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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Cerebrum, by Albert Teichner
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Cerebrum
+
+Author: Albert Teichner
+
+Illustrator: Lloyd Birmingham
+
+Release Date: October 3, 2008 [EBook #26761]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CEREBRUM ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CEREBRUM
+
+By ALBERT TEICHNER
+
+
+ _For thousands of years the big brain served as a
+               master switchboard for the thoughts
+                         and emotions of humanity.
+   Now the central mind was showing signs of decay
+                            ... and men went mad._
+
+
+Illustrated by BIRMINGHAM
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+The trouble began in a seemingly trivial way. Connor had wanted to speak
+to Rhoda, his wife, wished himself onto a trunk line and then waited.
+"Dallas Shipping here, Mars and points Jupiterward, at your service,"
+said a business-is-business, unwifely voice in his mind.
+
+"I was not calling you," he thought back into the line, now also getting
+a picture, first flat, then properly 3-D and in color. It was a
+paraNormally luxurious commercial office.
+
+"I am the receptionist at Dallas Shipping," the woman thought back
+firmly. "You rang and I answered."
+
+"I'm sure I rang right," Connor insisted.
+
+"And I'm sure I know my job," Dallas Shipping answered. "I have received
+as many as five hundred thought messages a day, some of them highly
+detailed and technical and--"
+
+"Forget it," snapped Connor. "Let's say I focussed wrong."
+
+He pulled back and twenty seconds later finally had Rhoda on the line.
+"Queerest thing happened," he projected. "I just got a wrong party."
+
+"Nothing queer about it," his wife smiled, springing to warm life on his
+inner eye. "You just weren't concentrating, Connor."
+
+"Don't you hand me that too," he grumbled. "I _know_ I thought on the
+right line into Central. Haven't I been using the System for sixty
+years?"
+
+"Exactly--all habit and no attention."
+
+How smugly soothing she was some days! "I think the trouble's in Central
+itself. The Switcher isn't receiving me clearly."
+
+"Lately I've had some peculiar miscalls myself," Rhoda said nervously.
+"But you _can't_ blame Central Switching!"
+
+"Oh, I didn't mean that!" By now he was equally nervous and only too
+happy to end the conversation. Ordinarily communications were not
+monitored but if this one had been there could certainly be a slander
+complaint.
+
+       *       *       *
+
+On his way home in the monorail Connor tried to reach his office and had
+the frightening experience of having his telepathic call refused by
+Central. Then he refused in turn to accept a call being projected at
+him, but when an Urgent classification was added he had to take it. "For
+your unfounded slander of Central Switching's functioning," announced
+the mechanically-synthesized voice, "you are hereby Suspended
+indefinitely from the telepathic net. From this point on all paraNormal
+privileges are withdrawn and you will be able to communicate with your
+fellows only in person or by written message."
+
+Stunned, Connor looked about at his fellow passengers. Most of them had
+their eyes closed and their faces showed the mild little smile which was
+the outer hallmark of a mind at rest, tuned in to a music channel or
+some other of the hundreds of entertainment lines available from
+Central. How much he had taken that for granted just a few minutes ago!
+
+Three men, more shabbily dressed, were unsmilingly reading books. They
+were fellow pariahs, Suspended for one reason or another from
+paraNormal privileges. Only the dullest, lowest-paying jobs were
+available to them while anyone inside the System could have Central read
+any book and transmit the information directly into his cortex. The
+shabbiest one of all looked up and his sympathetic glance showed that he
+had instantly grasped Connor's changed situation.
+
+Connor looked hastily away; he didn't want any sympathy from that kind
+of 'human' being! Then he shuddered. Wasn't he, himself, now that kind
+in every way except his ability to admit it?
+
+When he stepped onto the lushly hydroponic platform at the suburban stop
+the paraNormals, ordinarily friendly, showed that they, too, already
+realized what had happened. Each pair of suddenly icy eyes went past him
+as if he were not there at all.
+
+He walked up the turf-covered lane toward his house, feeling hopelessly
+defeated. How would he manage to maintain a home here in the middle of
+green and luxuriant beauty? More people than ever were now outside the
+System for one reason or another and most of these unfortunates were
+crowded in metropolitan centers which were slumhells to anyone who had
+known something better.
+
+How could he have been so thoughtless because of a little lapse in
+Central's mechanism? Now that it was denied him, probably forever, he
+saw more clearly the essential perfection of the system that had brought
+order into the chaos following the discovery of universal paraNormal
+capacities. At first there had been endless interference between minds
+trying to reach each other while fighting off unwanted calls. Men had
+even suggested this blessing turned curse be annulled.
