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diff --git a/33850.txt b/33850.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5fe8414 --- /dev/null +++ b/33850.txt @@ -0,0 +1,865 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Slizzers, by Jerome Bixby + +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: The Slizzers + +Author: Jerome Bixby + +Release Date: October 10, 2010 [EBook #33850] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SLIZZERS *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced Science Fiction Stories 1953. Extensive + research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this + publication was renewed. + + + _The main trouble is that you'd never suspect anything was + wrong; you'd enjoy associating with _slizzers_, so long as + you didn't know...._ + + + _The Slizzers_ + + + by JEROME BIXBY + + * * * * * + + + + +[Illustration] + +They're all around us. I'll call them the _slizzers_, because they +_sliz_ people. Lord only knows how long they've been on Earth, and how +many of them there are.... + +They're all around us, living with us. We are hardly ever aware of +their existence, because they can _make_ themselves look like us, and +do most of the time; and if they can look like us, there's really no +need for them to think like us, is there? People think and behave in +so many cockeyed ways, anyhow. Whenever a _slizzer_ fumbles a little +in his impersonation of a human being, and comes up with a puzzling +response, I suppose we just shrug and think. _He could use a good +psychiatrist._ + +So ... you might be one. Or your best friend, or your wife or husband, +or that nice lady next door. + +They aren't killers, or rampaging monsters; quite the contrary. They +need us, something like the way we'd need maple trees if it came to +the point where maple syrup was our only food. That's why we're in no +comic-book danger of being destroyed, any more than maple trees would +be, in the circumstances I just mentioned--or are, as things go. In a +sense, we're rather well-treated and helped along a bit ... the way we +care for maple trees. + +But, sometimes a man here and there will be careless, or ignorant, or +greedy ... and a maple tree will be hurt.... + +Think about that the next time someone is real nice to you. He may be +a _slizzer_ ... and a careless one.... + +How long do we live? + +Right. About sixty, seventy years. + +You probably don't think much about that, because that's just the way +things are. That's life. And what the hell, the doctors are increasing +our lifespan every day with new drugs and things, aren't they? + +Sure. + +But perhaps we'd live to be about a _thousand_, if the _slizzers_ left +us alone. + +Ever stop to think how little we know about why we live? ... what it +is that takes our structure of bones and coldcuts and gives it the +function we call "life?" + +Some mysterious life-substance or force the doctors haven't pinned +down yet, you say--and that's as good a definition as any. + +Well, we're maple trees to the _slizzers_, and that life-stuff is the +sap we supply them. They do it mostly when we're feeling good--feeling +really terrific. It's easier to tap us that way, and there's more to +be had. (Maybe that's what makes so-called manic-depressives ... they +attract _slizzers_ when they feel tip-top; the _slizzers_ feed; and +_floo-o-m_ ... depressive.) + +Like I say, think about all this next time someone treats you just +ginger-peachy, and makes you feel all warm inside. + +So see how long that feeling lasts ... and who is hanging around you +at the time. Experiment. See if it doesn't happen again and again with +the same people, and if you don't usually end up wondering where in +hell your nice warm feeling went off to.... + + * * * * * + +I found out about the _slizzers_ when I went up to Joe Arnold's +apartment last Friday night. + +Joe opened the door and let me in. He flashed me his big junior-exec's +grin and said, "Sit, Jerry. I'll mix you a gin and. The others'll be +along in awhile and we can get the action started." + +I sat down in my usual chair. Joe had already fixed up the table ... +green felt top, ashtrays, coasters, cards, chips. I said, "If +Mel--that's his name, isn't it, the new guy?