Free Slow Sculpture by Theodore Sturgeon Page A
Authors: Theodore Sturgeon
[Smith], plagued by what [I] can only, in the most cosmic breadth of generosity, call an excess of enthusiasm, insisted that [we] speed up our research by stimulating the Synapse in these specimens. In spite of [my] warnings and [my] caution, [he] [bulled] ahead giving [me] no choice but to assist [him] in re[wiring] the [machines] for this purpose. But let it be on the [record] that [I] specifically warned [him] of the dangers of revealing [our] presence here. [I] for [one] dread the idea of being responsible for the destruction of organized life. Even if only one of the specimens should detect [us], there is so much intercommunication in this small group that it would be virtually impossible to remove or destroy one without alerting and disturbing all. The least effect would be to negate all [our] efforts so far; the most is something [I] cannot [ethically] live with.
Under these [unhappy] circumstances [we] proceeded with the stimulation; Old Sam Bittelman went to Miss Schmidt’s room when she reported her venetian blind broken and unable to close. She suddenly found it impossible not to answer Sam’s questions, which probed at the very roots of her timidity. Shocked to these roots, but more thoughtful than she had ever been in her life, before, she went to bed forgetting the blind and thinking about the fact that her conditioningto keep her body covered was more deeply instilled into her than
Thou shalt not kill
—and other, equally unsettling concepts.
Mary Haunt overslept, for the very first time, and went into the kitchen, furious. Sam and Bitty were there, and suddenly the girl
had
to answer the questions they shot at her. She escaped quickly, but spent the rest of the day in bed, miserable and disoriented, wondering if, after all, she did want Hollywood.…
Anthony O’Banion went down to the night club where Sue Martin worked, and sat out of sight on the balcony. Suddenly Sam Bittelman was at the table with him, asking him deeply troubling questions about the law and why he practiced it, about his convictions of blood and breeding, and about his feelings for Sue Martin. Dizzied and speechless, O’Banion was led home by kind old Sam.
Bitty found Sue Martin alone in her room one morning, and asked her some pointed questions, all of which Sue answered with ease, quite undisturbed, quite willing. Yes, she loved O’Banion. No, she wouldn’t do anything about it; that was O’Banion’s problem. Sue Martin was no trouble at all to Bitty.…
Late one hot evening Halvorsen walked into the kitchen with a gun in his hand, saying there was something wrong, something he couldn’t name … but
“Who are you and what do you want?”
Bitty calmly asked him why he had bought a gun: “It was for yourself, wasn’t it, Philip?
Why do you want to be dead?
” [I] submit that [Smith] is guilty of carelessness and [unethical] conduct. [I] see no solution but to destroy this specimen and perhaps the others. [I] declare that this situation has arisen only because [Smith] ignored [my] clearly [stated] warning. As [I] [write], this alerted, frightened specimen stands ready to commit violence on [our] [equipment] and thereby itself. [I] hereby serve notice on [Smith] that [he] got [us] into this and [he] can [ ]ing well get [us] out.
IX
“Why do you want to be dead?”
Phil Halvorsen stood gaping at the old woman, and the gun, still shrouded in its silly paper bag, began whispering softly as he trembled. The butt fitted his hand as his hand fitted the butt;
It’s holdingme
, he thought hysterically, knowing clearly that his hysteria was a cloud, a cloak, a defense against that which he was not equipped to think about … well, maybe not ready to think about; but how had she known?
For nearly two days he had been worrying and gnawing at this sense of wrongness about him. Back and back he would come to it, only to reach bafflement and kick it away angrily; not eating enough, hardly sleeping at all;
let me sleep
Under these [unhappy] circumstances [we] proceeded with the stimulation; Old Sam Bittelman went to Miss Schmidt’s room when she reported her venetian blind broken and unable to close. She suddenly found it impossible not to answer Sam’s questions, which probed at the very roots of her timidity. Shocked to these roots, but more thoughtful than she had ever been in her life, before, she went to bed forgetting the blind and thinking about the fact that her conditioningto keep her body covered was more deeply instilled into her than
Thou shalt not kill
—and other, equally unsettling concepts.
Mary Haunt overslept, for the very first time, and went into the kitchen, furious. Sam and Bitty were there, and suddenly the girl
had
to answer the questions they shot at her. She escaped quickly, but spent the rest of the day in bed, miserable and disoriented, wondering if, after all, she did want Hollywood.…
Anthony O’Banion went down to the night club where Sue Martin worked, and sat out of sight on the balcony. Suddenly Sam Bittelman was at the table with him, asking him deeply troubling questions about the law and why he practiced it, about his convictions of blood and breeding, and about his feelings for Sue Martin. Dizzied and speechless, O’Banion was led home by kind old Sam.
Bitty found Sue Martin alone in her room one morning, and asked her some pointed questions, all of which Sue answered with ease, quite undisturbed, quite willing. Yes, she loved O’Banion. No, she wouldn’t do anything about it; that was O’Banion’s problem. Sue Martin was no trouble at all to Bitty.…
Late one hot evening Halvorsen walked into the kitchen with a gun in his hand, saying there was something wrong, something he couldn’t name … but
“Who are you and what do you want?”
Bitty calmly asked him why he had bought a gun: “It was for yourself, wasn’t it, Philip?
Why do you want to be dead?
” [I] submit that [Smith] is guilty of carelessness and [unethical] conduct. [I] see no solution but to destroy this specimen and perhaps the others. [I] declare that this situation has arisen only because [Smith] ignored [my] clearly [stated] warning. As [I] [write], this alerted, frightened specimen stands ready to commit violence on [our] [equipment] and thereby itself. [I] hereby serve notice on [Smith] that [he] got [us] into this and [he] can [ ]ing well get [us] out.
IX
“Why do you want to be dead?”
Phil Halvorsen stood gaping at the old woman, and the gun, still shrouded in its silly paper bag, began whispering softly as he trembled. The butt fitted his hand as his hand fitted the butt;
It’s holdingme
, he thought hysterically, knowing clearly that his hysteria was a cloud, a cloak, a defense against that which he was not equipped to think about … well, maybe not ready to think about; but how had she known?
For nearly two days he had been worrying and gnawing at this sense of wrongness about him. Back and back he would come to it, only to reach bafflement and kick it away angrily; not eating enough, hardly sleeping at all;
let me sleep