HAZARD (continued)

Quinn looked at her face. Very unusual. It was a mask of make-up. An almost white foundation, like that of a geisha, eyes outlined in black, rosebud mouth stained carmine in lines that did not follow the natural contours of her lips.

"You don't recognise me." She smiled, hand over her mouth, triggering a memory.

It was the woman from the Humming-Bird Bar. Looking so different.

"You! But you're a..."

"I'm a HYRO but don't worry about that. This isn't a trap... I wanted to talk to you. After yesterday. The bar wasn't the place. Everything there is bugged. That's why I told you to come here..."

"I don't understand."

"I thought you might be a candidate for resignation."

"What?"

"It seemed to me you might have got tired of playing the game."

Quinn stared at her. This was dangerous talk.

"I'm a member of an underground organisation. We arrange for people to get out."

"Get out?"

"Yes. Leave this place. Escape."

"How is that possible?"

She looked at him.

"Yesterday I thought maybe... maybe you'd be interested. And the very fact that you're here suggests that I'm right. That's why... But at the same time you understand that I can't take you on trust. You could be a spy. A CLOSER."

"As could you."

"Of course."

"Where did you get the hat?"

"The hat? It was my grandmother's. She disappeared yesterday. They delivered a bag with her things. A black plastic bag, as if it was all garbage. Such a sweet person. She deserved more."

The old woman had grabbed his arm. She had told him to run for his life.

"Did she know about your organisation?"

"A little. But she was too old to leave. You need strength and stamina to survive in the Wilderness."

"Are you telling me there are people out there?"

The woman was getting nervous.

"Yes, of course... What do you think? Listen. We've already stayed here too long. Come and visit me at HYRHQ tonight."

"How can I do that?"

"Put in an application asking for services 9, 31 and 57. You will certainly be allocated to me, since that combination requires very specialised skills. I'll look out for you and if by unlucky chance you are allocated to someone else, I'll find you."

"Can I ask what services these are?"

She smiled, revealing blackened teeth. "It's not something you'd want to know. If challenged, you can say it was a random choice. Your lucky numbers."

She turned and walked away quickly, heels clicking.

He had forgotten to ask her how to get into Bizcentre but found that it was in fact closer than he could have imagined, travelling on the speed-walkway that he found at the next junction. So concerned was he not to get to work too late that it only occurred to him, much later as he sat staring at the lists of computations on his screen, how oddly coincidental the encounter had been. After all, he was at City East only by chance and not through having picked up on her muttered message. By chance, if it was indeed possible to believe there was such a thing. Surely it was preposterous to imagine that the whole business of diverting the commuter train to City East, not to mention closing the bus doors before he could get on, were all designed to engineer his meeting with the woman. He shivered with foreboding. For her as well as for himself.

It was for that reason that, during his lunch break, while trying to swallow the glutinous brown mess described as the soup-du-jour chosen for him by CON-DEV™ from the MEALS-IN-A-MINUTE™ machine in the Bizcanteen, he clicked on the Fun-and-Games menu on his table computer and called up the icon for HYROS.

HYROS or Hygenic Relaxation Operands are men and women trained to provide pleasurable physical relief to the citizenry. The State recognises that certain outlets are required from the pressures of modern life, not only through sporting and cultural activities, but also through sexual gratification. Accordingly, the State has set up a comfortable environment for the safe provision of this in the form of Hygienic Relaxation Centres across the country. As well as being highly trained in a multitude of pleasure-inducing practices, HYROS are regularly monitored to ensure that they are clean and disease-free. Thus, each citizen of the State can indulge his or her tastes in perfect confidence.

Quinn was conscious that by entering his identification code, followed by the numbers the woman had indicated to him, he was embarking on an irreversible course of action. He was also fully aware that it could be a trap. On the other hand, he had to ask himself what his life was worth and whether there was likely to be any sort of future change for the better. He tried to swallow his soup-du-jour and clicked on OK.

He regarded the door. It was quilted with scarlet satin, as were all the other door along the carpetted corridor. The red-carpetted corridor. Lamps in the shape of flaming torches threw flickering shadows against the mirrored walls with their heavy gilded mouldings. Whatever was he doing here? He looked again at the print-out with his instructions. His HYRO operand was f/393x. That was the number on the door in front of him but he had no idea if this would turn out to be the woman he wanted to see. Nor any notion of what he would do if it wasn't. Go through with it anyway? She had seemed to suggest that she specialised in some sort of perversion, sado-masochism maybe. The chain-mail dress, the rapier-heeled shoes, the mask of a face.

