Solar Lottery by Dick Philip K

Author:Dick, Philip K. [Dick, Philip K.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction & Fantasy, Philip K Dick, Classics, Adventure, High Tech, Science Fiction, Dystopias, Fantasy
ISBN: 9780575074552
Amazon: 0575074558
Goodreads: 92504
Publisher: Gollancz
Published: 1955-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

The lounge of the intercon liner was swank and glittering with chrome. Keith Pellig stood by Miss Lloyd as she seated herself awkwardly in one of the deep thick-plush chairs and folded her nervous hands together on the surface of the null-legged plastic table. Pellig then sat down opposite her.

“What's the matter?” the girl asked. “Is anything wrong?”

“No.” Pellig moodily examined the menu. “What do you want to drink? Make it snappy; we're almost there.”

Miss Lloyd recoiled and her cheeks burned. The nice-looking man was grim-faced and sullen; she repressed a sudden desire to leap up and hurry downstairs to her seat. He was acting badly, insulting and nasty ... but the needling fear that it was something she had done dissolved her resentment and made her fearful instead. “What Hill are you under fief to?” she asked timidly.

There was no answer.

The MacMillan waiter glided up. “What do you wish, sir or madam?”

Within the Pellig body, Ted Benteley was deep in stormy thought. He ordered bourbon and water for himself and a Tom Collins for Margaret Lloyd. He scarcely noticed the two glasses the MacMillan slid before them; he paid the chit automatically and began to sip.

Miss Lloyd was babbling youthful nonsense; she was excited with anticipation, her eyes shone, white teeth sparkled, orange hair glowed like a candle flame. It was wasted on the man opposite her. Benteley allowed the Pellig fingers to take the bourbon and water back to the table; he fooled with the glass and continued reflecting.

While he was reflecting, the mechanism switched. Silently, instantly, he was back at the Farben labs.

It was a shock. He closed his eyes and hung on tight to the circular metal band that enclosed his body, a combination support and focus. On his ipvic-engineered vidscreen the scene he had just left glimmered brightly. The body cast a microwave sheet that bounced at close range and was relayed by ipvic along the control channel to Farben in the form of a visual image. A miniature Margaret Lloyd was seated across from a miniature Keith Pellig, in a microscopic lounge. Tiny sounds filtered from the aud end of the system, as Miss Lloyd bubbled away.

“Who's in it?” Benteley demanded shakily.

Herb Moore shoved him back down as he started to climb from the protective ring of metal. “Don't move! Unless you want half your psyche slammed over there and half left here.”

“I was just in it. It won't hit me again for a while.”

“You might be next. Sit still until your focus-system is disconnected and you're out of the circuit.”

At this moment a red button three rows down and four to the right was illuminated. On the screen the operator had already taken over; there was no time lag. He had, Benteley noted, in his first moment of shock spilled his glass of bourbon.

Miss Lloyd's chatter paused momentarily. “Are you all right?” she asked the Pellig body. “You look so sort of—pale.”

“I'm okay,” the Pellig body murmured.

“He's doing fine,” Moore said to Benteley. “That's your friend Al Davis.

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