+
+The Central Synaptic Computation Receptor and Transmitter System had
+ended all such negative thinking. For the past century and a half it had
+neatly routed telepathic transmissions with an efficiency that made
+ancient telephone exchanges look like Stone Age toys. A mind could
+instantly exchange information with any other Subscribing mind and still
+shut itself off through the Central machine if and when it needed
+privacy. Except, he shuddered once more, if Central put that Urgent
+rating on a call. Now only Rhoda could get a job to keep them from the
+inner slumlands.
+
+He turned into his garden and watched Max, the robot, spading in the
+petunia bed. The chrysanthemums really needed more attention and he was
+going to think the order to Max when he realized with a new shock that
+all orders would have to be oral now. He gave up the idea of saying
+anything and stomped gloomily into the house.
+
+       *       *       *
+
+As he hung his jacket in the hall closet he heard Rhoda coming
+downstairs. "Queer thing happened today," he said with forced
+cheerfulness, "but we'll manage." He stopped as Rhoda appeared. Her eyes
+were red and puffed.
+
+"I tried to reach you," she sobbed.
+
+"Oh, you already know. Well, we can manage, you know, honey. You can
+work two days a week and--"
+
+"You don't understand," she screamed at him. "_I'm_ Suspended too! I
+tried to tell it I hadn't done anything but it said I was guilty by
+being associated with you."
+
+Stunned, he fell back into a chair. "Not you, too, darling!" He had been
+getting used to the idea of his own reduced status but this was too
+brutal. "Tell Central you'll leave me and the guilt will be gone."
+
+"You fool, I did say that and my defense was refused!"
+
+Tears welled in his eyes. Was there no bottom to this horror? "You
+yourself suggested that?"
+
+"Why shouldn't I?" she cried. "It wasn't my fault at all."
+
+He sat there and tried not to listen as waves of hate rolled over him.
+Then the front bell rang and Rhoda answered it.
+
+"I haven't been able to reach you," someone was saying through the door.
+It was Sheila Williams who lived just down the lane. "Lately lines seem
+to get tied up more and more. It's about tonight's game."
+
+Just then Rhoda opened the door and Sheila came to an abrupt halt as she
+saw her old friend's face. Her expression turned stony and she said, "I
+wanted you to know the game is off." Then she strode away.
+
+Unbelieving, Rhoda watched her go. "After forty years!" she exclaimed.
+She slowly came back to her husband and stared down at him. "Forty years
+of 'undying' friendship, gone like that!" Her eyes softened a little.
+"Maybe I'm wrong, Connor, maybe I said too much through Central myself.
+And maybe I'd have acted like Sheila if _they_ had been the ones."
+
+He withdrew his hands from his face. "I've done the same thing to other
+wretches myself. We'll just have to get used to it somehow. I've enough
+social credits to hang on here a year anyway."
+
+"Get used to it," she repeated dully. This time there was no
+denunciation but she had to flee up the stairs to be alone.
+
+He went to the big bay window and, trying to keep his mind blank,
+watched Max re-spading the petunia bed. He really should go out and
+tell the robot to stop, he decided, otherwise the same work would be
+repeated again and again. But he just watched for the next hour as Max
+kept returning to the far end of the bed and working his way up to the
+window, nodding mindlessly with each neat twist of his spade attachment.
+
+Rhoda came back downstairs and said, "It's six-thirty. The first time
+since the boys left that they didn't call us at six." He thought of Ted
+on Mars and Phil on Venus and sighed. "By now," she went on, "they know
+what's happened. Usually colonial children just refuse to have anything
+more to do with parents like us. And they're right--they have their own
+futures to consider."
+
+"They'll still write to us," he started reassuring her but she had
+already gone outside where he could hear her giving Max vocal
+instructions for preparing dinner. Which was just as well--she would
+know the truth soon enough. Without a doubt the boys were now also
+guilty by association and they'd have nothing left to lose by
+maintaining contact.
+
+At dinner, though, he felt less kindly toward her and snapped a few
+times. Then it was Rhoda's turn to exercise forebearance and to try to
+smooth things over. Once she looked out the picture window at the
+perfect synthetic thatch of the Williams' great cottage, peeping over
+the hollyhock-topped rise of ground at the end of the garden. "Well?" he
+demanded. "Well?"
+
+"Nothing, Connor."