She opened the door before he had a chance to knock. The woman.

"I saw you on the monitor," she said. "Don't be afraid. Come in."

The room was dimly lit. Stuffy with perfume. Dark patterned carpets thick on floors and walls. Some sort of tapestry depicting an erotic or, rather, obscene act of coupling. Quinn tried not to stare at it. Metallic objects of an obscure function littered the floor. A beaded lampshade hung from a rose in the ceiling and the slight breeze from the open door made the tiny glass balls quiver and jingle against each other. Music was playing somewhere. It had an exotic discordance.

She came over and embraced him.

"They might be looking," she whispered almost without sound. "Don't say anything yet. They are certainly listening."

The door shut him in automatically.

Quinn was sitting in the Humming-Bird Bar drinking KONYAK™ for want of anything better. He wasn't sure what to make of the emotions he felt. It was certain he had been stirred for the first time in many years. The woman had whispered to him under the strange music that they would have to be seen to be doing something or suspicions would be aroused.

"We can pretend," she said. "They aren't so observant that they could spot the difference."

In the event, he didn't pretend anything. He was swept away, hardly taking in the instructions she muttered into his ear as she licked it, hardly able to concentrate on anything except sensation, skin on skin, flesh within flesh. How hungry he must have been, without realising it. How lonely.

"And 9, 31 and 57?" he whispered afterwards.

"That's all right. Citizens often chicken out when they see the apparatus."

She gestured towards the metallic objects. Something Quinn didn't want to think about.

"And they really watch us?"

"They film everything. In case they need evidence."

"How do you know?"

"We are briefed. And one of my regular visitors is one of the Elite. He is permitted to switch off the cameras." She went quiet, then drew long silver nails across his chest. "It's terrible. That's why I decided I had to leave. And now that grandmother has gone, there's nothing to keep me."

Quinn asked the barman for another KONYAK™. He would need courage. It had been a shock when the woman had told him he must go that very night.

"What's the problem?" she asked, observing his face. "Aren't you alone?"

"Yes, but..."

"So what have you to wait for?"

Could he just go? Just like that? He, Quinn, raging with rebellion within, but meek and mild and obedient outside? Of course he could. The thought elated him. Never again to lie in that beige room under the eye of the security camera, the ever-ready gaze of the HOME-HELP™. Never again to have to consume the Full Breakfast or one of those ghastly MEALS-IN-A-MINUTE™. Never again to punch his code into a CON-DEV™ and perform whatever absurd action was demanded of him. Never mind what lay beyond. It had to be better than all this. Others had gone before him, she said. She herself was leaving that very night. He would not be alone any more.

"I'll meet you at the bridge," she had whispered.

Suddenly the bleeper sounded on his portable CON-DEV™. He was tempted to ignore it, knowing however that the bleeper would continue, would get louder and more insistent. Already a head or two had turned towards him in the bar. If he tried to tamper with it, militiamen would be on the scene in minutes.

He threw his dice (5 + 2 =7).

WHOM CAN YOU TRUST?

He looked at the message in astonishment. Never before had he been asked a question. Was it rhetorical or was he supposed to answer it? The bleeper went off again. The barman looked his way. Again he threw his dice (6 + 1 =7)

WHOM CAN YOU TRUST?

"I can trust myself," he whispered.

The bleeper went again. (3 + 4)

WHOM CAN YOU TRUST?

"I can trust... the State." He said it aloud, so they would hear.

Then he stood up and left the bar, reeling slightly from the drink, even though he had only had two glasses. He emerged into the cold night, blindingly fluorescent under the MOONLIGHT™. He could turn right towards Central Station, presumably clear of flood water by now, and go back to the tower block, to the beige room allocated to him, or he could turn left towards the high bridge over the river that separated the City from the Wilderness. He should by rights consult the CON-DEV™ machine by the bar entrance. He burned his boats and turned left.

Immediately a strong wind forced him back. Dust filled his mouth and eyes. He bent his head and doggedly pushed forward.