--if he starts calling +wild games again when it comes his deal, I'll walk out. I don't like +'em." I looked at the drink Joe was mixing. "More gin." + +Joe crimped half a lime into the glass. "He won't call any crazy stuff +tonight. I told him that if he did, we wouldn't invite him back. He +nearly ruined the whole session, didn't he?" + +I nodded and took the drink. Joe mixes them right--just the way I like +them. They make me feel good inside. "How about a little blackjack +while we're waiting?" + +"Sure. They're late, anyway." + +I got first ace, and dealt. We traded a few chips back and +forth--nothing exciting--and on the ninth deal Joe got blackjack. + +He shuffled, buried a trey, and gave me an ace-down, duck-up. + +"Hit me," I said contentedly. + +Joe gave me another ace. + +"Mama! ... hit me again." + +A four. + +"Son," I told him, "you're in for a royal beating. Again." + +A deuce. + +Joe winced. + +I turned up my hole ace and said, "Give me a sixth, you poor son. I +can't lose." + +A nine. + +"Nineteen in six," I crowed. I counted up my bets: five dollars. "You +owe me fifteen bucks!" + +Then I looked up at him. + +I'll repeat myself. You know that hot flush of pure delight, of high +triumph, even of mild avarice that possesses you from tingling scalp +to tingling toe when you've pulled off a doozy? If you play cards, +you've been there. If you don't play cards, just think back to the +last time someone complimented the pants off you, or the last time you +clinched a big deal, or the last time a sweet kid you'd been hot after +said, "Yes." + +That's the feeling I mean ... the feeling I had. + +And Joe Arnold was eating it. + +I knew it, somehow, the moment I saw his eyes and hands. His eyes +weren't Joe Arnold's blue eyes any longer. They were wet balls of +shining black that took up half his face, and they looked hungry. His +arms were straight out in front of him; his hands were splayed tensely +about a foot from my face. The fingers were thinner and much longer +than I could recall Joe's being, and they just _looked_ like antennae +or electrodes or something, stretched wide-open that way and +quivering, and I just _knew_ that they were picking up and draining +off into Joe's body all the elation, the excitement, the warmth that I +felt. + +I looked at him and wondered why I couldn't scream or move a muscle. + +"Guess I made a boo-boo," he said. He blinked his big black globes of +eyes. "No harm done, though." + +His head had thinned down, just like his fingers, and now came to a +peak on top. + +He had practically no shoulders. He smiled at me, and I saw long black +hair growing on the insides of his lips. + +_What are you?_ I screamed at him to myself. + +Joe licked his hairy lips and folded those long inhuman hands in front +of him. + +"It hurts like hell," he said in a not-human voice, "to be _slizzing_ +you and then have you chill off on me that way, Jerry. But it's my own +fault, I guess." + + * * * * * + +The door-bell rang--two soft tones. Joe got up and let in the other +members of our Friday night poker group. I tried to move and couldn't. + +Fred raised his eyebrows when he saw Joe's face and hands. "Jerry +isn't here yet? Relaxing a little?" Then he saw me sitting there and +whistled. "Oh, you slipped up, eh?" + +Joe nodded. "You were late, and I was hungry, so I thought I'd go +ahead and take my share. I gave him a big kick, and he really poured +it out ... radiated like all hell. I took it in so fast that I +_fluhped_ and lost my plasmic control." + +"We might as well eat now, then," Ray said, "before we get down to +playing cards." He sat down across the table, his eyes--now suddenly +enormous and black--eagerly on me. "I hate like hell waiting until you +deal him a big pot--" + +"_No_," Joe said sharply. "Too much at one time, and he'd wonder what +hit him. We'll do it just like always ... one of us at a time, and +only a little at a time. Get him when he rakes in the loot. They never +miss it when they feel like that." + +"He's right," Fred said. "Take it easy, Ray." He went over to the +sideboard and began mixing drinks. + +Joe looked down at me with his black end-of-eggplant eyes. + +"Now to fix things," he