+
+"You sighed and I want to know what the devil--"
+
+"Since you insist--I was thinking how lucky Sheila Williams always is.
+Ten years ago the government authorized twins for her while I haven't
+had a child in thirty years, and now our disaster forewarns her. She'll
+never get caught off guard on a paraNormal line."
+
+       *       *       *
+
+He snapped his fingers and Max brought out the pudding in a softly
+shining silver bowl. Above it hovered a bluish halo of flaming brandy.
+"Maybe not. I've heard of people even being Suspended without a reason."
+He slowly savored the first spoonful as if it might be the last ever.
+From now on every privileged pleasure would have that special value.
+"One more year of such delights."
+
+"If we can stand the ostracism."
+
+"We can." Suddenly he was all angry determination. "I did the wrong
+thing today, admitted, but it really was the truth, what I said. I've
+concentrated right and still got wrong numbers!"
+
+"Me too, but I kept thinking it was my own fault."
+
+"The real truth's that while the System assumes more authority each
+decade it keeps getting less efficient."
+
+"Well, why doesn't the government do something, get everything back in
+working order?"
+
+His grin showed no pleasure. "Do you know anybody who could help repair
+a Master Central Computer?"
+
+"Not personally but there must be--"
+
+"Must be nothing! People are slack from having it so good, don't think
+as much as they used to. Why bother when you can tap Central for any
+information? _Almost_ any information."
+
+"How can it all end?"
+
+"Who knows and who cares?" He was angry all over again. "It will still
+be working well enough for a few centuries and we, we're just left out
+in the cold! I'm only ninety, I can live another sixty years, and you,
+you're going to have a good seventy-five more of this deprivation."
+
+Max was standing at the foot of the table, metal visual lids closed as
+he waited for instructions. Rhoda considered him unthinkingly, then
+snapped back to attention. "Nothing more, Max, go to the kitchen and
+disconnect until you hear from us."
+
+"Yes," he said in that programmed tone which indicated endless gratitude
+for the privilege of half-being.
+
+"That ends my sad day," Connor sighed. "I'm taking a blackout pill and
+intend to stay that way for the next fourteen hours."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next morning he rode into the city in the same car as the one that
+had brought him back the day before. None of the regulars even deigned
+to look in his direction. There was another change today. Only two
+fellow Suspendeds were reading their books even though there had been
+three for the past few months. Which meant another one had exhausted his
+income and was being forced into the inner city.
+
+At the office none of Connor's associates greeted him. They didn't even
+have to contrast the new tension in his face with the easy-going,
+flannelled contentment of their fellows. Undoubtedly somebody had tried
+to reach him or Rhoda and heard the Suspension Notice on their severed
+thought-lines.
+
+As was also to be expected, there was a notice on his desk that his
+executive services would no longer be needed.
+
+He quickly gathered up his personal things and went downstairs, passing
+through the office workers pool. Miss Wilson, his Suspended secretary,
+came up to him. She looked saddened yet, curiously, almost triumphant
+too. "We all heard the bad news this morning," she said, her blue eyes
+never wavering. "We want you to know how sorry we are since you're not
+accustomed--"
+
+"I'll never be accustomed to it," he said bitterly.
+
+"No, Mr. Newman, you mustn't think that way. Human beings can get
+accustomed to whatever's necessary."
+
+"Necessary? Not in my books!"
+
+"Some day you may feel differently. I was born into a Suspended family
+and we've managed. Being on the outside has its compensations."
+
+"Such as?"
+
+"We-l-l--," she faltered, "I really don't know exactly. But you must
+have faith it will be so." She pulled out a card from a pocket of her
+sheath dress. "Maybe you'll want to use this some day."
+
+He glanced at the card which said, _John Newbridge, Doctor at Mind, 96th
+Level, Harker Building, Appointments by Writing Only_. There was no
+thought-line coding.
+
+"I have no doubt," he muttered. But she was starting to look hurt so he
+carefully slid the card into his wallet.
+
+"He's very helpful," she said. "I mean, helpful for people who have
+adjustment problems."
+
+"You're a good girl," he said huskily. "Maybe we'll meet someday again.
+I'll have my wife call--write to you so you can visit us before we have
+to come into the city."
+
+"That," she smiled happily, "would be so wonderful, Mr. Newman. I've
+never been in a home like that." Then, choking with emotion, she turned
+and hurried away.
