On the social side, things weren’t much better. Hester found her biking Taurians too bossy and quit. Caring Cancers met every week in a different members home to discuss, over milk and gingersnaps, possible recipients for its good works but so far hadn’t found any, which made Billy feel silly. The captain’s gardening-and-water-polo club kept postponing its meetings, necessitating constant rounds of messages and plan reshufflings. No two Friends of the Peace Memorial could agree on a flower arrangement. And Councilman Luthguster, after a hard-fought campaign in which he had taken an extremely active part, had been blackballed at the Lions Club.
More and more, the former space rovers hung around the house, vaguely fretful. The bilious green sky, the nasty sun (color of ochre juice), the two mingy little marble moons in the eccentric orbits all pressed down on the landscape, on the town, on their own little gabled house, with its squeaking floors and doors that stuck. The local citizens had brought from the Hopeful all their personal possessions — clothes, tools, video camera and monitor, the captain’s birds, Pam’s sky charts Billy’s collection of The Adventures of Space Cadet Hooper and His Pal Fatso and Chang, Ensign Benson’s folders of Betelgeusean erotica, the bound cassettes of Councilman Luthguster’s speeches to the Galactic Council (with the boos edited out), even Hester’s coffee mug — but all these things simply reminded them of their former lives, made their present state less rather than more bearable.
Centerville was a small town in no nation. Distractions were few and local. No movies or videos, only the Morning Bugle and the Afternoon Independent for reading matter, very little variety in clothing or food (all good, all stolid) and no real use for any of their skills or talents. In 500 years, the population had grown from the original 63 to just over 11,000, but 11,000 aren’t very many when that’s all there are.
Even the news that both high school bands would march in next month’s Landing Day parade didn’t lift their spirits a hell of a lot. That’s how bad things were.
Ensign Benson brooded alone in his rocking chair on the front porch, watching the world (hah!) go by, when a bit of the world in the person of mayor Hank Carpenter came up onto the stoop to say, “Hey, Kybee.”
The ensign gave him a look from under lowered brows. Hank cleared his throat, a bit uncomfortable. “We’re sending an ambulance,” he said.
“You’re what?”
“Sorry,” Hank said, looking truly sorry, “but we’ll be taking the captain over to the hospital for a while.”
“What for?”
“Well, uh, he’s about to commit suicide.”
Ensign Benson stared. He knew these people now; they didn’t lie and weren’t wrong. But the captain? He said, “I thought I’d be the first to snap.”
“Oh, no,” Hank assured him. “In fact, you’ll, uh, be the last.”
“That’s it,” Ensign Benson said. Rising, he pointed stern finger at Hank. “Keep your ambulance. We’ll take care of our own.”
“Well, if you’re sure you—”
But the ensign had gone into the house and slammed the door.
He found the captain upstairs in his room, fooling with a rope. “Come downstairs,” he said. “Now.”
In the kitchen Billy and Hester were making coffee — separately, in different pots. The ensign and the captain entered and the ensign said, “Watch him. If he starts drinking anything funny, stop him.”
Billy said, “You mean, like Hester’s coffee?” But the ensign was gone.
Soon he was back, with Pam and the councilman. “It’s time,” he told them all, “to quit fooling around and get out of here.”
“But, Kybee,” Billy said, “we can’t. These people know the future, and they say we’ll never leave.”
“Probabilities,” The ensign corrected him. “The future is not fixed, remember? There’s still free will. The probabilities are caused by our narrowing free will. Things will probably happen in this way or that way because we are who we are, not because the stars force us into anything.”
Hester said, “I don’t see how that helps.”
“We have to break out of the probabilities. Somehow or other — I don’t see it clearly yet, but somehow or other — if we do what we wouldn’t do, we’ll get out of here.
Pam said, “But what wouldn’t we do?”
The ensign gave her a jaundiced look. “I know what you wouldn’t do,” he said. “But I would do it, so that’s that. No, we need something that’s so far from the probabilities that… that…”
The others watched him. Ensign Benson seemed to be reaching down far inside himself, willing a solution where there was none. “Take it easy, Kybee,” Billy said.
Hester said, “Do you want some coffee? Billy’s coffee.”
Slowly, the ensign exhaled; it had been some time since he’d breathed. “I know what were going to do,” he said.
“No!” said the captain. “I won’t!”
“That’s the point,” Ensign Benson said.
Hester said, “There’s no way you’re going to get me to do a thing like that.”
Pam said, “Kybee, this is just a scheme of yours; I can tell.”
“Gosh, Kybee,” said Billy.
“My dignity,” said the councilman.
“Precisely!” Ensign Benson said. “Your dignity is what keeps the probabilities all lined up in a neat and civilized and predictable row. It’s the only way were ever going to get back onto the Hopeful. Think about it.”
They thought about it. They hated it. But that, of course, was the point.
“Hidy, Kybee. The captain feeling better?”
“Oh, we’ll all adapt, Hank.”
“What’s that you’re watching?”
“Just a little video I made of the captain shooting birds. Never saw one of these machines?”
“No, sir, can’t say I have.”
“They’re easy to operate. Come here, I’ll show you.”
One nice thing about knowing the future, you never have to worry about a rain date for your parade. The sun shone bright, the bands and the marchers were respendent, and this year, thanks to the Earthpeople, there would be a permanent record of the whole affair! Hank Carpenter, armed with the video camera, stood atop a wagon right down by the Peace Memorial, ready to tape the whole show.
And a real nice show it was. The South Side High School band led off, in uniforms of scarlet and white, and the North Side High School band, in blue and gold, brought up the rear. In between were contingents of the 4-H, the Grange, the police department, bowling leagues, volunteer firemen, a giggle of beauty-contest winners in a bedecked surrey; oh, all sorts of interesting things.
Including the crew of the Hopeful. Naked.
“Keep taping!” Ensign Benson yelled at Hank Carpenter. “Tape! Tape!” And he did, and they all looked at the tape later, and it was still impossible to believe.
What an array of uncomfortable-looking people. What a variety of flesh was here on display. What an embarrassment all the way around.
Captain Standforth and Hester appeared first, side by side but determinably separate. The captain sort of vaguely squinted and blinked, pretending to do difficult math problems in his head, while Hester marched along like an angry rhinoceros, daring anyone to tell her she was naked. The captain in the buff looked more mineral than animaclass="underline" an angular, gawky armature, a scarecrow that wouldn’t scare a wren, an espalier framework for no known tree. Hester, on the other hand, merely became more Hester: chunky, blocky, squared-off.