Let’s get it! his mind howled. Let’s get it, let’s get it!
Almost caught up with, the animal doubled on its tracks abruptly, and dodged back through the line of people. Mr. Mead flung himself at it and made a grab. He got a handful of fur and fell painfully to his knees as the animal galloped away.
He was on his feet without abating a single note of the shriek, and after it in a moment. Everyone else had turned around and was running with him.
Let’s get it! Let’s get it! Let’s get it!
Back and forth across the meadow, the animal ran and they pursued. It dodged and twisted and jerked itself free from converging groups.
Mr. Mead ran with them, ran in the very forefront. Shriek-ing.
No matter how the furry brown animal turned, they turned too. They kept getting closer and closer to it.
Finally, they caught it.
The entire mob trapped it in a great, uneven circle and closed in. Mr. Mead was the first one to reach it. He smashed his fist into it and knocked it down with a single blow. A girl leaped onto the prostrate figure, her face contorted, and began tearing at it with her fingernails. Just before everyone piled on, Mr. Mead managed to close his hand on a furry brown leg. He gave the leg a tremendous yank and it came off in his band. He was remotely astonished at the loose wires and gear mechanisms that trailed out of the torn-off leg.
“We got it!” he mumbled, staring at the leg. We got it, his mind danced madly. We got it, we got it!
He was suddenly very tired, almost faint. He dragged himself away from the crowd and sat down heavily on the grass. He continued to stare at the loose wires that came out of the leg.
Mr. Storku came up to him, breathing hard. “Well,” said Mr. Storku. “Did you have a nice shriek?”
Mr. Mead held up the furry brown leg. “We got it,” he said bewilderedly.
The yellow-haired young man laughed. “You need a good shower and a good sedative. Come on.” He helped Mr. Mead to his feet and, holding on to his arm, crossed the meadow to a dilated yellow square under the grandstand. All around them the other participants in the shriek chattered gaily to each other as they cleansed themselves and readjusted their metabolism.
After his turn inside one of the many booths which filled the interior of the grandstand, Mr. Mead felt more like himself. Which was not to say he felt better.
Something had come out of him in those last few moments as he tore at the mechanical quarry, something he wished infinitely had stayed at the dank bottom of his soul. He’d rather never have known it existed.
He felt vaguely, dismally, like a man who, flipping the pages of a textbook of sexual aberrations, comes upon a particularly ugly case history which parallels his life history in every respect, and understands—in a single, horrified flash—exactly what all those seemingly innocent quirks and nuances of his personality mean.
He tried to remind himself that be was still Oliver T. Mead, a good husband and father, a respected business executive, a substantial pillar of the community and the local church—but it was no good. Now, and for the rest of his life, he was also … this other thing.
He had to get into some clothes. Fast.
Mr. Storku nodded when the driving need was explained. “You probably had a lot saved up. About time you began discharging it. I wouldn’t worry: you’re as sane as anyone in your period. But your clothes have been cleaned off the field along with all the rubbish of our shriek; the officials are already preparing for the next one.”
“What do I do?” Mr. Mead wailed. “I can’t go home like this.”
“No?” the government man inquired with a good deal of curiosity. “You really can’t? Hm, fascinating! Well, just step under that outfitter there. I suppose you’d like twentieth century costume?”
Mr. Mead nodded and placed himself doubtfully under the indicated mechanism as a newly-clad citizen of the twenty-fifth century America walked away from it briskly. “Ye-es. Please make it something sane, something I can wear.”
He watched as his host adjusted some dials rapidly. There WAS a slight hum from the machine overhead: a complete let of formal, black-and-white evening wear sprang into being on the stout man’s body. In a moment, it had changed into another outfit: the shoes grew upwards and became hip-length rubber hoots, the dinner jacket lengthened itself into sou’wester. Mr. Mead was perfectly dressed for the bridge of any whaling ship.
“Slop it!” he begged distractedly as the raincoat began showing distinctive sports shirt symptoms. “Keep it down to one thing.”
You could do it yourself,” Mr. Storku pointed out, “if your subconscious didn’t heave about so much.” Nonetheless, he good-naturedly poked at the machine again, and and Mr Mead’s clothes subsided into the tweed jacket and golf knickers that had been so popular in the 1920’s. They held last at that.
“Better?”
“I -I guess so.” Mr. Mead frowned as he looked down at himself. It certainly was a queer outfit for the vice-president of Sweetbottom Septic Tanks, Inc., to return to his own time in, but at least it was one outfit. And as soon as he got home—
“Now, look here, Storku,” he said, rubbing his hands together briskly and putting aside the recent obscene memories of himself with as much determination as he could call up. “We’re having trouble with this Winthrop fella. He won’t go hack with us.”
They walked outside and paused on the edge of the meadow. In the distance, a new shriek was being organized.
“That so?” Mr. Storku asked with no very great interest. He pointed at the ragged mob of nude figures just beginning to jostle each other into a tight bunch. “You know, two or three more sessions out there and your psyche would be in fine shape. Although, from the looks of you, I’d say Panic Stadium would be even better. Why don’t you do that? Why don’t you go right over to Panic Stadium? One first-rate, screaming, headlong panic and you’d be absolutely—”
“Thank you, but no! I’ve had enough of this, quite enough, already. My psyche is my own affair.”
The yellow-haired young man nodded seriously. “Of course. The adult individual’s psyche is under no other jurisdiction than that of the adult individual concerned.—The Covenant of 2314, adopted by unanimous consent of the entire population of the United States of America. Later, of course, broadened by the international plebiscite of 2337 to include the entire world. But I was just making a personal, friendly suggestion.”
Mr. Mead forced himself to smile. He was distressed to find that when he smiled, the lapels of his jacket stood up and caressed the sides of his chin affectionately. “No offense, no offense. As I’ve said, it’s just that I’ve had all I want of this nonsense. But what are you going to do about a Winthrop?”
“Do? Why nothing, of course. What can we do?”
“You can force him to go back! You represent the government, don’t you? The government invited us here, the government is responsible for our safety.”
Mr. Storku looked puzzled. “Aren’t you safe?”
“You know what I mean, Storku. Our safe return. The government is responsible for it.”
“Not if that responsibility is extended to interference with the desires and activities of an adult individual. I just quoted the Covenant of 2314 to you, my friend. The whole philosophy of government derived from that covenant is based on the creation and maintenance of the individual’s perfect sovereignty over himself. Force may never be applied to a mature citizen and even official persuasion may be resorted to only in certain rare and carefully specified instances. This is certainly not one of them. By the time a child has gone through our educational system, he or she is a well-balanced member of society who can be trusted to do whatever is socially necessary. From that point on, government ceases to take an active role in the individual’s life.”