+
+       *       *       *
+
+When he reached home and told Rhoda what had happened, his wife was not
+in the least bit moved. "I'll never let that girl in my house," she said
+through thin lips. "A classless nothing! I'm going to keep my pride
+while I can."
+
+There was some sense to her viewpoint but, he felt uncertainly, not
+enough for him to remain silent. "We have to adjust, darling, can't go
+on thinking we're what we're not."
+
+"Why can't we?" she exploded. "I couldn't even order food today. Max had
+to go to the AutoMart and pick it up!"
+
+"What are you trying to say?"
+
+"That _you_ made this mess!"
+
+For a while he listened, dully unresponsive, but eventually the
+vituperation became too bitter and he came back at her with equal vigor.
+Until, weeping, she rushed upstairs once more.
+
+That was the first of many arguments. Anything could bring them on,
+instructions for Max that she chose to consider erroneous, a biting
+statement from him that she was deliberately making herself physically
+unattractive. More and more Rhoda took to going into the city while he
+killed time making crude, tentative adjustments on Max. What the devil,
+he occasionally wondered, could she be doing there?
+
+But most of the time he did not bother about it; he had found a
+consolation of his own. At first it had been impossible to make the
+slightest changes in Max, even those that permitted the robot to remain
+conscious and give advice. Again and again his mind strained toward
+Central until the icy-edged truth cut into his brain--there was no line.
+
+Out of boredom, though, he plugged away, walked past the
+disdainfully-staring eyes of neighbors to the village library, and
+withdrew dusty microfiles on robotry. Eventually he had acquired a
+little skill at contemplating what, essentially, remained a mystery to
+his easily-tired mind. It was not completely satisfactory but it would
+be enough to get him a better-than-average menial job when he had
+finally accepted his new condition.
+
+At long last a letter came from Ted on Mars. It said:
+
+    Guilty by association, that's what I am! When it first happened I
+    was furious with the two of you but resignation has its own
+    consolations and I've given up the ranting. Of course, I've lost my
+    job and my new one will keep me from Earth a longer time but the
+    real loss is not being able to think on Earth Central once a day. As
+    you know, it's a funny civilization here anyway. As yet, there's no
+    local telepathic Central but all Active Communicators are permitted
+    to think in on Earth Central once a day--except for the big shots
+    who can even telepath social engagements to each other by way of
+    Earth! Privileged but a pretty dull crowd anyway.
+
+    Oh yes, another exception to the general ration, Suspendeds like me.
+    Funny thing about that, seems to me there are more Suspended from
+    the Earth System all the time. Maybe I'm imagining it.
+
+    As lovingly as ever, your son, Ted. (NO. _More_ than ever!)
+
+Rhoda really went to pieces for a while after that letter but, oddly
+enough, all recriminations soon stopped. She began going into the city
+every day and after each visit seemed a little calmer for having done
+so.
+
+       *       *       *
+
+Finally Connor could no longer remain silent about it. But by now all
+conversations had to be broached by tactful beating around the bush so
+he began by saying he had decided to take a lower level job in the
+metropolis.
+
+Rhoda was not surprised. "I know. A good idea but I think you should
+wait a while longer and do something else first."
+
+That made him suspicious. "Are you developing a new kind of unblockable
+ESP? How'd you know?"
+
+"No," she laughed. "Some day we will maybe and people will use it better
+this time. But right now I'm just going by what I see. You've been
+studying Max and I knew you were bound to get restless." She became
+thoughtful. "What you really want to know, though, is what I've been
+doing in the city. Well, at first I did very little. I kept ending up in
+theatres where we Suspendeds can go. That gave a little relief. But
+since Ted's letter it's been different. I finally got up the courage to
+see Dr. Newbridge."
+
+"Newbridge!"
+
+"Connor, he's a great man. You should see him too."
+
+"My mind may have smaller scope outside the System but what's left of it
+isn't cracking, Rhoda." Working himself into a spasm of righteous rage,
+he stalked out into the garden and tried to convince himself he was
+calmly studying the rose bushes' growth. But Sheila and Tony Williams
+came down the lane that skirted the garden and, as their eyes moved
+haughtily past him, his rage shifted its focus. He came back into the
+house and remained in sullen silence.
+
+Rhoda went on as if there had been no interruption. "I still say Dr.
+Newbridge is a great man. He dropped out of the System of his own free
+will and that certainly took courage!"
+
+"He willingly gave up his advantages and privileges?"
+
+"Yes. And he's explained why to me. He felt it was destroying every
+Subscriber's ability to think and that it could not last. Some day we
+would be without anything to do our thinking and he wanted out."
