The Altered Ego

THE ALTERED EGO

by

JERRY SOHL

Produced by ReAnimus Press

Other books by Jerry Sohl:

Costigan s Needle

Night Slaves

The Mars Monopoly

One Against Herculum

The Time Dissolver

The Transcendent Man

I, Aleppo

The Anomaly

Death Sleep

The Odious Ones

Point Ultimate

The Haploids

Prelude to Peril

The Resurrection of Frank Borchard

The Lemon Eaters

The Spun Sugar Hole

Underhanded Chess

Underhanded Bridge

Night Wind

Black Thunder

Dr. Josh

Blowdry

Mamelle

Kaheesh

© 2013, 1954 by Jerry Sohl. All rights reserved.

http://ReAnimus.com/authors/jerrysohl

Smashwords Edition License Notes

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~~~

To Marty, age five

and her wonderful imagination

~~~

Table of Contents

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

1

Here the surf was whisper quiet, but Carl could hear the boom of breaking waves far away and occasionally spindrift would dampen his face, spray carried on the chill night breeze across the cool sands to the two of them lying there.

It would have been better with a fire, but it would have been a beacon for the beach guard, that ubiquitous corps whose greatest delight seemed to be ferreting young lovers from their hiding places. In this respect he and Marilla had been unusually fortunate because the shining black patrol car with the overinflated tires and noiseless Evans motor had managed to miss them, either by choice or by accident, both times it had run by in the past four hours. Perhaps it was because they were not secretive about it, lying there on the open expanse in full view of anyone.

She stirred and he did not turn to look at her. Instead he pictured in his mind what she looked like on the sand from a short distance. Blonde hair, bronzed shoulders, small waist and long legs. As he viewed her so in his mind, he thought of how different she was from most of the girls in his set. Rank and affluence were certainly divorced from the genes—how empty Marilla’s past was of restoration, wealth or position! He was surprised to find these things suddenly had very little meaning for him.

Carl.

He had been so carried along with his thoughts he was not moved to answer. His eyes were on the tiny circle of lights of one of the space stations a thousand miles in the sky and he wondered what life would be like living there. He shuddered to think of it. Then his eyes swept to the moon and he imagined he could see the speck near the crater Copernicus that was the World Federation Moon Base. As he looked at the moon face he could see dots moving across its surface, dots that would have been stars in the sky if the moon had not been there. The dots were not in the air traffic lanes, so they would be either jets or space ships—it was hard to tell without a telescope, though as a youngster he had become so proficient in recognizing the lights, he could tell instantly which it was and what kind of craft. Years pass and models change, however, and the new lights, shapes and markings made them unfamiliar. And in the passing years, he had become interested in things other than space travel. Lovely things like Marilla, for instance.

Carl.

What? He looked at her in the wan light of the moon.

Are you going to ask for restoration?

He rolled over, raised on his elbows and said, What in the world makes you ask a question like that?

I just wondered. Are you?

Everybody hopes to make restoration.

You still haven’t said you would.

He could see the soft moonlight on her face, could see her as if through a dark glass and his memory filled in the parts that were in shadow. Here was a strange girl, this Marilla, full of love and beauty and questions, a girl with honest blue eyes that demanded honest answers.

I’ll apply all right, he said evenly. Doesn’t everyone hope to?

No. And you might be different, too. When will you apply?

Next year, when I’m thirty, if I pass the terminal test. Why do you ask?

Will you pass?

He shrugged. Who can say? I’m sure I’m still a stab. I was when I took the prime test and the medial test, too. My father is a stab. But why the sudden interest in the tests and in restoration?

I want you to pass, she said, running a hand along his arm. I want you to be selected for restoration.

You have to do something like discovering America to get selected. He smiled. I could tell the TDR I discovered you.

I’m sure the Bureau of Testing, Duplication and Restoration would be delighted, and I thank you for the compliment—I suppose you meant it that way?— but I happen to be serious, Carl.

So am I. He lowered his head to hers and kissed her.

If it were up to you, he whispered, would I pass?

I’d see to it. She returned his kiss. I’d see to it you were restored, too.

He rolled away, threw a handful of sand from him.

Did I say something wrong? she asked, moving to him.

No. It’s not your fault, he said. I suppose I shouldn’t let it bother me, but it does. Ever hear of two restorees in one family?

She didn’t answer, so he went on, I’m afraid it doesn’t make too much difference what I do, what I become, the chances of my being restored are as remote as... as finding life suddenly on one of the other planets in our system. My father is the only one who will ever be selected in our family.

I don’t think so, Marilla said, her eyes on his.

What do you mean?

"I select you." She tossed her hair back with a flip of her head and her eyes challenged his in the moonlight. There was a half-smile on her lips.

He reached for her, but she rolled away and was on her feet, hands on hips, laughing.

He rushed her and she was gone, running on cat feet. He raced after her as she ran into the water, as sleek and fast as a young thoroughbred racing horse.

He was right behind her, his soles slapping the wet sand. He could hear her laughter.

It was the oldest race in history.

It was nearly dawn when Carl got home. He put the aircar in the garage, uttering the sound that actuated the mechanism that lowered the door. Then he went into the house through the connecting door, lights turning on as he neared them.

He was surprised to see a glow at the end of the corridor, wondered if his father had awakened early or had fallen asleep over some work he might have brought home from the factory.

When he came to the room, he was startled to see that the person there was not his father.

It was a man he had never seen before—a man with a lean face, curious eyes and an air of infinite patience.

Carl stood in the doorway and took the steady gaze without flinching. Because neither said anything, the silence of the room became oppressive. The man was beginning to smile faintly.