An hour later and late he was. The MOONLIGHT™ had been dimmed by dust but he could make out her dark shape holding the railings of the bridge. He was experiencing an alien emotion. Could it be happiness? She was holding the hat to her head. As he approached he noticed that she was wearing the same heavy coat she had worn in the bar the first time he saw her. Flat shoes that revealed how tiny she was. He wanted to hold her, protect her. Her face was scrubbed clean of make-up. Her face. Suddenly he took a shocked step back. It had to be a mistake. He stared at her face, her pale eyes. No mistake. But how come he had not noticed before?

"What's the matter?" she asked as he tried to pull away from her. She held his hand tightly as though afraid the wind might blow him away.

"Come," she said. And he was filled with mortal terror. Now it made sense, the hat. Everything.

Whom can you trust?

"Look," she said. "It's not so far. They're waiting for us."

And indeed across the bridge, the wide divide, a small crowd seemed gathered on the Wilderness shore.

"Come quickly or the militia will arrive."

Already the marching of jackboots could be heard.

"Quinn..." She knew the name that he was sure he had never told her. Whom can you trust?

Suddenly, in exasperation, she broke away from him and darted towards the centre of the bridge. Dust swirled between them and she was lost to view.

He could see the militiamen now, their guns held ready to fire. One way or the other, he was doomed. He ran after the woman.

The BRIDGE spans the River that divides the City from the Wilderness. Crossing the bridge instantly disqualifies you forever from the game. There is no turning back.

Citizens should note that the chances of surviving in the Wilderness are nil. There are no forms of life support there. Bitterly cold, there is nothing to eat or drink, and deadly danger from wild beasts, snakes and poisonous insects as well as natural perils such as swamps, ravines, impassable mountain ranges will ensure an unpleasant closure.

More details can be found in this edition of the Handbook for Citizens, Appendix 11, and also in the KIDDICOMIX™ collection, used in schools to inculcate civic responsibility in an entertaining way among younger members of society.

He could see her again now, ahead of him, running as if into cloud. Perhaps he had made the wrong choice. Perhaps he could go back and explain. He stopped and looked over the edge of the parapet. Far far below the River boiled. Boulders loomed from the foam. No escape that way. Why had he listened to her? Was his life really so bad? It was a life anyway. He was a productive member of society, with a good job. A reasonable flat. Perhaps he should have applied for a wife. Skin on skin, flesh within flesh. The illusion of not being alone. Why hadn't he? The suspicion that he would be issued with a female equivalent of the soup-du-jour? But maybe it wouldn't have been like that at all. Perhaps he could go back and expiate. Miss as many turns as they liked if only...

There was a CON-DEV™ machine right in the middle of the bridge, of all places. He stared at it. Perhaps it could give him the answer. He threw his dice. Double six.

JUMP

No, not that. Not that.

"Double six. I have another turn," he said to no one.

He threw the dice but a gust of wind caught them and rolled them off the bridge. He could see them fall, far down into the rushing river.

JUMP

To the right of him the marching militia, guns at the ready. To the left, he saw that the woman had turned. Now she was running back towards him.

"Quinn," the wind blew her voice to him. "Come with me. Quinn..."

Whom can you trust?

He climbed on to the parapet of bridge.

The wind caught his coat. It billowed out and he was pulled upwards, soaring into the sky.

"I'm flying!" he thought. "I'm really flying!" And started to laugh before the wind abruptly dropped him and everything disappeared forever.

The woman reached the spot too late. She saw him soar up, his coat like wings. And then swoop down, down.

The screen of the CON-DEV™ machine was flashing.

As she peered at it she saw a reflection on the screen that she didn't recognise. The face that had caused Quinn to fear her more than a leap from the bridge. And as she looked on, puzzled, wondering what it could mean, the holograph of the bland face of the CLOSER who had eliminated her grandmother faded out and her own irregular features reasserted themselves. She had no time to think any more about this. She ran as fast as she could to the other side, the Wilderness, pursued but not hit by the bullets of the advancing  militiamen.

GAME OVER, flashed the screen of the CON-DEV™ machine. GAME OVER. PRESS ANY KEY TO RESTART. PRESS ANY KEY TO RESTART. PRESS ANY KEY...