+
+Connor sat down and stared thoughtfully out the window. Max had just
+lumbered into the garden and, having unscrewed one hand to replace it
+with a flexible spade, was starting on the evening schedule for turning
+over the soil at the base of the plants. He would go methodically down
+one flower bed, then up the next one, until all had been worked over,
+then would start all over again unless ordered to stop. "Are we to end
+up the same way?" Connor shuddered. He slapped his knee. "All right,
+I'll go with you tomorrow. I've got to see what he's like--a man who'd
+voluntarily surrender ninety percent of his powers!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next morning they rode into the city together and went to the Harker
+Building. It was in an area dense with non-telepaths each one showing
+that telltale cleft of anxiety in his forehead but briskly going about
+his business as if anxiety were actually a liveable quality. Newbridge
+had the same look but there was a nonetheless reassuring ease to the way
+he greeted them. He was tall and white-haired and his face frequently
+assumed an abstracted look as if his mind were reaching far away.
+
+"You've come here," he said, "for two reasons. The first is
+dissatisfaction with your life. More precisely, you're dissatisfied with
+your attitude toward life but you wouldn't be willing to put it that
+way, not yet. Secondly, you want to know why anyone would willingly
+leave the System."
+
+Connor leaned back in his chair. "That'll do for a starter."
+
+"Right. Well, there aren't many anomalies like me but we do exist. Most
+people outside the System are there because they've been Suspended for
+supposed infractions, or they've been put out through guilt by
+association, or because they were born into a family already in that
+condition. Nothing like that happened to me. From early childhood I was
+trained by parents and teachers to discipline the projective potential
+of my mind into the System. Like every other paraNormal, I received my
+education by tapping Central for contact with information centers and
+other minds. But I was a fluke." His dark blue eyes twinkled.
+"Biological units are never so standardized that _all_ of them fall
+under any system that can be devised. I functioned in this System, true,
+but I could imagine my mind existing outside, could see my functioning
+_from the outside_. This is terribly rare--most people are limited to
+the functions which sustain them. They experience nothing else except
+when circumstances force them to. I, though, could see the System was
+not all-powerful."
+
+"Not all-powerful!" Connor exploded. "It got rid of me awfully easily."
+
+His wife tried to calm him. "Listen, dear, then decide."
+
+"You're surviving as a pariah, Mr. Newman, aren't you? Your wife tells
+me you've even started to study robot controls, valuable knowledge for
+the future and personally satisfying now. Millions of people do survive
+as outsiders, as do the planetary colonists who only have limited access
+so far to social telepathy. The System has built into it defenses
+against Subscribers who lack confidence in it--if it didn't it would
+collapse. But people _in_ the System are not forced to remain there.
+They can _will_ themselves out any time they close their minds to it, as
+I did. But they don't want to will themselves out of it--you certainly
+didn't--and their comfortable inertia keeps everything going. I think
+you have to know a little about its history, a history which never would
+have interested you if you were still comfortably inside it."
+
+He slowly outlined the way it had developed. First those uncertain steps
+toward understanding the universally latent powers of telepathy, then
+growing chaos as each individual spent most of his time fighting off
+unwanted messages. After a period of desperate discomfort a few great
+minds, made superhuman by their ability to tap each others' resources,
+had devised the Central System Switchboard. Only living units,
+delicately poised between rigid order and sheer chaos, could receive
+mental messages but this problem had been solved by the molecular
+biologists with their synthesized, self-replicating axons, vastly
+elongated and cunningly intertwined by the billions. These responded to
+every properly-modulated thought wave passing through them and made the
+same careful sortings as a human cell absorbing matter from the world.
+Then, to make certain this central mind would never become chaotic,
+there was programmed into it an automatic rejection of all sceptical
+challenges.
+
+"That was the highest moment of our race," Newbridge sighed. "We had
+harnessed infinite complexities to our needs. But the success was too
+complete. Ever since then humanity has become more and more dependent on
+what was to be essentially a tool and nothing more. Each generation
+became lazier and there's no one alive who can keep this Central System
+in proper working order." He leaned forward to emphasize his point. "You
+see, it's very slowly breaking down. There's a steady accretion of
+inefficiency mutations in the axons and that's why more and more
+switching mistakes are being made--as in your case."
+
+       *       *       *
+
+Connor was dazed by it all. "What's going to be the upshot, I mean,
+_how_ is it going to break down?"
