. He did not seem afraid of
his superior, despite Garland's palpable wrath.
'I don't think you understand
the situation,' Garland said. 'This man - or android - Rick Deckard comes to us
from a phantom, hallucinatory, nonexistent police agency allegedly operating out
of the old departmental headquarters on Lombard. He's never heard of us and
we've never heard of him - yet ostensibly we're both working the same side of
the street. He employs a test we've never heard of. The list he carries around
isn't of androids; it's a list of human beings. He's already killed once - at
least once. And if Miss Luft hadn't gotten to a phone he probably would have
killed her and then eventually he would have come sniffing around after
me.'
'Hmm,' Phil Resch said.
'Hmm,' Garland mimicked, wrathfully. He
looked, now, as if he bordered on apoplexy. 'Is that all you have to
say?'
The intercom came on and a female voice said, 'Inspector Garland, the
lab report on Mr Polokov's corpse is ready.'
'I think we should hear it,'
Phil Resch said.
Garland glanced at him, seething. Then he bent, pressed the
key of the intercom. 'Let's have it, Miss French.'
'The bone marrow test,'
Miss French said, 'shows that Mr Polokov was a humanoid robot. Do you want a
detailed -'
'No, that's enough.' Garland settled back in his seat, grimly
contemplating the far wall; he said nothing to either Rick or Phil
Resch.
Resch said, 'What is the basis of your Voigt-Kampff test, Mr
Deckard?'
'Empathic response. In a variety of social situations. Mostly
having to do with animals.'
'Ours is probably simpler,' Resch said. 'The
reflex-arc response taking place in the upper ganglia of the spinal column
requires several microseconds more in the humanoid robot than in a human nervous
system.' Resching across Inspector Garland's desk he plucked a pad of paper
toward him; with a ball point pen be drew a sketch. 'We use an audio signal or a
light flash. The subject presses a button and the elapsed time is measured. We
try it a number of times, of course. Elapsed time varies in both the andy and
the human. But by the time ten reactions have been measured, we believe we have
a reliable clue. And, as in your case with Polokov, the bone marrow test backs
us up.'
An interval of silence passed and then Rick said, 'You can test me
out. I'm ready. Of course I'd like to test you, too. If you're
willing.'
'Naturally,' Resch said. He was, however, studying Inspector
Garland. 'I've said for years,' Resch murmured, 'that the Boneli Reflex-Arc Test
should be applied routinely to police personnel, the higher up the chain of
command the better. Haven't I, Inspector?'
'That's right you have,' Garland
said. 'And I've always opposed it. On the grounds that it would lower department
morale.' 'I think now,' Rick said, 'you're going to have to sit still for it. In
view of your lab's report on Polokov.'
NEXT