said. + +... I blinked and shook my head. "You owe me fifteen bucks!" I said. + +"Lord," Joe wailed, "did this gonif just take me!" + +Ray groaned sympathetically from the chair across the table, where +he'd been watching the slaughter. "And how!" + +Joe pushed fifteen blue chips at me. I began stacking them. "Well, +that's life," I grinned. Then I shook my head again. "It's the +damnedest thing...." + +"What?" Fred asked. He'd been over at the sideboard mixing drinks for +the gang while I'd taken Joe over the bumps. Now he brought the tray +over and shoved a tall one into Joe's hand. "Don't cry, Joe. What's +the damnedest thing, Jerry?" + +"You know ... that funny feeling that you've been some place +before--the same place, the same people, saying the same things--but +you can't remember where the hell or when, for the life of you. Had it +just a moment ago, when I told Joe he owed me fifteen bucks. What do +they call it again?" + +"_Deja vu_," said Allen, who's sort of the scholarly type. "Means +'seen before' in French, I think. Or something like that." + +"That's right," I said. "_Deja vu_ ... it's the damnedest funniest +feeling. I guess people have it all the time, don't they?" + +"Yes," Allen said. + +Then he paused. "People do." + +"Wonder what causes it?" + +Joe's blue eyes were twinkling. "Dunno. The psychologists have an +explanation for it, but it's probably wrong." + +"Wrong why?" Knowing Joe, I expected a gag. I got it. + +"Well," Joe said. "Let _me_ make up a theory. H'm ... hoo, hah ... +well, it's like _this_: there are monsters all around us, see, but we +don't know they're monsters except that every once in a while one of +them slips up in his disguise and shows himself for what he really is. +But this doesn't bother our monsters. They simply reach into our minds +and twiddle around and--zoop!--you're right back where you were before +the slip was--" + +"Very funny," Fred said boredly. "Maybe losing fifteen bucks made you +lose a little sense, Joe. You wouldn't want to lose more than fifteen +bucks, would you? You need some caution in the games we play, no? So +cut the nonsense and let's run 'em." + +Ray licked his lips. "Yeah. Let's play, huh, fellows?" + +Ray's always eager to get started. + + * * * * * + +We played until 3 A. M. I won forty-six dollars. (I usually do win ... +I guess over a period of six months or so I'm about five-hundred bucks +ahead of the game. Which is why I like to play over at Joe's, even +though I _am_ always so damned tired when I leave. Guess I'm not as +young as I was.) + +Sometimes I wonder why the odds go my way, right down the line. I +almost _never_ lose. But, hell, it _must_ be an honest game ... and if +they're willing to go on losing to "Lucky" Bixby, I'm perfectly +willing to go on winning. + +After all, can you think of any reason that makes any sense for +someone to rig a game week after week to let you _win_? + +Frederik Boles, Author's Agent Oct. 20 + +2200 Fifth Avenue + +New York, N. Y. + +Dear Fred, + + Well, here's a new story. I've cleared it with Joe ... he + says it's okay to use his name; you know his sense of humor. + I've used your name, too, but you can change it if you want + to, being the shy retiring sort you are. + + Frankly, I'm a little dubious about the yarn. It's the + result of last Friday's poker-session.... I actually did + have the _deja vu_ sensation, as you'll recall. On the way + home I stopped in to pick up a chaser, feeling tired as all + hell (like I always do--these long grinds are too much for + me, I guess, just like the guy in the story) and the idea + came to me to slap the old "we are fodder" angle into the + thing as it happened and write it up. + + But it's still an old plot. And one angle is left + unexplained: how is the narrator able to know all about the + _slizzers_ and write about them after Joe gives him the + _deja vu_ treatment? + + Well, maybe the readers won't mind. I've gotten away with + bigger holes than that. Try it on Bob Lowndes ... I still + owe him on that advance. It's up his alley, hope-a-hope. + + Jerry + + Oct. 22, 1952 + +Jerome Bixby + +862 Union Street + +Brooklyn, N. Y. + +Dear Jerry, + + I don't go for "The Slizzers." It just ain't