+
+Newbridge threw up his hands. "I don't know--it's probably a long way
+off anyway. I guess the most likely thing is that more and more errors
+will accumulate and plenty of people will be Suspended just because
+Central is developing irrational quirks. Maybe the critical social mass
+for change will exist only when more are outside the System than inside.
+I suspect when that happens we'll be able to return to _direct_
+telepathic contact. As things are, our projection attempts are always
+blocked." A buzzing sound came out of a small black box on the doctor's
+desk, startling Connor who in his executive days had received all such
+signals directly in his head. "Well, I've another patient waiting so
+this will have to be the end of our chat."
+
+Connor and his wife exchanged glances. He said, "I'd like to come back.
+I'll probably have a twenty-hour week so I'll be in town a few days a
+week."
+
+"More than welcome to come again," Newbridge grinned. "Just make the
+arrangements with Miss Richards, my nurse."
+
+When they were in the street Rhoda asked, "Well, what do you think now?"
+
+"I don't know what to think yet--but I do feel better. Rhoda, would you
+mind going home alone? I think I'll find a job right away."
+
+"Mind?" she laughed. "It's wonderful news!"
+
+After he left her he wandered around the city awhile. In his paraNormal
+days he had never noticed them but it certainly was true that there were
+a lot of Suspendeds about. He studied some of them as he went along,
+trying to fathom their likes and dislikes by the way they moved and
+their expressions. But, unlike the paraNormals, each was different and
+it was impossible to see deeply into them.
+
+Then, as he rounded a corner, he was suddenly face to face with his new
+enemy. A large flat park stood before him and there in the middle was a
+hundred-story tower of smooth seamless material, the home of the Central
+System's brain. There were smaller towers at many points in the world
+but this was the most important, capable of receiving on its mile-long
+axons, antennas of the very soul itself, every thought projected at it
+from any point in the solar system. The housing gleamed blindingly in
+the sun of high noon, as perfect as the day it had been completed. That
+surface was designed to repel all but the most unusual of the radiation
+barrages that could bring on subtle changes in the brain within. The
+breakdown, he thought bitterly, would take too many centuries to
+consider.
+
+He turned away and headed into an Employment Exchange. The man behind
+the desk there was a Suspended, too, and showed himself to be
+sympathetically understanding as soon as he studied the application
+form. "ParaNormal until a few months ago," he nodded. "Tough change to
+make, I guess."
+
+Connor managed a little grin. "Maybe I'll be grateful it happened some
+day."
+
+"A curious thought, to say the least." He glanced down the application
+again. "Always some kind of work available although there do seem to be
+more Suspendeds all the time. Robot repair--that's good! Always a
+shortage there."
+
+So Connor went to work in a large building downtown along with several
+hundred other men whose principal duty was overseeing the repair of
+robot servitors by other servitors and rectifying any minor errors that
+persisted. He was pleased to find that, while some of his fellow workmen
+knew much more about the work than he did, there were as many who knew
+less. But the most pleasing thing of all was the way they cooperated
+with one another. They could not reach directly into each other's minds
+but the very denial of this power gave them a sense of common need.
+
+       *       *       *
+
+He visited Newbridge once a week and that, too, proved increasingly
+helpful. As time went on, he found he was spending less of it regretting
+what he had lost. But once in a while a paraNormal came through the
+workshop, eyes moving past the Suspendeds as if they did not exist and
+the old resentment would return in all its bitterness. And when he
+himself did not feel this way he could still sense it in men around him.
+
+"Perfectly natural way to feel," Rhoda said, "not that it serves any
+purpose."
+
+"It's paraNormal lack of reaction," he tried to explain, "that's what
+really bothers me. They don't even bother to notice our hatred because
+we have the strength of insects next to theirs. They can all draw on
+each others' resources and that totals to infinitely more than any of us
+have, even if as individuals they're so much less. The perfect form of
+security."
+
+But for a moment one day that security seemed to be collapsing. Above
+the work floor in Connor's factory there was a gallery of small but
+luxurious offices in which the executive staff of paraNormals 'worked.'
+None of them came in more than two days a week but use of these offices
+was rotated among them so all were ordinarily occupied and workers,
+going upstairs to the stock depot, could see paraNormals in various
+stages of relaxation. Usually the paraNormal kept his feet on a desk
+rest and, eyes closed, contemplated incoming entertainment. On rarer
+occasions he would be leaning over a document on the desk as his mind
+received the proper decision from Central.
