At moments like this it seemed that the Park existed for him alone.
Oh, there were the times that the Park, or a section of it, was closed to all but employees and their families. At those times the entertainers put on their very best performances. It was rawer and bawdier. Outsiders had paid hefty bribes to get into those parties. That back-stage feel was Dream Park at its best: celebration for its own sake, and an opportunity for them all to take a breath and relax, and see what they had accomplished, and smile to each other.
We are the magicians! they could say, did say at those times. We bring the dream to life, and we’re the only ones who can. And around the world, people put hours and sweat into jobs that often have little meaning to them, saving up to come to Dream Park, to buy the most perfectly packaged Dreams in the world…
And now Alex wandered along Glory Road by dead of night. (The Starship Trooper Game, always a big hit, was being refurbished again. There was often damage in that one. The adrenaline really started rushing when the bug-eyed monsters came charging at you.)
Tonight, there were no couples from Kansas and Calcutta, tow-headed or olive-skinned children tagging along in a state of shock. The deserted streets offered his imagination a panoply of clowns and capering performers. There was so much here, so many exhibits, that he rarely roamed the streets without discovering something new and precious. He smiled fleetingly up as the faintly glowing shape of the Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man swaggered past.
Tonight he had no real sense of wonder. Tonight he searched the faces of the employees, looked at the buildings, remembered the illusions, contemplated his tomorrow.
Because something was happening in Dream Park. It was going on right under his nose, in the middle of the Barsoom Project, in the middle of the Fimbulwinter Game. It deviled him, because instinct, or some subrational thought system, had identified a world of true problems, potentials for hideous disruption, and they wouldn’t let him sleep.
Or was his nightmare only a memory of failed skyhooks smashing across Mars and Earth?
For a time, Alex Griffin had looked upon this magical place as a job, cushier and more interesting than most other jobs, to be sure. But the South Seas Treasure Game had taught him things about himself, and his ability to slip into fantasy, that he never would have believed. He had learned something about Dream Park that he never could have learned from the outside looking in.
At the next board meeting Alex had formally proposed that every employee be required to attend a Game as a condition for promotion.
Alex Griffin’s lesson had come late and hit hard. In the South Seas Treasure Game, reality had intruded lethally upon fantasy. There were zombies and monsters and wizards and thieves, a hidden murderer, and a wonderful, magical interlude with a beautiful girl named Acacia; and all of his conceptions of Dream Park were jarred to the core.
He’d been voted down. But how else would his people learn the true nature of the Park? How easily could cynicism grow if one saw only the nuts and bolts, and rarely experienced the final product? How could you empathize with the customer unless you saw what the customer saw? Unless, at least once, you felt what he felt?
If you truly understood, then when you saw customers staggering around the Park in a general state of emotional overload, you could help them, or at the very least comfort them with a silent Yes, I know. And that made all the difference.
How would the public feel if they knew about the men in black who manipulated the puppets? The stage assistants who spirited the lady out of the box and put the tiger in? And other, darker, uglier magics. They shouldn’t know, didn’t want to know, and it was his job… their job… to protect the illusion. That was why it was necessary to understand, to experience that illusion deeply and intimately.
The streets were deserted now. Only a few of the neon, plastic, or holographic signs were functioning. A few forlorn sweeper ‘bots cruised the streets, and one of them cruised at him, then paused, humming at his feet. It beeped apologetically, and continued on its industrious way.
Alex Griffin understood how it felt.
Ambassador Arbenz had been surprised but polite and responsive to Alex’s request for a midmorning interview. “I haven’t time for a private breakfast, but I’ll take my morning constitutional on my way to the Beanstalk conference.”
So Alex tubed over to the Hotel Gulliver to meet the Ambassador at nine o’clock.
Hotel Gulliver was always a wild experience. The furniture was constructed as if by miniature hands for the pleasure of giants (in the Lilliput wing) or roughly hewn as if by giant hands for brownies (in the Brobdingnag wing). The desk clerks were helpful elf-sized figures who happily balanced atop one another in their eagerness to sign you into the books. Elevators were hauled up and down the elevator wells by giants who paced outside the windows, pulling enormous cables.
Ambassador Arbenz was in the Brobdingnag wing.
Alex took the outside elevator. Through the glass wall he could see a titanic man with a receding hairline pulling him upward by a thick hemp rope. The giant panted; he perspired. There was a conspicuous knot in the rope where it must have broken.
Beyond the great bald head Alex could see the Laputa tower floating unsupported. He couldn’t see his favorite, the tower of the Houyhnhnm, with its statues of Saint Francis and Saint Ed.
“Mr. Griffin,” the Ambassador said. He strode across the room, and clasped Alex’s hand firmly. Richard Arbenz wore a well-cut purple walking suit that flattered his ectomorphic profile. His hair was gray; he might be the oldest of the Falling Angel crowd; but he seemed perfectly comfortable in Earth’s gravity. Griffin guessed that Arbenz worked long and hard to keep his muscles, bones, and ligaments strong.
“I have a very full schedule today, please forgive me if we can only talk on the move. These are crucial times in the negotiations.”
“What I came for won’t take much time,” Alex assured him.
In the kitchenette the smell of fresh-brewed coffee was becoming obtrusive. “Coffee?” Arbenz asked. “The President of Colombia sends it personally. An appreciation for a hydroelectric project Falling Angel helped to plan and execute.”
Alex found he was edging backward with that wonderful scent in his nose and a memory of battery acid in his belly. “Sorry, no. Ulcer.” May Castro’s ghost raise revolution in Colombia!
“Oh. Pity.” Arbenz finished his own cup in one smooth gulp. “Well, then, let’s proceed.”
The Ambassador led Alex out and to the nearest elevator. He set a swift pace. Their elevator was lowered by the same perspiring bald giant. The city beyond him seemed composed of blocks the size of houses. Despite the size of the inhabitants (and the rather disquieting realization that the floor thrummed slightly each time one of them took a step) the view was really rather enchanting.
“Very well,” Arbenz said, looking down on the top of Alex’s head. “What is it that I can do for you?”
“Well…” Alex still felt a bit uncomfortable. Arbenz was seven inches taller than he, even though Earth’s gravity had stooped him by an inch or two. “There was an incident in one of our Games. It’s the Game your niece is in.”
Arbenz became very alert indeed. “An incident?”
The elevator thudded down, the door opened as if jarred, and Arbenz strode through the lobby at a brisk walking pace. At least, for Arbenz it was walking. Alex would have felt ridiculous breaking into a jog, but as he tried to match the Ambassador’s long-legged stride, for the first time in his life he understood why race-walking was an Olympic sport. The gray hair must be premature. No old man raised in low gravity could outrun Alex Griffin!
It took him a minute to make his pace both efficient and comfortable. That gave him his breath back. He said, “It could mean nothing. It’s one of those. A hologram monster attacked the wrong person, and the computer killed her out of the Game.” Alex spread his hands. “No real problem. No explanation either.”
Arbenz’s long face creased with concern. “Was it Charlene?”
Alex gulped air, felt the first flush of perspiration under his collar. Arbenz looked perfectly comfortable. “No, it was her friend Eviane.”
Arbenz passed through the VIP gate and headed for the Tower of Night, a slender silver projection glistening in the morning light.. Alex blinked. He’d passed the Tower yesterday evening; it had been tall. This morning it went up forever! What he knew to be the Tower’s roof continued without a break, tapering to a silver line, stretching into
