Collected Stories by Frank Herbert

Author:Frank Herbert [Herbert, Frank]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2015-04-04T04:00:00+00:00

Martin Fisk’s car, a year-old 1997 Buick with triple turbines and jato boosters, flashed off the freeway, found a space between a giant mobile refueling tanker and a commuter bus, darted through and surged into the first of the eight right-hand lanes in time to make the turnoff marked “NEW PENTAGON ONLY-Reduce Speed to 75.”

Fisk glanced at his surface/air rate-of-travel mixer, saw he was down to 80 miles per hour, close enough to legal speed, and worked his way through the press of morning traffic into the second lane in plenty of time to join the cars diverging onto the fifth-level ramp.

At the last minute, a big official limousine with a two-star general’s decal-flag on its forward curve cut in front of him and he had to reduce speed to 50, hearing the drag-bar rasping behind him as his lane frantically matched speed. The shadow of a traffic copter passed over the roadway and Fisk thought: Hope that general’s driver loses his license!

By this time he was into the sweeping curve-around that would drop him to the fifth level. Speed here was a monitored 55. The roadway entered the building and Fisk brought his R-O-T up to the stated speed watching for the code of his off-slot: BR71D. It loomed ahead, a flashing mnemonic blinker in brilliant green.

Fisk dropped behind an in-building shuttle, squeezed into the right-hand lane, slapped the turn-off alert that set all his rim lights blinking and activated the automatics. His machine caught the signal from the roadway, went on automatic and swerved into the off-slot still at 55.

Fisk released his control bar.

Drag hooks underneath the Buick snagged the catch ribbands of the slot, jerked his car to a stop that sent him surging against the harness.

The exit-warning wall ahead of him flashed a big red “7 SECONDS! 7 SECONDS!”

Plenty of time, he thought.

He yanked his briefcase out of its dashboard carrier with his right hand while unsnapping his safety harness with his left and hitting the door actuator with his knee. He was out onto the pedestrian ramp with three seconds to spare. The warning wall lifted; his car jerked forward into the down-elevator rack to be stored in a coded pile far below. His personal I-D signal to the computer-monitored system later would restore the car to him all checked and serviced and ready for the high-risk evening race out of the city.

Fisk glanced at his wrist watch—four minutes until his appointment with William Merill, the President’s liaison officer on the Internal Control Board and Fisk’s boss. Adopting the common impersonal discourtesy, Fisk joined the press of people hurrying along the ramp.

Some day, he thought, I’ll get a nice safe and sane job on one of the ocean hydroponic stations where all I have to do is watch, gauges and there’s nothing faster than a 40 mph pedestrian ramp. He fished a green pill out of his coat pocket, gulped it, hoped he wouldn’t have to take another before his blood pressure began its downslant to normal.

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