convincing. As + you say, it's an old idea ... and besides--again as you + say--how does the narrator know what happened? + + The manuscript looks good in my wastebasket. Forget about + it. + + Sympathies. + + Fred + + Oct. 23, 1952 + +Frederik Boles, Author's Agent + +2200 Fifth Avenue + +New York, N. Y. + + Dear Wet Blanket (and aren't you a little old for that?) + + Respectfully nuts to you. After proper browbeating I think + I'll try the yarn on Lowndes ... it's no masterpiece, but I + think it's got a chance; he likes an off trail bit, now and + then. I made a carbon, natch, so your ditching of the + original comes to naught. + + Funny thing ... every time I read it over I get the + doggonedest _deja vu_ feeling. Real dynamic thing ... almost + lifts my hair. Hope it does the same for the readers, them + as can read. Maybe Joe didn't quite do the job of making me + forget what happened that night, ha, ha. Say! ... maybe that + could explain the _narrator's_ remembering what happened ... + or maybe--hey! A _real_ idea! + + Remember Joe's kidding us about monsters?--remember, you got + a little sore because he was holding up the game, you + money-hungry son? I think I'll rewrite the ending to include + that! ... which oughta take care of the narrator's + remembering: Joe can be sort of a dopey _slizzer_, a + blat-mouth, and his screwy theory (which is _true_ in the + story, or will be when I write it in--say, isn't this + involved!) can trigger our hero's memory just a bit, shake + the block a mite, undiddle the synapses etc ... and then + I'll have you, platinum-butt, step in to head Joe off, under + pretense of a poker itch. + + You know, it's wonderful the way there are hot story ideas + in plain old everyday things! S'long ... gonna revise. + + Jerry + +[Illustration] + + Oct. 23, 1952 + +Mr. Robert W. Lowndes + +COLUMBIA PUBLICATIONS, Inc. + +241 Church Street, + +New York 13, New York + +MASTER, + + Herewith a story, "The Slizzers," which Fred and I don't + quite see eye to eye on. He thinks it stinks on ice. I'm + sure you will disagree to the tune of nice money. + + J. + + ENCL: THE SLIZZERS + + 1952 OCT 24 AM 9 06 + +NB168 PD=NEW YORK NY 63 110B= +JEROME BIXBY= +862 UNION ST APT 6H= +BKLYN= +JERRY= + + URGE STRONGLY THAT YOU DON'T TRY TO SELL SLIZZERS STOP IT'S + JUST NO DAMN GOOD STOP YOU'VE GOT YOUR REPUTATION TO THINK + OF STOP WHY LOUSE UP YOUR GOOD NAME WITH A LEMON AT THIS + LATE DATE STOP KILL IT STOP I'VE TALKED IT OVER WITH JOE AND + HE ISN'T FEELING HUMOROUS ANY MORE STOP PREFERS NOT TO HAVE + NAME USED STOP REPEAT KILL THE THING FOR YOUR OWN GOOD= + + FRED + + 1952 OCT 24 AM 11 14 + +KL300 PD=NEW YORK NY 12 604B= +JEROME BIXBY= +862 UNION ST APT 6H= +BKLYN= +SON= + + LIKE SLIZZERS STOP PREPOSTEROUS BUT CUTE STOP DISAGREE WITH + FRED TO THE TUNE OF NICE MONEY BUT NICE MONEY STAYS IN MY + POCKET STOP YOU NOW OWE ME ONLY FIFTY DOLLARS OF ADVANCE + AUGUST 16 STOP DO I HEAR A SCREAM POOR BOY= + + BOB + + Oct. 24, 1952 + +Frederik Boles, Author's Agent +2200 Fifth Avenue +New York, N. Y. + +Dear Fred, + + Your telegram came too late, and besides, the hell with it. + Sent the yarn to Bob yesterday (groceries and rent wait for + no man, you know) and he bought it, like the sensitive and + discerning editor he is. What're you and Joe getting your + tails in an uproar about? It's only a gag, so relax. Joe'll + change his mind when he sees his name in print. + + Would like to have included another angle, by the way: if + the narrator's amnesia-job _had_ been botched, wouldn't the + _slizzers_ decide pretty damn quick that he was a menace to + them and get rid of him? Think I'll send Bob a line or two + to stick on the end ... you know, the old incompleted + sentence deal ... just as if, while the narrator was + finishing the story, the _slizzers_ came in and + +[Illustration] + + * * * * * + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Slizzers, by Jerome Bixby + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SLIZZERS *** + +***** This file should be named 33850.txt or 33850.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/3/8/5/33850/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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