+
+This particular morning Connor was feeling bitterly envious as he went
+by the offices. He had already seen seven smugly-similar faces when he
+came by Room Eight. Suddenly the face of its occupant contorted in
+agony, then the man got up and paced about as if in a trap. Deciding he
+had seen more than was good for him, Connor hurried on. But the man in
+Nine was acting out the same curious drama. He quickly retraced his
+steps, passing one scene of consternation after another, and went back
+down to the work floor, wondering what it all meant.
+
+Soon everybody knew something extraordinary was afoot as all the
+paraNormals swarmed noisily onto the runway overlooking the floor. They
+were shouting wordless sounds at each other, floundering about as they
+did so. Then, with equal suddenness, everything was calm again and,
+faces more relaxed, they went back into their offices.
+
+That evening Connor heard the same story everywhere--for ten minutes all
+paraNormals had gone berserk. On the monorail he noticed that, though
+still more relaxed than their unwelcome fellows, they no longer exuded
+that grating _absolute_ sense of security. No doubt about it--for a few
+minutes something had gone wrong, completely wrong, with the Central
+System. "I don't like it," Rhoda said. "Let's see Dr. Newbridge
+tomorrow."
+
+"I'll bet it's a good sign."
+
+Newbridge, though, was also worried when they got to see him. "They're
+losing some of their self-confidence," he said, "and that means they're
+going to start noticing us. Figure it out, Newman, about one-third the
+population of Earth--nobody can get exact figures--is outside the
+System. The paraNormals will want to reduce our numbers if more
+breakdowns take place. I'll have to go into hiding soon."
+
+"But why you of all people?" Connor protested.
+
+"Because I and a few thousand others like me represent not only an
+alternative way of life--all Suspendeds do that--but we possess more
+intensive knowledge for rehabilitating society after Central's collapse.
+That collapse may come much sooner than we've been expecting. When it
+does we're going to have enormous hordes of paras milling around,
+helplessly waiting to learn how to think for themselves again. Well,
+when we finally reach the telepath stage next time we'll have to manage
+it better." He took out an envelope. "If anything happens to me, this
+contains the names of some people you're to contact."
+
+"Why don't you come to our place now?" asked Rhoda. "We'll still be able
+to hold it for a few more months."
+
+"Can't go yet, too many things to clear up. But maybe later." He rose
+and extended his hand to them. "Anyway it's a kind--and brave--offer."
+
+"Sounds overly melodramatic to me," Connor said when they were outside.
+"Who'd want to harm a psychiatric worker with no knowledge except what's
+in his head and his personal library?"
+
+       *       *       *
+
+But he stopped harping on the point when they reached the monorail
+station. Three Suspendeds, obviously better educated than most, were
+being led away by a large group of paraNormals. The paraNormals had
+their smug expressions back but there was a strange gleam of
+determination in their eyes. "Sometimes life itself gets overly
+melodramatic," Rhoda said nervously.
+
+The possible fate of these arrested men haunted him all the way home as
+did the hostile stares of the people in the monorail car. At home,
+though, there was the momentary consolation of a pair of letters from
+the boys. There was little information in them but they did at least
+convey in every line love for their parents.
+
+But even this consolation did not last long. Why, Connor muttered to
+himself, did they have to wait for letters when telephone and radio
+systems could have eased their loneliness so much more effectively?
+Because the paras did not need such systems and their needs were the
+only ones that mattered! His fingers itched to achieve something more
+substantial than the work, now childishly routine, that he was doing at
+the factory. Just from studying Max he knew he could devise such
+workable communication systems. But all that was idle daydreaming--it
+wouldn't be in his lifetime.
+
+The next morning Rhoda insisted they go back into the city to try once
+more to persuade Newbridge to leave. When they arrived at the Harker
+Building it seemed strangely quiet. The few people who were about kept
+avoiding each others' glances and they found themselves alone in the
+elevator to the 96th level. But Miss Richards, the doctor's
+nurse-secretary, was standing in the corridor as they got out. She was
+trembling and found it difficult to talk. "Don't--don't go in," she
+stuttered. "No help now."
+
+He pushed past her, took one glance at the fire-charred consulting room
+where a few blackened splinters of bone remained and turned away,
+leading the two women to the elevator. At first Miss Richards did not
+want to go but he forced her to come along. "You have to get away from
+here--can't do any good for him now."
+
+She sucked in air desperately, blinked back her tears and nodded. "There
+was another ten-minute breakdown this morning. A lot of paraNormals
+panicked and a vigilante pack came here to fire-blast the Doctor. They
+said I'd be next if things got any worse."
