第17节

4-Level Deeps) with

accommodation units, workshops and community areas built into the sides

- rather like skyscrapers turned inside out. The domed hub of

Roosevelt Field was known as New Deal Plaza; Annie and Jack Brickman's

quarters were on Level Three-8 at N.E. and 2nd - the shaft known as

Tennessee Valley Deep.

Steve woke on the morning of the third day. The aching tiredness had

vanished but, in the process, his bones had turned to jelly. He felt

drained of all energy and did not need much persuasion from Annie to

stay in bed. Roz, his kin-sister, brought him a breakfast tray from

the Level Three mess deck, and put the remote control handset for the

tv within easy reach.

The Federation provided Trackers with nine tv channels.

1 and 2 gave access to the Archive/Data Bank; 3, 4, 5, 6 provided Study

Programmes covering a wide range of subjects; 7 offered Vocational

skills; 8 was a Recreation channel offering a variety of combative

video games, such as the popular 'Shoot-A-Mute'. Feeling he had earned

a break from studying, and having trained for the last three years to

kill Mutes, Steve selected Channel 9 - the Public Service Channel

something he rarely watched. PSC broadcasts were composed almost

exclusively of inspirational programmes, banal blue sky balladeers, and

the networked news from GC, interspersed with mind-deadening 'local

interest' items from the home-base station.

One such item was on the screen now. An on-the-spot report about Young

Pioneer work teams. An earnest stringer from Roosevelt Field who

insisted on being called Ron, put the next of a series of penetrating

questions to a sweat-stained, dusty, politely attentive

thirteen-year-old Group Leader. 'So, how many yards of rock do you

think your team of boys and girls has dug out today, Doug?"

Thank you, and goodnight. Click. Steve ate the rest of his breakfast

facing a blank, grey-faced screen.

After four days of virtual inactivity, Steve's natural energy level was

restored and he began to feel restless. He would have liked to talk

more with his guard-father but Jack was unable to sustain a meaningful

conversation. After two or three exchanges his voice would become

faint with exhaustion and he would lose track of the subject under

discussion.

Annie Brickman, in between looking after Jack, was working behind the

counter on the Level Three South mess deck. With the exception of

senior staff officers - like Bart everybody on a Tracker base,

regardless of their qualifications, had to put in a fixed number of

Public Duty hours every month. In theory, PD entailed anything and

everything to do with the running of the base; in practice, it usually

meant one hundred hours on a work squad assigned to repetitive

low-grade tasks ranging from food preparation and laundry work to

road-sweeping and garbage disposal.

Steve wandered into his kin-sister's room. Roz was packing her

trail-bag, glancing every now and then at the tv set on the table by

her bunk bed. She was running a videotaped Inter-Med lecture on

genetics.

Steve stacked up the pillows and made himself comfortable with his feet

up on the bed. 'When do you plan to pull out?"

'Tomorrow,' said Roz. 'Enrolment at Inner State U doesn't start for

another week but I want to take a look around Grand Central while I've

got some free time."

'Yeah... they say it's really something." Steve gazed idly at the

coloured diagram on the tv screen. The soundtrack was pure

gobbledygook. 'Is that what you're going to specialise in genetics?"

Roz nodded. 'It's the only area where there's still a chance to come

up with an amazing discovery that could change the future. Can you

imagine what it would be like if we all lived twice as long - till we

were eighty - wouldn't that be something?"

'Yughh - it would be terrible."

Roz smiled. 'Actually, I've chosen genetics because the Life Institute

is the only medical centre with unlimited research facilities. Who

knows? I just might make a name for myself."

'You just might,' agreed Steve.

'Always provided I qualify, of course. The bottom third of each

graduate year are automatically wiped out. That's it." Roz drew a

hand across her throat. 'No retreads."