"I have little to add to the plans we made last night at the lab. The
thing we need most is time; and next to that, a hiding place. We may
very soon be classed as traitors, with every watchguard on the continent
hunting for us. We will take care that they don't find us. Now, you said
last night that each one of you has accumulated a Free Choice during the
past year, which hasn't yet been used."
"That's right," said Fauré. "I intended to use mine next winter to live
among the Australian aborigines for a week. I've been wanting that for
years, but the planners always refused me; it was a project without
practical purpose."
"And I intended to use mine to attempt a water-color painting," added
Hudson. "In my boyhood I hoped to be put in Arts Category, but the
Planners laughed at me. I suppose it's wrong, yet I still have the yen."
"You have my sympathy," said Karl. "I was going to take an Aimless
Tramp. Just shed my identity and wander on foot through the great north
area of woods and lakes."
David sighed. "Well, if we are successful in hiding and in changing the
world as we'd like, you can all three be free to do as you like without
asking permission. But at present that's only the wildest of dreams.
And, first, we must find our refuge. Today is Saturday. Tomorrow
morning, each of you will go to BureauMed and claim your Free Choice.
And each of you will choose an Aimless Tramp."
"But I don't like hiking," objected Hudson.
"You won't be hiking. You'll take off in your roboplanes and then
disappear. You will be without supervision. You will then proceed,
disguised as you think suitable, to find a place for our new
colony--somewhere in South America?--and make preliminary arrangements
to receive us. You must be back by Tuesday afternoon at the latest. On
Tuesday, as soon as you have reported back to BureauMed, get to the
Institute as fast as you can."
"Why the deadline?"
"Because by Tuesday afternoon, sometime before evening, probably, I
expect all three of you to be suffering from an attack of Blue Martian
Fever, and I want you to get expert hospital care. You will be the
nucleus of the new regime."
Karl laughed. "I wish you could have picked a base for your SDE that was
less unpleasant than Blue Martian."
"Who's got Blue Martian?" asked Tanya, as the girls came in from the
kitchen with their trays of food. "I'll never forget how sick it made
me."
"You should worry," said Leah. "It kept you young and beautiful, didn't
it?"
"You won't have to envy her, Leah," said David going to the liquor
cabinet. "I'm going to give you and the others a shot of the SDE-Martian
Blue. Sometime Tuesday afternoon you should feel the first symptoms. But
after forty-eight hours in the hospital, you'll be good as new. And you
will all stop growing older."
They watched, fascinated, as he opened the cooling compartment of the
liquor cupboard.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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