Good morning, Carl. The stranger moved only his lips to say it. One arm was still draped over the back of the lounge, his hands locked together. Though he was smiling now, the man’s bright eyes continued to be cold and his manner alert.

You’ve made a better beginning than I, Carl said. You know me and I haven’t the slightest idea who you are.

Really? Now the smile was wide enough to show white teeth. But still the man did not move. "Come to think of it, it would be amazing if you did know who I am. But I had hoped you might guess what I am."

You’re talking in riddles now. Where’s my father?

You tell me.

What do you mean by that?

What should I mean?

Carl examined the man more closely. If he had met him on the street he would have passed him by. Of average height, not more than five feet, eight inches tall, of ordinary build, the stranger couldn’t be more than forty-five years old. He wore a thin summer permasuit that couldn’t have cost more than two hundred dollars. Yet the fact remained that he had not met the man on the street. He had met him in the privacy of his home. And being questioned by a man who had waited for him until this hour of the morning made it suddenly obvious the man was a police officer.

You’re from the police, Carl said. What’s happened? Where’s my father?

Do you want to tell me about it?

"Are you from the police?"

The man nodded. He withdrew a small folder from an inner shirt pocket, flashed it at Carl. The man’s picture and a metal badge strip appeared on it.

Los Angeles Police Department?

The man shook his head, smiled again. Federation Department of Criminal Investigation. My name is Jim Severn.

What’s Dad done?

Severn’s smile was broad again. Mr. Kempton hasn’t done anything. It’s you we’re interested in.

"Me? Why?"

You can’t guess?

Now look—

"You look. We’ve been trying to reach you all evening. Don’t you ever stay at any of those clubs of yours? Lots of people have been looking for you. Without success, I might add. Even your friends. Didn’t any of them tell you?"

Nobody’s told me a damn thing. Not even you.

Ever listen to the news? Ever buy a yard or two of fax to read while you’re waiting for lunch? Severn snorted. From what I’ve learned about you, you like only women and sweet music. Romantic music. Where did you go? No place is open this time of the morning. Or would that be telling too much?

Now I’m being analyzed by a Fed. You’re in the wrong profession, Mr. Severn.

It’s all part of this business, Carl. Only unstables commit crimes. You know that. So I’m continually with aberrants. I’ve come to be pretty good at analysis.

When are you going to tell me what this is all about?

I’ll be glad to tell you right now, the agent said. Your father was murdered this afternoon. Why did you do it?

2

Bradley Kempton dead. the thought chilled him; the concept was hard for him to grasp because his father had been so alive, so ambitious, so knowing... and even though he would be restored, it did not seem possible that the living thing that was Bradley Kempton could have been stilled.

As his father had lived, so had he died, then. For the name Bradley Kempton was not one that was repeated as names usually were, but with a special inflection, with respect, with awe, with wrath. But always with emotion. His father engendered emotion in others and often it was not the good feelings that were so engendered. A man of Bradley Kempton’s caliber had found it necessary to let little of humanity get between him and the job he had to do.

It was an old story, one Carl had heard so many times, about how much of an anomaly his father had been. He’d graduated from the University of California at Los Angeles in 2005 with a degree in space engineering without first having applied for a job on a space station, on the moon or for the companies that managed the ships in between.

His mother had been fond of telling how his father had accepted his sheepskin from the hands of the president of UCLA on a blue-skyed, sun-bright day in June, turning his back on meetings with government men and men from private industry, rejecting some fine prospects in rocketry, space and nuclear physics, as he might have fifty years before in aircraft production, oil or atomic energy, to go on his own. Bradley Kempton had married Susan Claggett that very day instead, and heads were shaken over this upstart who wouldn’t even interview for a possible position and tongues clacked over this young college graduate who said he wanted to get into something on his own and got married instead.

It was history now how Prismoid Products came to be. Prismoid Products. A name known from one end of the world to the other and up and down the space lanes to the stations and to the moon, for Bradley Kempton had taken crude visual devices and molded them into perfect instruments, creating a complete line of space optics, from viewscopes and scanners to light-operated electronics warning systems for space craft and stations.

The name of Bradley Kempton became one to respect.

It eventually became a name selected for restoration.

But what did this leave for his son, Carl?

Carl had dutifully taken his degree in space engineering and was gratified to see how much pleasure it gave his father. Since his training, he worked for Prismoid whenever he was needed, but found himself resisting his father’s suggestions to get out on his own.

Once men couldn’t see around their ships, his father had said. They had to have windows. And windows give you only a look in one direction and that usually only for a short distance. But now men can look in every direction simply by glancing at one of our scanners. Once someone told me you couldn’t do this just with prisms, screens, sensitive cells and tubes. But I had already done it. You see, I didn’t know it was impossible or I might not have tried. His father paused. Today there are still problems to lick, still frontiers to explore, and there are still people around saying it can’t be done.

But Carl wasn’t listening. He was thinking how big a man his father was and how he overshadowed anything Carl might do. And life was comfortable the way he was living it, wasn’t it? Why change it?

As a matter of fact, his father went on, I don’t see how any man can rest knowing there are problems out there—challenging problems, some that look as if they have no answers. We’ve visited Mars and Venus, the most likely planets, and found no life there. It follows there must be no life anywhere else in our solar system. But must we always be limited to this sun and these planets? Today we need men with vision, Carl, just as we always have. You could be such a man.

Why should we want to go anywhere else, Dad?

Carl had asked. Why can’t we be satisfied with the way things are?

There was fire in his father’s eye as