+
+Connor pinched his forehead to hold back his own anguish, then pulled
+out a sheet of paper. "Dr. Newbridge was afraid of something like this.
+He gave me a list of names."
+
+"I know, Mr. Newman, I know them by heart."
+
+"Shouldn't we try to contact one of them?"
+
+As they came out into the street, she stopped and thought a moment.
+"Crane would be the easiest to reach. He's an untitled psychiatrist and
+one of the alternate leaders for the underground."
+
+"Underground?"
+
+"Oh, they tried to be prepared for every eventual--"
+
+"It's impossible!" Rhoda broke in. She had been looking up and down the
+great avenue as they talked. "There isn't one person in the street, not
+one!"
+
+An abandoned robot cab stood at the curb and he threw open the door.
+"Come on, get in! Something's happening. Miss Richards, set it for this
+Crane's address."
+
+The cab started to shoot uptown, turning a corner into another deserted
+boulevard. As it skirted the great Park, he pointed at Central Tower.
+There seemed to be a slight crack in the smooth surface half way up but,
+as a moment's mist engulfed the tower, it looked flawless again. Then
+all the mist was gone and the crack was back, a little larger than
+before.
+
+       *       *       *
+
+Connor leaned forward and set the cab for top speed as they rounded into
+the straight-away of another uptown street. Occasionally they caught
+glimpses of frightened faces, clumped in lobby entrances, and once two
+bodies came flying out of a window far ahead. "They're killing our
+people everywhere," moaned the nurse.
+
+As they approached the crushed forms, Connor slowed down a little.
+"They're dressed too well--what's left of them. They're paraNormals!"
+
+A minute later they were at the large apartment block where Crane lived.
+They entered the building through a lobby jammed with more silent
+people. All were Suspendeds.
+
+At first Crane did not want to let the trio in but when he recognized
+Newbridge's nurse he unlocked the heavily-bolted door. He was a
+massively-built man with dark eyes set deeply beneath a jutting brow and
+the eyes did not blink as Miss Richards told him what had happened.
+"We'll miss him," he said, then turned abruptly on Connor. "Have you any
+skills?"
+
+"Robotics," he answered.
+
+The great head nodded as Connor told of his experience at work and on
+Max. "Good, we're going to need people like you for rebuilding." He
+pulled a radio sender and receiver from a cabinet and held an earphone
+close to his temple, continuing to nod. Then he put it down again. "I
+know what you're going to say--illegal, won't work and all that. Well, a
+few of us have been waiting for the chance to build our own
+communication web and now we can do it."
+
+"I just want to know why you keep mentioning _our_ rebuilding. They're
+more likely to destroy all of us in their present mood."
+
+"_Us?_" He took them to the window and pointed toward the harbor where
+thousands of black specks were tumbling into the water. "They're
+destroying themselves! Some jumping from buildings but most pouring
+toward the sea, a kind of oceanic urge to escape completely from
+themselves, to bury themselves in something infinitely bigger than their
+separate hollow beings. Before they were more like contented robots. Now
+they're more like suicidal lemmings because they can't exist without
+this common brain to which they've given so little and from which
+they've taken so much."
+
+Connor squared his shoulders. "We'll have our work cut out for us. Dr.
+Newbridge saw it all coming, you did too."
+
+"Not quite," Crane sighed. "We assumed that at the time of complete
+breakdown the System would open up, throwing all the Subscribers out of
+it, leaving them disconnected from each other and waiting for our help.
+But it worked out in just the opposite manner!"
+
+"You mean that the System is staying closed as it breaks down? Like a
+telephone exchange in which all the lines remained connected and every
+call went to all telephones."
+
+"Exactly," Crane replied.
+
+"I don't understand this technical talk," Rhoda protested, watching in
+hypnotized horror as the speck swarm swelled ever larger in the sea.
+
+"I'll put it this way," Crane explained. "Their only hope was to have
+time to develop the desire for release from the System as it died. But
+they are dying _inside_ it. You see, Mrs. Newman, every thought in every
+paraNormal's head, every notion, every image, no matter how stupidly
+trivial, is now pouring into every other paraNormal's head. They're
+over-communicating to the point where there's nothing left to
+communicate but death itself!"
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note:
+
+    This etext was produced from _Amazing Stories_ January 1963.
+    Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.
+    copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and
+    typographical errors have been corrected without note.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Cerebrum, by Albert Teichner
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CEREBRUM ***
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