Free Galactic Pot-Healer by Philip K. Dick Page A

understand.”
    “What do you stand to lose?” Joe asked Mali Yojez.
    “You and I has no future together,” she answered.
    “But that’s the whole point of the SSA machine,” Joe protested. “To find out what—”
    “I know what it finds out,” Mali Yojez interrupted. “I’ve used they before. Okay,” she said abruptly. “So you can see how it works. As a—” She searched for the word. “Experience.”
    “Thanks,” Joe said.
    The stewardess began setting up the SSA machine in a rapid, efficient fashion, meanwhile explaining it. “SSA stands for
sub specie aeternitatis;
that is, something seen outside of time. Now, many individuals imagine that an SSA machine can see into the future, that it is precognitive. This is not true. The mechanism, basically a computer, is attached via electrodes to both your brains and it swiftly stores up immense quantities of data about each of you. It then synthesizes these data and, on a probability basis, extrapolates as to what would most likely become of you both if you were, for example, joined in marriage, or perhaps living together. I will have to shave two spots of hair on both your heads, please, in order to attach the electrodes.” She brought out a little stainless steel instrument. “How far ahead are you interested in?” she asked as she shaved the two spots on Joe’s skull and then on Mali Yojez’s. “A year? Ten years? You’re free to choose, but the less time-elapse you pick, the more accurate the extrapolation will be.”
    “A year,” Joe said. Ten years seemed too remote; probably he would not even be alive, then.
    “Is that agreeable to you, Miss Yojez?” the stewardess asked.
    “Yes.”
    “It will take the computer fifteen to seventeen minutes to gather, store, and process all the data,” the stewardess said, as she attached two electrodes to Joe’s scalp and then twoto Mali Yojez’s. “Merely sit still and relax; there is of course no discomfort; you won’t feel a thing.”
    Mali Yojez said tartly, “You and I, Mr. Fernwright. Together a whole year. What a mellow, friendly year.”
    “You did this before?” Joe asked. “With another man?”
    “Yes, Mr. Fernwright.”
    “And the extrapolation was unfavorable?”
    She nodded.
    “I’m sorry I rubbed you the wrong way, back there,” Joe said, feeling humble and profusely apologetic.
    “You called me a—” Mali Yojez flipped through her dictionary. “A liar. In front of all. And I have been there and you have not.”
    “What I meant to say—” he began, but the stewardess interrupted him.
    “The SSA computer is gathering data from your minds, now. It would be best if you would relax and not quarrel for a time. If you could sort of gently free-float … let your minds open, open wide and let the probes gather data. Think of nothing in particular.”
    That’s hard to do, Joe reflected. Under these circumstances. Maybe, he thought, Kate was right about me; in ten minutes I managed to insult Miss Yojez, my flight companion and an attractive girl…. He felt gloomy and oppressed. All I have to offer her is ELMO PLASKETT SINKS GIANTS. But maybe, he thought suddenly, she would be interested in pot-healing. Why didn’t I talk about that the first time around? he asked himself. After all, that’s the basis on which we’re here: our skills, experience, knowledge, training.
    “I’m a pot-healer,” he said aloud.
    “I know,” Mali Yojez said. “I read your biographical material; remember?” But she did not sound so miffed, now. Her hostility, conjured up by his ineptness, had abated.
    “Are you interested in pot-healing?” Joe asked.
    “I’m fascinated by it,” she answered. “That’s why I so—” She gestured, then again consulted her dictionary. “Delighted.To sit and talk with you. Tell me—is the pots perfect again? Not mended but…like you say; healed.”
    Joe said, “A healed ceramic piece is in the exact condition as before it broke. Everything fuses;