Year's Best SF 17

More independent.”

Javier shut his eyes. “Independent. Sure.”

“He looked so much like you as he said it.” Brigid was already half asleep. “I wonder what I’ll pass down to my daughter, sometimes. Maybe she’ll fall in love with a robot, just like her mommy and daddy.”

“Maybe,” Javier said. “Maybe her whole generation will. Maybe they won’t even bother reproducing.”

“Maybe we’ll go extinct,” Brigid said. “But then who would you have left to love?”

Our Candidate ROBERT REED

Robert Reed (www.robertreedwriter.com) lives in Lincoln, Nebraska, with his wife and daughter, and is a Nebraska science fiction renaissance of one. He is perhaps the Poul Anderson of his generation. He is certainly the most prolific SF writer of high-quality short fiction writing today. He has had stories appear in at least one of the annual Year’s Best anthologies in every year since 1992. He is perhaps most famous for his Marrow universe, and the novels and stories that take place in that huge, ancient spacefaring environment. A new Marrow book, Eater of Bone, collecting four novellas, is out this year. His story collections, The Dragons of Springplace (1999) and The Cukoo’s Boys (2005), skim only some of the cream from his body of work. He is overdue for another substantial collection. He had another excellent year in a long line of them in 2011, and could easily have had three or four stories in this volume.

“Our Candidate” was published at Tor.com, and this is perhaps its first time in print. It is a story about how the illusion of political participation and democracy can pave the way to fascism. We offer it for what it is worth in an election year during hard times in the U.S.

Their first candidate was a youngish fellow with a list of minor achievements and small qualifications, plus a handsome wife willing to attend some portion of the rallies and fundraising events. He was the brave soldier who stepped forward when the state’s less-popular political party couldn’t find anybody who might win. The conservative opponent was unbeatable. Even agnostic voters considered the current governor as being Chosen. Once the invisible lieutenant governor, he stepped into the office when his predecessor’s Blackhawk went down in a freak hailstorm. Proper words and a few strategic tears at the funeral cemented the man’s rule over the sprawling state, and the new chief executive had served twenty-two months without scandal, scrupulously accomplishing nothing that tested his base supporters while avoiding becoming the enemy of those inclined to stand against him.

Wise tongues decided that seventy percent of the vote would be a disappointment, and more importantly, that the governor’s mansion was only a way station before becoming the state’s next Senator.

Into the slaughter, the liberal soldier pressed on. Little problems came, and in the way of all campaigns, never quite left. But everything could be endured, right up until the wife decided that nothing was as boring as rallies and her smile muscles were awfully, awfully tired. Even worse were matters of finance: a candidate was supposed to generate interest and dollars, and the interest was lacking early and the dollars dried up. His skeletal staff was competent enough to run a compelling student election but nothing more. Then the wife who was no longer on the campaign trail filed for divorce. That’s when the campaign died. One hundred days before the election—after half a year of mastering nothing in politics—the candidate released a poorly composed, grammatically questionable press release blaming the lack of party support and certain unspecified threats against his loved ones, leaving him no choice but to pack up and head home early.

His party was appalled. That is, except for quirky souls who saw opportunity in one man’s incompetence. Thankfully, an organizational meeting was scheduled for a few days later—the kind of non-event usually controlled by retirees and the most desperate political hacks. A replacement candidate would have to be appointed there. Various names were mentioned and discarded. Wealthy men and one famous widow with liberal tendencies were approached, but none said “yes.” That led to a second tier of names and biographies that were scrubbed and analyzed until a suitable candidate was found. But then several discrepancies were found in what seemed like an otherwise fine life story. No, the gentleman had never quite served in Iraq, and he did have more than two DUIs in his past, and the college that he always claimed as his own couldn’t find evidence that he was ever on campus, much less kicked the winning field goal in the ’98 game against the hated Bulldogs.

The media had gathered, expecting a new face and name, and the state deserved some kind of choice, no matter how uninspired. On that pragmatic note, the powers of the party gathered next to the overchlorinated pool at the Day’s Inn, and after a few drinks and some deep gazes into this endless mess, one voice in the back called out, “Okay. Me.”

“Me” was Morris Hersh. Quiet and polite and generally presentable, Morris was one of those individuals who leaves a good impression with strangers yet makes very few friends, and who despite a withering intelligence in several fields, can hide his gifts while sitting among half-drunk liberals, knowing the best moment to speak and what voice to use and anticipating which questions would be asked before being led out before a pack of reporters working on deadline.

Morris’s candidacy was launched quietly—a few words about persevering through difficult times but winning in the end—and the candidate’s first week was little different from the incompetence of his predecessor. Long profiles appeared in the state’s surviving newspapers. The retired professor of chemistry was a widower with three grown children and a long history of public action. Past flirtations with splinter parties and odd causes were mentioned and quickly discounted. He was a true believer now, and the liberals were happy to have him, and that’s the attitude that reigned until the State Fair and a choreographed not-really-a-debate debate against the reigning governor.

First to speak, the conservative held forth about the state’s wonderful residents and their justified suspicions about change and those high-minded, over-educated ideas from Washington and other sorry, ill-informed places. He promised jobs and minimal taxes and a thriving environment for good businesses. Of course he would do everything in his power to maintain agricultural supports from the bureaucrats in Washington. Of course he talked about the sanctity of education and the need to defeat waste. Then, in summation, he stated how much he loved this state and its good-hearted and exceptional, strong-willed and unquestionably honest people.

Standard applause led to polite silence. Morris took a few moments to flip through a towering stack of index cards that he left where he was sitting. Dressed in a suit that had been worn in the high halls of education, the new candidate stepped to the podium, looking out at an audience that nobody else could see. That was the first impression of careful observers. He stared at a place above every head, and he tried to smile at whatever he was seeing. Then the expression flickered and died, and he sighed as if suffering some small pain. Not a bit of nervousness showed. Indeed, he probably had the slowest heartbeat on the stage. One long finger needed to scratch at the white hair above an ear, and again he sighed, and then the other hand took hold of the microphone and he said, “We are in such deep, deep trouble, my friends.”

It was a strong, distinctly angry voice.

“Our world is moving into a time of catastrophe and extraordinary danger,” he continued. “The life that we believe that we have earned and deserve is about to vanish. Climate change and nuclear proliferation are two of the players in this ongoing tragedy. I’m sure a few of you agree with me on these counts. Blame can be given to overpopulation and wasted resources and carbon dioxide and the simple lack of good manners. But a full accounting of the villains would take too long. Suffice it to say, each of us is guilty. I am guilty and you are all guilty and the governor is culpable as well. We are the agents of change, and we have built this new world, and events will come soon enough that all but the oldest and luckiest of us will discover what misery means and how the universe deals with pests who dare infest one of its pretty blue worlds.”

At that point, Morris paused. Everybody needed a deep breath. But the old man didn’t give people time to rest, and he certainly didn’t wait for applause. Lucid and sober, almost cheerful, he offered up a list of vivid predictions