The mind is strange, but it has its reasons. The mind sees in a single glimpse life unlived, hopes unrewarded, emptiness and silence where there should have been noise and love... Nicholas and I had lived a long time and done much, but Sadassa Aramchek had been sacrificed before any good luck came to her, any opportunity to live and become. They had taken away part of Nicholas's life, and part of mine, but they had stolen all of hers. It was my job now to forget I had met her, to recall that I said no to Vivian Kaplan instead of yes when she asked if I'd talk with Sadassa; my mind had the solemn task of rearranging past reality in order that I could go on, and it was not doing a good job.
Sometime later in the month, I was taken from my cell, brought before a magistrate, and asked how I pled to fifteen charges of treason. I had a court-appointed attorney, who advised me to plead guilty.
I said, "Innocent."
The trial lasted only two days. They had tape recordings in vast boxes, some of them genuine, most of them fake. I sat without protesting, thinking of spring and the slow growth of trees, as Spinoza had put it: the most beautiful thing on earth. At the conclusion of the trial I was found guilty and sentenced to fifty years in prison without possibility of parole. That would mean I would be released after I had been dead some good time.
I was given a choice between imprisonment in a solitary confinement situation or what they called "work therapy." The work therapy consisted of joining a gang of other political prisoners to do manual labor. Our specific job lay in razing old buildings in the slums of Los Angeles. For this we were paid three cents a day. But at least we stayed out in the sun. I chose that; it was better than being cooped up like an animal.
As I worked clearing broken concrete away, I thought, Nicholas and Sadassa are dead and immortal; I am not dead and I would not be immortal. I am different from them. When I die or am killed, nothing eternal in me will live on. I was not granted the privilege of hearing the AI operator's voice, that voice Nicholas spoke of so often, which meant so much to him.
"Phil," a voice called to me suddenly, breaking my reverie. "Knock off work and have lunch; we got half an hour." It was Leon, my buddy who worked beside me, a former plumber who'd been arrested for passing out some kind of mimeographed handbills he had created himself, a sort of one-man rebellion. In my opinion he was braver than any of us, a plumber working by himself in his basement at a mimeograph machine, with no divine voices to instruct or guide him, only his human heart.
Seated together, we shared sandwiches provided for us. They were not bad.
"You used to be a writer," Leon said, his mouth full of bologna and bread and mustard.
"Yep," I said.
"Did you belong to Aramchek?" Leon asked, leaning close to me.
"No," I said.
"You know anything about it?"
Two friends of mine belonged to it."
"They're dead?"
"Yes," I said.
"What's Aramchek teach?"
"I don't know if it teaches," I said. "I know a little about what it believes."
"Tell me," Leon said, eating his sandwich.
"They believe," I said, "that we shouldn't give our loyalty to human rulers. That there is a supreme father in the sky, above the stars, who guides us. Our loyalty should be to him and him alone."
"That's not a political idea," Leon said with disgust. "I thought Aramchek was a political organization, subversive."
"It is."
"But that's a religious idea. That's the basis of religion. They been talking about that for five thousand years."
I had to admit he was right. "Well," I said, "that's Aramchek, an organization guided by the supreme heavenly father."
"You think it's true? You believe that?"
"Yes," I said.
"What church do you belong to?"
"None," I said.
"You're a strange guy," Leon said. "Do the Aramchek people hear this supreme father?"
They did," I said. They will again, someday."
"Did you ever hear him?"
"No," I said. "I wish I had."
"The man says they're subversive. They're trying to overthrow Fremont."
I nodded. That is true," I said.
"I wish them luck," Leon said. "I might even be willing to run off some mimeographed flyers for them." Speaking in a hoarse, confidential voice, he muttered in my ear, "I got some of my flyers hidden away in my backyard, where I lived. Under a big rhododendron plant, in a coffee can. I espoused justice, truth, and freedom." He eyed me. "You interested?"
"Very much," I said.
"Of course," Leon said, "we got to get out of here first. That's the hard part. But I'm working on that. I'll figure it out. You think Aramchek would take me?"
I said to him, "Yes. I think they have already."
"Because," Leon said, "I really can't get anywhere alone. I need help. You say you think they've taken me already? But I never heard any voice."
"Your own voice," I said, "is that voice. Which they have heard through the ages. And are waiting to hear again."
"Well," Leon said, pleased. "How about that. Nobody ever said that to me before. Thank you."
We ate together in silence for a time.
"Did believing that, about a heavenly father, get them anywhere?" Leon asked presently.
"Not in this world, maybe," I said.
"Then I'm going to tell you something you maybe don't want to hear. If your Aramchek friends were here I'd tell them too. It's not worth it, Phil. It has to be in this world." Leon nodded firmly, his lined face hard. Hard with experience.
"They gained immortality," I said. "It was conferred on them, for what they did or even for what they tried to do and failed to do. They exist now, my friends do. They always will."
"Even though you can't see them."
"Yes," I said. "Right."
Leon said, "There has to be something here first, Phil. The other world is not enough."
I could think of nothing to say; I felt broken and feeble, my arguments used up during all that had happened to me. I was unable to answer.
"Because," Leon continued, "this is where the suffering is. This is where the injustice and imprisonment is. Like us, the two of us. We need it here. Now."
I had no answer.
"It may be fine for them," Leon said, "but what about us?"
"I -" I began. He was right and I knew it.
"I'm sorry," Leon said. "I can see you loved your two friends and you miss them, and maybe they're flying around somewhere in the sky, zipping here and there and being spirits and happy. But you and I and three billion other people are not, and until it changes here it won't be enough, Phil; not enough. Despite the supreme heavenly father. He has to do something for us here, and that's the truth. If you believe in the truth - well, Phil, that's the truth. The harsh, unpleasant truth."
I sat staring down mutely. -
"What's this," Leon said, "about the Aramchek people having something resembling a beautiful silver egg placed with care very secretly in each of them? I can even tell you how it enters - along the optic conduit to the pineal body. By means of radiation, beamed down during the time of the vernal equinox." He chuckled. "The person feels as if he's pregnant, even if it's a man."
Surprised that he knew this, I said, "The egg hatches when they die. It opens and becomes a living plasmatic entity in the atmosphere that never -"
"I know all that," Leon broke in. "And I know it's not really an egg; that's a metaphor. I know more about Aramchek than I admitted. See, Phil, I used to be a preacher."