This Perfect Day

Six men to stop Uni's refrigeration and then hold its entrances against the help it would summon with its thawing faltering brain. Could six men hold the elevators and the tunnel? (And had Papa Jan mentioned other shafts in the other cut-out space?) But six was the minimum, and the minimum was what he wanted, because if any one man was caught while they were on their way, he would tell the doctors everything and Uni would be expecting them at the tunnel. The fewer the men, the less the danger. He and five others.

The yellow-haired young man who ran the LA. patrol boat—Vito Newcome, but he called himself Dover—painted the boat's railing while he listened, and then, when Chip spoke about the tunnel and the real memory banks, listened without painting; crouched on his heels with the brush hanging in his hand and squinted up at Chip with flecks of white in his short beard and on his chest. "You're sure of it?" he asked. "Positive," Chip said.

"It's about time somebody took another crack at that brother-fighter." Dover Newcome looked at his thumb, white-smeared, and wiped it on his trouser thigh. Chip crouched beside him. "Do you want to be in on it?" he asked. Dover looked at him and, after a moment, nodded. "Yes," he said. "I certainly do."

Ashi said no, which was what Chip had expected; he asked him only because not asking, he thought, would be a slight. "I just don't feel it's worth the risk," Ashi said. "I'll help you out in any way I can, though. Julia's already hit me for a contribution and I've promised a hundred dollars. I'll make it more than that if you need it."

"Fine," Chip said. "Thanks, Ashi. You can help. You can get into the Library, can't you? See if you can find any maps of the area around EUR-zip-one, U or pre-U. The larger the better; maps with topographical details." When Julia heard that Dover Newcome was to be in the group, she objected. "We need him here, on the boat," she said.

"You won't once we're finished," Chip said.

"God in heaven," Julia said. "How do you get by with so little confidence?"

"It's easy," Chip said. "I have a friend who says prayers for me."

Julia looked coldly at him. "Don't take anyone else from LA.," she said. "And don't take anyone from the factory. And don't take anyone with a family that I may wind up supporting!"

"How do you get by with so little faith?" Chip said.

He and Dover between them spoke to some thirty or forty immigrants without finding any others who wanted to take part in the attack. They copied names and addresses from the IA files, of men and women over twenty and under forty who had come to Liberty within the previous few years, and they called on seven or eight of them every week. Lars Newman's son wanted to be in the group, but he had been bora on Liberty, and Chip wanted only people who had been raised in the Family, who were accustomed to scanners and walkways, to the slow pace and the contented smile. He found a company in Pollensa that would make dynamite bombs with fast or slow mechanical fuses, provided they were ordered by a native with a permit. He found another company, in Calvia, that would make six gas masks, but they wouldn't guarantee them against LPK unless he gave them a sample for testing. Lilac, who was working in an immigrant clinic, found a doctor who knew the LPK formula, but none of the island's chemical companies could manufacture any; lithium was one of its chief constituents, and there hadn't been any lithium available for over thirty years.

He was running a weekly two-line advertisement in the Immigrant, offering to buy coveralls, sandals, and take-along kits. One day he got an answer from a woman in Andrait, and a few evenings later he went there to look at two kits and a pair of sandals. The kits were shabby and outdated, but the sandals were good. The woman and her husband asked why he wanted them. Their name was Newbridge and they were in their early thirties, living in a tiny wretched rat-infested cellar. Chip told them, and they asked to join the group—insisted on joining it, actually. They were perfectly normal-looking, which was a point in their favor, but there was a feverishness about them, a keyed-up tension, that bothered Chip a little.

He went to see them again a week later, with Dover, and that time they seemed more relaxed and possibly suitable. Their names were Jack and Ria. They had had two children, both of whom had died in their first few months. Jack was a sewer worker and Ria worked in a toy factory. They said they were healthy and seemed to be. Chip decided to take them—provisionally, at least—and he told them the details of the plan as it was taking shape. "We ought to blow up the whole fucking thing, not just the refrigerating plants," Jack said. "One thing has to be very clear," Chip said. "I'm going to be in charge. Unless you're prepared to do exactly as I say every step of the way, you'd better forget the whole thing."